Thought you’d all be interested in a new play opening this Friday as part of the New York International Fringe Festival. It’s loaded with elements of the ephemeral NYC. Here’s a link to the website: http://www.beholdthebowery.com
Dear Ephemeral NY,
I read with interest your article regarding the West 29th Street “firehouse”. This is particulary so since the Commissioner mentioned in the article was my great-grandfather. I thought you might like the link below to an article regarding his Dept. of Correction tenure.
As it turned out, Commissioner Lantry’s grandaughter, my Mom, married the son of Brooklyn Borough President James J. Byrne. This intermarriage amongst Irish politicians has produced som slo-widded puhrsons.
Regards,and congratulations on a wonderfule site,
Robert Lantry Byrne
I’d like to interview you on the ephemera blog about your work on this site. If you’re interested, you can reach me through the email link on my blog. I’d enjoy the opportunity to profile you and feature the work you’re doing.
I love your site and your photos. I grew up in the West Village in the 1970s and 1980s and was wondering if you had any photos for sale of West 8th Street then?
Thanks for the kind words. I don’t have any photos of West Eighth Street back then, but if you’re looking for a specific building you can always try ordering a Dept. of Records Tax Photo. Here’s the link with more info: http://www.nyc.gov/html/records/html/taxphotos/home.shtml
Great site! This is the first time I’ve been on here. I linked your ‘Fort Green’ picture on my blog, Brooklyn Before Now. Keep ‘em coming. http://brooklynbeforenow.blogspot.com/
Thanks for the kind words. Look for a Facebook page soon; I’ve been contemplating it for a while. And when Niblet wakes from his 10-hour nap I will tell him he nabbed another compliment!
Thank you for this valuable site. It has helped me a great deal in my research. I have a question I thought you might be able to answer. In 1946/7 would a luxury building –say in the upper east side — have had a doorman? How about an elevator?
Yes, a luxury building in the 1940s would definitely have had a doorman 24 hours a day as well as elevators. They probably would have had an elevator operator around the clock who ferried residents to their floor and back.
I notice that you have a tag for old phone exchanges (or tags really, you used a few slightly different ones) but not a category. This blog doesn’t work like the blogspot blogs, it seems; what’s the difference between tags and categories?
I really don’t know what the difference is. I keep meaning to organize the phone exchanges into a more cohesive category or separate page, but time constrains have prevented me from doing so. I find the phone exchange history fascinating and so do a lot of readers. Which reminds me: thank you for helping to clear up some of the OR and WA confusion out there.
I’m happy to have been of service, and I see people frequently getting onto my site that came from your blog, so I’m getting something out of it too: visitors to my site!
Your entry on Tiffany & Co. refers to a building on Prince Street – “The store did a stint on Broadway and Prince Street (see photo below) in the last years of the 19th century.” Like the other photos on your site, this one is not credited. Will you tell me the source? This is a building which interests me.
I haven’t been able to locate a source for the photo so far. But while researching it just now, I realized I had the information incorrect. This is not a photo of the Tiffany’s retail store that existed at 550 Broadway, near Prince Street. This is a photo of their silverworks factory at 51-53 Prince Street.
I just came across your site and, specifically, your picture of Kranich Soap. My father worked at the Kranich Soap Company until it closed (sometime in the early sixties, although I can’t remember exactly when) when the owner, Herb Kranich, died. It made two kinds of products that I can recall; soap for the the globe type dispensers used in department stores at the time and bases for soap manufactured by others. I remember riding with my father in a truck making a delivery to Helena Rubinstein which, if I am remembering correctly, was in Long Island.
Thanks for the background on Kranich Soap. I couldn’t dig anything up in newspaper archives. So many of New York’s small factories seem to have vanished with few traces.
I enjoy visiting your website. Thought you might be interested in knowing about my new website 98Bowery.com, a mix of art and reminiscences about downtown NY from 1969-1989. Lots of visual memories here; your readers might find especially interesting the portrait of Harry Mason, an owner of a Bowery Bar in the section entitled “First Years.” Keep up the good work.
Thanks again for this wonderful site. Please consider doing a piece on the history of the Dakota building (ie: John Lennon, etc). Was reading a nice thread on the building here (http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/showthread.php?t=189342) and it made me think of your site. The history is so interesting.
