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[Last name, First name], Oral history interview conducted by [Interviewer’s First name Last name], [Month DD, YYYY], [Title of Collection], [Call #]; Brooklyn Historical Society.
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Edwina Joseph
Oral history interview conducted by Sarita Daftary-Steel
October 31, 2014
Call number: 2015.011.12
0:00 - Moving to Linden Houses in 1962
7:24 - First Black family to move in and integrating with neighbors
13:23 - Development and transportation in the neighborhood
19:07 - Neighbors in Linden Houses
22:34 - White flight from Linden Houses and decline in building maintenance
32:33 - Drugs and violence in the Houses
36:03 - Couldn’t afford to leave
38:34 - Neighbors faced difficulties after leaving Houses
42:50 - Resistance to the decline in the Houses
44:48 - Frank Espada and voter registration drive
48:14 - Opposition to United Community Centers in Linden Houses
52:32 - Children went to PS 306
55:09 - Impact of neighborhood decline and drugs on children
60:43 - Leaving Linden Houses
67:40 - NYC Housing Authority failed to maintain quality of Houses
Interview Description
Oral History Interview with Edwina Joseph
Edwina (Greene) Joseph was born in 1940. She moved from the Clinton Hill neighborhood of Brooklyn to the Linden Houses (in the East New York neighborhood) with her husband and children in 1962, and lived there until 2010. Joseph worked at the Wells Fargo bank international branch on Wall Street for many years. After her retirement, she was active in the East New York Farms! Project as a member of a Community Supported Agriculture program. In 2010 she moved to Acworth, Georgia.
In the interview, Edwina Joseph describes life in the Linden Houses in the East New York neighborhood of Brooklyn, where she resided for over forty five years. She discusses being the first Black family to move into the Houses in 1962, relations with her neighbors, White flight from the Houses, and subsequent decline of the quality of life due to the New York City Housing Authority's disregard for residents. She also discusses the schools her children attended and political activism in the neighborhood. The interview was conducted remotely by Sarita Daftary-Steel in Brooklyn, New York and Joseph in Acworth, Georgia.
The collection consists of twenty oral history interviews (with nineteen narrators) conducted by Sarita Daftary-Steel with residents (past and present) of the East New York neighborhood of Brooklyn. The interviews were conducted between January 2014 and February 2015. The project was designed to capture the experiences of East New York residents who lived in the neighborhood during the period when families of color (African American, West Indian, and Puerto Rican) moved in and White families moved out, and the resulting decline of services and quality of life that followed. This process began as early as the 1950s and continued through the rest of the twentieth century. Sarita Daftary-Steel is a community organizer who worked for United Community Centers from 2003 to 2013, most of those years as the East New York Farms! Project Director.
Citation
Joseph, Edwina, Oral history interview conducted by Sarita Daftary-Steel, October 31, 2014, Sarita Daftary-Steel collection of East New York oral histories, 2015.011.12; Brooklyn Historical Society.People
- Espada, Frank, 1930-
- Joseph, Edwina
- Linden Houses (Housing complex)
- New York City Housing Authority
- United Community Centers
Topics
- African Americans
- Crime
- Drug traffic
- Public housing
- Public schools
- Race relations
- Urban policy
- Voter registration
Places
- Brooklyn (New York, N.Y.)
- East New York (New York, N.Y.)
Finding Aid
Sarita Daftary-Steel collection of East New York oral histories