PODCAST “If we were to offer a symbol of what Harlem has come to mean in a short span of twenty years, it would be another statue of liberty on the landward side of New York. Harlem represents the Negro’s latest thrust towards Democracy.” — Alain Locke
EPISODE 353 This is Part Two of our two-part look at the birth of Black Harlem, a look at the era before the 1920s, when the soul and spirit of this legendary neighborhood was just beginning to form.
The Harlem Renaissance is a cultural movement which describes the flowering of the arts and political thought which occurred mostly within the Black community of Harlem between 1920 and the 1940s.
Seventh Avenue in Harlem in 1932. Photograph: Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images
In particular the 1920s were described by writer Langston Hughes as “the period when the Negro was in vogue.” The moment when the white mainstream turned its attention to black culture.
But how Harlem become a mecca of Black culture and “the Capital of Black America”?
Reception for the Harlem Hellfighters
This is the story of constructing a cultural movement on the streets of Upper Manhattan in the 1910s. From the stages of the Lafayette Theater to the soapboxes of Speakers Corner. From the pulpits to the salons (both hair and literary)!
WITH stories of Marcus Garvey, Madam C.J. Walker, Arturo Schomberg and many more.
AND the origin of a beloved Harlem treasure, at home at the Apollo Theater.
Listen to HARLEM BEFORE THE RENAISSANCE on your favorite podcast player or from the player below:
Three ladies in Harlem, 1925
The Tree of Hope, sitting across from the Lafayette Theatre and Connie’s Inn.
The stump of the Tree of Hope still inspired hopefuls for many years before it was taken to the Apollo Theater.
James Reese Europe and the Clef Club Band, 1914.
Courtesy the New York Public Library
The home and salon of Madam C.J. Walker.
Madam C.J. Walker became one of Harlem’s most successful and prominent business owners.
A’Lelia Walker with dancer Al Moore
Courtesy Madam Walker Family Archives
Hubert Harrison — the ‘Black Socrates’ — whose fiery speeches on Speakers Corner galvanized political activity in Harlem.
Marcus Garvey in a UNIA parade, 1924.
Photo by James Van Der Zee
Garvey speaking at Liberty Hall, 1920
Library of Congress
FURTHER LISTENING:
The first part of the Birth of Black Harlem two-part series:
…and a newly produced version of our earlier show on the Hotel Theresa.
In addition, these people and events play a big role in this week’s show:
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is brought to you …. by you!
We are now producing a new Bowery Boys podcast every other week. We’re also looking to improve and expand the show in other ways — publishing, social media, live events and other forms of media. But we can only do this with your help!
We are now a creator on Patreon, a patronage platform where you can support your favorite content creators.
Please visit our page on Patreon and watch a short video of us recording the show and talking about our expansion plans. If you’d like to help out, there are six different pledge levels. Check them out and consider being a sponsor.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
PODCAST How did Harlem become Harlem, the historic and spiritual center of Black culture, politics and identity in American life? This is the story of radical change — through radical real estate.
By the 1920s, Harlem had become the capital of Black America, where so many African-American thinkers, artists, writers, musicians and entrepreneurs would live and work that it would spawn — a Renaissance.
But in an era of so much institutional racism — the oppression of Jim Crow, an ever-present reality in New York — how did Black Harlem come to be?
The story of Harlem, the neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, begins more than three and a half centuries ago with the small Dutch village of Nieuw Haarlem (New Haarlem).
During the late 19th century Harlem became the home of many different immigrant groups — white immigrant groups, Irish and German, Italian and Eastern European Jews — staking their claim of the American dream in newly developed housing here.
But then an extraorindary shift occurs beginning in the first decade of the 20th century, a very specific set of circumstances that allowed, really for the very first time, African-American New Yorkers to stake out a piece of that same American dream for themselves.
This is a story of radical real estate — and realtors! And not just any realtor, but the story of the man who earned the nickname the Father of Harlem — Philip A. PaytonJr.
Listen here or stream/download the episode from your favorite podcast player:
Harlem in 1870. West 125th Street in background, with St. James Roman Catholic Church on left and steeple of Manhattanville Presbyterian Church visible behind it.
New York Public Library
City Dairy at the southeast corner of East 116th Street and Fourth Avenue, in Harlem, New York City, 1889 (!)
New York Public Library
116th Street near Lenox Avenue, 1893, where tenement development rubs against the vestiges of rural Harlem.
A street in Harlem after the blizzard of Feb. 13, 1899. Note the elevated railroad in the distance.
Library of Congress
Plans for the Mount Morris, northeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 126th Street, 1908.
New York Public Library
Men in front of an apartment that rented to Black tenants, 1915.
New York Public Library / Science Source
Philip A. Payton Jr. who used real estate savvy to introduce many African-Americans to Harlem.
From the New York Evening World, May 2, 1904 (courtesy Newspapers.com)
John E. Nail and Henry C. Parker, who left the Afro-American Realty Company to pursue even greater success, become the ‘little Fathers’ of Harlem.
Harlem, late 1910s.
