The Bowery Boys: New York City History
Sixty years ago today — on August 2, 1962 — the Action Group for Better Architecture in New York (AGBANY), a group of young architects and activists, held a most curious protest outside of Pennsylvania Station, the old train station designed by McKim, Mead and White. “The best dressed picket line in New York City… Read More
What wonderful surprises await the Bowery Boys in Little Caribbean? The Brooklyn enclave in Flatbush is one of the central destinations for Caribbean-American life and culture in New York City. Since the 1960s, thousands of immigrants from Jamaica, Trinidad, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and other Caribbean nations have made this historic area of Flatbush (mostly… Read More
Over 350 years ago today’s Brooklyn neighborhood of Flatbush was an old Dutch village, the dirt path that would one day become Flatbush Avenue lined with wheat fields and farms. Contrast that with today’s Flatbush, a bustling urban destination diverse in both housing styles and commercial retail shops. It’s also an anchor of Brooklyn’s Caribbean… Read More
On a new episode of The Gilded Gentleman, it’s time to board the elevated train down to New York City’s premier commercial district to experience a day of luxurious shopping. During the 1870’s and 1880’s New York’s famous Ladies’ Mile shopping district took hold along Broadway, and grand palaces of retail grew, filled with splendors… Read More
Above: The arm of the Statue of Liberty stood solitary in Madison Square for six years, from 1876 to 1882. Eugene Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc, one of the forgotten names in Statue of Liberty history was born in Paris. As the godfather of historical restoration, Viollet-le-Duc would rescue countless medieval structures from decay, helping to preserve the… Read More
PODCAST What does the Manhattan neighborhood of Chelsea mean to you? Religion and architecture? Art galleries and gay bars? Shopping and brunch after a stroll on the High Line? Tens of thousands of people, of course, call it home. But before it was a neighborhood, it was the Colonial-era estate — the home of a… Read More
PODCAST A history of the Bowery in the 20th century when this street became known as the most notorious place in America. And the stories of the lonely and desperate men whose experiences have been mostly forgotten. From the moment that elevated train went up in 1878, the historic Bowery became a street of deteriorating… Read More
Just south of the World Trade Center district sits the location of a forgotten Manhattan immigrant community. Curious outsiders called it Little Syria although the residents themselves would have known it as the Syrian Colony. Starting in the 1880s people from the Middle East began arriving at New York’s immigrant processing station — immigrants from… Read More
Jean Shepherd was born 100 years ago today in Chicago, so I’m bumping up this older post in tribute to this wonderful New Yorker. Jean Shepherd, probably best known today as the voice of ‘A Christmas Story‘, was a regular presence on New York radio in the 1950s and 60s thanks to his memorable program… Read More
The new episode of the Bowery Boys Movie Club explores the new musical film In The Heights and the fascinating historical neighborhood at its center. An exclusive podcast for those who support us on Patreon. Lin Manuel Miranda‘s first Broadway musical In The Heights was a critical and box office smash and won four Tony Awards — including Best Musical. And yet… Read More
Ozone Park, a quiet residential Queens neighborhood near Woodhaven, is one of those places created by real estate developers in the 1880s. It happens to have one of the best neighborhood names in all of New York City. So where did it come from? Ozone is a gas that exists as part of the Earth’s… Read More
UPDATE FOR 2020: It was announced today that Lord & Taylor, America’s first department store, has announced it will go out of business after 193 years. It began in 1826 as women’s clothing store in Lower Manhattan. In tribute, we are bumping up this article from 1914, framed around its 1914 move to the Fifth… Read More
Astoria Pool is the largest venue for swimmers in New York, outside of the Hudson and East Rivers and, of course, the ocean. Its location in Astoria Park is certainly theatrical, parallel with the river and in sight of two spectacular bridges (the Robert F. Kennedy and the Hell Gate) that sail over to Randall’s Island.… Read More
Howard Philip Lovecraft — aka H.P. Lovecraft — was born 130 years ago this week (on August 20, 1890) in Providence, Rhode Island. The pulp-fiction storyteller, known for claustrophobic tales of the occult, lived for a time in Brooklyn. He did not enjoy it. In 1924, he moved to 259 Parkside Avenue in Flatbush, Brooklyn, close to Ebbets Field and Prospect Park.… Read More
EPISODE 332 The Manhattan neighborhood of Yorkville has a rich immigrant history that often gets overlooked because of its location on the Upper East Side, a destination usually associated with wealth and high society. But Yorkville, for over 170 years, has been defined by waves of immigrant communities which have settled here, particular those cultures… Read More