{"@context":"http://iiif.io/api/presentation/3/context.json","id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/iiif/0z70v8ck8f/manifest","type":"Manifest","label":{"en":["Gary Ackerman Oral History"]},"logo":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/010/original/Aviary_QPLlogo_192x192.png?1578574261","metadata":[{"label":{"en":["Description"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eGary L. Ackerman (b. 1942) served the people of Queens as a New York State Senator from 1979 to 1983, and as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1983 until his retirement in 2013. During his long tenure as a Congressman, Ackerman was a member of the Committees on Financial Services and Foreign Affairs, and sponsored significant health-related legislation, including the “Baby AIDS Amendment” that required mandatory AIDS testing of newborns and disclosure of the results to the mother, as well as legislation requiring Medicare to cover prostate cancer screening. A Democrat, he was frequently a part of bipartisan initiatives and served under five presidents.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e \u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003eIn this interview, conducted by his longtime friend and former staff member Terri Thomson, Ackerman focuses on his pre-Congressional life in Queens. Born in Brooklyn, he moved to Flushing’s Pomonok Housing as a child and made lifelong friends there. He speaks especially of his time at Queens College, where he met his future wife, Rita, and discovered and developed his public speaking and leadership skills as president of his house plan and senior class, vice president of the Central House Plan organization, and editor of the Castle newspaper. Following graduation, he taught for five years in Jamaica’s Shimer Junior High School, making history as New York’s first male public school teacher to apply for what would become paternity leave. Nearly 25 years later, Ackerman co-signed the landmark 1993 Family and Medical Leave Act, which guaranteed this right on a national basis. Before beginning his public service career, Ackerman also founded the Queens Tribune newspaper (originally the Flushing Tribune), which ran for 48 years.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},{"label":{"en":["Rights Statement"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eCC BY-NC-SA Contact digitalarchives@queenslibrary.org for research and reproduction requests.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},{"label":{"en":["Date"]},"value":{"en":["2026-02-04 (created)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Tags"]},"value":{"en":["Queens College Alumni"]}},{"label":{"en":["Type"]},"value":{"en":["Video"]}},{"label":{"en":["Agent"]},"value":{"en":["Gary Ackerman (Interviewee)","Terri Thomson (Interviewer)","Lori Wallach (Contributor)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Coverage"]},"value":{"en":["1940s-1978 (temporal)","Queens College, Flushing, and South Jamaica, Queens, NY; Brooklyn, NY (spatial)"]}},{"label":{"en":["Language"]},"value":{"en":["English"]}}],"summary":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eGary L. Ackerman (b. 1942) served the people of Queens as a New York State Senator from 1979 to 1983, and as a member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1983 until his retirement in 2013. During his long tenure as a Congressman, Ackerman was a member of the Committees on Financial Services and Foreign Affairs, and sponsored significant health-related legislation, including the \u0026ldquo;Baby AIDS Amendment\u0026rdquo; that required mandatory AIDS testing of newborns and disclosure of the results to the mother, as well as legislation requiring Medicare to cover prostate cancer screening. A Democrat, he was frequently a part of bipartisan initiatives and served under five presidents.\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u0026nbsp;\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003eIn this interview, conducted by his longtime friend and former staff member Terri Thomson, Ackerman focuses on his pre-Congressional life in Queens. Born in Brooklyn, he moved to Flushing\u0026rsquo;s Pomonok Housing as a child and made lifelong friends there. He speaks especially of his time at Queens College, where he met his future wife, Rita, and discovered and developed his public speaking and leadership skills as president of his house plan and senior class, vice president of the Central House Plan organization, and editor of the Castle newspaper. Following graduation, he taught for five years in Jamaica\u0026rsquo;s Shimer Junior High School, making history as New York\u0026rsquo;s first male public school teacher to apply for what would become paternity leave. Nearly 25 years later, Ackerman co-signed the landmark 1993 Family and Medical Leave Act, which guaranteed this right on a national basis. Before beginning his public service career, Ackerman also founded the Queens Tribune newspaper (originally the Flushing Tribune), which ran for 48 years.\u003c/p\u003e"]},"requiredStatement":{"label":{"en":["Attribution"]},"value":{"en":["\u003cp\u003eCC BY-NC-SA Contact digitalarchives@queenslibrary.org for research and reproduction requests.\u003c/p\u003e"]}},"provider":[{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/aboutus","type":"Agent","label":{"en":["Queens Public Library"]},"homepage":[{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/","type":"Text","label":{"en":["Queens Public Library"]},"format":"text/html"}],"logo":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/organizations/logo_images/000/000/010/original/Aviary_QPLlogo_192x192.png?1578574261","type":"Image"}]}],"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/308/731/small/ackerman_gary_20260204_portrait_resized.jpg?1777918919","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731","type":"Canvas","label":{"en":["Media File 1 of 1 - ackerman_gary_20260204_full.mp4"]},"duration":2835.08,"width":640,"height":360,"thumbnail":[{"id":"https://d9jk7wjtjpu5g.cloudfront.net/collection_resource_files/thumbnails/000/308/731/small/ackerman_gary_20260204_portrait_resized.jpg?1777918919","type":"Image","format":"image/jpeg"}],"items":[{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/content/1","type":"AnnotationPage","items":[{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/content/1/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"painting","body":{"id":"https://aviary-p-queenslibrary.s3.wasabisys.com/collection_resource_files/resource_files/000/308/731/original/ackerman_gary_20260204_full.mp4?1777918706","type":"Video","format":"video/mp4","duration":2835.08,"width":640,"height":360},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731","metadata":[]}]}],"annotations":[{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["Full Transcript [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/1","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"LORI WALLACH: Hello, it is Wednesday, February 4th, 2026. I am Lori Wallach from the Queens Memory Project, and we are about to record an interview with retired U.S. Congressman Gary Ackerman at his home on Long Island in New York. Conducting the interview today will be Gary's longtime friend and former staff person, Terri Thomson. Thank you both so much for doing this interview. We appreciate it. Have a wonderful conversation.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=4.0,30.