STEINWAY Village in northwest Queens was a small company town that was instituted by William Steinway, son of German immigrant Henry, who had moved his operations to Astoria on the…

JOHANNES Lott built a small house on his Flatlands property about 1720 on land first settled by Dutchman Hugh Aerens as far back as 1636. In the 1700s, Gerritsen Creek…

JOHN. It’s probably the most common given name in the English language. Most Johns walking around today are likely named for their father, or a prominent family member, who were…

WHEN the NYC Department of Purchase Building, at Water and New Dock Streets under the Brooklyn Bridge, was demolished in 2008, it wasn’t without protest from preservationists who wanted to…

PURELY guesswork on my part, but I’ll bet Five Mile Stone, a tavern on the corner of 2nd Avenue and East 85th Street in Yorkville, is named for a marker…

THE famed Silk Clock in the Schwarzenbach Building, 470 Park Avenue South, periodically disappears for repairs, but it was apparently in working order when I passed it on PAS and East…

THE region of Brooklyn’s DUMBO in the immediate Fulton Ferry area is one of my favorite parts of town to poke around in and I hope to get back there…

GROTE Street twists and turns through Belmont, the section of the Bronx most famed for the restaurants of Arthur Avenue and Dion DeMucci, who racked up hits in the 1960s…

NASSAU County residents know all about Hempstead Turnpike, one of its main east-west auto routes, synonymous with NY 24 for its entire length from the Queens line to East Farmingdale.…

IRONICALLY enough it’s been about five years since I have set foot on Governors Island, and it was recently made available (via a 10-minute ferry ride) for visits year round.…

I’m not sure, but sometimes things lose just a bit of their charm when they get landmarked. Bomelstein’s Clock, #753 Manhattan Avenue between Meserole and Norman was rusty, its paint…

I had been unaware that the former Bishop Ford High School, on 19th Street between 10th Avenue and Prospect Park West on the Park Slope-Windsor Terrace border, boasted a distinctive…