Anshe Chesed and Rodeph Sholom are respectively the oldest and second oldest surviving synagogue buildings in the city, and some of the oldest in the country. Both were constructed for German Jewish congregations in German architectural styles: Gothic Revival and Rundbogenstil (“round-arch style”), and feature red brick, central staircases and symmetrical façades with recessed central sections and square towers. Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue is the only Greek Synagogue in New York and the only synagogue of Romaniote Jews in the Western Hemisphere. The Eldridge Street Synagogue was America’s first major house of worship built by Eastern European Orthodox Jews. The yellow brick building features Moorish and Romanesque details and rich ornament. At its peak in the early 20th century, the synagogue hosted as many as 1,000 worshippers at services, but was forced to close in the mid-20th century when the area’s Jewish population began to dwindle. In 1986, the Eldridge Street Project funded a large-scale restoration of the building, which was repurposed as a museum. The Former Congregation Anshe Chesed, Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue and the Former Eldridge Street Synagogue are all designated New York City Individual Landmarks.

5th Precinct, 1900. This 1881-station house is the oldest original police precinct in the city. (Though the Central Park Precinct is in an older building, that structure was built as a stable and wasn't taken over by the police until the 20th century.) This four-story Italianate building was designed by the Police Department’s architect Nathaniel D. Bush, who was also a sergeant on the force! Originally called the 6th Precinct, it was known as the "Bloody Sixth" for the violence in nearby Chinatown, largely enacted by the local Tong gang. The local police dealt with rampant gambling, opium dens, and gang murders. By 1911, the station had been renamed the 5th, and a new fancy police patrol telephone booth had been added to the entranceway. On two separate occasions in the 1960s and 1970s, the NYPD expressed a wish to demolish the building for a new station house and the community fought to preserve the old building. Instead of being razed, the building was renovated and modernized.

Wong Family Association, 1960s. One of Poy Gum Lee's final designs in Chinatown, the Wong Family Association Building is also perhaps his most strictly modern. While most of his other designs in New York were somewhat heavily influenced by Chinese architectural styles, this structure had an overt mid-century modern facade. The building was constructed for a Chinese benevolent society which assisted new immigrants and created and organized social, political, and economic structures within the Chinese community.

"200-208 Bowery, west side, between Spring and Prince Streets, 134." The Federal style building at no. 206 (with the Barber sign) dates, along with its neighbor, to the 1810s. Once a pair amongst many Federal style buildings on the Bowery, most have been demolished and replaced or altered beyond recognition. No. 206 was constructed with a shop space on the first floor and residential space upstairs for the merchant's family. The ground floor retail space has seen a variety of businesses over its more than 200 years, including a shoe store, thread and needle shop, dentist, engraving business, and an umbrella store. At some point in the late 19th century, the upstairs space became one of many lodging houses on the Bowery, catering to " street salesmen and clerks, whose small wages will not admit of better quarters.” At some point in the 20th century no. 204 had its peaked roof and dormers converted into an additional floor. Today no. 206 remains as evidence of the early architectural of the neighborhood and houses a restaurant supply store.

Citizen Savings Bank ARCHITECT: Clarence W. Brazer DATE: 1922-24 STYLE: Beaux-Arts Citizens Bank is an important example of the 20th-century Beaux-Arts bank building combining Renaissance and classical precedents, with the building’s unusual height and nearly square massing, conveying its financial strength and stability to depositors. The street facades have rusticated bases above which rise monumental, arched windows enframed by engaged pilasters supporting an entablature in the Roman Doric order. To identify the building and its purpose noted sculptor Charles Keck designed a sculptural group, with a clock, that incorporates elements from the seal of the Citizens Savings Bank, including a Native American, a sailor, an eagle, and beehives, traditional symbols of thrift.

Former Germania Bank building, ca. 1975. In 1966, the Germania Bank Building was sold to Jay Maisel, a commercial photographer. Maisel maintained his residence and studio there until February, 2015, when the building sold for $55 million. During Maisel’s residence, the grand, mysterious building’s exterior became a magnet for graffiti artists and a well known Bowery landmark. After the 2015 sale, decades of graffiti, grime, and character were stripped from the facade as the building was prepared for commercial renovation.

Unknown architect ca. 1799 This Federal-style building may be another 18th century survivor. Records show that from 1799– 1802 a butcher occupied this address. It retains original features such as its steeply pitched roof, and, if one looks closely, paneled stone lintels on the second story. Unfortunately, its twin pedimented dormers were removed in 2011.

The intersection of Division, Canal, and Ludlow Streets. The intricate facade former Loew’s Canal Street Theater is visible at center-right, on the north side of Canal Street.

Grand and Allen Streets, from the Allen Street meridian mall. From 1878 to 1942, the Second Avenue El ran over Allen Street. In the early 1930s, the demolition of buildings on the street’s East side made room for what is now the eastern roadway, with the elevated tracks occupying the western side and a pedestrian mall in between. The storefront at 315 Grand is Goldman & Ostrow, “distributors of national advertised brands of infants and children’s wear.”

The China Daily News was the newspaper of the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance. Never shy of voicing their leftist beliefs, both the paper and its subscribers were monitored by the FBI at the height of the Red Scare. It became so controversial that its editor would be imprisoned and multiple staffers deported. Like many of New York's radical societies, the paper had an unlikely beginning: the passing of a local ordinance that concerned laundromats.

“Neighborhood Guild Library, 26 Delancey Street, in two windows to left of fire escape, 3rd floor.” In 1893, The University Settlement, a social services aid society then known as the Neighborhood Guild, moved from its original location on Forsyth Street to a larger building at 26 Delancey Street. The building itself had four floors which housed a gymnasium, a library and reading rooms, a room for the cooking school, a pool and billiards room, and various club rooms, as well as residential spaces. In 1898, the Settlement moved again, to its present location on Eldridge Street. In 1929, the City acquired land between Chrystie and Forsyth Streets, including 26 Delancey, with the intention of building low-cost housing. Instead, the land became part of the seven-block Sara D. Roosevelt Park, opened in 1934.

Spanning from the turn of the 20th Century to the 1920s, the Progressive Era left a lasting impact on the United States and New York City. During these years the nation experienced an increase in reforms meant to alleviate the suffering of the working classes. In order to accomplish this goal, Progressives believed the government needed to accept greater responsibility for its citizens' well-being. The Progressive ideals of greater government involvement and regulation was a reaction against the policies of the Gilded Age. During this period in American history, wealthy business owners and corporations accrued vast fortunes, often at the expense of working class people. Many believed something had to be done. Following the Civil War, The Gilded Age contributed to the rapid urbanization and industrialization of the United States. While both of these processes created enormous wealth for some, it also worsened the plight of many people. Urbanization and industrialization transformed both the physical landscape and the experiences and expectations of Americans. During the Progressive Era, many municipal services, like the police and fire departments, were established or expanded. School reform and increased access to sanitary living conditions improve the lives of poorer Americans. To many, the Progressive Era provided a much needed antidote to the societal ills of Gilded Age urbanization and industrialization. New York Social Studies Scope and Sequence Standards: 8.2e & 11.5. For Teachers: The Progressive Era in New York Lesson Plan

Police Department Headquarters, ca. 1905. Following the consolidation of the five boroughs, the city decided that it required a larger police headquarters. The small building on Mulberry Street, where Teddy Roosevelt had served as Police Commissioner, was now insufficient for a police force that quadrupled in size since the building opened in the 1860s. In 1905 the cornerstone was laid for a new, massive building on the wedge-shaped lot that had once housed the old Centre Market. The Beaux-Arts behemoth was designed by the firm of Hoppin & Koen and completed in 1909. The new five-story building was topped with a large copper dome. The facilities of the new headquarters included a basement shooting range and a rooftop observation deck. The design both inside and out aimed “to impress both the officer and the prisoner with the majesty of the law.” The police remained in this building until 1973 when they decamped to a brand new modern (Brutalist) building on Park Row. The building on Centre Street remained empty for some years with plans and proposals bandied about for a conversion to a hotel, cultural center, or museum. Finally in 1983 the City agreed to allow the building to be converted into luxury condos. The new complex, called the Police Building, opened to residents in 1988. Interestingly, while planning the condo conversion, it was discovered that the building exceeded the property lot lines on all sides—in some cases by several feet. Obviously the new owners were unable and unwilling to move the building's facades back to line up with the property lines on the official city planning map (both financially and because the Landmarks Commission would never allow it). The city eventually grandfathered the building's current shape into the municipal maps.

Sai Wing Mock, or "Mock Duck," was the leader of the Hip Sing Tong, one of the "tongs," or controlling agencies in New York's Chinatown. Tongs were essential in preserving the culture, political agency, and independence of Chinese Americans in the early 20th century. Mock, who would rise to become one of the most notorious figures in the Chinatown crime scene, was born in San Francisco in 1878 to Cantonese immigrants. At 18 years old, he relocated to New York, going by the name "Mock Duck" until the late 1910s, when a Newark newspaper mistakenly reported his death. Taking advantage of the error, Mock reverted to his given name, Sai Wing, which afforded him some privacy after years in the spotlight. This story tells of the life of Sai Wing Mock "Duck."

Named for a grove of fruit trees on the DeLancey estate that comprised much of this area, Orchard Street is characterized by its tenements and history as a commercial thoroughfare, hosting many prosperous shops and street vendors. The five-story pre-law tenement at number 97 was purchased by the Lower East Side Tenement Museum in 1988 to interpret the history of immigration to the area. It is estimated that roughly 7,500 people from 25 countries resided in the building until it was sealed due to non-compliance with City housing codes in 1935. The six-story, red brick, Queen-Anne-style Old Law tenement at number 14-16 features a fanciful cornice and terra-cotta Stars of David, a feature shared by its sister building at number 47. 97 Orchard is listed on the State and National Register of Historic Places.

