While Chicago deserves its props as the birthplace of skating for Black America, it was in New York where it transcended its role as a pastime to become a cultural force. However, the skate scene’s interaction with dance culture and its inspiration to the disco underground during the roller-disco boom of the 1970s has been largely unrecognized, except by those who floated across the hallowed wooden floors. New York’s skate story really begins in the 1940s when brothers Henry and Hector Abrami took on the Empire Rollerdrome, east of Bedford Avenue in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn. Nestled between a row of gas stations and storefront churches, the Empire was originally frequented by Eastern Europeans who were predominant in the area at the time. The demographics of Brooklyn changed rapidly in the following decades, with areas like Crown Heights becoming home to a large Black community… read more >
