A Special Installment of “A Helluva
Town”
[This section of “Rick’s Guide to New York” covers
mostly various “sites of interest” in Manhattan—a tourist guide, so to
speak. They’re largely places that I
think are interesting, which is not to say that there aren’t many others that
are worth seeing. “The famous places to
visit are so many / Or so the guidebooks say,” as the sailors in On the Town (see Part
1) sing in “New York, New York”: this city is, after all, “a visitor’s place.”
[This is the final installment of my New York
City guide, but additions to “A Helluva Town” will continue to appear from time
to time as topics I find worthy of a spotlight come up.]
Willkommen! Bienvenue! Welcome!
To the Big Apple
Some local sites of interest: There are some quite interesting things to note right
around the area where I live. For more
detail and a really good guide to local historical and cultural sights, get one
of the many tour books for Manhattan. I
recommend Gerard R. Wolfe’s New York: A Guide to the Metropolis (1st
ed.: New York University Press, 1975; 2nd ed.: Mcgraw-Hill, 1994) which
contains fascinating and well-thought-out walking tours of each Manhattan
neighborhood, including SoHo, Greenwich Village, the East Village, Chelsea, and
the Flatiron.
In
SoHo, beside the boutiques
and galleries, there are hundreds of wonderful cast-iron buildings from the 19th and 20th centuries. Many have been restored, and it pays to look
up at the façades as you pass. A
particularly good example of the architecture of the area which has been
elegantly restored is the Puck Building at 295 Lafayette Street on the corner
of Houston (remember: that’s HOW-ston). You should also note the wonderful trompe-l’oeil
painting by Richard Haas (muralist; b. 1936) along the east wall of 112-114
Greene Street (at Prince Street). Look
for the cat in one of the fake windows!
Just above SoHo,
across Houston Street at West Broadway in NoHo,
is a small patch of land that looks like just an overgrown abandoned
property. It’s not; it’s Time Landscape by landscape
artist Alan Sonfist (b. 1946),
a recreation of the topography and flora of Manhattan before it was colonized
by the Europeans, unveiled in 1978.
North of NoHo is
the East Village where you’ll
find the late Joe Papp’s (1921-91) Public
Theater at 425 Lafayette Street, formerly the Astor Library, built starting
in 1849. Across from it is Colonnade Row, built in 1833. Just north of these is Astor Place, the site of the famous theater riot in 1849 resulting
from a feud between the fans of American actor Edwin Forrest (1808-72) and his
British rival, William Macready (1793-1893).
(They were performing in competing Macbeths.)
The Astor Place
subway entrance for the IRT line has been restored to resemble a Victorian
kiosk. Nearby is Cooper Union, between 3rd and 4th Avenues at Cooper Square, built
in 1859. Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865; 16th
President of the United States: 1861-65) delivered his famous “Right Makes
Might” speech here on 27 February 1860.
(Cooper Union, an engineering, design, and art school of some renown,
charges no tuition.)
In the midst of the
Ukrainian neighborhood is McSorley’s Old Ale House at 15 East 7th
Street, claiming to be the oldest saloon in the city, dating from 1854. (See “Pete’s Tavern,” below.) Along 2nd Avenue north of 8th Street was
known as the Yiddish Rialto where
most of the old Yiddish theaters of the turn of the century were located. Some still exist now as Off-Broadway
commercial houses and movie theaters.
Along St. Mark’s Place, between 2nd and 3rd Avenues
where 8th Street ought to be, are the kicky and funky boutiques of the East
Village, featured in Susan Seidelman’s Desperately Seeking Susan of
1985. At 10th Street and 2nd Avenue is St. Mark’s Church, built in 1799 in
Greek Revival style which includes the burial site of Petrus (Peter) Stuyvesant
(ca. 1610-72; see Part 1), and on Broadway at 10th is the Gothic Revival-style Grace Church, built in 1846.
West of 5th Avenue
and centered on Sheridan Square on
7th Avenue is Greenwich Village,
the historic center of New York’s artistic and bohemian life. Washington
Square Park is the hub of New York University’s (chartered in 1831) “campus”—the
university owns much of the property here—and the “source” of 5th Avenue. The famous Washington Arch, designed by Stanford White (architect; 1853-1906),
was built in 1891-92.
