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by Danielle Berfond (Author)
This is a story about community - about how a single place can become a gathering place and a second home, shaping friendships, love stories, and memories that last a lifetime.
Beginning in 1960s Brooklyn, when 'travel' meant visiting the next neighborhood and your community was your whole world, the Palms Shore Club in Sheepshead Bay became both a hub and a symbol of its time.
By day, families swam, played cards, and lingered over Mahjong in the sun. By night, the doors opened to dinner dances, casino nights, disco, and live entertainment. Politicians, performers, and neighborhood regulars mingled together. Think The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel meets Dirty Dancing with a hint of Goodfellas.
The Palms reflected the changing times around it. Yet across four decades, one thing remained constant: from Memorial Day to Labor Day, the Palms was a summer home to the middle-class Jewish and Italian families who returned year after year.
Danielle Berfond was just eleven when her grandparents, Bob and Gloria Berfond, closed the gates on this Brooklyn institution they had built. Twenty-five years later, she returns to reclaim its story, capturing the voices, the history, and the unforgettable characters who made the Palms Shore Club an irreplaceable Brooklyn landmark.
Part family legacy, part oral history, and wholly alive with nostalgia and heart, this is the story of a place that shaped a generation.