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/2","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Thank you.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=30.0,31.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/3","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Thanks, Lori. So Gary, I guess it was 1980 I went to work for you and I'm one of hundreds of people who can say that you changed our lives. Hundreds of people who've worked for you over the years, and it's been an honor and a privilege for me. And now you are a lifelong friend and our families are connected forever through holidays and traditions and our love for all of each other. So we're going to talk a little bit about your early years before Congress. So maybe let's start talking about your family's history, your mom and dad and aunts and uncles, where they came from and how they ended up in the U.S.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=31.0,76.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/4","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Well, they came from afar, as they say. My mother was born in Poland, or she was born in Russia, or she was born in Eastern Europe somewhere, but it was northeast of Warsaw. And the country always changed depending on who conquered it, but it was Poland. But they never said they were Polish. I think most of the Jews from Poland always identified as Jewish and not as Polish because the country kept changing on them. She had four brothers and sisters, and my father had one sister and two brothers. And they lived in the same neighborhood, and they grew up practically on the same block or around the corner from each other.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=76.0,134.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/5","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: My mother's family was very close to us. My father went off to the war when I was born, and I didn't really get to meet him or remember ever meeting him until he came home. And I was about three and a half years old. So that was an experience. My mother's family is very closely knit. My father's family, not so much. My grandfather on my father's side, my Ackerman grandfather, had eight sisters. So there's a lot of different names in that side of the family. My mother's side, the name was Bandrymer in Poland, but they became Barnett when they got here. And they lived on the Lower East Side originally, all of them. And they moved to Brooklyn, both families separately, but coincidentally, around the corner from each other practically. And my mother's family owned the neighborhood bakery. My grandfather, Joe Barnett, had Barnett's Bakery, which was the third of his bakeries, the third or fourth, I think.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=134.0,210.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/6","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: But he had that for the longest period of time during the war and afterwards. And everybody that I meet, that I've met over the years from back then, always talks about going into Barnett's Bakery and having some kind of great experience there. Seemed like they fed half the neighborhood towards the end of the week with all the leftover bread they had, because they wouldn't throw anything away. They just gave it away. Which is not what you do when you're in a food business, you throw it away, because then you could sell the other inventory that comes in. At any rate, my Ackerman grandfather was a tailor. He had a tailoring business, and he owned a small apartment house and the building that they lived in, after a while. What else?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=210.0,268.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/7","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: When did you move from Brooklyn to Queens? How old were you?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=268.0,273.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/8","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Well, we lived in a project in Brooklyn, is the first thing that I can remember. When my father came home from the Army, we were in Kingsborough Housing Project. I was eight years old and we moved to Queens to be in, what my mother told me was the country. So we moved to the country to Queens and they had trees, which we really didn't have in our old neighborhood -- not too many anyway, just maybe one on a block. I went to school in Brooklyn until I think the fourth grade or fifth. And that year we moved to Queens.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=273.0,313.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/9","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: I was eight years old and lived in Pomonok Housing Project, which was a...depends on who you ask, but the official records show that it was a low-income housing project owned by the New York City Housing Authority. And it was paid for originally by the federal government. So it was a federally owned, city-run and -managed housing project. We had incinerators where we threw the garbage out on each floor, down the shaft, and it burned downstairs and smoke went up the chimney and they put the burnt garbage in, I guess they were 55-gallon drums and put them out on the sidewalk. Today, that's all changed because they just throw the garbage away and put them in big black bags. So you see it piled up on every corner around in that neighborhood.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=313.0,373.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/10","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: It was great growing up in the project. We didn't know that it was low-income or anything. It was middle class as far as we were concerned. I had about a million friends, which is, I guess, one of the things that propelled, if not motivated me, into public service a long time ago. I was pretty shy. I had knees that didn't work the way they were supposed to work. So I had several operations before I was 12 years old. And I didn't play any sports, but I was always in the playground, always in the park, always climbing and doing things. My friends were all great athletes in the neighborhood, and I'd be there all day long with them. And I had a radio, one of those...I guess today they would be boomboxes, but then they were transistor radios and they were quite small, and I had it all the time. And I would be listening to the radio and the talk shows and just learning things. And Queens College was in the neighborhood. We were on the other side of Kissena Boulevard, which is where the project is now, Pomonok.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=373.0,457.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/11","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: I started out in the fourth grade and P.S. 183 [note: P.S. 163] went up to the eighth grade. We didn't go to junior high school; we went to high school, and I was lucky enough to get into Brooklyn Tech. And I went back to Brooklyn to go to high school for four years. So every day I trudged through the snow from one end of the project all the way up to Jewel Avenue and took the bus to Forest Hills and then took the train from Forest Hills into Brooklyn to go to Tech. I didn't know what I wanted to be when I grew up. I was pretty handy around the house and I fixed the radio somehow. No, it was a toaster. Sorry, I fixed the toaster. And my mother was very impressed. So I was going to be an electrical engineer, I decided. And when I graduated from Tech, I was able to get into Queens College.