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History in the Making: Another Rainy Monday Edition

New York 1971 (Courtesy the blog MusicFromTheFilm) Irving Place and the house that Washington Irving never lived in — in 1905. [Shorpy] Did you ever wonder why a playground close Irving Place — at Second Avenue and 19th Street — was named after the prolific sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens? Wonder no more! [Ephemeral New York] Forgotten… Read More

Two Lions: A centennial for the New York Public Library

“There is not such a cradle of democracy upon the Earth as the Free Public Library — this republic of letters, where neither rank, office, nor wealth receives the slightest consideration.” –Andrew CarnegieThe doors of the main branch of the New York Public Library (a.k.a. the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building) opened 100 years ago this… Read More

Getting serious: Civil War barracks in City Hall Park

By the middle of May 1861, almost a month into the Civil War, most New Yorkers still swelled with enthusiasm for the Union cause, demonstrated at the great rally in Union Square just a few weeks earlier. Since that historic gathering, the streets were regularly filled with parades, rallies and general cries of support for President… Read More

Notes from the podcast (#124) Idlewild/JFK Airport

If Barbarella were an airport terminal, certainly she would be this one. A traveller’s dilemma: what destination could possibly be as exotic as the airport from which you were leaving? Scandals: We had a blast talking about JFK Airport this week, and it’s always funny seeing something we just talked about popping up in a… Read More

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Podcasts

Idlewild Airport/John F Kennedy International Airport: from a golf course to a motley crew of classic architecture

PODCAST Come fly with us through a history of New York City’s largest airport, once known as Idlewild (for a former golf course) and called John F. Kennedy International Airport since 1964. Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia wanted a new and improved facility to relieve the pressure from that other Queens airport (you know, the one with… Read More

Why not? Let’s build this outlandish Manhattan airport!

The ultimate terminal for air and sea, if you don’t mind eliminating a few neighborhoods. Goodbye Hell’s Kitchen! (Click image to enlarge) Are you a Manhattan business professional who’s tired of sitting in maddening traffic to get all the way out to John F. Kennedy Airport? Does LaGuardia Airport seem dreary and dismal to you? And Newark Liberty… Read More

Lots of hot air: Joseph Pulitzer’s failed balloon stunt

Collectors Item! If you lived in rural Illinois in 1887, you might have found one of these flyers on your roof or along the side of the road. Joseph Pulitzer, that icon of late 19th century sensationalistic journalism, did everything imaginable to promote his popular newspaper the New York World. Not everything worked. Pulitzer bought… Read More

The Hindenburg over New York, still a startling sight

Taken during one of its 1936 voyages, with the New York Times building in the foreground. (source: straatis/Flickr) The anniversary of the 1937 explosion of the German passenger airship Hindenburg over Lakehurst, NJ, was last Friday, May 6, and I spent some time this weekend looking up old videos of the famous Zeppelin floating over Manhattan.… Read More

New York City speed racer, 1911 style

The world-famous New York City Marathon was almost sixty years in the future on May 6, 1911, when a very different marathon was run from the Bronx to City Hall. The victor of this modified 12-mile race was a newcomer to the streets of New York. Louis Tewanima was born on a Hopi Indian reservation… Read More

‘Fringe’ benefits light up a forgotten New York fort

I’m an unabashed junkie of the sci-fi TV series ‘Fringe’, and the writers (or at one of them) seems to be a fan of New York history. One of the conceits of the series involves an alternate universe with things are just slightly different from ours. Most notably, the World Trade Center was never attacked.… Read More

Why go to Kentucky? New York’s horseracing history

Above: Man O’ War, racing at Belmont, where one of the world’s greatest thoroughbreds cemented his reputation. The horse was actually owned by the son of Belmont Park namesake August Belmont. (NYPL) The Kentucky Derby is this Saturday: two minutes of race and a day of fanciful hats, mint juleps and fanning oneself with a… Read More

The Empire State Building: Still youthful at 80 years old

Almost finished: Photo by Lewis Wickes Hine (courtesy NYPL) The Empire State Building was officially opened in a grand ribbon cutting ceremony 80 years ago yesterday, essentially ending the quest for New York’s tallest building until the World Trade Center came along in 1972.

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Current Events Podcasts Queens History

A short history of Trump: the roots of Donald’s wealth, from quiet Queens beginnings to glitzy Midtown excess

  PODCAST Sick of Donald Trump yet? (Probably.) Figured him out yet? Is he a financial wizard, reality sideshow, or political distraction? Or all of the above? The solution may be contained in the roots of his fortune — a saga that stretches back to the 1880s and begins with a 16-year-old boy named Drumpf who… Read More

Run DMC and the Revolution: Historic Hollis, Queens

I’m putting together a special edition solo podcast to be released tomorrow morning, featuring a very timely subject. In the meantime, here’s a reprint of an article originally posted April 3, 2009, on one of the places that will be mentioned in the show. It’s like that: Rap pioneers and proud sons of Queens NAME… Read More

Oui! Paris on Broadway (now with air conditioning)

New Yorkers have been borrowing things from Paris for decades — the fashion, the architecture, the people. And, one hundred years ago today, the city paid homage to Paris’ naughtiest hideaway with the opening of the Folies Bergere (206-14 West 46th Street) on April 27, 1911, a dinner-theater extravaganza that Irving Berlin once proclaimed was… Read More