Author Archives: Will Zeng

Final: List of my Favorite Works

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Throughout the course, there were a lot of interesting musicians, artists, and historical figures but ten really stuck out to me. The following are my top ten favorite works.

  1. I think the artist that had the most impact on me would have to be Andy Warhol. He is the man throughout this course that I admired the most because he is New York. And his painting, Green Coca-Cola Bottles, especially interested me. This was part of his “Pop Art” movement and with these bottles, Warhol was trying to say a radical statement of equality. If Marylin Monroe drinks Coca Cola, if the president drinks Coca Cola, and if you drink Coca-Cola, there isn’t much difference between you three. In fact, YOU could even aspire to be the president! How about that!

  2. Google Images

    Another piece that I like, also from Warhol was his film Chelsea Girls. I liked the way it was all-inclusive and the way that Warhol tried to show sexuality in its entirety. He dealt with such topics as sex, drug use, same-sex relations, and the transgendered in ways that were not socially accepted by his conservative society at the time. It’s truly remarkable the strides he was able to make and I like to think that his shocking efforts at the time made it easier for others to come in after and fight for sexual equality. I only hope I will have half as much courage as Warhol in the things I do.

  3. Google Images

    When we went to the Morgan Museum, what struck me was the way the two older museums was connected by this new modern, glass area with high ceilings and steel trusts and beams. But what was most interesting about the new modern glass building was the way it worked with the older architecture of the morgan museum. It did not, unlike in most of New York City, outshine the old and I think that was a very important componeent of the design. The new glass building paid homage to the old while still looking towards the future. In fact, the glass seemed better suited to enhancing the beauty of Pierpont Morgan’s museum rather than anything else.

    Central Park

  4. Central Park is another example of blending two seemingly different things. In this case, Olmstead managed to blend the nature and the city. Not too long ago when I walked the park, I got lost somewhere in the middle of it and I stumbled upon a walkway that went either up to an elevated lookout onto a pond or down to an amphitheater where some woman was singing opera. It all seemed ethereal like I was transported to 16th century England. But hardly twenty minutes before I was at the corner of 68th and seventh, trying to weave my way through incoming lanes of traffic. I’d like to think that Olmstead knew that New Yorkers who walked throughout his park would not forget the hustle and bustle of the city they just came from but he did the best to quietly envelop them with the quiet of nature. Central Park allows me to forget about the city but Olmstead knew that his park couldn’t block the skyscrapers that teetered on the edges of the park. He knew that his park would be one that reckoned nature with the city and this is why I love Olmstead’s vision for Central Park.

  5. Google Images

    I felt a sort of glimmer of hope coming from the Jackson Pollocks “Fire”. In the way that fire can destroy, it also gives life. Like the way a phoenix is reborn from the ashes of fire, I felt like Pollock was trying to say something similar about the American society during the Great Depression. That through all this pain, all this anguish, all this death, it gets better. That America can be reborn from the ashes, shown by the arms crawling out of the fire, from this place of pain come the new Americans. This really struck a chord with me because of the immense amount of hope it gave to me and the others who looked upon it before me.

  6.  Whitman I feel is a poet that encompasses New York in her fullest. In this brief excerpt from his poem Manhatta, I get the sense of universalitity, this cosmopolitation vibe from New York. This celebration of people–not people in singular but people in the plural sense of it. Whitman celebrates everyone and is proud that his city is free and is a city of zero slaves. He is also proud of the chaos of the city, the spirit of the city, the loud noises and the crowded streets. There will never be another New Yorker as in tune with his city.

    Trottoirs throng’d—vehicles—Broadway—the women—the shops and shows,

    The parades, processions, bugles playing, flags flying, drums beating;

    A million people—manners free and superb—open voices—hospitality—the most courageous and friendly young men;

    The free city! no slaves! no owners of slaves!
  7. George Gershwin was another man who dared to critisize the social norms of his time. He grappled with social justice in a racial perspective. Gershwin’s jazz-inspired Rhapsody in Blue confused many critics. They were unsure where to place Gershwin’s novel composition. Some critics saw it as blasphemous to classical music, others saw it as pure genius but the public overwhelmingly loved “Rhapsody in Blue.” At this time, jazz was still derogatively referred to as “sex music” in elite circles. Jazz music was commonly associated with African Americans and ran antithetical to the narrow structures of classical music. Gershwin however, had years of experience as a song plugger and played all kinds of music and in doing so, he saw the beauty of jazz, he saw the beauty of classical music and realized that they were both beautiful in their own separate ways. Heres a clip of Gershwin’s famous song
  8. Maggie, Girl of the Streets really tore at my heartstrings. My pity went out to Maggie. Maggie who was one of the purest people I’ve ever seen was faced with cruelty after cruelty. In this course we’ve talked about social justice and what is “fair” and what is not and I feel that Maggie got the short end of the stick in every case.
  9. When I look at the Empire Stae building, all I see is its magnificence but in thsi course I learned that it was an intial failure and if such a wonderful, groundbreaking building can be seen as a failure when it first came out then that gives me hope that every mistake I make, may prove to be more valuable than I origionally thought.
  10. I’ve known Jacob Riis for a long time. In fact, ever since elementary school I’ve admired him. Partly becuase my elementary school was named in his honor and partly because of the things he did, I felt a real affinity for this man and during this course I was able to rediscover my love for him. He is truely a mangnificent man, not without his flaws of course, but an interesting and influential man nonetheless.