Nearby are two
famous private streets, Macdougal Alley
and Washington Mews, south of 8th Street
off of Macdougal Street and 5th Avenue respectively. Just south of Washington Square West, at 133
Macdougal Street, is the famous Provincetown
Playhouse, home to early Eugene O’Neill (1888-1963) works by the
Provincetown Players (founded in Provincetown, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod in
1915; moved to New York City, 1916; disbanded, 1920).
On Washington Square
South at Thompson Street is the Judson
Memorial Church, built in 1892 by Stanford White. On Washington Square East at Washington Place
is an NYU building now known as the Brown Building (23-29 Washington Place);
built in 1900, it was originally known as the prophetically-named Asch Building
and contained the Triangle Shirtwaist
Company which burned at great loss of life on 25 March 1911.
At 8th Avenue and
14th Street, inside the subway station for the 8th Avenue IND and crosstown BMT
Canarsie Lines, is one of New York City’s most unique art installations. (You have to pay the subway fare to get in to
see it—but I say it’s worth it. Of course,
you can just get off the train here if you’re using this line, check out the
art, and then get back on.)
It’s called Life
Underground by sculptor Tom Otterness (b. 1952) and it comprises 140
(or more—the total seems uncertain) cast bronze statues most of which are no
more than 8-10 inches tall. They’re scattered in corners, on banisters,
in the crooks of I-beams, and on ledges all over the corridors, stairways, and
platforms of the two subway lines that use this station.
Even if you’re not
looking for them, you’re bound to see two or three, but it’s worth making a
point of searching them out in their various hiding places. (See my post “Tom
Otterness & Life Underground,” 27 April 2011. There are works of art of many different
genres in the New York City subway system; see “A
Helluva Town, Part 2,” 18 August 2011, for a run-down.)
Farther west in the
Village is the High Line, an elevated linear park, greenway, and rail
trail created on an abandoned New York Central Railroad spur on the west side
of Manhattan in New York City. It originates
in the Meatpacking District (West
14th Street south to Gansevoort Street, and from the Hudson River east to
Hudson Street.) and runs from Gansevoort Street—three blocks below 14th
Street—through Chelsea to the northern edge of the West Side Yard on 34th
Street near the Javits Center. The line
runs three stories above the streets, mostly 9th and 10th Avenues.
The High Line,
which is a city park, so it’s free to enter, opened in phases during 2009,
2011, and 2014. The Spur, an extension
of the High Line that originally connected with the Morgan General Mail
Facility at Tenth Avenue and 30th Street, opened in 2019. The Moynihan Connector, extending east from
the Spur to Moynihan Train Hall, an expansion of Pennsylvania Station into the former
main post office building, the James A. Farley Building, opened in 2023.
The park's
attractions include naturalized plantings, inspired by plants which grew on the
disused tracks, and views of the city and the Hudson River. The High Line also has cultural attractions
as part of a long-term plan for the park to host temporary installations and
performances. There are also food vendors
that sell light meals, drinks, and snacks all along the route.
There are stairs
from the street level at many access points along the line’s route, plus elevators
at four locations. Information is
available on the line’s website. (I have a post, “High Line
Park,” 10 October 2012, on this blog that might be informative.)
Deep in the
Village, at 75½ Bedford Street, is the city’s
narrowest house, only 9½ feet wide.
It was once the home of Edna St. Vincent Millay (poet and playwright;
1892-1950). It is near the Cherry Lane Theatre (38 Commerce Street),
the Village’s oldest Off-Broadway theater, built in 1923. Also in the deepest West Village is the White Horse Tavern, at 567 Hudson Street
(near 10th Street at Abingdon Square), a favorite drinking place of Dylan
Thomas (Welsh poet and writer; 1914-53).
The poet died after a drinking bout here in 1953 (his last words were
recorded as “Seventeen whiskies. A
record, I think”) and his ghost is said to haunt the place, rotating his
favorite corner table as Thomas did in life.
