Books: The Bronxs Boulevard of Dreams

admin

Stretching over four miles through the center of the West Bronx, the Grand Boulevard and Concourse, known simply as the Grand Concourse, has served as a silent witness to the changing face of the Bronx, and New York City, for a century. To coincide with the Concourse’s centennial, New York Times editor Constance Rosenblum has written a book, Boulevard of Dreams: Heady Times, Heartbreak, and Hope along the Grand Concourse in the Bronx that brings to life this historic street.

Designed by a French engineer in the late nineteenth century to echo the elegance and grandeur of the Champs Elysees in Paris, the Concourse was nearly twenty years in the making (it celebrated its centennial in November). Over that century it has truly been a boulevard of dreams for various upwardly mobile immigrant and ethnic groups, yet it has also seen the darker side of the American dream.

Constance Rosenblum unearths the history of the street and its neighborhoods through a series of life stories and historical vignettes. The story of the creation and transformation of the Grand Concourse is the story of New York—and America—writ large, and Rosenblum examines the Grand Concourse from its earliest days to the blighted 1960s and 1970s right up to the current period of renewal. Illustrated with historical photographs, the vivid world of the Grand Concourse comes alive—from Yankee Stadium to the unparalleled collection of Art Deco apartments to the palatial Loew’s Paradise movie theater.

The publishers call it &#8220An enthralling story of the creation of an iconic street, an examination of the forces that transformed it, and a moving portrait of those who called it home, Boulevard of Dreams is a must read for anyone interested in the rich history of New York and the twentieth-century American city.&#8221

Drunk History: Drink A Bottle of History

admin

Drunk History has got to be seen. It is one of the funniest historical things you will ever see, and I’m not kidding. Created by Derek Waters and edited and directed by Jeremy Konner, these short films involve a narrator / host who gets drunk and then relates a fascinating bit of U.S. History. Among the topics these hilarious denizens of history take on are William Henry Harrison (who death was from an obvious cause &#8211 &#8220with no coat on&#8230- cold as shit!&#8221), Benjamin Franklin&#8216-s time in London (&#8220Franklin liked to F@*#&#8221 &#8211 featuring Jack Black), Oney Judge, George & Martha Washington’s &#8220favorite slave&#8221), and more.

This Weeks New York History Web Highlights

admin

Each Friday New York History compiles for our readers the week’s best stories and links from the web about the history of New York. You can find all our weekly web highlights here.

New York And The American Jewish Experience

admin

The Milstein Conference on New York And The American Jewish Experience is a one day public conference celebrating history of Jewish life in New York, achievements of Jewish communal organizations, treasures of Jewish archives. Morning Sessions feature presentation on Jewish organizational archives and a roundtable discussion by Jewish agency leaders. Afternoon focuses on papers by scholars on a wide range of political, social and cultural issues and the evening session features a discussion by New York area archivists to discuss the rich resources found in New York and how to preserve them for the future.

Funded by the Milstein Family Foundation and the Howard and Abby Milstein Foundation. Organized by the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research in partnership with the 92nd Street Y, the Educational Alliance, F?E?G?S Health and Human Service System, NYANA and Surprise Lake Camp. Archival repositories participating: Archives of American Jewish Committee, Hadassah, HIAS, JDC, Yeshiva University and YIVO. DATE: Monday, November 2, 2009. 9:30 to 7:30 pm. Place: YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, 15 West 16th Street, NY.

Full details about the conference are available at www.yivo.org

ADVANCE REGISTRATON REQUIRED: RSVP: [email protected] or call 212-294-6157.

Books: Automats, Taxi Dances, and Vaudeville

admin

Cultural historian and journalist David Freeland has published his latest book,Automats, Taxi Dances, and Vaudeville: Excavating Manhattan’s Lost Places of Leisure, a rediscovery of the historic remnants of New York City’s leisure culture, including bier gartens in the Bowery, music publishers on Tin Pan Alley, jazz clubs in Harlem, and other locations throughout the city that remain partially intact, but obscured by the city’s development.