Looking north on the Bowery, under the Third Avenue Line, April 24, 1936.

215 Bowery Charles Kinkel 1872 This limestone-faced building was built for the New Amsterdam Savings Bank in 1872, which failed by 1876. It then became Germania Bank, reflective of the large German population near this area at the end of the 19th century. This building was constructed on an irregularly narrow lot, and the heavy stonework and quoins enhance its narrow façade.

Bo-Bo Restaurant, ca, 1975. The Chinese restaurant called Bo-Bo's (at 20 1/2 Pell Street, right) was a well-loved local institution between the 1950s and 1980s. The menu was up on a board on the wall and with less than a dozen tables, the wait could be an hour. Those who remember the spot even today say the wait was always worth it. The signage notes the restaurant's name and states "the home of Chinese actors." Ester Eng, who was a partner in Bo-Bo's and owned another nearby eatery was an early director in Chinese cinema, and many Chinese actors frequented the spot.

"The Bowery, north from Rivington Street, showing a bread line extending to the Salvation Army Memorial Hotel No. 223 -225 Bowery, ca. 1932." The Salvation Army Memorial Hotel, the final destination for the men waiting on this bread line, moved into the 10-story building, known as Booth House in 1913. From this location they provided a variety of service to the changing lower Manhattan populations over the 101 years they occupied the building. For the first decade and half the Army location largely served the vagrant population that lived and passed through the Bowery, but as the Great Depression took hold, the Army realized they could no longer function only by handing out meal tickets. The needy population was growing exponentially to include out of work men from common laborers to white collar workers. Knowing that food was one of the most important needs, by 1931 the Army location at Bowery started collecting unserved food from local restaurants to serve in a makeshift dining hall in the basement. This photograph depicts the lines for that service.

A 5-story structure, No. 68 (second from the corner), was supposed to have been the first place where stereopticon and shadow views were first shown. It also is reputed to have had the first public meeting rooms on this thoroughfare.

New York City has a small collection of 18th-century buildings, and these two survivors are part of it. They retain Federal features such as their steeply pitched roofs, twin pedimented dormers, Flemish bond, and No. 134 possesses an end chimney. These buildings also share an early wrought-iron fire escape. Sculptor Eva Hesse (1936– 1970\) had a studio in the half story of No. 134.

Berenice Abbott's 1937 photograph of Centre Market Place Frank Lava's storefront, February 4, 1937. This Berenice Abbott photograph shows the gun-shaped sign of a gunsmith storefront which had been in business since 1850. A number of gun shops once lined Centre Market Place, and were the appropriate neighbors of the massive Police Headquarters housed across the street in the grand Beaux-Arts building at 240 Centre Street. Lava was the third generation owner of a gunsmith shop established in 1850; he continued to manage the shop into the 1960s.

Manhattan Bridge Plaza ca. 1979 The Manhattan Bridge was completed in 1909 during a post-Consolidation building boom. The decorative grand plaza and colonnade completed in 1915 at the Manhattan entrance have been chipped away at by city administrations and the elements. It was almost torn down by Robert Moses during bridge reconstruction in 1961. Though it never achieved the elegance depicted in this postcard, the colonnade is still a part of the bridge.

Shoppers on Essex Street, ca. 1975. In the mid-1970s, Essex Street remained an important hub for business serving the Lower East Side’s Jewish community.

New York Dispensary, ca. 1915. The New York Dispensary, a philanthropic institution providing medical care for poor New Yorkers, built a new facility on Spring Street in 1912, on the site of a former coal yard. The dispensary, founded in 1790, had been displaced from locations further downtown twice in the previous four years: first, by the 1908 construction of the Centre Street Loop of the BMT Nassau Street Line (today’s J/Z subway); then for the expansion of courthouse facilities at Worth Street.

My Archive Spring 2019 "Tourist and locals both out for a summer day to get some Italian food. So many smells, so many choices, so many ornaments, and menus and cannoli. haha! It's one of my fav photos." —Justin Snyder

The Grand Theatre (also referred to simply as “The Grand”) opened in 1903 at 255-257 Grand Street, at the corner of Grand and Chrystie Streets. With its opening, The Grand became “the first theatre in America built for the express purpose of housing Yiddish productions.” An article published in The New York Times the week of the theatre’s opening entitled “A New Jewish Theatre,” remarks that it is “the first theatre in New York ever erected expressly and exclusively for foreign-speaking Jewish patronage of the better class.” The article then goes on to describe the theatre’s architecture, designed by Victor Hugo Koehler, proclaiming that it is a “handsome white stone structure – of the Renaissance style now prevailing at playhouses.” The Grand is also notable because it was the first theatre to be owned, run, and managed by the actors themselves. Judging by the mention of the “better class” in the Times article, we can imagine that this theatre, just a stone’s throw from the Eldridge Street Synagogue, would have catered solely to our historic congregations wealthy members. Early congregation leaders like banker Sender Jarmulowsky and kosher butcher Isaac Gellis would likely have attended shows here. But the congregants who could only afford the “cheap seats” at Eldridge Street may not have been welcome at The Grand. The Grand remained open for 20 years, but not exclusively as a Yiddish theatre. By 1909 it was leased to the Bedford Theatrical Company, and by 1913 it was playing Marcus Loew attractions (moving pictures). The theater closed in 1923, and after sitting vacant for several years, the entire structure was demolished in 1930. The theater was demolished in the wake of extensive neighborhood improvements on the Lower East Side, which included widening both Chrystie and Forsyth Street. As these streets were widened, all of the buildings on one side of the street were demolished, including The Grand. The demolished buildings once sat on the edge of what is now Sara Delano Roosevelt Park.

You would never guess that the building pictured at 190 Bowery is now a single-family residence. The former Germania Bank building was built in 1898-1899 by Robert Maynicke for its namesake, which served the middle class German residents who populated the area along and to the east of the Bowery, north of Division Street. The building functioned as a bank until the mid-1960s, when photographer Jay Maisel purchased it for $102,000. Maisel moved into the six-story, 72-room, 35,000-square foot building and continues to live there today with his wife and daughter, leading Wendy Goodman of New York magazine to declare 190 Bowery “maybe the greatest real-estate coup of all time.”

Numerous health facilities were established in New York City following the outbreak of HIV and AIDS cases in the 1980s. From 1993 to 1994, this building was converted to Rivington House, a VillageCare-operated nursing home for people living with AIDS. The architecture firms of Perkins & Will and Davis, Brody & Associates were responsible for the conversion. Rivington House opened in 1995 as the largest residential healthcare facility for AIDS patients in New York City and, perhaps, the nation. Equipped with 219 beds and an outpatient treatment center, it was originally considered an end-of-life nursing home for most of its patients; length of stay was 12 to 15 days and the death rate stood at nearly 50%. By 1997, new drug therapies were prolonging the lives of many people living with AIDS and, as a result, the death rate at Rivington House declined by 20% and the length of stay increased to 120 days.

96 Bayard Street, 1932.

My Archive Spring 2019 "Mott Street in front of Transfiguration school. A photo taken for 8th-grade graduation in 1982." —May Lew

Our Stories, Our Chinatown Landmarks is an ongoing audio exploration of memory and place, produced by Think!Chinatown. Through a story stroll around the neighborhood, we visit and remember our community members’ own personal landmarks and memories in Manhattan’s Chinatown. Our Stories, Our Chinatown Landmarks is a part of Chinatown Arts Festival 2023, produced by Think!Chinatown.

The Bowery Savings Bank, 130 Bowery,1975. Now a part of Capital One Bank, the Bowery Savings Bank was chartered in 1834. The building at 130 Bowery was designed by the firm of McKim, Mead, and White in a Roman classical style and was constructed between 1893-1895. The classical facade of this early bank building set the style for banking institutions in New York City.

Chatham Branch, NYPL, ca. 1903. Chatham Square Branch was the first of twelve Carnegie libraries designed by McKim, Mead & White. Completed in 1903, the structure remains one of the most intact Carnegie libraries (interior and exterior) in the city. The Chinatown-located library has served that community nearly since its opening. The library began a circulating Chinese language collection in 1911. Today the Chinese Heritage Collection, a unique collection of materials in English and Chinese, is housed on the lower floor.

Children on the Allen Street median eating ice cream. No. 21, the Lucky Merchandise Co. is seen in the background, 1955.

Manhattan Boot Black Supply, 254 Broome Street. The street is named after John Broome, an early city alderman and lieutenant governor of New York from 1804-1810.

My Archive Summer 2019 “247 Grand Street in Manhattan. On the left Vincenzo Trimarco and on the right Giovanni "Charlie" Trimarco (the Trimarco Bros.). Their father Domenico Trimarco came from Castelluccio Cosentino, Salerno, Italy to New York in the late1870s and worked his way from a simple tailor out of an apartment to an eventual store owner before passing away in 1906. His sons (brothers to my great-great-grandmother Nicoletta Felitti of East Harlem) became very wealthy businessmen through the family clothing business and were expert tailors themselves. They were well known for suits and wedding dresses. The original Lord and Taylor was a few buildings away, and the story has it that Lord and Taylor approached the Trimarco Bros. with a proposal to partner together, but the Domenico Trimarco said no, not wanting to move back uptown to where the new Lord and Taylor would be.” —Conor Welch

Tracks of the Second Avenue El above Division Street, viewed from the south walkway of the Manhattan Bridge. September 24, 1927.

