The Harlem Neighborhood Block Association

Neighbors united to improve the quality of life in Harlem

Tag: LGBTQ

Precinct Meeting – Focus on The Rise in Crime

Posted on by Harlem Shill
Bullet in East Harlem Bus Window Frame

Kioka Jackson, the president of the 25th Precinct’s Community Council writes:

Good Afternoon Neighbors and Friends,
I hope you all are doing great. I wanted to invite you to join us IN PERSON for our February 2022 meeting.  I have been getting a multitude of calls and emails about the current events in and around our neighborhood and want to invite you to discuss what’s going on, what is being done, and how we can help.  
The purpose of this meeting is to discuss your public safety concerns with the Commanding Officer, his team of Officers, along with other community stakeholders with the mission to make our neighborhood safe.  Please be advised that the meeting will not be at the Precinct. In order to have the ability to safely socially distance we are using a space that can accommodate a larger number of people.  Details are as follows.

Meeting Details:

Wednesday, February 16, 20226:00 PM (Meeting will begin on time)at Bethel Gospel Assembly 2-26 East 120th Street (Between Madison and Fifth) – right across from Marcus Garvey Park
You will be required to wear a mask.  There will be some available at the front door if you need one.  Upon arrival, your temperature will be taken and you will be asked to sign in before being directed to the meeting room. Please click on the link and fill the questionnaire by Wednesday at 3:00PM.
https://forms.gle/y8icpU7NYm2Q56sH8

Hope to see you all next week.

Have an awesome day

Kioka Jackson

The Gay Harlem Renaissance

Scholars of the Harlem Renaissance point out that acknowledging the queer culture and nightlife of the Harlem Renaissance is essential in order to paint a full picture of the time, queer history, and Harlem itself.

Additionally, looking at the thriving LGBTQ+ scene in Uptown New York helps to reveal rich cultural contributions by (frequently) overlooked queer artists and writers of the Harlem Renaissance.

Read more about the gay Harlem Renaissance, see: https://time.com/6104381/lgbtq-histor…

Mt. Morris Bathhouse

Posted on by Harlem Shill

The Mount Morris Bathhouse (also sometimes called) the Mount Morris Turkish Baths, was located at 28 East 125th Street.

Built in 1889-90 by C. Abbott French & Co., the structure was designed as a blend of two popular styles at the time, neo-Grec and Queen Anne.

The bathhouse was the first commercial tenant of the Lohengrin apartment building. The building itself is a stately late 19th Century structure with well-preserved architectural details on the façade. The Baths, located on the basement level, featured Turkish and Russian-style facilities.

Continuously in use from 1893-2003, Mt. Morris was the only bathhouse in New York City that specifically catered to Black men. The Baths started serving a predominantly gay clientele, probably sometime during the Harlem Renaissance. Those frequenting the baths during that period included Countee Cullen, Harold Jackman, Carl Van Vechten, and Lincoln Kirstein. Up until the 1960s, it was the only gay bathhouse in the city to admit Black customers.

Learn more about the history of the baths and it’s important social service work during the HIV/AIDs crisis from the NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project at https://www.nyclgbtsites.org/site/mt-morris-baths

Pride 2021: Exploring Harlem’s Queer Past – News Blast #2

NAN Community Day

Join the National Action Network at a Community Day at Col. Young Playground – 143rd and Lenox Ave. on Wednesday, September 1st – 11 am to 7 pm

Poetry in The Garden

The Harlem Rose Garden is excited to present the extraordinary poet Mr. Daniel Carlton on Sunday, August 29th at 4PM
Honoring Harlem as A Garden of History, Now, and Future Harvests

Daniel Carlton is an actor, storyteller, playwright, poet, director, and award-winning teaching artist who has appeared on New York, national, and international stages. His work has been presented in schools, jails, homeless shelters, libraries, and other traditional and non-traditional spaces.

Black Wall Street Festival

Posted on by Harlem Shill

3 short plays in Harlem’s first annual Black Wall Street (theater) Festival:

Celebrate a Black-Owned Harlem Gay Bar with Poster House

In honor of Pride month, Poster House is thrilled to partner with Alibi Lounge in Harlem, one of the last Black-owned gay bars in NYC, for an evening of cocktails & design activities that are sure to delight!
First, Alexi Minko of Alibi Lounge will walk you through some delicious cocktail creations, and share the history of Alibi lounge and the importance of preserving Black LGBT spaces.
Then Master Educator Maya Varadaraj will lead us through an interactive design activity in MURAL where participants will get the chance to name a cocktail at Alibi Harlem!

All proceeds from this event will go to The Transgender Law Center.

Check back closer to the event for a list of cocktail ingredients.

Alexi Minko opened the very first Black Gay owned LGBTQ+ Lounge in Harlem, NYC in 2013. Alexi grew up between Europe and Africa, and fifteen years ago, moved to NYC to start their career as a lawyer at the United Nations. Although not practising human rights law on a daily basis, Alexi found a new purpose in their new role as part of a shift in the LGBTQ+ culture in Harlem.

