# Father Panik Village

Father Panik Village was the first housing project located in Bridgeport, and the first in Connecticut. Ground was broken in 1939, and it opened as Yellow Mill Village. By 1936, Father Stephen Panik, a Slovakian priest, had enlisted the support of Mayor Jasper McLevy and Gov. Wilbur L. Cross to assist with finances through the Federal Housing Authority. Bridgeport NAACP Chapter, local church congregations and private citizens rallied with Father Stephen Panik to be built the public housing project to improve the lives of Bridgeport residence. Father Stephen Panik successful secured federal finances of $6.5 million to start the first public housing in Connecticut. The Federal Government approved the 40 acres of land to initiate the construction.
The first public housing apartments was built during World War II. Father Panik Village was spread across 40 acres of land, with parking lots for the people's mules to travel to work and church. Father Panik died in 1953. In 1955 Yellow Mill Village was formally renamed in honor of Father Stephen Panik, as Father Panik Village. The main road in and out of Father Panik Village was named Martin Luther King Drive after Reverence Martin Luther King Jr.
The 40 acres of land and mule parking abutted Saints Cyril & Methodius Parish | Diocese of Bridgeport on the northwest, with Crescent Avenue which the Greater Bridgeport Transit Authority contracted to have a bus arrive and leave on Crescent Avenue every fifteen minutes to ensure the residences of Father Panik Village had transportation to employment, school, shopping and healthcare appointments. The Metro North train tracks ran along the northern side of the 40 acres, filled with daily commutes. Directly south of the former Remington Arms ammunition plant where many residents of Father Panik Village were employed. The east of the development stopped at the Yellow Mill River, and the western end stopped at Pembroke Street. Hamilton Street was the southern boundary. Businesses within the local district of 40 acres of land were Singer Machine Manufacturer Co., Lace Manufacture, Carpenter Steel, Stanley Works, Bridgeport-Lycoming, Bridgeport Brass, General Electric Company, Jenkin Brothers, Skydale Department Store, hundreds of diversities restaurants, and small businesses.
Location
Since being torn down, the property was essentially split into three areas with the northeastern portion of the property becoming the Water View Park, the western half (the area south of the church) being converted into single and multi-family homes and the southeastern corner becoming Eastside Park, divided from Water View Park by the Waltersville Elementary & Middle School.

## Opening

The 1939 groundbreaking was attended by Congressman Albert E. Austin and Governor Wilbur L. Cross, both of whom gave speeches to mark the occasion. The Village opened in 1940, with 778 apartments in 47 brick buildings set on a 40 acres (16 ha) site on the east side of Bridgeport. Originally the population was 5,400 people, which would have made it the 51st largest town in the state at the time and was the 6th largest housing complex in the country.

## Life in the village

The 1940 rent prices were $17–$26 a month, was approximately 20% of an average man's pay where the family included two parents and three children. In 1987 the rent was $516, or approximately 30% of a family of three's income, that family being a single parent and two children. Progressive for 1940, the development included bathrooms inside the apartments, hot and cold running water, gas stoves, a park and community center with a library, including 600 children's books.
In 1963, a fight at a baptismal party located in Father Panik Village led to the death of Pablo Gonzales, a father of four children. His attacker, Lorenzo Cora, was charged with murder as a result.

## Decline and Demolition

The Village slowly degraded into a slum and became a centralized point for crime and drug dealing in the 1980s, averaging 4 or 5 of the yearly 150 gun homicides in the state per year. In 1986 the city of Bridgeport razed all but fifteen of the housing units, and completed the demolition in 1994. In 1987 the population of the remaining Village was 2,500 people, including 816 families. Bridgeport's Mayor Thomas W. Bucci stated at that time that "Father Panik Village was in fact one of the worst-managed housing complexes in the nation."