Cotopaxi, 1862, Detroit Institute of Arts, Michigan
Perched over the Hudson River near the city of Hudson sits Olana State Historic Site, once the wondrous home of painter Frederic Church.
This Gilded Age mansion is unlike any in the valley, mystical and imposing, evoking Persian and Moorish architectural styles and reflecting the art and ambitions of its former owner.
Church was more than a Hudson River School painter; he was an adventurer and dreamer, bringing the vistas of the world to America within his massive landscape creations. In 1859, when his Heart of the Andes made its New York debut, thousands lined up to soak in its impossible beauty.
She joins Greg and Tom on the podcast this week to discuss Church’s unusual life — both as a New Yorker and as a daring traveler. After this show, you may never look at a landscape painting the same way again.
LISTEN HERE: THE PAINTER WHO BROUGHT THE WORLD TO NEW YORK
You can also find the podcast on Apple, Spotify, Overcast and YouTube.
We want to thank Victoria Johnson for joining us on the Bowery Boys Podcast. Her new book Glorious Country is available on Scribner.
Floating Iceberg, Canada, June–July 1859, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design MuseumFrederic Edwin Church, Niagara Falls in Winter, March 1856, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design MuseumTwilight in the Wilderness, 1860, The Cleveland Museum of ArtThe Parthenon, 1871, The Metropolitan Museum of Art10th Street Studio, where Church’s studio was locatedFrederic Edwin Church, The Heart of the Andes, 1859, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
FURTHER LISTENING
Some other shows from the Bowery Boys Podcast related to this week’s show. Give them a listen when you’re done with our interview with Victoria Johnson:
In our modern world, people are turning to all sorts of unusual beliefs and fringe disciplines just outside the bounds of medical science and psychology, all in search of a better understanding of the human mind and the origins of personality.
In the mid-19th century, New Yorkers with similar questions became obsessed with the mysterious practice of phrenology, which promised to unlock the secrets of the brain through a careful examination and mapping of the human skull.
By the 1840s, visitors to New York City Hall and Barnum’s American Museum could walk just a short distance to the curiosity cabinet run by the Fowler family, a group of phrenologists and publishers who helped popularize this now-debunked practice.
At this very odd tourist attraction, visitors could examine rows of skulls and casts of skulls taken from both celebrated figures in human history and some of the world’s most infamous criminals.
Phrenology attracted the interest of some of the 19th century’s most notable figures, including P. T. Barnum and Walt Whitman. The Fowlers’ empire of unusual disciplines soon expanded to include mesmerism and even spiritualism. But there was also a darker side to phrenology: it was used by many to justify elitist and racist philosophies.
Greg is joined in the studio by Paul Stob, author of the new book Empire of Skulls: Phrenology, the Fowler Family, and a New Nation’s Quest to Unlock the Secrets of the Mind, to explore this strange craze, what people believed they saw when they looked at the skull, and why New York City played such a crucial role in its rise.
LISTEN NOW — THE PHRENOLOGY CRAZE
Thanks to Paul Stob for being on the Bowery Boys Podcast. His new book Empire of Skulls: Phenology, The Fowler Family and a New Nation’s Quest to Unlock the Secrets of the Mind is now available from Counterpoint Press
An advertisement for phrenological services at Clinton Halland an Evening Post ad for the ‘cabinet of curiosities’The study of phrenology was quite risqué in the Victorian era as male practicioners would often examine the scalps of female patients.Outside Clinton Hall….
FURTHER LISTENING
Some other shows from the Bowery Boys Podcast related to this week’s show. Give them a listen when you’re done with The Phrenology Craze:
Carnegie Hall is one of America’s greatest and most enduring cultural landmarks, enchanting audiences and making history since its opening night on May 5, 1891, when Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky appeared there in his first performance in the United States.
This groundbreaking performance space (originally known simply as “Music Hall”) is in fact a trio of distinct venues, all nestled within a single, opulent Italian Renaissance–style building.
Although its benefactor Andrew Carnegie and his fellow Gilded Age elites had moved their grand residences farther up Fifth Avenue, New York’s established cultural institutions, like the venerable Academy of Music, still lingered well to the south. Carnegie Hall helped shift that center of gravity uptown.
Yet the true history of Carnegie Hall lives inside its walls—within the experiences of the audiences and the artists, and, for this week’s show, within the archives themselves. Tom and Greg have been invited into the Carnegie Hall archives for an exclusive, unprecedented encounter with the story of American music.
Kathleen Sabogal and Robert Hudson of the Rose Museum & Archives guide the Bowery Boys through the Hall’s past, using some of their collection’s most cherished artifacts: a clarinet, mysterious locks, ledger books, stickpins, suffrage buttons, beaded jackets, photographs, and autograph books that together bring the spirit of Carnegie Hall vividly to life.
And in the end — they even take to the stage!
This episode was proudly sponsored by Carnegie Hall. Visit CarnegieHall.org for information on upcoming shows, including the United in Sound: America at 250festival, a multifaceted reflection of the United States 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
Carnegie Hall’s 2025–2026 season festival is a multifaceted reflection of the United States 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
In more than 35 concerts at the Hall, audiences will experience Broadway, jazz, film music, rock ‘n’ roll, hip-hop, bluegrass, classical, and so much more, showcasing the very best of the American spirit through music.
Events at top cultural institutions across New York further expand the festival’s scope, offering new avenues for discovery as we explore our nation’s vibrant and complex past, present, and future.
Carnegie Hall, 1891. Main entrance to Carnegie Hall on 57th street. The front stairs were removed in 1920 when 57th street was widened to add two additional traffic lanes.
Courtesy Carnegie Hall Rose Archives
The speakeasy lock! Double-lock used to gain entry to Club Richman, a speakeasy located on the Carnegie Hall property, 1924
Courtesy of Carnegie Hall Rose Archives
Judy Garland at Carnegie Hall 1961
Courtesy of John FrickeCourtesy Bowery Boys
The Beatles at Carnegie Hall, February 12, 1964
Courtesy of Carnegie Hall Rose Archives
FURTHER LISTENING
After taking in the story of Carnegie Hall, take a dive into these past Bowery Boys episodes to learn more about some of the topics mentioned in the show, including some forays into New York City musical history
Calling all history geeks, New Yorkers, and lovers of great storytelling! Greg Young of the Bowery Boys Podcast is bringing you another edition of BOWERY BOYS HISTORY LIVE on May 26, 2026
Bowery Boys History Live is a storytelling cabaret of true tales and spellbinding secrets from the past, brought to life by a rotating roster of the city’s finest historians.
For this season’s installment, Greg is joined by Carl Raymond (The Gilded Gentleman Podcast), Laurie Gwen Shapiro (former Bowery Boys podcast guest and author of the new Amelia Earhart biography The Aviator and the Showman), and many more for HEATED RIVALRIES FROM AMERICAN HISTORY, spotlighting the nation’s most combative frenemies and jaw-dropping personal clashes.
Alexander Hamilton vs. Aaron Burr was only the beginning. Prepare to duel!
BOWERY BOYS HISTORY LIVE! Heated Rivalries of American History The Loft at City Winery NYC (25 11th Avenue) Tuesday, May 26, 7:30 pm (doors open at 6pm)
Once upon a time, the streets of the Lower East Side were lined with pushcarts and salespeople haggling with customers over the price of fruits, fish and pickles. Whatever became of them?
New York’s earliest marketplaces were large and surprisingly well regulated hubs for commerce that kept the city fed. When the city was small, they served the hungry population well.
But by the mid 19th century, mass waves of immigration and the necessary expansion of the city meant a lack of affordable food options for the city’s poorest residents in overcrowded tenement districts.
Then along came the peddler, pushcart vendors who brought bargains of all types — edible and nonedible — to neighborhood streets throughout the city. In particular, on the Lower East Side, the pushcarts created makeshift marketplaces.
Many shoppers loved the set-up! But not a certain mayor — Fiorello La Guardia, who promised to sweep away these old-fashioned pushcarts that packed the streets — and instead house some of those vendors in new municipal market buildings.
For those immigrant peddlers, the Essex Street Market — in sight of the Williamsburg Bridge — would provide a diverse shopping experience representing a swirl of various cultures: Eastern European, Puerto Rican, Italian and more.
But could these markets survive competition from supermarkets? Or the many economic changes of life in New York City?
Top image from a colorized postcard of the Lower East Side. Find a great collection of these old photographs at the Blavatnik Archive.
Norfork and Hester Streets, 1898
Orchard Street in 1926. That unsightly pile running down the street is dirty snow!
