To wrap up our 15th anniversary celebration -- and to set up our big 400th episode -- we take a fond look at one corner of New York City which taught us to love local history.
Perhaps you know this area for Seward Park, the first municipal playground in the United States, or for Straus Square, named for Nathan Straus, philanthropist and co-owner (with his brother Isidor) of Macy's Department Store. Today, trendy artists and influencers instead spend their weekends in Dimes Square, just one block (and seemingly one world) away.
In the 19th century, as Rutgers Square, this area became a small portion of a large German immigrant community called Kleindeutschland. In an inconceivable historical moment, a statue was almost raised here -- to William 'Boss' Tweed, leader of Tammany Hall.
By the late 19th century, this place was the center for American Jewish culture, and East Broadway became Yiddish publishers row, hosting newspapers and magazines from a host of perspectives. In the 20th century, thanks to a mid-century housing boom (fueled partially by the labor unions firmly rooted to this place), some also called it Cooperative Village, with hundreds of old, deteriorating tenements replaced with new high rises.
It's a neighborhood that means so much to so many -- and we hope you learn to love it all yourself, no matter what you call it.
PLUS: We're join by staff members of the Forward, celebrating its 125th year of publication. Forward archivist Chana Pollack joins us along with Ginna Green and, hosts of the the newspaper column-turned-podcast version A Bintel Brief.
#337 Robert Moses and the Art of the New Deal
Rewind: TESLA -- The Inventor in Old New York
#336 The War on Newspaper Row
#335 Pulitzer vs Hearst: The Rise of Yellow Journalism
Rewind: The Land of the Lenape
#334 Midnight Cowboy (Bowery Boys Movie Club)
Rewind: The Secret Origin of Comic Books
#333 Tearing Down King George: The Monumental Summer of 1776
#332 Welcome to Yorkville: German Life on the Upper East Side
Rewind: Seneca Village and New York's Forgotten Black Communities
#331 The East Side Elevateds: Life Under the Tracks
#330 The Silent Parade of 1917: Black Unity in a Time of Crisis
#329 The First Ambulance: The Humans (and Horses) That Saved New York
#328 Chop Suey City: A History of Chinese Food in New York
#327 Listener Stories: At Home In New York Part Two
#326 Listener Stories: At Home in New York Part One
#325 The Staten Island Quarantine War
#324 Moving Day! Madness and Mayhem in Old New York
#323 The Bowery Wizards: A History of Tattooed New York
#322 Nickelodeons and Movie Palaces: New York and the Film Industry 1893-1920
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