Ralph (l) and Yury (r) Almaz in their store on 30th Ave
Ralph (l) and Yury (r) Almaz in their store on 30th Ave
Brothers Ralph and Yury Almaz opened their jewelers store at 35-13 30th Ave 26 years ago. It is aptly named Almaz Brothers. They had come to New York a few years previously from Uzbekistan. There were jewelers in their family going back generations and their grandfather was one; they decided to continue the tradition.
The brothers chose Astoria to live because it was livelier than parts of Brooklyn that they had seen, and for the European feeling on its streets. “It was always a dynamic neighborhood, very colorful and multi-ethnic,” says Ralph. “It has kept the same way all these years, though now we see a lot more young professionals moving in too.”
When the brothers came to New York during the cold war, communication with relatives and friends back in Uzbekistan was extremely difficult. Ralph says that now communication is open. “People can come here, we talk on email, Skype and so on,” he says, although they do not return often because most of their close family have left.
Almaz Brothers specializes in engagement rings and bridal jewellery like wedding bands. They also sell other jewelry items and watches. Twice a year, Ralph and Yury attend an international jewelery show at Jacob Javits Convention Center in Manhattan, where jewelers from all over the world are represented: from Italy, Hong Kong, Israel, Turkey, Brazil…They buy most of their jewelry there and then tailor it for their customers in their store. Yury adds that they also import diamonds from Israel, where his son is in the diamond-cutting business.
In the business of selling engagement rings, of course sometimes the proposal is rejected or the engagement breaks off. “In that case, we offer to restyle the ring so that it does not look like an engagement ring,” says Ralph. “Or if not, we offer to buy it back, though the customer takes a loss of course.”
Their business changes with the economy. “Right now there’s a new trend of people bringing back a lot of their gold,” Ralph says. “They want to take advantage of high gold prices and now everyone wants to sell their old jewelry, coins, and diamonds. If it’s an interesting item we try to sell it. But in most cases we melt down everything and then sell it to refiners.”
The brothers have clear-cut roles. Ralph works on the shop floor where he deals with the customers and Yury focuses on customizing the jewelry in the back of the shop – when I took the photo for this interview he made sure that he had the small magnifying glass that he uses in his work around his neck so it would feature in the picture. The most satisfying aspect of his work, he says, is creating something special.
Abdul Said has lived in Astoria for almost 15 years, and in his current place on 23rd Street, just off 30th Avenue, for four and half years. I met him on a sunny Sunday morning sitting on his doorstep, drinking a coffee bought from the Dunkin’ Donuts by the 30th Ave subway station.
He lives in one of the neighborhood’s old detached houses. But like many of the older homes it is scheduled to be knocked down and turned into a bigger apartment building. He’ll be moving, when a friend joins him from Boston, into one of the new buildings round the corner on 21st Street.
“Everywhere there are houses going down and new buildings going up,” he says. “I don’t mind. It’s good business for the owners. They see people moving into the area and smell the money. When I first moved here from Brooklyn everything said ‘for rent’, ‘for rent’. Now it’s hard to find a place.” The new buildings, he adds, can have 14-16 apartments. The old houses on the same site housed just two or three families.
Abdul is originally from Morocco and came to the US 26 years ago. “I’m from a small town in East Morocco, a very French part of the country. The North is much more Spanish.” He returns to Morocco to see family and friends. “I like to travel once a year. I just came back recently from a trip, I was away about six weeks – four weeks in Morocco and two weeks in Spain.”
Recently there was a news story about a New York Police Department surveillance program focused on Moroccans – not because of any specific allegations against individuals but in order to build up a detailed picture of the city’s Moroccan community, in support of the government’s anti-terrorism efforts. “I read about the police stuff, yes,” says Abdul. “It’s part of what’s going on in the world, the past decade. A lot of people are getting confused. It’s part of what’s going on.”
On the current democracy movements underway in the Middle East, Abdul is optimistic. “It’s like the sky, one minute it’s all cloudy and the next minute it’s clear. They needed to get rid of those guys who had been in power for thirty, forty years. That makes no sense. You need a system like here. Every four years if you don’t like who’s in charge you vote him out. These people were there for a lifetime. Now there’s a new generation who don’t buy those things. They want change.”
Before coming to New York, Abdul lived in Florida for ten years where he worked in real estate. His two children are still there, with their mother who is originally from Brooklyn (she and Abdul are divorced). Since moving to New York Abdul has worked in the restaurant industry: currently he is a bar tender in the Marriott hotel near La Guardia airport.
When Abdul first came to New York he lived in Brooklyn. He was working in an Irish restaurant in Manhattan and the commute took a long time. Then he came to visit a friend in Astoria, saw Manhattan just across the river and learned that it only takes 20 minutes to travel between the two.
He also likes Astoria for the fact it is quiet. “Though it’s got a lot less quiet now, especially with lots of people moving here from Manhattan,” he says. “The area up near Steinway has changed a lot.” Abdul still finds quiet in Astoria Park. Often he takes car there to have breakfast overlooking the river. “Oh man, I love that place!”
Ching Lee downstairs in the Taiwan Union Christian Church
Ching-Tse Lee downstairs in the Taiwan Union Christian Church
On 31st Street just South of the 30th Ave subway stop and opposite EuroMarket is the Taiwan Union Christian Church. I spoke with one of the church’s elders, Ching-Tse Lee: it happened to be on Sunday September 11th. A service had recently ended and the church basement was bustling with activity, as members of the congregation mingled with each other and sought advice from the pastor.
Ching-Tse came to the USA from Taiwan in 1964. He studied in Ohio before coming to live in New York. He worked as a psychology professor at Brooklyn College and retired three years ago, which has enabled him to become more active in the church as an elder.
The church originated in 1968 when a group of Taiwanese students in New York formed a bible study group. They then established a church which met at a Presbyterian Church in Manhattan. In 1982 they moved the church to the Astoria location, which was formerly the Second Reformed Church in Astoria. Two years later they joined the Reformed Church of America.
Ching-Tse says that the congregation today includes Taiwanese students who are in the US to study for their MD, PhD, or other forms of higher education; some of them stay in dormitories in the modern building next to the church. Others are Taiwanese immigrants to the US like himself. They come to the church in Astoria from all over the Tri-State area: some from Staten Island, Westchester, Long Island and elsewhere.
“We come here to worship and also we try to provide a home for our children,” he says. “Once they are in their individual community they don’t really have the kind of Taiwanese home base to grow up with. Many of them have adapted to the local environment. For some of them, the local environment may not be very suitable for them as Taiwanese.”
The church conducts services in Taiwanese, and in Mandarin for local Chinese residents. They have an English mission, also in the modern building next to the old church, for Taiwanese-Americans born or raised in the US.
Beyond services and bible study the church is active in many ways. The week after I was there they were holding a photography exhibition. “It’s very special,” says Ching-Tse, “because all the photographers are women. We thought that a female has her viewpoint of the world…they are much more sensitive about their environment. So we encourage them to put up shows. This time in the exhibition there will be images of flowers, scenery, and different places, like Disney World.”
The church members are also engaged in issues around Taiwan’s future and its efforts to maintain autonomy from China. They were preparing for a forthcoming “Keep Taiwan Free” rally, calling for the UN to accept Taiwan as a member.
Christina Chang and Mario Yang outside the Taiwan Union Christian Church
Outside the church, I met Mario Yang and his girlfriend Christina Chang who had attended the service. Mario is a financial analyst at American Express, and lives in Manhattan. His parents brought him to the US from Taiwan when he was eight years old: they lived in North Carolina and then Mario came to New York for college.
“My parents are firm believers in public education, but didn’t feel like the system in Taiwan was good at the time. It’s fantastic now, but back when I was younger they felt it was a better choice to be in the States. I think I got a great public education here! I would hope I did.”
Christina is currently a Masters student at Columbia University. She is a flutist and often plays at the church services.
The couple comes to the church in Astoria as often as they can. “We have tons of friends who come here, it’s a community,” says Mario. “There’s a wide variety of people at the church. There are people in arts, people in finance, people in all sorts of careers. They’re really supportive regardless of what you do.”