This architectural drawing shows plans for a grand public bath house on Allen Street. The building, built in 1905, operated as a bath house until 1975, when once again the changing demographics of the neighborhood no longer necessitated a public bath house. But at the time, a new generation of Lower East Sider was arriving, and they repurposed this building for their own needs. Since 1975, the old bath houses are home to The Church of Grace to Fujianese, a Christian Chinese congregation. The church added a cross and the name of their congregation, in two languages, to the facade, but scalloped shells etched in the stone facade remain as reminders of the building’s original use.

The Wah Yan Mue Temple was located above the Temple Garden Restaurant at 16 Pell Street in the Hip Sing Building. Hip Sing Tong is one of a dozen tongs or business and neighborhood associations that assisted new immigrants with services, jobs, and a community. Hip Sing, established in the 1850s, is also well known in the 20th century as a criminal organization. The original temple on the upper floors of 16 Pell was the Fut Cho Mue Buddhist Temple. Its successor was the Wah Yan Mue Temple, which seems to have utilized some of the same items, including the ceremonial gong (seen at right).

Named for a grove of fruit trees on the DeLancey estate that comprised much of this area, Orchard Street is characterized by its tenements and history as a commercial thoroughfare, hosting many prosperous shops and street vendors. The five-story pre-law tenement at number 97 was purchased by the Lower East Side Tenement Museum in 1988 to interpret the history of immigration to the area. It is estimated that roughly 7,500 people from 25 countries resided in the building until it was sealed due to non-compliance with City housing codes in 1935. The six-story, red brick, Queen-Anne-style Old Law tenement at number 14-16 features a fanciful cornice and terra-cotta Stars of David, a feature shared by its sister building at number 47. 97 Orchard is listed on the State and National Register of Historic Places.

The Bowery north from Grand Street, 1903.

Building at the southwest corner of Lafayette and Howard Streets being dismantled during the construction of the IRT Lexington Avenue line, March 2, 1903.

The Ludlow Street Jail, New York City's 19th-century federal prison, opened in 1862 at the corner of Ludlow and Broome Streets. Intended as a prison for civil offenders, most inmates were debtors. The infamous Tammany Hall politician Boss Tweed was held at Ludlow Street, where he died of pneumonia in 1878, at the time unable to repay some $6 million of embezzled city funds. Victoria Woodhull, the first female presidential candidate, was also imprisoned for six months in 1872, accused of sending obscene material in the mail. The jail closed in December 1927 and was subsequently demolished. Today, the Department of Education’s Seward Park Campus, built in 1929, occupies the site.

Germania Bank Building ARCHITECT: Robert Maynicke DATE: 1898-99 STYLE: Beaux-Arts The former Germania Bank building is a Beaux-Arts style structure prominently located on the northwest corner of the Bowery and Spring Street. Built-in 1898-99 to the designs of architect Robert Maynicke, it was the third home of the Germania Bank, which was established in 1869 by a group of local businessmen of German extraction. By 1840, more than 24,000 German immigrants and their descendants were living in New York City. Their numbers increased dramatically over the next two decades. The granite and brick building features rusticated stonework, a chamfered corner with an arched entry flanked by Tuscan columns, and multi-story pilasters. The ground floor features large arched openings with voussoirs surmounted a massive denticulated cornice. A similar cornice terminates the fifth story.

The Chinese Merchant's Associaton was built in 1950 by Poy Gum Lee. The Museum of Chinese America describes the building as, "a boxy modernist block with modest Chinese decorative motifs...the most iconic building in Chinatown, the pagoda-topped On Leong Tong building typified Lee’s Chinese modern style." Poy Gum Lee, born and educated in New York, was the architectural consultant for the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association. This was the first building to be constructed in a style reflective of Chinese-American culture. Additionally, Poy Gum Lee was the first well-known architect of Chinese-American descent to build in Chinatown. The building houses the On Leong Tong, or the Chinese Merchants Association, a tong society established in 1893. This building was part of the tong's territory. Upon its formation, the On Leong Tong feuded with the Hip Sing Tong over control of the area. Tongs were mutual aid societies established to protect Chinese families and businesses against racism and prejudice in the United States. Many tongs were quickly associated with street gangs as violence between tongs was not uncommon. In extension, tongs found profit in appealing to vices, and many tongs were sustained by running brothels, opium dens, and gambling houses. However, tongs acted as the court and police force for Chinese-American communities, providing a semi-legitimate structure for communities otherwise unprotected by the government. The On Leong Tong is still operational and maintains over 3,000 members.

One of the most important ways we can try to better understand a historical period is to examine primary documents and sources – first-hand records – from that time. Newspaper articles, government reports and letters are all important primary sources, but photographs are among the most fun to examine. They provide visual evidence of a time period or event that can expand your historical understanding – and help you really picture what life was like back then. Every week, we’ll share with you a photograph of real people or a real scene from New York in the early 1900s. Your job? Put on your Young Historian glasses and examine it. What do you see? What do you think it shows you about the people in the picture, the place where they are, and the time period? What are the clues in the picture that tell you something? You’ll be amazed by what you can discover when you look closely!

Prisco State Bank, 1927. Prisco State Bank was founded in by an Italian man named Raffaele Prisco in the mid 1920s and occupied this classical style bank building on Mulberry Street in the heart of what was Little Italy at the time. In 1931 the bank was closed by a New York State Banking Agency and Prisco was arrested and charged with grand larceny. The charges involved withdrawing funds from an account held by the bank to pay a personal debt. Along with Raffaele, his two sons and a third employee were also charged and served time for the crime. When the bank closed, many of its clients, small businessmen of the neighborhood, lost their funds.

Built was working class residences, the two Federal style homes at 298 and 300 Grand Street were completed in the late 1820s or 1830s. Each is two and a half stories, with a single dormer gracing the pitched roof. With the boom in Manhattan's population in the first half of the 19th century, the ground floors were likely converted early into commercial spaces. Today, the pair survives (though perhaps just barely).

Olliffe Pharmacy, ca. 1950. In 1805 Dr. William F. Olliffe opened his druggist business. The location of the original shop is unknown, though it could have possibly been here at 6 Bowery. The wealthy Olliffe family lived on Broome Street (described as a "then a fashionable quarter of New York"). Olliffe's son, also William (M.) took over the pharmacy business likely in the 1860s. A late biography of the man noted that he "continued as proprietor in such a way as to leave him large leisure for social and other engagements." William M. died in 1885, but the Bowery shop survived with his name on the sign until 1957, when it closed after more than 150 years in business!

Broome Street, north side, west of Chrystie Street to the Bowery. July 18, 1929. At left is No. 330 Broome, a brick structure with a peaked roof. In the late 1970s, the performance artist Arleen Schloss ran A's, a performance space, studio, and gathering place for avant-garde artists, out of the loft at 330 Broome. In 1979, a young Jean-Michel Basquiat performed and showed work from his SAMO© series in the space.

“Rendering of a new Public School on Hester Street between Orchard and Ludlow Streets.” Designed by Superintendent of School Buildings C.B.J. Snyder in the late 19th century, P.S. 42 today bears the name of Benjamin Altman, an entrepreneur and art collector born and raised on the Lower East Side. Altman worked in his father’s dry goods store on Attorney Street before founding B. Altman & Co. on Third Avenue and 10th Street, in 1865. Upon his death in 1913, Altman bequeathed his art collection, including works by Rembrandt, to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

247 Canal, 1930. The six-story tenement building at the corner (no. 247) is no longer standing and has been replaced by an ad hoc single story souvenir shop. The traffic tower is, of course, no longer extant either. The traffic towers of New York were attempts at safety and traffic control on city streets that were becoming gridlocked and dangerous with automobiles. In 1920 Dr. John A. Harriss, a millionaire doctor, designed the first permanent traffic lights in New York, which were a small wood shed on a steel frame. From inside the shed a police officer could change the signals, allowing for traffic to flow safely in each direction. More traditional traffic lights (red, yellow, green) began to be installed in the late 1920s, but this corner at Lafayette and Canal had not had their tower replaced when this photo was taken in 1930.

"Chinatown Today," a 1973 mural by Alan Okada, viewed from Pike Street.; ca. 1978. Okada's mural was one of several produced by the City Arts Workshop, a community organization promoting the representation of the neighborhood's communities of color through the arts, especially murals. "Chinatown Today," appeared on the eastern wall of No. 107 East Broadway, above a vacant lot along Pike Street. After Edmund Vincent Gillon's photo, the single-story Hong Kong Supermarket opened on this lot. In May 2009, a fire at the supermarket caused heavy damage to the buildings abutting this corner, leading to the demolition of No. 107. By then, however, Okada's mural had been painted over.

Division Street tobacco store, January 26, 1938. According to “Changing New York,” the collection of photographer Berenice Abbott’s WPA work: “The Scharlin family opened its snuff store in 1876. The Yiddish signs in the window say ‘Do you want real strong smelling tobacco? Come in and see for yourself-free trial.’ At its height, the business had branches throughout the nation, and, in 1906, Mrs Scharlin reportedly declined an offer of $500,000. But, by the time of the Depression, the vogue for snuff had ended and the business was in decline. The seven-foot wooden statue of "Sandy" the kilted Scotsman holding a snuff box advertised Scharlin's snuff from the 1870 until 1938. He now resides in the Shelburne Museum in Vermont.” The tenement building that housed the Scharlin storefront is still standing, a few doors west of the Knickerbocker Post Office’s rear entrance.

Essex Street between Grand and Hester Streets, ca. 1978. Essex Street storefronts include an auto driving school advertising classes in three languages, Castillo Travel Agency, and Hebrew Religious Articles.

