When we think of great African American historic sites in New York, we typically think of Harlem’s Apollo Theater, Lower Manhattan’s African Burial Ground, or Brooklyn’s Weeksville Houses. But one building that should perhaps join the list is 70 Fifth Avenue in Greenwich Village, which housed the headquarters of the NAACP, the nation’s oldest and largest civil rights […]
The streets, parks, and squares of Greenwich Village are named for a unique collection of historical figures. Last year in honor of the 50th anniversary of the Greenwich Village Historic District we developed a guide to how many of the locations within the Greenwich Village Historic District got their names. Today we go beyond the […]
Emma Goldman was born in Kovno, Lithuania in 1869. By the time she was 23 years old, she was a divorced American citizen under arrest. For everything from being associated with anarchists to “inciting a riot” in Union Square, Emma Goldman served her time. This was just the first of many arrests for this rabble-rouser, […]
Our area boasts some of the most historic and attractive architecture in the city, if we do say so ourselves. All too often, however, these buildings lose beautiful historic details, through lack of maintenance or intentional removal. The most common such alteration to the look of buildings is probably the removal of cornices, the protruding […]
Founded on May 23, 1895, the New York Public Library (NYPL) is the largest municipal library in the world, with 53 million items and 92 locations across Manhattan, the Bronx, and Staten Island. It’s also the steward of some of New York’s greatest landmarks, reflecting a century and a quarter of Gotham’s history, and in […]
Part of our blog series Why Isn’t This Landmarked?, where we look at buildings in our area we’re fighting to protect that are worthy of landmark designation, but somehow aren’t landmarked. I’ve walked by 86 University Place between 11th and 12th Streets, aka “Mittelstaedt House,” countless times. Based upon the unusually elaborate cornice alone, I have […]
2019 has been a huge year for Village Preservation. We celebrated the 50th Anniversary of the Greenwich Village Historic District, fought increasing pressure on Greenwich Village and the East Village below Union Square to become an extension of “Silicon Alley” and “Midtown South”, served thousands of students and adults with our free public programs, testified […]
In the years before the abolition of slavery in New York State in 1827 and the Civil War, New York was a hotbed of both pro-slavery and anti-slavery sentiment. The latter group consisted of both prominent African-American institutions and individuals (mostly associated with churches) who organized economically, politically, and socially against slavery, and whites who […]
Artists and photographer Carole Teller donated hundreds of photographs to Village Preservation that she took from the 1960s through the 1990s. An East Village resident for over fifty years, Carole so beautifully and thoroughly documented her neighborhood’s architecture, daily life, and many quirks, we have had to dole it out in multiple parts in our Historic Image […]
Village Preservation is always working hard to document, celebrate, and protect the historic character of our neighborhoods, including the great buildings that make Greenwich Village, NoHo and East Village such wonderful places to live, work and shop. Of course, we’re not always able to save every historic building from demolition, and some disappeared long before […]
When doing research on buildings in our area, you never know what you may find. We try to exhume and bring to light all the history we find — the good, the bad, and the ugly — because there are always important lessons to be learned. One such case is 11 East 12th Street, a […]
This is one in a series of posts marking the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. Click here to check out our year-long activities and celebrations. In 1909, Frances Perkins was living in Greenwich Village and pursuing a master’s degree in political science at Columbia University. She was, in her […]
Have you ever heard the term ‘French Flat?’ It sounds rather chic, doesn’t it? That’s because it was meant to. In New York City in the mid-to-late late 19th century, respectable, middle- and upper-class people were supposed to live in private homes. The poor and working-class lived in “tenement houses” (derived from “tenant houses”), which […]
The Village has a long history of putting on the best Halloween festivities. From the world-renowned NYC Village Halloween Parade to local specials at our many small business establishments, there is always something to do here to celebrate this spooky time of the year. Village Preservation has you covered on the top things to do […]
We are starting a new blog series entitled Why Isn’t This Landmarked?, where we will look at buildings in our area which are worthy of landmark designation but somehow aren’t landmarked and we are fighting to protect. To kick off this series, our first stop is the San Isidoro y San Leandro Western Orthodox Catholic […]
The area south of Union Square, on the border between Greenwich Village and the East Village, is changing. The approval of the new 14th Street Tech Hub south of Union Square combined with an explosion of tech-related development in the area has resulted in the demolition of mid-19th-century hotels and Beaux-Arts style tenements, with new office towers like 809 Broadway taking […]
The Children’s Aid Society, founded in 1853, dramatically altered the lives of the city’s poor and homeless children through a pioneering rural emigration program and a strong network of country-like lodging houses and industrial schools. In doing so, it set the development of social services across the country into motion. Not only do a number […]
This is one in a series of posts marking the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. Click here to check out our year-long activities and celebrations. Dr. Horatio Gomez was a 19th-century doctor who could trace his Jewish lineage to Abraham Haim de Ludena, one of the original Sephardic Jewish […]
Henry Agard Wallace (October 7, 1888 – November 18, 1965) served as Vice President under Franklin Delano Roosevelt from January 20, 1941 to January 20, 1945. Roosevelt preferred that Wallace serve a second term as Vice President, in which case he would have become our 33rd President, but other forces intervened to bounce him off […]
The Shiloh Presbyterian Church is one of many African American churches once found in Greenwich Village, when nearly all the city’s leading African American churches were located in this neighborhood. Like most of those churches, it played a leading role in the abolitionist movement, and its present-day descendant church can be found in Harlem. But […]
Marcel Duchamp was born in France on July 28, 1887 and died on October 2, 1968. He was trained as a painter in Paris until 1905, and spent much of his adult life living in Paris and New York City. He moved to Greenwich Village, not because of the artistic milieu, but to be near […]
Nineteenth-century Jewish immigrant life in New York is well-documented, when massive waves of Jews, first from Germany and then from Eastern Europe, began to flood into the city. This made New York the largest Jewish city by population in the world, which it remains to this day. Like all immigrant stories, the Jewish community had […]
Hillel (Hilly) Kristal, founder of legendary rock club CBGB, was born on September 23, 1931 in New York City. His early life, well into adulthood, might not have given any hint of the legendary status he would earn in the Pantheon of rock and roll, and particularly as one of the prime forces behind the […]
For almost 30 years, the original World Trade Center dominated the New York City skyline. Its twin towers were the subject of countless photographs; visible throughout the five boroughs, they could be seen from 30 or so miles away in New Jersey or Long Island. Whether you were in the East Village, Greenwich Village, Jersey […]
The Attica Prison Riots, which took place September 9th through 13th, 1971, rocked the entire country. The bloodiest prison disturbance in recent American history, the riot was unplanned but ignited at a time of deep unrest among the prison population. The prisoners spent the four days of the riot/uprising in negotiations for better conditions, dignity, […]
On a farm far from the city on August 15, 1969, the Woodstock music festival entered into history and helped define a generation. The “Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace & Music” was held at Max Yasgur’s dairy farm which was actually in Bethel, New York. Woodstock marked a pivotal moment in music and countercultural […]
On August 12th, 1882, the very first Yiddish theatrical performance in New York City was held in a building which still stands at 66 East 4th Street, between the Bowery and Second Avenue. Over the next four decades, the Yiddish theater would become a focal point and social outlet for the 3.5 million Jews that […]
This post is part of our “Beyond the Village and Back” series, in which we look at great New York City landmarks outside of the Village, and trace their (sometimes surprising) roots back to our neighborhood. On Thursday, November 24, 1927, the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade as we know it was launched. While the first […]
On August 8, 1974, President Richard Nixon announced his resignation, effective noon the following day. Following months of impeachment proceedings, Nixon could read the writing on the wall that his time as President would be coming to an end, one way or another. There were several prominent Villagers who played key roles in the push […]
Village Preservation has a collection of over 2,000 images in our Historic Image Archive, ranging from the 18th to the early 21st century, most of Lower Manhattan, but with some images across the five boroughs. The majority were donated, and some come with absolutely no information about date or location. We’ve managed to figure out […]
The tumult and unrest in the streets of Puerto Rico right now harken back to a time when many Puerto Rican New Yorkers were also agitating in the streets for long-overdue reform and change. One milestone in that history took place 50 years ago when several Puerto Rican activists gathered in the East Village to found […]
This is one in a series of posts marking the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. Click here to check out our year-long activities and celebrations. Aviatrix Amelia Earhart is a household name for shattering a record-breaking 18,415-foot glass ceiling in her airplane. Almost as famous is her mysterious disappearance […]
This is one in a series of posts marking the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. Check out our year-long activities and celebrations at gvshp.org/GVHD50. With neighborhoods like the Lower East Side and Upper West Side in close proximity, Greenwich Village, and more specifically the Greenwich Village Historic District, is not one of the […]
This is one in a series of posts marking the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. Click here to check out our year-long activities and celebrations. The streets, parks, and squares of the Greenwich Village Historic District are named for a unique collection of historical figures. In honor of the […]
On July 11, 1804, Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton crossed paths for the last time. That was the date of their infamous duel on the cliffs of Weehawken, New Jersey when Burr exacted his long-desired revenge upon Hamilton with a gunshot to the abdomen. But this was not the first time the two men’s lives and careers came in […]
John D. Rockefeller (July 8, 1839 — May 23, 1937) was a determined man who ascended from very humble beginnings to unrivaled wealth and productivity after the Civil War.
