Abigail Savitch-Lew

Researching Livonia Chow Mein

While Livonia is fictional, it draws inspiration from many historical accounts. The book is deeply indebted to the Brownsville residents, past and present, who shared with Abby their stories and insights into Brownsville’s history. In addition to the people who spoke with Abby when she was a housing reporter for City Limits, the following individuals sat down with her for this book.


Interviews (conducted btw. 2014-2025)

Cathie Wright-Lewis, Miriam Robinson, and members of Power in the Pen Writing Workshop

James “Mo” Johnson

Paul Chandler

Hank Trotman

William Green

Herman McClain

Lisa Kenner

Violet (but details from this interview were left out of my manuscript)

Ronald Robertson

Camara Jackson

Nadiyah Ford

Jonathan Bennett

Michaeline Mann

Secondary Research

Abby also relied on the research of scholars, documentarians, and reporters to supplement her understanding of Brownsville, Chinese American history, and other subjects. Below is a list of sources that inspired her, divided by research area.

(Note: Her thinking was also deeply influenced by Adrienne Marie Brown’s Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds.)

On Brownsville’s History & Future

Books, Podcasts, Documentaries

  • Broadman, Richard. Brownsville Black and White, Documentary. 2002. Documentary Educational Resources.
  • Giwa, Tayo and Cynthia Gordy Giwa. The Sun Rises in the East: The Birth, Rise & Legacy of Brooklyn’s Black Nation, Documentary. 2022, Distributed by Indie Rights.
  • Hampton, Henry and Julian Bond. Eyes On the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Movement: Volume 5 – “Power,” Documentary, 2006. PBS Video.
  • Isaac, Charles. Inside Ocean Hill-Brownsville: A Teacher’s Education. New York: Excelsior Editions, 2014.
  • Kazin, Alfred. A Walker in the City. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1969.
  • Podair, Jerald E. The Strike That Changed New York. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002.
  • Pritchett, Wendell. Brownsville, Brooklyn: Blacks, Jews, and the Making of an Urban Ghetto. University of Chicago Press, 2003.
  • Samaha, Albert. Never Ran Never Will. New York: PublicAffairs, 2018.
  • Soren, Gerald. Nurturing Neighborhood: The Brownsville Boys’ Club and Jewish Community in Urban America, 1940-1990. New York: New York University Press, 1990.
  • Winston Griffith, Mark and Max Freedman. School Colors, Podcast. Brooklyn Deep, https://www.schoolcolorspodcast.com/the-podcast.
  • Wright Lewis, Cathie, Maura’s Seed, Lincoln, NE: iUniverse, 2001.
  • Wright Lewis, Cathie, Passion’s Pride, New York: Power in the Pen Press, 2020.

Online Articles, Websites

On African American & Black American History, and on Anti-Black Racism in America

  • DiAngelo, Robin. White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism. Boston: Beacon Press, 2018.
  • Gyasi, Yaa. Homegoing. New York: Penguin Random House, 2016.
  • Kelley, Robin. Freedom Dreams. Boston: Beacon Press, 2003.
  • Lorde, Audre. Zami: A New Spelling of My Name. Bath, United Kingdom: Persephone Press, 1982.
  • McWhorter, John. Talking Back, Talking Black: Truths About America’s Lingua Franca. New York: Bellevue Literary Press, 2019.
  • Ramsey, Donovan X. When Crack Was King. New York: One World, 2023.
  • Rankine, Claudia, editor. The Racial Imaginary: Writers on Race in the Life of the Mind. New York: Fence Books, 2015.
  • Senna, Danzy. New People. New York: Riverhead Books, 2017.
  • Smith, Tom W. “Changing Racial Labels: From ‘Colored’ to ‘Negro’ to ‘Black’ to ‘African American.’” The Public Opinion Quarterly, vol. 56, no. 4, Winter 1992, pp. 496-514. Oxford University Press, JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/2749204.
  • Taylor, Keeanga-Yamahtta. From #BlackLivesMatter to Black Liberation. Chicago: Haymarket Books, 2016.
  • Wilkerson, Isabel. The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration. New York: Vintage, 2010.

