{"@context":"http://iiif.io/api/presentation/3/context.json","id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/iiif/z02z31p67d/manifest","type":"Manifest","label":{"en":["Abdussabur, Shafiq, 2007 April 5"]},"logo":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/013/original/yale-blue.png?1678220072","metadata":[{"label":{"en":["Preferred Citation"]},"value":{"en":["Abdussabur, Shafiq, 2007 April 5. Oral Histories Documenting New Haven, Connecticut (RU 1055). Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library.\n\n https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/12/resources/2867."]}},{"label":{"en":["Source Metadata URI"]},"value":{"en":["https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/12/archival_objects/1002497"]}},{"label":{"en":["Publisher"]},"value":{"en":["Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library."]}},{"label":{"en":["Rights Statement"]},"value":{"en":["The materials are open for research.\n\nOriginal audiovisual materials, as well as preservation and duplicating masters, may not be played. Researchers must consult use copies, or if none exist must pay for a use copy, which is retained by the repository. Researchers wishing to obtain an additional copy for their personal use should consult Copying Services information on the Manuscripts and Archives web site."]}},{"label":{"en":["Identifier"]},"value":{"en":["mssa.ru.1055 (EAD ID)","RU 1055 (Call Number)","ru_1055_2001-A-001_abdussabur.mp3 (Digital Object ID)","ru_1055_2001-A-001_abdussabur_shafiq1.mp3 (Digital Object ID)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Date"]},"value":{"en":["2007 April 5 (Creation)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Description"]},"value":{"en":["Shafiq Abdussabur grew up in the Dixwell neighborhood in New Haven in the 1970s. Abdussabur recalls that Dixwell was not unified neighborhood. Although the street was almost entirely African-American, lines of geography and class were readily apparent to most residents. He suggests that there were effectively five distinct neighborhoods on Dixwell, and that class and geographical snobbery ran rampant among Dixwell residents, particularly the children with whom Abdussabur grew up. There was a key difference, he recalls, between people who were \"poor\" -- single parent families, living in the Elm Haven projects, on welfare -- and those who were just \"broke.\" Abdussabur's family fell into the latter class. Despite these class divisions, he recalls that community life in the Dixwell area was vibrant, with lots of opportunity for kids and many positive Africa-American role models. It was, he says, \"really a black-empowered zone from Dixwell all the way up.\" Abdussabur now works for the New Haven Police Department. \n\nInterviewer: Joseph, Amber (Scope and Content Note)","https://preservica.library.yale.edu/explorer/explorer.html#prop:4\u0026amp;bf3b1bfd-593b-446d-a7c6-a517bce1ba79 (Other Finding Aid Note)","As a preservation measure, original materials may not be used. Digital access copies must be provided for use. Contact Manuscripts and Archives at beinecke.library@yale.edu to request access (Accessrestrict)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Format"]},"value":{"en":["computer files (wav)","duration_HH_MM_SS_mmm","audio/mpeg"]}},{"label":{"en":["Preservica Representation Type"]},"value":{"en":["Access-2"]}},{"label":{"en":["Preservica Uri"]},"value":{"en":["/structural-objects/66c354d2-6c4a-4e10-9ffd-7dbed220ad9c"]}}],"summary":{"en":["Shafiq Abdussabur grew up in the Dixwell neighborhood in New Haven in the 1970s. Abdussabur recalls that Dixwell was not unified neighborhood. Although the street was almost entirely African-American, lines of geography and class were readily apparent to most residents. He suggests that there were effectively five distinct neighborhoods on Dixwell, and that class and geographical snobbery ran rampant among Dixwell residents, particularly the children with whom Abdussabur grew up. There was a key difference, he recalls, between people who were \"poor\" -- single parent families, living in the Elm Haven projects, on welfare -- and those who were just \"broke.\" Abdussabur's family fell into the latter class. Despite these class divisions, he recalls that community life in the Dixwell area was vibrant, with lots of opportunity for kids and many positive Africa-American role models. It was, he says, \"really a black-empowered zone from Dixwell all the way up.\" Abdussabur now works for the New Haven Police Department. \n\nInterviewer: Joseph, Amber","https://preservica.library.yale.edu/explorer/explorer.html#prop:4\u0026amp;bf3b1bfd-593b-446d-a7c6-a517bce1ba79","As a preservation measure, original materials may not be used. Digital access copies must be provided for use. Contact Manuscripts and Archives at beinecke.library@yale.edu to request access"]},"requiredStatement":{"label":{"en":["Attribution"]},"value":{"en":["The materials are open for research.\n\nOriginal audiovisual materials, as well as preservation and duplicating masters, may not be played. Researchers must consult use copies, or if none exist must pay for a use copy, which is retained by the repository. Researchers wishing to obtain an additional copy for their personal use should consult Copying Services information on the Manuscripts and Archives web site."]