What was the neighborhood like in the '70s? The neighborhood was rough.
The neighborhood was rough at that time. Can you give me some examples?
In
the '70s, was a lot of drug infestation.
Yeah, it was down there, it was a poor neighborhood, Fulton Street.
I think it was called Bed Stuy. Yeah, I think still Bed Stuy at
that time. Now they call it... Clinton Hill. Clinton Hill, I don't know,
for maybe real estate purposes. Okay? It was called Bed Stuy back then.
It was the crack epidemic and all that. It wasn't pleasant.
But we sort of stuck it up with the people, or the good
people over there. There was a lot of good people, a lot of
good people.
And now the neighborhood now has changed. And we helped it change, as a
matter of fact. We... By continuing to stay in the neighborhood and
provide them with a good food. You go to a poor,
poor neighborhoods.
What do you find in really poor neighborhoods?
Liquor store, pawn shop, candy store with junk food. You don't find
a good supermarket with good fruits, fresh fruits and vegetables and all
that. We always provided that, stuck it up with that neighborhood.
And the neighborhood appreciates that. Yeah, they really do. They support
us all the way through. My dad opened up the catering hall, I
think in 1980. I could be one year off. That's what I saw, yeah.
Yeah. Yeah, I could be a year off or something. He opened
it up... My dad, always been a pioneer. Like I told you,
he opened up that coffee shop. That was for the people to come
in and there's a... Now, they started having engagements, parties and stuff,
social activities, and they had no place to go.
So he opened that for them,
and he was giving it to them
near free, almost free in the beginning. He wanted to introduce them to
it.
And
sure enough, it's still there. And he was always, always
good to his neighbors, he loved everybody.
If somebody didn't have enough money to pay for the wedding,
he would just forgive them, say, "You don't have... " This is a... One
guy comes in and he says, "You know what? I'm short $1000.
I'll bring it... " Sometimes, he would say,
"Forget about it. Give me what you got and that's it.
Forget about the debt."
And he stayed there from
running that business, God bless his soul, and being active with the community
from maybe '80 until he became... He died in '98. He stayed active
I would say, until
maybe '96, 'cause in the last two years, he was bedridden.
Yeah, '96. Say, '95. From 1980 to '95, that's
15 years, right? Yeah. Was that his only business at that time?
No, no, at that time, we had this store, we had Fulton Street. He
had a Key Food also on Franklin Avenue.
Yeah, that he gave to
the second... His new family, to the family that...
The kids that he had from the Lebanese woman, yeah,
which he loved. They're my half... My brothers and I love them all.
Where was that one? What? Franklin and what? Franklin and Fulton.
Yeah.
Yeah, there's a big development going on over there. Yeah, my siblings sold
it after he passed. And something big going on over there
right now.
And that's it. And
my dad was really, really, really good to the people,
and people appreciated him and they loved him in the neighborhood
that when he passed,
the people in the neighborhood or at least a few of them got
together and they said, "This man was good to us all these years.
We gotta do something for this guy. We gotta do something for him."
So they got together and they signed petitions. They went around to the
neighborhood and got some signatures.
We, as his children
didn't know that we could do something like call or something like that
for him. They got this petition done for him, they came to us
and they said, "This is what we did. Now, you just gotta finish
up." Sure enough, me and my brothers and my sister, we were active
and we went to every community meeting, and I think it was Community
Board Number 10. I'm not sure, I think, 9 or 10.
We went to the meetings and we got a autobiography for him,
we got some of his old pictures with important people,
his
plaques that he acquired, some of the plaques that he acquired during his
life. And sure enough,
it was signed into law.
Yeah. Where is it? It's on 56th Street... 56th Street and Sixth Avenue.
Okay, so it's like Bay Ridge... No, it's Sunset Park. It's Sunset Park.
Yeah. Yeah, Sunset Park, yeah. And is that where the catering hall is? That's
where the catering hall is, yeah. On your way back, if you're going that
way, you can look at it. The corner of 56th and Sixth Avenue,
it say Subhi Widdi Way.