Village Preservation’s Oral History Project includes interviews with some of the great artists, activists, business owners, community leaders, and preservation pioneers of Greenwich Village, the East Village, and NoHo. It captures and preserves their first-person perspective on the important histories they witnessed or of which they were a part.
Click here for an alphabetical list of our entire Oral History Collection.
The views expressed by the contributor(s) are solely those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or endorsement of our organization.
Ingrid Bernhard and her husband, Sven, were Swedish nationals who met in New York and lived in a farmhouse on the Upper East Side sometimes known as “Cobble Court” or “the Goodnight Moon” house, as writer Margaret Wise Brown wrote the book while living there. In 1967, the Bernhards moved the house to 121 Charles […]
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Robert Zerelli (b. November 30, 1962) was raised in New Jersey, and at the age of 18, he moved to New York City to work at the bakery founded by his great uncle in 1894 — the legendary Veneiro’s. Zerilli lived above the store at 342 East 11th Street, married a customer, raised a family, […]
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Virlana Tkacz (b. June 23, 1962) was born in Newark, but had family connections to the Ukrainian community in the East Village, to which she eventually moved. She pursued theater at La MaMa under Ellen Stewart, whose encouragement led to the creation of Tkacz’s own theater company. The Yara Arts Group addresses themes related to […]
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Lorcan Otway (b. July 27, 1955), the owner of the Off Broadway Theater 80, located at 80 St. Mark’s Place, speaks about the theater’s history, as well as the cultural history of the East Village. He recounts stories of the former repertory movie house and theater’s past as a speakeasy during Prohibition, at which time […]
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Born in 1943 in Berlin, Germany, Marlis has lived in Loisaida since 1975. Her photographs document the struggle of the mostly Puerto Rican people living in that part of Manhattan. Her black-and-white and color photographs have been used to illustrate national and international publications on political and cultural topics such as: gentrification, urban development, slumlords/arson […]
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Born in Lithuania, Jonas Mekas (1922-2019) came to New York City after World War II and became part of the downtown arts scene as a writer, poet and auteur. He pursued his passion for making and displaying avant garde film, founding the world-renowned Anthology Film Archive in 1970.
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Born in Germany, Wolf Kahn (1927-2020) came to America as a teenager, and discovered painting while working in a U.S. Navy paint shop. He went on to study under Stuart Davis and Hans Hofmann, and was part of the East 10th Street gallery scene. One of this highly acclaimed contemporary painter’s most vivid Village memories […]
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Hartman (b. August 14, 1955) is a co-owner and founder of Two Boots Pizza, a filmmaker, and an advocate for the preservation of the East Village, where he has lived for decades. He also founded the Great Jones Café and maintained his love for punk rock, film, and culture while managing a successful and growing […]
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Frances Goldin (1924-2020) was a successful Manhattan literary agent and activist in practically every progressive movement of the past 70 years on the Lower East Side. A fighter for equitable housing, she was a founder of the Metropolitan Council on Housing and the Cooper Square Committee, and was a leader in the successful effort to […]
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Chino Garcia (b. 1947) is a Lower East Side/East Village community activist. In this oral history, he discusses his birth in Puerto Rico and movement to New York, his activism as a founding member of the CHARAS–El Bohio Cultural Center, which the City took from the community and sold; his work with renowned poet Miguel […]
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A painter and interior designer, Albert Fabozzi grew up in Coney Island and lived in the West Village as a young adult. When he and his longtime partner moved to the East Village, Fabozzi took an interest in making the neighborhood, and especially Tompkins Square Park, safer and more appealing. He served on Community Board […]
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A trustee of Village Preservation, Tom Birchard has owned and run Veselka, a Ukrainian restaurant and neighborhood institution, for more than four decades.
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