‘During the summer going into seventh grade, I was lucky enough to be picked to be the SNY Kidcaster for that year.’

John Gadamowitz, Greenlawn

“I had the same childhood dream as a lot of kids: You grow up wanting to be the next Major League Baseball superstar or NFL quarterback. But for me, it became clear pretty early on that wasn’t going to be the case for me after I was cut from my middle school baseball team. But aside from my interest in playing sports, I also always had an interest in watching sports and listening to the announcers. I grew up a big Met fan, tuning in to Gary [Cohen], Keith [Hernandez] and Ron [Darling], and they were synonymous with baseball for me. Sometimes as a kid I would throw a game on mute and do my best Gary impression.

“Then, during the summer going into seventh grade, I was lucky enough to be picked to be the SNY Kidcaster for that year [a contest in which a winning youngster gets to call a half-inning of a Mets game with Gary, Keith and Ron]. I entered the contest by submitting an essay about why I’d be a good pick to be the next Kidcaster, and I was picked as a finalist with about 10 other kids. We were brought into the SNY studios, where we talked up some Mets highlights and did mock calls in front of a panel of judges. A couple of weeks later, I was chosen as the Kidcaster.

“When I went on with Gary, Keith and Ron, it was awesome. People always think I’d have been so nervous, but the crazy thing was, I wasn’t leading up to it. I would say it was only about 20 minutes before I went into the booth, that’s when the nerves started to hit me. The experience itself was great. I have nothing but good things to say about Gary, Keith and Ron. They were super welcoming and made me feel comfortable right from the jump. It was everything I could have imagined. I was only 12 at the time, so I wasn’t thinking it was a career move of some kind, but it did put the idea of sportscasting on my radar.

“My high school was Harborfields High School, which has a top-notch journalism program, and they stream their sports games out over the Internet. When I got there, I was invited to join the journalism team after they had gotten wind I was a Kidcaster, which then got me four years of calling games at the high school level.”

As it worked out, I got to work with one team pretty much in my backyard: the Brooklyn Cyclones.

“When it came time for college, I knew what I was looking for when it came time for me to look at schools. The question came down to, ‘Do they have the broadcasting program, and do they have a student radio station?’ and that narrowed my search. I ended up at Syracuse [University] and got to do some great things there. I didn’t cover much baseball, as it doesn’t have a baseball team, but it’s an awesome school for broadcasting. I got to anchor ‘SportsCenter’-style highlights shows of Syracuse sports and cover its other sports teams. Also, the ESPN+ TV network uses student broadcasters sometimes, so I got to call games on there as well. I also worked as an intern covering minor league hockey. My experience at Syracuse was incredible, and I was a May 2023 grad. Outside of school, I also spent my 2021 and 2022 summers in Cape Cod with the Cape Cod Baseball League, which is one of the more renowned collegiate summer leagues. I did play-by-play for one of the teams, the Brewster Whitecaps, so when it finally came time to start thinking about a job, it was pretty clear to me I wanted to go down a play-by-play path.

“Baseball is my favorite sport, so I sent out my stuff to a bunch of minor league teams, and as the business requires, I was ready to go up and anywhere for an opportunity. But, as it worked out, I got to work with one team pretty much in my backyard: the Brooklyn Cyclones [a minor league team for the Mets]. I sent the Cyclones my resume, reel and cover letter, and after having a chat with them, I ended up getting a job with the team. I’m pretty sure it was my resume and collegiate experience they liked, and I can’t say for sure my being a Mets fan helped at all, and while being a Kidcaster was an amazing opportunity, it wasn’t very high on the list of necessary qualifications; it was more about what I’ve done more recently. I’m now a few months in, and I’m calling home games, plus I help out with media relations stuff. It’s great. It’s a lot of fun. It’s the Mets, and I’m still able to live at home where I grew up and see my family and friends. The organization is incredible, and I work with awesome people. It’s everything I could have hoped for and then some.”

Interviewed by Ian J. Stark

‘Over the last four decades, I’ve collected 5,000 films.’

John Carpenter, Massapequa Park

“I am known as ‘The Movie Man.’ I earned that name while growing up in Jamaica, Queens. In those days, you could buy 10-minute Super 8 versions of classics like ‘Frankenstein,’ ‘Dracula’ and Gary Cooper’s ‘High Noon.’ I used to go into the city with my dad to a Manhattan camera store that had a full floor of these movies you could show in your home. I invited kids in the neighborhood to Saturday showings – advertising my events by putting signs up on telephone poles – and we’d all watch together in my house with the living room wall as the movie screen. I discovered that these supposedly ‘old’ movies still retained their original magic.