Near Sheridan Square
at 165 Waverly Place is the Northern Dispensary (built in 1831), actually located at
Waverly Place and Waverly Place! (You
figure it out.) A few blocks east along
Christopher Street is Gay Street, the site (and film location) of the basement
apartment in My Sister Eileen (play by Joseph A. Fields [1895-1966] and Jerome
Chodorov [1911-2004], 1940; film, 1955).
At 53 Christopher is the Stonewall
Inn, where the gay-rights movement was born when drag queens rioted against
police harassment on 28 June-3 July 1969.
On 6th Avenue and
10th Street is the Jefferson Market
Branch of the New York Public Library. The art deco building used to be the
Jefferson Market Court House, and its garden was the site of the New York Women’s
House of Detention (the only art deco jail ever built). (La MaMa founder Ellen Stewart [1919-2011]
was incarcerated there a few times in the ’60s and Mae West was jailed there
for indecency.)
(The women’s jail
is the setting for scenes—and “10th and Greenwich,” considered the first
lesbian love song in Broadway history—in Melvin van Peebles’s [1932-2021] Ain’t
Supposed to Die a Natural Death [Broadway musical, 1971].)
The library, a
wonderful building built in 1874-77, was seen in Woody Allen’s (b. 1935) 1986
Hannah and Her Sisters as one of the architect character’s (David, played
by Tony Roberts) favorite buildings; I suspect it’s one of Allen’s, too. (It’s one of mine.) Note particularly the clock tower; the bell was
restored in 1996 and rings on the hour during the day.
Off of 10th Street
are two wonderful little streets, Patchin
Place and Mulligan Place; note
particularly the iron gate of Mulligan Place.
Theodore Dreiser (novelist and journalist; 1871-1945) and e. e. cummings
(poet, painter, essayist, author, and playwright; 1894-1962) used to live on
Patchin Place.
Across 6th Avenue, on
11th Street, is the remains of the Second
Cemetery of the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue (Beth Haim Sheni),
consecrated in 1805 and functioning until 1830.
(Beth Haim means ‘House of Life’ in Hebrew; it’s a common name
for ‘cemetery’; sheni or shenee means ‘second.’ The third [shelishi] cemetery is on West
21st Street, the first is at Chatham Square in Chinatown, and the congregation,
Shearith Israel, is currently at 8 West 70th Street).
(Shearith Israel, an Orthodox Sephardic
congregation, is the oldest Jewish congregation in the United States. It was established in 1654 in New Amsterdam
by Jews who arrived from Brazil, fleeing the scourge of the Spanish Inquisition
that had followed them from Europe. Until
1825, when Jewish immigrants from Germany established a congregation, it was
the only Jewish congregation in New York City.)
Above the Village
is Chelsea, established in
1750. On 21st Street just west of 6th Avenue
is the Third Cemetery of the Spanish and
Portuguese Synagogue (Beth Haim Shelishi).
On 22nd Street west of 9th Avenue (# 436) is the home of actor Edwin
Forrest. On 23rd Street between 9th and
10th Avenues stood the house of Clement
Clarke Moore (writer, scholar, and
real estate developer; 1779-1863), the author of “A Visit from St.
Nicholas” (“‘Twas the Night before Christmas . . . “) and grandson of
Thomas Clarke (1692-1776), who named Chelsea.
At 222 West 23rd
Street, west of 7th Avenue, is the renowned Hotel Chelsea, built in 1883 and residence at various times of Mark
Twain (writer; 1835-1910), Thomas Wolfe (novelist; 1900-37), Dylan Thomas,
Brendan Behan (Irish poet and playwright; 1923-1964), O’Henry (short story
writer; 1862-1910), Sarah Bernhardt (French actress; 1844-1923), Lillian
Russell (actress and singer; 1860-1922), Edgar Lee Masters (poet and dramatist;
1868-1950), Larry Rivers (painter; 1923-2003), Arthur Miller (playwright and
screenwriter; 1915-2005), Tennessee Williams (playwright and screenwriter; 1911-83),
Virgil Thompson (composer; 1896-1989), Jackson Pollock (painter; 1912-56),
Yevgenii Yevtushenko (Soviet-Russian writer of many genres; 1933-2017), and Sid
Vicious (English musician; 1957-79) of the Sex Pistols (who killed himself and
his girlfriend there). In 1989, En Garde
Arts, a theater company specializing in site-specific works, staged At the
Chelsea about some of the hotel’s residents in the rooms, with the
residents themselves.
