Coney Island during the Great Depression and World War II
95-year-old Rita Kaminsky describes growing up in Coney Island during the 1930s and 1940s. Rita was born at home in the family's apartment above her grandmother's store at 2717 Surf Avenue. In this interview she shares memories of life during the...
Content type: Oral History Item
Jimmy and Tina's Famous Sausage Restaurant
The Smaldone family's Famous Sausage Restaurant began as a hole-in-the-wall food stand below the Atlantis Bar on Stillwell Avenue in the mid-1950s. Italian immigrant Vincenzo (Jimmy) Smaldone and his wife Tina later moved it to a larger space...
Content type: Oral History Item
A childhood watching boats in the Coney Island Channel led to the founding of a tugboat company
Gerard Thornton's childhood fascination with the maritime industry began when he and his brother Rick would watch shipping traffic from their window in the O'Dwyer Gardens housing project in Coney Island. The Coney Island Channel with its tugs and...
Content type: Oral History Item
Author of two books about Coney Island basketball
Delbert Prince is the author of two books tracing the history of Coney Island basketball and what the sport meant to the community. Prince grew up in Coney Island and played ball on all the local courts. His detailed personal history includes the...
Content type: Oral History Item
Girlhood memories of visiting Coney Island in the 1930s and '40s
Toby Deligdish, 92, grew up in the Borough Park neighborhood of Brooklyn. She shares memories of going to Coney Island at around age 10, when her family rented a room in a home for the summer, and returning as a teenager with friends from school....
Content type: Oral History Item
Boyhood memories of visiting Coney Island in the 1930s and getting lost on the beach
Norman Finkel, 94, grew up on 48th Street and 8th Avenue in Brooklyn, where the candy store was the social center of the neighborhood and he played stickball on the street. He shares memories of visiting Coney Island with his family during the 1930s...
Content type: Oral History Item
Retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel who emigrated from Ukraine to Brighton Beach as a child
Alexander Vindman was born in 1975 in Soviet Ukraine and emigrated at age four with his family to Brooklyn’s Brighton Beach. He shares memories of growing up and going to school in Brighton, being photographed with his twin brother by the...
Content type: Oral History Item
Washington Baths pool and the scary movies at the Mermaid Theater
Arthur Galka was born in Coney Island and spent his 1950s childhood summers at Washington Baths. He tells tales of the swimming pool watermelon races, Shatzkins Knishes, the Mermaid Theater, and the rivalry with Ravenhall.
Content type: Oral History Item
"Best of the Best" slugger at the Coney Island Batting Range
In 2003, at the age of 66, Joe Miller won the "Best of the Best" slugging Contest at the Coney Island Batting Range. He had also won it three years earlier. Joe tells about his college baseball career and shares memories of the annual contest held...
Content type: Oral History Item
Working the Rides: From the streets of Coney Island to the war in Vietnam
Jeffrey Brettler began working in Coney Island at the age of 12 during the early 1960s. He got to know all the ride operators. He shares vivid memories of the colorful characters he met and describes the idiosyncrasies of some of the most beloved...
Content type: Oral History Item