This virtual event will be hosted on Zoom with attendees cameras off. Closed Captioning will be provided. A recording will be provided to all registered attendees. Questions about access? Please email Salvador Muñoz, Public Programs Manager, at [email protected]

New Supportive Housing Projects Coming to East Harlem

Posted on by Harlem Shill
Renderings of 244 East 106th St., a proposed development for homeless LGBTQ youth (left), and 107-111 East 123rd St., which would house formerly incarcerated and homeless New Yorkers (right).
Renderings of 244 East 106th St., a proposed development for homeless LGBTQ youth (left), and 107-111 East 123rd St., which would house formerly incarcerated and homeless New Yorkers (right). (Think! Architecture and Design / Curtis + Ginsberg Architects)

Developers unveiled plans this week for a 10-story building housing LGBTQ youth and a 15-story building for formerly incarcerated people.

Story  Nick Garber, Patch StaffVerified Patch Staff Badge
Nov 19, 2020 4:36 pm ET|Updated Nov 19, 2020 6:42 pm ET

Two new supportive housing developments are coming to East Harlem. Supportive housing is more than just an apartment or room, it’s a building that also typically has a manager, social workers, and security. One of the new developments will house LGBTQ youth, and the other will house the formerly incarcerated.

In November, Community Board 11 ‘s Land Use committee heard about the proposed building on East 106th Street at Second Avenue that would serve homeless LGBTQ youth. The second project on 123rd Street and Park Avenue will be reserved mostly for formerly incarcerated people.

Both projects will need to be approved by the City Council via ULURP (Uniform Land Use Review Process). During this phase, elected officials, residents of CB11, and the community board will get to provide feedback before the City Council has the final say.

The LGBTQ youth project will be located at 244 East 106th Street – currentlya vacant lot.  Ascendant, a Harlem affordable housing developer, is seeking to construct a 10-story, 36-unit building.

The proposed buildings are for 244 East 106th St. (left) and 107-111 East 123rd St. (Google Maps)

It will be run by the nonprofit Ali Fourney Center, the nation’s largest organization devoted to LGBTQ homeless youths. The building would include 5 total apartments, each containing between four and eight private bedrooms.

A rendering of one of the apartments 244 East 106th St., a proposed development for LGBTQ youth. (Think! Architecture and Design)

Members of CB11’s land use committee reacted warmly to the project, which would break ground by 2023 at earliest and does not require any changes to the zoning code.

“I love that East Harlem is the type of place where people feel welcome and would want to live and be supported by members of the community,” member Jessica Morris said.

“Castle III” – 107-111 East 123rd Street – will be a 15-story, 82-unit building operated by The Fortune Society, a nonprofit that helps people reenter society after being incarcerated.

Sixty percent of the building’s 82 units would be reserved for homeless, formerly incarcerated people, with another 10 percent reserved for formerly homeless people.

One hundred percent of the apartments will be affordable, open to New Yorkers earning between 30 and 60 percent of the area median income — qualifying as “extremely” and “very” low-income.

For Castle III to be built, the city would need to grant a special zoning permit for the site, on East 123rd between Park and Lexington avenues, to allow for increased density. Developers hope to start construction by 2022 and wrap up in 2024.

To read more about The Fortune Society, and “Castle 1” – located on Riverside Drive in West Harlem – see this fantastic New Yorker article:

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/16/what-makes-the-difference-between-getting-out-of-prison-and-staying-out

Mail In Your Vote and Honor Wesley A. Williams

Posted on by Harlem Shill

The image (above) from The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture is of Wesley A. Williams, a Black mail carrier/driver from 1915. Wesley was photographed under the presidency of Woodrow Wilson, a notoriously racist American President who re:segregated the Post Office (from Vox – https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2015/11/20/9766896/woodrow-wilson-racist):

Easily the worst part of Wilson’s record as president was his overseeing of the resegregation of multiple agencies of the federal government, which had been surprisingly integrated as a result of Reconstruction decades earlier. At an April 11, 1913, Cabinet meeting, Postmaster General Albert Burleson argued for segregating the Railway Mail Service. He took exception to the fact that workers shared glasses, towels, and washrooms. Wilson offered no objection to Burleson’s plan for segregation, saying that he “wished the matter adjusted in a way to make the least friction.”

Both Burleson and Treasury Secretary William McAdoo took Wilson’s comments as authorization to segregate. The Department of Treasury and Post Office Department both introduced screened-off workspaces, separate lunchrooms, and separate bathrooms. In a 1913 open letter to Wilson, W.E.B. DuBois — who had supported Wilson in the 1912 election before being disenchanted by his segregation policies — wrote of “one colored clerk who could not actually be segregated on account of the nature of his work [and who] consequently had a cage built around him to separate him from his white companions of many years.” That’s right: Black people who couldn’t, logistically, be segregated were put in literal cages.

I, of course, don’t know what Wesley’s take would be on our current president and his efforts to sabotage the US Postal Service in order to give him an electoral advantage, but I hope that in Wesley’s spirit (if you are going to vote by mail) that you vote as early as possible, and as carefully as possible, in order to insure that your vote counts in 2020.

This image is a part of Photoville – this year an outdoor exhibition of photography throughout the 5 boroughs. See: https://photoville.nyc/exhibitions/ for more information.

The photo of Welsey is featured in St. Nicholas Park.

Billy Eckstine

Photoville’s exhibit on 145th Street at Bradhurst features a number of wonderful images of mid-century Black America. Billy Eckstine was ‘a neighbor’, living at the corner of 5th Avenue and 126th Street:

25th Precinct Officers and Community Council Clothing Giveaway

ClothingDownload

High Times and Hot Times in Homo Harlem, 1920-1990

Posted on by Join HNBA

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: