From The Peopling of New York City
I
New York Burning by Jill Lepore (pg 1 – 169)
Beginning the novel, I am extremely intrigued by the tale which Lepore aims to tell. The book’s title alone piqued my interest. Of course I’ve studied liberty, slavery, some of New York’s notable fires, and eighteenth century history, but never all of these in conjunction. As the tale begins to unfold I am shocked that I knew nothing of this historical travesty. It seems it was conveniently left out of the endless American history requirements I’ve fulfilled.
Following the preface and prologue, the body of the book, curiously separated into the elements Ice, Fire, Stone, Paper and so on, are nothing short of poetic. I am struck by both the lyrical nature and impeccable historical accuracy of Lepore’s prose. The content seems as if it was drawn heavily from journals. There are endless quotations about the weather or entertainment gathered from newspapers and impeccable journal- like accounts of where this person went or what another person did on any particular afternoon. The way Lepore is able to weave the stories is brilliant and I am particularly fond of the sentiment of common wisdom which is gained from using various journals and anonymous accounts.
Perhaps most central to the tale is the 1744 journal of Supreme Court justice Daniel Horsemanden. Leopore is able to add a cultural and political framework to the accessible evidence to craft somewhat of a historically accurate mystery. This alluring and mysterious setup along with initial vagaries, make all the historical facts quite digestible. The book reads more like a novel and less like a textbook which is wonderful.
We are introduced to Mary Burton within the first chapter; she is immediately brought to the our attention although the uninformed reader (me) remains curiously unaware of her significance until later on, when we learn that she will provide the singular account which tragically implicates more than eighty slaves.
Initially the book was a bit difficult to follow, because I had almost no prior knowledge of the historical event depicted. At this point in the novel, the plot is relatively clear: Ten fires burn simultaneously in 1741 Manhattan igniting panic and conspiracy theories. White politicians are able to corner a common enemy: slaves. Mary Burton’s singular account is evidence enough to identify an African American conspiracy to burn the city, murder whites, and take over Manhattan’s government.
Many questions still exist for me at this point in the novel. Firstly I am still unsure about Horsemanden’s role in the travesty and weather the book aims to vilify the Supreme Court Justice when he is clearly not alone in his guilt. Lepore also seems to call into question the most basic existence of such a conspiracy, shaking the very foundations of history. I am also perplexed both by Horsmanden’s peculiar behavior towards Mary Burton and the ease with which her account is taken seriously.
In terms of connection to “the peopling of New York,” I think this book raises some very important themes. Fist is one of an unsung history and the tragedy which exists in that misfortune. New York’s history is so extensive, its populations so diverse, that some little know incidents are conveniently left out of our consciousness, this minority voice is so important to nurturing a diverse environment such as New York City.
The Restless City by Joanne Reitano (pg 1 – 30)
The overarching sentiment that I take away from the first few pages of the book is one of paradox. Reitano, aiming to illustrate New York’s dichotomy/diversity, is constantly usking contradictory adjectives alongside one another, it is effective and does serve to underscore the city’s complex past and present, but the device becomes very repetitious. “Urban energy could be simultaneously positive and negative, constructive and destructive” (Reitano, 2).The book is a difficult one to remain focused on, it reads like a well written high school textbook, I’m not particularly fond of the writing style.
This sentiment of paradox which is unmistakably present, sometimes unnecessarily so, throughout the entire introduction and first chapter is also captured in the books title, The Restless City. It is carried into the first chapter in the form of turbulence, the pulling of opposites in polar directions, the swirling of a whirlpool. The first chapter is entitled “City of Whirlpool” and provides historical background on the years 1607 – 1799. Tension is at the forefront of all of Reitano’s prose. She explicitly states in the introduction, “This book focuses on political economic, social and cultural developments that best capture the tensions of each era,” (Reitano, 5).
Chapter one follows suit detailing the conflicts of New York’s colonial/revolutionary era. I find myself trying, painfully, to stay present through descriptions of Dutch and British occupation of Manhattan. New York is described as a historical, “home for the restless, the dissidents, the nonconformists, the rebels, the free booters, the disenchanted,” (Rachlis, 9). I find this quote quite poignant and it is particularly amazing how well it could also apply to the city in the present.
The description of this era continues, focusing on conflict and controversy. Reitano details the simultaneous promotion of slavery and liberalism, the disturbances of the Stamp and Tea Acts and finally New York’s acquiesce to the Declaration of Independence. The chapter ends offering a bridge to the next era and proposing the idea that New York will be “a paradigm of the new nation.”
Reitano’s recognition of conflicts heavy handed role in shaping our city coincides beautifully with the little known conflict that Lepore reveals to us. By understanding the positive and negative benefits of conflicts that Reitano presents us with and simultaneously understanding a particular conflict presented by Lepore our wisdom of “the peopling of New York City” can increase exponentially.
II
New York Burning by Jill Lepore (pgs. 170-end)
On the surface, Jill Lepore’s novel New York Burning seems like a simple setting straight of a skewed historical record. She tells the story of slavery and conspiracy in colonial New York through the subjective journal of Supreme Court Justice Horsemanden, pointing to curious flaws in accounts and situational ambiguities as evidence for his implausibility. Most basically, Lepore succeeds in presenting the reader with a fuller portrait of an important historical moment in New York City’s history; however, the mission of the book is far more pervasive than a simple historical rectification. The larger ideas that can be contracted from this novel and the telling of this story are diverse and far-reaching, but all are invaluable in order to wholly understand New York City’s history.
Perhaps most importantly is the primary argument which underlines Lepore’s narrative, the idea of Country vs. Court Parties in both colonial New York and later, the larger United States. Lepore points out that studying this particular moment and slave conspiracy can help us to understand the development of politics; she aims to make a larger argument about understanding the two party system and the political descent of our nation.
Another important idea to be taken away from the novel is the juxtaposition of historical facts and historical interpretations. Lepore develops this idea by using Horsemandensen’s journal as the primary source of her research. She argues that the journal reads more like a formulaic novel, and less like a historical account. She then points to the danger of skewed historical accounts such as this.
Horsemandensen’s journal is the only record of the trial which remains. Lepore points out that he writes statements for the slaves and interrogates them. She leads the reader to understand that he is both the judge and the jury and his power is dangerously unchecked.
This exposure leads Lepore to examine other problems regarding justice. She devotes a large portion of the text to thinking about how justice works-, she examines trial transcripts, contextual evidence etc. and succeeds in using the slave conspiracy to analyze legal proceedings and the popular sentiment of guilty until proven innocent, or British common law. Along with examining justice, Lepore considers the slave’s roll in a criminal proceeding. She points out that, in these proceedings, the law is perverted in that Horsemandensen pushes to slaves to confess or to implicate one another, when typically, slaves are not allowed to give testimony, and they have no legal rights.
Along with the inadequacies of the colonial justice system, Lepore presents the savagery of slavery in 1930’s Manhattan. She reveals that slavery was no less savage in the north and that contrary to popular opinion 1930’s Manhattan had the second largest slave holding community, second only to Charleston, South Carolina. She points out the travesty of this unsung history and attempts to correct or at least amend it.
Lastly, the book speaks to an international community and to the diversity of even early New York City. Lepore presents a diversified and tense New York in which the new colony is left to fend for itself in the absence of its international over lookers who are involved in conflicts in Spain, France and Britain.
I think this novel is pertinent in a course like, the Peopling of New York City, for several reasons. Firstly, we are able to get a unique and objective portrait of an important historical moment in New York City’s extensive history. Next, we are able to examine slavery’s prevalence in the north/colonial Manhattan and its simultaneous construction and near destruction of the city. Lastly we are able to examine several themes which are pertinent to practically all of New York’s history including politics, conspiracy, and liberty.
III
Gotham: The Paradoxical City 1800-1840
“In 1807 Irvin equated New York with Gotham, an old English town whose residents pretended to be simple minded in order to keep the king from taking over their village” (Reitano, 33). Reitano uses this interesting anecdote as well as Irving’s vantage point to describe the paradoxal nature of New York City from 1800-1840. I think paradox is the most important theme of this book, simply because it suits New York City in a variety of ways. In each new chapter, Reitano seems to adapt the word paradox to fit some present situation in New York City. Within this time period, the main paradox she observes is one of similarity and uniqueness. She talks about how during this time New York City was beginning to become a model for the new nation, representing the tensions and triumphs of a county. However, the city was simultaneously unlike any other place in the world, setting it utterly apart from any other single city in the United States. She extends this metaphor the entire chapter detailing this period of New York’s history as a “colorful” one wrought with tension and activists such as Fanny Wright.
The Proud and Passionate City 1840-1865
Reitano introduces this era with yet another author’s vantage point, Walt Whitman. I particularly like her inclusion of poetry and prose written by authors of the period, it provides a much-needed departure from the strictly historical descriptions. This period is depicted as perhaps the most turbulent thus far, mired with “rapid economic growth, significant population shifts, and intense political struggle,” (Reitano 56). I’m finding each era difficult to differentiate because the writing style and themes present in each chapter are so similar. The introduction of specific conflicts, such as The Astor Place riots, in this chapter stand out and provide good historical background but I’m finding that there is an annoying amount of repetitive “filler” throughout the book which makes it annoyingly repetitious.
Connections to “The Peopling of NYC:”
Thus far I’m finding this book much more difficult to get through than Lepore’s elegant New York Burning. I think it is because there is no specific storyline; the only real plotline that the book follows is a chronological one. I think it will prove valuable to have a sound knowledge of New York’s history in order to explore its people and its present status. I noticed a trend in the conflicts that seem to arise in New York City, which is also present in Lepore’s novel. Conflict always seems to arise out of disparity in race, class, and gender. The Astor Place Riots, in the city’s theatre district became the stage that presented the city’s class tensions. Even discussions about activism such as Fanny Wright’s crusade for equality are born out of trying to reconcile these disparities.
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VII
East Side, West Side, all around the town/ The tots sang ring-around-rosie, London Bridge is falling down/ Boys and girls together, me and Mamie O'Rourke/ Tripped the light fantastic on the sidewalks of New York
Reitano includes this verse from the legendary tune, “Sidewalks of New York” directly following her description of The Harlem Renaissance and Garveyism in the chapter “The Big Apple: Pursuing the Dream” in her novel, The Restless City. I was struck by this verse and its place in both New York’s history and Reitano’s book. She includes a bit of the song’s illustrious history, mentioning that it was one of the period’s most popular celebrations of young Irish-American revelry in the streets of New York. I was initially struck by the verses lighthearted contagiousness coupled with its curious birth during a very troubled time in New York’s history and prompted to research the song’s history further.
The original composer of the song was Charles Lawlor. The story goes something like this: in the summer of 1894 Lawlor strolled into the East Side Hat Shop whistling his newly created tune. James Blake, with a curious hobby of lyric writing, happened to be tending the counter and caught wind of the catchy melody and penned lyrics to the song. Going along with the idea that the best creations are often accidents, their unlikely collaboration proved a sensation. “Sidewalks of New York” sold more sheet music than any other song in the country during the 1895, (Wikipedia.)
Under examination, the lyrics reveal volumes about 1890’s New York. Overall the verse emotes a sense of carefree mingling of neighborhoods (east side west side,) genders (boys and girls,) and even races (me and Mama O’Rouke.) Although we are unaware of the ethnicity of the imagined narrator, Mama O’ Rouke clearly references a young Irish girl.
Reitano examines this important nuance. “In Greenwich Village, competition between old Irish immigrants and new Italian immigrants resulted in constant strife during the twenties.” She further examines other controversies which Irish New Yorkers found themselves entangled within including tensions in Washington Heights between German Jews and Irish Catholics. The fantastical quality of the verse seems to be curiously contradictory to the realistic condition of New York during this time period. The final line contains the phrase, “tripped the light fantastic,” which denotes a “light and nimble dance,” (wikipedia.) This sort of carefree innocence coupled with the New York’s turbulent sidewalks provides an interesting perspective of the peopling of New York. Despite the enormous racial tensions and movements detailed by Reitano in this chapter, the narrator of the verse details the city through the eyes of an innocent child, untainted by the complications of prejudice. Blake was able to find a sort of refuge in the song, communicating through the simple voice of a child, that despite its turbulent state, New York remains, the most magnificent city in the world.
I think this sentiment is important to Reitano’s book as a whole and also to understanding the peopling of New York. Although the history of our great city is wrought with strife, that is precisely, what has made it so great. Both Reitano and Blake demonstrate a keen understanding of the paradox of progress.
VIII
Stonewall by David Carter
Reaction to Book:
I found this text strikingly meticulous and straight to the point. Unlike Lepore’s novel, there is little room for elegant prose among the endless interviews, background information, and carefully gathered statistics. I felt that the book skirted a precarious line between losing relevance and a larger emotional feeling among hundreds of pages of disparate research, as I felt Reitano’s novel did, and maintaining an emotional connection to the research as I felt Lepore did. Carter’s masterful balance grants him the credible position of objective researcher but the more personal narrative is maintained through the introduction of specific characters like Fat Tony.
