The Bowery Boys: New York City History

Latest Episodes:

#299 The Promenade and Preservation of Brooklyn Heights Sep 19, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 299: Part Two of our series on the history of Brooklyn Heights, one of New York City's oldest neighborhoods.

By the 1880s, Brooklyn Heights had evolved from America's first suburb into the City of Brooklyn's most exclusive neighborhood, a tree-lined destination of fine architecture and glorious institutions.

The Heights would go on a roller-coaster ride with the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge and the transformation of Brooklyn into a borough of Greater New York. The old-money wealthy classes would leave, and the stately homes would be carved into multi-family dwellings and boarding houses.

The new subway would bring the bohemians of Greenwich Village into Brooklyn Heights, transforming it into an artist enclave for most of the century. But even with addition of trendy hotels and the Brooklyn Dodgers (whose front office was located here), the Heights faced an uncertain future.

When Robert Moses began planning his Brooklyn Queens Expressway in the 1940s, he planned a route that would sever Brooklyn Heights and obliterate many of its most spectacular homes. It would take a devoted community and some very clever ideas to re-route that highway and cover it with something extraordinary -- a Promenade, allowing all New Yorkers to enjoy the exceptional views of New York Harbor.

This drama only served to highlight the value and unique nature of Brooklyn Heights and its extraordinary architecture, leading New York to designate the former tranquil suburb on a plateau into the city's first historic district.

FEATURING: Truman Capote, Jackie Robinson, Gypsy Rose Lee, St. Ann's Warehouse, Matt Damon and the Jehovah's Witnesses!

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#298 The Story of Brooklyn Heights Sep 05, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 298: This is the first of a two-part celebration of Brooklyn Heights, a picturesque neighborhood of architectural wonder, situated on a plateau just south of the Brooklyn Bridge.

A stroll through Brooklyn Heights presents you with a unique collection of 19th century homes -- from wooden houses to brownstone mansions, all preserved thanks to the efforts of community activists in the 20th century.

But in this episode, we'll explain how they got here. And the answer can be found on almost any street sign in the neighborhood -- Pierrrepont, Hicks, Middagh, Remsen.

Those are more than just street names. Each sign traces back to an original landholder who developed this special place in the early 19th century. In a way, the neighborhood tells its own story.

By then, the land once known as Clover Hill had seen its share of both tranquility and drama, the former site of a Revolutionary War fort and a crucial evening in the saga of the Revolutionary War.

But in the 19th century, most Americans knew Brooklyn Heights for more than just architecture and George Washington. This was the home to respected cultural institutions and to scores of churches, so many that the borough received a very spiritual nickname.

FEATURING: Henry Ward Beecher, Robert Fulton, the Marquis de Lafayette and, of course, the Lady Montague.

boweryboyshistory.com

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#297 Dr. Hosack's Enchanted Garden: Botany, Medicine, and Discovery in Old New York Aug 23, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 297: Dr. David Hosack was no ordinary doctor in early 19th-century New York. His patients included some of the city’s most notable citizens, including Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr, both of whom he counted as close friends -- and both of whom agreed to bring him along to their fateful duel.

But it was Dr. Hosack’s love and appreciation for the field of botany that would eventually make him famous in his time. In 1801 he opened his Elgin Botanic Garden on 20 acres of land located three miles north of the city on Manhattan Island.

In this first public botanical garden in the country, Hosack would spend a decade planting one of the most extraordinary collections of medicinal plants, along with native and exotic plants that could further the young nation’s agriculture and manufacturing industries.

And yet, he also spent a decade looking for funding for this important project, and for validation that this kind of work was even important.

In this episode we discuss Hosack’s life and surprising legacy with Victoria Johnson, author of the 2018 book, “American Eden, David Hosack, Botany, and Medicine in the Garden of the Early Republic,” a New York Times Notable Book of 2018, a finalist for the 2018 National Book Award in Nonfiction, and a finalist for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize in History.

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Introducing Mob Queens Aug 19, 2019

Show notes

Check out Mob Queens, a new podcast from Stitcher! Mob stories are always all about the guys. But not this one. Anna Genovese is a New York drag club maven and bad-ass mob wife. Hollywood besties Jessica Bendinger (writer, Bring It On) and Michael Seligman (writer, RuPaul’s Drag Race) are obsessed. They piece together Anna's story, racing between speakeasies, mob informants and former drag queens. But will their heroine's secrets unlock more than they want to know about Anna... and themselves? Mob Queens is out NOW - listen wherever you get your podcasts.