Hi Eph-
West 20th Street between 9th and 10th Avenues is a beautiful block. The General Theological Seminary runs the length of the north side of the block. The south side has some beautiful Greek Revival buildings. But I’m writing about 454 W 20. Based on an exhibit I once saw at the 5th Avenue Public Library, this building was where Jack Kerouac wrote “On the Road”. In a place like London, this house would proudly display a plaque to that effect. Here there is nothing. Could you consider a mini series showing these undocumented literary landmarks that pepper our wonderful city?
Thanks for the fab idea. When I started this site, I intended to do a lot of literary postings–places writers lived, blocks where famous books took place, that kind of thing. But with so much history in New York, it’s easy to get distracted. Kerouac is a great writer to cover, since he lived and wrote in so many little apartments and residence hotels all over the city.
It’s amazing there are so many photos of Jack Kerouac, from being stoned at Columbia University, to working on a ship around the world, to being drunk in Times Square on New Years Eve etc.. Can imagine what he would have left us in the age of the Internet…
My brief somewhat contact with him was I knew his printer at the time, Igal Roodenko, who printed his “Vanity of Duluoz” in the early 60s but Igal remembers him as not a nice man. I never found out what he did…
He was probably drunk all the time. Or maybe he stole his printer’s girl? Kerouac had a way with the chicks. Joyce Johnson’s bio, Minor Characters, and the book of Kerouac letters she published are pretty insightful.
The card with the Lenox 25 number is clearly pre-1920. In late 1920 the first dial exchanges happened, and the number would have been changed to LENox 0025.
Very cool ephemera; thanks for the links. I love the museum ticket and the ice company business card. The Lenox 25 phone number is a treasure. And the polar bear postcard.
I remember a quick news story on channel 5 when I was growing up (late 80s to early 90s) – a construction worker decided, on his lunch break, to climb the cables of a downtown bridge (I can’t recall if it’s the Brooklyn bridge or what). The story showed him swinging from cable to cable, like it was a trapeze for him to play on – do you have anything on that? The video has haunted me (but in a good way) for years, and I’ve yet to find anything about it. A part of me wonders if it truly did happen.
I love your blog and always learn something when I visit, which is a great pleasure. I also blog about old New York (and Brooklyn) – and various odd corners of Victorian popular culture/history at
I grew up in Manhattan (upper East Side) in the late 60s and 70s, back when the phone numbers started with two letters and TV cartoons were only on on Saturday morning.
Your feline assistant is most charming – I have 2 Russian Blues who could be cousins; grey cats (they might prefer me to call them silver, though) are my favorites.
I have 6 New York Transit tickets (uncut) that are over 100 years old and would like to know if you have an idea where I might be able to sell them? I have pictures I can email you if you receommend how I can do so. Any input would help. Thanks.
I am looking for any information regarding Lincoln Place, a short street that cut through the block between E. 118th Street and E. 119th Street and Third and Lexington Avenues. It appears on city maps from 1894 through 1934
I have just spent a good part of today going through all the pages on Ephemeral New York, and love it!
I have 2 photographs of work crews from Blackwell’s/Welfare/Roosevelt Island taken in the early 1900s. One of the crews has 2 African-Americans. My great-grandfather was part of these crews. Would you be interested in having me email you copies of these pictures?
Thanks! Sure, send the photos along and any info you have about them. Do you know what the crews are working on? You can email it to me at ephemeralnewyork at gmail dot com.
One question that’s been gnawing at me is: I seem to recall reading about an ancient Manhattan neighborhood that still exists somewhere in the West 60s. If not mistaken, it’s a gated community consisting of gingerbread-type houses.
Can you provide any information? I can’t seem to find mention of it anywhere.
July 16, 2008 at 9:04 pm |
Excellent place!
I’ll be back and roam around.
I just left a comment re Sloane House and didn ‘t realize there was so much besides…
Many thanks.
Gilles Grosdoit-Artur
France
July 17, 2008 at 1:00 am |
Thanks for checking Ephemeral out!
July 30, 2008 at 6:54 pm |
How do you sign up for updates?
Thanks,
Wendy
July 30, 2008 at 8:08 pm |
New stuff is posted generally every other day, so right now the best way is to just check back every few days. We’ll have update sign-ups soon.
August 7, 2008 at 3:37 am |
Thought you’d all be interested in a new play opening this Friday as part of the New York International Fringe Festival. It’s loaded with elements of the ephemeral NYC. Here’s a link to the website: http://www.beholdthebowery.com
September 8, 2008 at 2:48 pm |
Dear Ephemeral NY,
I read with interest your article regarding the West 29th Street “firehouse”. This is particulary so since the Commissioner mentioned in the article was my great-grandfather. I thought you might like the link below to an article regarding his Dept. of Correction tenure.
As it turned out, Commissioner Lantry’s grandaughter, my Mom, married the son of Brooklyn Borough President James J. Byrne. This intermarriage amongst Irish politicians has produced som slo-widded puhrsons.
Regards,and congratulations on a wonderfule site,
Robert Lantry Byrne
http://www.correctionhistory.org/html/chronicl/1906keepersball/1906keepersball.html
September 9, 2008 at 1:17 am |
Thank you so much for the link and for writing in–it’s an honor to hear from Irish New York royalty!
September 10, 2008 at 9:22 pm |
Hi,
I’d like to interview you on the ephemera blog about your work on this site. If you’re interested, you can reach me through the email link on my blog. I’d enjoy the opportunity to profile you and feature the work you’re doing.
Thanks.
Marty
http://www.ephemera.typepad.com
September 25, 2008 at 4:30 pm |
I love your site and your photos. I grew up in the West Village in the 1970s and 1980s and was wondering if you had any photos for sale of West 8th Street then?
Thanks,
TM
NYC
September 25, 2008 at 5:45 pm |
Thanks for the kind words. I don’t have any photos of West Eighth Street back then, but if you’re looking for a specific building you can always try ordering a Dept. of Records Tax Photo. Here’s the link with more info: http://www.nyc.gov/html/records/html/taxphotos/home.shtml
September 26, 2008 at 12:09 am |
Well, lovely work. Really very nice.
October 6, 2008 at 1:14 am |
U be cute.
December 19, 2008 at 4:29 pm |
Great site! This is the first time I’ve been on here. I linked your ‘Fort Green’ picture on my blog, Brooklyn Before Now. Keep ‘em coming.
http://brooklynbeforenow.blogspot.com/
December 27, 2008 at 6:03 pm |
Thanks so much! I’ll add your link to my blog roll.
January 25, 2009 at 12:28 am |
I love this site– just stumbled on it. Seems like you have a lot of fans– ever consider putting in a facebook link/ facebook fan thingy?
Niblet is very very cute.
January 25, 2009 at 12:53 am |
Thanks for the kind words. Look for a Facebook page soon; I’ve been contemplating it for a while. And when Niblet wakes from his 10-hour nap I will tell him he nabbed another compliment!
February 4, 2009 at 10:57 pm |
Hi,
Thank you for this valuable site. It has helped me a great deal in my research. I have a question I thought you might be able to answer. In 1946/7 would a luxury building –say in the upper east side — have had a doorman? How about an elevator?
Many thanks in advance.
February 4, 2009 at 11:00 pm |
Yes, a luxury building in the 1940s would definitely have had a doorman 24 hours a day as well as elevators. They probably would have had an elevator operator around the clock who ferried residents to their floor and back.
February 4, 2009 at 11:55 pm |
Thank you so much!
February 20, 2009 at 5:51 pm |
I love this!
I grew up in the Village in the 60’s my father owned the Legendary Village Gate.
Thank You.
s.
February 20, 2009 at 7:12 pm |
Thanks for writing in! You must have seen quite a lot of spectacular shows there.
February 24, 2009 at 5:58 pm |
Found this site thought I’d pass it on, there’s a wealth of info about Gay NYC
http://bitterqueen.typepad.com/history_of_gay_bars_in_ne/2007/12/the-everard-bat.html
February 25, 2009 at 5:28 am |
There’s a lot of interesting stuff on that site, thanks for sending it on.
March 16, 2009 at 6:24 pm |
Are you participating in the NYC Fringe Festival in 2009?
I am confused….sorry.
We are holding a baby, Fringe on Long Island this year, 2009.
It will be the first time, but, I hope you will come?
Did you do the Fringe last year? 2008?
Thanks, Deb
April 5, 2009 at 1:59 am |
I notice that you have a tag for old phone exchanges (or tags really, you used a few slightly different ones) but not a category. This blog doesn’t work like the blogspot blogs, it seems; what’s the difference between tags and categories?
April 5, 2009 at 11:31 pm |
I really don’t know what the difference is. I keep meaning to organize the phone exchanges into a more cohesive category or separate page, but time constrains have prevented me from doing so. I find the phone exchange history fascinating and so do a lot of readers. Which reminds me: thank you for helping to clear up some of the OR and WA confusion out there.
April 5, 2009 at 11:44 pm |
I’m happy to have been of service, and I see people frequently getting onto my site that came from your blog, so I’m getting something out of it too: visitors to my site!
April 15, 2009 at 11:43 pm |
Your entry on Tiffany & Co. refers to a building on Prince Street – “The store did a stint on Broadway and Prince Street (see photo below) in the last years of the 19th century.” Like the other photos on your site, this one is not credited. Will you tell me the source? This is a building which interests me.
Christopher Gray
April 16, 2009 at 2:43 pm |
I haven’t been able to locate a source for the photo so far. But while researching it just now, I realized I had the information incorrect. This is not a photo of the Tiffany’s retail store that existed at 550 Broadway, near Prince Street. This is a photo of their silverworks factory at 51-53 Prince Street.
April 16, 2009 at 2:52 pm |
“I haven’t been able to locate a source for the photo so far.”
That seems unlikely, since you have published it on your website. What is its source?
April 17, 2009 at 4:22 am |
I just came across your site and, specifically, your picture of Kranich Soap. My father worked at the Kranich Soap Company until it closed (sometime in the early sixties, although I can’t remember exactly when) when the owner, Herb Kranich, died. It made two kinds of products that I can recall; soap for the the globe type dispensers used in department stores at the time and bases for soap manufactured by others. I remember riding with my father in a truck making a delivery to Helena Rubinstein which, if I am remembering correctly, was in Long Island.
April 17, 2009 at 4:35 am |
Thanks for the background on Kranich Soap. I couldn’t dig anything up in newspaper archives. So many of New York’s small factories seem to have vanished with few traces.
May 1, 2009 at 5:16 pm |
I enjoy visiting your website. Thought you might be interested in knowing about my new website 98Bowery.com, a mix of art and reminiscences about downtown NY from 1969-1989. Lots of visual memories here; your readers might find especially interesting the portrait of Harry Mason, an owner of a Bowery Bar in the section entitled “First Years.” Keep up the good work.
May 1, 2009 at 5:31 pm |
Thanks. Love your site–lots of great pictures. I’ll add it to the blogroll.
July 17, 2009 at 2:05 pm |
I absolutely LOVE this site! Thanks so much for maintaining it
July 17, 2009 at 2:34 pm |
Thank you for reading it!
July 20, 2009 at 8:35 pm |
I just came across your site through a link on Bowery Boogie and I LOVE it!
LL
July 20, 2009 at 8:56 pm |
Thanks Lux! Keep on keeping tabs over there at Stuy Town.
July 28, 2009 at 3:37 pm |
Thanks again for this wonderful site. Please consider doing a piece on the history of the Dakota building (ie: John Lennon, etc). Was reading a nice thread on the building here (http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/showthread.php?t=189342) and it made me think of your site. The history is so interesting.
July 28, 2009 at 4:32 pm |
Thanks! That’s a cool link too. Check back for a Dakota post soon.
August 15, 2009 at 12:06 am |
Hi Eph-
West 20th Street between 9th and 10th Avenues is a beautiful block. The General Theological Seminary runs the length of the north side of the block. The south side has some beautiful Greek Revival buildings. But I’m writing about 454 W 20. Based on an exhibit I once saw at the 5th Avenue Public Library, this building was where Jack Kerouac wrote “On the Road”. In a place like London, this house would proudly display a plaque to that effect. Here there is nothing. Could you consider a mini series showing these undocumented literary landmarks that pepper our wonderful city?
August 17, 2009 at 5:31 pm |
Thanks for the fab idea. When I started this site, I intended to do a lot of literary postings–places writers lived, blocks where famous books took place, that kind of thing. But with so much history in New York, it’s easy to get distracted. Kerouac is a great writer to cover, since he lived and wrote in so many little apartments and residence hotels all over the city.
August 17, 2009 at 5:54 pm |
It’s amazing there are so many photos of Jack Kerouac, from being stoned at Columbia University, to working on a ship around the world, to being drunk in Times Square on New Years Eve etc.. Can imagine what he would have left us in the age of the Internet…
My brief somewhat contact with him was I knew his printer at the time, Igal Roodenko, who printed his “Vanity of Duluoz” in the early 60s but Igal remembers him as not a nice man. I never found out what he did…
August 17, 2009 at 6:24 pm |
He was probably drunk all the time. Or maybe he stole his printer’s girl? Kerouac had a way with the chicks. Joyce Johnson’s bio, Minor Characters, and the book of Kerouac letters she published are pretty insightful.