New York Daily NewsBerenice Abbott, Hester Street in 1938Essex Street Market, 1940, Wurts Brothers, courtesy the Museum of the City of New YorkInside the market, early 1940s, courtesy Essex Street Market
Gastropolis: Food and the City, editors Annie Hauck-Lawson, Jonathan Deutsch Landscape of Modernity: Essays on New York City, 1900-1940, editors David Ward and Oliver Zunz Next to Godliness: Confronting Dirt and Despair in Progressive Era New York by Daniel Eli Burnstein The Pushcart War by Jean Merrill “New York’s Many Miles of Pushcarts” New York Times, Nov. 30 1924 “LaGuardia Renews War on Pushcarts” New York Times, May 22, 1938
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is brought to you …. by you!
We are now a creator on Patreon, a patronage platform where you can support your favorite content creators.
Please visit our page on Patreon and watch a short video of us recording the show and talking about our expansion plans.
If you’d like to help out, there are a few different pledge levels. Check them out and consider being a sponsor.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
Greg Young from the Bowery Boys Podcast is a guest on this week’s episode of the Official Marvel Podcast, speaking about the TV show Daredevil: Born Againand the intreguing inspirations for its principal antagonist Wilson Fisk aka Kingpin. He’s the mayor of New York City!
Vincent D’Onofrio as Wilson Fisk. Image courtesy Disney Plus/Marvel Studios
Here’s the description of the podcast:
This week, Vincent D’Onofrio and Charlie Cox discuss their work on season 2 of Marvel Television’s Daredevil: Born Again (1:10). Plus, a deep dive on Wilson Fisk’s most unforgettable moments (7:46).
Later on, The Bowery Boys Podcast co-host Greg Young dives into the history of New York City’s most notorious political criminals (12:01). All time codes are approximate.
In 1889, Robert Ray Hamilton, great-grandson of Alexander Hamilton, became ensnared in a sensational web of deceit — forged identities, attempted murder, and brazen fraud that captured headlines across the country.
Although this gripping saga played out over a two-year period, it has largely faded from public memory.
Bill joins The Gilded Gentleman to unravel this astonishing true-crime drama, a story that shocked Gilded Age readers and is sure to raise eyebrows even today.
This show is brought to you by The Gilded Gentleman podcast, produced by the Bowery Boys and edited and produced by Kieran Gannon.
Why is the West Village both historically important and incredibly expensive?
In the final part of our West Village mini-series, we look at the elements that define the modern neighborhood — from battles with Robert Moses to the protests that galvanized the gay-rights movement.
The 19th-century charms of the old Village seem timeless, but they survive thanks to the 1969 Greenwich Village Historic District. The fight to save the neighborhood, however, began two decades earlier, and those early conflicts even popularized the name “West Village.”
Jane Jacobs, fresh off the publication of her landmark book The Death and Life of Great American Cities, would become the leading voice in protecting this uniquely New York enclave.
That same year, clashes between police and patrons at the Stonewall Inn united the area’s LGBT residents, culminating in the first Christopher Street Liberation Day Parade (today’s NYC Pride March).
A vibrant, radical queer culture flourished — from leather bars to the Christopher Street Pier.
In the 1980s, thousands of New Yorkers died of AIDS, and St. Vincent’s Hospital became known for its pioneering care. Today, long-running establishments like the Monster and Julius’ form a kind of “legacy cultural district,” linking present-day nightlife to those transformative years.
In the 1990s, pop-cultural phenomena Friends and Sex and the City (which made one Perry Street brownstone famous) brought international attention to the neighborhood.
By the 21st century, the West Village had become a luxury enclave, even as its history was further elevated with Stonewall’s designation as a U.S. National Monument.
What has the West Village become in 2026?
LISTEN NOW: PRIDE AND PRESERVATION: THE STREETS OF THE WEST VILLAGE
All episodes of The Streets of the West Village mini-series are now available.
Before the 1910s, Seventh Avenue once stopped right at this intersection with Greenwich Avenue. Today people flock to this corner for trendy bagels. Photo by Greg Young66 Perry Street, made famous for its appearance on Sex and the City. Photo by Greg YoungInside the Stonewall National Monument Visitors Center. Photo by Greg YoungAlthough part of a National Monument, the Stonewall Inn is still an active bar. Photo by Greg YoungThe Center — aka the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center. Photo by Greg YoungThe New York City AIDS Memorial, opposite the former site of St. Vincent’s Hospital. Photo by Greg YoungThe “Friends” apartment building
In Part Two of our mini-series, The Streets of the West Village, we turn to the people who gave the neighborhood its character and vitality. From Irish longshoremen on the docks to actors on the off-Broadway stage, from street gangs to speakeasy proprietors.
From Eugene O’Neill to Bea Arthur, their stories help define this corner of Manhattan.