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=457.0,522.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/12","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: They showed poor judgment, I guess, and accepted me anyway. And then the toaster broke, and there went my career as an engineer. So I switched majors after a while in Queens College. In Queens College -- I went to Queens College because I could afford it, or rather my parents could afford it. The tuition was $12.50 a semester, which was absolutely amazing. It was basically free, but we knew it was $12.50, that's for sure. And at one time, I had three different part-time jobs in order to buy my books, but I did not become an engineer happily, it seems, or maybe that was a mistake today. But Brooklyn Tech was an all-boys school, and today it's a co-ed, and I guess it's dominated by Asians today, for the most part. And back then, there were almost no Asians in the school or in the project, but the project was integrated, and we didn't know any difference between people.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=522.0,608.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/13","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Everybody was equal, everybody was friends, and I had tons of them. I was able to go building by building and tell you who lived on which floor and in which entrance, which was very, very helpful in running for office when you start figuring out how many people you actually do know. And if you lived in the project, you knew everybody. Queens College, I was very shy. I didn't like speaking out in class in public school and not in college. And then one day we were on the way over to school and one of my friends said, \"We're going to start a house plan.\" And I know they don't have too many house plans today, but back then they were the rage. House plans were the fraternities for the average kids who couldn't afford all together to buy a house. We didn't even own a house. Those of us that lived in Pomonok, anyway.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=608.0,680.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/14","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: But Queens College was great because there were people of all kinds of backgrounds because the price was right. Price was right for everybody. Everybody paid almost nothing, compared to today, almost nothing. And my friends encouraged me to be the president of the house plan that we started. So I did, and I became very active. I was the vice president of the Central House Plan, which was a coordinating group that all the house plans belonged to. I decided we should have a newspaper, so I started one. I became the editor-in-chief of the Castle and put out the Castle for the first time ever.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=680.0,722.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/15","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Then the administration had a rule that they could only have one newspaper on campus, and we weren't going to be it because we were just a little too independent. They had no control because we funded it ourselves, by selling ads to the house plans who put little tiny ads in the paper about events they were having and where their parties were going to be on the weekend. And we didn't have a house to have the parties in, so we always had it in somebody's house or somebody's basement. And there were male house plans and female house plans. They were segregated to that extent. Today, they still have them, I believe, but they don't know anything about the history. [Note: At the time of this interview, there were no active house plans at the college.]","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=722.0,765.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/16","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: When I graduated, I had been voted the...One of the big awards they had was always won by a fraternity. They would have milk bottles. Milk used to come in bottles -- I don't know if you know that, but milk used to come in bottles [laughs]. And if somebody goes like this and goes like that [makes bottle-shaking gestures], that's because it wasn't homogenized and you had to shake it to get the cream and the milk mixed in the milk bottle. So you had milk bottles, and every organization on campus could enter somebody. And this was the \"Ugly Man on Campus\" contest. You didn't have to be ugly, but I guess maybe it helped in my case, anyway. And you had your picture, not on the milk container, but on a milk bottle, and people would put money in through the top of the bottle, and you never knew how much was in because if they put a dollar bill, they would roll it up.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=765.0,829.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/17","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: And AE Pi used to win most of the time, because -- AE Pi or Phi Ep -- because those were the guys who came from wealthier backgrounds because they could afford the dues over in the fraternities. And in the house plans, we didn't need much dues because we didn't have to support a house. I won the ugly man on campus contest. And I tell everybody that I won it on the merits. I was the only one who ever won it on the merits. So I was the ugly man on campus.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=829.0,866.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/18","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: I also was the president of the senior class in January of 1964 [note: 1965], and editor of the paper, president of my house plan, and all around pain in the neck for the administration to handle. And they decided they didn't want to have more than one newspaper, so they tried to put us out of business. And they said, \"The newspaper can't be more than 8.5 by 11 [inch] single pages.\" So I went to that kind of a format, but made it as a regular newspaper. And we called it Son of Castle instead of Castle. And we held a funeral for the Castle, and we went down and we rented a coffin. Yes, a coffin, from a local funeral parlor and somebody at the end got a used coffin, I don't know! [laughs] But we rented a coffin and filled it with all the campus publications with the words on it: \"Who's next?\" And we had a parade all across the campus to where the dean's office was and put it under his window and just left it there. And they called up and said, \"You can take the coffin now. It's been here all day.\" And they said, \"No, we're not taking it. We're leaving it there. It's yours. You killed the paper. You bury it.\" [See related photo.]","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=866.0,950.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/19","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: So that's when I became active and learned how to talk out and be a pain in the neck towards the administration. And if they passed rules like that, that didn't make any sense to us because it violated our -- what we thought was our freedom, but they had a legal right to do it evidently, because we checked that out. Anyway, that was life on campus. Friday nights were parties, Saturday nights were parties. The daytime was...you had to study for school and do all that. And I became a history and an education major instead of an engineer. And that was my life on Queens College's campus.