 

 

 

 

Historical Fiction (As I Waited)

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Will Zeng

Prof. Hoffman

5 Dec. 2016

IDC 1000H

Historical Fiction Project

Away I Waited

Saw the recruiters again. Nine twenty-seven. Third time this week. They always moved in groups of three. They first appeared near the subways and like rats, the slowly crawled out of the sewers, handing out flyers, shouting patriotic propaganda, and beaming guilt at any passersby. They had carved out a niche for themselves on the concrete crags out on 23rd and 6th. That was where I saw them every day as I commuted from deep Queens to class.

But they soon weren’t satisfied with their spot and as the war dragged on for longer than Ike promised and all the volunteers abroad were either disillusioned or lying in ditches, or perhaps both, the recruiter’s smiles melted away at the seams exposing the red within. Had it finally dawned on them that their guilt shaming might be morally wrong? Nope. Because as days passed, months, and years, and their superiors and their superiors breathing down their necks, they moved into the schools.

“A proud institution of higher learning” I read off a brochure somewhere once, of higher learning rather than war. That was partly true, just partly. LBJ couldn’t touch us with his draft but he didn’t need to. Despite our professor’s best efforts, despite the hours my friends, my family, and practically half of New York City spent out on the streets protesting the draft, it not only went through but the recruiters were also granted clearance to move in. They set up camp in the hallways that once served idealistic young men and women with stars in their eyes. They erased those stars and hung a banner covering the entirety of the front hallway, slithering past the corner, wrapping around the hollow pipes, and engulfing the entire hallway in a deep crimson. It divided the college into two halves: One that shouted the virtues of the United States government and the other that didn’t.

Reflected in the recruiter’s eyes and their skinny smiles was a kind of ravenous hunger, like starved wildebeests, eyes that follow you in the night and down a dark corridor. Theirs were the eyes of death and they were looking straight at us. We wearily listened to their inflated stories about the heroic deeds of our soldiers, how they defied all odds, how they pulled best friends, enemies, four-star generals from the back of burning trains into over-loaded Jeeps, and how they freed grateful civilians from a tyrannical communist regime. But somehow it worked. I wanted it to work. Their stories somehow enticed the best of us. It enticed the innocent, the soon-to-be-guilty, the lovers of peace and friendship and faith. The recruiters weren’t completely human and neither was I, not for a long time.

 

I knew a woman once, and she was hopeful once. I’ve only heard this story through the recollections of others but what I knew was that she was on the same plane as my parents when they immigrated to America. Partly, because they couldn’t afford otherwise, partly because they wanted to see the sights, they boarded a plane that went the long way round. From Minsk to Warsaw and a small detour to Slovakia, then on to Beijing, skipping over Vancouver to touch Seattle and finally to New York City, the metropolis of dreams.

She shared my parent’s fondness of the American Dream, and, I guess, that’s what drew them together but that was also what broke them. She was hopeful once. She loved hot dogs, baseball, and even the stifling noise of the city. She carried a pink duffel bag that she got from a week-old Sears Roebuck catalogue pilfered from a neighbor, a Revlon RC720 hairbrush covered with strands of flaxen hair, a neatly folded picture of her family back east, and in one of her many pockets was a letter from her son, dated 1939. Mrs. Sybyil often rose with the sun and was at her desk before even the first lanes of morning traffic. She often imagined lifting the wisps of smoke that curled and twisted from the exhausts of the cars in front of her, dancing in the morning rays a dance only they knew, and she was reminded of the sunny days back in Slovakia.

In her little crinkled photograph, they stood next to a poplar tree and a path leading to the banks of a lazy river, just a man, his wife and their little boy wrapped around his neck. They were beaming at a photographer and as he took the picture, the lazy river reflected the beams of brilliant white sunshine and whitewashed the sides of the photograph. Or perhaps it was waterlogged. She allowed herself to think about that time, she remembered that not too long after that photograph was taken, the Hungarians came, then the Germans, and then the Soviets came and in all that mess, she kept quiet. Not because she misunderstood the gravity of her situation but because she was the sort of person who’d rather stare forward at the beautiful horizon rising in the distance than at the fires behind that lapped at the cold arms behind her.

