The Bowery Boys: New York City History
You probably know something about the Civil War draft riots that kept New York paralyzed during the week of July 13, 1863. But New York only meant Manhattan back then. What about the rest of the future boroughs? The conscription act initiated draft lotteries throughout the area as, by 1863, the Union struggled to fill… Read More
Post editor Dorothy Schiff, before the arrival of Murdoch in 1976… Yes, there is a New York institution that one can use the headline above as its description, and that institution is the New York Post. Given all the recent calamities within the Murdoch empire these days, I thought I would re-post the link to… Read More
A torrid night at Harry Hill’s concert saloon on Houston Street. Naturally, such fun must be stopped! (Pic courtesy NYPL) Yes, yes, the Civil War began 150 years ago this year. I hope you have not grown tired of hearing that fact, as I’ve got an entire summer of posts and podcasts relating to it!… Read More
Albert Langdon Coburn sees mystery on ‘Broadway at Night’ While you rush to join the thousands of museumgoers checking out the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s fantastic Alexander McQueen exhibition ‘Savage Beauty’ — now in its last few weeks — may I recommend you check out a small room near the back of that long hallway… Read More
Bird in the sky: The delicate Ms. Millman makes it look easyLast night on my walk home, I observed something you just don’t always see everyday — a renegade acrobat dangling from the top of the Williamsburg Bridge! The perilous pair, Seanna Sharpe and Savage Skinner, performed this foolhardy trapeze as traffic whizzed by below them, and… Read More
Alexander Hamilton was shot by Aaron Burr 207 years ago today in their infamous morning duel in Weehawken, New Jersey. Hamilton would die of his injuries the next afternoon, July 12, 1804. Just imagine Joe Biden and Timothy Geithner rowing to New Jersey and shooting at each other*! This bluff overlooking the Hudson River was the bloodsoaked… Read More
I hope you’ve had a chance to play around in the Library of Congress’s National Jukebox was recently launched on their website. It’s an incredible catalog of old music, from a variety of genres, and could easily play as a soundtrack to many of the posts on this page. One old tune I happened to… Read More
Somebody should make a movie about Fernando Wood, and the role should be played by Johnny Depp. Wood is endlessly fascinating, not only as a shady character of political theater, but as a example of bald tenacity. He was written off as finished at many occasions — and saddled with mounting corruption charges — only to… Read More
An elaborate fireworks celebration over the grounds of the World’s Fair of 1939-40. (I’m not sure which year this picture was taken.) The wars of American independence, the Civil War, the Spanish-American War and World War I are represented in a lighting display in the foreground. And you also may have noticed something familiar over… Read More
His Honor, one of the most ambitious, most duplicitous leaders of New York in its history — as photographed by no less than Matthew Brady. PODCAST The first part of our Bowery Boys Go To War! trilogy of podcasts set during the years of the American Civil War. Fernando Wood, New York’s mayor at… Read More
House on the hill: the stark and mysterious convent of Central Park, 1861 In tomorrow’s podcast, I’ll be spending a bit of time in 1861 and will be briefly mentioning Central Park. So I thought I’d give you a look at what it looked like then. Pictured above is a structure that once dominated the… Read More
As if one needed any more examples of the importance of New York’s immigrant culture to the history of music, today is the centenary of the birth of Bernard Herrmann, arguably the most important film music composer in history. Bernard was born (and prematurely at that) to immigrants from Russia. His father, Abraham Dardick, came to… Read More
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast celebrates its FOURTH ANNIVERSARY this week! And we’re using the occasion to debut a trilogy of summer podcasts, starting July 1st, featuring New York City’s involvement during the Civil War as a dramatic backdrop. The secession of Southern states starting in February 1861 brought out the best in New… Read More
Above: From a great photo stream of images from the 1971 parade by Me In San Fran/Flickr (check them out here) I happened across some rather extraordinary archival videos on YouTube posted by Randolfe Wicker, recorded in 1971 at New York’s second Gay Pride festivities ever, initially called the Christopher Street Gay Liberation Day. In those… Read More
One hundred years ago today (June 23), the big news was the coronation of England’s King George at Westminster Abbey. Judging from the New York papers, American fascination with this event makes the recent royal nuptials of William and Kate seem like a forgettable folly. The June 23, 1911, issue of the New York Tribune is… Read More