The Queens Nobody Knows: An An Urban Walking Guide by 
International Express: New Yorkers on the 7 Train by 
Jackson Heights Chronicles: When Crossing the Border Isn't Enough by 
A Modern Arcadia: Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. & the Plan for Forest Hills Gardens by 
111 Places in Queens That You Must Not Miss by
-The ultimate insider's guide to Queens -Features interesting and unusual places not found in traditional travel guides -Part of the international 111 Places/111 Shops series with over 170 titles and 1 million copies in print worldwide -Appeals to both the local market (nearly 2.3 million people call Queens home) and the tourist market (over 50 million people visit New York City every year ) -Fully illustrated with 111 full-page colour photographs Staggering ethnic diversity, rich cultural history, and a robust arts scene make Queens one of the most exciting destinations in all of New York City. See and taste the world, travel back in time, and experience nature all without leaving the confines of Queens. Home to immigrants from Azerbaijan to Vietnam and everywhere in between, Queens is truly a melting pot of cultures and cuisines. Eat your way through China, Malaysia, Romania, and visit a Tibetan dumpling speakeasy - no passport necessary. Visit the birthplace of religious freedom in America and then tour local Hindu, Thai and Korean temples. Marvel at migratory birds and terrapins and visit the oldest tree in New York City. Whether you're a first time visitor or a long-time resident, you'll find 111 hidden places in Queens. The most majestic of New York City's boroughs is yours to explore and discover.
Flushing by 
Jackson Heights by
At the turn of the 20th century, the neighborhood known as Jackson Heights was originally called Trains Meadow, a sprawling area covered by acres of farmland and rolling hills. Its only inhabitants were homesteaders who lived in their ancient wood-framed dwellings with spreads occupied by barns, horse stables, cabbage patches, and beehives. Overgrowing populations in Manhattan and Brooklyn led developers to Queens County to transform that landscape into Jackson Heights. Headed by Edward Archibald MacDougall, the ambitious Queensboro Corporation spent nearly $4 million buying properties, molding roads, and constructing buildings of great architectural merit. Jackson Heights provides an in-depth look at the history of America's first garden apartment community with the use of never-before-seen photographs culled from local archives and private collections. Images featured show the neighborhood's progression from rural farmland to the highly populated economic center it is today with memorable businesses like Jahn's Ice Cream Parlor and the cultural splendor along Thirty-seventh Avenue and Eighty-second Street.
Queens by 
The East River by
The East River captures the history of New York's premier waterway. The river, a source of life for Native Americans, spawned communities from Brooklyn to Harlem. Its shipyards and docks projected American enterprise around the world. The waterfront, an industrial and commercial dynamo, forged a continent. The dreams of immigrants who arrived and lived on its banks created this nation. The river's strong currents guarded prisons and hospital quarantines while keeping secret legends of gold on its bottom. The sinews of a great city are knitted by more than a score of its tunnels and bridges. Today, a renaissance draws people to this river, the heart of New York.
Jamaica by
Jamaica, Queens, has long occupied a commanding position in the political, social, and industrial life of Queens County. Indigenous people created a trail, used by various tribes to trade furs and other goods, through the woods that later became Jamaica Avenue, the main street of the village. Jamaica was witness to the evolution of change, receiving a charter from Dutch governor Peter Stuyvesant in 1656, becoming an English colony in 1664, and winning freedom in the American Revolution with the Jamaica Minutemen. The area is richly steeped in history: George Washington slept here; and Walt Whitman, Susan B. Anthony, Rufus King, Jacob Riis, and many more have left their mark on Jamaica. Jamaica is an astounding visual journey documenting the unique history of this remarkable community over more than 350 years.
Rockaway Beach by 
The Neighborhoods of Queens by 
Tudor Village: The History of a Unique Community in Queens County, New York by 
Between Ocean and City: The Transformation of Rockaway, New York by Jackson Heights, a Garden in the City: The History of America's First Garden and Cooperative Apartment Community by 
Becoming American, Being Indian: An Immigrant Community in New York City by 
Crossing the Boulevard: Strangers, Neighbors, Aliens in a New America by City Limits: A Social History of Queens by 
Long Island City
Jamaica Station by 
Walking Queens: 30 tours for Discovering the Diverse Communities, Historic Places, and Natural Treasures of New York City's Largest Borough by
Home to more than 2.3 million people who speak at least 150 different languages, Queens is heralded as the most multicultural place on Earth. People go there to watch Major League Baseball or the U.S. Open. Perhaps they venture just across the river, to check out a trendy new restaurant, bar, or performance space in Long Island City or Astoria, or ride the train all the way out to the beach on a summer's day. Now, with Walking Queens by local author Adrienne Onofri, readers get to know the whole borough. Each walk tells the story of a neighborhood: how it developed originally and how it's transformed over the years. Readers are pointed to distinctive architecture, landmark buildings, popular eateries, ethnic enclaves, celebrity residences, art and performance spaces, and natural scenery. There are tours that reveal forgotten moments in Queens history, or position you for a stunning view, or immerse you in all the sights, scents, and sounds of a melting pot. Maps and transportation directions make it easy to find your way. Whether you're looking for an afternoon stroll or a daylong outing, grab this book and start walking Queens!
The Queensboro BridgeDiscovering Queens! A useful guide to Queens, New York by 
Hispanas de Queens: Latino Panethnicity in a New York City Neighborhood by 
Old Queens, N. Y. in Early Photographs by 
Old Rockaway, New York, in Early Photographs by 
LaGuardia Airport by 
COVID-19 in Brooklyn: Everyday life during a pandemic by
COVID-19 in Brooklyn: Everyday Life During a Pandemic looks closely at the ways that the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the lives of ordinary people living in the super-gentrified Brooklyn neighborhoods of Park Slope and Greenpoint/Williamsburg, where the authors hunkered down during the 2020 lockdown. Putting their private lives into broader scientific and public contexts, Krase and DeSena discuss a wide range of research methods and theories, as well as print and internet media sources about the pandemic. With words and images, the scholar-activist authors place their own personal experiences and those of their family and neighbors inside the broader context of global and national medical emergencies, as well as related economic, social, and political unrest, such as widespread unemployment, the Black Lives Matter Movement, and the contentious 2020 presidential election. Using a distributive social justice perspective and examining their own privileges, they discover and discuss the racial and economic inequities that affected the lives of other Brooklynites. These disparities included public health measures and lack of access to basic necessities of urban living. The book also addresses the cultural and economic shifts that took place at the start of the pandemic and contemplate how those forces will impact on urban life, asking what the "new normal" of business, entertainment, education, housing, and work will look like locally and globally. This richly illustrated book offers an invaluable local study of the impact of the pandemic on ordinary people in Brooklyn. As such, it will be of great interest to students and researchers in the humanities and social sciences.
Historic Black Brooklyn: 400 years of struggle and hope by
This book covers the struggle and accomplishments of African Americans in Brooklyn, New York over the last four hundred years and it's profusely illustrated with several hundred never-before-seen photographs that document this incredible story.
When Brooklyn Was the World, 1920-1957 by 
Brooklyn by Name: How the Neighborhoods, Streets, Parks, Bridges, and More Got Their Names by Brooklyn: People and Places, Past and Present by Of Cabbages and Kings County: Agriculture and the Formation of Modern Brooklyn by 
Nathan's Famous: The First 100 Years by
Also in Library: Stacks TX945.5 .N37 H36 2016
"Nathan's Famous: The First 100 Years of America's Favorite Frankfurter Company" chronicles the history and business strategies of company founder Nathan Handwerker that led to the success of an iconic international brand and two of America's most loved foods: The Nathan's Famous Frankfurter and Crinkle-cut French Fries.
Brooklyn: A State of Mind by Crossing Brooklyn: Art from Bushwick, Bed-Stuy, and beyond by 
Carnival and the Formation of a Caribbean Transnation by 
How East New York Became a Ghetto by 
A Covenant with Color: Race and Social Power in Brooklyn by 
Brooklyn: The once and future city by
An unprecedented history of Brooklyn, told through its places, buildings, and the people who made them, from the early seventeenth century to today America's most storied urban underdog, Brooklyn has become an internationally recognized brand in recent decades--celebrated and scorned as one of the hippest destinations in the world. In Brooklyn: The Once and Future City, Thomas J. Campanella unearths long-lost threads of the urban past, telling the rich history of the rise, fall, and reinvention of one of the world's most resurgent cities. Spanning centuries and neighborhoods, Brooklyn-born Campanella recounts the creation of places familiar and long forgotten, both built and never realized, bringing to life the individuals whose dreams, visions, rackets, and schemes forged the city we know today. He takes us through Brooklyn's history as homeland of the Leni Lenape and its transformation by Dutch colonists into a dense slaveholding region. We learn about English émigré Deborah Moody, whose town of Gravesend was the first founded by a woman in America. We see how wanderlusting Yale dropout Frederick Law Olmsted used Prospect Park to anchor an open space system that was to reach back to Manhattan. And we witness Brooklyn's emergence as a playland of racetracks and amusement parks celebrated around the world. Campanella also describes Brooklyn's outsized failures, from Samuel Friede's bid to erect the world's tallest building to the long struggle to make Jamaica Bay the world's largest deepwater seaport, and the star-crossed urban renewal, public housing, and highway projects that battered the borough in the postwar era. Campanella reveals how this immigrant Promised Land drew millions, fell victim to its own social anxieties, and yet proved resilient enough to reawaken as a multicultural powerhouse and global symbol of urban vitality.
Flatbush: The Heart of Brooklyn by The East River by
The East River captures the history of New York's premier waterway. The river, a source of life for Native Americans, spawned communities from Brooklyn to Harlem. Its shipyards and docks projected American enterprise around the world. The waterfront, an industrial and commercial dynamo, forged a continent. The dreams of immigrants who arrived and lived on its banks created this nation. The river's strong currents guarded prisons and hospital quarantines while keeping secret legends of gold on its bottom. The sinews of a great city are knitted by more than a score of its tunnels and bridges. Today, a renaissance draws people to this river, the heart of New York.
How We Got to Coney Island: The Development of Mass Transportation in Brooklyn and Kings County by 
Gravesend, Brooklyn by 
The Brooklyn Experience: The Ultimate Guide to Neighborhoods & Noshes, Culture & the Cutting Edge by
From Paris to Rio, everyone's curious about hot, new Brooklyn. The Brooklyn Experience, Ellen Freudenheim's fourth comprehensive Brooklyn guidebook, offers a true insider's guide, complete with photographs, itineraries, and insights into one of the most creative, dynamic cities in the modern world. Walk over the Brooklyn Bridge at dawn or sunset, discover thirty-eight unique Brooklyn neighborhoods, and experience the borough like a native. Find out where to go to the beach and to eat great pizza, what to do with the kids, how to enjoy free and cheap activities, and where to savor Brooklyn's famous cuisines. Visit cool independent shops, greenmarkets, festivals, and delve into the vibrant new cultural scene at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Barclays Center, and the lively exploding neighborhoods of DUMBO, Williamsburg, and Bushwick. Included in the book are essays and the pithy, sometimes funny comments of sixty cultural, literary, and culinary movers and shakers, culled from exclusive interviews with experts from the James Beard Foundation to the cofounder of the famous Brooklyn Book Festival, as well as MacArthur "genius" award winners, to young entrepreneurs, hipsters, and activists, all of whom have something to say about Brooklyn's stunning renaissance. Neighborhood profiles are rich in user-friendly information and details, including movies, celebrities, and novels associated with each neighborhood. There are also 800 listings of great restaurants, bars, shops, parks, cultural institutions, and historical sites, complete with contact information. Targeting the independent, curious traveler, The Brooklyn Experience includes a dozen "do-it-yourself" tours, including a visit to Woody Allen's childhood neighborhood, and amazing Revolutionary and Civil War sites. Freudenheim draws clear--and sometimes surprising--connections between old and new Brooklyn. Written by an author with an astounding knowledge of all Brooklyn has to offer, The Brooklyn Experience will guide both first-time and repeat visitors, and will be a fun resource for Brooklynites who enjoy exploring their own hometown.
Coney Island: The People's Playground by 
Bedford-Stuyvesant by
The heart of Bedford-Stuyvesant is still found in the near-forgotten settlement of Brooklyn's Bedford Corners, a Dutch township colonized in 1667, where ancient Native American trails determined its now major thoroughfares, and where Colonial patriots fought the British in the country's struggle for independence. Bedford-Stuyvesant remained a quiet farming hamlet until the 1880s when rapid subway transportation, construction of the Brooklyn Bridge, and the burgeoning population of Manhattan combined to forge one of America's first and finest suburban communities. Bedford-Stuyvesant details the evolution of this neighborhood, home to the nation's second largest African American community, and it documents how this urban center is now finally enjoying new regard for its wealth of architecture and its notable place in American history.
Crown Heights and Weeksville by 
Race, Class, and Gentrification in Brooklyn: A view from the street by
In this book, the authors "revisit" two iconic Brooklyn neighborhoods, Crown Heights-Prospect-Lefferts Gardens and Greenpoint-Williamsburg, where they have been active scholars since the 1970s. Krase and DeSena's comprehensive view from the street describes and analyses the neighborhoods' decline and rise with a focus on race and social class. They look closely at the strategies used to resist and promote neighborhood change and conclude with an analysis of the ways in which these neighborhoods contribute to current images and trends in Brooklyn. This book contributes to a better understanding of the elevated status of Brooklyn as a global city and destination place.
Williamsburg by 
The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn (2nd edition) by
Brooklyn--famed for its bridge, its long-departed Dodgers, its Botanic Garden, and its accent--is the most populous borough in New York City and arguably the most colorful. Its many neighborhoods boast diverse and shifting ethnic enclaves, an abundance of architectural styles, and an amazing number of churches and festivals. Generously illustrated with both historical and contemporary photographs, The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn is an indispensable and entertaining guide. Begun as an offshoot of The Encyclopedia of New York City, which provides much of the historical background, the book takes its character from the neighborhoods themselves, as detailed by the Citizens Committee for New York City and Brooklyn Borough Historian John Manbeck. Taking us on a tour of some 90 neighborhoods (including ghost neighborhoods that no longer exist), the book identifies the boundaries of each one through a neighborhood profile and a street map. There is also an essay on each neighborhood as well as an insert with practical tips on subways, buses, libraries, police precincts, fire departments, and hospitals. In addition, each entry includes eclectic neighborhood facts: Erasmus Hall Academy, in Flatbush, boasts such famous graduates as Barbra Streisand and Bobby Fischer; during Poland’s 1990 elections, more than 5,000 absentee ballots were postmarked Greenpoint. The introduction by Kenneth T. Jackson gives an overview of Brooklyn, while an index allows readers to locate key sites within the borough. In 1898, when it was the third largest city in the United States, the City of Brooklyn merged with New York City to become one of its five boroughs. A century later it is time to salute this unique community in a book that will be an essential resource for past, present, and future residents. The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn is the first in a series on New York’s five boroughs.
The Neighborhoods of Brooklyn by 
Famous Nathan: A Family Saga of Coney Island, the American Dream, and the Search for the Perfect Hot Dog by
From a Nickel to an Empire Before the gut-busting eating contests and franchise stores across the country, there was a single man, Nathan Handwerker. An Eastern European Jewish immigrant who left the small provincial world he knew for a fresh start in America, Nathan arrived at Ellis Island speaking not a word of English, unable to read or write, and with twenty-five dollars hidden in his shoes. He had a simple goal: work hard and carve out a piece of the American dream. But history had bigger plans for Nathan. Beginning in 1916, with just five feet of counter space on Coney Island’s Surf Avenue, Nathan sells his frankfurters for five cents. As New York booms, bringing trains and patrons to the seashore, so too does Nathan’s humble frankfurter stand. Soon Nathan’s Famous takes over the whole block, and Nathan gathers around him a dedicated core of workers (many who stay for decades) who help launch the hot dog as an American food staple. Even as the business soars, Nathan remains fiercely loyal to what matters most: his customers, workers, and family. There’s Ida, the wife he fell in love with because no one could peel an onion faster; Sammy, the counterman who could serve an astonishing sixty franks per minute; and then there are the heirs to the empire, Murray and Sol, whose differing visions for the future lead to clashes with their eternally demanding father. Success brings difficulties, and as the two sons vie over control of the family business, a universal story of success and ambition plays out, mirroring the corporatization of the American food industry. Written by Nathan’s own grandson, and at once a portrait of a man, a family, and the changing face of a nation through a century of promise and progress,Famous Nathanis a dog's tale that snaps and satisfies with every page.
Green-Wood Cemetery by 
Walking Brooklyn: 30 Tours Exploring Historical Legacies, Neighborhood Culture, Side Streets and Waterways by 
Coney Island: 150 years of rides, fires, floods, the rich, the poor and finally Robert Moses by
Before the Civil War, Coney Island boasted a beach, a dozen small hotels with ramshackle bathhouses, some chowder stands and a few saloons. After the war, it was taken over by powerful individuals who made its 0.7 square miles a domain of the wealthy. By 1905, with the population of New York City at four million, the city's amusement park builders designed an entertainment wonderland on the island that even the poor could enjoy, creating a "nickel empire," where visitors paid five cents for the subway, five cents for a Nathan's hot dog and five cents for a ride. In 1910, Coney Island saw 20 million visitors--more than Disneyland and Disney World combined could claim 70 years later, adjusted for population growth. Through the decades, the island has seen changes of fortune, floods and fires, cycles of decay and rehabilitation. Yet the ultimate power on the island was and is the government of the city of New York, which--for good or ill--has made Coney Island what it is today.
Fort Greene by 
Brownsville, Brooklyn: Blacks, Jews, and the Changing Face of the Ghetto by Greenpoint Neighborhood History Guide by 
Bay Ridge by
Bay Ridge was once a rural community of farmhouses and summer cottages that sat on the banks of the East River. First known as Yellow Hook, it included the military post at Fort Hamilton. Where British troops once marched up the banks, commuters today traverse the Verrazano Bridge. Over the years, Bay Ridge has grown into a thriving, diverse neighborhood with a proud Brooklyn history.In Bay Ridge, the Bay Ridge Historical Society has collected images from days gone by to tell the stories of an earlier time. One of the most famous contributions comes from the photographs of Samuel Winter Thomas, a photographer who lived at 3rd Avenue and 75th Street. Gazing at his nineteenth-century photographs, we see the early, rural character of Bay Ridge. Throughout this volume, which contains over two hundred rare, never-before-published photographs, readers can look back into the faces of those who came before them, the early schools and places of worship, and the trolleys that took the earliest commuters to work.
