Friday, April 12, 2024
Wednesday, April 10, 2024
RIP Debby Lee Cohen
Debby Lee founded Cafeteria Culture as a concerned parent of public school students. After her younger daughter announced that she didn't want to eat school food anymore because styrofoam trays were "killing the polar bears," Debby Lee started working to eliminate styrofoam from New York City Public School cafeterias.Always a uniter but never afraid to push boundaries, Debby Lee advocated with constant pressure on decision-makers to eliminate foam trays in school cafeterias and didn't stop until her mission was accomplished. This grassroots victory eliminated over half a billion plastic foam trays per year from student meals, landfills, and incinerators in New York City and now 18 other cities across the U.S.Debby Lee's public school work to drive change forward has a tremendous and lasting impact on our world far beyond the city. Her dream to achieve equitable zero waste has fueled the continued work of Cafeteria Culture and paved the way for New York City's 2019 and New York State's 2022 foam bans. We owe much to Debby Lee's sheer determination to tackle this problem that at the outset, most people thought was impossible to accomplish.Debby Lee centered our students throughout these victories. Whether she was teaching them to build giant foam monster puppets or to create their own stop-motion animation projects, she shared her creative gifts to support students in telling their own stories. These principles continue to guide our teaching today to support Cafeteria Culture students as they continue to advocate for environmental justice and possibility.
Saturday, March 30, 2024
Remembering Tim Lomas
Saturday, February 24, 2024
RIP Flaco
Flaco, the Eurasian eagle-owl who escaped from New York City's Central Park Zoo and became one of the city's most beloved celebrities as he flew around Manhattan, has died, zoo officials announced Friday.A little over one year after he was freed from his cage at the zoo in a criminal act that has yet to be solved, Flaco appears to have collided with an Upper West Side building, the zoo said in a statement.
As you may have already seen, Flaco the Eurasian eagle-owl has passed away. I am sad beyond words. Flaco defied the odds and made quite a life for himself in the city over the past year. Along the way he came to mean so much to so many, including me. ❤️🦉 pic.twitter.com/gJnby3TtvB
— David Lei (@davidlei) February 24, 2024
Thank you for visiting us and for connecting us to something bigger. Rest easy, Flaco 💔 #flaco #birdcpp @BirdCentralPark @davidlei pic.twitter.com/vxgeasUvtP
— RHP (@RobinHerbstPapa) February 24, 2024
I am heartbroken tonight as I know so many of you are. I took this video of Flaco one week ago today, which was the last time I saw him. Hearing him hoot brings me comfort, and I hope it brings you some comfort too.💕🦉
— JacquelineUWS (@jacquelineUWS) February 24, 2024
We will never forget you, Flaco. pic.twitter.com/VvAOyYaupf
Tuesday, February 6, 2024
RIP Merle Ratner
My family has a history — my grandmother, when she came from Odessa, was the first woman business agent at the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union, and my mother was a member of Local 1707 Day Care Workers. I have a picture in my house of my grandmother; it must have been in the 1920s, with a long skirt with a bustle, the very traditional thing that women wore, holding a picket sign with her friend that said, 'Don’t be a scab.'"
Friday, January 19, 2024
Celebrating the life and spirit of John Crellin, aka 'Architect John'
Wednesday, January 10, 2024
RIP Vinie Burrows
Burrows began her Broadway career in the 1950s, starring alongside Ossie Davis in "The Wisteria Trees." She continued to perform on Broadway for several years, appearing in such shows as "The Green Pastures," "The Skin of Our Teeth," and "The Blacks." But Burrows became frustrated with the narrow range of roles available to Black women, and she left Broadway to pursue a solo career in one-woman shows.Burrows' one-woman Off-Broadway show, "Walk Together Children," was critically acclaimed and continued as an international tour after its initial run. She went on to perform other one-woman shows, including "Sister! Sister!" "Dark Fire" and “The Great White Way: The Story of Rose McClendon."
In 2020, she was honored with an Obie Award for Lifetime Achievement. Burrows was also an activist who represented the Women's International Democratic Federation at the United Nations.