The American dream, she used to say, wasn’t without sacrifice. She came here with nothing and spent her first years in America volunteering at local pounds, homeless shelters, she almost had this uncanny knowledge of what you were feeling before you felt it. Her main job was a counselor for addicts, many of whom where former marines, seals, or army men. These were some of the most broken men in society, men who had seen the worst and all they wanted was to cut the cord, little by little.

The last I saw of her was in the fall of ‘65, when she visited my parents. She did not put up any fancy booths nor decorate the walls with blood, but her words rang loudly all the same. She declared that she was going to be a medic on the front lines, deployed as an auxiliary squadron in Saigon. I didn’t understand her reasons why then and I still don’t understand but the reasons why she went can’t be articulated. It’s a feeling you get when your dreams are crushed by brute reality and all she could do is to keep up hope. She told me that there will be a day where the war will end and as long as the sun shines bright and the rivers course through the valleys, life will always return to normal but today is not that day. Today she joins her husband and son. Perhaps she wanted to see the poplar tree again, perhaps she lost faith in us, perhaps she was convinced by blather of the recruiters, or had she finally found something she wanted to fight for. She had bright eyes and a brilliant smile; I couldn’t imagine how the teeth might look in a spider hole in Vietnam.

The day was warm, seasonably warm for the first time that month. Even though I expected it, my heart fluttered and my hands shook. There was no draft letter in my hand, but one in my throat and plenty of indication there would be.

How to break it to my parents? How do I tell them I wouldn’t be spending Christmas with them this year, or next year, depending on how the war goes? How do I tell them that I will have blood on my hands? The American dream isn’t without sacrifice, and even if they might not want our dream, even if there is nothing to fight for, America needs sacrifices. We need veterans to admire, we need those galvanizing and historic stories, we need enemies and martyrs, we need to create the tanks, the AK47s, provide financing for the war. We are slaves of our economic and social gods as much as the Aztecs were to theirs and we both spill blood to appease them.

I could feel it in my stomach—the dread and the pain wrenching through my belly and at least I could feel the pain wrenching my belly but I could not fathom the pain my parents felt. It’s one thing to commit to your resolve but it’s another to be forced to accept another’s. My parents knew, my sisters knew, everyone knew. Even the recruiters seemed to know as the vacated our halls and left it unsettlingly quiet. No one at school seemed to have anything to talk to me about and it was as if a somber cloud settled onto us, a cloud that would soon whisk me off to Vietnam.

Yet I couldn’t blame the recruiters, even with all the pain and the resentment I was feeling, they were not the ones who shoved me to war. It was a series of circumstances that included a woman, her son, and my personal responsibility to my country. It’s not sacrifice if you go into it willingly and with a smile. At least that’s what I think she believed. If you welcome it with open arms, then it can only be a present.

I volunteered for the war on July 7th 1969.

Life went on seemingly unchanged and yet the little things, the way people spoke to me, the way they looked at me with barely concealed pity, the way I saw at myself in the mirror sometimes, the little things I couldn’t control. She said to me that there isn’t anything worth more than life. The sun she said, gave us all life and it was not our right to lose that gift or take anyone else’s. Yet she went to war. Perhaps the recruiters were right: there is that thrill, that exhilaration in war is what we crave. There is a morbid fascination that we have with war but that was not the reason why. There were others whose life depended on my decisions and relied on my M-16 rifle. I looked up.

There was a leaf, the first of many to come, blossoming on the topmost branches of the tree, I remembered telling someone that I would climb, climb higher and higher and hide between the leaves and gnarled branches while playing hide and seek, never getting caught, never coming down until the sun set. The leaf trembled as the wind tried its best to wrest it away but the leaf hung on to its home. I pulled the leaf off.

I did it a favor.

It was going to fall off anyway.

Better sooner than later. And I followed the leaf to war.

 

Andy Warhol: Pop Legend

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Warhol rocking some killer shades

Andy Warhol will always be remembered as the pioneer of the Pop Art movement and for being one of the preeminent artists of the 20th century. He practically defined it. In a career that only spanned 58 years, Warhol was not only active in the arts scene but also dabbled in the film and music scenes. Warhol is also know for being a major figure in the counterculture

Early Life

Crude depiction about the involuntary muscle spasm caused by Chorea

Andy Warhol was born on August 26, 1928 as Andrew Warhola in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  His parents were Slovakian immigrants. His father Andrew Warhola sr. was a construction worker while his mom, Julia, was a seamstress. At the age of 8, Warhol had Chorea, which is a potentially fatal disease that causes involuntary muscular twitching. Warhol was bedridden for several months and became an outcast at school. He grew very close to his mother and his mother gave Warhol his first drawing lessons. Warhol would later attend Carnegie Technical College, (now Carnegie Mellon,) graduating with a B.A. in pictorial design.