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#296 Talking Trash: The NYC Department of Sanitation Aug 09, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 296: Picture New York City under mountains of filth, heaving from clogged gutters and overflowing from trash cans. Imagine the unbearable smell of rotting food and animal corpses left on the curb. And what about snow, piled up and unshoveled, leaving roads entirely unnavigable?

This was New York City in the mid-19th century, a place growing faster than city officials could control. It seemed impossible to keep clean.

In this episode, we chart the course to a safer, healthier city thanks to the men and women of the New York City Department of Sanitation, which was formed in the 1880s to combat this challenging humanitarian crisis.

Along the way, we'll stop at some of the more, um, pungent landmarks of New York City history -- the trash heaps of Riker's Island, the mountainous Corona Ash Dump, and the massive Fresh Kills Landfill.

PLUS: We'll be joined by two special guests to help us understand the issues surrounding New York City sanitation in the 21st century:

Robin Nagle is a Clinical Professor at NYU and the Anthropologist in Residence for New York City’s Department of Sanitation, and the author of "Picking Up - On the Streets and Behind the Trucks with the Sanitation Workers of New York City".

Maggie Lee is the records management officer in the Sanitation Department, and also serves as the deputy director for Museum Planning for theFoundation for New York’s Strongest. She has helped organize “What is Here is Open: Selections from the Treasures in the Trash Collection” -- an art show centered around pieces thrown out with the trash, which is currently running at the Hunter East Harlem Gallery at 119th and 3rd Avenue through September 14, 2019.

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#295 Saving the City: Women of the Progressive Era Jul 25, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 295: This is a podcast about kindness and care. About the Progressive Era pioneers who saved the lives of people in need -- from the Lower East Side to Washington Heights, from Hell's Kitchen to Fort Greene.

Within just a few decades – between the 1880s and the 1920s – so much social change occurred within American life, upending so many cultural norms and advancing so many important social issues, that these years became known as the Progressive Era. And at the forefront of many of these changes were women.

In this show, Greg visits two important New York City social landmarks of this era --Henry Street Settlement, founded by Lillian Wald in the Lower East Side, and the Cabrini Shrine, where Mother Frances X. Cabrini continued her work with New York's Italian American population.

Then he pays a visit to the Brooklyn Historical Society and their exhibition Taking Care of Brooklyn: Stories of Sickness and Health, featuring artifacts from the borough's surprising connection to medical and social innovation -- from settlement houses to the birth control revolution advocated by Margaret Sanger.

If you have ancestors who came through New York City during 1880s through the 1920s, most likely they came into contact with the efforts of some of the women featured in this show. From the White Rose Mission, providing help for young black women, to the life-saving investigations of 'Dr. Joe' aka Sara Josephine Baker, leading the city's fight for improvements to public health.

Greg is joined by several wonderful guests helping to tell this story, including Tanya Bielski-Braham (currently of the Holocaust Center of Pittsburgh), Beckett Graham(of the History Chicks podcast), Julie Golia (Vice President for Curatorial Affairs and Collections at the Brooklyn Historical Society), Cherie Sprosty (director of liturgy at the Cabrini Shrine) and Katie Vogel (public historian at the Henry Street Settlement).

boweryboyshistory.com

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#294 That Daredevil Steve Brodie, 'King of the Bowery' Jul 11, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 294: A tale of the 'sporting life' of the Bowery from the 1870s and 80s. A former newsboy named Steve Brodie grabs the country's attention by leaping off the Brooklyn Bridge on July 23, 1886. Or did he?

The story of Steve Brodie has all the ingredients of a Horatio Alger story. He worked the streets as a newsboy when he was very young, fighting the bullies (often his own brothers) to become one of the most respected newsies in Manhattan.

He experienced his first taste of adulation and respect as a minor sports celebrity, participating in pedestrian competitions across the country. Back in New York, Brodie started a family and promptly lost most of his money at the race track. He yearned to do something athletic and attention grabbing again.

TheBrooklyn Bridge, completed in 1883, was a crowning architectural jewel linking two major cities; Brodie witnessed much of its construction during afternoons diving from East River docks. He now proposed an outrageous stunt that would garner him instant fame and fortune.

He would jump off the Brooklyn Bridge!