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=950.0,996.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/20","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Gary, you were on campus at a very historic, socially active time in history in the early '60s. Can you talk about what campus life was like then?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=996.0,1008.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/21","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Yeah. Well, the athletes were the athletes. They were the jocks. And then you had all the social organizations, which were very numerous and very active. And you had the social organizations -- a lot of people belonged to a whole bunch of different ones. It was a time for the Civil Rights Movement in the '60s, the Vietnam War was raging. Suddenly there was a draft that everybody was concerned with. It wasn't about what mark, did you get an A or B or a C? It was, what's your number on the draft? was all the talk because a lot of people on campus, on city college campuses, especially Queens, were very anti-war; [it] didn't make any sense.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1008.0,1059.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/22","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: And one of the students that had an office near mine in the College Memorial Center, which I don't know what they're using that building for now, but it was the CMC as it was known. [Note: At the time of this interview, the former CMC was called the I Building and housed the college's IT department.] And there were offices for different student organizations, and several rooms down from my office, from the Castle, Central House Plan, there was a group that was very, very super involved in the war, against it. And Andrew Goodman, who was a student at Queens College, was going down with a whole bunch of our other friends to Mississippi, to register people for voting. That was a time of all the civil rights movements coming to a head and the war at the same time. And they were organizing in this organization called SNCC -- the Student New...SNAC, Students New Action Organization [Note: It was the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).] -- and Andrew Goodman was among them, and they organized the trip down to Mississippi to register people to vote. And he had made up with the people in the office there that they were going to call back at 5 o'clock every single day, no matter what was going on, to let them know. And of course, the history shows that they never came back, and that the first day they were there, that they didn't call back at that time, they knew there was a problem. And we decided we had to get the press involved to get the FBI involved to go down there and try to find them, but they weren't missing very long.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1059.0,1190.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/23","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: So we held a strike, a student hunger strike. It was the first strike that was ever held like that, a hunger strike on a city college campus. And I was like a prize because I wasn't part of that group originally. I was very interested in it and sympathetic and agreed with the cause and everything, but I wasn't in that organization. So they were happy that I joined the group. And we went and we ate lunch in the lunchroom, or we sat in the lunchroom where everybody else was eating lunch, I should say. And we had a rope around us, like a rope line that they have in the movie theaters or the red carpet places. And all day long, we sat there and we wouldn't eat and we didn't go to class.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1190.0,1241.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/24","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: And we did that for quite a few days. I forgot how many days it was altogether, maybe -- it was less than a week. And we drank water was our diet until the FBI decided they were going to come in early and look for them. And they did. They found them, as you know, in the Mississippi mud. And they're buried on the Queens-Brooklyn border, the same cemetery that coincidentally my parents happened to be buried in, and they're right across the way a few feet down from my parents' burial place. [Note: Goodman is buried in Mount Judah Cemetery.] And his father, Andrew Goodman's father, was a poet and a philosopher, and they designed a gorgeous tombstone with hands crossed, holding hands all across the tombstone. And the FBI, of course, found them buried in the Mississippi mud. And they made the movie Mississippi Burning, which tells that story.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1241.0,1317.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/25","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Very sad. How did you do in school? How did you do in Queens College?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1317.0,1321.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/26","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Terrible.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1321.0,1322.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/27","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Your academic career. Talk about your academics.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1322.0,1326.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/28","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Actually, it was very successful when you think about it. I learned my profession. I learned my trade. I probably held a record for cutting classes more than anybody in the history of the school. I probably graduated, I never checked it for sure, but it had to be close to last place as president of the senior class. And the reason is, I cut the classes, I just stood outside the classroom talking to people, and that's what politicians do. And you find out what their problems are and what they're interested in, and then you go about trying to work with them on them. But the interesting thing was, I remember going to Dean [James] Kreuzer's office and talking to the dean. He was the dean of students. \"What do I do?\" He says, \"Well, you got all these incompletes.\" He says, \"These incompletes are automatically going to turn to failures, to Fs. And what you have to do is you have to drop those classes if you can.\" I said, \"How do I do that? \" He says, \"You go to the teachers and ask them, you weren't in the class and you never showed up.\" I said, \"Well, that's true.\" And he said, \"And ask them if you can drop the class.\"","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1326.0,1397.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/29","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: So I started to do that. I forgot who the teacher was, because I didn't really know the teachers, but I tracked them all down and I said, \"I want to drop your class.\" They said, \"Who are you?\" I said, \"That's exactly the point! Who am I? I was never in your class.\" And one by one, they started allowing me to drop the classes that I never attended. And I dropped enough classes to get my grade point average up above the point you needed it. And I walked into the office one day to review where we were standing and Dean Kreuzer said, \"Where are we?