The Bowery Boys: New York City History
Lauren Bacall, the cinema and stage legend who died yesterday at age 89, was once the less enigmatic Betty Joan Perske, a New York girl with a lot of moxie. As a sixteen year old, she ventured downtown from her home on the Upper West Side (84th Street, under the elevated train) to look for work… Read More
PODCAST One World Trade Center was declared last year the tallest building in America, but it’s a very different structure from the other skyscrapers who have once held that title. In New York, owning the tallest building has often been like possessing a valuable trophy, a symbol of commercial and social superiority. In a… Read More
Photographed dated 1886, the institution was called Manhattan Hospital then, changing its name to J. Hood Wright Memorial Hospital, then to Knickerbocker Hospital in 1913 (Picture courtesy the Museum of the City of New York) On Friday begins The Knick on Cinemax, a historical drama set in the turn-of-the-century Knickerbocker Hospital. . Last year, Tom… Read More
Men and women aboard La Lorraine, heading to France and the prospects of a grave war. War was newly ablaze in Europe one hundred years ago today. A latticework of alliances was slowly drawing virtually country on the continent into a conflict which would rage for years and later become known as World War I.… Read More
“Of a Sunday, Wall-Street is deserted as Petra; and every night of every day it is an emptiness.” — Herman Melville, Bartelby the Scrivener. The lithograph above is what Wall Street would have looked like in Melville’s day. (NYPL) Herman Melville, one of America’s greatest writers of the 19th century, was born 195 years ago… Read More
The New York State Pavilion in its prime. (NYPL) The New York Mets owe much to Robert Moses and the World’s Fair of 1964-65. The fledgling baseball team was still playing at the decrepit old Polo Grounds when plans were hatched for their new home out in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, named for their primary benefactor William… Read More
Above: Clara Bow, in It (1927), one of the roles that made her an major film star.Two iconic actresses of the early silent film industry share a birthday today — Theda Bara (born July 29, 1885) and Clara Bow (born in Brooklyn, July 29, 1905). Bow became the screen’s leading flapper archetype of the 1920s,… Read More
Above: Clara Bow, in It (1927), one of the roles that made her an major film star. Two iconic actresses of the early silent film industry share a birthday today — Theda Bara (born July 29, 1885) and Clara Bow (born in Brooklyn, July 29, 1905). Â Bow became the screen’s leading flapper archetype of the… Read More
Party time at Leon and Eddie’s nightclub at 33 West 52nd Street, photo from July 1948.  That’s the proprietor himself — Eddie Davis.  The nightlife impresario Toots Shor got his start here as a bouncer. [Library of Congress] Demolition Is Hot Right Now: A disturbing report from the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation of… Read More
I’m heading through France on my way to Tom’s wedding, but I stopped by Paris to check out an object we mentioned in our Cleopatra’s Needle podcast — the Paris obelisk in Place de la Concorde! Here it is reflected in the basin at Jardin des Tuileries.
Girls with a pretty amazing dollhouse at Seward Park playground. Photo labeled August 1913 I’ll be traveling for the next few days so I’ll be posting here a bit less than normal. Next week I’ll re-post some interesting stories from the back catalog. Enjoy your weekend! I recently discovered this first image in a collection… Read More
Does this woman look like a murderer to you? This is Florence Carman, the wife of Dr. Edwin Carman, one of the most respected men in Freeport, on Long Island’s south shore. Mrs. Carman would be at the center of a murder trial that captivated New Yorkers 100 years ago. Dr. Carman received a visitor… Read More
It’s the return of Niblo’s Garden, the 19th century pleasure garden and entertainment palace once on Broadway and Prince Street! Except this time around, it’s in a cemetery. Niblo’s is perhaps most famous as being the site of the first Broadway musical (at least, some form of it). The venue’s impresario William Niblo is buried… Read More
Independence Day may be over, but our celebration of the Founding Fathers continues all this week, culminating in a brand new podcast this Friday! I thought I’d share some of my favorite books on the subject of America building, great reads on the personalities of the men and women who helped form America. Included here… Read More
Above: One of my favorite pictures of the Williamsburg Bridge, at its opening in 1903 Nothing befits a fireworks display quite like a skyline to frame it, and no city has a skyline quite like New York City. Â And so, despite the obvious dangers of setting off thousands of pounds of explosives in a crowded,… Read More