The innocuous-looking apartment building at 226 East 13th Street, between Second and Third Avenues, may raise few eyebrows now. But on February 8, 1976, the building became synonymous in the popular imagination with drugs, prostitution, runaways, murder and mayhem, steeped in the urban decay which many saw as defining New York City in the 1970’s.
Browsing through GVSHP’s recently updated image archives, I came across photographs of the Variety Theater, which was, once upon a time, a favorite place of mine to go and see new works of theater. The Variety Arts Theater once stood on the west side of 3rd Avenue between 13th And 14th streets. Built around 1897, […]
41 years ago today, New York City was a much different place than it is today. By almost every measure it was dirtier and more dangerous. Many viewed the city as inevitably doomed to failure and the decade was a period of decay- failing industries, collapsing infrastructure, enormous budget gaps, and a population net loss of […]