In early June, Ad Hoc Art brought a group of street artists from around the world to paint new murals, and paint over some of the old murals, for the Welling Court Mural Project. I had interviewed Jonathan Ellis and Georgina Young Ellis, who live along Welling Court, earlier in the year. Walk to the far Western end of 30th Ave and you can check the murals out, and also the Two Coves Community Garden which is just opposite. Below are a few photos of the murals for tasters. Here’s a link to Ad Hoc Art’s description of the project, and here’s one of the artists, Fumero, talking about his painting of Einstein that features on one of the walls.
Ice cream on 30th Ave today: Gino's Italian Ices on sale outside Salerno Pizza, near 29 Street
Ice cream on 30th Ave today: Gino's Italian Ices on sale outside Salerno Pizza, near 29 Street
As of yesterday Summer is officially over. It already felt like it was over a few weeks ago, with the passing of labor day and the heavy rain that settled in over 30th Ave and the rest of New York City as if to say enough fun, back to work.
While summertime is still fresh-ish in our minds, here’s a post in its honor, looking back in time to the ice cream parlors that featured along 30th Avenue until sometime in the 1970s and 80s. I was recently contacted by Alfred Holzman, now in Miami, who lived on 30th Avenue from 1944. His parents owned a paint and wallpaper store at number 34-03 called “Grand Paint Supply Company.” Among the vivid memories that he and his contemporaries have of 30th Avenue are the ice cream parlors.
“During the summer months, in the evening, the ice cream parlors would be jammed with eat-in and take out customers,” he says. “Without question, these places were absolutely spotless. In addition to ice cream, they were all counter and booth luncheonettes. The place to go for fountain drinks. Each had a juke box.”
There were three along 30th Ave:
Goodness Gracious Thrift store, between 30th and 31st Streets on 30th Ave, where Jacoby's used to be
Jacoby’s, between 30 and 31st street, where the “Goodness Gracious Thrift Shop” now is. Alfred says: “I was there many times for lunch when I was in the fifth and sixth grades at PS 5. Teachers had lunch there, and I saw them smoking whilst sitting in the booths.” (PS5, which was on 29th Street just off 30th Ave, burned down in 1967 after an eight-year-old pupil set a fire in a clothes closet while playing with matches).
Gerken’s, at 34-04, where Astoria Art and Framing now is. This was directly opposite Alfred’s parents’ shop. “It was run by the wonderful couple, Henry and Margaret Gerken. Like us, they lived above their store. They started the business shortly after the war, in about 1947. The façade was black and very stylish. I and my family knew these hard-working folks well. The hours were 10am to 11pm. They sold great ice cream made in the basement. Terrific Banana Splits, Banana Royals, and their specialty, the 30th Avenue Special. The Gerkens retired to Florida in the late 70s / early 80s.”
Rudy’s, a block up from Gerken’s at 35-16. “This business was the oldest of the three. Rudy owned it, and again, the family lived upstairs,” says Alfred. “The façade was/is beige. Rudy died long ago, but his daughter, a Bryant High grad, ran the place. She married a guy who was an electric train collector. Years ago, he began to sell electric trains from one side of the store.”
Marvin Cochran of Rudy's Hobby Supplies, 35-16 30th Ave
He, Marvin Cochran, still sells electric trains from the store, which is now called “Rudy’s Hobby Supplies.” They also sell model toys and all the materials you need to make them. I dropped by to speak with Marvin, who told me that the store first started selling ice creams in 1939 and was “Rudy’s Ice Cream Parlor” until 1987. “We changed over because it was just too many hours, and we were getting older. It was pleasant though – you had your friends and customers who you knew for years and years coming by for their ice cream.”
In the non-summer seasons, the ice cream parlors still did well, selling chocolates and candies – especially at Valentines, Easter (when they sold chocolate bunnies made in-house) and Christmas.