Kletzker Brotherly Aid Association building, ca. 1978. The Kletzker Landsmannschaft, an aid organization for immigrants, was founded in 1892 by Jewish immigrants from Kletzk, Poland (near present-day Minsk, Belarus). The L-shaped building, which has an additonal entrance at 41 Canal Street, has since been a funeral home serving the Jewish, Italian, and Chinese communities of the Lower East Side.

6-8 Delancey Street, date unknown (post 1929). Built on the foundation of a former theatre, the building at no. 6 Delancey Street was constructed in 1928 as a commercial space. But the financial crash of the following year prevented any retailers from succeeding in the space initially. Though a number of sources claim that Tree Mark, an affordable shoe store, did not move into the building until after the Second World War, there is evidence (a newspaper advertisement) of the store occupying the building as early as 1934. The shoe store lasted three decades in that space before closing. In 1997 the building was taken over by the Bowery Ballroom, a well-known music venue.

Odd Fellows Hall, ca. 1975. Built in 1849, the large Italiantate brownstone structure, with a steep double story mansard roof, was constructed as the grand lodge of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, a fraternal organization. Designed by architects Trench & Snook, the original structure was only five stories tall, with a traditional cornice and a broad dome above. According to a 1862 guidebook, ''Miller's New York as It Is,'' the building ''contains a series of highly ornamented lodge rooms, richly furnished in the different styles of architecture; some Egyptian, Grecian, Elizabethan, etc.'' Originally the lodge housed 79 subordinate lodges and commercial spaces on the ground floor. For organizations and clubs that could afford to build their own buildings, the cost was often defrayed some by collecting rent from purpose built retail spaces. The Odd Fellows sold the building in 1881 and the new owner, a printer, had the structure drastically altered to create lofts. The highly decorated interiors were gutted and the cornice was removed and replaced with the steep mansard. The loft spaced were occupied by manufacturing for more than a century. In the 1980s and 1990s, most of the lofts were occupied by garment factories. Despite the vast changes to the surrounding neighborhood, the building has changed very little since its massive renovation in 1881. Today it is a building of residential condominiums.

The Forsyth Street Synagogue of the Congregation Poel Zedek Anshe Illiya, 1930.

Anshe Chesed and Rodeph Sholom are respectively the oldest and second oldest surviving synagogue buildings in the city, and some of the oldest in the country. Both were constructed for German Jewish congregations in German architectural styles: Gothic Revival and Rundbogenstil (“round-arch style”), and feature red brick, central staircases and symmetrical façades with recessed central sections and square towers. Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue is the only Greek Synagogue in New York and the only synagogue of Romaniote Jews in the Western Hemisphere. The Eldridge Street Synagogue was America’s first major house of worship built by Eastern European Orthodox Jews. The yellow brick building features Moorish and Romanesque details and rich ornament. At its peak in the early 20th century, the synagogue hosted as many as 1,000 worshippers at services, but was forced to close in the mid-20th century when the area’s Jewish population began to dwindle. In 1986, the Eldridge Street Project funded a large-scale restoration of the building, which was repurposed as a museum. The Former Congregation Anshe Chesed, Kehila Kedosha Janina Synagogue and the Former Eldridge Street Synagogue are all designated New York City Individual Landmarks.

“Young men in front of 147 Forsyth St. Neighborhood Guild Library in hall bedroom over front door, parent of Rivington St. Branch.” The University Settlement Society of New York, was founded in 1886 as The Neighborhood Guild, a settlement house on Forsyth Street. The organization provided lodging, social services, and education to new immigrants arriving in New York. Today, University Settlement continues to operate on the Lower East Side at 184 Eldridge Street (the “Rivington St. branch” referenced in the photo caption).

Construction on the BRT Centre Street Loop, with timbering supporting buildings along Kenmare Street, June 5, 1908. The wooden foot bridge at center is at Mulberry Street. Completed buildings in the background are on the eastern corners of Mott Street. The Centre Street Loop, approved in 1907 but never completed as planned, was designed to connect service from the Williamsburg and Brooklyn bridges, via Chambers Street. Today, some tracks are used by the BMT Nassau Street Line (J/Z trains).

China Daily News was founded at 105 Mott Street by the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance, a rival of the Chinese Hand Laundry Association and the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association. Labeled a communist paper by its rivals, The Daily News was certainly leftist and was attacked for celebrating the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949. Some rumors even suggested that the Alliance was quietly aided by the Communist Party in China in the early years of its formation. A congressional record from 1942 wrote that the paper was suspicious, though it was helped by the fact that it was printed in Chinese and "a considerable amount of translating would be required to ascertain whether or not the paper adhered to the Communist Party line." However, by 1952, the paper was charged with violating the law by the United States Department of Justice. Two years into the Korean War, the China Daily News had been advertising ways for subscribers to skirt the Trading with the Enemy Act. The paper was caught publishing instructions on how to send remittances to families in China. Manager of the Daily News Eugene Moy was found guilty and sent to jail, where he died a few years later. Some staff members of the newspaper were deported, some fled the country voluntarily. To make matters worse, newspaper vendors were fearful to even carry the paper. Reportedly, even subscribers were hounded by the FBI. The paper survived the Cold War, but just barely. It was funded by leftists across the country who donated to its cause. The small circulation finally ceased to exist in 1989, as did the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance.

191 Canal Street has a long history. It was first home to the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance, which formed in 1933 in response to an ordinance targeting Chinese laundry owners. In 1933, an ordinance from the board of alderman required that the 3,500 Chinese-owned laundromats in New York City pay $25 in annual fees and post a $1,000 bond. Even though this ordinance did not explicitly target Chinese laundrymen in its language, they were its target. The ordinance was specifically geared toward one person laundries (almost all of the Chinese-owned laundromats were one-person businesses.) This ensured that the Chinese laundries would bear the brunt. Seeking legal protection, laundrymen looked to the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association (CCBA). The organization promised the protection of all Chinese-owned businesses so long as they paid their annual dues. In response, the CCBA asked for additional payments to open an investigation of the ordinance. Out of frustration with the CCBA's inaction and dues, the laundry owners formed the Chinese Hand Laundry Alliance in 1933. They had the help of Y.K. Chu, a regular critic of the CCBA and the editor of the Chinese Journal of Commerce. The following year, it is said that the CCBA bankrolled the formation of the Chinese Hand Laundry Association, a rival to the Alliance. The Alliance was never shy of their leftist and radical beliefs and therefore shed many members to the conservative Association in its early years. Soon becoming politically homogenous, the Alliance formed a newspaper aligned with their beliefs. The China Daily News was headquartered at 105 Mott Street, just around the corner from the Alliance's headquarters on Canal Street. The Daily News proved so successful that they were able to purchase the entire building at 191 Canal Street in 1951. Though Alliance and the China Daily News were met with success early on, this was by no means the end of the fight. The Korean War and the Cold War took its toll on both groups. Decreased subscribers and other financial strains required the news company to sell 191 Canal Street in 1951. A year later, the Justice Department charged the China Daily News with violating federal law. The paper was caught printing advertisements with instructions on how to send remittances to families in China, an act that violated the Trading with the Enemy Act. Manager Eugene Moy was announced guilty in 1954, and he died in jail a few years later. Some of the paper's staffers were deported, others fled the country. Subscribers of the China Daily News were hounded by the FBI with the intensifying pressure of the second Red Scare. However, The paper held on until 1989. The Alliance found a similar fate with "the long decline of the hand laundry industry...and the death of its elderly members."

Pushcarts and garment stores on Hester Street, ca. 1938.

80 Delancey Street, 1937. The street vendor here is sitting on the Allen Street median, directly across the street from the west facade of 80 Delancey Street. The plain flat brick facade remains the same, while the architecturally detailed south facade (not visible here) survives as well. The vendor is selling "Indian Nuts," which was the culturally inappropriate name for pinon, or pine nuts. These street nuts were not sold, shelled and roasted for $30 a pound such as they are today in Whole Foods, but in the shell in a wax or paper bag for 1 cent. A movie theatre staple as well as a street nut, they were once somewhat nostalgically described as, "those tiny nuts we bit open to get at a kernel that wasn't worth the work."

"White Street, at, adjoining and east of the north east corner of Centre Street, showing prominently three 2 1/2 story buildings bearing No's. 118 to 122 inclusive, 1938."

American Theatre (Thalia Theatre) In the stratified world of New York City theaters, with their implicit class associations, the American Theatre, at the corner of Canal Street and the Bowery, was considered a middlebrow house. Designed by Ithiel Town with the innovative use of gas jets for interior lighting, it had opened in 1826 and, by 1833, had been twice remodeled after fires. Three thousand patrons could be accommodated within its large central pit and four tiers of galleries, which reached across the house and down each side almost to the stage. In the Jacksonian era, urban theaters like the American Theatre had assumed new importance as democratic gathering spaces, in which ticket holders could not only relax but also vent political opinions publicly and intermingle with allies and enemies seated, depending on allegiances, in the more boisterous pit or costlier boxes. Ungovernable audiences often interrupted performances.

Opposite Mulberry Bend ca. 1898 This stretch of East Broadway was enjoying a revival of sorts after the 1892 demolition of the adjacent notorious slum, the Mulberry Bend. Here the well-dressed families and closed shops- one with a sign in Hebrew- suggests that it is Saturday and families are milling about after attending synagogue. Lazarus Levy- the proprietor of the shop at 30 East Broadway- was among twelve and a half pages of Levys listed in the 1898 city directory. He moved his business to East Houston Street within the year.