Millions converge in New York City each year in late June to celebrate events which took place in and outside of a Greenwich Village bar in 1969. The Stonewall Riots are not only be memorialized here in New York City, but those events have come to take on international significance. There are celebrations and marches in countries across the globe, […]
On June 27th, 2016, President Obama designated the Stonewall National Monument, the 412th National Park site, and the first U.S. National Monument chosen specifically for its LGBT history. This milestone moment brought national attention to the Village site that transformed LGBT lives forever.
Architect Stanford White (November 9, 1853 – June 25, 1906) designed many of New York City’s most beautiful Gilded Age buildings, including the Washington Square Arch and Judson Memorial Church in Greenwich Village and NoHo’s Cable Building, as well as other landmarks like the Players Club, the Metropolitan Club, Gould Memorial Library, the Bowery Savings […]
On June 24, 1969, the Stonewall Inn was raided by New York City Police, four nights before the infamous raids that sparked the Stonewall Riots. This was not the first time the police had targeted the bar for a raid, nor would it be the last. That night, in one of a series of what […]
Their neighbor to the west, Greenwich Village, may be more well known as a nexus for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender history, but the East Village and Noho are chock full of LGBT culture as well, from the site of one the very first LGBT demonstrations to the homes of some of the greatest openly-LGBT artists and […]
In late June, New York is in the throes of celebrating the anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, three nights of disturbances from June 28th to June 30th 1969, which are recognized globally as the start of the modern LGBT rights movement. But Stonewall is only one of the scores of important LGBT landmarks in Greenwich Village – the homes […]
On May 30th, 1922, fifty-seven years after Abraham Lincoln was assassinated, over 35,000 people gathered at the western end of the National Mall in Washington D.C. to see him once again. Sitting within the grand, neoclassical Lincoln Memorial building designed by architect Henry Bacon, the statue of the beloved president seemed to convey to the […]
Did someone say FREE CONCERT? Yes, indeed we did! Celebrating the 125th anniversary of its historic choir, Grace Church is offering a free concert featuring current choir members and alumni, as well as professional singers, at 7:00 PM on Friday, April 26th at Grace Church, 805 Broadway at 11th Street. The music will include compositions […]
Each year, immigrant history week is celebrated in late April, commemorating the day in 1907 when more immigrants came through Ellis Island than any other day in history. More than a few of those immigrants came through Greenwich Village, which has a long and storied history of welcoming newcomers from across the city, country, and […]
This is one in a series of posts marking the anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. President Abraham Lincoln, after saving the Union and winning the Civil War, was shot by actor John Wilkes Booth at the Ford Theater in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865, finally succumbing to his wounds […]
As many can agree, there’s nothing like a good seedy scandal for some shock and entertainment. And with all the characters that have passed through the Village, it’s no surprise that plenty such events occurred right here. One such story involves Josie Mansfield, a little-known but thoroughly fascinating figure who rose to fame as the […]
Few places on Earth have attracted more or a broader array of activists and agitators for social change than Greenwich Village. And much of that activity took place right in the heart of the neighborhood in the Greenwich Village Historic District, where that rich history has been preserved through landmark designation for the past half-century. […]
In the fall of 1949, a group of the most renowned artists of their time who were part of the Abstract Expressionist movement gathered together to fix up a third-floor loft at 39 East 8th Street. In the months that followed, the loft, which came to be known as “the Club,” evolved into a center […]
On April 1, 1966, the Velvet Underground and Nico began their residency at 19-25 St. Mark’s Place in the space that would become the Electric Circus, as part of Andy Warhol’s ‘Exploding Plastic Inevitable.’ It was this month-long series of performances, attended by a who’s who of Downtown’s avant-garde and Uptown’s glitterati, which perhaps more […]
This is one in a series of posts marking the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. Click here to check out our year-long activities and celebrations. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. One of the city’s oldest and largest landmark districts, […]
On March 18, 2008, the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) approved the designation of four East Village landmarks, and they were as varied as the East Village itself. They were the Webster Hall and Annex at 119-125 East 11th Street, the Children’s Aid Society Elizabeth Home For Girls at 307 East 12th Street, the (Former) […]
On March 12, 1651, Peter Stuyvesant, Director General of the Dutch West India Company, purchased Bouwerie (Dutch for ‘farm’) #1 and part of Bouwerie #2 in what is today’s East Village and surrounding neighborhoods. While it only remained farmland for a fraction of its existence, the land between present-day 5th and 20th Streets, from Fourth […]
