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Steve Lawrence
A Student at Thomas Jefferson High School
and Resident of East New York, Brooklyn

Fellow alumni and those who lived near Steve and his family in the East New York section of Brooklyn remember Steve, Eydie, and his family in this way:

  • I was in the same school with Steve Lawrence. His name was Sidney Liebowitz. We sang in the school operetta "The Mikado." I was in the chorus, he was the Mikado. That was JHS 109.

  • I also went to JHS 109. The year I was to enter, 109 invited the sixth graders to visit and see Gilbert & Sullivan's Mikado. Steve Lawrence, then known as Sidney Liebowitz was the star of show ...

  • I was in 109 and we went to Jeff for a special assembly. He won that night.

  • Went to 109 with him. He was always a sweetie pie.

  • I knew Sidney Liebowitz (we called him Sid) from my JHS 109, where he was the star performer in Gilbert & Sullivan 0perettas, and then in TJHS before he changed name to Steve Lawrence. He would come with his friend, Ralph Montag, to my friend Carol Newman’s house on Linden Blvd near Williams Avenue, where a small group of my friends and I would all get together. Someone would be playing her piano while we all sang. I had the most wonderful teenage years.

  • I never really got to know him; my sister double dated with a close friend of Steve’s, Eddie Marcus,  before he became famous. While doing my postdoctoral at the Rockefeller University I actually lived in the apartment house next to his ...

  • I was married to his nephew. He is a great and kind person.

  • He was and I am sure still is, the nicest guy.

  • Steve was a real nice guy! He went to school with my brother and also the Army with my brother! I would shoot pool with him on Sunday on Livonia Avenue.

  • While he was still in high school my aunt had a date with him and stood him up. I don’t know which is better to brag about, if she went or standing him up.

  •  Met him a few times by when he visited his cousin Stu Liebowitz on Alabama Avenue. I lived on the same block.

  • Steve Lawrence played his first record on my record player. His brother Vic did not have a player and I had just gotten one for my birthday.

  • My "claim to fame" is that my beloved mother-in-law played mah-jongg with Steve's Mom!

  • He lived with his parents across the street from us on Alabama Avenue. When Steve and Eydie came to visit, everyone would crowd around outside hoping for an autograph when they emerged.

  • I remember going to his house on [443] Alabama Avenue. I went with about three other girls from my block. I was on Snediker Avenue. He gave us all autograph pictures of himself. So sorry that I do not have it anymore.

  • My grandfather lived on that block, 456 Alabama Avenue. Steve had a brother who looked just like him and he worked in an appetizing store (lox, bagels, white fish, pickled herring etc.) on Nostrand Avenue and Montgomery St. in Crown Heights. We (my parents and I) saw him every weekend. Friendly and personable all the time. He spoke highly of his sister-in-law Eydie Gorme and drove the Cadillac(?) that she gave him when she did the commercial. Nice memories.

  • We lived on Alabama Avenue until we moved to Long Island. My grandparents lived their too. There was a store, Henry’s, next door to us. My grandfather owned both buildings. My brother use to play with Steve Lawrence’s nephew.

  • I lived at 485 Alabama Avenue from from 1946 to 1959. I was there when Steve and Ede left after the wedding. Everyone on the block was there. Big day.

  • My wife babysat for Steve and Eydie when she lived on Alabama Avenue. Back in the day.

  • Sidney spent plenty of time at my home. My sister was President of his first fan club and they were very close friends.

  • While at bat playing stickball in the P.S. 174 schoolyard I swung and the bat left my hands and hit Steve Lawrence in the lip. He needed four stitches. 174 is on Dumont between Williams and Alabama. I lived on Williams, Steve lived on Alabama. We went to Jeff together.

  • My father took Steve for his first audition. My dad was a teacher in the after-school center in P.S. 174. Steve needed someone to take him so my dad did.

  • Steve was a student at TJHS when he came to P.S. 174 to sing at a special assembly. He was handsome and had a lovely voice.

  • I was in P.S. 174 and he came a sang there many moons ago. 

  • My wife was in the chorus. Mrs. Davis told us she asked him to leave because he refused to harmonize.

  • My mother went to Thomas Jefferson High School with him, and he accompanied my mom on piano while she sang.

  • Always enjoyed hearing him sing in Jefferson auditorium.

  • My parents loved his singing; he and Eydie were great! I still love listening to him.

  • When I went to incoming orientation in Jefferson Steve sang the song he was gonna sing on Arthur Godfrey talent scouts, "Domino." (1951)

  • Steve (Sid) was in my Hebrew class at Thomas Jefferson, and he was the sweetest, funniest person. Also was at the Arthur Godfrey show when he won. Remember him singing "Domino."

  • My brother attended Jefferson when Sidney Liebowitz (his real name) was there and went onto the Arthur Godfrey show and he never graduated.

  • They had a special assembly on the afternoon he was to appear on television, and we all supported the contest and cheering our hometown winner!

  • I interviewed him for the Liberty Bell [TJHS newspaper]. My friend and I were able to wrangle a visit with him at his agent's office in Manhattan. We had a list of prepared comments, which he answered, and gave us an autographed picture and two demo singles (one was "Go Away Little Girl.") I still have the 45s and probably the rest of it somewhere. It had taken me quite a few weeks of calling to set this up, and I was a nervous wreck. This was the first of big thrills in my life.
     

 

STEVE LAWRENCE AT REHEARSAL, ON STAGE AT THOMAS JEFFERSON HIGH SCHOOL
year unknown

Music director: Mr. Levine

Photographs courtesy of Gad Aflalo.

See a terrific photograph of Steve with the Jefferson High School Band, circa 1952 ⊲⊲

  • We had a special assembly to watch him rehearse! That night we watched him win on national televising and the Arthur Godfrey talent scouts show that night had all those Jeffersonians watching and cheering!

  • I lived on Pennsylvania Avenue, and while my dad was playing cards with his brother, we watched Steve sing on Arthur Godfrey show.

  • When he won the Arthur Godfrey show as a Junior, he left school but completed his senior year as a correspondent. So I guess he did graduate. He never forgot his classmates.

  • After winning the Arthur Godfrey Talent Show on TV, he sang a song (“Domino”) a few days later to fellow students at the assembly in the auditorium. Steve Lawrence (Sidney Liebowitz) was a fellow classmate who was a cast member of the "Steve Allen Late Night" show where he met his future wife Eydie Gormé.

  • I remember my Mom telling me the story of how he used to use the phone booth in the luncheonette Jack & Oscar on Livonia Avenue with his agent. Naturally before he was famous.

  • When you spent time in the music office of TJHS, you had reminders everywhere of him.

  • Steve Lawrence sang when I came to Thomas Jefferson in 1954.

  • He was still in Jefferson in 1952, but he left that year and came back to sing.

  • I have a photo of Steve Lawrence on stage at TJHS.

  • When I went to the orientation at Jeff, Steve Lawrence was on the stage, I guess rehearsing for a show.

  • He was in my father’s physical education class.

  • He sang at my graduation.

  • I was in the same class as Steve. I remember we had the best singers at our assembly.

  • I went to Thomas Jefferson high school class of 1966. I met Steve Lawrence when I worked for RCA on the Avenue of the Americas in New York. He treated me so kindly in the elevator and talked to me.

  • I was a bar mitzvah in the synagogue where Steve Lawrence's father was the head cantor on Alabama Avenue, between Livonia and Dumont Avenues. They lived next door.

  • My brother went to Jeff with him. His father was a cantor and wanted Steve to do the same. So much for his dad's intuition.

  • Never forgot his fellow Jeffersonian. Whenever he did a show he was wonderful to anyone from Jefferson. I went backstage several times.

 






From the "Brooklyn's Thomas Jefferson High School" Facebook page.

 

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