While I was previously aware of the general portrait of the Stonewall Riots, I would now consider myself an expert. Carter masterfully dispels long held myths regarding the controversy revealing the historical truth about the times, the places, and the unprecedented three days of rioting in Greenwich Village. He also alerts the reader to the scale of the riots calling them the “most significant rebelling against the status quo until the tearing down of the Berlin Wall.” The Stonewall Riots are not some obscure event in New York City’s history, they are relatively well known, Carter’s challenge and success lies in the clearing up of misconceptions and brining new insight to an already established topic.
Relationship to class:
I find this book both invaluable and appropriate for CHC 2 for a number of reasons: Firstly and fore mostly it depicts the struggle of a people excluded for reasons outside of race or ethnicity. The primary oppression we have discussed in NYC’s history has been along racial lines, New York Burning revealed the city’s treacherous treatment of African Americans while Nancy Foner’s book revealed its mistreatment against immigrants from all over the world. I think this nuance in oppression is very important, it provides a different sort of insight into the personality of New York City, a sort of mean-streak. We learn that even New York, it all of it’s supposedly tolerant splendor, will and has turned against its own, committing travesties against gays, women, the poor; anyone and everyone, not strictly immigrants or supposed “outsiders.” Another important theme to both the novel, and the city of New York, is challenging the status quo. Homosexuals bravely challenged accepted conventions in the stonewall riots and New York has been testing the nations limits for years, a sort of ongoing experiment. Lastly, I think this book is impeccably researched and the detail with which the story is relayed is amazing. This text serves as the paradigm for thorough research, drawing on hundreds of interviews, exhaustive searches of public and previously sealed files, and intensive research into Stonewell’s history and the background.
IX
Nightshift NYC vs. Nightlife on Little W. 12th Street
“After the tour buses disgorge their tourists into the sleek hotels of midtown Manhattan, and after the day-dwellers lock themselves in against an accumulated fear of the night, the city slowly slouches into its own skin, revealing a vulnerability and an occasional mean streak to those who brave its darker side,” (Nightshift NYC .)
After midnight little West 12th Street is alive with the sound of sex inch heels stumbling and scarping over its uneven grey cobblestone. It’s midday, sundrenched; vacancy is replaced by the intrigue of night. It is as if the tiny street has slipped into its little black cocktail dress and is prepared to play with its revelers. Women twitter nervously outside important looking doorways, twirling golden strands of hair and blinking voraciously, hoping it is enough to get them into the door at one of the city’s trendiest nightlife venues.
“There are those who work the nightshift and those who live in the night. Submerging the natural rhythm of human life, workers on the nightshift live in service to the city that refuses to sleep. There’s are the fry cooks and coffee jockey, train conductors and cab hacks, the cops, the docs, and the fishmongers selling cod by the crate,” (Nightshift NYC.)
Little west 12th street certainly operates by virtue of the nightshift, its wide eyed, long legged inhabitants could care less, but without the unsmiling doorman checking IDs and the physically ample bouncers which flank his sides, the privileged could hardly sway to overplayed pop-rock favorites beneath inadequate lighting. Or sip overpriced champagne for that matter. The underpaid Mexican-American bar backs run around like eager soldiers ready at any moment to combat a broken glass or empty bottle of Sky Vodka, “Perdón, lo siento!” they shout, migrating the hoards of gyrating corpses.
Waitresses and bottle girls buzz about offering neat, lipsticked mouths and cocktail napkins around every turn. Outside, eager taxi drivers line up, waiting to deliver tipsy revelers safely back to their upper-east side apartments. And for those who are having a bit too much fun, the nightshift policeman lends a steady arm as he hails a yellow taxi for the woman who sways precariously as if the dark night air will blow her away.
CONNECTION TO READING/CLASS:
I love this book thus far, I feel like it fits impeccably with my street project and so I felt prompted to write my own responses to some of the text. Having worked briefly as a waitress at an after-hours longue/restaurant, I am familiar with the nightshift in the more glamorous capacity but I am utterly intrigued by the “darker side,” which the book presents. The book leaves no one out, recognizing immigrant power and the necessity of the nightshift to New York City as a whole.
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