Courtesy Brown Brothers, Columbia University
St. Philip’s Episcopal Church, 1920
Courtesy Columbia University
Mother Zion Church, West 137th Street, 1924
Wurts Brothers, Museum of the City of New York
FURTHER READING
Boss of the Grips: The Life of James H. Williams and the Red Caps of Grand Central Terminal by Eric K. Washington Greater Gotham by Mike Wallace Harlem Is Nowhere: A Journey to the Mecca of Black America by Sharifa Rhodes-Pitts Harlem: The Four Hundred Year History from Dutch Village to Capital of Black America by Jonathan Gill Harlem: The Making of a Ghetto by Gilbert Osofsky Race and Real Estate: Conflict and Cooperation in Harlem 1890-1920 by Kevin McGruder
FURTHER LISTENING
Check out these past Bowery Boys Podcasts with related themes to this week’s show
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is brought to you …. by you!
We are now producing a new Bowery Boys podcast every other week. We’re also looking to improve and expand the show in other ways — publishing, social media, live events and other forms of media. But we can only do this with your help!
We are now a creator on Patreon, a patronage platform where you can support your favorite content creators.
Please visit our page on Patreon and watch a short video of us recording the show and talking about our expansion plans. If you’d like to help out, there are six different pledge levels. Check them out and consider being a sponsor.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
In a bit of Super Bowl counter programming, we’ve just released an unusually eccentric episode of Bowery Boys Movie Clubto the general Bowery Boys Podcast audience, exploring the 1958 comedy masterpiece Auntie Mame.
In the latest episode of the Bowery Boys Movie Club, Tom and Greg celebrate wild and fabulous Auntie Mame, the outrageous comedy masterpiece starring Rosalind Russell that’s mostly set on Beekman Place, the pocket enclave of New York wealth that transforms into a haven for oddballs and bohemian eccentrics.
Auntie Mame cleverly uses historical events — the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the Great Depression — as a backdrop to Mame’s own financial woes, and her progressive-minded care of nephew Patrick introduces some rather avant garde philosophies to movie-going audiences.
Listen in as the Bowery Boys set up the film’s history, then give a rollicking synopsis through the zany plot line.
Shouldyouwatchthemoviebeforeyoulistentothis episode? This podcast can be enjoyed both by those who have seen the film and those who’ve never even heard of it.
We think our take on Auntie Mame might inspire you to look for the film’s many fascinating (but easy to overlook) historical details, so if you don’t mind being spoiled on the plot, give it a listen first, then watch the movie! Otherwise, come back to the show after you’ve watched it.
Listen now: Auntie Mame (Bowery Boys Movie Club)
This episode of the Bowery Boys Movie Club was originally released on February 19, 2019, to those who support the Bowery Boys Podcast on Patreon.
Sign up and help support the show today to get the latest episodes of the Bowery Boys Movie Club.
In the film version of Truman Capote‘s daring 1958 novella — starring Audrey Hepburn and George Peppard— New York City provides the elegant backdrop to a romantic fable dripping in diamonds and booze.
Holly Golightly lives in her own fantasy world, and from her Upper East Side apartment, she seduces wealthy strangers and entertains a roster of outcasts and oddballs. From glamorous dates at the 21 Club to visits with her mobster ‘friend’ in Sing Sing Prison, Holly paints for herself a glamorous life — even through bouts of the ‘mean reds’.
But when a handsome writer moves into the building — a man with his own complicated relationships (hello, Patricia Neal!) — will Holly find in him, as the song goes, a fellow ‘drifter, off to see the world’?
Listen in as Greg and Tom recap the story and explore some of the historical context for the film. Featuring a dreamy lineup of New York locations including the Central Park, the Seagram Building, theNew York Public Library and, of course, Tiffany and Co.
PLUS: What to do with Mickey Rooney.
HowdoIlistentheBoweryBoysMovieClub? Once you’re signed in on Patreon, you’ll see a private RSS link that can be put directly into your favorite podcast player. Even easier, it can also be played directly from the Patreonapp if you’re signed in.
Your support on Patreon assists us in producing our podcast and website and it helps as we endeavor to share our love of New York City history with the world.
PODCAST The World Trade Center opened its distinctive towers during one of New York City’s most difficult decades, a beacon of modernity in a city beleaguered by debt and urban decay. Welcome to the 1970s.
EPISODE 350 This year, believe it or not, marks the 20th anniversary of the attacks on the Twin Towers on September 11, 2001.
Today there’s an entire generation that only knows the World Trade Center as an emblem of tragedy.
But people sometimes forget that the World Trade Center, designed by Japanese-American architect Minoru Yamasaki, was a very complicated addition to the New York skyline when it officially opened in 1973.
While it might be fun to think of New York City in the 1970s through the lens of places like Studio 54 or CBGB, it was really the Twin Towers that redefined New York.
The journey to build the world’s tallest building and its expansive complex of office towers and underground shops began in an effort by David Rockefeller to stimulate development in Manhattan’s fading Financial District.
By the time Port Authority got onboard to fund the project, the Twin Towers were bonded together with another vital project — a commuter train from New Jersey.
The World Trade Center inspired strong opinions from critics and the public alike, but eventually many grew to admire the strange towers which marked the skyline.