Brooklyn!: An Illustrated History by 
A History of Brooklyn Bridge Park by
By the 1970s, the Brooklyn piers had become a wasteland on the New York City waterfront. Today, they have been transformed into a stunning park that is enjoyed by countless Brooklynites and visitors from across New York City and around the world. A History of Brooklyn Bridge Park recounts the grassroots, multivoiced, and contentious effort, beginning in the 1980s, to transform Brooklyn's defunct piers into a beautiful, urban oasis. The movement to resist commercial development on the piers reveals how concerned citizens came together to shape the future of their community. After winning a number of battles, park advocates, stakeholders, and government officials collaborated to create a thoroughly unique city park that takes advantage of the water and the 'Manhattan skyline, combining an innovative design with vibrant cultural programming. From start to finish, this history emphasizes the contributions, collaborations, and spirited disagreements that made the planning and construction of Brooklyn Bridge Park a model of natural urban development and public-private partnership. The book includes interviews with Brooklyn residents, politicians, activists, urban planners, landscape architects, and other key participants in the fight for the park. The story of Brooklyn Bridge Park also speaks to larger issues confronting all cities, including the development of postindustrial spaces and the ways to balance public and private interests without sacrificing creative vision or sustainable goals.
Old Brooklyn in Early Photographs, 1865-1929: 157 Prints from the Collection of the Long Island Historical Society by 
Making a Promised Land: Harlem in Twentieth-Century Photography and Film by The Spirit of Harlem by Amateur Night at the Apollo: Ralph Cooper Presents Five Decades of Great Entertainment by Fifth Avenue: A Very Social History by 
Around the Block: The Business of a Neighborhood by Creating Central Park by 
Up from Zero: Politics, Architecture, and the Rebuilding of New York by 
City in the Sky: The Rise and Fall of the World Trade Center by 
Divided We Stand: A Biography of New York's World Trade Center by 
Crossing Broadway: Washington Heights and the Promise of New York City by 
Flying over 96th Street: Memoir of an East Harlem White Boy by 
Harlem, Lost and Found: An Architectural and Social History, 1765-1915 by
Long identified with African-American style and culture, Harlem is also a pillar of New York's social and architectural history. In this beautifully illustrated study, historian Michael Henry Adams presents an evocative portrait of the various and divergent Harlems of yesteryear, from the Native American settlements discovered by the Dutch in the seventeenth century to the vibrant community of present-day preservationists. In addition to the legacy of residential architecture—Dutch farmhouses, Native American longhouses, mansions and country villas, thoughtfully planned row houses, and handsome apartment buildings, the author examines schools, industrial facilities, stores, churches, and more. Harlem's spectrum of designers ranges from the well known—McKim, Mead & White, responsible for part of Strivers' Row; George B. Post & Sons, architects of the monumental Shepard Hall at the City College of the City University of New York—to practitioners who, though today mostly forgotten, designed much of the urban fabric of Harlem and New York City. All have contributed to an extraordinarily rich streetscape that today preserves the best of Harlem's past.
Naming New York: Manhattan Places & How They Got Their Names by 
Five Points: The 19th-Century New York City Neighborhood That Invented Tap Dance, Stole Elections, and Became the World's Most Notorious Slum by Harlem: On the Verge by 
Broadway: Its History, People, and Places : An Encyclopedia by 
Touring the Upper East Side: Walks in Five Historic Districts by 
Twin Towers: The Life of New York City's World Trade Center by 
The Jews of Harlem: The Rise, Decline, and Revival of a Jewish Community by
The complete story of Jewish Harlem and its significance in American Jewish history New York Times columnist David W. Dunlap wrote a decade ago that "on the map of the Jewish Diaspora, Harlem Is Atlantis. . . . A vibrant hub of industry, artistry and wealth is all but forgotten. It is as if Jewish Harlem sank 70 years ago beneath waves of memory beyond recall." During World War I, Harlem was the home of the second largest Jewish community in America. But in the 1920s Jewish residents began to scatter to other parts of Manhattan, to the outer boroughs, and to other cities. Now nearly a century later, Jews are returning uptown to a gentrified Harlem. The Jews of Harlem follows Jews into, out of, and back into this renowned metropolitan neighborhood over the course of a century and a half. It analyzes the complex set of forces that brought several generations of central European, East European, and Sephardic Jews to settle there. It explains the dynamics that led Jews to exit this part of Gotham as well as exploring the enduring Jewish presence uptown after it became overwhelmingly black and decidedly poor. And it looks at the beginnings of Jewish return as part of the transformation of New York City in our present era. The Jews of Harlem contributes much to our understanding of Jewish and African American history in the metropolis as it highlights the ever-changing story of America's largest city. With The Jews of Harlem, the beginning of Dunlap's hoped-for resurfacing of this neighborhood's history is underway. Its contemporary story merits telling even as the memories of what Jewish Harlem once was warrants recall.
New York's New Edge: contemporary art, the High Line, and urban megaprojects on the far West Side by
The story of New York’s west side no longer stars the Sharks and the Jets. Instead it’s a story of urban transformation, cultural shifts, and an expanding contemporary art scene. The Chelsea Gallery District has become New York’s most dominant neighborhood for contemporary art, and the streets of the west side are filled with gallery owners, art collectors, and tourists. Developments like the High Line, historical preservation projects like the Gansevoort Market, the Chelsea galleries, and plans for megaprojects like the Hudson Yards Development have redefined what is now being called the "Far West Side” of Manhattan. David Halle and Elisabeth Tiso offer a deep analysis of the transforming district in New York’s New Edge, and the result is a new understanding of how we perceive and interpret culture and the city in New York’s gallery district. From individual interviews with gallery owners to the behind-the-scenes politics of preservation initiatives and megaprojects, the book provides an in-depth account of the developments, obstacles, successes, and failures of the area and the factors that have contributed to them.