August 26, 2009 at 4:14 am |
Have been reading your site with interest for some time.
You might enjoy:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bt3/sets/72157608089283703/
or even a few of the items at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bt3/sets/72157610669336368/
August 26, 2009 at 10:51 pm |
The card with the Lenox 25 number is clearly pre-1920. In late 1920 the first dial exchanges happened, and the number would have been changed to LENox 0025.
August 26, 2009 at 4:54 am |
Very cool ephemera; thanks for the links. I love the museum ticket and the ice company business card. The Lenox 25 phone number is a treasure. And the polar bear postcard.
September 14, 2009 at 5:03 pm |
I remember a quick news story on channel 5 when I was growing up (late 80s to early 90s) – a construction worker decided, on his lunch break, to climb the cables of a downtown bridge (I can’t recall if it’s the Brooklyn bridge or what). The story showed him swinging from cable to cable, like it was a trapeze for him to play on – do you have anything on that? The video has haunted me (but in a good way) for years, and I’ve yet to find anything about it. A part of me wonders if it truly did happen.
September 22, 2009 at 3:38 am |
Hi–I’m an original New Yorker–please add me to your blog list: http://melaniemusings-melanie.blogspot.com AND
http://melaniemusings2wordpress.com
My blogs deal with the nitty and gritty of daily life in the East Village and surroundings. I am visual.
Thanks.
Melanie
September 23, 2009 at 1:21 pm |
I love your blog and always learn something when I visit, which is a great pleasure. I also blog about old New York (and Brooklyn) – and various odd corners of Victorian popular culture/history at
http://thevirtualdimemuseum.blogspot.com
I grew up in Manhattan (upper East Side) in the late 60s and 70s, back when the phone numbers started with two letters and TV cartoons were only on on Saturday morning.
Your feline assistant is most charming – I have 2 Russian Blues who could be cousins; grey cats (they might prefer me to call them silver, though) are my favorites.
Cheers, Lidian
September 23, 2009 at 2:44 pm |
Thank you; the virtual dime museum is pretty neat itself. I will have my feline assistant add it to the blogroll.
October 7, 2009 at 4:23 pm |
I just wish to take a moment and gush – I subscribe to 8 or 9 NYC blogs and this is by far my favorite. Don’t change a thing.
October 7, 2009 at 4:30 pm |
Thanks!
October 17, 2009 at 10:44 am |
What are the addresses of your ‘rustic cabins’, please and thank you?
October 17, 2009 at 4:12 pm |
Oh, I can’t give out addresses–lets just say East and West Village.
October 23, 2009 at 1:02 pm |
I have 6 New York Transit tickets (uncut) that are over 100 years old and would like to know if you have an idea where I might be able to sell them? I have pictures I can email you if you receommend how I can do so. Any input would help. Thanks.
November 10, 2009 at 4:55 pm |
I am looking for any information regarding Lincoln Place, a short street that cut through the block between E. 118th Street and E. 119th Street and Third and Lexington Avenues. It appears on city maps from 1894 through 1934
November 13, 2009 at 6:05 am |
Great site! Love reading about the hidden treasures in NY, yet sad how things are changing so quickly…
November 28, 2009 at 12:47 am |
I have just spent a good part of today going through all the pages on Ephemeral New York, and love it!
I have 2 photographs of work crews from Blackwell’s/Welfare/Roosevelt Island taken in the early 1900s. One of the crews has 2 African-Americans. My great-grandfather was part of these crews. Would you be interested in having me email you copies of these pictures?
November 28, 2009 at 9:35 pm |
Thanks! Sure, send the photos along and any info you have about them. Do you know what the crews are working on? You can email it to me at ephemeralnewyork at gmail dot com.
November 30, 2009 at 1:27 am |
Hi. I really enjoy your blog.
One question that’s been gnawing at me is: I seem to recall reading about an ancient Manhattan neighborhood that still exists somewhere in the West 60s. If not mistaken, it’s a gated community consisting of gingerbread-type houses.
Can you provide any information? I can’t seem to find mention of it anywhere.
Thanks in advance.