And for some, the Twin Towers became objects of obsession.
Jean-Louis Blondeau / Polaris Images
FEATURING: The insane, completely outlandish and ultimately successful feat of acrobatics by a very bold French tightrope walker.
PLUS: An interview with with Kate Monaghan Connolly of the National September 11 Memorial and Museum about how that institution memorializes those lost in the tragedy while still celebrating the technological marvels that once stood there.
Listen here or stream/download the episode from your favorite podcast player:
Architect Minoru Yamasaki with a model of this Twin Tower design for the World Trade Center, March 25, 1964
Photographer Tony Spina/Courtesy Walter P. Reuther Library
David Rockefeller with a model of the westside of lower Manhattan.
Courtesy John Duricka/Associated Press
The first plan for the World Trade Center called for construction of a United Nations-inspired set of structures on the east side, most likely eliminating (or seriously reducing) the South Street Seaport.
Images of Radio Row, clearly showing a vibrant retail district that remained active over many decades. Had it remained, who knows how much larger it would have gotten with the advent of television?
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
They were so prominent and tall that they become the world’s most observed construction project — for years.
Courtesy AP
Over the years, the landfill site (and future home of Battery Park City) was used for performance art, musical performances and even circuses.
The wheat field (an art project by Agnes Denes), planted in 1982.
The lobby of one of the towers.
The Twin Towers from the film King Kong.
From the New York Daily News, August 8, 1974. For context, Richard Nixon resigned as President of the United States the following day (Friday, August 9).
Courtesy Newspapers.com
The Philippe Petit story made international news. Here’s one example — from Butte, Montana!
Courtesy Newspapers.com
From the Oscar-winning documentary Man On Wire:
Photo by Lars Plougmann/Wikimedia Commons
Dolly Parton and Andy Warhol at Windows on the World, 1977.
Photo by Allan Tannenbaum/Getty Images
FURTHER READING
City in the Sky: The Rise and Fall of the World Trade Center / James Glanz and Eric Lipton Twin Towers: The Life of New York City’s World Trade Center / Angus Kress Gillespie The World Trade Center: A Tribute / Bill Harris
FURTHER LISTENING
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is brought to you …. by you!
We are now producing a new Bowery Boys podcast every other week. We’re also looking to improve and expand the show in other ways — publishing, social media, live events and other forms of media. But we can only do this with your help!
We are now a creator on Patreon, a patronage platform where you can support your favorite content creators.
Please visit our page on Patreon and watch a short video of us recording the show and talking about our expansion plans. If you’d like to help out, there are six different pledge levels. Check them out and consider being a sponsor.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
“The city seen from the Queensboro Bridge is always the city seen for the first time, in its first wild promise of all the mystery and the beauty in the world.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald
EPISODE 349 This is the story of a borough with great potential and the curious brown-tannish cantilever bridge which helped it achieve greatness.
The Ed KochQueensboro Bridge (sometimes known as the 59th Street Bridge) connects Manhattan with Queens by lifting over the East River and Roosevelt Island, an impressive landmark that changed the fate of the borough enshrined in its curious name.
In 1898, before the Consolidation of 1898, which created Greater New York and the five boroughs, much of Queens was sparsely populated — a farm haven connected by dusty roads — with most residents living in a few key towns, villages and one actual city — Long Island City.
With Brooklyn and Manhattan already well developed (and overcrowded in some sectors) by the early 20th century, developers and civic leader looked to Queens as a new place for expansion. But in 1900 it had no quick and convenient connections to areas off of Long Island.
The bridge in 1917 with the elevator storehouse, Museum of the City of New York
With the opening of the bridge in 1909, rich new opportunities for Queens awaited. Communities from Astoria to Bayside, Jackson Heights, Flushing and Jamaica all experienced an unprecedented burst of new development.
Thanks in small part to the bridge so famous that it inspired a classic folk song and became the cinematic backdrop of a 1970s film classic.
Listen here or from your favorite podcast player:
From a stormy Spring day in 2014. Photo by Greg Young(Courtesy Shorpy)Courtesy Shorpy)
The unique finials at the top of the bridge, 1905. Courtesy Museum of the City of New York
The bridge near complete, 1908. Courtesy the Museum of the City of New YorkThe marketplace with Guastavino tile, 1915. Courtesy Museum of the City of New York
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is brought to you …. by you!
We are now producing a new Bowery Boys podcast every other week. We’re also looking to improve and expand the show in other ways — publishing, social media, live events and other forms of media. But we can only do this with your help!
We are now a creator on Patreon, a patronage platform where you can support your favorite content creators.
Please visit our page on Patreon and watch a short video of us recording the show and talking about our expansion plans. If you’d like to help out, there are six different pledge levels. Check them outand consider being a sponsor.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
Approaching the bridge at street level on the Manhattan side. Photo Greg YoungThe bridge as the Roosevelt Island Tramway crosses. (GY)Guastivino tile on the First Avenue archway beneath the bridge. (GY)Across the bridge….. (GY)On the Queens side, the bridge takes on a different character, dominating the waterfront blocks. (GY)Views from Queensbridge Park. (GY)Gustav Lindenthal in 1909, the year the bridge opens.From the June 12, 1909 Brooklyn Daily Eagle
This Friday we begin our 14th year of podcasting with a new episode about one of New York City’s most beloved landmarks.