The ice cream parlors may have gone but there are still plenty of details that define 30th Ave in summertime, for which we’ll now have to wait another nine months or so. There’s the water fountain for kids to cool off in at Athens Square. There are the groups of chairs on the sidewalk outside the Laundromats where people chat as they wait for their clothes cycles to finish. There are long sticky waits for trains in the sweltering heat at 30th Ave subway station (which really shouldn’t be called “subway” here at all, because it’s elevated). And of course there’s ice cream too, just sold in different ways: like Gino’s Italian ices sold from the cart by Salerno Pizza near 29th Street, and the ice cream vans that jingle their way along 30th Ave and its surrounding roads.
As the 30th Ave labor day street fair was winding down I met Philip Sparta and his best friend Wallace de Olivera on their way to meet some friends at the Athens Square basketball courts.
They are both skateboarders. Serious skateboarders. They skateboard for between four and six hours every day. They used to skateboard in Athens Square itself but only do that rarely now. Philip explains why:
“People thought that the skateboarders here were annoying. Once in a while the police would come and kick us out of this park. We didn’t really care, we loved skating so much that we just kept coming back once they’d left. But now since the Skate Park opened up we hardly come here, just once in a while. We have friends who play basketball on the courts here so we come to hang out.”
The Skate Park he is talking about is the one in Astoria Park that opened in 2010, beneath the towering Trioborough Bridge and next to the East River. It’s always whirring with boarders, the sound of their wheels competing with the traffic roar overhead. (Here’s an article about the opening of the park and a You Tube clip of boarders there).
Wallace and Philip met in primary school but now go to different high schools: Wallace is at La Guardia High and Philip at Bryant High, at 31st Ave and 48th Street. “I like it around here in Astoria,” says Philip, who lives near 30th Ave. “I used to live in Flushing. Over here is a lot nicer, it’s really diverse.”
On what they enjoy about skating, Wallace says, “it’s the thrill of actually skating.”
“And it keeps us from doing bad things, you know,” adds Philip. “We don’t do bad things like most of our friends have gotten into. It keeps us fit too, it’s very healthy.” Not that it’s without its risks; both of them have recently recovered from ankle injuries.
Philip, now sixteen, was born in Japan and came to New York with his family when he was six. He has few memories about living in Japan but does remember the move and how weird it felt. He hasn’t been back. “I’m totally Americanized. I’m not really interested in going back. Except to skate there.”
I met friends Janeth Toral and Julia Bravo sitting outside a house on 14th Street just south of 30th Avenue, on a Saturday morning. Janeth works as a consultant for Mary Kay: they were selling beauty products made by Mary Kay and Avon from the porch to passersby.
Janeth and Julia are both from Ecuador. Julia has lived in Astoria for 49 years and is now considered the “abuelita” – the “grandmother” – of her community. She works as a crossing guard by public school 171, which is bordered by 29th and 30th Aves, and 14th Street. Her work is clearly needed there, as there are no traffic lights. One day four years ago, after getting a group of children across the street, a taxi hit her and hurt her leg.
Julia works 12 months a year – in the summertime there are still classes going on. She says that the children who she helps cross the road are from all ethnic backgrounds – Hispanic, black, South Asian, Chinese, Irish, Italian – but that differences are overridden by the fact “they are all children.”
She enjoys the affection she gets from the children and the fact their parents are grateful for her help. Julia’s own children are now grown up and married, and are currently serving in the army – she says that email helps her to keep in regular contact with them.
Janeth came to New York from Ecuador 19 years ago. For the first year before moving to Astoria she lived in Corona. “I didn’t like it because it was so noisy. There was so much loud music! Here it’s a bit calmer. There are problems here and there, but we manage.” She began selling beauty products to help support her family. Her husband and two of her sons are in Ecuador, and her other four children (two boys and two girls) live with her in Astoria.
Both Janeth and Julia agree that the good things about the neighborhood are the nearby parks – in particular Astoria Park with its swimming pool – and access to different things that they need: stores, schools, post-offices. The problems, they say, come mainly from people who come through from other parts of New York City. And as Julia adds, the prices are going up, making it an expensive neighborhood to live in now.