Built in 1890 by architect Josiah Cleveland Cody, this Romanesque Revival structure was first built as the temporary home to a missionary group attempting to proselytize to the local Jewish community. Unsurprisingly, that mission failed and the building was sold to Chevrah Poel Zedek Anschei Illia, a Jewish community of Lithuanian immigrants. In 1909 the new owners converted the ground level facade on Delancy Street side into retail spaces. The synagogue remained here until the 1960s despite long dwindling membership. Today the building is home to Templo Adventista del Septimo Dia. In early 2016 the church sought a developer to demolish the 19th-century building and erect a 12-story structure. As of 2018, nothing has come of that intention.

Former synagogue at Forsyth and Delancey Streets, now a Seventh-Day Adventist Church, ca. 1978. Built in the 1890s as the Forsyth Street Church, the congregation of immigrants from present-day Belarus and Lithuania took over the church in 1900. The building is notable for the row of ground-level retail storefronts on Delancey street, around the corner from its main entrance. In 1971, the building was sold to the Seventh-Day Adventist Church of Union Square.

Essex and Hester Streets, looking West, toward Ludlow Street. The Second Avenue El tracks are visible in the background, above Allen Street. Service ran along this segment, opened in 1880 and including stops at nearby Canal and Grand Streets, until its closure in 1942.

“Storefronts at the intersection of Division and Canal Streets. In the center is the former Loew's Canal Street Theatre.” Thomas Lamb designed the theater and its facade, completed in 1927. Loew’s Canal Street opened with a capacity of over 2,300 and remained in operation for at least 30 years. The former theater was sold in 1960 for retail use and designated a New York City Landmark in 2010.

Located at 54 Canal Street, this 12 story classical-style bank was built by architects Rouse & Goldstone for Sender Jarmulowsky in 1912. Jarmulowsky established his banking business on the Lower East Side in 1873 and was operating at this location by 1878. Here, recent immigrants could set up bank accounts, send remittances, and buy steerage tickets for their European relatives – in Yiddish. The bank quickly became a household name among Jews on both sides of the ocean. According to legend, Jarmulowsky added the capital to the top of the building (now removed) so that it would be the tallest in the neighborhood. His original plan had not included this detail, but the Forward Building down the street on East Broadway went up simultaneously and was slightly taller than his bank prompting the architectural change. The bank become a testament to Jarmulowsky’s success as a businessman and reflected his prominence in the Jewish community of the Lower East Side. Jarmulowsky died in 1912 shortly after the bank was completed, and his sons took over the business. unfortunately, they lacked their father’s business acumen and mismanaged the business. In 1914, at the start of World War I, the bank closed as many depositors made “runs” on the bank to get money to help their families in Europe. According to the New York Times, 2,000 people demonstrated in front of the bank. 500 people stormed the house where son Meyer Jarmulowsky lived, forcing him to escape across tenement rooftops. Jarmulowsky’s sons were indicted for banking fraud and the bank closed. The State of New York took over the bank in May 1917 and auctioned it off. In 2009, Jarmulowsky’s Bank building was designated a landmark by the Landmarks Preservation Commission. The building is currently (2015) being restored and the temple at the top will be rebuilt.

“Looking south on Orchard Street at the Sender Jarmulowsky Bank Building, 54-58 Canal Street.” The Jarmulowsky Bank Building was built by architects Rouse & Goldstone in 1912, in Beaux-Arts style. The bank failed after the United States entered World War I as immigrant depositors withtheir money to send to relatives abroad, and the bank became insolvent. Until 1990, the building featured a massive columned tower rising 50 feet to a dome ringed by eagles, allegedly added at Jarmulowsky’s behest in order to make sure his building was the neighborhood's tallest.

104, 102, 100 and 98 Forsyth Street, ca. 1977. The pair of matching tenements at 102 and 100 Forsyth Street (left and right, respectively, at center) were built circa 1868. The facades of these five-story buildings have retained many of their original features including decorative stone lintels and pediments and the crowning bracketed metal cornices. In the last few decades of the 19th century, these buildings were the headquarters of a meat packer and dealer called Coles, Marshall, and Co. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the avant-garde and experimental filmmaker, author and activist Marjorie Keller lived in an apartment in no. 100 while attending graduate school at NYU.

The Classic Coffee Shop, 56 Hester Street, ca. 1984. The coffee shop and diner at right has been serving the Lower East Side since the mid 1970s. The old-style lunch counter was owned in the mid century by a Benny Steinberg before being inherited by Miguel Morales who passed it along to his son, Carmine. They continue to serve no-frills fare (coffee, tuna melts, and grilled cheese) to the ever changing LES population.

149 Mulberry Street House ARCHITECT: Unknown DATE: 1811-21 STYLE: Federal Among its many important qualities, the Stephen Van Rensselaer House, at 149 Mulberry Street, is a good example of a modest early Nineteenth Century Federal style house. It has fine proportions, with its original features and excellent details well related in scale. After one hundred and fifty years, this structure continues to serve a useful purpose and in the neighborhood where it stands, it remains a quaint reminder of an earlier city.

Presbyterian Church of the Sea and Land, May, 1924.

After returning to New York from Paris in 1929, photographer Berenice Abbott set out to document the changing landscape she encountered in the city. Despite initially struggling to find funding for this endeavor, Abbott was hired by the Federal Art Project to complete a collection that became known as Changing New York. Although Abbott’s focus was the city’s changing nature, examining her photographs almost a century later brings to light a contrasting theme: the continuity within the change; aspects of New York life that have remained constant through the decades, serving as a reflection of some of the many things that make New York New York.

Manhattan Bridge, 1915. In 1910, a year after the bridge opened, the architectural firm Carrère and Hastings drew up preliminary plans for a grand entry to the bridge on the Manhattan side, in keeping with the City Beautiful movement’s emphasis on monumental architecture. Construction began that year, and plans were finalized in 1912. The arch and colonnade, completed in 1915, feature ornate sculptural detail, including pylons by the sculptor Carl Augustus Heber and a frieze by Charles Rumsey, entitled "Buffalo Hunt." The arch and colonnade were designated a New York City landmark on November 25, 1975. After years of neglect and appeals by traffic engineers to remove the structure, the arch and colonnade were repaired and restored in 2000.

Just as churches were often converted into synagogues by newly arriving Jewish immigrants, the inverse happened as well. This synagogue was built by Kol Israel Ansche Poland in “eclectic Moorish-Romanesque-Gothic style” by the architectural team of Herter & Schneider. It cost $100,000 and was dedicated on September 19, 1892. It gave the congregation much needed space for their rapidly growing congregation. Unfortunately, prosperity was short-lived and the congregation had to sell the building to St. Barbara’s Greek Orthodox Church in 1926. In short order, St. Barbara’s, too, had financial trouble and the building was foreclosed in the late 20s. It sat vacant until 1934 when St. Barbara’s was able to reacquire the property. The church made some alterations, removing or altering the Gothic stained glass windows and adding cross iconography but otherwise left the facade as it was. St. Barbara’s still owns the property today.

The Greek Orthodox Church of St. John the Baptist, October 1930. Built for the Congregation Kol Israel Anshe Poland in 1892, the synagogue at 27 Forsyth Street (then nos. 20-22) was sold to the Greek Orthodox Church in 1926. Today, it is St. Barbara’s Greek Orthodox Church The building was designed by the firm Herter & Schneider, whose Francis William Herter had previously designed the nearby Eldridge Street Synagogue.

88 Division Street, at the intersection of Division, Eldridge, and Forsyth Streets, looking north on Eldridge towards Canal Street. The Eldridge Street Synagogue, opened in 1887, and beautifully restored at the start of the 21st century, is visible on the east side of Eldridge Street (center).

"Thalia Theatre, 46-48 Bowery. Formerly Bowery Theatre. Photograph taken around 1881." Built originally in 1826, as the New York Theatre, the playhouse was established as direct competition to the Park Theatre on Park Row and Ann Street. The wealthy and fashionable citizens who had recently moved to the newly developing neighborhood on nearby Lafayette Street wanted access to high-class European theatre. The building itself was constructed on land that had once been occupied by the Bull's Head Tavern, one of George Washington's headquarters during the Revolution. After only two years in business, the theatre suffered a major fire in 1828, and the interior was rebuilt behind the surviving facade and renamed the Bowery Theatre. Though it would have a series of other names (American Theatre, Thalia Theatre , Fay's Bowery Theatre) it was from 1828 on generally referred to as the Bowery Theatre. The theatre's most successful period was from the 1830s to the 1850s, when it made a name for itself as a American nativist and populist hub (unsurprisingly it was during this period that it was renamed American Theatre). The building survived through the constantly changing neighborhood and populations of the mid to late 19th century and early 20th century. After a series of 19th century fires and rebuilding efforts, the theatre was finally destroyed by a fire in 1929.

The corner building at 85 Mott Street began its history as a luxurious brick-fronted home, complete with all the trappings of a Federal-style while also holding on to some Georgian elements. It featured dormers on a peaked roof, a pair of chimneys, and charming arched windows. Owing to its corner location, it perhaps received much more sunlight than most mid-block Federals. It likely only remained a single-family home for a short time, as the density of the city closed in on it. By 1835 it, and its two Mott Street neighbors, were bought by the Bull family and became multifamily dwellings. . Over the next century, the structure at no. 85 saw likely thousands of residents cycling through the various ethnic communities that inhabited the neighborhood. In the 1870s the ground floor was converted into commercial space, occupied by variously by a tavern and retail shops. . The Bull family sold the three buildings in 1939 and Chinatown-born architect Poy Gum Lee was hired to design a new structure for the On Leong Tong, or Chinese Merchants Association. The resulting building, completed in 1951, was a cultural hybrid, which combined a Modern style with stereotypical “Chinese” features, like a pagoda roof and projecting balconies.

New York City Police Headquarters ARCHITECT: Hoppin & Koen DATE: 1905-09 STYLE: Edwardian Baroque Among its important qualities, the Former Police Headquarters Building is one of New York City’s most important examples of the Edwardian Baroque style of architecture and of Beaux-Arts principles of design. It incorporated a new, official image for the nation’s largest and most sophisticated police force.

P.S. 20, Rivington Street, 1920. P.S. 20 opened in 1899 when the Lower East Side was a neighborhood of poor immigrant families living in crowded, dark and decaying tenements. In contrast, the public schools designed by C.B.J. Snyder offered a rigorous education in classrooms that maximized natural light, fresh air and ventilation. The fifth story of P.S. 20 contained a library, reading room, separate gyms for girls and boys and manual training rooms for carpentry, drafting and modeling. The rooftop playground offered a large space for a variety of open-air activities, far above the congested and dirty streets below. The red-brick school later became the Rivington House, a nursing home which provided hospice care to AIDS patients. The building was sold to a private developer in 2015, after deed restrictions were lifted, leading to public outcry and scrutiny of de Blasio administration practices.

203 Bowery, between Spring and Rivington Streets, 1932.

41 Mott Street in rendering at the far right, 1950.

Built in 1887, the Eldridge Street Synagogue was the first grand synagogue built by Eastern European Jews in the United States. Now a museum, it stands as a testament to the 19th century’s great wave of Jewish migration and the Lower East Side’s legendary Jewish community. The synagogue was designed in a Moorish style and built by German Catholic brothers Peter and Francis Herter. It was only the fifth building the Herter brothers had created in New York, and the first non-tenement structure. The structure’s Moorish style is evident in the horseshoe windows on the exterior, interior domes & arches, and dazzling decorative arts in the main sanctuary. The interior also boasts a more recent addition - a stained glass window designed by artist Kiki Smith & architect Deborah Gans, installed in 2010 to replace a historic rose window damaged in the mid-20th century. In the mid-20th century, after decades of declining membership, the congregation abandoned the main sanctuary in favor of the smaller sanctuary (Bes Midrash) on the lower level. Rediscovered in the late 1970's in a state of severe disrepair, the building underwent a meticulous 20 year, $20 million restoration. In 2007 the fully restored space was officially rededicated as the Museum at Eldridge Street. Today the Museum welcomes visitors of all backgrounds, faiths, and interests for tours, concerts, book talks, and other programs. The surrounding neighborhood, now Chinatown, offers a rich foundation for exploring history, immigration, and urban culture. It is open to the public Sunday through Friday.

282-286 Grand Street, ca. 1970. The three buildings at 282, 284 and 286 Grand Street are Federal style rowhouses erected in the early 1820s. In 1864 a shocking murder occurred right in front of no. 282 (at left). A Robert Haines, painter, motivated by jealousy murdered the new domestic partner of the wife he had abandoned years earlier. Once topped with a pair of dormer windows each, by the 21st century these features had been lost. In 2017 plans were filed with the city to demolish these nearly 200-year-old structures and construct a seven-story rental building on the site. Despite considerable delays, the three buildings were finally razed in the early months of 2018.

S. Jarmulowsky Bank Building ARCHITECT: Rouse & Goldstone DATE: 1911-12 STYLE: Modern Renaissance The S. Jarmulowsky Bank Building was described at the time of its construction as “the first strictly high-class tall bank and office building” on the Lower East Side. It was completed in 1912 as the architectural showpiece of Sender Jarmulowsky, one of the Lower East Side’s most prominent bankers. Jarmulowsky achieved wealth and fame on the Lower East Side by providing steamship tickets and banking services to the immigrants of the neighborhood, which was then unrivaled as the world’s largest Jewish community. It was executed in the “Modern Renaissance style” and the tripartite configuration that was standard for tall buildings of the time.

Golden Pacific National Bank, 1991. In 1982, the firm P.K.Y. Chen completed a drastic conversion of a few early 20th-century buildings at the northwest corner of Canal and Centre Streets. Designed for the headquarters Golden Pacific National Bank, the new edifice had the look of a Chinese pagoda. The main Canal Street frontage stands six stories while a two-story wing extends along Centre Street to Howard Street. The building is rendered in tan brick, multi-colored tiles, red piers, and numerous green, tiled, pagoda-style roofs. While the original tenant vacated the building two years after it opened when they became insolvent. Today, the main tenant is once again a bank, but its best-known occupant is perhaps the Starbucks at its corner.

Odd Fellows Hall ARCHITECT: Trench & Snook DATE: 1847-48 STYLE: Anglo-Italianate Built in 1847-48, it is an early and particularly fine example of the Anglo-Italianate style of architecture that architects helped introduce to New York. It is one of the few surviving institutional buildings of any style from the 1840s, an important period in the architectural history of the city. The design with its emphasis on planar surfaces accented by a rusticated base, central projections, and colossal pilasters is characteristic of the style and takes full advantage of the building’s prominent site.

180-184 Lafayette Street, ca. 1970-1985. These three classic SoHo buildings were constructed at various times, by different architects in different styles, and slightly different purposes, though they all epitomize the historic built environment of this neighborhood. No. 184 (at right) is the oldest. Designed in 1871-1872 by William Jose in an Italianate style, this five story tenement was built for and continues to be used for residential purposes on the upper floors. The two buildings at left are Queen Anne style loft buildings. No. 180 (left) was designed by Buchman & Deisler in 1891-1893, while no. 182 (center) was built in 1890-1891 by Thom & Wilson. These buildings signaled a shift in the area from SoHo's early history as an entertainment center, to its 20th century life as a manufacturing and industrial hub.

"138-142 Bowery, south of the S.W. corner of Broome Street, 1932." The building at 140 Bowery (with the Callahan the Hatter sign) was a Federal style house built as early as 1808. The building was likely, exclusively, a home until 1825 when a dry goods store moved into the ground floor space. That store was followed by a jeweler and a hat and artificial flower shop. In 1868, the retail space was taken over by the Callahan the Hatter store, which would remain in place for more than 60 years. John Callahan, the Irish immigrant who established the store, had a sharp marketing sense and big plans. Callahan, at one point, had 700 advertising signs around the city, and in late 1870s expanded the store into the second floor residential area. According to the notes on this photograph, Callahan's was popular among "many of the beaux and dandies of the 'Gay Nineties." The building survived into the 2010s when in 2011 it was being considered for landmark status. At that point the owner removed the twin dormers and covered them with a black asphalt material. In 2014 the three buildings at Nos. 136 through 140 Bowery were sold for $45 million. They were demolished in the spring of 2016.

The intersection of Canal, Baxter, and Walker Streets, ca. 1870. The above view is westward, toward the Hudson River. At center left, west of Centre Street, is the warehouse of the M\&G Wilkinson wood and willow ware wholesalers. At bottom left is the Grand Street Ferry-bound streetcar, likely en route from the Cortlandt Street Ferry downtown. The image, credited to "American Photo," also appears in the New York Public Library's Photographic views of New York City collection. Notes there date it to ca. 1860, though the presence of M\&G Wilkinson advertising (founded 1867) indicate a later date.

Public art represents and is represented with many different forms and ideas, its creation, concept and location all come into play when looking at a piece's place in an urban landscape such as New York City. Public art takes up a space, one that is always shared with a community, part of this story would like to address how the two intersect. In some cases a piece can even breed its own community, in the case of 5 Pointz, which in itself was its own piece of public art but also a space that created a community of artists. The Graffiti Mecca can also lead us to ask the question, “What is considered public art and where is the line drawn?” This question will be explored as well as looking to an ideal future for a city where art is put at a higher priority. Where graffiti artists aren’t criminalized for their work or used for profit. Looking at spaces and experiences where a community can be represented and enhanced by public art with ways of giving back and giving all people ways of expressing themselves.

Soy Kee Co. Soy Kee and Company was an importer and exporter of Chinese goods, selling curios, chinaware, lamps, silks, ivory carvings, imported Chinese teas, candies, coffees, and other accessories. It was first located here at 36 Pell, under a Chinese eatery before moving to 7-9 Mott Street where it occupied the ground floor space of a building known for its busy upstairs restaurant, called Port Authur. It is unknown when Soy Kee and Company opened, but its move to Mott Street occurred sometime after 1903. In 1921 Soy Kee and Co. became the owners of the building they had long rented at 7-9 Mott Street.

The Church of the Sea and Land, viewed from the Manhattan Bridge. Photographed by Berenice Abbott as part of the Federal Art Project, March 30, 1937. At the turn of the 19th century, the Rutgers family — for whom nearby Rutgers, Henry, and Catherine Streets are named — owned a farm on the Lower East Side. After the Commissioner’s plan of 1811, Henry Rutgers donated land along Rutgers Street for the construction of churches, including the Market Street Reformed Church (also known as the Northeast Dutch Reformed Church, and variations on the same). The Georgian Gothic Revival church was constructed from field stone and Manhattan schist and completed in 1819. In 1864, following the dissolution of the Dutch Reformed Church, it became the Presbyterian Church of the Sea and Land, its new name a reference to waterfront laborers who made up the congregation. In 1972, the Sea and Land Church transferred ownership of the building to the First Chinese Presbyterian Church, who had shared the space since 1951.