Well into the early 19th century, the West Village still felt like a true village, with its preserved, winding lanes. Over the following decades, a diverse array of residents arrived and made the neighborhood their own, working along the waterfront or gathering at local haunts like the beloved White Horse Tavern.
The promise of a new subway line once seemed entirely beneficial, but it brought a devastating consequence: Seventh Avenue had to be extended straight through the western Village, cutting a swath through the existing streetscape and wiping away hundreds of buildings.
Today, the avenue’s curious wedge-shaped structures stand as evidence of that sweeping change.
Prohibition and the Jazz Age are seemingly etched into the very fabric of the West Village, reflected in the many institutions that date from the 1920s and ’30s, including numerous former speakeasies.
Join us as we wander through the Jazz Age Village — Fedora, Chumley’s, the Cherry Lane Theatre, and more — and trace the echoes of that exuberant era.
LISTEN TODAY: HOW THE WEST VILLAGE BECAME A NEIGHBORHOOD
AND LISTEN TO PART ONE OF OUR THE STREETS OF THE WEST VILLAGE MINI-SERIES HERE — CREATING THE VILLAGE
This episode was produced and edited by Kieran Gannon.
A few West Village landmarks featured in this week’s show. Photos taken by Greg Young/Bowery Boys
Topographical map showing approximate course of Minetta Creek, overlayed with street grid as of 1865, reproduced from Egbert Ludovicus Viele's "Sanitary & Topographical Map of the City and Island of New York"
Why are the streets of Manhattan’s West Village so unusually charming and romantic? Why does it make such an excellent place for a night out in New York City? Why is the real estate so expensive? And when did it become a distinct place separate from Greenwich Village?
We‘ll get to the bottom of these questions in our epic new limited series on the history of the West Village.
Of course, the biggest question is — why are the streets, you know, so twisty and confusing and so utterly unlike most other places in Manhattan?
People have been living in this region of Manhattan Island for centuries — first the Lenape, then the Dutch, who gave the area its distinctive name (“Groenwijck”). During the English colonial period, several large estates were developed here, and their memories survive today in certain street names — like Christopher Street. The area was remote enough that the state of New York built its very first penitentiary here — Newgate Prison.
By the 19th century, the fear of yellow-fever epidemics in the crowded city south of here brought new residents, new housing development — and new streets, built every which way, conforming to hills, farms, and private property.
It immediately clashed with the city’s plan for an organized Grid Plan of streets and avenues. The result is a bewildering map that often seems to bend space and time (as at the intersection of West 4th and 11th Streets).
But the real economic engine of the neighborhood came from the waterfront, providing jobs, river access, and a future set of piers at Christopher Street that would evolve to become something quite different in the 20th century.
And for 2026, we’ve added a bunch of new exclusive features to our membership levels — on top of our regular behind the scenes podcast called Side Streets, which we are also recording on video, we’re also releasing classic episodes of the Bowery Boys each week, ad-free.
On top of that, of course, we have exclusive merchandise made just for patron, you also get first dibs on tickets for upcoming live appearances – and so much more!
So please join the fun over at Patreon.com/boweryboys and thank you for helping support the Bowery Boys podcast.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
FURTHER LISTENING
After listening to the first part in our Streets of the West Village series, dive into these older shows with similar themes:
A Greenwich Village man named Bernhard Goetz shot four black teenagers who he believed were about to assault him.
The incident made international news, amplified by the city’s shameless tabloid newspapers because it so perfectly embodied all the cultural stereotypes about New York City in the 1980s.
Goetz became a sort of folk hero, the so-called Subway Vigilante, who took things into his own hands because the city’s weakened and inept services could not.
The facts of this case only came to light in the courtroom, playing out over the years. And, if you’re old enough to remember this incident, chances are that you may not be remembering it accurately.
This episode was produced and edited by Kieran Gannon
LISTEN NOW:
We want to thank Elliot Williams for being our guest on this show. Please run and get Five Bullets especially if you like gripping court cases and insight about life in New York City in the 1980s (which many of you may remember).
On August 6, 1930, Supreme Court Justice Joseph Force Crater stepped into a taxi on West 45th Street and vanished without a trace.
For 27 days, nobody reported him missing—not his wife waiting in Maine, not his Tammany Hall cronies, not the courts. When the story finally broke, it became the most famous missing persons case in New York history.
