The Bowery Boys: New York City History

A long, long time ago in New York — in the 1730s, back when the city was a holding of the British, with a little over 10,000 inhabitants — a German printer named John Peter Zenger decided to print a four-page newspaper called the New York Weekly Journal. This is pretty remarkable in itself, as there was only one other newspaper in town called the New York Gazette , an organ of the British crown an...

When Prospect Park was first opened to the public in the late 1860s, the City of Brooklyn was proud to claim a landmark as beautiful and as peaceful as New York’s Central Park. But the superstar landscape designers — Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux — weren’t finished. This park came with two grand pleasure drives, wide boulevards that emanated from the north and south ends of the park. East...

On October 29, 1975, President Gerald Ford walked into a press conference at the National Press Club and, using more precise, more eloquent words than legend remembers, but in no uncertain terms, told New York City that the federal government was not going to bail it out. The following day the New York Daily News -- the city's first tabloid newspaper summarized his blunt, castigating speech into o...

Join us for an interview with Instagram historian Keith Taillon ( @keithyorkcity ), whose detailed posts about New York's history have earned him nearly 60,000 followers and launched a successful tour business. Keith shares the story behind his remarkable pandemic project of walking every single block of Manhattan in 2020, capturing the empty city in photographs that now appear in his first book,...

We invite you to come with us inside one of America’s most interesting art museums – an institution that is BOTH an art gallery and a historic home. This is The Frick Collection , located at 1 East 70th Street, within the former Fifth Avenue mansion of Gilded Age mogul Henry Clay Frick , containing many pieces that the steel titan himself purchased, as well as many other incredible works of art fr...

The history of the United States Postal Service  as it plays out in the streets of New York City -- from the first post road to the first postage stamps. From the most beautiful post office in the country to the forgotten Gilded Age landmark that was once considered the ugliest  post office. The postal service has always served as the country's circulatory system, linking the densest urban areas t...

A special bonus episode! Two years ago we featured Patrick Bringley on the show, the author of All The Beauty In The World (Simon & Schuster) , regarding his experiences as a security guard at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the life lessons he learned strolling silently past priceless works of art. The book has become a massive best-seller worldwide and has even become a cultural phenomenon in...

It's one of the most foundational questions we could ever ask on this show -- how did New York City get its name? You may know that the English conquered the Dutch settlement of New Netherland (and its port town of New Amsterdam) in 1664, but the details of this history-making day have remained hazy -- until now. Russell Shorto  brought the world of New Amsterdam and the early years before New Yor...

The New Yorker turns one century old -- and it hasn't aged a day! The witty, cosmopolitan magazine was first published on February 21, 1925. And even though present-day issues are often quite contemporary in content, the magazine's tone and style still recall its glamorous Jazz Age origins. The New Yorker traces itself to members of that legendary group of wits known as the Algonquin Round Table -...

Greg and Tom have taken off their historian hats and have become -- movie critics? Close but not quite! This week we're giving you a 'sneak preview' of their Patreon podcast called Side Streets, a conversational show about New York City and, well, whatever interests them that week. In honor of the Academy Awards, the Bowery Boys hosts pay homage to the great Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert while looki...

This year marks the 100th anniversary of Alain Locke 's classic essay "The New Negro" and the literary anthology featuring the work of Langston Hughes , Zora Neale Hurston , Countee Cullen  and other significant black writers of the day. The rising artistic scene would soon be known as the Harlem Renaissance , one of the most important cultural movements in American history. And it would be center...

One of America's first great Italian neighborhoods was once in East Harlem, once filled with more southern Italians than Sicily itself, a neighborhood almost entirely gone today except for a couple restaurants, a church and a long-standing religious festival. This is, of course, not New York's' famous "Little Italy,"  the festive tourist area in lower Manhattan built from another 19th-century Ital...

A star of the New York City skyline is reborn -- the Waldorf Astoria is reopening in 2025!  And so we thought we'd again raise a toast to one of the world's most famous hotels, an Art Deco classic attached to the Gilded Age's most prestigious name in luxury and refinement. Now, you might think you know this story -- the famous lobby clock, Peacock Alley, cocktail bars!  -- but do we have some surp...

