This week, as we observe Pride Month here in June, Amy & Joe talk with longtime Asbury Park luminaries with the help of Ming Chen from A Shared Universe PodcaStudio. Our guests are former Asbury Park city clerk Kiki Tomek and Jimmy Bruno– former Deputy Mayor of Asbury Park, former Board of Education President and Vice President, longtime Little League president and coach, and retired Asbury Park Firefighter. The duo became unlikely icons of LGBTQ history when they licensed and performed the first (and at the time still illegal) gay marriage in the state of New Jersey on March 8, 2004 and expedited the state’s march to marriage equality.
This week Amy and Joe, with the help of Ming Chen from A Shared Universe PodcaStudio, welcome Tee Gates, the first Black Woman to serve as Fire Marshall for the city of Asbury Park—which is apparently a family tradition. She also is the daughter of the first Black Female Police Officer to serve in Asbury Park. We talk to Tee about her 32 years in and around the Asbury Park Firehouse and find out what responsibilities the Fire Marshall has. Other important take-aways include, remembering to keep your propane tanks outside, never to chain your fire doors and that, inexplicably, there is no women’s restroom in the Asbury Park Firehouse.
This week Amy and Joe welcome Judy Meltsner Feinstein, a pioneer in Women’s Aviation as both pilot and educator with the help of Ming Chen from A Shared Universe PodcaStudio. Judy is a two-time recipient of the Amelia Earnhardt Medal—and someone who has spent over 50 years in and around Asbury Park. We talk to Judy about her life as a pilot–with second and third lives as restauranteur, caterer, and antiques’ dealer– we learn that Asbury Park had an airport on route 66 and most importantly, we learn that when you are flying from Managua to Panama City Florida, do not take photographs when you land at a Mexican Air Force Base to refuel.
This week Amy and Joe welcome Dani Boglivi-Fiori while social distancing from their respective homes with the help of Ming Chen from A Shared Universe PodcaStudio. Ms. Boglivi-Fiori, known best as Sweet Dani B, owner of Sweet Dani B’s Cookie Kitchen and Café on Bangs Avenue here in Asbury Park—home of the life changing chocolate chip cookies (no lies detected) and some of the prettiest designs you’ll see on a cookie. We talk to Dani about her previous lives working for Ralph Lauren and Martha Stewart, where she keeps her Emmy (seriously, she has a real Emmy), how she found herself opening a cookie shop here in Asbury Park, and what to do When Martha Stewart blows up your cellphone by giving your business a shout out on national television.
This week Amy and Joe welcome Tara Pimco of Asbury Park’s Hot Mess Studio while social distancing from their respective homes with the help of Ming Chen from A Shared Universe PodcaStudio. Tara talks about how a small storefront salon became the premier “destination boutique” anchoring Press Plaza on Cookman Avenue and how some quick thinking not only kept the lights on during the early days of pandemic but allowed the business to hit the ground running when things began to reopen.