On Chinese & Chinese American History

  • Barde, Robert E. Immigration at the Golden Gate: Passenger Ships, Exclusion, and Angel Island. Wesport: Praeger, 2008.
  • Brooks, Charlotte. “Numbed with Fear: Chinese Americans and McCarthyism.” American Experience: PBS. December 20, 2019. “https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/mccarthy-numbed-with-fear-chinese-americans/
  • Chang, Iris. The Chinese in America. New York: Viking, 2003.
  • Chin, Ava. Mott Street. New York: Penguin Press, 2023.
  • Chuang, Xie. “Imprisonment at Angel Island.” Introduction by Judy Yung, Translation by Charles Egan. Immigrant Voices: Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation. www.immigrant-voices.aiisf.org/930-imprisonment-at-angel-island/.
  • Dietz, Pierce Kathryn and Sue Williams, China: A Century of Revolution – China in Revolution (1911-1949), Documentary. 1989. Produced by Ambrica Productions for PBS.
  • Liang, Ursula. Down a Dark Stairwell, Documentary. Co-produced by PLAG Documentary, LLC, the Independent Television Service, and Center for Asian American Media, 2021.
  • Lin, Alfred H.Y. The Rural Economy of Guangdong, 1870-1937: A Study of the Agrarian Crisis and its Origins in Southernmost China. Great Britain: MacMillan Press, 1997.
  • Pick, Anne and William Spahic. Iris Chang: The Rape of Nanking, Documentary. 2007. Journeyman Pictures.
  • Munro, Ross. “China Is Still Stigmatizing Rich Peasants of the 1940s.” The New York Times, October 13, 1977. www.nytimes.com/1977/10/13/archives/china-is-still-stigmatizing-rich-peasants-of-the-1940s.html.
  • Song, Jingyi. Shaping and Reshaping Chinese American Identity: New York’s Chinese During the Depression and World War II. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2010.
  • Tchen, Jack. Zoom and Email Correspondence. 2024. 
  • Wu, Frank H. “From the ‘Perpetual Foreigner’ to the ‘Model Minority’ to the ‘New Transnational Elite’: The Residential Segregation of Asian Americans.” In The Fight for Fair Housing, edited by Gregory D. Squires, New York: Routledge, 2017, pp. 61-84.

On Puerto Rican & Nuyorican History

  • Casillas, Ketty Rodriguez. Life experiences of Puerto Ricans in New York from 1950 to 1960. IFLA, June 21, 2011, www.ifla.org/past-wlic/2011/107-casillas-en.pdf.
  • Francis-Synder, Emma. Takeover, Documentary. 2021.
  • Latino Americans – Episode 4: “The New Latinos,” Documentary Series. Produced by WETA Washington, DC; Bosch and Co., Inc.; and Latino Public Broadcasting; in association with Independent Television Service. September 23, 2013. www.pbs.org/video/latino-americans-episode-4-new-latinos/.
  • Manzano, Sonia. The Revolution of Evelyn Serrano. New York: Scholastic Press, 2012.
  • Morales, Iris. Palante Siempre Palante! The Young Lords, Documentary. 1996. Aired on PBS.
  • Santiago, Esmeralda. When I Was Puerto Rican. Cambridge: Da Capo Press, 1993.
  • Shekitka, John. “On Arrival: Puerto Ricans in Post World War II New York.” Teachers College, Columbia University. August 16, 2016. https://www.tc.columbia.edu/che/projects/past-projects/blog-posts/on-arrival-puerto-ricans-in-post-world-war-ii-new-york/.
  • Solomons, Gemma. “‘Becoming Nuyorican: The History of Puerto Rican Migration to NYC.” National Trust for Historic Preservation. October 13, 2017. savingplaces.org/stories/becoming-nuyorican-history-puerto-rican-migration-nyc#.W1nMHthKjfY.

On NYC History & Policy

Books, Documentaries, Interviews

  • Caro, Robert. The Power Broker. New York: Knopf, 1974.
  • Diouf, Sylviane A. “New York City’s Slave Market.” Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. June 29, 2015. https://www.nypl.org/blog/2015/06/29/slave-market.
  • Osman, Suleiman. The Invention of Brownsville, Brooklyn: Gentrification and the Search for Authenticity in Postwar New York. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
  • Schwartz, Joel. “Rent Strikes and Community Power, 1962-1971.” In The Tenant Movement in New York City, 1904-1984, edited by Ronald Lawson and Mark Naison. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press. 1986. Accessed at http://www.tenant.net/Community/history/hist04d.html.
  • Vázquez Irizarry, Vivian and Gretchen Hildebran, A Decade of Fire, Documentary. Co-production of Red Nut Films, LLC and Independent Televisions Service (ITVS) in association with Latino Public Broadcasting (LPB) and Black Public Media (BPM), 2019.
  • Seltzer, Leo and Lewis Jacobs. For the Living, Short Film. 1949. Sponsored by the New York City Housing Authority. Co-produced by Television-Film Unit and the New York Municipal Broadcasting System. https://archive.org/details/FortheLi1949.

Online Articles & Websites

On the History of Munsee-Speaking Lunaape People