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NeighborhoodsAugust 2, 2022
Sixty years ago today -- on August 2, 1962 -- the Action Group for Better Architecture in New York (AGBANY), a group of young architects and activists, held a most curious protest outside of Pennsylvania Station, the old train station designed by McKim, Mead…
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In honor of the 100th birthday of television icon Norman Lear (creator of All in the Family, The Jeffersons, Good Times and many, many more) I've…
Two books won the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in History this year, underscoring the excellent offerings on the history shelf in 2021. They are two wildly different…
What was life like for a valet, a cook or a scullery maid in the mansions of late 19th century New York? How were houses with…
The New York Tribune of July 7, 1911, says it all: "Heat's Scythe Mows Down 56 On Fifth Day." The city was in the midst of…
Most New Yorkers have probably never been to Co-Op City, the massive residential development in the Bronx. And that's partially by design. This historic development, built…
Playboy Magazine called Herb Cohen "the world's greatest negotiator" and whether or not that was true, Cohen could convince you that it most certainly was. He…
The superstar and civil rights activist Lena Horne had such a dynamic, multi-faceted and enduring career -- starting in 1933, she worked regularly well into the…
Privateers have been much maligned in history, so much so that perhaps you didn't realize their important role in gaining America its independence from Great Britain.…
Frances Ethel Gumm was born 100 years ago (June 10, 1922) in Grand Rapids, Minnesota, a world away from the glamour of Hollywood and the lights…
The tale of two artist's models named Hettie Anderson and Thomas McKeller -- their stories little known until recent years -- and the magnificent art they…
In 1857 Elizabeth and Emily Blackwell threw open the doors to the New York Infirmary for Women and Children at 58 Bleecker Street, revolutionary as being…
Welfare Island (once the more enticingly named Blackwell's Island) was New York's depository of human services, once a dour place of horrifying asylums and miserable workhouses. In…