After college, in 1949, Warhol moved to New York.

Warhol’s ink drawings of shoes

Career

He was first recognized for his quirky ink drawings for shoe ads. Critics praised Warhol for the humor and wit of his drawings. My favorite is the “Checkmate,” where he inventively integrates the checkboard design and the Rook as the heel. Warhol’s approach to art was even evident in his early ink drawings. Unlike many others, Warhol accepts imperfection. Every stray mark, every unintended blemish, Warhol doesn’t erase them. He lets chance play a role in his art.  As Warhol put it: “When you do something exactly wrong, you always turn up with something.”

Cambell’s Soup

In 1961 he coined the term “pop art,” which are paintings that feature common commercial goods. In 1962, he presented his famous paintings of the Campbell Soup Can. These works depicting everyday, ordinary objects greatly contrasted with the previous notion of art being something to capture the magnificent, capture the great. This created great unrest in the art scene. Some of Warhol’s other popular pop art paintings include his depiction of Coca-Cola bottles, vacuum cleaners, and hamburgers. These common items were also a great equalizer. Warhol had this to say about Coca Cola:

Image result for warhol coca cola

Warhol’s Coca-Cola

 

“What’s great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest. You can be watching TV and see Coca-Cola, and you know that the President drinks Coca-Cola, Liz Taylor drinks Coca-Cola, and just think, you can drink Coca-Cola, too. A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the Cokes are the same and all the Cokes are good. Liz Taylor knows it, the President knows it, the bum knows it, and you know it.”

-Andy Warhol

Image result for warhol marilyn

Warhol’s Marilyn Monroe

At the same time, Warhol was also obsessed with Hollywood and its celebrities. He painted Marilyn Monroe, Mick Jagger, and Elvis Presley in vivid color.

Mick Jagger

Eight Elvises

Perhaps because of his obsession with celebrities, Warhol became active a major player in the counterculture. In 1963, he opened an art studio that it gained the title of “the Factory” because it was like an assembly line of high-quality art. The factory attracted  n eclectic band of artists, drug users, and socialites and around the same time, Warhol began to make films of them. His films were unusual for his conservative time because they almost always included nudity, drug use, same-sex relations, and transgender people. He wanted to show sexuality in its entirety. He wanted to shock the nation into sexual radicalism. He wanted to give voice and give light to a part of our society so long ignored and rejected, for Warhol was one of them. Though never confirmed, many biographers suspect that Warhol might have been homosexual and living in the years just before Stonewall Inn, Warhol’s films brought sexual deviation out from the shadows and into center stage and perhaps played an instrumental role in the fight for same-sex equality.

Warhol intersects many of the themes for this course, fulfilling the notion of Social Justice with his art and the notions of Morals and Norms and NYC characters in all their Diversity.

He fought for social justice in the way he portrayed his Coca Cola bottles or can of Cambell’s soup. One of the reasons why Warhol painted “pop art” was to show the idea that these items, Coca-Cola or soup is common to everyone: not just the poor drink Coca-Cola but the president does too and Marylin Monroe because materials transcend wealth. Materials also transcend sexuality and  all people regardless of sexuality enjoy soup and Coke.

Furthermore, in terms of morals and norms and tackling the diversity of this nation, Warhol criticizes the social conservatism of his age. He questions the nationally accepted notion that marriage is only correct if its between a man and a woman, offering no room for deviation. Warhol tried and succeeded throwing all of this out the window. He presented the public with the ugly truth that they refused to acknowledge and with that he challenged the morals and norms of his society.

Bibliography

“Andy Warhol: Biography.” Biography.com, 6 June 2016. Web. Accessed 21 Nov. 2016.

“Andy Warhol: A Documentary Film.” PBS, 20 Sept. 2006. Web. Accessed 21 Nov. 2016.

Evans, C.T.  and Schilling, K. “Andy Warhol.” Nova, 27 Nov. 2011. Web. Accessed 21 Nov. 2016.

Leong, Henry. “Chorea and Huntington’s Disease.” International Parkinson’s and Movement Disorder Society, n.d. Web. Accessed 21 Nov. 2016

“Warhol Timeline.” Tate Museum, n.d. Web. Accessed 21 Nov 2016.

