The Bowery Boys: New York City History
This Saturday the city begins its annual Summer Streets program, closing a corridor of avenues from the Brooklyn Bridge to 72st Street and transforming them into pedestrian havens. From 7am until 1pm on August 6, 13, and 20th, you can walk, bike, skateboard or generally meander in any way you please for miles. You can… Read More
I’m at the end of the painful process of finding a new apartment and haven’t had a chance to write a new blog posting this week. So I’ll end the week with a song by the Brooklyn-based My Cousin, The Emperor. Tom and I were invited by the band to attend their performance last night at the Gramercy… Read More
If this were 1914, we would be in the midst of a week-long celebration of New York babies! Actually, the occasion was a bit more somber. According to the photo caption, Greater New York Baby Week was initiated “to reduce the toll of preventable infant deaths by calling city-wide attention to needs met and needs… Read More
Trafalgar Square, by way of Park Row, in an imagined universe of American domination “If London Were Like New York” — as this 1902 article from Harmsworth’s Magazine imagines — it would be twenty times more spectacular. [Lubin] (Thanks to Chris Perriman for sending this via Twitter) A walk down Jamaica Avenue in Queens. I… Read More
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
In honor of tomorrow’s cartographic-flavored podcast, I present to you a classic clip which begins in that most mysterious of Manhattan locations. Well, at least according to Kramer*: *If this blew his mind, imagine had he stumbled upon the intersection of 4th Street and 10th Street, two streets that logically should never cross paths.
Taking a weekend break from history to offer congratulations to our close friend Nancy Schwartzman who has also occasionally done some research for a few Bowery Boys podcasts in the past. Nancy is a documentary filmmaker based in Brooklyn, and she is piecing together her second short film now, called xoxosms. And she just successfully… Read More
Here’s the whole menu of our 2010 podcasts. As always, you can download them all for free from iTunes and or your favorite podcast aggregator. The original blog page for each is listed below, along with a link to download directly from our satellite site. See you in 2011! TRINITY CHURCHBlog page / Trinity Church:… Read More
Fran with Nick Rhodes from Duran Duran (Life Google images) Fran Lebowitz is such a wry, curmudgeonly treasure to so many people that it takes no less than Martin Scorsese to actually make a documentary about her. The film ‘Public Speaking’ debuts on HBO this Monday at 10pm, taking an adored look at the career… Read More
Illness and a crazy schedule this week have conspired to delaying this weeks podcast, but we promise to have it ready to download by Wednesday morning. In the meantime, you can check out our television debut on the Brian Lehrer Show, which was recorded on Wednesday. It’s running throughout the week on CUNY TV, Channel… Read More
Hopefully you’ve listened to this week’s ‘Supernatural Stories of New York’ podcast and heard Tom’s tale of the legend of two combative ghosts who haunted the penthouse at 57 W. 57 Street. Well, here’s a couple pictures of the penthouse in question. Thanks to Dave at The Imagist for sending us the link. You can… Read More
The Bowery Boys 4th Annual Halloween Podcast is coming your way this Friday, featuring four new tales of haunted history. We’re putting it together now and will try to have it ready for download by Thursday night. Below: A different set of flamboyant boys get gussied up for the Hallowe’en holiday. Click pic for a… Read More
Over 15,000 Irish Americans gathered in Jones Wood in 1856, to greet countryman James Stephen Once upon a time, back when Fifth Avenue was a dirt path and Bloomingdale was literally a blooming dale, there stood a haunted and most mysterious forest located on bluffs overlooking the East River, far east of the area today… Read More
Abandoned railroad tracks dart along the cobblestones of the Brooklyn waterfront. Walker Evans 1960 (Courtesy LIFE images) Mad Men starts on Sunday, speeding the story up to Thanksgiving 1964. What was going on in the city then? [City Room] You think it’s hot down in the subway today? Imagine what it was like several decades… Read More
Manhattan waterfront property, from Thomas Edison, circa May 1903: an uninterrupted swell of piers, tugs and steamships jutting into the water, the skyline obscured at camera angle by towers of masts. This short film starts immediately north of the Battery Maritime Building (next to the Whitehall Ferry Terminal) and scans the entire waterfront up to… Read More