“They drew people in like they did during the early days of cinema. I became the most popular kid in the neighborhood, almost like a magician able to create movie magic for my neighbors. When I was in high school, I was introduced by a friend to a fellow who worked for David Letterman’s TV show. He had a house-load of 16 mm films, and he lent me one of these films to watch. It was as sharp and as clear as in a movie theater. The genres that I could collect in 16 mm were a lot wider than in Super 8. I was able to get films from the 1910s, including Charlie Chaplin’s first film, ‘Making a Living,’ in 1914 while he was not yet the tramp character, and, of course, the 1920s, ’30s and into the ’40s. At the time, many New York TV stations were getting rid of their film prints, throwing them into dumpsters, and collectors were salvaging them and selling them in a newspaper called The Big Reel.

“All over America, people were advertising prints for sale of feature films for $150, and $50 for a two-reeler. Over the last four decades, I’ve collected 5,000 films, including trailers, shorts, features from the silent era to the golden age of Hollywood. And I’m still collecting. Although chronologically old, they are often brand new to the audiences at the classic film programs I offer at public libraries in Amityville and Levittown. I learned as far back as childhood that those old motion pictures are a unification tool. Where else can you go into a pitch-black room with total strangers, sit right beside them and share emotions like one big film-fan family?”

I had to learn how to walk and talk again.

“A car accident in 1997 permanently injured both of my legs. But I chose not to be submerged in self-pity. And I became more successful than I was prior to my accident. At the time I was a professional actor, with leading roles in Off-Broadway musicals. I had also written, produced, directed and starred in ‘Late to Lunch,’ a recreation of the silent comedy genre and homage to my silent comedy hero, Charley Chase. This was 10 years before ‘The Artist,’ the first modern-day silent film, which won the Oscar for best picture of 2011.

“My own film was all shot and waiting to be edited when, one day, I was coming home from Manhattan to visit my parents in Massapequa Park. Walking from the station, I had been waved to cross the street by a car stopping at a yellow light, but as I stepped off the curb, the car behind it zoomed around and hit me. My head smashed through the windshield. My left leg was almost in need of amputation. I was in a coma in the hospital for three months. I had to learn how to walk and talk again. I also had to find something to keep me busy. I recovered at my parents’ house, and my editing room was in their basement, so I went downstairs every day, step by step on my bottom, to edit my film into the equivalent of a 47-minute four-reeler. It was shown in the Long Island International Film Expo. It was promoted by film historian Joe Franklin on his WOR radio show. And you can see excerpts of it on YouTube as part of a 17-minute documentary I made about my life, ‘Smelling Like a Rose.’

“Lately, I’ve been going deeper into the history of home film collecting. I collect 16 mm films originally sold by Blackhawk, a company that beginning in the 1950s released, for home consumption, complete two-reelers as originally seen in theaters. I still collect Castle films, which are 10-minute versions of newsreels and old theatrical films for viewing on home movie projectors. They are relics of the first years of film collecting, which goes back to the 1930s. It’s fascinating that these companies found that these silent films were still loved. And they are bringing me back to what interested me in film preservation in the first place.”

Interviewed by Jim Merritt

‘Having a passion for something is half the battle with anything in life.’

Matthew and Kim Pestour, Melville

“We really didn’t know my son was deaf until he was 3 years old, when he started talking with deaf speech. He got tested and they told us he was profoundly deaf. One day we’re in a toy store going down the aisle, and there was a whole board of little plastic horses, and he just saw them and pointed. We got one. And every week we’d go back and get a different breed. Then he started watching ‘The Lone Ranger.’ He didn’t watch cartoons. That’s what he was watching when he was a little kid. So, he’s always been a cowboy at heart. I said he was born on the wrong side of the country. It should have been out West. When he was 3 years old, he started getting therapy on horses. So, what a great opportunity!

“As he got a little older, he started taking English riding lessons. There was a girl learning sign language, so she was his instructor. What really was the catalyst to all of this was in high school, BOCES has a horse care and stable management program. So he started taking that in his junior and senior year. And he was the first deaf kid to ever be in the program. He was in the running for a Vanguard Award from the New York State Nontraditional Employment & Training program. The program got him an internship at an equestrian facility, and then he volunteered there for a few years after he graduated high school in 2007. And then he landed a job there doing what he loves! He wakes up every morning at 4, gets ready and takes care of all the animals.

Through him, I’ve learned so much about horses, and I’ve just seen him grow.

“I’m proud that he has the initiative to do what he wants to do. And his work ethic. Through him, I’ve learned so much about horses, and I’ve just seen him grow. He’s created a Facebook group about Sulphur mustangs with 1,500 members — just about this one breed of mustangs. He also has been a volunteer with the Bureau of Land Management, which has wild Mustang auctions. So he’s been in love with wild mustangs for a very long time.

“In 2021, he finally adopted a horse. The horse is in Utah right now being trained, a wild horse, and his name is Jack. He’s being gentled so that when we go back this year, he’ll be able to ride him and then maybe one day bring him here. That’s his passion, Jack. I think having a passion for something is half the battle with anything in life.”

Interviewed by Jay Max