Harlem Renaissance

Hidden Histories of Jazz Age New York

April 16, 2026 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

Hidden Histories of Jazz Age New York: From the Suppressed to the Strange (SUNY Press Excelsior Editions, 2026) by Jonathan Ezra Goldman offers a fresh look at 1920s New York City, unearthing stories of everyday life and marginalized communities.

In sections that intertwine entertainment, politics, art, technology, crime, shopping, eating, and recreation, the book portrays sweeping events such as the Harlem Renaissance, Prohibition, and immigration through anecdotes of individual experiences that counter the era’s popular conceptions of ballooning wealth and uproarious celebration. [Read more…] about Hidden Histories of Jazz Age New York

Noble Sissle’s Lucky Lake: An Interracial Catskills Lake Colony

February 21, 2025 by John Conway 1 Comment

To many historians, World War I Harlem Hell Fighters Band lead vocalist, composer, lyricist, bandleader, singer and playwright Noble Sissle (1889-1975) is the man most responsible for ushering in the Harlem Renaissance.

In Sullivan County, NY history however, he will be forever remembered as the celebrity name behind Lucky Lake, “America’s first and only inter-racial lake colony community.” [Read more…] about Noble Sissle’s Lucky Lake: An Interracial Catskills Lake Colony

Duke Ellington and New York City

December 15, 2024 by Guest Contributor 2 Comments

For most of the 20th century, the City of New York ran the largest municipal broadcast organization in the United States, consisting of WNYC-FM, AM and TV. During this time, WNYC brought the diverse lives and cultures of the city into the homes of its residents through original entertainment, journalism and educational programming. [Read more…] about Duke Ellington and New York City

Transit & Transfer: The Avant-Garde in Montmartre & Manhattan

October 10, 2024 by Jaap Harskamp Leave a Comment

The term “New World” originated from the late fifteenth century and referred to the recently discovered Americas which astonished Europeans who had previously thought of the world as consisting of Europe, Asia and Africa (the “Old World”).

The earliest accounts of Spanish explorations in Central and South America were written in a series of letters and reports by Peter Martyr d’Anghiera (1457 – 1526), an Italian-born historian and chaplain to the Court of Ferdinand II, King of Aragon, during the Age of Exploration. [Read more…] about Transit & Transfer: The Avant-Garde in Montmartre & Manhattan

The Syracuse Riot of 1919: Red Summer in Upstate New York

July 31, 2024 by Editorial Staff 1 Comment

The Syracuse Riot of 1919 was a violent racial attack that occurred when the management of the Globe Malleable Iron Works pitted striking white unionized workers against black strikebreakers on July 31, 1919.

After the First World War white unionized workers across America were facing difficult working conditions and striking for better conditions and pay. At the same time, as part of the Great Migration, black Americans were moving from the South to urban manufacturing towns in the Northeast and Midwest. [Read more…] about The Syracuse Riot of 1919: Red Summer in Upstate New York

Black Librarians & America’s Battles Over Books

July 11, 2024 by Jaap Harskamp 1 Comment

In 1727, Benjamin Franklin and friends formed the Junto Club (from the Spanish junta or assembly) in Philadelphia, a debating society that probed questions of morality, politics and philosophy. The group was composed of twelve members drawn from diverse backgrounds, but they all shared a spirit of inquiry and a desire to improve society.

Access to books was limited at the time. Most of them were imported and expensive. There were no public libraries. [Read more…] about Black Librarians & America’s Battles Over Books

The Harlem Renaissance: A Primer & Some Sources

June 3, 2024 by Rebecca Rector Leave a Comment

Renaissance is a French word meaning rebirth or revival. The Harlem Renaissance was a social revolution and cultural explosion among the growing Black community of Harlem during the 1920s and early 1930s. Some of the best-known black artists of the period include Duke Ellington, Bessie Smith, Zora Neale Hurston, and Langston Hughes. [Read more…] about The Harlem Renaissance: A Primer & Some Sources

Before There Was A ‘Jazz Age,’ There Was The Marshall

May 18, 2024 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

Manhattan wanderers may track down old music landmarks, but anyone looking for Smalls Paradise, the original Cotton Club, the midtown Cotton Club, the original Birdland, Roseland, the folk clubs, the rock venues, the neighborhood opera houses, is lucky to find a plaque.