The two women first got to know each other when Janeth’s son, now 13, was in pre-kinder. “He kept asking me about Julia, saying ‘when are we going to see my grandmother?’” says Janeth. “I would say no, she’s not actually your grandmother’ and he would say, ‘yes, she is!’”.
Benny (Virendra) Banker has been delivering mail along 30th Avenue for over 13 years. “My area covers most of this heart part of Astoria,” he says. “It’s a nice residential area. There’s Astoria General Hospital which is now Mount Sinai, so there are a lot of doctors around here.” Benny is also a singer of Hindi devotional songs and other forms of Indian classical music.
He lives in Queens Village, in Eastern Queens. It takes him one and a half hours by train to get to Astoria. But he makes it no matter what. “On the day when there was the biggest snowstorm I woke up at four in the morning, I walked to the subway station and I took a train and I made it here by eight o’ clock. I managed to work, while 80% of people didn’t make it to their work that day.”
He adds: “When people see us in the snow and the rain they feel really sorry about us. But if you talk about counting the full year of 365 days we hardly have those heat-waves and those mountains of the snow or the rain. Hardly I would say ten days in the year. This job may look like its hard but I think it is not that bad. To be honest, the difficult and the easy thing about the job is just your mindset.”
Benny says that he loves his job “because it’s a service for the people. I feel good seeing old people – when they wait for me and then they see me they become so happy. If I am off a while, when I’m back everybody feels like a family member came back after a long time. This job is also my lifesaver, because it gives me compulsory exercise everyday.”
Benny was born in Gujarat, India. He came to New York City in his late teens, went back to Gujarat in 1977 when he got married, and returned to New York with his wife. His three children are now grown up: one son is a pediatrician in Houston, one is a gastro-intestinal doctor in Stonybrook, and his daughter is in business management.
Benny crams a lot into his spare time. He singsbhajan sandhyas (devotionals) and light classical Indian music in various languages including Hindi, Gujarati, Sanskrit, performing at events in New York and also other parts of the US. (You can listen to him singing here).
When Benny first started working for the US Postal Service he was working in Brooklyn and living in Woodside. That commute was very long: he applied for a transfer, and within six months his choice of the Long Island City area came up. One of the main changes in the area that has affected him has been the increase in large new buildings with many apartments. “That creates a parking problem mainly. Before we used to find parking any time – now we have to struggle for it.”
Before, he says, there was a lot more first class mail. “Now there is more junk mail, though even that is decreasing.” He hastens to add that mail is not dwindling entirely. “People still have to mail things like lawyers documents. People still need a hard copy.”
The US Postal Service is currently in financial trouble and is planning to make major cuts, including by closing post offices. One of the four in Queens on a list for potential closure is the Grand Post Office on 30th Ave between 45 and 46th Streets – over 1000 people have reportedly signed a petition to keep it open. Benny keeps things in perspective though. “Like every other business the post office is in the midst of hardship but personally I don’t think there’s a serious problem. People do need to mail a letter. Every business has a right to save the money and they are trying, but what I see in a big city like New York, downsizing will be almost impossible.
“What I say, is think positive you’re going to get positive. If you think negative, you’re inviting the negative.”
Sami Mobarak in his shop Old Village Thrift, Gifts and Antiques
Sami Mobarak in his shop Old Village Thrift, Gifts and Antiques
Sami Mobarak runs Old Village Thrift, Gift and Antiques, on 30th Ave just West of 29th Street. The store sells all kinds of products. When I was there to interview him, among them were silver jewelery (his specialty), watches, furniture, clothes, a saxophone, a cricket score board…
For almost eight years previously, Sami had a pizzeria. “It was good. But I burned myself left and right. And when the oven is too hot and you’re sweating and tired… I’m getting older now (I’m 53), so I decided it’s time to calm down a little and do something more relaxing.”
Sami and his wife enjoyed going to flea markets at the weekend to buy antiques. “So we turned a hobby into business. You do something that you like to do and you make some money at the same time, that cannot be bad! It’s not like a huge profit, just a living.”
A friend of his has a huge warehouse of goods and sends Sami a truck of things to sell each month. He also finds things to sell in yard sales and flea markets. He puts his customers into groups. “Some are interested in antiques and willing to pay good money for them – but that is not so many people. Most people are looking for cheaper stuff. I focus on having a little bit to satisfy everybody’s taste in different products.”