Bowery Savings Bank Interior ARCHITECT: McKim, Mead & White; Stanford White DATE: 1893-95 STYLE: Roman Revival The interior of the Bowery Savings Bank is an early example of the Roman Revival style which was to become standard for savings bank buildings and was intended to express both simplicity and grandeur. The skylit, eighty-foot square, steel-framed banking room has details that closely follow Roman prototypes and it compares in scale to the grandest buildings of ancient Rome. The banking room is a prime example of a type which evolved in the second half of the nineteenth century characterized by a symmetrical arrangement and a prominent, axially-placed freestanding bank vault in a large centralized space organized with a peninsular layout of the tellers’ area to accommodate male and female depositors. In response to contemporary sanitary concerns, the interior was designed with durable, easily cleaned, surfaces and the building’s form was exploited to provide effective natural ventilation.

Though Broadway has become synonymous with theater in New York, the Lower East Side has a rich tradition of theatrical productions. To explore this, let's take a look at two of these theaters on the Lower East Side, The Grand Theatre and the Loews Canal Theatre. Both of these theatres are closed today, however, after their final curtain their fates have been entirely disparate.

Germania Bank, ca. 1905. Robert Maynicke’s Renaissance Revival building, completed in 1899, was the third location of the Germania Bank, which was founded by a group of German-American businessmen in 1869.

Hebrew Religious Articles store, 45 Essex Street.

Over a 130 years ago, New York’s Lower East Side was home to the world’s largest Jewish community. Between 1881-1924 over 2 million Eastern European Jews called this neighborhood home. And just as generations of immigrants have and continue to do, this community transformed the LES, creating a network of businesses, synagogues, public gathering spaces and more. Today, the LES has gone through many changes, but look closely. Tucked along these bustling blocks, signs of immigrant Jewish life – and hopes – still remain.

Founded by Sender Jarmulowsky, the Jarmulowsky Bank provided vital services to the immigrants of the LES and today serves as a marker of the neighborhood's heritage.

6 Centre Market Place ca. 1937 The shop on the small alley of Centre Market Place had belonged to gunsmiths since the 1850s. Its oversized shop sign was an age-old form of European advertising, originally devised for illiterate patrons and still useful on the multi-lingual Lower East Side. The ornate French Baroque police headquarters was built across the street in 1909 for the then-staggering cost of $1.5 million, and stood as a potent symbol of the rule of law. One of Abbott’s photographs of the shop offers a straightforward description of the storefront, similar to Atget’s Parisian views. A second photograph, with the camera pointed up from beneath the sign, transforms the gun from a symbol of a craftsman’s trade into a surrealist found object or a political joke. The shop remains a gunsmith, although the sign is gone. In the 1970s, a new police headquarters was built near the Municipal Building. The old headquarters is now a landmarked luxury condominium called The Police Building, home to artists and celebrities.

Umberto's Clam House, pictured here in the distance, at the corner of Mulberry and Hester Street, has long been famous as the site of a mob hit. The establishment was opened by Umberto Ianniello in 1972. His son, Matthew Ianniello AKA "Matty the Horse" was a rambunctious mobster and part of the Genovese crime family. He was later be found guilty of skimming the profits from around 70 Manhattan restaurants, bars, and strip clubs. This list included his father's restaurant. At 4:30 in the morning on April 7, 1972, gangster "Crazy Joey," Joe Gallo was killed while dining at Umberto's with friends and family. His party included Gallo's wife of three weeks, her 10-year old daughter, and his bodyguard Peter Diapoulas, and Diapoulas' date. They had just come from the Copacabana nightclub at 10 East 60th Street. Gallo, who was celebrating his 43rd birthday, supposedly thought the Genovese family wouldn't take offense at his presence as Little Italy was believed to be off-limits for gang brawls. Gallo was a member of the Profaci crime family and had been marked for execution by the Colombo gang for several months. The shooting left bullet holes in the facade of the restaurant across the street (they were still visible in the mid-1990s!) The next morning, Colombo gang member Joseph Luparelli turned himself in to the FBI as one of the perpetrators. Luparelli detailed the events of the evening as follows: Luparelli and a friend, who happened to be at Umberto's Bar, spotted Gallo and entourage enter the restaurant and take a table facing the door. Luparelli rushed to a nearby hangout of other Colombo members to alert them to the sighting. The men included Philip Gambino and Carmine Di Biase. They phoned acting head Yacovelli and left the restaurant briefly the arm themselves. Shortly after, five men drove two cars to Umberto's, four of whom entered the back door of Umberto's and shot 20 bullets. Three of these bullets entered the mobster's body. Gallo stumbled out into the street and he died on the pavement. The Colombo men fled to Nyack, New York, at which point Luparelli began to become concerned that the others planned to kill him as well. He turned himself into the FBI after fleeing to California. Matty Ianniello claimed that he was not involved in the incident in any way, and recounted diving from the cash register into the kitchen when the first shot was fired. On the floor of the kitchen, Ianniello covered his eyes. The next thing he heard was the empty clicks of a gun pressed against his skull. Fortunately for Ianniello, Gallo's bodyguard depleted his ammo trying to save his client. On February 13, 1986, the court sentenced Matty Ianniello and eight others to time in prison after being indicted for racketeering charges. With "Matty the Horse" in jail, the Federal Government began overseeing the business of Umberto's. United States Attorney Rudolph W. Giuliani administered this action, which made it the only restaurant in the country to have been overseen or seized by the government due to mob activity. From 1988 until 1994, all managerial manners and finances were handled by government-appointed Michael C. Prezioso. Owner and brother of Matty, Robert Ianniello, complained that the interference left slim profits during the 6 years of supervision. A revision to the agreement restored Ianniello's management rights in 1994, though Prezioso would still be allowed to perform spot inspections of all financial records. Umberto's has moved twice since the 1972 shooting, once in the mid-1990s to Mulberry and Broome, and again in 2010 to a spot closer to the original. Umberto's is owned by Robert Ianniello Jr., the grandson of Umberto Ianniello. The original Umberto's building is occupied by Ristorante Da Gennaro.

Northern Reformed Church ARCHITECT: Unknown DATE: 1817-19 STYLE: Georgian Gothic The Northern Reformed Church has what were probably among the earliest pointed Gothic windows and doors in Manhattan. it is an especially fine, simple example of a well-constructed church of the Federal period, and its construction was made possible through the generosity of one of New York’s leading citizens, Colonel Henry Rutgers. It was built in Georgian Gothic style.

Kosher chicken market, Hester Street, ca. 1937.

Tracks of the Second Avenue El above Division Street, viewed from the south walkway of the Manhattan Bridge. March 9, 1934. The car at left is traveling on the northbound track, from Chatham Square toward Canal Street. This segment of the elevated line closed in 1942. The building under construction in the background is the United States Courthouse at 40 Centre Street (today the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse).

78 Mott Street, 1914. James Naughton (referred to as Joseph in at least one source) was born in Ireland and immigrated to New York in the 1860s. For more than five decades he served the Chinatown/ Five Point area as an undertaker. He purchased a number of local buildings including Nos. 37 and 78 Mott Street, as well as the stables at Nos. 31-37 which operated for both mortuary and police horse needs. Though Irish and certainly having enough Irish clients, he also advertised to and served both the local Italian and Chinese communities.

“A crowd of people on Orchard Street, lined with street vendors. Orchard Street at Hester Street, Looking South, 1898.” Division Street is visible at the end of Orchard Street. Orchard and Hester Streets were home to two of the Lower East Side’s largest open-air pushcart markets. These markets were a feature of daily life for the neighborhood’s poor tenement residents; they provided cheap food and goods for customers and income for vendors.

174-178 Grand Street, ca. 1978.

Orchard Street pushcarts, ca. 1940. As Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia worked to eliminate the unregulated outdoor vendors who had long been a fixture of Lower East Side life, commerce on Orchard Street shifted from push carts to garment retail.

The Bowery is one of New York’s most storied streets with a rich and varied past that reflects the hurly-burly history of New York City itself. As Manhattan’s oldest thoroughfare, the Bowery began as a Native American trail and originally extended the length of the island north to south. New York’s early Dutch settlers widened the trail for their own use to connect New Amsterdam at the tip of Manhattan with their farms, or bouweries, farther north. This “Bouwerie Lane” became simply “Bowery Lane” under the English in 1813 and the name has remained unchanged since. By the 1830s, the Bowery was mostly developed into single-family Federal-style rowhouses inhabited by New York’s wealthy merchant class. Remarkably, some of these buildings still survive today. Massive immigration to New York beginning in the 1840s led to new residents, and Germans became a large presence just east of the Bowery in an area which became known as Kleindeutschland. Many prestigious institutional buildings from this era survive today on the Bowery and reflect this German presence. As immigration continued to increase in the decades before the Civil War, the upper class who resided in the townhouses moved northward, and the rowhouses were then converted to multiple dwellings and businesses like beer halls and saloons. By the end of the Civil War, the Bowery had become a primarily commercial area with little new residential development. To accommodate the waves of returning and homeless veterans, the area increasingly became home to flophouses and other types of cheap lodgings. During this period, it also became a major theater and nightlife district, where vaudeville and other popular entertainments were developed. The Third Avenue elevated line opened in 1878 and cast the street into deep shadow, further discouraging new residential development. Regardless, due to prevalence of affordable lodging, at the turn of the 20th century the Bowery was housing more than 25,000 men per night. With this large transient population came a host of social ills and during this period, the Bowery gained a national reputation as a “Skid Row” and a “Thieves’ Highway.” The area upheld this reputation until the Second World War, when the draft depopulated the area. The G.I. Bill and other social programs of the post-war era greatly reduced homelessness and the seemingly permanent transient population of the Bowery never returned to its early 20th-century peak. The street developed into a thriving light fixture and restaurant equipment district, although many of those businesses have recently closed in the face of new hotel and commercial development. The Bowery remains an architecturally rich area with a unique mix of Federal-style rowhouses, grand institutional buildings, tenements and commercial loft buildings, each type speaking to a different era in the boulevard’s storied history. Many of these buildings were spared because the elevated rail line, which was removed in the 1950s, deterred speculative development for decades. In recent years, however, new large-scale development has increased and is putting the built heritage of the Bowery greatly at risk.

