Barbara Kahn
Barbara Kahn is an East Village playwright who has produced dozens of works rooted in history, especially the history of New York and marginalized or oppressed people, with a frequent … Continued
Full TranscriptVillage Preservation Oral History Collection
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.
- Activists & Advocates
- Arts
- East Village
- Greenwich Village
- Immigration
- LGBTQ
- Local Business
- Preservationists
- South Village
- Westbeth
LGBTQ
Michael E. Levine
Michael E. Levine (b. 1943) is an urban planner who worked as the NYC Department of City Planning’s CommunityBoard #2 liaison beginning in the 1960s, and was intimately involved in … Continued
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Rich Wandel
Rich Wandel (b. May 20, 1946) is a former president of the Gay Activist Alliance, and served as the Archivist Historian at the LGBT Community Center from its founding in … Continued
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David Rothenberg
David Rothenberg (b. August 19, 1933) is one of the Village’s most prolific activists. A former Broadway producer, he also produced the off-Broadway play “Fortune in Men’s Eyes”, which ignited … Continued
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Victor Keyloun
Dr. Victor Keyloun (b. February 20, 1935) worked at St. Vincent’s Hospital from 1963 to 1983. He was a neighborhood doctor, notably serving extended Italian families as well as the … Continued
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Merce Cunningham
Merce Cunningham (1919 -2009) was an American dancer, choreographer and leader of the Merce Cunningham Dance Company, located since 1971 at Westbeth in the West Village.
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George Cominskie
Since 1983, Cominskie has lived in Westbeth, a nonprofit housing and commercial complex dedicated to providing affordable living and working space for artists and arts organizations, located in the old … Continued
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Vincent Livelli
Vincent Livelli (b. April 10, 1919) has lived in the Village for close to 100 years. From the 1940s to 1970s, Vincent helped revolutionize the cruise ship industry as a … Continued
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Tom Bernardin
A native of Lawrence, Massachusetts, Bernardin (b. September 15, 1948) moved to New York City as a young man and enjoyed the freedom and community for gay men that he … Continued
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Albert Fabozzi
A painter and interior designer, 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 … Continued
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Penny Arcade
The oral history with this icon of the Downtown arts scene and “Queen of the Underground” (b. 1950) covers her life in New York City since leaving home as a … Continued
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