\" And the woman who was wonderful working in the office, Mrs. Krumholz, said, \"I think we're at 1.999.\" So I needed to drop one more course, which was easy to do because they were very willing. And I dropped them and I graduated, president of the senior class.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1397.0,1458.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/30","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Wow, that's amazing. It's amazing. So after you left Queens College, what'd you do? You graduated Queens...well, first of all, talk to me a little bit about meeting Rita.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1458.0,1476.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/31","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: That was the best thing that happened at Queens College. I met this young lady on a college weekend. They had Queens College leadership -- freshman leadership weekend, it was called at the time -- where freshmen who were interested in going to Queens College and joining organizations would go on the weekend and meet the people who were leaders in the various different campus organizations. And there she was, the love of my life. We met, we dated, we married, we had three children, we have four grandchildren, three boys and a girl, presently.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1476.0,1522.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/32","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: I know there was an interesting story of how you got engaged.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1522.0,1529.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/33","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: There was?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1529.0,1530.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/34","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Yes, there was. You got engaged on campus, didn't you?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1530.0,1535.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/35","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Oh yeah, we did.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1535.0,1536.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/36","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: You proposed on campus.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1536.0,1538.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/37","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: I proposed on campus and she accepted on campus.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1538.0,1544.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/38","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Great fun. So you leave Queens College, and what was your career? What did you do after Queens College?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1544.0,1551.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/39","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: I taught. I was a schoolteacher. I graduated with enough courses in education that I actually attended. Spanish was my weak point, because I passed most of my courses by being a fairly good writer and they didn't want to know if it was true, whatever you were writing about. So if it was history, I wrote about history. I could make up history and write about it, but I couldn't make up a whole language. And I saved for a long time the papers that I got back in Spanish. I remember you'd go into class say, \"Who has so-and-so for the psychology and who has so-and-so?\" But the teachers were going, \"Who has Ackerman for Spanish 1?\" [laughs] I repeated it so many times, but you couldn't make up a language. You couldn't invent one. You couldn't fake it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1551.0,1616.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/40","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: So where did you teach?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1616.0,1619.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/41","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: I taught in -- I asked what the worst school, the toughest school, I asked, in Queens. And they said it was, for intermediate school, it was Shimer Junior High School in South Jamaica. So I taught in South Jamaica. I went to South Jamaica and I went into the office and I gave him my resumé and I was hired. They couldn't get teachers to work there. The only teachers that worked there were people trying to avoid the draft, that were men anyway, and they wanted some men who could teach math, and I was pretty good at math. So I taught math. And Mr. Booty, who was the principal at the time, came in the next day when I was there and he says, \"You were very active at Queens College.\" I says, \"Yeah, I was. How do you know?\" He says, \"My daughter told me when I got home. I said, 'I hired somebody who went to Queens College.' \" Well, she evidently -- I didn't know who she was.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1619.0,1688.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/42","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: But anyway, that's how I got the job. And I became right away the editor of the school newspaper, the publisher of the school newspaper. And I taught a journalism class. They didn't have journalism before. Anyway, they went from one of the worst schools in the city as far as academics were concerned. It was a school that had the highest number of pupils who were in foster care. And what people would do, they would take in a kid, and when the kid got too old and ate too much, they would trade them, send them back and get a different kid. And it was like a game they played with the city. But the kids -- some of them were very, very well taken care of in the homes they were in. But it was a pretty tough school.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1688.0,1740.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/43","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: And I taught math. I taught social studies and I taught special ed. They had a special program for kids that -- it was a great program. I taught math by bringing in street signs that were in the shape of triangles and octagons and hexagons and all that, and taught geometry by street signs, which the kids were very interested in. So you had to be able to get their attention. And most of these kids were going to be high school dropouts. That's how they were picked for the program. The kids who were not going to make it in high school, they knew who they were in junior high school, and they were in this special program. And then they discontinued the program because that's the way the Board of Education works. They do everything cockeyed. There's no follow-up. They had the data, but they didn't know how to use it. And had no motivation to follow through. I taught for about five years and my daughter was born. I can tell that story, can't I?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1740.0,1813.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/44","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Sure you can, absolutely. It's a great story.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1813.0,1815.