At 23rd Street and
6th Avenue was the location of the Edwin
Booth Theatre, which the esteemed actor (1833-93) built in 1869 when this
area was the center of the entertainment district. The actual building no longer exists. At 14 West 23rd Street was the birthplace of Edith Wharton (writer and designer; 1862-1937),
though the building has been greatly altered.
Chelsea has become
a center for dining and drinking and the hip lifestyle of many of the city’s
homosexuals. The strip of 6th Avenue
from 14th to 23rd Streets, once known as the Ladies’ Mile for its many elegant
dress shops, has been restored and is again a shopping mecca, though somewhat
more eclectic than of old. (Many of the
buildings are cast-iron architecture, restored in the 1970s.)
At 5th Avenue and
23rd Street, on a triangle of land on the east side of the avenue formed by the
intersection of Broadway, stands the Flatiron
Building, built in 1902, for a few years the tallest building in the
city. The area from here south, bordered
by Chelsea on the west, Greenwich Village on the south and west and the East
Village and Gramercy Park on the east has now become known as the Flatiron District.
The location of the
building—23rd Street—was a particularly windy spot, blowing women’s long skirts
enough to show a little ankle occasionally.
Girl-watchers gathered to catch a glimpse and were often shooed away by
the traffic cops in the intersection, hence, supposedly, the origin of the
phrase, “Twenty-three skidoo!” True or
not, it’s an amusing anecdote.
Just north of the
Flatiron is Madison Square Park; the
home of P. T. Barnum’s (1810-91) original Madison Square Garden in 1880 (and
its replacement designed by Stanford White in 1890 was at Madison Avenue
between 26th and 27th Streets, just north and east of the park). In the traffic island at the intersection of
Broadway and 5th Avenue is often a piece of whimsical public sculpture. In the past it has been a giant ear of corn
or a wooden statue of an ox.
(From 8 May to 2
September 2024, a “video portal” connecting Dublin, Ireland, to New York City’s
Flatiron District, essentially a large live-streaming screen where people in
both cities can see and interact with each other in real-time, was installed in
that traffic island, across 23rd Street from the Flatiron Building (now designated
the Flatiron South Public Plaza). The
installation, by Lithuanian artist Benediktas Gylys, is called The Portal.
(As soon as the
portal was installed and covered in the news, it reminded me of the portal in
the Star Trek episode “The City on the Edge of Forever” [Season 1, Episode
28; 6 April 1967]. I’m a big fan of Star
Trek, and old enough to have watched the original series [1966-69—I was
in college]. I looked at pictures of
both the ST portal and the video one, and they are unmistakably visual
avatars of one another—but no commentator ever mentioned a connection. Was I the only one who saw it‽)
Across 5th Avenue,
at No. 200, is the Toy Center South,
the headquarters of many of America’s major toy and game companies. (One of those toy companies was Horsman Dolls,
my grandfather’s business; see “Horsman Dolls,” 14 February 2017.) Between 23rd and 24th Streets on the west
side of 5th Avenue is one of the few remaining—and operating—sidewalk clocks. The cast iron clock was manufactured in 1880
and still runs perfectly.
You should note, by
the way, that West 28th Street from Broadway to 5th Avenue was the heart of “Tin Pan Alley.” A block north, at 29th Street and 5th Avenue,
is the Marble Collegiate Reformed Church
where Dr. Norman Vincent Peale (1898-1993) was pastor (1932-84). East on 29th Street, halfway to Madison Avenue,
is the famous “Little Church around the
Corner,” whose true name is the Church of the Transfiguration. Since 1870, it has been associated with
actors (see “Mark
Twain & The Little Church Around The Corner,” 5 March 2010).
Across 21st Street,
a half a block east of Park Avenue, is Gramercy
Park, the only remaining private park in Manhattan. At 16 Gramercy Park South is The Players, a very special club
founded by Edwin Booth in 1888 in his own home which he had remodeled by
Stanford White. It was the last home
Booth, America’s first internationally famous actor, ever owned, and his room
is preserved as it was at his death in 1893.