And on January 29, we will release our 350th episode — on a subject which is certain to surprise you!
We’re returned to our regular recording schedule — a brand new episode of the podcast every two weeks.
BUT you’ll still be getting a show in your podcast feed every week thanks to our REWIND series, presenting shows from our back catalog that have renewed relevance to events occurring in our world today.
For instance, our two shows on Penn Station were just recently re-released to mark the opening of the new Moynihan Train Hall.
But these aren’t merely reruns! Most of the REWIND shows will include newly recorded material — either updates to the information or extra bonus stories that we have discovered since first recording those shows.
All shows will be re-edited for a slightly more pleasing listening experience than the first time around. (Hey we’ve been doing this for 14 years! We’ve obviously learned a lot about producing audio since 2007.)
We hope that the Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is providing you with some needed escapism and entertainment during this unbelievable moment in our nation’s history.
CAN YOU DO US A FAVOR?
— Just make sure you’re subscribedto the Bowery Boys podcast on your favorite podcast player. See below for specific links.
— And tell a friend or two about our show. We’ve got so many now that we undoubtedly have something for everything.
(And of course we also welcome your support on Patreon where you’ll also receive audio bonuses and other surprises. There will be new Patreon-only audio released later this week.)
Pennsylvania Station 1950 (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
On January 1, 2021 Moynihan Train Hallofficially opened to the public, a new commuters’ wing catering to both Amtrak and Long Island Railroad train passengers at New York’s underground (and mostly unloved) Penn Station.
To celebrate this big moment in New York City transportation history, we’re going to tell the entire story of Pennsylvania Station and Pennsylvania Railroad over two episodes, using a couple older shows from our back catalog.
PODCAST Why did they knock down old Pennsylvania Station?
The original Penn Station, constructed in 1910 and designed by New York’s greatest Gilded Age architectural firm, was more than just a building. Since its destruction in the 1960s, the station has become something mythic, a sacrificial lamb to the cause of historic preservation.
Amplifying its loss is the condition of present Penn Station, a fairly unpleasant underground space that uses the original Pennsylvania Railroad’s tracks and tunnels. As Vincent Scully once said:
“Through Pennsylvania Station one entered the city like a god. Perhaps it was really too much. One scuttles in now like a rat.”
Robert R McElroy/Getty Images
In this show we rebuild the grand, original structure in our minds — the fourth largest building in the world when it was constructed — and marvel at an opulence now gone.
Why was Penn Station destroyed? If you answered MONEY!, you’re only partially right.
This is the story of an architectural treasure endangered — and a city unprepared to save it. Should something so immense be saved because of its beauty even if its function has diminished or even vanished? Does the public have a say in a privately owned property?
PLUS: We show you where you can still find remnants of old Penn Station by going on a walking tour with Untapped Cities tour guide Justin Rivers.
Listen to the show here or on your favorite podcast player:
THE BULK OF THIS SHOW WAS ORIGINALLY RELEASED AS EPISODE 254 — FEB 2018. THIS SHOW ALSO INCLUDES NEW MATERIAL.
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is brought to you …. by you!
We are now producing a new Bowery Boys podcast every other week.
We’re also looking to improve and expand the show in other ways —
publishing, social media, live events and other forms of media. But we
can only do this with your help!
We are now a creator on Patreon, a patronage platform where you can support your favorite content creators.
Please visit our page on Patreon and
watch a short video of us recording the show and talking about our
expansion plans. If you’d like to help out, there are six different
pledge levels. Check them outand consider being a sponsor.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
Bain Collection/Library of Congress. Clean-up version courtesy Shorpy
The 32nd Street entrance in 1910
The corner of 31st Street and 7th Avenue, entrance to the south carriage entrance, 1914
Museum of the City of New York1912- MCNY/Detroit Publishing Col
The Pennsylvania Station restaurant, found after one stepped through the arcade but before the waiting room.
MCNY/McKim Mead and White
The train concourse, 1911
1910 — Library of Congress/clean-up version Shorpy
Awaiting the arrival of preacher Billy Sunday. (Read more about the context of this extraordinary picture here.)
Library of Congress1936 — MCNY/Wurts BrothersMCNY/Berenice AbbottNYPL/Berenice Abbott
The view of the concourse from the Grand Waiting Room, 1939
Museum of the City of New York
The loggia, leading to the grand staircase, 1939
Museum of the City of New YorkNew York Public Library
A 1955 bar menu from the Penn Station restaurant/bar
NYPL
The AGBANY protesters including Philip Johnson and Jane Jacobs.
WALTER DARAN/HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGE
Madison Square Garden rose as old Penn Station was slowly demolished.
New York Daily NewsNorman McGrath/New York TimesNEW YORK DAILY NEWS/GETTY IMAGES
A couple eagles still flank the 7th Avenue side of the Madison Square Garden/Penn Station complex today.
