George Conk   (interview 1999 photo 1997)

   George Conk practices law in Essex County, NJ. He does occupational disease, workers compensation claims, and product liability litigation. He is very interested in public health issues and has represented many seamstresses in the Ladies Garment Workers Union. He has handled asbestos cases and drug product liability, most recently representing the Hemophilia Assoc. of NJ. He teaches product liability law and torts at Seton Hall Law School, on a part-time basis. He was involved in a landmark case before the U.S. Supreme Court on scientific evidence.

   "I came here in 1986. For years when I'd drive across the George Washington Bridge, I'd notice these apartments and say, 'They must really have a spectacular view.' I saw an ad in The New York Times, and it was for Castle Village. So I came and looked and as soon as I saw the river from here, I wanted to move here. So I did. I bought one of the larger apartments, I guess the largest, and I bought it because it has a beautiful view of the City, two hundred seventy degrees from true south to the northwest, and a great view of the Palisades.

   "I bought it for the river. I've been sailing on the river since 1978. I had the smallest sailboat on the river then, and I think I still have the smallest sailboat on the river that is actively sailing . . . mine was built fifty years ago.

   "None of the commercial people ever refer to the Hudson River. I've never heard a ship or a ferry boat, or a barge announce its position as being on the Hudson River. They all say, North bound on the North River, . . . because it is always been called that. The pollution control plant, where Riverbank State Park is? Where we go ice-skating in the winter? That is actually called the North River Water Pollution Control Plant. The Manhattan Piers on the West Side were always referred to as the North River Piers . . . Some people say that the North River extends to just above Nyack, where the water stops being brackish, but it is this stretch of the river that is always been called the North River, and you would mark yourself as an out-of-towner if you said your position was on the Hudson River. They would say, 'Who is this guy?' I'm talking about ferry boat captains.

   "I used to say when I was a kid, 'My idea of country is an acre in Riverdale, within walking distance to the Seventh Avenue subway.' So this is my acre in Riverdale . . . I think this is a better neighborhood than Riverdale, 'cause I like the convenience to the Upper West Side of Manhattan and the George Washington Bridge."