Was Steve Brodie a hero or a fool? A daredevil or a con artist? His story provides a window into the 'sporting men' life of the Bowery and a look into what may possibly be the greatest hoax of the Gilded Age.

boweryboyshistory.com

Our thanks to Grant Barrett of A Way With Words

Featuring clips from the 1933 film The Bowery, the 1949 Warner Brothers cartoon Bowery Bugs and the 1958 recording of "The Bowery" by Billy Randolph & The High Hatters

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#293 Secret Places of Upper Manhattan Jun 28, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 293: In Washington Heights and Inwood, the two Manhattan neighborhoods above West 155th Street, the New York grid plan begins to become irrelevant, with avenues and streets preferring to conform to northern Manhattan's more rugged terrain. As a result, one can find aspects of nearly 400 years of New York City history here -- along a secluded waterfront or tucked high upon a shaded hill.

In this episode, we look at four specific historic landmarks of Upper Manhattan, places that have survived into present day, even as their surroundings have become greatly altered.

-- A picturesque cemetery -- the final resting place for mayors, writers and scandal makers -- split in two;

-- An aging farmhouse once linked to New York's only surviving natural forest with a Revolutionary secret in its backyard;

-- A Roman-inspired waterway that once provided a vital link to New York City's survival;

-- And a tiny lighthouse, overwhelmed by a great bridge and saved by a strange twist of fame.

For those who live and work in Washington Heights and Inwood, these historic landmarks will be familiar to you. For everybody else, prepare for a new list of mysterious landmarks and fascinating places to explore this summer.

And that's just the beginning! Upper Manhattan holds a host of fascinating, awe-inspiring sites of historical and cultural interest. After you listen to this episode, check out our article on the Bowery Boys website entitled Secret Places of Upper Manhattan: Twenty remarkable historic sites in Washington Heights and Inwood.

Boweryboyshistory.com

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Sip-In At Julius': Gay New York In The 1960s Jun 13, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 292: This month New York City (and the world) celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising, a combative altercation between police and bar patrons at the Stonewall Inn in the West Village, an event that gave rise to the modern LGBT movement.

But in a way, the Stonewall Riots were simply the start of a new chapter for the gay rights movement. The road leading to Stonewall is often glossed over or forgotten.

By the 1960s, a lively gay scene that traced back to the 19th century -- drag balls! lesbian teahouses! -- had been effectively buried or concealed by decades of cultural and legal oppression.

A few brave individuals, however, were tired of living in the shadows.

In this episode, we’ll be zeroing in on the efforts of a handful of young New Yorkers who, in 1966, took a page from the civil rights movement to stage an unusual demonstration in a small bar in the West Village. This little event, called the Sip-In at Julius', was a tiny but significant step towards the fair treatment of gay and lesbians in the United States.

IN ADDITION: We'll be joined by Hugh Ryan, author of When Brooklyn Was Queer, to talk about the forgotten lives of LGBT people in the ever-changing borough of Brooklyn.

Visit our website for photographs and more details -- boweryboyshistory.com

This episode features an audio interview clip from the podcast Making Gay History, as well as a musical clip of 'I Hear A Symphony' by The Supremes (Motown).

Special thanks to our sponsor this week -- Flatiron School.

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#291 The Tombs: Five Points' Notorious House of Detention May 31, 2019

Show notes

EPISODE 291: Some might find it strange that the Manhattan Detention Complex -- one of New York City's municipal jails -- should be located next to the bustling neighborhoods of Chinatown and Little Italy. Stranger still is its ominous nickname -- "The Tombs".

Near this very spot -- more than 180 years ago -- stood another imposing structure, a massive jail in the style of an Egyptian mausoleum, casting its dark shadow over a district that would become known as Five Points, the most notorious 19th-century neighborhood in New York City.

Both Five Points and the original Tombs (officially "New York City Halls of Justice and House of Detention") was built upon the spot of old Collect Pond, an old fresh-water pond that was never quite erased from the city's map when it was drained via a canal -- along today's Canal Street.

But the foreboding reputation of the Tombs comes from more than sinking foundations and cracked walls. For more than six decades, thousands of people were kept here -- murderers, pickpockets, vagrants, and many more who had committed no crimes at all.

And there would be a few unfortunates who would never leave the confines of this place. For the Tombs contained a gallows, where some of the worst criminals in the United States were executed.

Other jails would replace this building in the 20th century, but none would shake off the grim nickname.

Boweryboyshistory.com

Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/boweryboys

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