There were very few history podcasts around back in the year 2008, but the Bowery Boys Podcast was certainly here ... and so was The Memory Palace, hosted by Nate DiMeo , presenting small, often forgotten vignettes from history in a descriptive, narrative format. In this special interview episode, Greg talks with Nate on the occasion of his new companion book " The Memory Palace: True Short Storie...

Just the name "Tiffany" evokes the glamour and elegance of the Gilded Age. But there is much more to the story than just the eponymous retailer who continues to sell fine jewelry and decorative objects today.  In this episode of the Gilded Gentleman podcast, Carl Raymond is joined by Lindsy R. Parrott, the Executive Director of The Neustadt Collection , one of the country's most important collecti...

  Greenwich Village is one of America's great music capitals, an extraordinary distinction for an old neighborhood of tenements, townhouses, dive bars and a college campus. So many musical titans of jazz, folk, pop and rock and roll got their start in the Village's many small nightclubs and coffeehouses, working alongside artists, writers, actors and comedians to create an American cultural mecca...

Does your personal library overwhelm your home? Are there too many books in your life -- but you'll never get rid of them? Then you have a lot in common with Gilded Age mogul J.P. Morgan ! Morgan was a defining figure of the late 19th century, engineering corporate mergers and crafting monopolies from the desk of his Wall Street office. In the process Morgan became one of the wealthiest men in Ame...

The Rockettes are America’s best known dance troupe — and a staple of the holiday season — but you may not know the origin of this iconic New York City symbol. For one, they’re not even from the Big Apple! Formerly the Missouri Rockets, the dancers and their famed choreographer Russell Markert were noticed by theater impresario Samuel Rothafel , who installed them first as his theater The Roxy, th...

What is Thanksgiving without the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade ? The annual march through Manhattan -- terminating at Macy's Department Store -- has delighted New Yorkers for a century and been a part of the American tradition of Thanksgiving since it was first broadcast nationally on television in the 1950s. Macy's began the parade in 1924 as a way to promote the new Seventh Avenue extension of...

The energy and personality of New York City runs through its local businesses -- mom-and-pop shops, independently run stores and restaurants, often family run operations. We live in a world of chain stores, franchises, corporate run operations and online retailers that have run many of these kinds of stores out of business. But what is New York without its diners, its small book shops, its curious...

The young socialite Dorothy Arnold seemingly led a charmed and privileged life. The niece of a Supreme Court justice, Dorothy was the belle of 1900s New York, an attractive and vibrant young woman living on the Upper East Side with her family. She hoped to become a published magazine writer and perhaps someday live by herself in Greenwich Village. But on December 12, 1910, while running errands in...

On January 1, 1898, Greater New York was formed from the union of two cities – New York and Brooklyn, along with other towns and villages of the region, creating the five boroughs we know and love today.  But each of those five boroughs brings their own unique histories and personalities. And so for this year’s annual Bowery Boys Halloween Special, we thought we’d give each borough the spotlight –...

New York City has its fair share of famous 'urban legends' -- persistent rumors, too good to be true, often macabre and dark. No, we're not talking about just about ghost stories. (Those arrive next episode.) We mean far fetched, reality defying fantasies sometimes rooted in science fiction and horror – with just enough bearing to the real world that many people believe them to be true. Tom and Gr...

Ida Wood had a secret. Born Ida Mayfield in New Orleans, Ida moved to New York in the 1850s and through her marriage to Benjamin Wood, publisher of the New York Daily News , she entered society.  By the 1870s, Ida’s name was regularly found in the social columns of the city’s newspapers. So why, in 1907, did Ida Wood cash in – withdrawing her fortune from the bank and then, along with her sister a...

In 2022, Greg received a large box in the mail, containing hundreds of news clippings and documents related to the Collyer Brothers. This expanded, newly edited version of his 2019 show on the Collyer Brothers includes some of this research. New York City, with over 8 million people, is filled with stories of people who just want to be left alone – recluses, hermits, cloistering themselves from th...