A Block in Time
A New York City History at the Corner of Fifth Avenue and Twenty-Third Street
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- $24.99
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- $24.99
Publisher Description
Gotham meets The Island at the Center of the World in this dazzling history of a single block in Manhattan from the Age of Exploration to the present.
This is the story of New York City, told through the prism of one block, bordered by Twenty-third Street to the south, Twenty-fourth Street to the north, Fifth Avenue and Broadway to the east, and Sixth Avenue to the west. It's a story of forest and cement, bird cries and taxi horns, theaters and factories, gambling dens and gourmet foods. It's also the story of high life and low life, immigrants and tourists, farmers and aristocrats, crooked cops and moral reformers, toy stores and social climbers--from Solomon Pieters, a former slave who was the first owner of the block, to Alexander "Clubber" Williams, the notorious police officer of the 1870s who accepted bribes and wielded his club with equal impunity, to Marietta Stevens, whose Sunday-night socials and scheming became the stuff of legend. Greed and generosity, guilt and innocence, extravagance and degradation--all have flourished on this one Manhattan block, emblematic of the city as a whole.
Venturing from the opulent halls of the Fifth Avenue Hotel to grimy Sixth Avenue brothels, from the era of the Lenape to that of the Dutch, from the Gilded Age to the twentieth century, when the block and the city were transformed into something closely resembling the Manhattan we know today, A Block in Time takes us on a dynamic, exhilarating tour of history. Welcome to New York, past and present, and hear all the sordid and edifying stories this small patch of land has to tell.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Journalist Bird (The Sultan's Shadow) sheds light on the evolution of Manhattan from the 17th century to today in this colorful history of "the block between Twenty-third and Twenty-fourth streets, Fifth and Sixth avenues." She sketches the island's natural history before introducing the block's human inhabitants, including Solomon Pieters, who, in 1680, was awarded "the largest land grant ever given to a Black man," 30 acres on which the block later developed. A chapter focusing on real estate tycoon Amos Eno, who opened the Fifth Avenue Hotel at the corner of 23rd Street and Fifth Avenue in 1859, gives insights into the early days of the city's hospitality industry. Perhaps the most intriguing story is that of surveyor John Randel Jr., "a young, inexperienced, dark-haired man with a temper and a passion for details and math," who spent three years making measurements and pounding 1,600 bolts and markers into the ground in order to create the 1811 grid that formed the basis for the current layout of Manhattan's streets. Elsewhere, better-known historical figures including financier James "Jubilee Jim" Fisk and architect Stanford White, who kept a "love nest" on the block and was shot and killed in the rooftop theater of the nearby Madison Square Garden, make appearances. Enriched by Bird's brisk character sketches and copious research, this is an entertaining and eye-opening snapshot of New York history.