The Hotel Marshall gets no monument. The block itself is monumental now, West 53rd between 6th and 7th Avenues, office buildings and huge (modern) hotels, many people on their way somewhere. But the Marshall is real, real gone. Its address(es), numbers 127 and 129, survive only on the City of New York’s old tax maps. [Read more…] about Before There Was A ‘Jazz Age,’ There Was The Marshall

Paul Robeson In The Bronx

May 15, 2024 by Guest Contributor 2 Comments

Prior to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. becoming a national icon of the Civil Rights Movement during the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955–1956, one of the most well-known figures of African-American freedom struggles was Paul Robeson (1898–1976). [Read more…] about Paul Robeson In The Bronx

Joe Gould: Bohemian Misfit of Greenwich Village

April 27, 2024 by Rebecca Rector Leave a Comment

There are many ways to look at Joe Gould (1889-1957), the eccentric New York City character and poet who has been profiled in numerous books and articles for over a century. He was often described as a bearded, disheveled bohemian slouching through Greenwich Village, sometimes homeless, scribbling in a notebook, and mooching off anyone who would give him a handout. He hung out at the Minetta Tavern and other bars and cafeterias, often scooping up free packets of tomato ketchup. He also had a darker side.
[Read more…] about Joe Gould: Bohemian Misfit of Greenwich Village

Effort Underway To Recreate Augusta Savage’s “Lift Every Voice and Sing” Sculpture

February 27, 2024 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

African American sculptor Augusta Savage’s “Lift Every Voice and Sing” sculpture that was created for the 1939 World’s Fair held in Queens, New York. Viewed by more than five million attendees, Savage’s sculpture was destroyed when the Fair ended. [Read more…] about Effort Underway To Recreate Augusta Savage’s “Lift Every Voice and Sing” Sculpture

New York City In the Roaring 20s: A Primer

May 29, 2023 by Barbara Slonevsky Leave a Comment

As the ravages of the First World War and the 1918 Influenza Pandemic receded into the past, a new spirit gripped New York City. Energy seemed to infuse every aspect of city life, from business to leisure and everything in between. For a decade, New Yorkers by and large lived, worked and partied with abandon. [Read more…] about New York City In the Roaring 20s: A Primer

How Harlem Developed as an African American Community

May 26, 2023 by Bob Cudmore Leave a Comment

This week on The Historians Podcast, New York City attorney and regular New York Almanack contributor Jim Kaplan explains how Harlem was economically developed in the early 1900s. Jewish financiers joined with Black realtor Phillip Payton to develop Harlem and in the process improved race relations in New York City. [Read more…] about How Harlem Developed as an African American Community

The Seligmans, Philip Payton & Harlem’s Black-Jewish Alliance

April 10, 2023 by James S. Kaplan 4 Comments

Around the time of the Civil War Joseph and Jesse Seligman were the most prominent Jewish businessmen on Wall Street – financiers of the Northern effort in the Civil War and close associates of Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant.

Every summer in the 1870s they would bring their families with a retinue of servants to stay at the Grand Union Hotel in Saratoga Springs, NY among the most prominent resorts in the United States. In 1879 however, the new manager of the hotel, Judge Henry Hilton, announced a new policy — henceforth no Jewish people would be allowed to stay there. [Read more…] about The Seligmans, Philip Payton & Harlem’s Black-Jewish Alliance

Madam C. J. Walker: Black Hair Care Entrepreneur

March 3, 2023 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

The latest History Twins podcast is about Madam C. J. Walker (1867 – 1919), who made a fortune by developing and marketing a line of cosmetics and hair care products for Black women, especially through the business she founded, the Madam C. J. Walker Manufacturing Company.