... including this piece in The New Yorker titled The Many Lives of Vinie Burrows.Vinie Burrows, an actress who made her mark on Broadway in the 1950s but who grew frustrated by how few choice roles were available for Black women and turned her focus to one-woman shows exploring the legacies of racism and sexism, has died at 99. https://t.co/qakbhiKE74
— The New York Times (@nytimes) January 5, 2024
Tuesday, January 9, 2024
RIP Charlie Carroll
Friday, December 15, 2023
RIP Phil Klein
Of course, he missed going into the store, said his wife and partner of 42 years Randy Klein. "He would go in every day with gusto. Never angry or with frustration."Phil and Randy Klein are a New York story if ever there was one. Having met 43 years ago at a bus stop in front of the New York Public Library, they were both going to the same stop at 34th Street to Penn Station — one to Flushing and the other to Long Island. That became a ride of love, and they married a year later in 1982.You could say that fateful meeting started them off on the same road into a shared future that led to Whiskers Holistic Pet Care. Born from their commitment to trying to save their own dog from cancer and the frustration and anger with traditional recommendations and medicine.
Thursday, December 14, 2023
A memorial for Bill Dean
Tuesday, December 5, 2023
RIP Ed Burns
Saturday, November 25, 2023
RIP Bob Contant
Bob Contant, co-founder and co-owner of St. Mark's Bookshop, died at his Manhattan home on Nov. 6. Per published reports, he died of cardiac arrest. He was 80.Bob Contant, a founder of the countercultural St. Mark’s Bookshop in the East Village, who prided himself on stocking titles that were not “too popular” and stayed in business for four decades, died on Nov. 6 at his home in Manhattan. He was 80. https://t.co/uFpbf6K1GR
— NYT Metro (@NYTMetro) November 22, 2023
He came to New York in 1972 and was manager of the old 8th Street Bookshop in Greenwich Village. In 1977, Contant, along with others working at East Side Books — Terry McCoy, Peter Dargis, and Tom Evans — decided to open their own store at 13 St. Mark's Place. St. Mark's Bookshop moved to a larger location, at 12 St. Mark's Place, in 1987 and then in 1993 to a new development by Cooper Union at 31 Third Avenue.The store built on its strength in poetry, critical studies, small press literature, and art. But after many years, with a change of board, the school shifted its approach to the bookstore and offered no help when, in the wake of the financial crisis, St. Mark's had trouble paying its $20,000-a-month rent.
Tuesday, October 17, 2023
RIP Maryanne Byington
Maryanne left us Friday, Oct. 13, after a long battle with a pulmonary illness.
Maryanne was a resident of East Eighth Street since 1982 and an integral part of Green Oasis and Gilbert's Sculpture Garden. She was one of the founders of LUNGS and served as Vice President from 2011 to 2020.Maryanne was a trophy-winning professional ballroom dancer. She was Emeritus Dean of High Heels at Miss Vera's Finishing School for Boys Who Want to Be Girls, where she offered students expert instruction in the arts of dressing up, making up, going out, and acting like a lady. Maryanne said, " Do you enjoy wearing high heels? Sometimes, the technique of rumba will create just the right walk for the right situation."Maryanne loved to dance and dress in Oscar de la Renta's most colorful Latin-influenced festive party gowns. She also loved to sit in her garden, watch children carve pumpkins, and listen to the birds sing. She was partial to shrimp cocktails, grilled cheese sandwiches and chilled Negronis served in a pretty cocktail glass.Maryanne's graciousness, sense of humor and beautiful smile are already greatly missed.
Wednesday, October 11, 2023
RIP Richard 'Pete' Peterson
Thursday, September 7, 2023
A memorial for Dennis Edge in Tompkins Square Park
Thursday, August 3, 2023
RIP Miss Kita the Wonder Dog of East 10th Street
Tuesday, July 18, 2023
RIP Big Lee
Sunday, June 18, 2023
Police: Woman dies after jumping from 3rd Street residential building
Friday, June 16, 2023
[Updating] 18-year-old cyclist killed in collision on 1st Avenue at 17th Street
Wednesday, June 7, 2023
Support for the family of Salvino Luis Ceballos
Salvino Luis Ceballos, our beautifully wide eyed, sweet, kind, curious, scrappy, energetic, dog loving, Pokemon collecting, bike riding, EVCS second grader and community member passed away tragically Saturday night June 3, 2023. It feels as if we are frozen. There were no warning signs and his sudden loss is completely unconscionable.Salvino had the most beautiful way of connecting with anyone he met. When his next-door neighbor told Salvino she didn't have any friends in the building, he knocked on her door shortly after with another adult neighbor and introduced them! His heart was giant. He made everyone laugh, included everyone in on the secret, and let anyone and everyone who crossed his path know how much fun there was to be had, and where to find it...Every dollar can help ease the financial burden for Salvino's grieving family, regardless of contribution size. We hope this beautiful family finds a way forward with ongoing family support, continued family therapy, and visits from close family and friends both here and from France.