New York Almanack

History, Natural History & the Arts

Manhattan

Historic Districts Council’s NYC Preservation Priorities

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The Historic Districts Council, New York’s city-wide advocate for historic buildings and neighborhoods, has announced it’s first Six to Celebrate, a list of historic New York City neighborhoods that merit preservation attention. This is New York’s only citywide list of preservation priorities.

The Six were chosen from applications submitted by neighborhood groups around the city on the basis of the architectural and historic merit of the area; the level of threat to the neighborhood; strength and willingness of the local advocates, and where HDC’s citywide preservation perspective and assistance could be the most meaningful. Throughout 2011, HDC will work with these neighborhood partners to set and reach preservation goals through strategic planning, advocacy, outreach, programs and publicity. [Read more…] about Historic Districts Council’s NYC Preservation Priorities

A Livingston Family Secret: Arsenic and Clam Chowder

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Arsenic and Clam Chowder recounts the sensational 1896 murder trial of Mary Alice Livingston, a member of one of the most prestigious families in New York, who was accused of murdering her own mother, Evelina Bliss.

The bizarre instrument of death, an arsenic-laced pail of clam chowder, had been delivered to the victim by her ten-year-old granddaughter, and Livingston was arrested in her mourning clothes immediately after attending her mother’s funeral.

In addition to being the mother of four out-of-wedlock children, the last born in prison while she was awaiting trial, Livingston faced the possibility of being the first woman to be executed in New York’s new-fangled electric chair, and all these lurid details made her arrest and trial the central focus of an all-out circulation war then underway between Joseph Pulitzer’s World and William Randolph Hearst’s Journal.

The story is set against the electric backdrop of Gilded Age Manhattan. The arrival of skyscrapers, automobiles, motion pictures, and other modern marvels in the 1890s was transforming urban life with breathtaking speed, just as the battles of reformers against vice, police corruption, and Tammany Hall were transforming the city’s political life.

The aspiring politician Teddy Roosevelt, the prolific inventor Thomas Edison, bon vivant Diamond Jim Brady, and his companion Lillian Russell were among Gotham’s larger-than-life personalities, and they all played cameo roles in the dramatic story of Mary Alice Livingston and her arsenic-laced clam chowder.

In addition to telling a ripping good story, the book addresses a number of social and legal issues, among them capital punishment, equal rights for women, societal sexual standards, inheritance laws in regard to murder, gender bias of juries, and the meaning of “beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

NY Historical Society SeeksTimes Square Photos

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The New-York Historical Society is soliciting digital photographs of contemporary Times Square from West 42nd to 47th Streets at Broadway or Seventh Avenue. Photographers are encouraged to share their perspective on historic Times Square in New York City by submitting photos taken between November 21, 2010 to March 31, 2011

Photographers should look to capture exterior architecture, outdoor portraits, group snapshots, billboards and advertisements and interior images of notable area buildings. Everyone, from serious amateur photographers to tourists are invited to submit photographs.

Photograph submissions should be sent to photos@nyhistory.org in either GIF, JPG, or PNG format, and be at least 1,200 x 1,500 pixels *or 8” by 10”. Include the photographer’s name so work can be attributed. Complete submission guidelines are online.

Photo: Times Square, 1922.

New Guide: Chronicles of Old New York

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It’s been said that the history of New York City is written in its streets. A new Museyon Guide, Chronicles of Old New York: Exploring Manhattan’s Landmark Neighborhoods by third generation New Yorker James Roman (who can be found on re-runs of HBO’s Six Feet Under), provides an opportunity to really discover the 400 years of the city’s history. Illuminating those streets through the true stories of the visionaries, risk-takers, dreamers, and schemers who built Manhattan is the strength of this unusual guide.

With eight historical walking tours, illustrated with Chronicles of Old New York is enjoyable for history buffs, city residents, occasional visitors, or tourists. The guide includes detailed maps and full-color photographs, 25 meticulously researched articles on dramatic stories from New York history including episodes from the lives of John Jacob Astor, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Stanford White, Gertrude Whitney, Donald Trump, and more. Sidebars on taverns, townhouses, architecture, and neighborhoods, a detailed timeline of historical events, and walking tours of nine historic New York neighborhoods tat include include detailed maps and subway directions make this guide handy.

Chronicles of Old New York includes nearly 60 historical maps, over 100 photographs and illustrations from the collections of the New York Public Library, the New-York Historic Society, New York University Archive, the Smithsonian Institute Portrait Collection, the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, and the Museum of the City of New York.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

Great Crash of 1929 Anniversary Walking Tour

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The Great Crash of 1929 will be the subject of the Museum of American Finance‘s 22nd annual guided walking tour of Lower Manhattan on October 30, 2010, 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM. This unique walking tour, which is the only regularly scheduled event that commemorates the Great Crash of 1929, the Panic of 1907 and the 1987 stock market collapse, delves into the political, financial, real estate and architectural history of Wall Street and New York City.

The tour shows that despite such adversities as the Great Fires of 1776 and 1835, financial panics of the 19th century, the 1920 Wall Street explosion, the Crash of 1929, the stock market collapse of 1987, the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack and the financial crisis of 2008, New York and Wall Street have always recovered their position as the world’s financial capital.

Tour meets at the Museum of American Finance and costs $15 per person. For information and reservations please contact Lindsay Seeger at 212-908-4110 or lseeger@moaf.org.

Exhibition: The Ground Beneath Our Feet

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On the occasion of The Grinnell’s 100th birthday, members of the Grinnell Centennial Planning Team have mounted an exhibition of more than 50 photos, prints, maps, and documents that tell the story of the half-acre triangle of land numbered 800 Riverside Drive, from the Native American Lenape people who inhabited northern Manhattan when Dutch settlers arrived in the early 17th Century through The Grinnell’s co-oping in the late 20th Century. The exhibition explores the individuals who have owned this unique half-acre during the last three centuries, and examines the political and economic events that inserted a triangle in the midst of the rectangular grid pattern that dominates New York’s street plan.

A slide presentation accompanying the exhibition highlights newsmakers who have lived at The Grinnell during its hundred year history, including operetta prima donna Christie MacDonald (a favorite of Victor Herbert who wrote “Sweethearts” for her); actress, playwright, and novelist Alice Childress; architect Max Bond; artist Ademola Olugebefola; Lucy McDannel, the first woman to graduate Yale Law School; and Catherine Phelan, a housekeeper who earned The Grinnell unwanted national publicity in 1934 when she murdered her employer Douglas Sheridan in his Grinnell apartment.

“The Ground Beneath Our Feet” is open to the public free of charge. There are three dates left:

Sunday, October 10th: 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Tuesday, October 12th: 7:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m.

Sunday, October 17th: 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Photo: The Grinnell in 1950 when it appeared on the cover of Grace Magazine. At the time, the evangelist Sweet Daddy Grace owned 800 Riverside Drive.

John James Audubon’s 225th Birthday Event

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John James Audubon’s 225th Birthday will be commemorated on Saturday, April 24th 2010 at 4PM in the Riverside Oval (156th Street at Riverside Drive, NYC), a few steps from the site of the naturalist’s final home in northern Manhattan.

In May 1842, Audubon moved his family to a fourteen-acre farm in northern Manhattan, a large triangular plot resting on present-day 155th Street, stretching from Amsterdam Avenue to the Hudson River, and including the land surrounding the Riverside Oval, the site of one of the Audubon barns. 765 Riverside Drive, adjacent to the Oval marks the site of Audubon’s house (pictured here).

Audubon called his farm Minnie’s Land, but after his death, his sons and wife renamed it Audubon Park, selling large portions of their land to wealthy New Yorkers who inhabited villas under the forest trees, laying out their gardens and drives where Audubon once had enclosures for both wild and domesticated animals. Audubon Park was a name familiar to New Yorkers from the mid 1850s until about 1910 when developers, capitalizing on the newly-opened subway with a stop at 157th Street, purchased large portions of the land and erected the magnificent Beaux Arts apartment houses that exist in the area today. In 2009, Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the blocks between 156th and 158th Streets west of Broadway the Audubon Park Historic District.

The event is being sponsored by the Riverside Oval Association, a not-for-profit neighborhood organization, plants and maintains green spaces in the Audubon Park Historic District, presents musical events, and sponsors oral history evenings at neighborhood buildings. Audubon’s 225th Birthday Celebration will kick off the 2010 gardening season and give residents in the neighborhood an opportunity to meet Oval Association members and become involved in the Association’s activities.

In the event of rain, the celebration will take place in the community room at the Grinnell, 800 Riverside Drive.

Books: Automats, Taxi Dances, and Vaudeville

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Cultural historian and journalist David Freeland has published his latest book,Automats, Taxi Dances, and Vaudeville: Excavating Manhattan’s Lost Places of Leisure, a rediscovery of the historic remnants of New York City’s leisure culture, including bier gartens in the Bowery, music publishers on Tin Pan Alley, jazz clubs in Harlem, and other locations throughout the city that remain partially intact, but obscured by the city’s development.

From the lights that never go out on Broadway to its 24-hour subway system, New York City isn’t called “the city that never sleeps” for nothing. Both native New Yorkers and tourists have played hard in Gotham for centuries, lindy hopping in 1930s Harlem, voguing in 1980s Chelsea, and refueling at all-night diners and bars. The island is packed with places of leisure and entertainment, but Manhattan’s infamously fast pace of change means that many of these beautifully constructed and incredibly ornate buildings have disappeared, and with them a rich and ribald history.

David Freeland serves as a guide to uncover the skeletons of New York’s lost monuments to its nightlife. With an eye for architectural detail, Freeland opens doors, climbs onto rooftops, and gazes down alleyways to reveal several of the remaining hidden gems of Manhattan’s nineteenth- and twentieth-century entertainment industry.

From the lights that never go out on Broadway to its 24-hour subway system, New York City isn’t called “the city that never sleeps” for nothing. Both native New Yorkers and tourists have played hard in Gotham for centuries, lindy hopping in 1930s Harlem, voguing in 1980s Chelsea, and refueling at all-night diners and bars. The slim island at the mouth of the Hudson River is packed with places of leisure and entertainment, but Manhattan’s infamously fast pace of change means that many of these beautifully constructed and incredibly ornate buildings have disappeared, and with them a rich and ribald history.

Yet with David Freeland as a guide, it’s possible to uncover skeletons of New York’s lost monuments to its nightlife. With a keen eye for architectural detail, Freeland opens doors, climbs onto rooftops, and gazes down alleyways to reveal several of the remaining hidden gems of Manhattan’s nineteenth- and twentieth-century entertainment industry.

From the Atlantic Garden German beer hall in present-day Chinatown to the city’s first motion picture studio—Union Square’s American Mutoscope and Biograph Company—to the Lincoln Theater in Harlem, Freeland situates each building within its historical and social context, bringing to life an old New York that took its diversions seriously.

Freeland reminds us that the buildings that serve as architectural guideposts to yesteryear’s recreations cannot be re-created—once destroyed they are gone forever. With condominiums and big box stores spreading over city blocks like wildfires, more and more of the Big Apple’s legendary houses of mirth are being lost.

The New Amsterdam Trail, Free Downloadable Audio Tour

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The Dutch and the indelible role they played in the formation of the ideas and ideals that shaped New York City and America is being celebrated by National Parks Service, the National Parks of New York Harbor Conservancy, and the Henry Hudson 400 Foundation with The New Amsterdam Trail. This free downloadable audio walking tour is the first of three in a series featuring the iconic National Park Service Rangers and an expert cast of historians, scientists, and other great storytellers.

Using a backdrop of period music and special sound effects, the audio with map can be downloaded from the Harbor Conservancy’s website or on the Henry Hudson 400 website. Visitors travel through the streets of downtown Manhattan to 10 historically significant locations, cueing commentary from their mobile phone, mp3 player or ipod. As they stand at the tip of the Battery, they can visualize Manhattan in the hours before Henry Hudson arrived and when he first navigated our waters and then listen to the stories of the life and times of New Amsterdam’s most famous and infamous settlers.

The New Amsterdam Trail features Steve Laise, Chief of Cultural Resources for Manhattan’s National Parks; Eric Sanderson, author of Mannahatta, Natural History of New York City; Andrew Smith, editor of The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America, and Russell Shorto, author of Island at the Center of the World.

The family-friendly walking tour takes about 90-minutes– however, you can walk the trail at your own pace during lunchtime and pause the recorded commentary at any point. For more details and to download the free tour, visit www.nyharborparks.org or www.henryhudson400.com.

The Harbor Conservancy is the official partner of the National Parks of New York Harbor and together they champion the 22 National Park sites that call New York Harbor home by helping to preserve the environment, promote economic development and create the finest urban waterfront recreation and educational park system in the world.

Henry Hudson 400 New York is a foundation created to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s legendary voyage for the Dutch to the Hudson River and New York. The unique character of New York City, originally New Amsterdam, has been shaped by the legacy of the multiethnic and tolerant culture of 17th century Amsterdam. Henry Hudson 400 is producing a series of special events in 2009 to celebrate the spirit of freedom, enterprise, and diversity shared by Amsterdam and New York.

The Mannahatta Project Uncovers NYC in 1609

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A new web site (now in Beta) sponsored by the Wildlife Conservation Society shows viewers what New York City looked like before it was a city. After nearly a decade of research the The Mannahatta Project uncovers online the original ecology of Manhattan circa 1609. According to the site:

“That’s right, the center of one of the world’s largest and most built-up cities was once a natural landscape of hills, valleys, forests, fields, freshwater wetlands, salt marshes, beaches, springs, ponds and streams, supporting a rich and abundant community of wildlife and sustaining people for perhaps 5000 years before Europeans arrived on the scene in 1609. It turns out that the concrete jungle of New York City was once a vast deciduous forest, home to bears, wolves, songbirds, and salamanders, with clear, clean waters jumping with fish. In fact, with over 55 different ecological communities, Mannahatta’s biodiversity per acre rivaled that of national parks like Yellowstone, Yosemite and the Great Smoky Mountains!”

The goal of the Mannahatta Project is no less than “to re-start the natural history of New York City.” The site includes a virtual Mannahatta map that allows you to see Mannahatta from any location, block-by-block species information, lessons on the science and technology used to create the site, hundreds of layers of digital data, place-based lesson plans for elementary and high school students that meet New York State standards, an online discussion page, and event listing.

Recent updates to Mannahatta include the ability click on a city block to find out what type of plants and animals called it home, whether the Lenape people lived or worked there, and what kind of landscape features appeared on that block. You can also use the slider bar to fade from Mannahatta to modern day to see how the island has changed in the last 400 years.

Last week a related multimedia exhibit “Mannahatta/Manhattan: A Natural History of New York City” also opened at the Museum of the City of New York.