Greg Young
The Samuel Rea statue that once greeted commuters from the original Penn Station loggia. In his hands are blueprints to the old Penn Station and a model of the station to his side.
Greg Young
Tom and Untapped Cities guide Justin Rivers walking down one of the original Penn Station departure staircases, still in operation.
FURTHER READING The Late Great Pennsylvania Station by Lorraine B. Diehl Conquering Gotham: The Construction of Penn Station and Its Tunnels by Jill Jones Old Penn Station by William Low Pennsylvania Station: McKim, Mead and White by Steven Parissien
The story of Pennsylvania Station involves more than just nostalgia for the long-gone temple of transportation as designed by the great McKim, Meade and White. It’s a tale of incredible tunnels, political haggling and big visions.
Special thanks to Kieran Gannon for helping with editing this week’s show.
At the Times Square ball drop in 1926, Getty Images
For more information on the history of Times Square’s New Year’s celebrations, listen to our show A New Year In Old New York:
One hundred years ago, Americans rang in the new year in an entirely new way — without legal liquor.
“New Year’s Eve Agreeably Dull,” declared the New York Herald. “Sober Crowds Jam Streets of City on New Year’s Eve,” observed the New York Times.
But look more closely and you’ll find the mad revelry was still there, sequestered in hotel rooms, brandished by defiant saloons or tucked away in a coat pocket.
The Eighteenth Amendment, prohibiting the production and sale of alcohol in the United States, had actually gone into effect almost 12 months before — on January 17, 1920.
Partygoers welcoming in the year 1920 knew that access to liquor would soon be shut down courtesy the Volstead Act, the law that enforced the new amendment.
According to the New York Herald, “A year ago the stuff could be toted around with perfect legality and in the course of the revelry thousands of bottles of it were given away to diners by restaurant men who took prohibition seriously and now curse their folly.”
Why “curse their folly”? Over the past eleven months, liquor manufacturing and distribution had gone underground.
The thirst for alcohol simply became more discrete. And hotels and restaurants could now charge extra for their secretive stashes of wine and champagne. (Not to mention their Manhattans and martinis.)
New Years’ Eve at Rector’s, 1910, courtesy Museum of the City of New York
And so the last hours of 1920 saw the birth of an entirely different party — where the added element of secrecy and lawbreaking added a new, wilder dimension for many.
The new style of revelry become obvious early in the evening. Oddly enough, Prohibition killed off more conservative celebrations where the crowds tended to be older and speakeasies less available. Without champagne, what was the point of braving a crowd?
Witness the scene downtown at the ‘traditional’ celebration around Trinity Church:
“In past years Park Row and lower Broadway have been crowded paths for those who marched to Trinity early to hear the chimes. These crowds used to shriek with ratchet and horn and it took extra police to keep them in line.
“Last night the police were there and lonesome.” [source]
Below: In the early 1900s, before the popularity of Times Square, crowds flocked to Trinity to hear the midnight chimes.
As one headed uptown, further evidence seemed to suggest a dampened party vibe that year — even in Times Square:
“A policeman in Longacre Square said it was the smallest turnout he had seen in his fifteen years in the precinct. It almost reminded one of the storied past, when whole families stayed at home and played charades for New Year’s Eve, when friends went to friends’ houses for holiday dinner and when people drank little or no liquor, there being no law to violate.”
Yet as the clock drew near to the midnight hour, crowds did suddenly appear.
From the New York Times, January 1, 1921
And many of those celebrants did express a certain glow found only from illicit and overly potent intoxicants.
“The throngs in the hotels and streets, probably the largest in the history of the city, saw an entirely new kind of celebration,” wrote the New York Times the following day. “The big crowd was roughly divided into two classes, the vast majority who were cold sober and a small minority who were hopelessly to the contrary.”
New York City was experiencing its first New Year celebration without legal liquor — which meant absolutely nothing.
The Hotel Astor in Times Square, pictured here in 1904. Courtesy NYPL
Liquor had not vanished.
Due to rather lax enforcement of the Volstead Act among high-end establishments — poorly paid Prohibition officers were easily bribed — liquor sales actually flourished in the Times Square area if you knew where to look.
“All the restaurant, hotel and saloon managers said with affecting solemnity that they were not selling a thing, and wouldn’t allow a drop to be brought into the house on the hip or elsewhere. Some of them meant it.
“Yet the streets were full of walking bulges and where did the bulges go when they left the street but into the — some of the — hotels and restaurants?” [source]
Celebrations carried on indoors in the finest hotels and restaurants as always but now the liquor stayed indoors as well, clandestine and under the counter. Champagne was just as likely sipped from coffee cups as from glamorous cocktail glasses. But it certainly tasted the same.
Many saloons boldly served alcohol out in the open. “The uninitiated would sometimes walk [into a saloon], look around timidly, see the backs of two or three policemen and then feel safe in demanding a glass of nice fresh whisky.” [NYT]
While some did risk a flask out in the street, many in Times Square preferred to revel within the walls of places like the Hotel Astor or the Hotel McAlpin until a few minutes before midnight — and, for many, why bother leaving at all?
