Layers of NYC #24: Now...and Then?

On the site of Rockefeller Center was the site of America's first _________________?

Layers of NYC #23: Now...and Then?

Today, at the bottom of Broadway the Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House (home of a federal bankruptcy court and a museum dedicated to the Native American) stands in all its Beaux Arts splendor.  But what bulky building occupied this site from the 1620's until 1789 when it was finally demolished to clear the way for the new federal city?

New York Video Friday! Episode #8

It's Black Friday. Many of you have been out shopping for hours. Remember, if things look bad, many people have faced defeat and still achieved great success.

You don't drown by falling in the water, you drown by staying in the water....

Happy Shopping!!

Layers of NYC #22: Now...and Then?

Today, a fountain stands in the middle of Bowling Green, but what "first" was erected there in 1770 after the repeal of the Stamp Act?

(Hint:  The black iron fence surrounding the park was put up to protect this in 1771.)

Layers of NYC #21: Now...and Then?

What substance would the Dutch of the seventeenth century have found at the present-day intersections of Forty-Sixth and Twelfth Avenue, Wall and Front, and Washington and West Houston? 

(Hint:  This substance could also have been seen where the East Coast Memorial now stands in Battery Park and where the hospital buildings stand on Ellis Island.)

Layers of NYC #20: Then...and Now?

What abstract sculpture in Lower Manhattan stands on a corner where the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, John Jay, once lived?

Lucky Episode #7 of New York Video Fridays

My taxi driver this morning, told me that today was the start of "Gridlock Fridays" because of the beginning of the Holiday Shopping season. While you are stuck in that traffic, this is a great place to spend some of your time.

Today's video comes to use very fresh, recorded yesterday at the NextGen conference here is NYC. It comes to us from Tony Martignetti's Nonprofit Radio and features Regina Walton of Organic Social Media interviewing Seth Godin(American Way Magazine calls him, "America's Greatest Marketer," and his blog is perhaps the most popular in the world written by a single individual. His latest book, LINCHPIN, hit the Amazon top 10 on the first day it was published and became a New York Times bestseller.)

This is New York: Seth, Tony, Regina & NextGen. Really smart people doing really smart stuff. It doesn't happen like this anywhere else.

"Fail, and fail often...In 1920, there were 2300 car companies in the United States." - Seth Godin

What can you start today?

Layers of NYC #19: Then...and Now?

There was a mansion in Lower Manhattan called Richmond Hill (demolished 1849) that served as the first Vice Presidential mansion for John Adams.  George Washington had used it as a headquarters in 1776 and Aaron Burr would later occupy it as a country home.

Today what off-Broadway house and what independent movie theater would you find closest to the site of that first Vice Presidential mansion?

Layers of NYC #18: Then...and Now?

What sort of structure now stands where Thomas Jefferson lived while Secretary of State (57 Maiden Lane)?

What structures now stand where George Washington lived while president (1 Cherry Street and 37 Broadway)?

Layers of NYC #17: Then...and Now?

According to popular legend, what restaurant operates in Aaron Burr's former carriage house?

Layers of NYC #16: Then...and Now?

This week's questions will focus on the days of New York as the nation's first capital.

The first question will be easy.  Name the intersection in Lower Manhattan where the first capital was located and where George Washington was inaugurated?  And what building now stands in its place?

Episode #6 New York Video Fridays

Beautiful New York City.

Layers of NYC #15: Then...and Now?

This local island was known as Lesser Island (Minnissais) and Great Oyster Island.  It was named after Isaac Bedloe in 1667 and retained that name for 290 years.  It was the city's first quarantine station during a smallpox epidemic and was used as a refuge for Loyalists on the eve of the Revolution.  It also served as a recruitment camp and ordnance depot during the Civil War.

Name that island.

Answer after the jump.

Layers of NYC #14: Then...and Now

This local island was known as Hog Island and had farms as early as 1639.  The king of England granted it to John Manning in 1668.  In 1675, after John Manning surrendered Fort James, allowing the Dutch to briefly reclaim the city, the king of England exiled Manning to the island for cowardice and treason.  Manning's son-in-law, Robert Blackwell, inherited the island, and the Blackwells owned it until 1828.

The city purchased it and built a workhouse, an almshouse, a madhouse, and a penitentiary (which housed both Boss Tweed and Mae West).  In 1887, Nellie Bly famously went undercover to expose conditions at the island's lunatic asylum.  In 1921, it was renamed Welfare Island.  With its history, it was known as a "home for the unfortunate and suffering." 

Today?  Not so much.

Name that island. 

Answer after the jump.

Layers of NYC #13: Then...and Now?

This local island was known as Kioshk Island in 1600, Gull Island by 1630, Oyster or Little Oyster Island by 1680, Bucking Island by 1730, and Gibbet or Anderson Island (Anderson was a sailor hanged here from a gibbet) by 1765. 

What is the present name of this island?

Answer after the jump.

Layers of NYC #12: Then...and Now?

This local island was where the first eight European settlers lived in 1624 before following their dreams and moving to Manhattan the following year.  In the early 1700's the city used the island to quarantine thousands of German Protestants expelled by Louis XIV.  In 1755, during the French and Indian War, it served to quarter the 51st Regiment of the British Colonial Militia.  Until 1997, it was the oldest continually active military base in the United States.

Name that island.

Answer after the jump.

It's another NYVF! Episode #5

It's been rainy recently in NYC, so let's step inside the Met(Metropolitian Museum of Art) and view the the exhibition of John Baldessari's work, "Pure Beauty." This video by James Kalm* also includes the artist responding to questions from the interested crowd.

In 1970, he burned all his paintings created between 1953 and 1966. He baked the ashes into cookies.

"If I saw the art around me that I liked, then I wouldn’t do art." - John Baldessari

 

*James Kalm is a working artist living in Brooklyn New York. He has been an active critic for over twelve years writing for the controversial Brooklyn Rail http://brooklynrail.org/. For higher resolution videos, writings by James Kalm and views of the paintings of Loren Munk visit http://www.lorenmunk.com/.

Layers of NYC #11: Then...and Now?

This local island was where the first eight European colonists set their cattle to pasture in 1624.  Known later as York Island, it was almost entirely deforested by the end of the American Revolution.  Name that island.

Answer after the jump.

Layers of NYC #10: Then...and Now?

In The Great Gatsby (1925), the Valley of Ashes between East Egg and the City serves as a metaphorical wasteland.  The ash heaps were not a literary invention.  They actually existed and were located in Queens.  Fitzgerald saw this part of town--a giant dump with piles of ash reaching up to ninety feet--as the antithesis of "the fresh, green breast of the new world."  Within fourteen years, however, this part of the city would be completely cleaned up in order to showcase a bright, new vision of the future.

What precipitated the transformation and what stands there now?

Answers after the jump.

Layers of NYC #9: Then...and Now?

A body of water, formerly known as the "Fresh Water Pond" and then "the Collect," became a polluted swamp that required drainage via a canal in the early 1800's.  A neighborhood rose from the mud to become a slum known as "the Five Points," so infamous that the streets themsleves were renamed or removed entirely.  To pinpoint exactly where the original streets intersected, you'll need maps, but ROUGHLY:  what district now stands where the Five Points once did?

Layers of NYC #8: Then...and Now?

Following up on yesterday's question, what famous Broadway theater (opened 1911) sits at the top of what was the Long Acre Farm on the site of W.K. Vanderbilt's American Horse Exchange (1896)?

(Hint:  Its longest running show turned the block from equine to feline.)