Besides the club, The Players (not the Players Club, by the way) has a
research library, established by actor Walter Hampden (1879-1955), specializing
in Booth and New York theater. There is
also a collection of Boothiana throughout the building (including a human skull
he used as Yorick’s skull—“Alas, poor Yorick!”—in Hamlet).
Number 15 Gramercy Park
South, right next door, is the National
Arts Club, formerly the home of New York Governor Samuel J. Tilden (1814-86;
25th Governor of New York: 1875-76) who resigned to run as Democratic candidate
for President against Rutherford B. Hayes (1822-93; 19th President of the
United States: 1877-81) in 1876. He won
the popular vote but lost the election in the electoral college.
The National Arts
Club is a nonprofit members club founded in 1898 by Charles DeKay (1848-1935), a
linguist, poet, and critic, to “stimulate, foster, and promote public interest
in the arts and to educate the American people in the fine arts.”
Across the street,
inside the Park—for which a key is necessary—is a statue of Edwin Booth in his most famous role, Hamlet, unveiled in
1918. At 28 East 20th Street, between
Broadway and Park Avenue, is the reconstruction of the birthplace of Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919; 26th President of the United States: 1901-09).
Down Irving Place, a charming little street
between Park and 3rd Avenues that runs only from Gramercy Park to 14th Street,
is Pete’s Tavern, 66 Irving Place at
18th Street. Pete’s dates from 1864 and
calls itself the oldest saloon in New York, a claim disputed by McSorley’s Old
Ale House on East 7th Street (see above).
Pete’s also claims
to be a favorite watering hole of O’Henry, but it’s a debatable assertion. 55 Irving Place, at 17th Street, is the site
of the residence of William Sidney
Porter (O’Henry), but little remains of the original house.
No. 40, across the
street, is the Washington Irving House,
though it was actually his nephew’s home.
Irving was a frequent visitor, however.
Further east, at 327 East 17th Street, was a house in which Anton Dvorak (Czech composer;
1841-1904) lived for a while. (It was
demolished in 1991 by Beth
Israel Hospital, to great local protest.)
West of Irving Place
at 14th Street is Union Square Park,
named for neither the federal union nor the labor organizations located near
and around the square, but because it was located at the “union” of two major
roads exiting the city during the 19th century.
Originally built in 1831, it was substantially renovated and beautified
in the 1980’s, and the surrounding sidewalks and parking area was redesigned in
2002. (Note the historical bronze
plaques in the new sidewalk outside the park.)
Once famous for
radical soap-box oratory—the park is still a venue for protests and rallies—it
now sports an outdoor restaurant (during the warm-weather months only, of
course). On Mondays, Wednesdays,
Fridays, and Saturdays, Union Square is the site of one of New York’s Greenmarket farmers’ markets, one of
the largest and most popular in the system (see the “Greenmarkets” section in “A
Helluva Town, Part 3,” 9 January 2012).
Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, the Union Square Holiday Market sells
handcrafts at the south end of the square.
Two of Union Square’s
subway entrances have been
reconstructed as they might have appeared in the 1890’s. Aside from the several statues and monuments
inside the park, there is a 1986 statue
of Mahatma Gandhi (Mohandas K. Gandhi, Indian lawyer, anti-colonial
nationalist, and political ethicist; 1869-1948) at a spot once known as “Dead
Man’s Curve” at 14th Street and Union Square West.
On the east side of
the square, between 14th and 15th Streets, is a huge, new condominium complex
called the Zeckendorf Towers,
completed in 1987. It stands on the site
of Klein’s on the Square, once one
of old New York’s most famous department stores. (Remember the line from “Marry the Man Today”
in Guys and Dolls (1955): “In Wanamaker’s and Saks and Klein’s / A
lesson I’ve been taught. / You can’t get alterations / On a dress you haven’t
bought”? Wanamaker’s, by the way was at
770 Broadway at 8th Street).
A little further
east on 15th Street is the present location of the Strasberg Institute, the theater school founded by Lee Strasberg (theatre
director, actor, and acting teacher; principal theorist of Method acting;
1901-82) for would-be actors who weren’t ready for his more famous Actors
Studio (the incubator of Method acting).