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District on April 29, 1969. One of the city’s oldest and still largest historic districts, it’s a unique treasure trove of rich history, pioneering culture, and charming architecture. GVSHP will be spending 2019 marking this anniversary with events, lectures, and new interactive […]
On March 6, 1970, the unexpected detonation of a bomb being assembled by members of the Weather Underground tore through Greenwich Village and the heart of its newly-designated historic district, destroying the townhouse at 18 West 11th Street. The radical group behind the explosion was committed to protesting against what they saw as grave injustices, […]
Emma Goldman, anarchist and feminist, advocate of free speech, free love, birth control, and the eight-hour workday, was arrested in New York City on February 11, 1916. Charged with violating the Comstock Act, an 1873 law banning the transportation of “obscene” matter, the courts interpreted distribution as transportation. Goldman later spent time in jail for […]
Black History is Village history, and while many are celebrating Black Futures Month, as a historic preservation organization, we’re glad to amplify a history that often goes unnoticed in the Village. These histories live in the context of the other movements that have their roots in our neighborhoods. So many of these stories are intersectional, […]
The East Village is probably not the first neighborhood that comes to mind when most New Yorkers think about African American history. But this incredibly rich, multi-layered neighborhood was home to some remarkably consequential events, places, and figures in African-American history. To help explore just some of them, we have created a new African American […]
Earlier this month, GVSHP launched its East Village Preservation effort, releasing its new website “East Village Building Blocks,” which contains historic information and images for every one of the neighborhood’s 2,200 buildings. Of course, any neighborhood spanning five centuries of history and nearly 100 blocks will reveal some surprises when you scratch the surface. But the East Village’s story has […]
British-born architect Richard Upjohn was born on January 22, 1802 in Sheffield, England. He moved to the United States in 1829, and in 1835 designed his first of many churches throughout the United States. He would go on to design over 50 churches in the Gothic Revival and Italianate styles across the country throughout his almost forty-year career. […]
On January 10th, 1750, James Varick was born into slavery in upstate New York. Possibly a slave of the prominent Dutch Varick family, as a young boy he and his mother were freed and moved to New York City. The church he helped found, what would grow to be Zion African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, had a profound effect on […]
On January 7, 1967, German-born singer Nico performed with The Velvet Underground at Steve Paul’s nightclub, the Scene, and this moment was captured stunningly in a photograph by Fred W. McDarrah. McDarrah was the photographer behind the Village Voice at the time and he had a fifty-year association with the paper that chronicled the post-War […]
Mother Teresa, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 for her work among the poor in Calcutta, India, opened an AIDS Hospice in Greenwich Village on Christmas Eve in 1985. Mother Teresa was the founder of the Order of the Missionaries of Charity, a Roman Catholic congregation of women dedicated to helping the poor. […]
If you were to ask me to name a truly perfect album, it would take a very quick punk-rock-beat to say “London Calling!” Released on December 14, 1979, this iconic album has been called the first post-punk album; “merry and tough, passionate and large-spirited” by one reviewer; and one of the five greatest albums by […]
Straddling Greenwich Village and the East Village, the neighborhood south of Union Square between Fifth and Third Avenues was once a center of groundbreaking commercial innovations, radical leftist politics, and the artistic avant-garde. With the city’s recent decision to allow an upzoning for a “Tech Hub” on the neighborhood’s doorstep on 14th Street, there are […]
There have been a handful of times in this country when the outcome of a political campaign was truly stunning. Such was the case in 1919 when several groups known as the “Drys” won a 70 year campaign to prohibit the production, sale, and distribution of alcohol. The 18th Amendment abolished booze in on January […]
“For all of us who were worried that the conservative backlash in this country would bring about unnamed terrible things, the future is now.” These words date to November 1980, and were written by activist and journalist Andy Humm following the mass shooting at the Ramrod bar on West Street in Greenwich Village on November […]
Mass transit emerged in New York City in 1827 with the omnibus, a large stagecoach pulled by horses that could accommodate about a dozen riders at a time. While horse-drawn carriages had always existed in NYC, the omnibus was different because it ran along a designated route and was a more affordable option. “Omni” meant the bus carried everyone […]
November 11, 2018 marks the 100th anniversary of the Armistice which ended World War I, a war that engulfed most of Europe since 1914. United States troops tipped the balance toward Allied victory, placing the United States on the world stage in a new way. The war came at a great cost, though. WWI claimed […]
John “Jack” Silas Reed was an American journalist, poet and communist activist at the beginning of the 20th century whose writing about revolutionary events and radical causes made him a very polarizing figure in this country and abroad. He is probably best known as the author of Ten Days That Shook the World, his account […]
On October 15, 1974, the Gay Activist Alliance Firehouse, located in SoHo at 99 Wooster Street, was bombed.
