A campaign to co-name a Brighton Beach street corner to honor a beloved barber, Jack Skolnick, is gaining momentum in the community.
Skolnick, who passed away in 2023, spent more than 60 years serving the Brighton Beach community, not only with haircuts but also with compassion, generosity, and a sense of pride. Now, his family hopes to formally etch his name into the very essence of the neighborhood he helped define.
The effort to co-name “Jack ‘The Barber’ Skolnick Street” at the corner of Brighton Beach Avenue and Brighton 13th Street was launched six months ago, according to son-in-law Wayne Rosenfeld, who said the idea came to him in the middle of the night.
“I woke up around 2 a.m. and just thought, ‘We need to do this,” he said.
Working closely with local officials, including Council Member Inna Vernikov and members of Community Board 13, Rosenfeld and his family began laying the groundwork — organizing testimonials, designing flyers and preparing to collect signatures. The campaign officially kicked off at a June 25 community board meeting, where residents responded enthusiastically.
“We were told to collect 150 signatures,” Rosenfeld said. “I want to get 500. They said a couple dozen testimonials, I’m aiming for hundreds.”
More than a barber
Skolnick opened his first shop in Brighton Beach in 1964 and quickly became a fixture on the block. He never turned away a customer in need. Throughout his career, he offered free haircuts to children, seniors, veterans and anyone who simply couldn’t afford to pay.
“I can’t tell you how many people said he gave me a few haircuts when I was a kid, when I couldn’t afford it,” Rosenfeld said. “No one knows how he stayed in business.”

“It was his purpose,” his wife of 58 years, Linda Skolnick, said.
His service extended well beyond the barbershop, frequently visiting local nursing homes and hospitals to offer free grooming to elderly and bedridden patients. He also welcomed children with disabilities, taking the time to make them feel safe and comfortable, often singing to them or making them feel like “they were the only person in the room.”
“He was so patient,” his daughter Kimberly Ganapolsky said. “There were kids with disabilities who couldn’t be left near scissors — and yet patients trusted him.”
A Brighton Fixture
Support for the campaign spans many backgrounds and generations. Civic leaders like Pat Singer — a longtime community board member — are among the many endorsing the effort. Singer had known Skolnick since the 1960s.
His impact was so far-reaching that even celebrities passed through his chair. Among his customers were the fathers of Neil Diamond and Darren Aronofsky, both of whom had fond connections to the shop. The family recalls a particularly memorable story involving Aronofsky catching his first glimpse of a Playboy magazine in Jack’s shop.

But it wasn’t just brushes with fame that defined Skolnick. It was his unwavering belief in being present, whether that meant helping a lost child, comforting a stranger after an accident or making house calls to shave a sick neighbor. He never sought recognition, but rather considered helping a part of being human.
The Road Ahead
The street co-naming campaign is expected to culminate in August during the Brighton Beach Jubilee, a neighborhood celebration that celebrates the neighborhood’s multicultural diversity. By then, the family hopes to exceed their signature and testimonial goals and formally submit the proposal to the City Council for approval later in the fall.
While the campaign highlights Skolnick’s decades of generosity and community impact, its deeper purpose is for future generations to know the kind of person who once stood behind the barbershop window on Brighton 13th Street.
“He was very much present in the community… my entire school’s behind it, because he was such a part of the school community and such a part of Brighton,” Ganapolsky said.
For updates on the campaign or to support the petition, contact the Skolnick family at nameastreetforjack@gmail.com.