}},"provider":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/aboutus","type":"Agent","label":{"en":["Manuscripts and Archives Yale University Library"]},"homepage":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/","type":"Text","label":{"en":["Manuscripts and Archives Yale University Library"]},"format":"text/html"}],"logo":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/013/original/yale-blue.png?1678220072","type":"Image"}]}],"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/public/images/audio-default.png","type":"Image","format":"image/png"}],"items":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 1 of 2 - open-uri20200615-6634-n9w4b6.mpga"]},"duration":5838.02776,"width":640,"height":40,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/public/images/audio-default.png","type":"Image","format":"image/png"}],"items":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/content/1/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-yalemssa.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/092/512/original/open-uri20200615-6634-n9w4b6.mpga?1592225760","type":"Audio","format":"audio/mpeg","duration":5838.02776,"width":640,"height":40},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["ru_1055_2001-A-001_abdussabur_alignedtranscript.json [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Amber Joseph: Can you say your name and the date?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=0.84,2.44"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/2","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: Shafiq Abdussabur. April 4, 2007.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=3.39,6.96"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/3","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Amber Joseph: So I’m wondering you can just talk a little about where you grew up and tell me some of your experiences. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=6.96,16.88"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/4","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: Well, I grew up in New Haven. I’m forty years old now. I grew up roughly around, um, the late 1960s, early 1970s. So, I came along at probably the tail-end of the post-Civil Rights era, after the assassination of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King. I lived in New Haven in what is now known as the Hill section. I actually grew up on Edgar Street, which is in the Hill, located off of Commerce Avenue and Spring. At that particular time, most of the residents were Portuguese and African American. From there we moved to Ferry Street. Ferry near Chamberlain Street, right across from what is now a C-Town then was a Pegnataro’s. And that area was predominantly black and Portuguese at that time as well. And from there we moved to West Haven—my grandparents actually bought a house in West Haven. I was living with my grandparents. And my mother lived in New Haven. And then when I moved back with my mother and stepfather, we moved to this area, Dixwell. At that time I was probably about seven years old. We moved to the area where we are now. At there we lived at Florence-Virgil, where which was literally behind where we’re at right now, at the library. Webster Street and Goffe Street. And I had a grandmother, which was my stepfather’s mother, lived in the projects. What we call now Elm Haven—or the former Elm Haven—then we just called it the projects. (chuckles) And, that, was in the Foote Street area. So, I had the, I guess you can say that I had the opportunity to grow up between two neighborhoods. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=16.9,148.27"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/5","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Actually, growing up in Dixwell, Dixwell had about three neighborhoods in one. So you had, if you lived on Goffe Street, in the St. Martin’s Apartments, which are the gray apartments that are on Goffe between Orchard and—roughly between Orchard and they start around Orchard and Winter—everybody that lived in those apartments were considered one neighborhood. Those families were separate and they didn’t really mingle with other families. When you got into Florence-Virgil, which is a co-operative or housing apartments that encompass Orchard, Goffe Street, Webster Street and part of Charles Street, those families stayed together in one neighborhood. That was a whole other neighborhood. And then if you lived in “the projects”, former Elm Haven—in Elm Haven if you lived in the low rises, the low rises was one group, and then if you lived in the high rises, on Ahsmun Street, that was a whole other group. And it was like five cultures in one solid neighborhood. All those cultures, there were two major things that determined those little social classes. One was family relations, and the other was your economic status. So, people who lived in St. Martin’s, those were a lot more upgrades than Florence-Virgil, and Florence-Virgil was a lit more upgraded than the low-rises and the low rises were a lot more upgraded than the high rises. So it was really a class system playing into a dynamic—most people as a result that lived in Florence Virgil got their family members in. So, a lot of the family members I had growing up there—my mother’s sister was living in Florence-Virgil, as well as my father’s sister had an apartment at Florence-Virgil, and my father’s sister was a college graduate and worked for the state and made good money: a single parent, had a car, a lot of these things were unheard of coming out of the projects. Whereas she moved away from the projects—which was only two block away—uh, actually, one block and two parking lots— but just by being able to live across the parking lot, elevated her status and automatically disconnected her from folks who lived in the other parts of the neighborhood.