History focused posts that look at Harlem and/or East Harlem’s past.
You may recognize this vacant lot, church, and new rental building on W. 127, just behind the Collier Brother’s Park:
The church ‘grew’. The two brownstones to the right were knocked down and the decades-old vacant lot is where the new rental is located. The Victorian framed home to the left in the photo below is where the vacant space next to the church is now:
to see more:
Here are 3 great photos of Marcus Garvey Park (formerly Mount Morris Park) from Columbia University’s collection of images.
Below is a postcard from 1905 on the east side of the park, looking south towards where the basketball courts are today:
Mount Morris Park was renamed in honor of Marcus Garvey in 1973, the park was built largely as a green space for Boss Tweed’s Tammany Hall cronies, many of whom lived uptown by the 1860s.
Below is a postcard sent in 1916 after an ocean voyage:
The land for the park had been purchased by the city in 1839, but landscaping was long delayed. Its design was eventually supervised by Ignaz A. Pilat, who would later serve as an able associate of Frederick Law Olmsted during the creation of Central Park.
This final image is of the bandstand, and was sent in 1907:
To see the collection:
Historian Michael Henry Adams leads a virtual tour of Lesbian and Gay life in the historic African American cultural capital, where we’ll meet personalities living and lost and see landmarks long gone and still standing that illuminate the a fabled part of New York. Past and Present LGBTQ+ Harlemites have played a leading role in defining Harlem’s artistic significance.
To join the virtual tour: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/high-times-and-hot-times-in-homo-harlem-1920-1990-tickets-114454941812?aff=ebdssbonlinesearch
For a short 11 minute look at one of Harlem’s great gay performers – Gladys Bentley – see:
To travel (before the age of rail and subways) to lower Manhattan (and Astoria), the Sylvian Steamship company ran for 8 cents (10 cents if purchased on board):
Details of the fare:
And, the complete card here:
If you’ve ever been curious about internal race relations within the Jewish community (in Israel and here in in the US), 400 Miles to Freedom is a great introduction. I’m including it here because of some wonderful shots of our neighborhood in the film:
In 1984, the Beta Israel, a secluded 2,500-year-old community of observant Jews in the northern Ethiopian mountains, fled a dictatorship and began a secret and dangerous journey of escape. Co-director Avishai Mekonen, then a 10-year-old boy, was among them. 400 MILES TO FREEDOM follows his story as he breaks the 20 year silence around the brutal kidnapping he endured as a child in Sudan during his community’s exodus out of Africa, and in so doing explores issues of immigration and racial diversity in Judaism.
One of my favorite songs of all time, Harlem River Drive, can be found on Soundcloud as a repeatedly covered and remixed tune:
https://soundcloud.com/teza-cappuccino/harlem-river-drive-teza-cappuccino-edit
The Library of Congress has a great short of horse racing on Harlem River Drive. Note the Aquaduct Bridge with its full complement of masonry arches before the center arches were replaced with a steel span to permit boat traffic:
Note the people on the Aqueduct Bridge, taking the parade of wealthy families and their horses.
To see the full 1903 film:
The Bronx Documentary Center has a great online exhibit of the photography of Leo Goldstein. Goldstein photographed East Harlem in the 50’s and captured, in black and white, the gritty world that awaited many Puerto Ricans who moved to New York in the post-war era.
Goldstein belonged to The Photo League which was targeted by the FBI in the postwar witch hunt period as a subversive organization and forced to disband in 1951. However, Leo and a number of former members continued to meet at each other’s homes on a round-robin basis to show and critique their work.
For more of Goldstein’s work, see: https://www.laffbdc.org/leo-goldstein