 

 

 

Historic Overview and Background of the Lower East Side

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Though this map cuts off LES at the Manhattan Bridge, it actually extends and includes the Smith Housing Projects between the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges

First Developed

The Lower East Side is classified as the area between Bowery, Fulton, and Houston Street. Some people tend to include the East Village as part of the Lower East Side, but this guide will focus on the first interpretation cutting it off at Houston Street.

 

 

History of the Habitation of the Lower East Side

The area is one of the oldest of New York City with its earliest inhabitants in the 17th century. Free black farmers settled there as white Dutchmen avoided the area due to its proximity to the Native Americans.  The small farms were then merged to form massive holdings. After the American Revolution, much of the Lower East Side became available again after the largest of the holdings was seized from loyalist James De Lancey (Diner). The site then attracted many families of shopkeepers and artisans ranging mostly in the poor to middle class.

In the 1830’s, many of the newly arrived Irish immigrants sought the Lower East Side for its affordability and location. The massive influx of Irish descent immigrants leads to the creation of the first tenements in New York City. Designed to maximize the capacity of people it can hold, tenements often faced unsanitary conditions.

After Irish immigrants migrated to new parts of the City, many German, Jewish immigrants took their place. The Lower East Side thus developed a widely known reputation as an immigrant neighborhood. The new wave of immigrants brought a new title to the area: Klein-Deutschland or Little Germany. Despite the German influence, it would be the Jewish faith that more widely impacted the area. Roughly seventy-five percent of Jews in New York City were situated in the Lower East Side in 1892 (Diner). Working mostly through sewing, the Jewish inhabitants found the housing affordable to their lower-ended wages. The Lower East Side became an epicenter for Jews as traditional food, books, and services were provided. Even after 1910 when many Jews began moving to other neighborhoods, they still returned to buy culturally relevant items.

Photo Credit: Row of Tenements, 260 to 268 Elizabeth St., N.Y. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA Photographer: Lewis Wickes Hine 1912 March LC-DIG-nclc-04208

The Lower East Side continued to house the immigrants of New York City between the 1950’s through the 1980’s. Some ethnic groups included Dominicans, Indians, Koreans, and more. Each new wave of immigrants shared a common theme: live in the low rent area until they can move to better neighborhoods. As each group left, a new one came to take their place. The cycle continued until the 1980’s.

The Lower East Side broke  its social stigma associated with immigrants when many young artists moved to the area for the low rent. As galleries, shows, and concerts sprung up, The Lower East Side flourished from the growth of business. Today, the Lower East Side is known for its artistic qualities, but the immigrant influence has not been lost as many cultural sights are still present.

1798 Watercolor of Collect Pond with View of Bayard’s Mount

Notable Changes in Buildings or Streets

One notable change in the layout of the Lower East Side was the dredging of Collect Pond. When the Dutch landed in Manhattan in 1600’s, they gazed upon a pretty five-acre lake they called the Collect. Locals ice-skated there in the winter and it was the main source of freshwater for the colony. By 1700, many breweries and slaughterhouses had sprung up on the banks of the pond and they polluted it with spent grain and rotten pig carcasses. Locals also relieved themselves in the pond. Soon it became infested with mosquitoes and on hot summer days, the stink of sewage was crippling. Malaria and yellow fever were rampant. There were calls to dredge the pond and fill in the land. Thus one of the first notable changes in the streetscape of Lower Manhattan occurred.

Looking down Canal Street at the corner of Centre Street

Canal Street is an east-west street and runs basically the entire width of Manhattan and was so aptly named because it was once a canal for the plague-ridden waters of the Collect to the Hudson.

The Samuel Osgood House at the corner of Pearl and Cherry Streets, residence of George Washington from April 1789 to February 1790

The pond was fully landscaped in 1823 and at this time, immigration to America was a trickle of what it would become. Wealthy individuals from downtown New York moved up to the land reclaimed from the pond and built beautiful rowhouses but soon left when immigrants started pouring into the city, particularly in the Lower East Side. They also fled because their houses were literally sinking into the earth. It turned out that the men who filled in the pond cut corners and did a shoddy job. The houses in this neighborhood began to reek of sewage and bubbles of methane made the ground unstable.

Illustration of the Five Points circa 1827

The neighborhood that developed on top of the pond was called the “Five Points” so called because in the center was the intersection of Orange, Cross, and Anthony Streets, forming an area with five corners. This area would become nationally notorious for crime and disease. The population of the Five Points was predominantly Irish and they were packed in tenements tightly and suffered horrible living conditions. By 1900, the Five Points became a part of New York history.

Manhattan Municipal Building (1914)

The first call to renovate the dreaded Five Points came in 1931 from business owners who operated near the neighborhood. Because of efforts by quality of life reformers, the neighborhood was torn down and in its place the New York Civic Center was built. Including buildings like the NYPD Headquarters, Thurgood Marshall Courthouse, and Columbus Park.