Sami, who has lived in Astoria for 26 years, is originally from Alexandria in Egypt. He says that the revolution earlier this year “was about time. It should have happened a long time ago. I hope that it will bring some sort of stability in the country because it was like a boiling pot, with big time poverty.
“I was visiting six months before the revolution. I saw people eating from the garbage, and I saw people spending tons of money. There was no in-between. Society was split between filthy rich and dirty poor. What happened was a wake-up call for everybody who lives there.” As an Egyptian living outside Egypt, Sami was emotionally involved and looked for any way to give his support. He and some friends joined with a local singer and made a song for the revolution.
Sami lives with his wife – originally from Algeria – and their two young sons. Of Astoria, he says it is one of the safest and most beautiful parts of New York City to live in. “The 114th precinct is one of the best police stations, they are always present, always there. Young ladies who get off work at three or four o’clock in the morning and are walking home by themselves feel safe.”
Twice, he attempted living elsewhere, in New Jersey. The first time he came back after a month, the second after two months. He missed the community here, and also says that other neighborhoods feel too quiet in comparison. Along 30th Avenue and nearby, there are places open and people on the streets all through the night.
He adds: “Being here for a long time creates something like it’s a whole big family living in the neighborhood, everybody looking after everybody. After all these years I think also that people start to trust each other. You’ll find Turkish people close friends with Greeks, or an Egyptian who has an Israeli as one of his best friends. You forget about what is the foreign policy and politics, and you just go down to a person-level, to human beings who need a living.”
When Sami first lived in Astoria a one bedroom apartment would rent for $375 or $400. “Now we’re talking about $1400 for a one bedroom studio,” he says. I see a lot of movement from Manhattan to Astoria, because in only 10 to 15 minutes you are in the heart of the city but the rent is still cheaper here. A lot of middle class working couples move to the neighborhood. To accommodate this movement, they open a lot of cafés which didn’t exist before, there were just small stores here and there.
“Some of those new cafés cost maybe a million or so. They are doing a great business, and in turn attract more crowds, and I think that is why the rents here have never gone down, even though real estate has been busted and the rent went down almost everywhere else.”
Sami has no plans to try moving again though. He says as long as he is in the US, he will stay in Astoria.
30th Ave the day after hurricane/tropical storm Irene
On 20 July 2011 the Greater Astoria Historical Society hosted the launch of an exhibit of photos from this site, “30th Ave – A Year in the Life of a Street.” The event was a great way to mark the mid-point of the project (which had 29 interviews at that time, 23 more to come by the end of the year!). Five of us spoke about 30th Ave from different perspectives.
Bob Singleton of GAHS began by bringing the audience back to when 30th Ave was originally proposed as a street. He read from the minutes of a meeting of the trustees of Astoria Village on November 4, 1850. The trustees resolved that a new street, 60 feet wide, would be created and named Grand Street.
The proposal met a lot of opposition. One property owner objected because the new street would run through his grove of trees. Others complained that they would be taxed for construction and maintenance that would largely benefit others. The proposal was never formally adopted, but the street appeared and developed rapidly all the same.
I introduced my project and described two of the sources of inspiration for it. One was National Geographic’s “Genographic” project, which had collected cheek cells from people along 30th Ave at the street fair in 2008. They found that the street and its surroundings form one of the most diverse places in the planet. As a local resident, I knew of course that 30th Ave was diverse: but here was some unusual evidence in the form of genetic markers.
The other source of inspiration was a woman called Helen, who once did my nails (on one of the rare occasions that I’ve had my nails done), at Athena’s Nails on 30th Ave. I was 33 at the time and pregnant with my son. Helen, who is from Tibet, told me that she had had her two children when she was 13 and 14 years old. She said she is always surprised how long women in New York stay single, and how late they have their kids. She also told me that she had left her children in Tibet, and missed them a lot, and often couldn’t get through to them on the phone.
