Media Inquiries & Consulting

The Lower East Side History Project provides expert historical consulting, on-camera interviews, archival research, and narrative development for documentaries, television, film, podcasts, and news media. Our scholars and historians have contributed to major national and international productions and are available for media appearances and research consulting.

Eric Ferrara
Elissa Sampson

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Eric Ferrara

Founder & Director, Lower East Side History Project

Eric Ferrara is a fourth-generation, native New Yorker and the founder of the award-winning Lower East Side History Project. He has spent decades researching and preserving the stories of Manhattan’s immigrant neighborhoods, with expertise in organized crime history, urban vice culture, and working-class life in 19th and 20th century New York.

 Founder

• Lower East Side History Project
• Museum of the American Gangster
• Lower East Side Welcome Center
• East Village Visitor Center

Areas of Expertise

• General NYC history
• Immigrant history
• Organized crime & Prohibition-era NYC
• Educational programming
• Museum & exhibition development
• Film & television historical consulting
• Urban preservation & community-based documentation

Published Books

• Manhattan Mafia Guide (History Press)
• Lower East Side: Then & Now (Arcadia Press)
• Revolt: 1960s to 1990s Activism Literature (LESHP)
• A Guide to Gangsters, Murderers & Weirdos of NYC’s Lower East Side (History Press)
• Lower East Side Oral Histories (Arcadia Press)
• The Bowery: A History of Grit, Graft and Grandeur (History Press)

Featured Consulting

• Boardwalk Empire (HBO)
• Making of the Mob (A&E)
• The Irishman (Netflix)
• Great Gatsby (Warner Brother)

Sample Media Contributions

• No Longer for Down and Outs, the Bowery is Up and Coming — The New York Times
• The Bowery: Is Manhattan’s Edgiest Street Losing its Soul? — NY1
• A New York Minute With the Lower East Side History Project’s Eric Ferrara — 6sqft
• Discussing “The Godfather” — PBS MetroFocus
• The Lower East Side’s Changing Fortunes — The New York Times
• Cities 101: The Evolution of NYC’s Neighborhood Names — Untapped Cities

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Dr. Elissa Sampson

Urban Geographer, Historian, and Research Associate, Cornell University

Dr. Elissa Sampson is an urban geographer and historian specializing in migration, race, memory studies, and the layered social history of New York City’s immigrant neighborhoods. At Cornell University, she teaches acclaimed courses including The Lower East Side: Jews and the Immigrant City and Jewish Cities.

Her work bridges academic scholarship, museum interpretation, and public history. Dr. Sampson has been awarded the NYC Acker Award and the Lower East Side Community Hero Award for her preservation efforts. Her forthcoming book, From Popular Front to Cold War (Cornell University Press, 2026), examines interracial and interethnic alliances in the 20th-century American Left.

Areas of Expertise

• Urban geography & neighborhood change
• Migration, ethnicity & race
• Lower East Side community history
• Jewish, labor & Leftist political movements
• Museum & exhibition development
• Digital humanities & archival preservation
• Heritage tourism & walking tour interpretation

Selected Media Appearances & Consulting

• PBS / VPM (NPR) — The Future of America’s Past: “The Fire of a Movement”
• ARTE TV — Le New York des exilés de James Gray
• Amazon Prime Video — Sammy’s: The Luckiest Guys on the Lower East Side
• Menemsha Films — Streit’s: Matzo and the American Dream
• Conference organizer & presenter for Cornell University’s Di Linke project
• Featured in public programs by City Lore, Belt Magazine & Village Preservation