 

Alfred E. Smith Projects

Another major transformation of the streetscape in the Lower East Side was the creation of the Alfred E. Smith Housing Projects. In the 1950’s there was a movement to change cities for the better and one way to do that was to build tall, affordable housing projects. Prior to the projects, there were vibrant neighborhoods of tenement houses. The area that the Smith houses now inhabit looked very much like the tenement houses of Chinatown or of Soho or of the protected South Street Seaport district. Nearly 22 acres of land were razed for the project and they were built in the “Garden City” style, which supported large, self-contained communities, large green spaces, and entirely cut off from the streetscape outside the community. But this model failed miserable in large part to one design flaw: it separated these communities from the larger street grid. Meaning well but this style of housing may have created havens of lawlessness that are hard to police.

 

Select Important Historical Events in LES

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Select Historical Events of the Lower East Side

Stonewall Riots:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/35/Stonewall_Inn_1969.jpg/200px-Stonewall_Inn_1969.jpg

Google Images

The Stonewall Inn is a bar known for its vibrant LGBTQ culture and history. Located in the Greenwich Village, it had an instrumental part in the fight for sexual equality in the sixties and seventies. In 1969, there were a series of riots that took place at Stonewall Inn, sparked by the zero tolerance of the NYC city police of homosexuality at that time. In fact, Stonewall Inn was one of the few establishments at the time that allowed LGBTQ drag queens, transgender people, prostitutes to show themselves openly the way they were. The Stonewall Riots brought the struggles of the LGBTQ to the forefront of the American mind forced the American public to truly grapple with what it meant and the struggles of being LGBTQ in America. The first Gay Pride Parade was inaugurated only one year after Stonewall in 1970.

 


 

The Murder of Mary Cecilia Rogers:

Google Images

The murder of Mary Rogers is one of the biggest mysteries of the 19th century and embodied many of the struggles that faced women during that time. The Lower East Side in the 19th century was not a good place, to say the least, for young women to be in. There are countless cases of rape, assault, and kidnappings of local women during this time. However, Ms. Roger’s case is especially sad because of the gruesome nature of her death. Ms. Rogers was a notable beauty in town. Every other day there was a suitor asking for her hand. They were taken in by her “starry eyes” and heaven-like smile. She eventually settled down with a fiancé, Daniel Payne. On July 25th, 1841 she told her fiancé she was visited some relatives in the neighborhood. Three days later on July 28th, her corpse was found floating in the Hudson River. Although, murders of young, beautiful women were not uncommon in the Lower East Side, her case was publicized by newspapers and sensationalized so much by the press that it led to new discussions on women safety, women well-being, and the rights of women. If all else, her murder caused people to lock their doors a little tighter at night.

 

 

The 1896 Eastern North American Heat Wave:

Google Images

In the late 19th century, there were ten days of record humidity and temperatures often over 90 degrees Fahrenheit. Though affecting all people in New York City, the poor immigrants living in the tenements in the Lower East Side suffered the most. Tenements by definition did not have good ventilation and immigrants rarely have the resources to survive natural disasters. At the end of these ten terrible days, about 1500 men, women, and children lay dead, more than the NYC Draft Riots, more than 1871 Chicago Fire. The majority of the deaths were from the lower classes, and many were from the Lower East Side.

Famous Residents of the Lower East Side

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Joseph Bloomingdale

Joseph (1842-1904) and Lyman (1841-1905) Bloomingdale-

The sons of Bavarian German-Jewish immigrants, the brothers were trained in the skill of ladies fashion by their father and would go to found Bloomingdales, one of the quintessential New York Clothing retailers.

Gov. Al Smith

Alfred E. Smith (1873-1944) – Politician

Was born in the Fourth Ward to Irish immigrants. He was elected governor of New York four times but lost his bid for president to both Hoover and FDR. He was a part of the Tammany machine but espoused progressive values.

Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia

Fiorello LaGuardia (1882-1947) – Politician

Is arguably one of the best mayors in New York History. He was the first Italian-American mayor. Despite being a republican, he was a fierce proponent of FDR’s New Deal. He dismantled the Tammany machine, used government funds to build fire stations, hospitals, housing projects, and airports.

Jack Kirby

Jack Kirby(1917-1994)-Comic Writer

Born Jacob Kurtzberg in the Lower East Side to Austrian-Jewish parents who earned wages as garment workers. As a young boy he, like many others who were born in the LES at that time, wanted to get away from the neighborhood because of the stigma associated with it. Kirby would evolve from drawing comics on strips of paper to establish one of the most popular comic book companies of all time, DC comics.

Robert DeNiro

Robert DeNiro (1943) – Actor

Born in Greenwich Village, raised in Little Italy DeNiro would grow up to become a critically acclaimed actor, nominated for four Golden Globes and a two-time Academy Award winner. He is most remembered for his portrayal of the young Vito Corleone in the Godfather.

Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga (1986) – Singer/Songwriter

Though she was born and raised in the Upper East Side, she attended NYU and got her music start in the nightclubs of the Lower East Side, where she lived for a time. She would become a multi-platinum artist and a pop sensation.

 

Cultural Events and Institutions in LES

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Cultural Events and Institutions

The Museum at Eldridge Street:

The latter half of the 19th century saw a large wave of East European Jews settling in the United States. Of the two and a half million Jewish immigrants, more than half came to the Lower East Side. The Eldridge Street Synagogue (Fig 18)[i] was erected in 1887, and it quickly became a center for prayer and community bonding. In the 1920s-1940s, the aftermath of the Great Depression and the immigration quota in place at the time hindered the initial success of the Synagogue. In 2007, it was fully restored and renewed into The Museum at Eldridge Street. The museum currently hosts many cultural events. Moreover, the architecture of the museum’s interior style is certainly a sight to behold. It invokes a Moorish design which is seen in the museum’s interior murals. The choice to use Islamic art may seem inconsistent since the museum was initially a synagogue; however, the connection between the two goes back to 11th century Spain where Jews lived peacefully among Muslims and allowed some of their art to diffuse. The museum’s exterior architecture is gothic, one example being its rose windows.

Lower East Side Festival of the Arts:

Presented by the Theater for the New City, the Lower East Side Festival of the Arts (Fig 19)[ii] is a three-day arts event that celebrates dance, theater, film, music, comedy and art being created by New York City’s talented emerging artists. Founded in 1996, this festival preserves and promotes the spirit of creativity in NYC. It serves as a tribute to artists who have lived and produced art in the Lower East Side and the East Village, and it allows new artists to showcase their work.

First Street Green Cultural Park:

Created in 2008, First Street Green Cultural Park (Fig 20) [iii]is an open art space providing cultural activity by engaging with emerging artists, architects, community and cultural groups through a series of programs that activate this public space. The many programs offered through First Street Green Cultural Park invite unrecognized artists to exhibit their work in an open space that is accessible to anyone.

The Clemente Soto Velez Cultural and Educational Center:

Figure 21: The Clemente Soto Velez Cultural and Education Center

Founded in 1993, The Clemente Soto Velez Cultural and Education Center (Fig 20)[iv], named after the renowned Puerto Rican poet, Clemente Soto Velez, nurtures and aids in the development of the Puerto Rican and Latino arts in the Lower East Side. According to the Center’s website, “While the Clemente’s mission is focused on cultivation, presentation, and preservation of Puerto Rican and Latino culture, it is equally determined to operate in a multi-cultural and inclusive manner, housing and promoting artists and performance events that fully reflect the cultural diversity of the Lower East Side and the city as a whole.”

 

 

Top Ten Things to See in the Lower East Side

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Things Worth Experiencing

  1. Tenement Museum

    Tenement Museum at 97 Orchard

For a cultural insight, one should visit the Tenement Museum. Through the tour, one can get a true sense of the atmosphere many immigrants experienced as they started their new life in America. With parts of the building being in its original condition, the building is a standing relic and symbol of the immigrant life that meant so much to the Lower East Side. Insightful tour guides even go into detail about specific families that lived in the very rooms you tour. The hardships of immigrant families can be seen through the unsanitary and tight living quarters. After visiting, one can truly appreciate the progression the Lower East Side has made from an immigrant neighborhood into a young, artistic scene.

  1. Katz’s Delicatessen

Katz’s Deli

Championed for its legendary pastrami, Katz’s Delicatessen is great place to visit when looking for a meal. Established in 1888, the deli is one of the few remaining relics of the old Hebrew Quarter. Pastrami from Katz’s Deli symbolized a taste of home to many immigrant Jews. The deli meant more to immigrants than simply a place to eat; it was a reminder of their unique culture. Today, people from around the world visit Katz’s for the coveted pastrami. The meat takes thirty days to prepare, contributing to its superior nature. Katz’s Deli is a timeless classic that offers insight into the past and, possibly, more importantly, pastrami.

  1. Other Restaurants
No more hunting for your Kung Pao Pastrami; the new Mission Chinese Food declares its location loud and clear.

Mission Chinese Food at 171 East Broadway

Katz’s Delicatessen isn’t the only place you can get a great bite to eat and experience history in every bite. There are many restaurants which embody the culture of New York City. Visitors and natives alike can visit restaurants such as the Russ & Daughters Cafe, famous for their bakery. If one’s in the mood for Asian food, Mission Chinese Food and Pig & Khao fuze Southeast Asian flavors to satisfy their customers.

