Starting at the tip of Peter Cooper Village at East 23rd Street, Asser Levy Place runs just two blocks to East 25th Street between First Avenue and the FDR Drive. It’s named for one of New Amsterdam’s first Jewish settlers, who arrived in Manhattan with dozens of other refugees in 1654 after being chased out of Brazil.
Levy fought a law on the books at the time preventing Jews from joining the militia that patrolled New Amsterdam. He eventually became a prosperous, prominent citizen.
Blink-and-you’ll-miss-it Szold Place is tucked away in the East Village between Avenues C and D, from 10th to 12th Streets. This neighborhood used to be called Dry Dock back in the late 19th century; the name survives at nearby Dry Dock Playground.
Henrietta Szold, the street’s namesake, wasn’t even a New Yorker. Born in Baltimore in 1860, she was a founder of Hadassah, a Jewish service organization, and an advocate of the Zionist movement.
Tags: Asser Levy Place, Dry Dock, Dry Dock Playground, First Jews in New Amsterdam, Hadassah, Henrietta Szold, Peter Cooper Village
Ephemeral New York 
May 15, 2009 at 5:11 pm |
There used to be a Dry Dock Savings Bank, and in the 1920s and 1930s a DRYdock (later DRydock 4) telephone exchange.
May 15, 2009 at 5:46 pm |
Cool, thanks. Here’s an 1880 photo of the Dry Dock Savings Bank; it was on Third St. and the Bowery: http://www.picturehistory.com/product/id/1858#
May 15, 2009 at 7:23 pm |
There is also Jersey St. in Soho. Its where Carrie got her shoes mugged off her feet!
http://www.thomaslockehobbs.com/2004/08/jersey-st.html
September 16, 2013 at 5:53 am |
[…] That’s when it was known as the “famine church” built by Irish immigrants who lived in the 19th century Dry Dock District. […]