From the lights that never go out on Broadway to its 24-hour subway system, New York City isn’t called &#8220the city that never sleeps&#8221 for nothing. Both native New Yorkers and tourists have played hard in Gotham for centuries, lindy hopping in 1930s Harlem, voguing in 1980s Chelsea, and refueling at all-night diners and bars. The island is packed with places of leisure and entertainment, but Manhattan’s infamously fast pace of change means that many of these beautifully constructed and incredibly ornate buildings have disappeared, and with them a rich and ribald history.

David Freeland serves as a guide to uncover the skeletons of New York’s lost monuments to its nightlife. With an eye for architectural detail, Freeland opens doors, climbs onto rooftops, and gazes down alleyways to reveal several of the remaining hidden gems of Manhattan’s nineteenth- and twentieth-century entertainment industry.

From the lights that never go out on Broadway to its 24-hour subway system, New York City isn’t called &#8220the city that never sleeps&#8221 for nothing. Both native New Yorkers and tourists have played hard in Gotham for centuries, lindy hopping in 1930s Harlem, voguing in 1980s Chelsea, and refueling at all-night diners and bars. The slim island at the mouth of the Hudson River is packed with places of leisure and entertainment, but Manhattan’s infamously fast pace of change means that many of these beautifully constructed and incredibly ornate buildings have disappeared, and with them a rich and ribald history.

Yet with David Freeland as a guide, it’s possible to uncover skeletons of New York’s lost monuments to its nightlife. With a keen eye for architectural detail, Freeland opens doors, climbs onto rooftops, and gazes down alleyways to reveal several of the remaining hidden gems of Manhattan’s nineteenth- and twentieth-century entertainment industry.

From the Atlantic Garden German beer hall in present-day Chinatown to the city’s first motion picture studio—Union Square’s American Mutoscope and Biograph Company—to the Lincoln Theater in Harlem, Freeland situates each building within its historical and social context, bringing to life an old New York that took its diversions seriously.

Freeland reminds us that the buildings that serve as architectural guideposts to yesteryear’s recreations cannot be re-created—once destroyed they are gone forever. With condominiums and big box stores spreading over city blocks like wildfires, more and more of the Big Apple’s legendary houses of mirth are being lost.

Cities in Revolt: The Dutch-American Atlantic Conference

admin

Deutsches Haus at Columbia University (420 W. 116th St., New York City) will be the location for &#8220Cities in Revolt: The Dutch-American Atlantic, ca. 1650-1815,&#8221 a conference on the relationships between the Netherlands and (mostly North) America in the long eighteenth century, that will take place November 13th and 14th, 2009. The main conference goals are 1) to create a scholarly discussion about Dutch-American interconnections in the eighteenth century and 2) help the general public gain a fuller picture of an understudied period in Dutch-American relations. Most of the conference will consist of panels of three presenters each, a comment, and time for discussion at the end.

The conference speakers and schedule is below, but more info about the conference is also available here.

Seventeenth-Century Histories, Eighteenth-Century Memories
Nov 13, 9:30-11:30
Chair: Karen Kupperman (NYU)

– Virginie Adane (EHESS): The Evolution of a New Netherland Narrative:
The Penelope Stout Story, 17th-19th Centuries

– Paul Finkelman (Albany Law): Jews and Other Minorities in New
Netherland and Early New York: The Beginning of Religious Freedom in
America

– Martine van Ittersum (U. Dundee): Filial Piety versus Republican
Liberty? The Cornets de Groot Family in Rotterdam and the Legacy of
Hugo Grotius, 1748-1798

Comment: Evan Haefeli (Columbia)

American Political Events in Dutch Atlantic Perspective
Nov 13, 1:30-3:30
Chair: Hans Krabbendam (Roosevelt Study Ctr.)