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=148.27,295.14"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/6","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So, that was the kind of neighborhood dynamic that I grew up in; however, the common tie that binded was that everybody was black. No Puerto Ricans, no Hispanics, nobody knew what a Dominican was, no one knew nothing about a Portuguese. Everybody was black. You know, black, Negro: that was it. Um, colored, that was it. It was in a nutshell. I remembered growing up our neighborhood was so concentrated as African-Americans, I remember that one day, that there was a young man—he was white—apparently, he had…lost his way, coming up Goffe Street, going towards the firehouse,. So he was walking in from Sherman Parkway, down Goffe, back towards Yale. I don’t know if he was a Yale student—but he looked like he could have been a student of some sort. And there was a whole group of us playing…I want to say that there was roughly around 10 to 15  African-American boys between the ages of like, probably 8 to 17, and all I know is I heard somebody go, “who’s that white boy?” And, it was like the whole group—almost like, when you see those cameramen going to those areas where nobody has ever seen a camera before and they kind of stop for a minute and look and they reacted, and it’s like everybody just stopped, and they just reacted. And they chased this boy out of the neighborhood. They didn’t chase him down, they didn’t beat him up—they just chased him out of the neighborhood. And what was out of the neighborhood? Once he broke past Webster Street, where Webster and Sperry kind of meet-- the nexus—Webster and Goffe, where the firehouse is, once he broke that plane, he was in the safe zone. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=295.14,408.97"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/7","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And it was just that serious. You just did not see white folks in the black neighborhood. You didn’t see white people in Dixwell unless they were a social worker coming in or a teacher or something of that nature, and that allowed them pass into Dixwell culturally. A police officer, obviously. But, having now been a police officer for 11 years, and I have found that the second black police association—The New Haven Guardians—within the police department, within the 55 year history of the police department, it is, I’ve now found out that black cops were hired exclusively to work in the black neighborhoods. So when they hired black cops—as the kids say, “back in the day—when they hired the first black cop that we’ve known, that was hired for the police department, was known only as Mr. Purvis. And they hired Mr. Purvis exclusively to work at the large baseball game and event gatherings where there would be large concentrations of African Americans.  From Mr. Purvis, other officers were hired later on down the line exclusively to work in the black neighborhoods. So black officers did not work in Westville, they did not work in Fair Haven—which, keep in mind, Fair Haven was still, a grade balance of Portuguese—white—and African American. But they were exclusively hired to be in those areas—the high rises of Dixwell, Newhallville, those areas—and, even today—eleven year history, going back, been on the job eleven years—because the department has been around for approximately 55 years—in Dixwell, in the Dixwell Avenue area where we sit now, this area is staffed, primarily 99 percent African American. We have one Latino—Puerto Rican—cop that works in this area, now, we have, I believe one white officer that is assigned to this area. But on the night shift—black, and one Latino. On the midnight shift I believe we have one white cop and one Latino female: Puerto Rican.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=410.01,547.71"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/8","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So this is the nature of Dixwell. Some of this is done by design at the request of the residents. Some residents still do not feel comfortable having a large white population of cops working and policing them. They want black officers. I spoke with Scott Esdale a couple of years back regarding the Freddy Fixer parade and having officers marching the parade and he related to me that there was, you know, a concern that residents might prefer to see African American officers working the parade [pause] rather than having them all marching in the parade and having the parade being staffed by white officer who have, you know, some issues with the engaged public. So we recognize this, and we are able—with that knowledge I am able to address people at a larger scale that it’s not a racial issue. You know, you can’t have it both ways. You can’t one end say, well, we don’t want black cops we want to see more white cops but then say, well, we want more black cops. You have to figure out what you want. I looked at the focus more as, it’s not always about if the cop is black or white. I believe it’s if the individual is sincere about the population he is serving. And color, often in this country, cuts across one barrier but the other barriers are always economic at the root. And a result of your economic stat, it will have a bearing on where you can be educated, and your ability to be educated is based on your ability to, um, be able to communicate with people, and if you can’t communicate well, that’s going to put you in a whole other bracket. Sometimes that bracket is considered that you are an underachiever, or you’re deprived, or you’re not—you don’t have the aptitude to operate in my world. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=548.52,654.85"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/9","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So, with that being said, growing up in Dixwell was a very closed environment. Everything you did, growing up in Dixwell, happened in Dixwell. Dixwell had it’s—pretty much—had it’s…churches, so when you grew up, you went to a school—that school was in Dixwell. Normally it was Wexler-Grant and Winchester. Those were the two choices that you had. And then we had a place called Baldwin Street School. Back then school’s were segregated into like…your district. So, in other words, if you grew up in Elm Haven projects, you went to Winchester. Period. The only other school you were going to go to besides Winchester was Wexler-Grant. And then if you had some money, some connections, you might be able to get into St. Martin’s, which is the empty lot next to Scanteberry Park. That was a Catholic School. Um, the only black Catholic School that I ever knew of, that actually had black Catholic people, Because, nobody had ever even heard of no black Catholic people. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=654.85,722.22"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/10","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So, those were your picks. Now, the interesting thing was that, because you had this projects, and you had this Catholic school, you had this halfway decent education coming out of a college preparatory grammar school, so that you did have three options: Wexler-Grant, Winchester, or St. Martin de Poores. Some of the residents wanted to get their kids out to some of the better schools at that time, which was like, Troup Middle School, which was in Edgewood; Edgewood was still predominantly white, mostly Jewish, some Portuguese, some Italians, and a few blacks. Most of those blacks was Jamaican-West Indies. This is before drugs. This is before crack rock-cocaine. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=722.67,773.49"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/11","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And  some people wanted to get those kids to those areas. The only way to do that was to show an address where the kids lived. And a lot of people, they used their cousins and nephews and all that stuff to use those addresses and that got their kids out of that neighborhood and educated.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=774.19,788.47"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/12","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So it comes back to, sometimes, people say, well, they to me, because I grew up, I went to Wexler-Grant, from the third grade on, from first to second grade I was at the Malloy Road School in West Haven, which was just horrific. Racism at that time was just institutionalized. And even the books—ever book you read had Negro in it, or Black, um, Colored, um, anything, really, that really just denoted what was going on in our culture in terms of that time. And I know my first grade teacher I had a tremendous amount of problems with. They wanted to mark me as being that whole thing, ADD and all of that nonsense, so we—my mother moved me to Wexler-Grant, into the second grade, where I went to the second grade and my teacher was, surprisingly again, another white teacher. Um, several white teachers over at Wexler Grant at the time. Ms. Frasier was a teacher, Ms. Patterson, Ms. Young, there was a lot of black teachers over there. I think the principal over there was Mr. Esposito, who I wound up later on, I wound up going to school with his kids and later working for him as a substitute teacher later on down the road. Mr. Esposito was a nice guy—Italian dude, very in touch with the community. I think Wexler-Grant at that time was a very good school—very enthusiastic teachers, working together as a team—and, um, so my school was in my backyard. It was a bad deal.  Um, I was involved in the arts. Ms. Fulton, who’s still around, I see her often, she was the art teacher, very dedicated, single, fluent African-American lady, very cultured. She was into the arts and the whole deal. And she kept it alive at Wexler-Grant. We did a lot of things—singing choirs, music, we had arts there—I mean, the place was really alive with culture and vibrant. And I know that a lot of kids that I grew up, that was probably the strongest foundation that they got, was at Wexler-Grant. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=788.47,906.99"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/13","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And when fourth grade ended, at this wonderful school, you had the ability after fifth grade to go to Troup—no, no, you couldn’t go to Troup. You could go to Baldwin, or you could go to Winchester, because Winchester went up to the eighth grade. And Baldwin was located now where at the dead end of County Street where the condos are at. And there sat this big school, like this place, where they was doing organ operations on they wasn’t really successful. And you could go there, and that was school was just like, chaotic. And, I knew I didn’t want to go to Baldwin.  You know, as good as Wexler-Grant was, we fought everyday in school. Somebody wanted to fight you everyday, about the way you looked, about a shirt you had on, something. There was always something. It was just drama. Conflict and resolution was everyday. And if you didn’t fight during school, you had to be prepared to fight after school. If you were a good student you were going to have to fight because wanted to fight you because you were good, people wanted to fight you because you were tough—there was always something going on. And so, my mother asked me, “where do you want to go to school next?” Of course, I threw my hands high in the air for St. Aidan’s, which was in Westville.  And I knew I didn’t want to go to St. Martin’s. St. Martin’s was buried in the middle of the projects.  