Below: Times Square on New Year’s Eve just a few years later, 1926 (Getty Images)
And then of course there was the abundance of medical services available.
“For some reason a dozen hotels, taking counsel from experience, established yesterday fully equipped medical stations with physicians and nurses in attendance. The nurses’ registry offices were besieged with calls all day for nurses for emergency duty, one hotel offering $2o as a bonus for a single night’s work.” [Herald]
A Perscription for alcohol used during Prohibition, courtesy Smithsonian
According to the Smithsonian, “during Prohibition, the U.S. Treasury Department authorized physicians to write prescriptions for medicinal alcohol. Licensed doctors, with pads of government-issued prescription forms, advised their patients to take regular doses of hooch to stave off a number of ailments—cancer, indigestion and depression among them.”
I imagine a few hastily written prescriptions were dispensed that evening. Curing whatever ailed you!
But some of that medical experience was put to good use as many partygoers drank poisoned, inferior alcohol — called ‘new whisky’ by the New York Times — to great excess, brought in from other places.
New York had never seen so many sloppy drunks.
“The joy of being illegal became more intense than ever before.”
The act of ringing in the year 1921 easily proved that Prohibition was completely unenforceable in the biggest city in the United States — amid the centers of entertainment and vice, with law enforcement so used to looking the other way.
Between Greenwich Village, Midtown Manhattan and Harlem alone, thousands of speakeasies would operate without disruption over the next decade.
Writes Esad Metjahic: “It would be fair to say that New York City never truly accepted prohibition. Laws were passed, an amendment ratified, and even police task forces trained to enforce these laws, but the City of Immigrants never gave in.”
Happy New Year!
For more information, check out our podcasts on New Years Eve AND on the early days of Prohibition:
EPISODE 348 It’s the happiest of hours! The tales of four fabulous cocktails invented or made famous in New York City’s saloons, cocktail lounges, restaurants and hotels.
Cocktails are more than alcoholic beverages; over the decades, they’ve been status signifiers, indulgences that show off exotic ingredients or elixars displaying a bit of showmanship behind the bar.
In this podcast, we recount the beginning days of four iconic alcoholic drinks:
— The Manhattan: How an elite Gilded Age social club may have invented the cocktail for a new governor of New York;
— The Bloody Mary: A Parisian delight, enjoyed by the leading lights of the Jazz Age, makes it way to one of New York’s most famous hotels;
— The Martini: A drink of mysterious origin and potency becomes New York City’s most popular drink — and a curious lunchtime companion;
— The Cosmopolitan: Tracing the history of a new cocktail classic from Provincetown to San Francisco — and into two of New York’s most famous 1980s hangouts
LISTEN NOW — THE ORIGIN OF FOUR FABULOUS COCKTAILS
Professor Jerry Thomas, serving fire drinks to New York patrons.
From Jerry Thomas’ bartender guide (1887 edition). Read the whole guide here.
(OR ABSINTHE IF REQUIRED)
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is brought to you …. by you!
We are now producing a new Bowery Boys podcast every other week. We’re also looking to improve and expand the show in other ways — publishing, social media, live events and other forms of media. But we can only do this with your help!
We are now a creator on Patreon, a patronage platform where you can support your favorite content creators.
Please visit our page on Patreon and watch a short video of us recording the show and talking about our expansion plans. If you’d like to help out, there are six different pledge levels. Check them outand consider being a sponsor.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
A mobile vaccine station on 84th Street and Amsterdam Avenue in 1961. Department of Health Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.
We released the following show on the history of vaccines back in early April 2020 when the idea of a COVID 19 vaccine seemed little more than distant fantasy.
Just this past Monday, on December 14, Sandra Lindsay, the director of critical care at Long Island Jewish Medical Center in Queens became the first American to receive the Pfizer COVID 19 vaccine in a non-trial setting.
And so this week we’re re-releasing this show — in a much more hopeful context this time around.
This is the story of the polio vaccines developed by Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin — and then a look at the origin of the vaccine itself, first developed to combat smallpox almost 225 years ago, thanks to Edward Jenner and a cow named Blossom.
Jenner, Stephen; ‘Blossom’, the Cow; Edward Jenner Museum; http://www.artuk.org/artworks/blossom-the-cow-62938
In 1916 New York City became the epicenter of one of America’s very first polio epidemics.
The scourge of infantile paralysis infected thousands of Americans that year, most under the age of five. But in New York City it was especially bad. The Department of Health took drastic measures, barring children from going out in public and even labeling home with polio sufferers, urging others to stay away.
That same year, up in the Bronx, a young couple named Daniel and Dora Salk — the children of Eastern European immigrants — were themselves raising their young son named Jonas. As an adult, Jonas Salk would spend his life combating the poliovirus in the laboratory, creating a vaccine that would change the world.
In 1921 a young lawyer and politician named Franklin Delano Roosevelt would contract what was believed at the time to be polio. He would use his connections and power — first as governor of New York, then as president of the United States — to guide the nation’s response to the virus.
AND THEN: The second half of the show is devoted to the question — who came up the first vaccine anyway?
Once upon a time there was a country doctor with a love of birds, a milkmaid with translucent skin, an eight-year-old boy with no idea what he’s in for and a wonderful cow that holds the secret to human immunity.
This is the story of the first vaccine, perhaps one of the greatest inventions in modern human history. Come listen to this remarkable story of risk and bravery which led to the eradication of one of the deadliest diseases in human history.
And hear the words of Dr. Edward Jenner himself, written in the first weeks of his experiments!
LISTEN NOW — THE STORIES OF TWO HISTORIC VACCINES
Bellevue Hospital 1916, a bus with children and polio patients — Department of Public Charities Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.A map marking the places most severely hit by the polio epidemic in 1916. The Historical Medical Library of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia. Poliomyelitis (Infantile Paralysis). Prevalence and Geographic Distribution During 1916. Reprint no. 403. Public Health Reports. June 29, 1917. The Historical Medical Library of The College of Physicians of Philadelphia. The Epidemic of Poliomyelitis (Infantile Paralysis) in New York City in 1916. Department of Health of New York City, 1916.
Young Jonas Salk (at far left) with his family. Picture courtesy San Diego Union TributeSalk stands in his University of Pittsburgh laboratory, 1956. Bettmann/Corbis Department of Health Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.Young Albert Sabin, courtesy University of CincinnatiAlbert Sabin, administering his oral polio vaccine. Courtesy of the Henry R. Winkler Center for the History of the Health Professions, University of CincinnatiA rare picture of FDR in his wheelchair, on the porch at Top Cottage in Hyde Park. FDR Presidential Library & Museum photograph by Margaret SuckleyRoosevelt with Basil O’Connor (and a whole lot of dimes), 1944Museum of the City of New York
Gypsy Rose Lee at a March of Dimes benefit lunch in New York, 1945. Courtesy Bettmann/Corbis
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The Encyclopedia of New York is a rich, attractive and surprising collection of stories from the city’s history, arranged alphabetically — from abstract expressionism to zoning.
Throughout the book, you’ll be discovering fascinating articles written by some of your favorite New York writers — Kevin Baker on baseball, Frank Rich on anchormen, Jerry Saltz on modern art, Rebecca Traister on birth-control clinics.
And me! I was honored to be invited to write the six-page opening timeline which lays out the story of New York City via important historical moments.
Below are just a few of my favorite entries in the timeline. This book an absolute treasure trove of information and I’m pretty sure you’ll fall in love with it.
The new David Fincher film Mank, a tribute to old Hollywood and an elegant inspection of the studio system, is one of the most lavish original Netflix films ever.
California history buffs will find it especially fascinating. Some of the more interesting moments actually have to do with the gubernatorial campaign of Upton Sinclair. And those parties at San Simeon (Hearst Castle) are breathtaking.
But there’s an interesting undercurrent to the real life figures portrayed in the film — many of them were born New Yorkers like Marion Davies (born in Brooklyn) and the film’s subject Herman Mankiewicz (born in New York to German immigrants).
If you’ve seen the film or have plans to see it this holiday season, we suggest listening to these shows from our back catalog for a better understanding of these historical moments and figures:
William Randolph Hearst
We present Hearst’s origin story in our 2020 episode on his epic journalism rivalry with Joseph Pulitzer….
… and in Part Two we even get to his first meeting with Marion Davies and the development of Hearst’s own film production studio.
Early Hollywood
How did the movies move from the East Coast to the West Coast? This show breaks down the early days of film production and what lead to the industry fleeing to Los Angeles:
A cartoon promoting the California campaign of Upton Sinclair, courtesy Revolutionary DS
Great Depression
In the first part of our New Deal mini-series this year, we provide on overview of the Great Depression which sunk the nation into financial and social despair….
Orson Welles
… and in the second half of that series, a very young Welles makes his debut in New York City, thanks to producer John Houseman (featured in the film), directing a visionary production of Macbeth in Harlem, later known as “Voodoo Macbeth” (pictured above and referred to in Mank).
Round table regulars Art Samuels and Harpo Marx; Charles MacArthur, Dorothy Parker, and Alexander Woollcott
Herman Mankiewicz and the early writers of Hollywood
Many great writing talents of early Hollywood practiced their witticisms on the other members of the Algonquin Round Table, a collection of journalists, playwrights and general gadabouts who frequented one of New York’s poshest hotels.
Spike that hot cocoa and put on your finest Robert Moses-dressed-as-Santa-themed pajamas because Greg and Tom are celebrating!
The Bowery Boys look back at the unbelievable year of 2020. Wait, who would want to revisit this year?
Well this special Patroon-only holiday show is actually a look at producing the podcast over the past twelve months — but it’s impossible for that to not reflect the many trials and tribulations of the year.
But don’t worry — even in a truly intense year, we were able to find joy and camaraderie in telling the story of New York City.
FEATURING:
— A run-down of your favorite Bowery Boys podcasts — from the libraries of Andrew Carnegie to the halls of the Metropolitan Museum Art;
— A reflection on the Christmas holiday in New York City — festivity at a very unusual time;
— A couple Rudy Giuliani jokes;
— AND Greg and Tom recount on of their favorite 1990s winter memories. An evening with Eartha Kitt!