The first child of her large family born free. Sarah Breedlove was a child near Delta, Louisiana where her parents die and she was orphaned by the age of seven. She moved to Vicksburg, Mississippi, at the age of 10, working as a domestic servant. [Read more…] about Madam C. J. Walker: Black Hair Care Entrepreneur

The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American Family

December 11, 2022 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

Sarah and Angelina Grimke are revered figures in American history, famous for rejecting their privileged lives on a plantation in South Carolina to become firebrand activists in the North. Yet retellings of their epic story have long obscured their Black relatives. [Read more…] about The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American Family

Artists Reflect On the Impact of Great Migration in New Exhibit

November 24, 2022 by Editorial Staff 1 Comment

Between 1915 and 1970, in the wake of racial terror during the post-Reconstruction period, millions of Black Americans fled from their homes to other areas within the South and to other parts of the country. This movement of people caused a radical shift in the demographic, economic, and sociopolitical makeup of the United States.

For instance, New York City — and particularly Manhattan — became home to hundreds of thousands of Black Americans during this time, catalyzing the start of the artistic and cultural movement known as the Harlem Renaissance. [Read more…] about Artists Reflect On the Impact of Great Migration in New Exhibit

Harlem on Fire: Langston Hughes & Wallace Henry Thurman

July 26, 2022 by Jaap Harskamp 4 Comments

Before the arrival of European settlers, the flatland area that would become Harlem (originally: Nieuw Haarlem after the Dutch city of that name) was inhabited by the indigenous Munsee speakers, the Lenape. The first settlers from the Low Countries arrived in the late 1630s.

Harlem was an agricultural center under British rule (attempts to change the name of the community to “Lancaster” failed and the authorities reluctantly adopted the Anglicised name of Harlem). During the American Revolutionary War in September 1776 it was the site of the Battle of Harlem Heights. Later, rich elites built country houses there in order to escape from the city’s dirt and epidemics (Alexander Hamilton built his Harlem estate in 1802). [Read more…] about Harlem on Fire: Langston Hughes & Wallace Henry Thurman

Hubert Harrison: Tribune of the People

June 7, 2022 by Sean Ahern 1 Comment

Over the past two decades there has been an upsurge of interest in the life and work of Hubert H. Harrison. As a leading socialist and subsequent proponent of what he termed the mass-based “Race First” approach to organizing, Harrison exercised a direct, seminal influence on his contemporaries including A. Philip Randolph, W. A. Domingo, Marcus Garvey, Richard B Moore, Chandler Owen, Arturo Schomburg, Cyril Briggs, Claude McKay, James Weldon Johnson, Hodge Kirnon, J. A. Rogers and William Monroe Trotter.

As W. A. Domingo, childhood friend of Garvey and first editor of the Negro World would later explain, “Garvey like the rest of us followed Hubert Harrison.” [Read more…] about Hubert Harrison: Tribune of the People

The Cabaret Trail: 1920s Urban Nightlife in New York, Paris & London

December 8, 2021 by Jaap Harskamp 1 Comment

On November 30th, St Louis-born entertainer and civil rights activist Josephine Baker became the first Black woman to be inducted into the Pantheon in Paris, the highest honor that France bestows.

Baker had started her career as a young dancer in Vaudeville shows where her exuberant talent was quickly spotted. When she moved to New York City she joined in the festival of black life and art now known as the Harlem Renaissance, but segregation and racism drove her away from home. [Read more…] about The Cabaret Trail: 1920s Urban Nightlife in New York, Paris & London

Harlem Renaissance

We Need Your Help Now More Than Ever

New York Almanack receives no public funds.

It’s supported only by readers like you.

Please give today (a monthly recurring gift is best)