– Michiel van Groesen (U. A’dam): New Netherland vs. New York:
Contested Representations of a Colony, 1664-1673

– Megan Lindsay (Yale): Leislerian and Anti-Leislerian Political
Ideologies in an Atlantic Context

– Benjamin L. Carp (Tufts): Did Dutch Smugglers Provoke the Boston Tea
Party?

Comment: Ned Landsman (Stony Brook)

Keynote Address
Nov 13, 4:00-5:30
Jonathan Israel (Institute for Advanced Study):

The Dutch Cities, Radical Enlightenment and the ‘General Revolution,’
1776-1790

Reception to follow in honor of the publication of Four-Centuries of
Dutch-American Relations (SUNY Press)

War, Trade and Politics in the Dutch-American Atlantic
Nov 14, 10:00-12:00
Chair: Herb Sloan (Barnard)

– Christian Koot (Towson): Looking Beyond Sugar: Dutch Trade,
Barbados, and the Making of the English Empire

– Thomas Truxes (Trinity College): Dutch-Irish Cooperation in the Mid-
Eighteenth-Century Wartime Atlantic

– Victor Enthoven (Netherlands Defense Academy / Free U. A’dam): St.
Eustatius: The Rise and Fall of an Emporium

Comment: Jaap Jacobs

Dutch and American Republicanisms
Nov 14, 1:30-3:30
Chair: Evan Haefeli (Columbia)

– Wyger Velema (U. A’dam): The Reception of Classical Sources in Dutch
and American Republicanism

– Arthur Weststeijn (European U. Inst.): The American Fortunes of the
Dutch Republican Model: De la Court, Oglethorpe and Madison

– Joris Oddens (U. A’dam): No Extended Sphere: Gerhard Dumbar and the
Batavian Understanding of the American Constitution

Comment: Andrew Shankman (Rutgers-Camden)

Travelers and Friends in the Age of Revolution
Nov 14, 4:00-6:00

– Annie Jourdan (U. A’dam): Theophile Cazenove, Jacques-Pierre
Brissot, and Joel Barlow: Three Transatlantic Actors in a
Revolutionary Era

– Nathan Perl-Rosenthal (Columbia): Revolutionary Epistolarity: J.D.
van der Capellen and Samuel Adams

– Joost Rosendaal (Nijmegen): A Dutch Revolutionary Refugee in the
United States: Francis Adrien van der Kemp and his Circle

Comment: Cathy Matson (U. Delaware / PEAES)

Easier Access to Old New York State Museum Publications

admin

The New York State Library has a new web page that highlights and links to New York State Museum publications that have been digitized by the Library. These publications include links to the Museum Memoirs and Handbooks series, which have been recently scanned from print copies in the Library’s collection.

To make it easier to find the digital copy of a specific Bulletin, Memoir or Handbook, the titles in each series are listed in tables which can be sorted in several ways, including by by Memoir, Bulletin or Handbook number- title of the publication- author- date- or general subject (anthropology, biology, geology, history, and paleontology). You can also click on any of the thumbnail images, taken from several of the Museum publications, to get a full view of that image, along with information about it.

Sound and Story of The Hudson Valley Event

admin

Eileen McAdam, Director of The Sound and Story Project of the Hudson Valley, will be the featured speaker during the Annual Meeting of the Friends of Senate House on Wednesday November 4th, at the Senate House Museum, 312 Fair Street in Kingston. Ms. McAdam has made it her mission to preserve and celebrate the history and culture of the Hudson Valley through recorded sound. Her Sound and Story Project includes oral history interviews, but it also encompasses many unusual sound recordings that portray this region, including the now-silenced bells of early American churches, or the sounds of bats in the caves of Rosendale. McAdam will talk about the art and method of capturing and preserving the sounds of the Hudson Valley, and the history they offer us.