PLUS: Earlier this week we asked our Patreon supporters for ideas for our first new show of 2021. We reveal the winner (or should we say, winners) of that poll.
Video of Eartha Kitt’s last performance at the Cafe Carlyle in 2008. She died on Christmas Day on 2008.
Here’s a rundown of some of my favorite books that I reviewed for this website in 2020.
As with any list formed from the reading list of an individual writer, it’s limited by the number of books I was able to put in front of my face this year — which given all my podcast research AND the 2020 lockdown, was quite a lot actually.
The list is broken down between New York City history books (where most of the action occurs in the city) and American history books (of general interest), although of course that’s a pretty arbitrary divide in some cases.
And the reviews for 2020 aren’t done yet! Check back in the next few days for a couple more book recommendations — and one very cool New York City book where I was a contributor.
Happy holidays.
— Greg Young
The Bowery Boys New York City History Book of the Year 2020
WILD CITY A Brief History of New York City in 40 Animals Illustrated by Kath Nash Written by Thomas Hynes
Couldn’t you use a little natural beauty in 2020? Yes squirrels and rats can be beautifultoo –– especially here.
“In Wild City, author Thomas Hynes and illustrator Kath Nash reveal an urban environment more exotic and thriving than any city of concrete and steel has right to be.
The creators focus on forty creatures — from the ancient mastodon whose skeletal remains presumably linger underfoot to the clever starlings who have bullied their way into the American habitat (to the detriment of other birds).”
“In Rosen’s absorbing biography of Burkan, we find a somewhat enigmatic presence standing beside some of the most iconic figures of American culture — from songwriters to movie stars, from bootleggers to socialites.” [full review]
“Gleason was no ordinary comic book publisher; he was also a vibrant anti-fascist organizer, a suburban liberal who was eventually targeted by the federal government in the early years of the Red Scare.” [full review]
“In 1854 an African-American woman named Elizabeth Jennings (later Elizabeth Jennings Graham) was denied a seat on a lower Manhattan streetcar, forcibly removed due to the color of her skin…an electrifying show of bravery at the beginning of a long journey towards equality..” [full review]
“The Henry Street Settlement became a testing ground for social reform. Every child in America has been positively affected by Wald’s crusades, local endeavors which took wing across the country — for playgrounds, for free school lunches, for special education, for child labor laws.” [full review]
“The charming biography Lady Romeo has by circumstance become a truly fantastical read, more so than the author probably intended. Not only is Cushman’s life fascinating and almost unbelievable, but nostalgia for the theater itself in 2020 has become romanticized. Imagining anybody on stage performing Shakespeare gave me a thrill!” [full review]
The Bowery Boys American History Book of the Year 2020
SWEET TASTE OF LIBERTY A True Story of Slavery and Restitution in America W. Caleb McDaniel Oxford University Press
A book that single-handedly proves that new American heroes can be found in the obscured corners of this country’s history.
“One hundred and fifty years ago, Henrietta Wood sued the man who kidnapped her and sold her back into slavery.
In his lifetime, that man — a prison warden and general scoundrel named Zebulon Ward — often bragged about losing the case, saying “he was the last American ever to pay for a slave.”
But Ward has become an ugly footnote. The woman who suffered that injustice, whose story has almost been lost in obscurity, will never be forgotten again — thanks in part to McDaniel’s brilliant historical detective work. “
“For a time, it seemed that Hot Springs, not Las Vegas, would be the vice capital of the United States. In David Hill’s captivating and beautifully written The Vapors, we’re re-introduced to an overlooked corner of history, a historic spa town with troubling secrets and a sleazy underbelly.” [full review]
“In Begin Again, Glaude presents a selection of moments from Baldwin’s life and his writings from those moments, then a modern perspective of those views. Glaude and Baldwin are most often in a duet with one another, letting Baldwin’s past words underscore or sometimes even directly address a present situation.” [full review]
“Consider this one of the America’s strangest national landmarks — Fort Conger, a scientific research post originally built in 1881 by an American expedition in a remote and frozen area of Nunavit, Canada.
Some might call it the world’s most northern haunted house.
Over two dozen men — fronted by Civil War vet Adolphus Greely — lived and worked here for two years, battling a hostile environment to conquer the so-called Farthest North, an almost mystical destination that, if reached, would hold both international glory and economic possibility.” [full review]
“Widmer takes the reader on Lincoln’s thirteen day journey to destiny — through Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Deleware and Maryland — on his way to lead a country at the precise moment it splintered apart.
This is also the story of the railroad and the telegraph as primary technologies of the day — but with their limits. The North’s comparatively sophisticated railway system allowed the president-elect quick passage to D.C. but not safe passage.” [full review]
“In theory a book detailing a series of hurricane disasters might appear to be an exercise in gloom. And while each hurricane Dolin details does seem to be worse than the last, his tales are distinctly and vividly drawn, pulling from dozens of eyewitness reports — from doctors and housewives and police offices and even a few from famous folk (Ernest Hemingway, Katharine Hepburn).” [full review]
And for all the book reviews written for this website visit the BOWERY BOYS BOOKSHELF