32 Mott Street (tall building, second from right), ca. 1890. 32 Mott Street is a dumbbell-shaped "old-law" tenement that was built in 1897 by the architect Louis Heimeeke. This section of Mott between Pell Street and Chatham Square was the center of late 19th century Chinatown. The ground floor of this building was occupied for more than 100 years by a Chinese store run by generations of the Lee family. The Quong Yuen Shing and Company shop opened here in 1899, changed its name to 32 Mott Street General Store in the mid 20th century and only closed in 2003 due to rising rents. Chinese-American architect Poy Gum Lee lived here at no. 32.

Doyers seen from Bowery, ca. 1900. The Chinese Tuxedo opened in 1897 as a high-class restaurant catering to both Chinese and white patrons. Established around the same time as a number of other eateries of similar ilk (including Port Arthur on Mott and the Chinese Delmonico on Pell), this restaurant had a district advantage over the others. Location, location, location! The restaurant at the corner of Doyer Street and the Bowery was so close to the Third Avenue elevated that passengers could practically climb out the train car window onto the ornate second-floor balcony. The pretty balcony and large eagle that topped it were eye-catching from both the street and the el, and when those same passengers exited the nearby Chatham Square Station, this was the first Chinese restaurant they encountered. The owners spared no expense with decoration. The entrance included a large and colorful stained glass awning with a dragon perched atop. The balcony was not metalwork but delicately carved teak panels. The interior was a showy display of mosaic tile floors, tin ceilings, lush plants, fountains, and hard carved screens, statues, and moldings. The Chinese Tuxedo was out of business by the 1920s (closing its doors decades before some of it local contemporaries). The ornate facade features were lost and today the building houses a Chase Bank. In 2016 a family-run Chinatown investment company opened a new Chinese Tuxedo Restaurant just down the block from its historical predecessor. The new eatery is located at 5-7 Doyers, a building with its own history. In 1983 a local merchant established the Chinese Opera House at no. 5-7, the first Chinese language theater in New York City and the only Chinese theater east of California at the time.

Looking east on Canal Street from the intersection of Division Street. The tall building at left is the Jewish Daily Forward Building, designed by architect George Boehm and completed in 1912. The Jewish Daily Foward was founded in 1897 and was published in Yiddish. The paper is still published, with the English-language printed weekly and the Yiddish printed by-weekly.

Central and Prospect Park parks dominate New York City park history. While that’s somewhat understandable, it’s about time smaller parks got some attention of their own.

Congregation Sons of Israel Kalwarie, ca. 1978. The Romanesque Revival synagogue was designed by Alfred E. Badt and completed in 1904. Also known as the Pike Street Shul, the synagogue closed in controversial circumstances, beginning in September 1979. Just prior to Rosh Hashanah, the trustees sold the building without notifying the congregation, beginning a 15-year legal battle which ended with its eventual sale to a developer. Though 13-15 Pike Street was made a New York City landmark in 1997, the designation came too late to save its original stained glass windows. Today, it is home to the Sung Tak Buddhist Temple.

“Looking west from the intersection of Division and Canal Streets at Ludlow Street.” The Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, completed in 1973, are visible along Division Street, at left.

View of the Manhattan Civic Center, including the Municipal Building, U.S. Courthouse, and Woolworth Building, ca. 1935. The building at extreme right, in the foreground is the Church of Land and Sea, at the northwest corner of Henry and Market Streets.

149 Mulberry Street, 1932. The Federal style building, seen at left, was more than 100 years old at the time of this photograph. Built by Stephen Van Rensselaer, a businessman, landowner, and politician, circa 1816, the home was actually built on a plot on the northwest corner of Mulberry and Grand, but moved to this location in 1841. The once wood-frame and now brick clad building retains much of its Federal styling, including the dormer windows. Currently home to a restaurant and cocktail bar called the Mulberry Project, from 1947 until 2005 it was Paolucci’s restaurant, and prior to that (at least in 1932 when the photo was taken) it was Villa Nova Restaurant.

This collection of locations in Chinatown was curated in collaboration with Think!Chinatown to celebrate, appreciate, and support the local community of Chinatown. This collection of historical photographs illustrates the diverse businesses, architecture, and communities that have occupied the streetscapes of this vibrant neighborhood over the last two centuries!

Seward Park High School, 350 Grand Street, ca. 1972. Constructed in 1929, the building was built to house a high school whose origins dated back to 1905 and the opening of Public School 62. P.S. 62 was an intermediate school located at the intersection of Essex, Hester, and Norfolk Streets. Originally only seventh and eighth graders, in 1916 a ninth grade class was added it became the Seward Park Junior High School. In 1923 it was made an experimental school that was both an intermediate and high school. By the late 1920s the intermediate students had been transferred and the first school building was razed in the construction of the Sixth Avenue Subway. The new lot for the school, bound by Essex, Grand, Brooms and Ludlow Streets, had formerly housed a school, the Alimony Jail, a court house, and some tenements.

From pig's knuckles to spaghetti to liver balls, find out how a city eats in years past!

Doorway to 113 East Broadway, March 30, 1937.

77-79 Delancey Street, ca. 1970. The newly chartered Bank of the United States was founded in 1914 by Joseph S. Marcus. The private bank prospered for a number of years in part because people believed its "high-titled" name indicated that it was run by the government. Many complained, particularly immigrants, that it deceived depositors into thinking it was even the central bank founded by Alexander Hamilton. Following the crash of 1929, the bank was among the first to fail. With 400,000 depositors at the time of its collapse, the New York Times declared the bank’s defeat to be the largest in history up until that point. Shortly thereafter, the building housed the Hebrew Publishing Company, one of the most famous publishers of Yiddish literature in the world. In 1976, the company relocated to a smaller office just a few blocks south on Grand Street. The building has since been converted into an office and apartment complex.

103 Bowery ca. 1935 The Blossom Restaurant occupied the ground floor and Jimmy’s Barber Shop the basement of the Boston Hotel, a flophouse on the Bowery. As a child, Al Smith, governor of New York from 1919 to 1928, lived next door at 105 Bowery when it was a lodging house. Abbott made three exposures, one without figures, one with a ragged man perusing the restaurant menu, and a third showing the barber Jimmy and his assistant waiting for customers. The third version is the most emotionally resonant: the restlessness of these hapless people exemplifies the mood of the Depression. Like so many other buildings on the Bowery today, this one is occupied by a restaurant supply wholesaler.

20 Mott Street (three-story building with double balconies), ca. 1900. The Baohuanghui (Protect the Emperor Society or the Chinese Empire Reform Association) was founded by exiled Chinese reformer Kang Youwei in 1899 to promote constitutional reform in China (and the return of Guangxu Emperor to power). It became the first and the largest Chinese transnational organization. Various locations on Mott Street housed the New York headquarters of this organization in the first half of the 20th century. In 1902 and 1903 the Baohuanghui used an address at 20 Mott Street to communicate with their members, before moving on to nos 5, 6, 7-9, and 12 Mott in later years.

41 Mott Street, 1933. No. 41 (at the center of the frame with the balcony at the top) was home to the Chinese Merchants Association or the On Leong Tong, in the first half of the 20th century. The Association celebrated the opening of their new headquarters in 1921 with an eleven-day celebration. Its opening night saw 15,000 revelers crowding the narrow street of Chinatown and more than 6,000 merchants from 20 different cities. In 1950 the On Leong Tong Merchants Association moved into a new Chinese Modern building on Mott and Canal Streets. Since 1977 No. 41 was has been owned by the Lee Family Association, the oldest and largest tong in New York City. The building today has a modern style white facade, installed at an unknown date in the midcentury. Its lower floor has long been home to Golden Fung Wong Bakery, one of the oldest bakeries in Chinatown.

The Canal Street Station on the Third Avenue Elevated Railway, c. 1880. The Third Avenue El opened in 1878, with operations from South Ferry to 129th Street, later connecting to service in the Bronx. The Third Avenue El was the last of the Manhattan elevated railways to close — after the Second, Sixth and Ninth Avenue lines — following pressure from City Hall and property owners along Third Avenue. On May 12, 1955, the Canal Street Station closed, as Third Avenue service was eliminated south of 149th Street in the Bronx.

Storefronts at 62-66 Hester Street advertise silks, woolens, dress goods, laundry, and “family electric shoe repairing."

178 Hester Street, 1932. Despite the asphalt shingles that can be seen on the side of the building and the odd perhaps 1980s style brick facade, this building is the early 19th century, wood-frame structure seen in this 1932 photograph. Built in the first few decades of the 19th century, the history of this structure which survived alongside the construction of the taller tenement buildings that define these streetscapes, tells the story of this neighborhood. In 1855 a volunteer firefighter named John Nichols, who was a teamster by trade, lived here. In 1900, owing to the massive influx of Italian immigrants, the building had residents with names like Dominick Pagano and Guadazro Gaetano. Supposedly a mob hit occurred just outside the store at no. 178 in 1906 when Angelo Ladero (a fish dealer with a shop at 120 Mulberry Street) killed Michael Dambra after he left the store. In 1908 the owner of two pushcarts resided here.

You submitted, and we rounded up our faves! Here are some spectacular shots of dads across NYC's five boroughs throughout the years. Happy Father’s Day!