Judge Crater was a rising star in the city’s legal world—a Tammany Hall insider who’d just landed a prestigious judgeship paying $23,000 a year (about $450,000 today). But he was also tangled up in corruption, office-buying schemes, and shady real estate deals. He had a taste for Broadway chorus girls, speakeasies run by gangsters, and envelopes stuffed with cash.
His disappearance rocked the city and captivated the nation for decades. The phrase “to pull a Crater” entered the popular lexicon. Psychics came forward with tips. Grand juries investigated. Deathbed confessions emerged decades later.
This week, Tom takes you through one of the city’s greatest unsolved mysteries—a story of Tammany corruption, Broadway nightlife, and Depression-era New York. What happened on that hot August night? Was it murder? Blackmail? A carefully planned escape?
We would like to thank Founded by NYC for sponsoring the Bowery Boys Podcast in 2025 and giving us the opportunity to feature upcoming New York City events in our shows this year.
To mark the 250th anniversary of the United States in 2026, Founded By NYC continues to highlight how the City has helped shaped history and continues to inspire America and the world today.
We were grateful to play a role in bringing some of that history to light this year in the following shows:
Christmas time in the pit of Rockefeller Center, 1931. (AP)
PODCAST The Rockefeller Center Christmas tree has brought joy and sparkle to Midtown Manhattan since the early 1930s. The annual festivities may seem steady and timeless but this holiday icon actually has a surprisingly dramatic history.
Millions tune in each year to watch the tree lighting in a music-filled ceremony on NBC, and tens of thousands more will crowd around the tree’s massive branches during the holiday season, adjusting their phones for that perfect holiday selfie.
But the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree is more than just decor. The tree has reflected the mood of the United States itself — through good times and bad.
In 1938 they actually had a pair of Christmas trees.
The first tree at this site in 1931 became a symbol of hope during the Great Depression. With the dedication of the first official Christmas tree two years later, the lighting ceremony was considered a stroke of marketing genius for the grand new “city within a city” funded by JD Rockefeller Jr.
The tree has also been an enduring television star — from the early years in the 1950s with Howdy Doody to its upgrade to prime time in the 1990s.
Join Greg for this festive holiday history featuring kaleidoscopic lighting displays, painted branches, whirling snowflakes, reindeer and a very tiny owl.
Please enjoy this newly edited and remastered version of our 2021 show on New York City’s most famous Christmas tree and the surprisingly fascinating story of how its annual lighting became a national event.
LISTEN NOW — THE ROCKEFELLER CENTER CHRISTMAS TREE
Before the lighting, 2017. Photo by Greg YoungGetting ready for the television special, 2017The Christmas tree, 2015. Photo by Greg YoungRadio City Music Hall 2015, photo by Greg YoungHeading into the Christmas tree lighting, 2011. Photo by Greg Young
FURTHER READING
Check out these additional stories from the Bowery Boys: New York City History website about Rockefeller Center and New York City holiday traditions:
After you’ve listened to the history of the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree, dive back into the back catalog and listen to these podcasts which further explore themes discussed in the show:
The Bowery Boys: New York City History podcast is brought to you …. by you!
We are now producing a new Bowery Boys podcast every other week. We’re also looking to improve and expand the show in other ways — publishing, social media, live events and other forms of media. But we can only do this with your help!
We are now a creator on Patreon, a patronage platform where you can support your favorite content creators.
Please visit our page on Patreon and watch a short video of us recording the show and talking about our expansion plans. If you’d like to help out, there are several different pledge levels. Check them out and consider being a sponsor.
We greatly appreciate our listeners and readers and thank you for joining us on this journey so far.
A special presentation of the live show Bowery Boys History Live, recorded at City Winery on December 12, 2025, a holiday themed history-variety show with Bridgerton vibes.
Bowery Boys History Live is a live-show series at City Winery hosted by Greg Young featuring a variety of historians and tour guide. The last installment this summer featured author Liz Block and tour guide Keith Taillon. As live performances, they’re a bit more loose and irreverent than the regular podcast, and sometimes feature references to images being projected on stage.
As a special holiday bonus, step into the season with this festive dose of “Hot Victorian” history, naughty-list edition.
So pour yourself some eggnog, cozy up by the fire, and enjoy live shenanigans full of holiday history and vintage comedy.
Featuring author Aaron Radford-Wattley, author of Hot Victorians: Meet Your Dream Man From The Past, a fascinating and cheeky look at 19th century photography and the styles of mid-19th century men.
And Kyle Supley, clock enthusiast and repairman. If you’ve got an old clock, he’ll fix it for you!
