Tish and Snooky Bellomo have a story on just about anyone from the punk rock scene of the late 1970s in New York City.

“One time Joey Ramone said to a friend of ours, ‘You think you’re so cool because you hang out with those Manic Panic girls,’” Tish Bellomo said of the late Ramones singer. 

The two sisters from the Bronx opened the nation’s first punk rock boutique in 1977 on St. Mark’s Place in the East Village. It was named Manic Panic by their mother Estelle.

“We were selling the hair color, and Tish’s original designs and some of my knitted sweaters and records and posters and fanzines and just everything we liked. Everything punk rock and rock and roll,” Snooky Bellomo said of the shop.

Almost 50 years later, Manic Panic lives on as an international hair color dye brand with more than 50 different colors.

Tish and Snooky are the focus of an exhibition at the City Reliquary Museum and Civic Organization in Williamsburg. It’s called “Still Manic After All These Years: 50 Years of Manic Panic.”

“So exciting, it’s unbelievable, and we love this place. We love the City Reliquary. It’s just the coolest place. I just want to live here,” Snooky said. 

Tish agreed. “The minute we walked in, we knew we have to do this.”

The pair have also performed as singers all these years, including as part of the early lineup of Blondie. Debbie Harry’s platform shoes are part of the exhibit, a nod to their time with the group.

Curator Lee Berman dove into Tish and Snooky’s archives to put the show together.

“There are photos from before they opened up the shop, all the different moves they’ve done, all the different bands they played in, their famous friends. They were at the center of a lot of different things,” Berman said. 

Tish and Snooky say this is something they never could have imagined when they started making the trip down from the Bronx to be part of the Lower Manhattan scene in the 1970s.

“We never would have believed it and you know we were advised actually not to become international. We had advisers, and they would tell us oh no, there was enough business here. We said no, we want to travel. We want to you know, spread the word. We want to go international, and we did. We never listen to anyone,” Tish said.

The show runs at the museum through March 28. Plan your visit here.