CROWN HEIGHTS — This summer, the neighborhood will mark a grim anniversary: the 25th year since racial violence and rioting swept Crown Heights in August of 1991.
In an effort to make sense of the Crown Heights riots a quarter century later, one of the area’s cultural institutions is aiming to compile oral histories of the events, collected through recorded interviews with area residents of the time.
The Weeksville Heritage Center, built on the site of a 19th-century free black community on Buffalo Avenue and Bergen Street, has collected oral histories of “primarily black voices and lives” in Crown Heights and Bedford-Stuyvesant since 1970, the group wrote in a post about the project last week.
Now, Weeksville is looking for those who participated in or experienced the 1991 riots to tell their stories. Anyone who has heard family or friends discuss the violence is also invited to contribute as well as those who have lived in Crown Heights for 25 years or more to capture “how the neighborhood has changed,” the group said.
A man looks on while a car burns during the violence that erupted in Crown Heights during August 1991. (Photo Credit: John Roca/New York Daily News)
“As Brooklyn experiences economic, demographic, and cultural changes, we think it is important to collectively remember and record Brooklyn’s past and present,” the posting said.
In addition to Crown Heights locals, the project is open to those with relevant stories from neighboring areas including Bedford-Stuyvesant, Prospect Heights, East Flatbush, Brownsville, Clinton Hill, Fort Greene and Flatbush, the post said.
Those interested in being interviewed by staff at Weeksville should contact Amaka Okechukwu at 718-756-5250 ext. 305 or by email at amaka@weeksvillesociety.org.