I mean, it was saturated. To get down that far to St. Martin’s to go to school, you had to pass all of the deep projects. And they were—the projects were so dense, you know? It was just like—you know, you didn’t want to have to deal with that kind of stuff. And as we were getting older—","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=907.13,1007.52"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/14","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Amber Joseph: You didn’t want to deal with what kind of stuff?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1007.54,1008.0"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/15","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: Well, to get down to Webster Street, you had cars parked on both sides of the street. You had these old trees that hovered over the street. You know, some folks took care of their yards and some folks didn’t. You had that, like, urban grass. We called it dirt. You know, that kind of dirt that when it rains, when the rain hits for the first five minutes, dust is just flying all over the place because it can’t even absorb water. And so, you dealt with that. You dealt with the trash dumpsters, just the trash in the street, the people just hanging out, basically—back then, you didn’t have crackheads—you had winos, people who drank, people just out bumming around, kind of. And then, you know, it was just the normal chaos. Sometimes you might run into a group of guys, they wanna fight, this and that. So, like, who wants to deal with that, going to school and coming home every day? You know, who wants to go through all of that…melodrama? Which is what it was.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1008.02,1062.14"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/16","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So opted for, you know, school is about education, send me where the education is at. The education was at St. Aidan’s. Cost a little bit more money—I think at that time, we was paying $800 a year, which, I’d cut my arm off to pay for any education like that for my kids now. And you know, the buses would pick you up—we’d catch the bus in front of Bethel Church, which was at Goffe and County. And that was such a nice area. The difference between Goffe and County then and the projects of Elm Haven, was the difference going to Goffe Street Park now and Edgewood Park. You know, it was a complete transition. It was like turning the page. Waiting for the bus, you know, in the spring, you could see the trees, it was peaceful, it was quiet. Um, you could actually see a bird, you know? Um, you could see grass. People would drive by with the nice, fancy cars…because, remember, all of the rich people lived basically up Goffe Street. They had to work downtown, so you had an opportunity to see all of those nice cars come by and stuff, and it was like, wow. And you’re going to get on a us, and you’re going to go that way. You know, so it’s like, wow. So that’s what prepping to go to school was all about. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1062.4,1139.44"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/17","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Amber Joseph: And it’s not like that now, the park at Goffe Street? ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1139.75,1141.44"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/18","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: Well, I’m not talking about the park—","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1141.46,1143.79"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/19","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Amber Joseph: But the area?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1144.46,1144.64"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/20","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: —I’m making a comparison to—of course not now, no, no. Now, you know, that area has even transitioned to, even though the church has done some development over there, you have the jail, which has become a mecca for family reunions. And it’s not the family’s fault, but the biggest—I guess what I’m saying is, for me, growing up, the biggest icon there was the church and that scenery of the little patches of nature that was represented. And now that area is probably known more to young people as being places where there are a lot of shootouts and violence—a nexus for violence—and a nexus for where family meets the criminal justice system, because, you know, you have the Whalley Avenue Jail, you have in front of that now the Whalley Avenue Detention Center, which we did not have when I was growing up—Whalley Avenue Juvenile was not in front.  So now you have—you have the juvenile—you have a criminal justice school, you know? And, um, in a lot of ways, our society has fed into that. At the Armory, when I was growing up, the Armory was where the soldiers were, and that was a place where would go and be like, “you wanna see the soldiers?” Go and see the soldiers and they would be doing their regiment and on occasion, we would have the Black Expo there and we would go in there and the Black Expo would be like, your first chance to see inside the army and it would be like, “wow, this is serious.” So you had a respect for the armory, you know, soldiers and all of this stuff. Now, you know, the Armory is a place that, if you don’t do well at Hillhouse or we don’t want to deal with your issues, socially or whatever, we will transfer you over to the Armory, at the Armory School, which is like a Hillhouse annex, where it’s any area where they’re displacing kids who they don’t want to deal with. I’ma be real about it, it’s my opinion. They don’t want to deal with these kids, or they’re not prepared in dealing with them, or they don’t know how to deal with them. And given their current state, these kids are being moved over to the Armory. And the Armory becomes the bad-boy school. In the front, behind the bad-boy school, is the jail, and behind that, or in front, however you want to look at it, is the juvenile probation facility. So if you’re really great, and you do a good job, we’ll put you in the Armory, and if you’re really great, and do a really great job, we’ll transfer you up front, where you can go from a freshman to a sophomore and you’re good and you graduate you can go to jail right there, how’s that? ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1144.66,1300.7"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/21","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"So, I think that, growing up, having known that area, that whole block now has, you know, really become a—you know, I don’t think that that block represents for lot a young people today what it represented for us. We knew that the jail was there. We had a healthy respect for that jail. We knew that it was there, but it wasn’t so visible. It was there, but you had to look for it, you know. It was kind of tucked away, everyone wasn’t going there. Now the jail is becoming—it’s an icon, like on a desktop. You know, click “Jail Publisher.” You know, we could make some cards and send them back home. Um, growing up, you know, those are, obviously, some of the stark differences. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1300.97,1341.07"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/22","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"The Dixwell Plaza, which is also the desktop icon for the urban sector—I don’t recall growing up that we hung out in front of the Dixwell Plaza as much as I see young people do it here. We spent a lot of our summers in the library, in each other’s houses, playing Monopoly. You know, I recall spending summers playing Monopoly and cards and Sorry! We played every game under the sun, religiously. When we got tired of doing that, we opened up a fire hydrant. When we got tired of doing that, we went to the park and played baseball. When we got tired of doing that, we played basketball. When we got tired of doing that, you know, when we got tired of going that, we went swimming at Hillhouse. The Q House was obviously open at that time, which was a major factor in what was going on in the community because you had a lot of children, there was a lot of things going on. During the time that I was growing up, not only did we have the Q House, but we also had Reverend Edmonds church—that’s Tony Walker Edmonds, State Representative Tony Walker Edmonds’ father’s—I call it their church that was operating there. And there was a gentleman named Mr. Bowie who taught music and you could go down there at any time and Mr. Bowie would teach you any instrument you wanted to play because he knew how to play them on and he had them all down there.  So if you didn’t want to go and get on what was going on in the Q House, you could go see Mr. Bowie, and if that wasn’t good enough for you, there was always something for young people to do, always a place to go. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1342.2,1439.56"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/23","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"And we had issues in the Plaza. I remember when the first liquor store opened up. When Proctor’s sold alcohol it was the first time that I ever saw a pharmacist sell alcohol. He sold medicine and alcohol! It was like, wow. Um, we had a gambling spot at Florentino’s, which is right where the Dixwell Market is right now. So the guys went over there and played their numbers, and we went over there and bought pea-shooters and candy. And popsicles came out for five doll—five cents—and stuff. So we had stuff, and we had a supermarket—Capital Market—was here then. Country Market was a little bit up the street, where you could get—where if you really wanted your bones and fat back and all of that other good stuff, you could go there. Most of the corner stores were owned by African-Americans or some Italian person that was nexused into the neighborhood that wasn’t too far away. We had the collard green man come out and do collard greens. The Elks Club was doing proactive things in the community in terms of cook-outs and things with the kids and the young people, so the Masons, you knew who they were because they were the ones out there doing stuff. And the Muslims were involved, from the Nation of Islam. And Muhammad Masjid were out, doing what we call outreach and involving the community. So, community was very vibrant, and a lot of the businesses on Dixwell, from Dixwell, starting on Broadway, all the way to the Hamden town line, were all black businesses. You know, we had bakery further up Dixwell in Newhallwville, Kramer’s. Best black bakery. You know we had a funeral parlor—when you died, black people buried you. When you wanted to go to church, black people married you. You wanted to go to school, black people taught you. You wanna eat, black people feed you. I mean, it was really a black-empowered zone from Dixwell all the way up. And I think we saw a lot of that reverberating into the culture of the kids. We had Bone(?) Peter’s dance school, which was the old firehouse, which is now right next to Bishop Brooks’ church, Buehler Heights. Diane Pettway, who is the branch manager here [at the Stetson Library] was a dancer over there. D.D. Holder, who is Donald Morrison’s wife, Donald Morrison runs the CCC now. You know, a big outreach guy in the community—he’s a minister. You know, these are the people, you could almost see that, this is what we had and these are the people that it produced. And, well, you have the critics who say, “”well, you made it, so-and-so made it, why did you guys make it and other people didn’t?” ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1440.98,1591.26"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/24","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Well, I went to private school. St. Aidan’s, when I finished St. Aidan’s I went to Notre Dame. You know, there was no way I was going to Hilhouse, Cross—I wasn’t scared of—for me, the thing wasn’t being scared to fight. That was—my parents didn’t raise me like that, I was raised for a long time by my grandmother and grandfather from South and North Carolina, um, who were very rich on values with the community and a whole lot of stuff.  I had generations of history and educating me. So, for me, it wasn’t about trying to be bad. My parents and family were, very, um, committed to education. Education, education, education was something that was always pushed in my family. So, I, uh, try to live up to that expectation of trying to be a smart person.\u003cbr\u003eAmber Joseph: So, you describe a very vibrant neighborhood—did you thin of yourself as living in a so-called low-income neighborhood? ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1591.61,1655.16"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/25","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: Well, we knew that…Dixwell was funny. When I grew up, I grew up in Florence-Virgil, and there was broke and there was poor. We were broke. The folks that lived in the projects were poor. The difference was, folks that lived in the projects were almost all exclusively all on welfare. This was the persona that was given, that the folks on the projects are on welfare. Those are folks who don’t have a husband; they’re mostly single parent mothers. And that’s why they’re on welfare. Because either—it wasn’t like they didn’t have a husband because they had a baby’s daddy. They didn’t have a husband because some of them got divorced, many of their husbands had went to Vietnam and died, man of their husbands were involved in some point in the military, where they kind of flaked out when they came back, Many of their husbands were men that were in transition, were living in other states trying to work and do different things, things that was going on. So it wasn’t like it was this culture of baby mommas all living together and raising kids—no. I knew maybe out of fifty of the friends that I grew up with in the projects, in the low rises, maybe two of their mothers had a drinking problem, and one had a real bad drinking problem, you know what I mean, but everybody kind of knew that, and kind of kept that low-key. But we didn’t have mothers being dope fiends and other foolishness going on. Things like domestic violence wasn’t anything that was rampant. You know, I didn’t know of too many girls growing up that were molested or boys, or at last nobody talked about that kind of stuff. And we didn’t—and stuff like sex offenders—there was people in the neighborhood that people knew, “don’t you go near him,” you know, you stay away from that dude. And everybody knew that. But it was like, one dude. It wasn’t like all of these different people with a cast of suspicion. So growing up, folks that lived in Florence-Virgil, and St. Martin’s—that side of Dixwell, you could say the left side going towards Hamden, those were the broke folk. But they had cars, they had their own bedrooms, they had hardwood floors in their house, they had windows—they had a whole lot different of things. The folks that lived in the projects, those were the poor folks. They were visibly poor. Normally, there were multiple siblings, like three or four kids in the house. Whereas people who lived on this side, maybe had like two or three kids. And then they had another income coming in. So you had two incomes, versus welfare income. And then that was, if I’m not mistaken, part of the criterion for living in the projects, that you had to be on welfare, you couldn’t make a certain amount of money, you couldn’t make too much money and you couldn’t make too low money. You had to be like right in the middle. So the parents had a very challenging way of trying to balance that money as a way of trying to make ends meet. And things wasn’t so expensive, and people’s need for materialistic things were not as demanding. People were more spiritual, less materialistic . At that time you could get by with little. Now as time goes on in this history of Dixwell, a lot of dynamics from the outside begin to influence the community, and that really put a spin on the way a lot of things really developed down the line.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1655.16,1861.13"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/26","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Amber Joseph: Did you think, living on the left side, that you were distinctly different from people who were living on welfare and living in the projects? ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1861.15,1872.37"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/27","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: Oh yeah. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1872.39,1873.23"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/28","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Amber Joseph: Were they stigmatized?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1873.25,1873.43"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/29","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: Yeah! Oh course.