  1. Museum at Eldridge Street

    Interior and exterior of Eldridge St Synagogue at 12 Eldridge

The Museum at Eldridge Street is an old Jewish synagogue that was converted into a museum for all to indulge in. Opening its doors in 1887, it was built by the very immigrants who came to America. The space carries sentimental value as it provided an escape to thousands of Jewish immigrants in taxing living conditions. There is even a small congregation that still uses the space for services. The aesthetically pleasing synagogue has high ceilings and unbelievable architectural influences that still amaze visitors today. One does not need to be of the Jewish Faith to appreciate the detail of the structure.

  1. Food at the Feast of San Gennaro

Cannoli-eating competition at the San Gennaro Feast

Brought over in 1926 by Italian immigrants, the Feast of San Gennaro is an eleven-day annual celebration of both the immigrant and American cultures. This September marks the 89th anniversary of the festival. The festival celebrates the struggles of Italian immigrants making their life in America. But an Italian festival would not be complete without its food. Every year Mulberry street, running from Canal to Houston, is closed to traffic and the food carts, the local restaurants, and the food vendors return home to Little Italy. This is one festival, if you’re lucky enough to be in the city in September, you would not want to miss. For a week attendants are delighted with top quality meatballs, linguini, and even a world-famous cannoli-eating competition. Come for the culture, stay for the food. The Feast of San Gennaro not only recognizes the struggles of Italian immigrants but also celebrates it.

  1. Must see graffiti: “Temper Tot”

    Temper Tot Mural at 114 Mulberry

One of the best examples of what happens when pensive street graffiti meets the comedic flair of pop-culture artists, the “Temper Tot” is a mural that makes you think. Subverting the expected, the piece is part of Ron English’s “Popaganda” series. One of the first things people usually ask  is “How the heck did he manage that?” Indeed the wall of a tenement overlooking a parking lot is his canvas. Near the corner of Mulberry and Canal streets, the mural depicts the Hulk complete with the overly muscular body and jeans ripped and a size too small, but with a baby’s head and face. And the most striking thing about the mural is how the boy seems to be in pain. It’s so out of the ordinary but it isn’t. In our own socially accepted competition for vanity, (to be the most muscular, the most beautiful, the most successful), we often neglect our own selves, our own happiness. Temper Tot speaks to the notion that we are something more than our physical bodies, our physique and perhaps with the baby face, the artist is telling us that we are all good and innocent in a way. Temper Tot is a must see mural in the Lower East Side.

Three beautiful renovated gates at 83-87 Chrystie

  1. 100 Gates

Around the city, particularly in the early mornings or late at night, you might have seen interesting designs or fantastic murals spray painted on the steel gates of a business. No, there isn’t some vigilante parading around the neighborhood vandalizing property to mete out his own idea of street beauty, like a sort of Batman with a spray can. The 100 Gates project is the brainchild of former pro skater and artist, Billy Rohan, with the Lower East Side Partnership, working to beautify the neighborhood and give it that flair that everyone knew it had but seldom saw. Walk around the neighborhood to see if you can spot them.

  • Williamsburg Bridge

The Williamsburg Bridge (Fig 28) [vii] is a suspension bridge which connects the Lower East Side of Manhattan with the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn. The bridge itself is worth seeing. Many take runs and bicycle rides on the bridge and enjoy the views of Brooklyn and Manhattan. There is also a plaza at the foot of the bridge on the Brooklyn side, called Williamsburg Bridge Plaza or George Washington Plaza, which can be used as a recreational area. Come here with your friends and family to relax while in Brooklyn, and then take a train or lengthy-yet-pleasant walk back to the vibrant Lower East Side.

  • Angel Orensanz Center

Figure 29: Angel Orensantz Center

The Angel Orensanz Center, (Fig 29)[viii] originally named the Anshe Chesed Synagogue, is the oldest surviving synagogue in New York City. Built in a gothic style, the synagogue had a history of a congregation of German, Dutch, and Polish Jews. The synagogue is magnificently colored, adorned with vibrant patterns and a huge interior. A visitor to the Lower East Side must make a spot in visit to see this piece of New York City’s history.

  • Seward Park

Figure 30: Seward Park in Spring

After spending a day touring the Lower East Side, you may want to relax somewhere. Seward Park (Fig 30)[ix] is a public park in the Lower East Side where families, couples, and friends can unwind and enjoy the park. Integrated with nature and surrounded by historic buildings and apartments, Seward Park is a perfect place to start a morning or end a day in one of Manhattan’s most historical areas.