The Forgotten Ones

Submitted by ub on

HART ISLAND PROJECT ANNUAL MEETING with special performance of Forgotten Ones by Dave Doobinin, City Island Branch New York Public Library, 320 City Island Avenue, Bronx, New York 10464, June 21, 2014 2:00 - 3:30 PM. Free admission.

Melinda Hunt is on a mission and personal crusade to open up Hart Island to the public. This is America's largest cemetery, where nearly a million people are buried in mass graves on 101 acres in the Bronx. Families struggle to sort out how their relatives ended up on Hart Island. They confront social stigma, outdated policies, police oversights and complacency. They defy the assumption that no one cares about people buried in the potter's field.

Her dealings with NYPD, NYC Office of the Medical Examiner, NYC Department of Correction learns a truth about how easily people become become lost before they may achieve the most basic grieving rituals: visiting a grave, spreading the parents' ashes, locating a body mistakenly buried, searching the records and seeking justice.

Hart Island is the last underdeveloped one hundred acres in New York City, a place abundant nature. Yet, it carries a primal fear of being forgotten. This massive burial place represents a Democratic as well as the looming flip-side of the American Dream.

https://vimeo.com/81077042

http://hartisland.net/

http://youtu.be/zG09qF5MOWc