On the corner of
17th Street, at No. 100, is the old Tammany
Hall. It’s currently a union hall
and houses the Union Square Theatre (which is said to be haunted by a ghost who
inhabits a crawl space).
Among the popular
department stores that made the Union Square area a shoppers’ haven at the turn
of the century was the original Macy’s
at 56 West 14th Street, among the cheap clothing and electronics stores that
now line 14th Street.
The façade of one
of the new buildings on East 14th Street, across from the park, is an elaborate
and complex sculpture representing “time”—clock time, geological time,
astronomical time, etc. The sculpture is
called Metronome (1999) by Kristen Jones and Andrew Ginzel, and
it’s on the front of a high rise at 1 Union Square South at the corner of 4th
Avenue and East 14th Street. (I find it
pretentious and obscure, but there is an explanation of the symbolism in a New
York Times article. See if you can figure it out.)
A little south of 14th
Street is an apartment building at 20 East 11th Street in which Eleanor Roosevelt
(1884-1962) leased an apartment as a pied-à-terre from 1933 to 1942. It’s not open for visitors, but there’s a plaque
on the façade that attests to the residence of FDR’s First Lady there.
Fort Tryon Park
is at the northwest side of Manhattan between Henry Hudson Parkway and
Broadway, from 190th Street to Dyckman Street.
Besides its wooded acres is The Cloisters, part of the
Metropolitan Museum of Art focusing on medieval art and architecture (also
covered in “A Helluva Town, Part 3,” referenced above). In the fall they hold a medieval crafts fair,
with jousting and entertainment from the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. Definitely see The Cloisters—even if medieval
art isn’t your thing, and it isn’t mine, the building and the display is
wonderful. And if the weather’s fine,
the park is beautiful alternative the city.
(For the Medieval
Festival in Fort Tryon Park, if you like that kind of entertainment, check
out the city’s website.)
Lincoln Center,
home of the Metropolitan Opera (212-362-6000), New York City Ballet
and New York City Opera (New York State Theatre, 212-870-5570), New
York Philharmonic (Avery Fisher Hall, 212-874-2424), Lincoln Center
Theater (Vivian Beaumont, Mitzi Newhouse, and Claire Tow Theaters,
212-239-6200), the Juilliard School and the New York Public Library for the Performing
Arts (Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center, 212-930-0800)), is between
Columbus and Amsterdam Avenues, from 62nd Street to 65th Street. It also contains Alice Tully Hall, a concert
venue (212-362-1911), and Damrosch Park with the Guggenheim Bandshell (not to
mention several works by prominent artists in the plaza, such as Alexander
Calder [1898-1976] and Henry Moore [1898-1986]).
Other performance
spaces around the city include New
York City Center, home
of the Alvin Ailey Dance Company, Joffrey Ballet, and the Manhattan Theatre
Club, 131 West 55th Street (212-581-7907), and Carnegie Hall, 7th Avenue and 57th Street
(212-247-7800).
St. Patrick’s Cathedral,
seat of the Catholic archdiocese of New York, is on 5th Avenue at 50th Street;
the Cathedral of St. John the Divine,
the Episcopal cathedral and the world’s largest Gothic cathedral, is at
Amsterdam Avenue and 112th Street in Morningside Heights (behind Columbia
University). Temple Emanu-El, 1 East 65th Street, is the world’s
largest reform synagogue. Shearith Israel, an Orthodox
Sephardic congregation at 8 West 70th Street, is the oldest Jewish congregation
in the United States.