The program will begin with light refreshments in the Vanderlyn Gallery at 6:30 pm, followed by a brief annual report, with the keynote address starting at 7:15 pm in the second floor gallery. The program is free and open to the public. For more information, please call (845) 338-2786, or visit www.nysparks.state.ny.us

This year the Friends of Senate House supported a diverse range of activities and events for the public, including 17th, 18th and 19th century living history events, as well as celebrations of African-American and Native-American contributions to our history, heritage and culture. The Friends of Senate House also help make possible the historic site’s many school programs, which serve schools in several counties. The November 4th event is a great opportunity for newcomers and current supporters alike to learn about the Friends’ recent activities and enjoy an entertaining evening.

Senate House State Historic Site is part of the Palisades Interstate Park Commission, which administers 29 parks, parkways, and historic sites for the Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation in New York as well as the Palisades Interstate Park and parkway in New Jersey. For more information about New York State parks and historic sites, please visit www.nysparks.com, for information about the New Jersey section of the PIPC please visit www.njpalisades.org, and for more information about the Palisades Parks Conservancy and the Palisades Interstate Park parks and historic sites, please visit www.palisadesparksconservancy.org.

Mastodon Tusk May Be Largest Ever Uncovered in NYS

admin

Research under way at the New York State Museum indicates that a huge mastodon tusk, recently excavated by Museum scientists in Orange County, may be the largest tusk ever found in New York State. The nearly complete but fragmented tusk, measuring more than nine feet long, was one of two excavated this past summer in the Black Dirt area of Orange County at the confluence of Tunkamoose Creek and the Wallkill River, on the property of Lester Lain of Westtown. Museum scientists believe that the other less complete tusk, about 5-6 feet long, came from the same mastodon, which has been named the Tunkamoose mastodon.

Glen Keeton of Mount Hope, N.Y. and Chris Connallon of Hampton, N.J. came across the tusks in November 2008 as they were canoeing down the Wallkill River. Keeton contacted the Orange County chapter of the New York State Archeological Association, which then contacted the State Museum. Weather conditions delayed the excavation until this past
summer.

Since then, Dr. Robert Feranec, the Museum’s curator of vertebrate paleontology, has been researching other mastodon excavations in New York State. Feranec believes that the Warren Mastodon tusk, which is 8 feet, 8 inches long, is the longest one uncovered to date. It was discovered in New York State in the 1800s and is on exhibit at the
American Museum of Natural History in New York City. The tusk of the Cohoes Mastodon, on display at the State Museum, is about 4-5 feet long.

Based on the age of similar fossils, Feranec suspects that the tusks are about 13,000 years old. However, carbon dating results to determine the exact age, will not be available until later this year. In the meantime, the tusks have been taken apart to be cleaned and conserved for their long-term survival. It is hoped that eventually the tusks can be made available for scientific research and exhibits at the State
Museum and at a museum in the area where the tusks were found.

Abundant mastodon fossils have been found in Orange County, especially in the rich Black Dirt area which Keeton calls “a gold mine for these fossils.” Other fossils have also been found including those of giant beavers, stag moose, ground sloths, peccaries and reindeer. Several Museum scientists will be involved in an integrative research
project in the Black Dirt area where they will investigate the ancient environment in which the mastodon lived, as well as how that environment changed over the last 13,000 years.

“From my perspective, this is a significant find,” said Feranec. “These fossils will tell us more about the ancient history of New York. We hope to be able to reconstruct the environment in which the mastodon lived, as well as to try to understand why they went extinct.”

In 2007, Feranec oversaw the relocation of the Cohoes Mastodon from the State Museum lobby window to its new location in the Museum’s Exhibition Hall, where temperature and humidity levels are more stable and more conducive to the skeleton’s long-term preservation. The iconic Museum treasure is now the centerpiece of an expanded exhibition.

Discovered in 1866 near Cohoes Falls, the Mastodon once stood about 8 ? feet tall, was about 15 feet long, and weighed between 8-10,000 pounds. Its tusk weighs 50 pounds.

Photo: During the excavation process in Orange County, Dr. Robert Feranec, curator of vertebrate paleontology at the New York State Museum, poses next to part of the tusk of a mastodon. (Photo courtesy of NYS Museum)