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/45","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: My daughter was born.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1815.0,1821.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/46","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: I just want to start by saying your education career, your teaching career, there was sort of a theme there in writing and newspaper production.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1821.0,1831.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/47","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Yeah, there was.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1831.0,1832.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/48","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Right.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1832.0,1833.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/49","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: It was. There was. My daughter was born, and I decided I was going to try to do something in journalism. So I started with a friend of mine from Queens College, who I think you've interviewed once upon a time [see Richard Branciforte oral history], planning to put out a newspaper in Jamaica where he lived and in Flushing where I lived. And then we decided that we weren't going to do that. We were going to keep them separate. So I put out a newspaper in Queens and he put out a newspaper in Jamaica, Queens. I was in Flushing. My daughter was born and I said, \"I'm going to take a shot and take a leave of absence.\" I enjoyed staying home with my daughter while that lasted when she was first born in 1969, November of '69. And I decided I was going to take a leave of absence. I didn't qualify for anything except maternity leave. So I became the guy, the first guy, the first guy ever, the only guy at the time to apply for maternity leave.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1833.0,1910.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/50","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: From the Board of Ed?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1910.0,1911.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/51","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: From the Board of Education, from the New York City Board of Education. And a lot of funny stories go along with that. I'll spare you all the pain.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1911.0,1920.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/52","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: You can tell some of them. It's fine.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1920.0,1923.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/53","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Well, he said, \"Why are you applying for this?\" The board was meeting in the next room and he was outside that room with me. I said, \"Well, I became a father and I enjoy being a father. I want to spend time.\" He said, \"Well, what about your wife?\" I said, \"Well, she enjoys being a mother. And it's our business why, not yours.You're my employer.\" So he goes back in the room and he comes back out and he says, \"Well, the board is deciding now that on the basis of...\" Hold on. What do you call it? Not seniority...","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1923.0,1969.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/54","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: I don't know. Based on seniority, based on length of service or no?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1969.0,1975.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/55","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: History.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1975.0,1976.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/56","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Yeah.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1976.0,1977.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/57","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Nobody ever did it.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1977.0,1978.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/58","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Nobody ever did it. Yeah, I know what you mean, I can't think of the word either.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1978.0,1982.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/59","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: There's a word.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1982.0,1983.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/60","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Yeah. A precedent.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1983.0,1985.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/61","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Precedent, yeah. OK. He came back after going into the meeting and said they decided that because of precedent, nobody has ever -- no man has ever applied for maternity leave before. I said --","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1985.0,1999.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/62","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: And I notice you're calling it \"maternity leave.\"","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1999.0,2001.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/63","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Because, yeah, that was it. It was maternity leave. There was no paternity leave. There was no such thing. I applied for something that didn't exist and wanted to get it, but I said it's for fathers. And what I did was I had called my wife's gynecologist and I said, \"Doc, this is what I'm trying to do, get paternity leave for men.\" He goes, \"That's a great idea.\" And he met me at a bus stop because I didn't need an office appointment. Met me at a bus stop in Forest Hills after he was finished with his working hours and he filled it out. [The form] said, \"the name of this illness is...\" he put down \"fatherhood.\" He just went along, right along with the form, and I did too. And I filed it and the principal turned it down.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2001.0,2057.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/64","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: I was the chapter chairman for the union back then in the school. And that was when the big strike was and Big Al [United Federation of Teachers president Albert Shanker] had the teachers out on a strike over Ocean Hill-Brownsville [in 1968]. And I made sure that my teachers went out as well. And what we did was we had the kids stay out of school if they were coming to school with books or not. Some of them came to school without their books. And we would have a bus around the corner that we got from a private guy who had a bus company, private bus company, put the kids on that bus and took them to a church over in South Jamaica, and we ran a school.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2057.0,2105.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/65","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Wow.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2105.0,2106.