Manhattan's Turtle Bay: Story of a Midtown Neighborhood by 
Around Washington Square: An Illustrated History of Greenwich Village by 
Nearest Thing to Heaven: The Empire State Building and American Dreams by 
City on a Grid: How New York Became New York by
You either love it or hate it, but nothing says New York like the street grid of Manhattan. Created in 1811 by a three-man commission featuring headstrong Founding Father Gouverneur Morris, the plan called for a dozen parallel avenues crossing at right angles with many dozens of parallel streets in an unbroken grid. Hills and valleys, streams and ponds, forests and swamps were invisible to the grid; so too were country villages, roads, farms, and estates and generations of property lines. All would disappear as the crosshatch fabric of the grid overspread the island: a heavy greatcoat on the land, the dense undergarment of the future city. No other grid in Western civilization was so large and uniform as the one ordained in 1811. Not without reason. When the grid plan was announced, New York was just under two hundred years old, an overgrown town at the southern tip of Manhattan, a notorious jumble of streets laid at the whim of landowners. To bring order beyond the chaos-and good real estate to market-the street planning commission came up with a monolithic grid for the rest of the island. Mannahatta-the native "island of hills"-became a place of rectangles, in thousands of blocks on the flattened landscape, and many more thousands of right-angled buildings rising in vertical mimicry. The Manhattan grid has been called "a disaster" of urban planning and "the most courageous act of prediction in Western civilization." However one feels about it, the most famous urban design of a living city defines its daily life. This is its story.
Central Park by 
Inside Greenwich Village: A New York City Neighborhood, 1898-1918 by Greenwich Village and How It Got That Way by 
The New York Immigrant Experience: Trace the Path of America's Heritage by
These history travel guides provide an introduction discussing the history and preservation of the present-day site and facilities and include a detailed, walking tour interspersed with first-hand accounts about the cemetery and events that have taken place there. A timeline runs through the walking tour giving descriptions of key personalities who conceived, planned and designed the area with brief and colorful biographies. Also included is information that visitors to the site need to know about planning a trip there, including where to stay, eat, and what to see nearby.
Bellevue: Three Centuries of Medicine and Mayhem at America's Most Storied Hospital by
From a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian comes a riveting history of New York's iconic public hospital that charts the turbulent rise of American medicine. Bellevue Hospital, on New York City's East Side, occupies a colorful and horrifying place in the public imagination: a den of mangled crime victims, vicious psychopaths, assorted derelicts, lunatics, and exotic-disease sufferers. In its two and a half centuries of service, there was hardly an epidemic or social catastrophe--or groundbreaking scientific advance--that did not touch Bellevue. David Oshinsky, whose last book, Polio: An American Story, was awarded a Pulitzer Prize, chronicles the history of America's oldest hospital and in so doing also charts the rise of New York to the nation's preeminent city, the path of American medicine from butchery and quackery to a professional and scientific endeavor, and the growth of a civic institution. From its origins in 1738 as an almshouse and pesthouse, Bellevue today is a revered public hospital bringing first-class care to anyone in need. With its diverse, ailing, and unprotesting patient population, the hospital was a natural laboratory for the nation's first clinical research. It treated tens of thousands of Civil War soldiers, launched the first civilian ambulance corps and the first nursing school for women, pioneered medical photography and psychiatric treatment, and spurred New York City to establish the country's first official Board of Health. As medical technology advanced, "voluntary" hospitals began to seek out patients willing to pay for their care. For charity cases, it was left to Bellevue to fill the void. The latter decades of the twentieth century brought rampant crime, drug addiction, and homelessness to the nation's struggling cities--problems that called a public hospital's very survival into question. It took the AIDS crisis to cement Bellevue's enduring place as New York's ultimate safety net, the iconic hospital of last resort. Lively, page-turning, fascinating, Bellevue is essential American history.
Manhattan's Chinatown by 
The Financial District's Lost Neighborhood, 1900-1970 by
Before the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel, the World Trade Center, and Battery Park City, Manhattan's southern tip was home to a vibrant community of thousands of Slovakian, Irish, Syrian, Greek, and Lebanese immigrants. Living closely in five-story tenement buildings, these early New Yorkers, many of whom filled the low-wage jobs of Wall Street, built a multicultural neighborhood where the weekdays were filled with the hustle of business and the nights and weekends were filled with stickball games, dances, and worship. The Financial District's Lost Neighborhood: 1900-1970 celebrates this little-known neighborhood while highlighting some of New York City's most famous landmarks: Trinity Church, St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church, Battery Park and the New York Aquarium, and the Downtown Athletic Club, home of the Heisman Memorial Trophy.
Times Square Roulette: Remaking the City Icon by 
Upper West Side Story: A History and Guide by 
Harlem on My Mind: Cultural Capital of Black America, 1900-1968 by 
Imagining Ground Zero: Official and Unofficial Proposals for the World Trade Center Site by 
Chinatowns of New York City by 
Harlem: The Unmaking of a Ghetto by
For more than a century, Harlem has been the epicenter of black America, the celebrated heart of African American life and culture--but it has also been a byword for the problems that have long plagued inner-city neighborhoods: poverty, crime, violence, disinvestment, and decay. Photographer Camilo José Vergara has been chronicling the neighborhood for forty-three years, and Harlem: The Unmaking of a Ghetto is an unprecedented record of urban change. Vergara began his documentation of Harlem in the tradition of such masters as Helen Levitt and Aaron Siskind, and he later turned his focus on the neighborhood's urban fabric, both the buildings that compose it and the life and culture embedded in them. By repeatedly returning to the same locations over the course of decades, Vergara is able to show us a community that is constantly changing--some areas declining, as longtime businesses give way to empty storefronts, graffiti, and garbage, while other areas gentrify, with corporate chain stores coming in to compete with the mom-and-pops. He also captures the ever-present street life of this densely populated neighborhood, from stoop gatherings to graffiti murals memorializing dead rappers to impersonators honoring Michael Jackson in front of the Apollo, as well as the growth of tourism and racial integration. Woven throughout the images is Vergara's own account of his project and his experience of living and working in Harlem. Taken together, his unforgettable words and images tell the story of how Harlem and its residents navigated the segregation, dereliction and slow recovery of the closing years of the twentieth century and the boom and racial integration of the twenty-first century. A deeply personal investigation, Harlem will take its place with the best portrayals of urban life.
