There are some places wherever you live that you take to represent an important part of your life. Maybe a restaurant where you always go or a movie theater where you saw your favorite movie for the first time. Whatever the reason, these are places that you sentimentalize, maybe sometimes to a fault, because you… Read more »
We are less than a month away from annual tributes to the September 11 attacks, and for a few tense days it looked like one of the most enduring traditions around the commemoration, the Tribute in Light—two columns of light projected from lower Manhattan close to where the Twin Towers were located—may not go on…. Read more »
This coming weekend two free punk rock shows will be held in Tompkins Square Park in New York City’s East Village. The shows commemorate the Tompkins Square Park riot of 1988, when police clashed with squatters, homeless and others that had been camping out in the park. Accounts of that night very but few dispute… Read more »
Fifteen years ago, it was a cold night in an apartment in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn where maybe two dozen people gathered for a Burns Night party. Burns Night is January 25 and celebrates the birthday of Robert Burns, the Scottish poet who lived in the late 1700s. Several of us had brought our volumes of… Read more »
I have a strong interest in the history of New York City orphanages. My grandfather, Thomas E. Pryor, spent seven years in Father Drumgoole’s Staten Island orphanage, Mount Loretto. Father Drumgoole first orphanage at 53 Warren Street two blocks from City Hall was for homeless newsboys. Prior to building the Staten Island complex through farm purchases,… Read more »
Imagine you are a life-long upper east side, Yorkville resident born in 1949 and you’ve spent 39 years in Mary Manning Walsh nursing home on York Avenue due to a life-altering brain injury suffered when you were mugged in John Jay Park walking your dog in 1976. You were twenty-seven when you became trapped to the… Read more »
Do you know New York City has an extraordinary and diverse storytelling community? It’s all over the five boroughs, every night. And many of the events are free. All you need to do is check out newspapers and magazines and online sites like Time Out New York and NYC Storytelling. I’ve been part of this… Read more »
Some years ago I noticed a newly installed payphone outside a coffee shop on Broadway in Astoria. Payphones, even 6 or 7 years ago when this occurred, were typically being removed from service, not placed anew. I picked up the handset of this Astoria payphone and wouldn’t you know it: No dial tone. Probably the… Read more »
The once-celebrated East Village bar the Yaffa Café announced that it is closing its doors for good. It was initially shut down in September by the Department of Health for health violations. The coverage sent up its standard lament; another “iconic” landmark crushed by cruel fate. It’s a familiar pattern now. A well-known music venue,… Read more »
In the past few years a litany of small businesses have closed in Manhattan. From music venues like CBGBs and the Roseland Ballroom to stalwart restaurants like Union Square Cafe, NYC landmarks are disappearing at an alarming rate. Normally this would be a sign of a struggling economy but here it means quite the opposite…. Read more »