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/66","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Nobody knew we were running a school, but we didn't want the kids not to be in school. And we were teachers, so we were going to teach if we could. And we did, and we taught in the church during the time of the teachers' strike.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2106.0,2119.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/67","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Anyway, what happens is, I had a sterling record up until that time, being the head of the school newspaper and the kids would win first place in the Columbia Interscholastic [note: Scholastic] Press Association for high school and junior high school kids. And our school, which did very poorly in the rankings of anything, did very well and would win first place for a couple of years in a row in journalism for our school newspaper. And the acting principal at the time wouldn't let me come back and be the person who ran the school newspaper.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2119.0,2174.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/68","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: And she and a teacher who, I won't mention her name, a teacher who was a girlfriend of the head of the Black Panthers at the time, didn't like the fact that I was running the newspaper. And the board, I filed a complaint against them, a grievance it's called. I filed a grievance about that and I won the grievance, but she did away with the newspaper, which I thought was a terrible thing to do. It's not what you do. You punish the kids because she was mad that I was with the union in the strike? And that was over Ocean Hill-Brownsville, if you remember. At the time, it was Al Shanker's pet project. Anyway, I told her to please find somebody because I'm going to take my leave of absence. She turned me down. She said, \"refused\" on my application for my maternity leave and sent it down to the local school board and they refused, and sent it over to the chancellor, who was the last person who had to refuse, and he refused. \"This type of leave is not intended for fathers.\"","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2174.0,2267.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/69","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: So I went and I said, \"If you're going by precedent, you have to give it to me instead of turning me down.\" He said, \"Nobody's ever gotten it.\" I said, \"Nobody's ever applied. That's the precedent. It's now the precedent time.\" Anyway, of course they turned me down and I said, \"Make sure you get a teacher for my class because I'm not coming back. I'm going to fight this.\" And I did, and we fought it in court and the Board of Education handed down a ruling pretty quickly -- [rather] the court handed down a ruling pretty quickly -- that it was unconstitutional for them to do that, that they had to give me the rights that they gave any other teacher I asked for -- any teacher, not the majority, not all, but even if you did one who happens to be a father, just demonstrate that you did it once.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2267.0,2324.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/70","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Of course they couldn't, because they hadn't. And I became the first teacher who filed and sued them. And they said, \"Because of Ackerman v. Board of Education, from now on, we're going to make this available to men.\" And they went along with some guidelines that I had suggested, and that is if there's a man and a woman who are both teachers, as we both were, they can decide for themselves if one can take off and the other one can go to law school. I didn't have to go to law school. My wife could have gone to law school, but if we wanted to have our family, divide our family's work and obligations in a certain way, that's our business. That's not our employer's business. So as I understand it, there's a lot of men now that take maternity leave. I think it's --","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2324.0,2373.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/71","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Actually --","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2373.0,2374.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/72","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: They take paternity leave.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2374.0,2375.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/73","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: It's actually the law of the state now in New York.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2375.0,2378.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/74","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Yes, it is absolutely a New York State law.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2378.0,2382.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/75","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: So then you went on to your career in journalism.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2382.0,2387.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/76","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Yeah. So then I started, I said, \"How am I going to make a living if I'm really home?\" My wife was busy also at home. And I said, \"I'm going to put out a newspaper in the community. I'm going to go ahead with that project that we had talked about before.\" And at 3 o'clock, I would leave school. I didn't have a newspaper to run or classes or kids to see or any other schoolwork because I wasn't allowed to. And I started putting out a community biweekly. What's biweekly? Well, it's either every two weeks or twice a month, depending on how many weeks you think there are in a year -- 48 times a year or 26 times, 26 or 24 times a year. Anyway, we did that and then we put out a different edition for Forest Hills. And we had people working on our newspaper like Irving Gikofsky, who went to Queens.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2387.0,2452.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/77","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Mr. G?","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2452.0,2454.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/78","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Mr. G, as he's better known on television as the weatherman. And he lived in Pomonok, and he's still on TV today. He's probably the longest-serving weatherman on any station.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2454.0,2466.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/79","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Yeah, we all know him.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2466.0,2467.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/80","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Yeah. And so I put out a newspaper and I did that for a whole bunch of years. And then we sold the newspaper, and then we bought it back, and the newspaper lasted for about 48 years.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2467.0,2492.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/81","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: The Queens Tribune.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2492.0,2494.