Thirteen Months to Go: The Creation of the Empire State Building by
The Empire State Building, a construction fear that to this day invokes awe and wonder, began as a contest between two industrial moguls who croved the status of constructing the tallest building in the world. The building was the center of a "race to the skies" competition between Walter Chrysler, of the Chrysler Corporation, and John Jakob Raskob, creator of General Motors, and coincided with the onset of one of the worst economic downturns in American history -- the Great Depression. Thirteen Months to Go encompasses the optimism and potential of 1920s New York. It is a wonderful tribute to the perseverance of New Yorkers and on amazing story of fortitude and ambition.
I Never Knew That about New York by
A treasure trove of fascinating trivia about the city that never sleeps Did you know: * Grand Central Terminal is the largest railway station in the world. * Columbus Circle is the point from which all official distances to and from New York are measured * When Queen Elizabeth II visited Trinity Church in 1976, she was presented with 279 peppercorns in back rent * Macy's owns almost a full city block...but not the real estate its famous sign featuring its signature red bag is on. Take a delightful journey from the bottom of the island of Manhattan to the top and discover extraordinary facts about New York along the way. You'll find yourself saying, "I never knew that about New York!"
The East River by
The East River captures the history of New York's premier waterway. The river, a source of life for Native Americans, spawned communities from Brooklyn to Harlem. Its shipyards and docks projected American enterprise around the world. The waterfront, an industrial and commercial dynamo, forged a continent. The dreams of immigrants who arrived and lived on its banks created this nation. The river's strong currents guarded prisons and hospital quarantines while keeping secret legends of gold on its bottom. The sinews of a great city are knitted by more than a score of its tunnels and bridges. Today, a renaissance draws people to this river, the heart of New York.
Urban legends : The South Bronx in representation and ruin by
A cultural history of the South Bronx that reaches beyond familiar narratives of urban ruin and renaissance, beyond the "inner city" symbol, to reveal the place and people obscured by its myths. For decades, the South Bronx was America's "inner city." Synonymous with civic neglect, crime, and metropolitan decay, the Bronx became the preeminent symbol used to proclaim the failings of urban places and the communities of color who lived in them. Images of its ruins--none more infamous than the one broadcast live during the 1977 World Series: a building burning near Yankee Stadium--proclaimed the failures of urbanism. Yet this same South Bronx produced hip hop, arguably the most powerful artistic and cultural innovation of the past fifty years. Two narratives--urban crisis and cultural renaissance--have dominated understandings of the Bronx and other urban environments. Today, as gentrification transforms American cities economically and demographically, the twin narratives structure our thinking about urban life. A Bronx native, Peter L'Official draws on literature and the visual arts to recapture the history, people, and place beyond its myths and legends. Both fact and symbol, the Bronx was not a decades-long funeral pyre, nor was hip hop its lone cultural contribution. L'Official juxtaposes the artist Gordon Matta-Clark's carvings of abandoned buildings with the city's trompe l'oeil decals program; examines the centrality of the Bronx's infamous Charlotte Street to two Hollywood films; offers original readings of novels by Don DeLillo and Tom Wolfe; and charts the emergence of a "global Bronx" as graffiti was brought into galleries and exhibited internationally, promoting a symbolic Bronx abroad. Urban Legends presents a new cultural history of what it meant to live, work, and create in the Bronx.
The Rat That Got Away: A Bronx Memoir by
One man's "gripping" story of growing up in the South Bronx during an era of upheaval--and overcoming addiction to find success (Library Journal). Allen Jones grew up in a public housing project in the South Bronx at a time--the 1950s--when that neighborhood was a place of optimism and hope for upwardly mobile Black and Latino families. Brought up in a two-parent household, with many neighborhood mentors, Jones led an almost charmed life as a budding basketball star--until his teen years, when his once peaceful neighborhood was torn by job losses, white flight, and a crippling drug epidemic. Drawn into the heroin trade, first as a user, then as a dealer, Jones spent four months on Rikers Island, where he experienced a crisis of conscience and a determination to turn his life around. Sent to a New England prep school upon his release, Jones used his skills and street smarts to forge a life outside the Bronx, first as a college athlete in the South, then as a professional basketball player, radio personality, and banker in Europe. In this memoir, he brings Bronx streets and housing projects to life as places of possibility as well as tragedy--where racism and economic hardship never completely suppressed the resilient spirit of the residents. "Paints an earthy picture of the neighborhood in the 1950s, when the projects were home to working-class black and Latino families who pushed their children to excel, through the 1970s." --The New York Times
The Secret City: Woodlawn Cemetery and the Buried History of New York by 
South Bronx Rising: The Rise, Fall, and Resurrection of an American City by 
Born in the Bronx: A Visual Record of the Early Days of Hip Hop by
Hip hop first became a part of the mainstream music industry in the early 1980s, when major record labels released albums from such accessible groups as Run DMC and the Sugarhill Gang. But the true origins of one of the most powerful pop-cultural influences in the world are in the spontaneous, progressive musical culture that grew out of tough Bronx neighborhoods of the 1970s and led to a renaissance of poetry, music, and fashion.Through years of research, writer and curator Johan Kugelberg has pulled together the scattered remains of a movement that never had its eye on posterity. The book includes the improvisational artwork of previously unpublished street flyers of the era, Polaroids buried for decades in basements across the Bronx, and testimonials from influential figures such as Tony Tone, LA Sunshine, and Charlie Chase. Through the work of pioneering hip-hop photographer Jow Conzo–the man The New York Times calls “the chronicler who took hip hop’s baby pictures”–Born in the Bronx presents a unique introduction to an explosive and experimental period in music history.
The Bronx by
With a population of more than one million and covering over 42 square miles, the Bronx is a vibrant part of New York. The Bronx was given its name in 1898 when the new borough was named after its single largest geographical feature: the Bronx River. The Bronx showcases the borough's rich history in a personal way through vintage and contemporary images.
