Forgotten New York is in Association with the Greater Astoria Historical Society, a non-profit organization supported by the Long Island City community.
Long before the “humpbacked” street signs showing cross streets were installed on cast-iron lamps in the 1910s…long before porcelain, enamel and aluminum embossed signs appeared in the 1950s…and long before color-coded vinyl and aluminum signs appeared around 1964 (the green and white successors of which still dominate around town) … there were street signs chieseled onto building corners. [...]
Continued from Page 2 Home stretch Green-Wood Cemetery zigs another zag at the “trintersection” of McDonald Avenue, 10th Avenue and 20th Street (above left). The architecture here begins to be more interesting as older Park Slope housing stock begins to make itself seen. There are a couple of interesting items a block over at 10th [...]
Categorized in: Street Scenes Walks Tagged with: Brooklyn Park Slope Windsor Terrace
Continued from Part 1 A Lost Railroad Between 1954 and 1975 the right-of-way between 37th and 38th Streets was partially occupied by an elevated railroad that served as a shuttle between the West End line and the Culver Line (now the F train). The tracks themselves were once part of the Culver, which ran from [...]
Categorized in: Street Scenes Walks Tagged with: Brooklyn Park Slope Windsor Terrace
Despite the fact that ForgottenTours 24 (in April 2006) and 29 (in April 2007) have taken place in Green-Wood Cemetery (and there are likely more tours upcoming) I have yet to write a definitive FNY page on the vast enclave, probably because it would take multiple pages to do it justice — the sheer details, [...]
Categorized in: Street Scenes Walks Tagged with: Brooklyn Park Slope Windsor Terrace
It was way back in the pre-Forgotten New York era — about 1994 or 1995 — (I know that’s ancient history now that your webmaster is becoming ancient) — when I first saw block after block of glorious red brick pavement on 89th Avenue between Jamaica Avenue and Sutphin Boulevard. It wasn’t long after that that the [...]
Categorized in: Cobblestones Tagged with: Jamaica Queens
Riverside Drive is justly famed for its undulating route along the Hudson; Riverside Park — New York’s longest; its Beaux Arts and Art Deco apartment buildings; and Grant’s Tomb, the massive memorial to the Ohioan at West 122nd Street. Grant and his wife are entombed, not buried there … Less famed, though no less beautiful, is the [...]
Categorized in: Forgotten Slices Tagged with: Manhattan Upper West Side
I was staggering around the Briarwood-Jamaica border a few weeks ago (in July 2008) ignoring the drizzle and humidity and getting images for a possible Briarwood page and picking up possible ideas for a long-planned Jamaica page when I spotted some unusual sights and signs along Jamaica Avenue, which I had earlier chronicled in its Brooklyn stretch late [...]
Categorized in: Forgotten Slices Signs Tagged with: Jamaica Queens
Unlike apparently everyone else in the NYC blogosphere I haven’t paid a lot of attention to Williamsburg the past couple of years — until a couple of weekends ago (writing this August 11, 2008) when a too-long wait for the B61 caused me to ditch my planned visit to Red Hook and walk down Willoughby, through Ft. Greene [...]
Categorized in: Forgotten Slices Tagged with: Brooklyn Williamsburg
BY ALEXIS BUISSON Guest FNY columnist Describing the “Iron Triangle” other than “a place you would never go to otherwise than compelled to do so” would not be an overstatement. This small, smelly and noisy triangular neighborhood in Queens is home to warehouses, car repair and auto parts stores, and, they say, only one resident. In [...]
Categorized in: Neighborhoods Tagged with: Corona Flushing Iron Triangle Queens
I was surprised, and disappointed, to see one of NYC’s iconic painted walldog ads is gone, as the giant Wellner Motors ad on Greenwich Avenue facing 8th opposite Jackson Square has been cruelly sandblasted out of existence. For decade after decade, long after its titular garage had left the scene, it had advertised sales, service and [...]
Categorized in: Ads Forgotten Slices Tagged with: Greenwich Village
According to the Bible of Brooklyn street names, Brooklyn By Name by Leonard Benardo and Jennifer Weiss, Williamsburg’s Dunham Place was named for David Dunham (1790-1823), a New York merchant who helped initiate an early steam ferry from Brooklyn to New York, which earned him the nickname “Father of Williamsburg.” Dunham was an indefatigable advocate for steam navigation and [...]
Categorized in: Alleys Forgotten Slices Tagged with: Brooklyn Williamsburg
In January 2008 I was perusing an old Hagstrom map (yes, I do that for fun). The old Hagstrom, before the company digitized the entire NYC map, preserved some archaisms and oddities that are often worth investigation. For example, in the Bronx (either in Allerton or Bronxdale; it’s on the borderline) at Mace and Bronxwood, [...]
Categorized in: Neighborhoods Street Scenes Tagged with: Bronx Bronxdale