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/82","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: The Queens Tribune, which was the biggest weekly newspaper in -- I don't know about the city, but certainly in the county, maybe the city also. And we had a lot of volunteers on that also, mostly kids who worked on the Queens College newspapers. So we have a lot of people with a lot of experience whose names are in bylines over the years and still today.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2494.0,2523.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/83","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: And some famous authors too.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2523.0,2525.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/84","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: And some famous authors too. Yeah. One of them won a Pulitzer Prize.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2525.0,2534.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/85","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: What's his name? I can't remember his name. He's so famous.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2534.0,2540.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/86","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Tuesdays with Morrie.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2540.0,2541.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/87","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Tuesdays with Morrie, the author of that, right. [note: Mitch Albom]","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2541.0,2545.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/88","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Yeah, he worked for us. Hank Sheinkopf, who's a political commentator, and he's quoted every day in the papers. And some photographers also that are pretty famous. And they were all volunteers, helped us get the paper out every week. So I did that for a while. And then we covered one of the local politicians who wasn't really, as they say, on the up and up most of the time, and ran a whole bunch of exposé stories that the dailies picked up. Everybody said, \"Well, you should run against him, you should run against him.\" I said, \"Me? I'm not running for anything. I'm running a newspaper.\" And they said, \"Well, put your money where your mouth is.\" And they couldn't get anybody to run. And I did want to, and I thought it would be interesting. And I ran, and as fortune would have it, the only time in history the United States Postal Service went on strike, and our whole campaign was a mail-in campaign, and all our mail was backed up in the post office. It was the first time the city had an election under what they call the...what do they call it? Time...","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2545.0,2630.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/89","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Oh, Justice Department or...","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2630.0,2633.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/90","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: No, no, no, no, no, no. The voting system. You vote in order. They're doing it now.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2633.0,2642.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/91","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: Yeah. Oh, I can't think of it. Yep. Ranked choice voting.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2642.0,2647.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/92","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: Yeah, they call it ranked choice voting now. They called it something else back then. So we had 64 people running, 63 people and me, running for nine seats. And so nine people got elected and you vote for the person you want first, and then the votes spill over to the next person. So you get your choices, you get your first choice or second choice. And as soon as that second choice makes the threshold and gets elected, then they go to the next ballot and count that, and they spill over from one candidate to another until they elect nine. I came in 10th, which is one 700th of a billionth of a point away from being elected. And that was the luckiest election I ever ran in, because when you run for the school board, nobody's ever happy and you don't get elected to anything else.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2647.0,2704.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/93","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: The next year I ran for City Councilman-at-large, which I said was unconstitutional. And everybody said, \"Why are you running for something that you think is unconstitutional?\" And I said, \"It's unconstitutional because it violates one man, one vote, if you have every borough entitled to a councilman-at-large, which means Queens would have the same say in electing a councilman-at-large as Brooklyn or as Staten Island, which had one-tenth the population. So the vote of a person in Staten Island was worth 10 votes in Queens if you were a councilman-at-large.\" Anyway, I lost that election and they did away with, guess why? Because it was unconstitutional. Mostly every lawyer disagreed with me, but it was, and I lost that. The next year was a congressional year, Congress runs every two years. And I put my name in. I ran, put together a campaign with a lot of volunteers, mostly kids that I knew from growing up in the neighborhood and kids from Queens College working on the campaign, running the campaign, et cetera.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2704.0,2795.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/94","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: I think we'll stop here...","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2795.0,2796.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/95","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"GARY ACKERMAN: And somehow I won and I became a congressman.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2796.0,2800.0"},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/transcript/93516/annotation/96","type":"Annotation","motivation":"transcribing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"TERRI THOMSON: So I mean, it's clear that your family, your background, your friends, your education, your college experience turned this shy, quiet little boy into someone who aspired for public service. So I think we'll do another interview about your career in the State Senate, in Congress, which could probably require two or three videos. So I think we'll stop now, and then the next one will go on to life in public service.","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=2800.0,2835.08"}]},{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/annotation_set/2505","type":"AnnotationPage","label":{"en":["Richard Branciforte oral history [Transcript]"]},"items":[{"id":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731/annotation_set/2505/annotation/97","type":"Annotation","motivation":"supplementing","body":{"type":"TextualBody","value":"\u003cp\u003e\u003ca href=\"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/r/3j3901zp5s\"\u003eLink to Richard Branciforte's oral history\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/p\u003e","format":"text/plain"},"target":"https://queenslibrary.aviaryplatform.com/collections/21/collection_resources/169928/file/308731#t=1833.0,1910.0"}]}]}]}