In the South Bronx of America by
Residents of New York City's South Bronx neighborhood live amidst what is frequently described as the most severe and widespread poverty in any U.S. metropolitan area. In the South Bronx of America is a work which, through documentary photographs, counterpointed with statements by residents and by newspaper reports and statistical information, offers both an intimate view of life in this neighborhood and a context for understanding the last two decades of accelerated social decay. In the words of Penny Coleman, New York Times photographer, In the South Bronx of America, "is important because it is not cynical, because it is a sincere attempt to provide the awareness necessary for change."
City Island and Orchard Beach by
A resort community once known as a "playground for the wealthy," City Island rose to fame as a leader in boat manufacturing and gained international recognition for the victorious yachts it produced for the America's Cup races. Well-known shipyards on the island, including Nevins, Minneford, and Kretzers, weathered society's changing demands to cater to a new clientele of boat owners who required smaller vessels with low maintenance features. With over 200 vintage photographs accompanied by an insightful text, City Island and Orchard Beach traces the transformation of this European-styled community from the mid-1800s to the 1990s. This visual journey to the early days of the island focuses on the community's sense of purpose and its adaptability to the changes brought on by time and technology. Learn about the lives of the island's original settlers, tour its original homes and businesses, and discover the significant role that the area played in the Revolutionary War.
The Diamond in the Bronx: Yankee Stadium and the Politics of New York by 
East Bronx, East of the Bronx River by
Using a collection of many never-before-seen photographs, East Bronx: East of the Bronx River celebrates the history of this group of neighborhoods. From the late 1800s to the present day, the area has undergone many dramatic changes. The most important factor in the history of the east Bronx is the development of mass transit. Its introduction to the Bronx brought a new age of commuters, people seeking professions largely in Manhattan as well as the comforts of suburbia and a more rural atmosphere for raising families. The elevated trains and the highway construction between 1910 and 1940 helped to triple the population. Property values rose and new construction became commonplace along the waterfront from Pelham Bay to Clason Point as summer houses were built. Today, the area east of the river is a community rich in history and diversity. Here we can watch the changing landscape, as old modes of transportation replace new ones, neighborhoods evolve, and the people of the Bronx build communities full of pride.
Northwest Bronx by
Northwest Bronx is home to Wave Hill, Van Cortlandt Park, Woodlawn Cemetery, the New York Botanical Garden, and a variety of colleges and universities. Hunter College served as a training facility during World War II, and Mark Twain, Theodore Roosevelt's family, and Arturo Toscanini once lived at Wave Hill. Pres. John F. Kennedy's boyhood home is only steps from Wave Hill, and George Washington slept at the Van Cortlandt Mansion. Northwest Bronx features an array of vintage photographs of the borough's neighborhoods, from Spuyten Duyvil, Kingsbridge, Riverdale, and Woodlawn to the neighborhoods north of Fordham Road and west of the Bronx River.
South Bronx by
Once a part of Westchester County, the Bronx was annexed to New York City in the nineteenth century. The South Bronx came to be defined as the area in the southwest part of the borough between the Harlem River and the Bronx River, with Fordham Road generally considered as the northern boundary. Less urban than nearby neighborhoods in Manhattan, the South Bronx attracted countless numbers of immigrants arriving in New York City in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Choosing to raise their families in what was then a country setting, they helped to make the South Bronx one of the most culturally diverse sections of New York. Churches, schools, ballparks, and streets of the old neighborhoods come back to life on the pages of South Bronx. This book revisits the Third Avenue trolley, Old West Farms, the Third Avenue El, tar beach, and the cobblestone roadways of a bygone era. The breweries and old-time taverns that were once such a vital part of the culture of the South Bronx are found anew in these pages. The Schnorer Club, the Elks Club on the Concourse, the Concourse Plaza Hotel, and Yankee Stadium come to life in this stunning collection of more than two hundred images.
The Beautiful Bronx (1920-1950) by
A native Bronxite takes us back to the heyday years of the Bronx.
Bronx Accent: : A Literary and Pictorial History of the Borough by
For the last three hundred years, and through all its social and economic transformations, The Bronx has been a major literary center that many prominent writers have called home. Bringing together a variety of past literary figures as well as emerging talents, this comprehensive book captures the Zeitgeist of the neighborhood through the eyes of its writers. Included are selections from the writings of Jack Kerouac, Mark Twain, James Baldwin, James Fenimore Cooper, Tom Wolfe, Herman Wouk, Theodore Dreiser, Washington Irving, Clifford Odets, Cynthia Ozick, Grace Paley, Edgar Allan Poe, Chaim Potok, Kate Simon, Leon Trotsky, and Sholem Aleichem. Lloyd Ultan and Barbara Unger place the literature of these and other writers in historical context and reproduce one hundred vintage photographs that bring the writings to life. Filtered through the imaginations of authors of different times, ethnic groups, social classes, and literary styles, the borough of The Bronx emerges not only as a shaper of destinies and lives, but as an important literary mecca.
The Bronx: It Was Only Yesterday, 1935-1965 by
THE BRONX IT WAS ONLY YESTERDAY, 1935-1965 tells the story of a dynamic period in the development of New York City's northernmost borough. The depths of the Great Depression brought the New Deal to combat the economic disaster, & this was followed quickly by the ferment of the Second World War. Peacetime brought great changes in society, including a movement from the city into the suburbs & a vast influx of different ethnic groups into the city. The Bronx was also marked by islands of stability & by continuity to the past. In these decades, entertainment shifted from enjoying movies & radio to spending hours watching newly-purchased black & white television sets; transportation changed from riding trolleys, buses, & subways to automobiles; musical taste switched from big bands to rock 'n' roll. Heretofore quiet neighborhoods were disturbed by the clatter of new highways & high-rise housing complexes. The absorbing narrative of the colorful activities of these times is complemented with numerous rare photographs from the research archives of The Bronx County Historical Society. They offer a vivid glimpse into the wide-ranging changes & elements of continuity that made the Bronx a desirable residence. To order contact: The Bronx County Historical Society, 3309 Bainbridge Avenue, The Bronx, NY 10467. Telephone (212) 881-8900.