Among the many delights included in this weekend’s Open House New York will be three iconic Greenwich Village buildings–a Gothic Revival church with many architectural firsts, a library that was originally a courthouse which heard the “Trial of the Century,” and a groundbreaking artists’ housing complex that was formerly home to Bell Telephone Labs and the site […]
The Beat poets, inextricably linked with the Village and East Village, materialized in the post-WWII American of white picket fences to celebrate all things messy, countercultural, drug-addled, disenfranchised, and unstoppably vital. East Villager Allen Ginsberg’s poem “Howl” was an anthem of this movement, with its power, breathlessness, and breadth of content. And on October 7, 1955, Ginsberg […]
The Village is hallowed ground, and much like any sacred space, its landscape is marked by holy figures. For our neighborhoods, these figures are the architecture, and we even have our own “saints.” Yet, while these saints are often canonized in our memory, some of them have unfortunately left our temporal plane. With our fighting […]
Ithiel Town, born on October 3, 1784, transformed American architecture, as well as the landscape of our neighborhoods. A significant figure in beginning the Greek and Gothic Revivals in this country, he was among the first professional architects here and started the first architectural firm, later joined by Alexander Jackson Davis, another seminal figure in […]
The number “343” is indelibly linked with September 11, 2001 — the official number of firefighters killed on 9/11. However, a 344th New York City firefighter was killed at the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. His name was Keith Roma, and he was a 27-year old Staten Island firefighter who worked for the […]
In the early 2000’s GVSHP conducted research that led to the designation of the Gansevoort Market Historic District. That research included photo surveys of the area. We recently added one such photo survey to GVSHP’s Historic Image Archive covering the northern area of the district above 14th street including the Chelsea Market, the old Nabisco factory, and the High […]
“We need to change the system. We need to overthrow, not the government, as the authorities are always accusing the Communists [of conspiring to do], but this rotten, decadent, putrid industrial capitalist system which breeds such suffering in the whited sepulcher of New York.” Such are the words of the “radical Christian,” Dorothy Day, who […]
It’s an often-overlooked enclave with the largest concentration of Federal and Greek Revival style houses in New York City. Its origins can be traced back to historical figures as esteemed as George Washington, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jacob Astor, but it’s just as deeply connected to Italian immigrants and radical 20th-century innovators. The […]
We recently added two new collections of photographs to the GVSHP Historic Image Archive, and they do not fail to impress! One is the Meatpacking District Above 14th Street/Chelsea Market/High Line Before Transformation and it comes from GVSHP’s own photo archives, taken in early 2002 as part of our advocacy efforts to preserve the Meatpacking […]
They Dwelt on West 9th Street: Marianne Moore, Mother of Modernism is the 5th in a series. One of this author’s favorite poets dwelt on West 9th Street. Marianne Moore, known as the Mother of Modernism, lived on the 7th floor of the neo-Classical apartment building at 35 West 9th Street from 1966 until her […]
GVSHP’s primary focus is between the Hudson and East Rivers, from Houston Street to 14th Street. Still, in 2016 GVSHP fought to secure the Sullivan-Thompson Historic District which dips 3+ blocks just below Houston and abuts the SoHo-Cast Iron Historic District, which was designated on August 14, 1973.
This post is part of a series about Village blocks that correspond to calendar dates. Once again, another August date corresponds with a Village intersection. Jackson Square Park is located at 8th Avenue and 13th Street, and has had an interesting and varied life as an unimproved public rallying place, a classic Victorian viewing garden, […]
Earlier this week, photographer and NYC tour guide David Schmidlapp took us on a meander through the East Village using four old, beautiful maps of New York City as part of a program for GVSHP. Armed with a copy of each map, we explored the present-day streets imagining the streams, farmlands, docks, and buildings as they […]
On August 9, 2010, GVSHP and the East Village Community Coalition asked the Landmarks Preservation Commission to consider designating this historic building at 323-327 East 6th Street with various layers of historical significance as a New York City landmark.
In the mid-1970s, New York City was falling apart. Its finances, infrastructure, and social cohesion were, figuratively speaking, crumbling. But in one very tragic case, they were literally crumbling, too. And it all came tumbling down on August 3, 1973, when what was once one of the world’s grandest hotels (which had more recently become known for […]
The Fourteenth Amendment, adopted on July 28, 1868, played an important role in setting legal precedents for equality after the Civil War. The most radically worded of the Reconstruction Amendments, it was intended by its post–Civil War Radical Republican sponsors to stop the efforts by the former Confederate states to nullify emancipation. Its language promotes “liberty” […]
The Young Lords announced the founding of their New York Chapter in Tompkins Square Park on July 26, 1969. The Puerto Rican nationalist group started as a turf gang in Chicago’s Lincoln Park in 1960, but by the mid-60s had transformed into a civil and human rights movement, led by Jose Cha Cha Jimenez.
On July 20, 1969, the Apollo 11 Moon Landing became one of the most defining events of American History in the 20th Century. Two years prior though, the Village experienced its own “Goodnight Moon Landing” when the house of Margaret Wise Brown, author of the famous children’s book Goodnight Moon, was moved from 1335 York […]
This Friday, July 20, marks the 20th anniversary of the controversial auction of the former P.S. 64/CHARAS-El Bohio Community and Cultural Center at 605 East 9th Street by then-Mayor Giuliani over widespread community opposition. Check out the Facebook event page here.
There were many moments to celebrate along the arc of fighting for the protection of the Gansevoort Historic District, also known as the Meatpacking District. One such milestone took place on July 17, 2002, when the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation determined, in response to an application by GVSHP, that […]
On this date in 1804, just five days following his infamous duel with Alexander Hamilton, Aaron Burr sold two plots of land in our neighborhood. Why? Well, he was charged with multiple crimes in New York and New Jersey following the duel, including murder, and he would end up avoiding both states for many years (those charges […]
This piece is part of a series about Village blocks that correspond to calendar dates. You can read some of the other ones here. Another day, another date that corresponds to a Village intersection! For many in the Village, 7th Avenue and 12th Street holds a strong place in their memories of the neighborhood: this […]
They Lived on West 9th Street: Dashiell Hammett is the 4th in a series. Dashiell Hammett (May 27, 1894 – January 10, 1961) is arguably one of the most mysterious and alluring characters of American 20th century literature. Dashing and elusive, he rose from nothing to becoming one of the most celebrated of American writers.
The roof of the former McCreery’s Dry Goods Store at the corner of Broadway and 11th Street is obviously an addition. But few know that two different fires in the course of a century destroyed two different roofs. On July 3rd, 1909, the original mansard roof was lost to flames. The one story addition which […]
As we enter July, it’s not hard to notice that some of the dates align with some neighborhood intersections. In honor of today’s date, we are taking a look at some of the buildings and history around the intersection of 7th Street and 2nd Avenue .
On June 28, 1914, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated, an event that led to the start of World War I. While the Archduke himself bears few of any ties to the Village, WWI had a significant impact on the social and cultural life of the neighborhood and beyond. The atrocities of WWI marked an […]
On June 26, 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court in a 5 to 4 decision (United States v. Windsor), declared unconstitutional part of the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) which defined marriage solely as a legal union between a man and a woman. This landmark case had its roots here in the Village with the […]
As we add images to our Historic Image Archive, we try to provide as much identifying information as possible on each one. Sometimes the images come to us with the exact location of the image, date, etc. Sometimes they come with no information whatsoever, and we have to comb our files, mental and otherwise, to try to […]
This picturesque wintry scene of Christopher Street was painted by Greenwich Village resident and artist Beulah Bettersworth in 1934. Looking west from Hudson Street along Christopher, it shows the Ninth Avenue El Christopher Street Station and St. Veronica’s Church beyond. Currently, this painting is part of the permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. […]
