Voices of Crown Heights oral histories: Weeksville Heritage Center, 2017

In this interview, Deborah Alexander talks about her life growing up in the Bronx and what led her to eventually become a speech teacher in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn. She discusses her experiences in Intelligent and Gifted Classes (IGC) in both junior high school and Lehman High School. She recalls facing racism in an incident at school that corresponded with the Roots series' premiere. She describes her role in the Afro-Latin Club at Ithaca College and the racism that she also faced there as a student. She delves into her experiences as a speech teacher and the reemergence of the Weeksville Museum at PS 243. Alexander then evaluates the differences between her life as a student and the lives of students circa 2017. Interview conducted by Obden Mondésir.

In this interview, Morris Britt recalls that he moved to New York because of the racism in the South and his realization that he could not "exist" in South Carolina. He talks about living in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn since 1970 and how he found himself working as a janitor at the Weeksville School at eighteen years old. Britt recounts how PS 243 changed its name from the Isaac Newton School to the Weeksville School. He discusses the politically and culturally involved faculty members that worked at the school, such as Marguerite Thompson, Joyce Washington, and Parent-Teacher Association president Elman Meggs. Britt reviews how the school and neighborhood have changed from 1970-2017, touching on what it was like to have his son attend the school. He also considers his first dealings with gentrification. Interview conducted by Obden Mondésir.

In this interview, Myrah Brown Green recalls many of her biographical highlights. She remembers her youth in a neighborhood of Cambridge, Massachusetts, where she experienced racism from a childhood friend's father and a stutter which she believes had developed from a fear of needles. She remembers meeting Richard Green for the first time and realizing his impact on the community in Brooklyn. Brown Green discusses starting the Crown Heights Youth Collective, the difficulty in maintaining the organization, and the roles that she and her husband played during the social upheaval in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn in August of 1991. She also references the Summer Youth Employment Program that she directed to specifically support pregnant teenage women. Brown Green relates her involvement in starting up a home school. In closing she shares where her focus is in 2017; taking part in raising a granddaughter, publishing a book, and exhibiting her quilted artwork. Her husband, Richard Green, was recorded for Voices of Crown Heights oral histories: Brooklyn History Society and the Listen to this: Crown Heights Oral History collection in 2010 (2010.020). Interview conducted by Larry Weekes.

In this interview, Jean Derico talks about her experience as an educator at PS 243 and how the school changed during her three decades-long teaching career. She describes how the school initially was a very prominent one; with her being part of a change in demographics in regard to the teachers employed. Derico evaluates how the student population started to decrease with the rise of charter schools. She also discusses the changes in demographics both racially and generationally that she has witnessed in her profession. She also shares about the Weeksville museum that was at the school; how it was turned into a junk room and how it was eventually re-opened in 2015 through the impetus of the local Parent Teacher Association president's (Donnaly Lamont) proactivity. Herman Butler intermittently adds description of his experience at PS 243; recalling the school's participation in the archeological dig that occurred in 1968 and when the school changed its name from the Isaac Newton School to the Weeksville School. He also discusses how the school has changed since 1967 and how it may have lost the "feeling of the community." Interview conducted by Obden Mondésir.

In the interview, Linda Patricia Leach-James speaks about her experiences in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn as a member of a middle class African American family. She discusses her upbringing and her educational experiences in Catholic parochial schools. Leach-James recalls key biographical turning points. She remembers arriving to college and attending Hampton Institute, a historically Black school. Leach-James references her time living in a few towns in France. She reflects on how her family reacted and coped during the August, 1991 event that's sometimes known as the Crown Heights riot. Interview conducted by Vivian Millicent Warfield.

In the interview, Richard Maxwell initially discusses the changing boundaries of central Brooklyn and the demographic and political influences that create them. He also focuses on encountering the Jewish community in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn during the 1940s and how he grew up— predominantly on Jefferson Street and Nostrand Avenue. He recalls the many positions that he held in the Department of Education and his interactions with Brooklyn political players. He mentions his time as a student at Boys' High School, its preponderance of quality basketball players, and how that played a role in his social life growing up. Maxwell reflects on his decision to move closer to his brother— who, after serving in Vietnam, suffered from the effects of Agent Orange— which led him to work at the notoriously difficult school IS 320. He speculates on the issues of school safety and the gang behavior that he encountered as an anti-gang specialist and acknowledges the patterns among some youths that impacted the August 1991 uprising in Crown Heights. Maxwell identifies Richard Green as an educator who helped quell the uproar and violence that occurred at that time. In closing, he lists many of the bars that he frequented in Crown Heights. Interview conducted by Brigitte Winston.

In this interview, Dr. Mark Naison talks about life in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn during the 1950s. He describes the neighborhood as very working class and, in demographic terms, mostly Italian and Jewish. Dr. Naison remembers being ostracized for the intellectual pursuits that his parents foisted upon him, and the gameplay, athletics, and fighting with his public school peers which he used as social compensation. Interview conducted by Obden Mondésir.