Central Park
runs from 59th (CPS) to 110th Street (Cathedral Parkway) and from 5th Avenue to
CPW (8th Avenue). It contains, aside
from many walks, playing areas, and 843 acres of green space—like the Sheep
Meadow, the Delacourt Theatre (212-861-7277), where the New York
Shakespeare does free “Shakespeare in the Park”; the Wollman Memorial Ice
Skating Rink (212-517-4800), renovated for ice-skaters by Donald Trump; the
Great Lawn, where summer concerts are often held, and the Central
Park Zoo (212-439-6500), now a new children’s zoo; The Carousel
(212-879-0244), built in 1908 (the fourth one on this site); The Hans
Christian Andersen Statue where storytellers do their thing Saturday
mornings (beginning at 11:00 a,m.) most Saturdays, June to September; The
Swedish Cottage Marionette Theatre (212-988-9093); Belvedere Castle
(Central Park Learning Center – 212-772-0210) with children’s workshops on park
history and ecology.
Rockefeller Center
covers West 48th to West 52nd Street between 5th and 6th Avenues. Radio
City Music Hall, home of the world-renowned Rockettes, is on 6th Avenue
at 51st Street.
The Jacob K. Javits Convention Center
(212-216-2000), between 11th and 12th Avenues and 34th and 39th Streets, named
for the New York Congressman from 1947 to 1954 and United States Senator from
1957 to 1981, is the largest facility of its kind in the Western Hemisphere.
The Main Library (the Stephen A.
Schwarzman Building) and Bryant Park
(where you can get reduced-priced tickets for Broadway and Off-Broadway shows)
is between 40th and 42nd Street and 5th and 6th Avenues. (This is the non-circulating research
library. The circulating library near
there is the Mid-Manhattan Branch
at 40th and 5th on the east side of the avenue.
The Jefferson Market Branch is at 10th Street and 6th Avenue—in a wonderful building that used to be a
courthouse (see Part 2). The library
garden used to be the site of a women’s jail.)
Bryant Park now has a skating rink in the winter.
The Empire State Building is at 5th Avenue
and 34th Street. Aside from the breathtaking
views of New York City from the 86th floor (and thoughts of King Kong), it
houses the Guinness Book of World Records exhibit (opened in 1976).
The Chrysler Building (my favorite skyscraper)
is at 405 Lexington Avenue at 42nd Street.
The United Nations complex is at East
42nd-48th Streets and 1st Avenue.
Trump Tower
(assuming “The Donald” hasn’t lost it to someone who’s changed its name) is at
56th Street and 5th Avenue.
The Theatre District centers on Times Square
(Duffy Square, the north end of Times Square, has been officially dubbed “Actors’
Square”) and spreads east and west of Broadway several blocks from 41st Street
to 53rd Street. Theatre Row, home to many of New
York’s Off-Broadway theaters and companies, is 42nd Street between 9th and 10th
Avenue (unofficially extended to 11th Avenue).
Restaurant Row, with
many wonderful little places to eat, is 46th Street between 8th and 9th Avenues.
The Diamond Center is along 47th Street
from 5th to 6th Avenues. Museum Mile is along 5th Avenue from
the Guggenheim (88th Street) to the Frick (70th Street). Ladies’
Mile is in the Flatiron District: along 6th and Broadway from 24th
to 15th Streets. Fashion Avenue is 7th Avenue in the
women’s Garment District,
the 20’s and 30’s.
Sheridan Square,
the heart of Greenwich Village, is at 7th Avenue South where West 4th Street
and Christopher Street intersect it.
(Christopher Street is a famous center of the gay community.)
Gramercy Park
is a private park (you need a key to get in) at 20th and 21st Streets where
Irving Place becomes Lexington Avenue.
Besides being elegant, old New York, at #16 Gramercy Park South is the
last home owned by Edwin Booth, first internationally famous American actor and
brother of John Wilkes Booth (1838-65).
The home is now The Players, a club for actors started by Booth 100
years ago. Edwin’s statue in his most
famous role, Hamlet, is in the park.
Washington Square,
with its famous century-old arch at the foot of 5th Avenue, one block below 8th
Street, is the center of the NYU campus and, unfortunately, the drug trade in
the area. It is also the spiritual heart
of New York’s art and literary avant-garde, starting in the mid-19th century.
City Hall
is at Broadway and Murray Street in City Hall Park. Built in 1811, it is a beautiful example of
Federal period architecture.
The New York Stock Exchange is at 20
Broad Street in the heart of the Financial
District, commonly known as Wall Street. Nearby are St.
Paul’s Chapel, Broadway and Fulton Street, where George Washington
worshipped, and Trinity Church, Broadway and Wall Street, which has Manhattan’s
oldest cemetery, including the graves of Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804; 1st
U.S. Secretary of the Treasury: 1789-95) and Robert Fulton (engineer and
inventor, credited with developing the world’s first commercially successful steamboat;
1765-1815).
All the way
downtown is Battery Park,
on the southern tip of Manhattan—the site of the original colony of New
Amsterdam—and South Ferry,
whence depart the Liberty Island and Staten Island Ferries. The ferry to Ellis Island,
which has been restored for tourism, departs from Battery Park.
The South Street Seaport, a wonderful
place to wander and browse on a warm day, is the old harbor of New York at the
southern tip of the island at the mouth of the East River along Fulton Street
between Water and South Streets. It has
shops, restaurants, and restored old ships.
The main tourist site is the South Street Seaport Museum,
which also provided access to some of the restored ships. (Until 2005, when it relocated to the Bronx,
it was also the home of the Fulton Fish Market, for 183 years, the most
important wholesale fish market on the East Coast of the United States.)
Guide
to Cross Streets
Addresses on
Cross-Town Streets
West
Side East Side
#
1 is at: 5th Avenue............................... 5th
Avenue
#
100 is at: 6th Avenue............................... 4th or
Park Avenue
#
200 is at: 7th Avenue............................... 3rd
Avenue
#
300 is at: 8th Avenue............................... 2nd
Avenue
#
400 is at: 9th Avenue............................... 1st
Avenue
#
500 is at: 10th Avenue............................... York
or Avenue
#
600 is at: 11th Avenue............................... Avenue
B
#
700 is at: 12th Avenue............................... Avenue
C
Addresses on
Avenues
To find nearest
cross street, drop last digit of house number, divide by 2, and make correction
shown below. Example: 1000 3rd Avenue: Cancel last figure (0), divide remainder
(100) by 2 (50), and add key number for 3rd Avenue (10). Nearest cross street is 60th Street
Avenues A, B, C, D . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . add 3
1st and 2nd Avenues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . .add 3
3rd Avenue. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . .add 10
4th Avenue (Park Avenue S.) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . .. .add 8
5th Avenue up to 200 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . add 13
201-400 . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . add 16
401-600 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . add 18
601-775 . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . add 20
775-1286 (do not divide by 2) . . . . . . . . . .
. . subt. 18
1287-1500 .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . add 45
above 2000
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . add 24
6th Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . subt. 12
7th Avenue up to 1800 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . add 12
above 1800 . . . . . . . . . , . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . add 20
8th Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . add 9
9th Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . add 13
10th Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . add 14
11th Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . .add 15
Amsterdam Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . .add 59
Audubon Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . .add 165
Broadway up to 754 . . . . . . . . . . . . below 8th Street
755-858 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . subt. 29
859-958 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . subt. 25
above 958 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . .subt. 31
Central Park West (do
not divide by 2) . . . . . . . . . . . add 60
Columbus Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . add 59
Convent Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . .add 127
Edgecombe Avenie . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . .add 34
Fort Washington Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . .add 158
Lenox Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . .add 110
Lexington Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . .add 22
Madison Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . .add 26
Manhattan Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . add 100
Park Avene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . .add 34
Pleasant Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . add 101
Riverside Drive (do
not divide by 2)
up to 567. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . add 73
above 567 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . .add 78
St. Nicholas Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . .add 110
Wadsworth Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . add 173
West End Avenue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . add 159
[“New York, New York! / It's
a helluva town!” It’s the opening line
of the song so nice, Bernstein, Comden, and Green named it twice. It’s also the source of the title or subtitle
of my ad
hoc series for Rick On Theater.
As of this date, not including the present three-part post, “Rick’s
Guide to New York,” there are seven posts in the “A Helluva Town” series. They are: “A Helluva Town,” 15 August 2011; 18
August 2011; 9 January 2012; “High Line Park,” 10 October 2012; “Governors
Island,” 19 November 2012; “Lower East Side Tenement Museum,” 19 December 2012;
“Manhattanhenge,” 30 June 2023.]
