Courtesy AMC This Sunday (9pm EST) marks the debut of AMC’s new Revolutionary War drama Turn, documenting the beginnings of George Washington’s mysterious spy circuit The Culper Ring and starring Jamie Bell as Washington’s spy leader Abraham Woodhull. Follow along with me on Twitter this Sunday as I throw in a few historical details related… Read More
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Are you a new listener to the Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast? Here are some answers to a few questions you might have: Where can you listen to the Bowery Boys? You can download us through traditional podcast aggregators like iTunes or you can stream our shows directly from such services as Stitcher,… Read More
“Photo shows Marion Simpson with her French bull dog, possibly at the French Bull Dog Club of America Show at the Hotel Astor, New York City, April 1914.” (Source: Flickr Commons project, 2010 and New York Times, April 19, 1914) Click photo for a better, cuter look. — Do you like Downton Abbey? I’ve started… Read More
Frank and Al Capone, with Nelson Van Alden (played by Michael Shannon), at Western Electric’s Hawthorne Works in Cicero, although I suspect this was actually filmed at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. (Courtesy HBO)BOARDWALK EMPIRE: I’ve been up to my regular Sunday Tweet-alongs with historical-based television shows, this time around following the newest season of Boardwalk… Read More
WARNING The article contains a couple light spoilers about last night’s ‘Mad Men’ on AMC. If you’re a fan of the show, come back once you’re watched the episode. But these posts are about a specific element of New York history from the 1960s and can be read even by those who don’t watch the… Read More
The first time: A TV Guide advertisement from 1965 announcing the upcoming Charlie Brown special, “presented … by the people in your town who bottle Coca-Cola.” [source] A Charlie Brown Christmas, the holiday special to end all holiday specials, needed a little encouragement from the Madison Avenue advertising world in 1965 to spring into existence.… Read More
The first time: A TV Guide advertisement from 1965 announcing the upcoming Charlie Brown special, “presented … by the people in your town who bottle Coca-Cola.” [source] A Charlie Brown Christmas, the holiday special to end all holiday specials, needed a little encouragement from the Madison Avenue advertising world in 1965 to spring into existence.… Read More
It’s a different world: Illustrating the difficulty of a New York TV show set in the 1880s, above is a picture of the corner of Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street. The Reservoir is off to the left, where the New York Public Library is today. More on this photo here. Ever since the announcement that… Read More
I’ve been on Twitter every Sunday at 10pm EST during broadcasts of BBC America’s ‘Copper‘ throwing out trivia and other observations on 19th century New York. I had a blast doing this kinda thing during ‘Mad Men‘ earlier this year, and I’ve also started with the new season of ‘Boardwalk Empire‘. Well, this Sunday is… Read More
Party at Pompadou’s Bordello: Cocktails and carousing on ‘Copper’ Courtesy BBC America My first ever column for the Huffington Post is available to read on their site. I look at the different ways that three Sunday night ‘prestige’ shows — BBC America’s Copper, AMC’s Mad Men, and HBO’s Boardwalk Empire — approach the task of… Read More
I’ve been traveling the last few days and haven’t been able to get a blog posting up about the season finale of ‘Mad Men’, but I promise one within the next couple days. In the meantime, another television show will take on New York City history later this summer. ‘Copper‘ is a ten-part British production… Read More
Tom Bosley in a Tony-winning performance as Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia, in ‘Fiorello!’, which tied for the Best Musical Tony in 1960 with ‘The Sound of Music’. Only one of these productions is regularly produced by high schools across the country. For those of you not watching the season finale of Mad Men this Sunday, the… Read More
Ladies in their most decorative hats enjoy a sunny ride from a double-decker in the fleet of the Fifth Avenue Coach Company. Anybody recognize this street corner? There’s an advertisement for McMullen’s White Label Bass Ale, Guinness Stout, Appolinari’s mineral water on the building in the background. (Photo by Alice Austen, courtesy NYPL. Labeled 1896, but most likely… Read More
The Dakota Apartment circa the 1890s: If you arranged everything just right, could you go back to it? The writer Jack Finney, who was born a hundred years ago this week, on October 2, 1911, turned the Dakota Apartments into a time machine in his 1970 novel ‘Time And Again’. He inspired a legion of New… Read More
NEWSIES: The Disney film ‘Newsies’ is notable almost exclusively for giving us a singin’, dancin’ Christian Bale. But the glowing reviews for the new musical version, which debuted this Sunday at the Papermill Playhouse in Milburn NJ, suggest this version has more to shout about. Suggested Listening: The original story is based on events which occurred on… Read More