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1873.45,1876.59"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/30","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Amber Joseph: How so?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1878.61,1878.74"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/31","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"Shafiq Abdussabur: Projects were like, to say that someone was coming from the projects was basically like, in modern day, today, if you was to call someone a Negro. You know, so you would have, “oh man, go back to the projects. Nobody is trying to hear that. Don’t come over here with that project talk.” You know, or it’s a project something. And then “projects” and “ghetto” was used synonymously for those who lived in the low or the high rises. And if you lived on Ashmun Street, you didn’t even have to say none of that. Just say “Ashmun Street.” Go on back to Ashmun Street, man. Aw, man! Everybody was like, “it’s like that?”   Because what did Ashmun Street have? You had no backyard, I mean, back then, kids were real crude, so you could get real specific. If you’ve got no backyard, you can’t get no grass. Your tomato plant is on the terrace. You know. You’re eating on a Hibachi. You know what I’m saying, so…Hibachis was for people who had a terrace. Grills were for people who had a backyard. Florence-Virgil residents had backyards. With a fence. You could have a dog. You know, which dogs were big then. You know, a puppy. Folks that lived in the projects couldn’t have that. Folks that lived in the low-rises of the projects had backyards. But they were so small. You could only get like ten people in there to do a cook-out. And then if you had a cook-out, they didn’t even have a real high fence. The fence was about, three feet high. All the fences that ran through the backyards were about three feet high. All connected and they were all three feet high. So they kind of looked like chicken pens. And their walkway was so small you could barely even fit a wheelbarrow through. So you had this narrow walkway, and if you were a female, inevitably, if you were trying to walk too fast with stockings on, you’d rip your stockings before you even got three fences down because if you didn’t get snagged by a blade of grass that was almost as tall as your knee, you were going to get snagged by a fence that was, uh, uh, a fence that was not being maintained. So your level of privacy was a whole different ballgame. ","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1878.76,1990.25"},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/32","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"In the projects, then, we didn’t really have basketball courts. Like this thing, where you throw the ball in and in come out of like, four different tubes. You didn’t know what side it was going to come. So anything you got you shared that with the whole community. If you got a new ball, everybody played with that new ball. You couldn’t go out and just do a one-on-one or a two-on-two, you and your father, you and your cousin. You couldn’t do that. You had to share that ball with everybody there. If you got a football, you know, you might be the only person with a football. In the community. Out of like twenty kids. So you might want to play football for like an hour and want to leave and can’t, because twenty other kids are engaged in a full scale football game. So then you have to go home, and be like, look. “Yo, Jay, drop that off at my grandmother’s house.” “A’ight, I got you, I got you.” I mean, that’s how poor it was. That’s not poor? That’s serious. You know what I mean? Bikes? Forget about it. Nobody had no bike. Folks was walking. We had no bike, no skateboards, no roller-blades. When them things came out, you were lucky if you got stuff like that. And so, as I talk about the dynamics changing, when I grew up, these are things we didn’t have. As other families moved into the neighborhood, and people moved on and different things, folks started coming around and some had bikes and things like that. You know, and then the kids got involved in taking those things.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512#t=1990.62,2077.38"}]},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["English [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/92512/transcript/49564/annotation/33","type":"Annotation","motivation":"subtitling","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/file_transcripts/associated_files/000/049/564/original/transcript_1693962051.vtt20230906-1288019-fthy8n?1693962051","format":"text/vtt","language":"en"},"target":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/file_transcripts/associated_files/000/049/564/original/transcript_1693962051.vtt20230906-1288019-fthy8n?1693962051"}]}]},{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/238518","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 2 of 2 - open-uri20240326-2906522-3s7gj6.mpga"]},"duration":1800.07184,"width":640,"height":40,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/public/images/audio-default.png","type":"Image","format":"image/png"}],"items":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/238518/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/238518/content/2/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-yalemssa.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/238/518/original/open-uri20240326-2906522-3s7gj6.mpga?1711449160","type":"Audio","format":"audio/mpeg","duration":1800.07184,"width":640,"height":40},"target":"https://yalemssa.aviaryplatform.com/collections/988/collection_resources/26081/file/238518","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[]}]}