The Bronx in the Innocent Years, 1890-1925 by 
The Bronx: The Ultimate Guide to New York City's Beautiful Borough by
Often overlooked by most tourists and locals alike, the Bronx--one of five boroughs that comprise the city of New York--is rich in cultural and historical attractions. From the Bronx Zoo (the largest urban zoo in the United States) to the New York Botanical Garden (one of the most visited botanical gardens in the world), this borough has something for everyone. Visitors can explore historical locations (including where George Washington slept and where Edgar Allan Poe lived and worked), watch a game in one of the most famous baseball stadiums in the United States--Yankee Stadium--and sample delicious Italian food in New York's real "Little Italy" on Arthur Avenue and New England style seafood at City Island along the edge of Long Island Sound. Author and foremost historian of the Bronx Lloyd Ultan and educator Shelley Olson have teamed up to create a handy guidebook with detailed maps that will provide all the information prospective visitors need for planning their adventures to famous and little-known sites, including the hours, admission fees, and directions to featured attractions. The Bronx--which includes thirty-six color photographs--provides visitors with informative chapters on more than twelve of the borough's extraordinary destinations as well as self-guided walking tours of some of the most ethnically, architecturally, and historically diverse neighborhoods. History buffs will find beautifully preserved eighteenth- and nineteenth-century homes, the Hall of Fame for Great Americans (which pays homage to many familiar faces in American history), and Woodlawn Cemetery (the final resting place for prominent Americans including Duke Ellington, Joseph Pulitzer, Gloria Vanderbilt Whitney, and Thomas Nast). In addition to the botanical garden, nature lovers can enjoy the beautiful Pelham Bay Park and Van Cortlandt Park. The Bronx also highlights the surprising number of art galleries, museums, and performance venues that visitors are sure to enjoy, further demonstrating the borough's cultural prominence. .
Staten Island, Gateway to New York by 
Staten Island: Isle of the Bay by
Lying at the entrance to one of the world's greatest natural harbors, Staten Island has been a most alluring destination ever since Giovanni da Verrazano set eyes upon it in 1524. Even before Colonial times the borough played a significant role in our nation's development economically, culturally, and historically. From Revolutionary battles to Civil War draft riots, while hosting iconic businesses or creating inspiration for the likes of Olmsted and Thoreau, the island has cultivated a prolific and distinguished past that reflects the passion of the American spirit.
Staten Island: Conservative bastion in a liberal city by
Staten Island is New York City's smallest yet fastest growing borough: a conservative, suburban community of nearly a half a million on the fringe of the nation's most liberal, global city. Staten Island: Conservative Bastion in a Liberal City chronicles how this "forgotten borough" has grappled with its uneasy relationship with the rest of the City of New York since the 1920s. Daniel C. Kramer and Richard M. Flanagan analyze the politics behind events that have shaped the borough, such as the opening of the Verrazano Bridge and the closure of the Fresh Kills Landfill. Lost opportunities are discussed, including the failure to construct a rail link to the other boroughs of New York, to adequately plan for the explosive housing boom in recent decades and, some say, to create an independent City of Staten Island. Unlike much of New York City, Staten Island is a place with robust party competition and lively democratic politics with hard-fought campaigns, bitter feuds, and career-ending scandals. Staten Island's two most successful politicians of the twentieth century--Republicans John Marchi and Guy Molinari--defended the borough's interests while defining an urban conservativism that would influence politics elsewhere. In fact, Staten Island has played a pivotal role in the winning electoral coalitions of Republican mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg and continues to spark the imaginations of New Yorkers on a scale that is disproportionate to the borough's relatively small size. Staten Island: Conservative Bastion in a Liberal City will allow readers to gain access to the borough-based roots of New York City's politics. This book will be of special interest to anyone who wishes to understand the dynamics of middle-class life and democratic representation in a global city.
Staten Island Through Time by
Despite years of growth that dramatically altered Staten Island's landscapes, the Island retains its unique identity as a borough apart. The least populated of New York City's boroughs, the Island continues to be recognized for independence of spirit and preservation of community and historic treasures. Known as the "Borough of Parks", its support of green space, the arts, and cultural institutions gives Staten Island a sense of community and a way of life that continues to attract newcomers. Located within a short ferry ride to Manhattan, the Island has elements, such as the Travis Fourth of July Parade and the Richmond County Fair, that are more typical of Middle America than a metropolitan suburb. As in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, Islanders can be counted on to pull together, and as they plan for the future, one thing is certain "the best is yet to be.".
Staten Island by
From the moment Giovanni da Verrazzano first spied it in 1524, Staten Island has been recognized as a verdant oasis at the mouth of one of the world's most breathtaking natural harbors. Since that time, Staten Island has evolved from a hunting ground and farming community to one of suburban homes and small businesses. People have been drawn to the island's bucolic surroundings to escape the urban sprawl consuming so much of the city. From lush valleys to commanding heights, Staten Island has provided inspiration for writers like Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Henry David Thoreau, and Ralph Waldo Emerson, as well as providing opportunities for entrepreneurs like Cornelius Vanderbilt, Donald Trump, Charles Goodyear, and Daniel Tompkins. The area afforded sanctuary to people like Giuseppe Garibaldi, Don Antonio de Santa Anna, Maxim Gorky, Xhevdet Mustafa, and Gustave von Struve to escape persecution. Staten Island chronicles more than 400 years of the island's transformation, illustrating the dramatic changes that have taken place in the fastest growing county in New York State.
Staten Island: A Walk Down Memory Lane by
Were there really four airports here? Was the Staten Island Airport shut down each night to ensure no peril to the patrons of the drive-in theater? Is there truly a 150 foot dormant tunnel under the harbor between Staten Island and Brooklyn with the entrance capped in Brooklyn? Did President John Kennedy, sip coffee at the St. George ferry terminal? Can you believe that a famous Island milk company resorted to rowboats to delivery milk to areas from Oakwood to Midland Beach during some of the worst storms to every hit that area? Did Buffalo Bill Cody and Annie Oakley have a Wild West show in 1886 down at Erastina (Mariners Harbor)? In what year was a bomb actually exploded on a Staten Island Ferry?
The 7 Train: An Immigrant Journey [videorecording]There Goes the Neighborhood
Season 1 of this podcast focuses on gentrification in Brooklyn.
