Bronxites in the northwest of the borough are mourning the recent death of Norwood resident and community activist Lyn Pyle who died last month at the age of 83. Pyle was a “Knox Place Legend,” according to a flier posted ahead of a memorial service held in her honor on Sunday, Oct. 29, at the COVE, located 3418 Gates Place.

 

COVE stands for Community Organized with a Vision of Excellence and, as reported, is an after-school media arts program for teens created by the Knox-Gate Neighborhood Association (KGNA), of which Pyle served as executive director. The after-school program celebrated 25 years in the community in 2014, and was established to offer programming in martial arts, health and beauty, and literacy. Its purpose was propelled by a tragic shooting took place outside Tracey Towers in 2007. Her memorial took place two days after a stabbing occurred a few blocks from the COVE.

 

Participants were encouraged to assume responsibility and practice self-respect. Students of the program wrote, produced, directed, acted, and edited a movie, “Only If,” a neo-noir film that told the fabled story of a young man whose good intentions lead him into trouble. In her role as executive director, Pyle experienced some challenging years. “During the Bloomberg years, it was very hard for small programs to exist,” she said.

 

According to the National Council of Elders, Pyle’s activism began when she was arrested in the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley, California, and later became a longtime community organizer in The Bronx for most of her adult life. For 44 years, they said she acted, choreographed, and wrote politically provocative plays and documentaries with Mass Transit Street Theater, located at 75 West Mosholu Parkway North in Norwood.

 

Pyle, a former member of Bronx Community Board 7, who advocated for the opening to the public of the Croton Water Filtration Plant project meetings, also wrote open letters to former U.S. President Barack Obama ahead of his address at West Point in 2009, and on another occasion in 2009, together with two other members of Bronx Action for Justice and Peace, Carolyn Eubanks and Dave Wenger, in which they called for an end to the Iraq War which began in March 2022 under Obama’s predecessor, former U.S. President George W. Bush. All three

 

In 1988, with several neighbors and a group of neighborhood teens, they said she co-founded the referenced Media Arts & Literacy youth program. In 2006, with a group of Bronx young people, she also co-created “AIN’T EASY,” a play that told their stories of living with violence. Out of this production evolved “Dare to Revitalize Education thru Arts & Mediation (DREAM!), training Bronx and Harlem students and their teachers in restorative practice and mediation.

 

“Ain’t Easy,” played regularly at Hostos Community College in the South Bronx in 2007. COVE later merged with DREAM in 2017, as reported. Pyle’s activism also extended to protecting local jobs and the environment from pollution caused by local developments.

Gary Axelbank, host of The Bronx Buzz, on BronxNet, later wrote of Pyle, “Lynn was a neighbor in arms in our righteous fight to prevent the city from destroying parkland in favor of the Croton Treatment Plant. A fierce, intelligent, uncompromising voice. I will forever think of her as a friend. RIP.”

 

Buddy Stein, whose father, David Stein, founded The Riverdale Press, also wrote of Pyle, “I met Lynn on the way to or on the way back from jail. Nearly 800 of us were arrested when we took part in a sit-in in the administration building of the University of California at Berkeley during the Free Speech Movement.”

 

He continued, “Later, Lynn was one of the founders of Berkeley Agitprop, a satirical political theater troupe that was a new way of protesting and educating around the war in Vietnam and campus issues. To my surprise and delight, we met again in The Bronx. The Riverdale Press was pleased to publicize the work of her Mass Transit Theater. Those articles aren’t on-line, but the two South Bronx publications I edited also covered her work.”

 

Stein concluded, in part, “A story on “Ain’t Easy” ran in The Hunts Point Express and “Guilty Until Proved Innocent” appeared in the Mott Haven Herald. She never gave up the fight for a better, juster world.”

Pyle told Norwood News at the time of COVE’s 25^th anniversary that there was a need for a program like it in the community to lure local kids away from drug influences happening along several known corners of the neighborhood. “You can’t just say no,” she said. “You got to provide something positive that’s more fun, more exciting than hanging out with your friends and getting high.”

 

As reported, applications for the En Foco Media Arts Fund 2024: Works-In-Progress Initiative will open on Wednesday, Nov. 15, at 12 a.m. and close on Saturday, Jan. 27, 2024, at 11.59 p.m. The fourth Annual En Foco Media Arts Fund: Work in Progress (WIP) Initiative Support Grant, in collaboration with BronxNet, is designed to support New York City-based, early career artists of color who engage with digital media technologies within their art-making processes. For this opportunity, early-career artists are defined by a 2 to 9-year artistic working history. Artists who have also applied for the 2024 Photography Fellowship are only eligible to receive one award if selected for either opportunity. Contact grants@enfoco.org for more information.

 

Editor’s Note: Norwood News reached out to various neighborhood sources for comment on this story. We will update it with any feedback we receive. A previous version of this story incorrectly reported that Buddy Stein founded The Riverdale Press. This has since been updated. We apologize for this error.