It wasn’t until after my son Jack was born that the idea for the website and of doing one interview a week came together, but those two things definitely planted seeds for it. A short while after starting the project I went back to Athena’s Nails to see if I could find Helen. The managers told me she doesn’t work there anymore and didn’t know how to track her down. It is a reminder that for every story that is told about someone along 30th Avenue there are stories – hundreds of them – that are not told. I’m aiming for this site to tell a story of 30th Ave during 2011 that reflects as many aspects as possible, but it is by no means the story.
Frank Arcabasio spoke next. He set up Redken Saloon Salon on 30th Ave – and is currently President of the 30th Ave Business Association. He was inspired to become a hair stylist when he worked as a kid in his cousins’ barbershop in Astoria (his interview for this site included the fabulous line, “I knew early on the power of a good hair cut”). Frank spoke about the entrepreneurial spirit of 30th Ave: how the small size of the buildings and therefore the small area for shop floors had prevented some of the big chains from moving in, and had therefore helped family-run businesses to flourish. He also said that the internet had provided all kinds of new opportunities for people in local communities to interact and learn from each other.
Melissa Rivera began her talk describing growing up around 30th Avenue. She mentioned her first jobs in the area as a teenager, like working at the old cinema on the corner of 30th Ave and Steinway (now a pharmacy and sports club), and at a bridal store. She said that despite a brief stint living in Manhattan she was drawn back to the neighborhood.
Alongside her work in child welfare and raising her young son Melissa has set up a soap-making business in her apartment (in one of the railroad apartment buildings just off 30th Ave, beyond Steinway). “Naturally Good Soaps” is a a truly local business if ever there was one, and all of the products are proudly stamped “Made in Astoria”.
Her dream would be to employ a few people in the neighborhood and train them in her business. But alongside her praise for the community Melissa injected a note of caution. She said that with fewer and fewer mom and pop shops and the rents increasing, her community is starting to feel like someone else’s community. She is beginning to feel the pinch and she – and her son, who goes to school nearby – both really hope that they will be able to stay.
Debbie Van Cura, the next speaker, is a trustee of the Greater Astoria Historical Society. She teaches urban sociology at La Guardia Community College. In her talk (which you can watch on You Tube here) she quoted the wonderful urban historian Jane Jacobs, who said: “cities have the capability of providing something for everybody, only because, and only when, they are created by everybody.” She said that spirit is at the heart of what makes 30th Avenue a successful street – the fact that people from all backgrounds are able to interact, and to participate in and influence what the street has to offer.
She added that the geography of the street itself enables those interactions, with its wide sidewalks and many benches, and spaces to linger like Athens Square. Unlike many parts of the city, when you walk down 30th Avenue you see people standing still and talking to one another in the middle of the sidewalk. She reminded us that while the internet has provided a new forum for interaction it is those sidewalk conversations that are the lifeblood of a neighborhood.
Debbie’s talk also echoed some of the characteristics of a “successful” street that have emerged time and again in the interviews I have done so far with people along 30th Ave. Among the characteristics that many people have said they like about the street, are:
– everything they need is easily accessible;
– they feel safe;
– there are people from all over the world;
– the atmosphere is relaxed and friendly (more than in Manhattan!);
– newcomers and old-timers generally mix well together;
– and there is life on the streets at all times of day and night.
Sometimes I consider the dynamic of 30th Ave as a “respectful proximity of strangers.” But once you have been into someone’s store a few times and spoken with the owner each time, he or she is more than a stranger. Better to say that there is a “respectful proximity of strangers and friends.”
To wrap up the event, Bob Singleton of GAHS proposed a resolution: that those in attendance formally designate the street of 30th Avenue as a “dynamic city neighborhood with easy access to everything,” and “a place for creative people in search of a better life.” The resolution was approved by with a unanimous “aye!”
I want to say a big thank you to the GAHS for hosting this exhibition. When I first went to their sprawling and fascinating space in the Quinn building on Broadway to see a documentary about the Steinway Piano Factory, little would I have known that I would be back a year later for the launch of my own little exhibit.
The photos were up through the end of August. You can still check them out here though. Those featured in the exhibit were:
