History.Workshoppin’: Issue 4 (February 2025)
Oof. What a rough time we are in, both federal (*waves in direction of everything*) and local (a mayor who just wants to avoid prison and will sell us out to make that happen, and a media environment ginning up an all-about-crime campaign and a Kang vs. Kodos choice of said mayor or resigned-in-disgrace-but-wanting-a-comeback former governor, ranked choice voting be damned). I have been having a lot of trouble trying to formulate a reasonable political praxis that (a) is relatively effective and (b) will keep me sane. But so much of our politics is steered by people motivated neither by logic nor shame, but rather a desire to (as Josh Gondelman put it in a recent edition of his excellent newsletter) “steal someone’s bowling ball, just to drop it out the window onto the head of a pedestrian.” I guess the best thing I’ve been able to do to fight back is lift up candidates I like for mayor and start advocating for critical issues in the state budget process, but if anyone’s figured out a way to keep our most vulnerable neighbors safe, I’m all ears.
Sorry for the heavy intro, but it’s a heavy time. On to the dates, deets, and other goodies.
Coming Up Next
In addition to the below, I’m also conducting a rare reprisal of my Ray Carney’s Harlem: 1959-1976 tour. This tour looks at Harlem through the lens of Colson Whitehead’s Harlem Shuffle and Crook Manifesto mystery novels and premiered last Jane’s Walk. 2/22 is exclusive to past Jane’s Walk leaders and some Municipal Arts Society members, but I’m also hosting a free friends and family edition the following day (2/23). And while I can’t offer you unlimited soup, salad, or breadsticks, when you’re here, you’re family, so reply to this email to get on the guestlist for this one. After that, the Harlem tour goes back into the History Works Vault™ until whenever Whitehead finishes the trilogy, so now is your chance!
As a reminder, use code KICKOFF25 on my website for $5 tickets to all tours from New Year’s Day through March 30. More discount codes below. Cool? Cool.
February 2025
2/9, 1:00 p.m.: The Lower East Side: History and Foodways
2/15, 1:00 p.m.: Frederick Douglass in Brooklyn
March 2025
3/1, 2:00 p.m.: The Lower East Side: History and Foodways
3/2, 12:00 p.m.: Quenching Gotham’s Thirst: New York Before the Croton Era
3/16, 11:00 a.m.: The Lower East Side: History and Foodways
3/30, 11:00 a.m.: Greenwich Village: Activists and Agitators
April 2025
4/5, 2:00 p.m.: The Lost Theaters of Bay Ridge
4/6, 11:00 a.m.: Green-Wood, Sunset Park, and LGBTQS Lives
4/19, 2:00 p.m.: The Bridges of Gowanus: Rezone Remix
4/26, 2:00 p.m.: The Lower East Side: History and Foodways
And remember, I have the following coming up in May and June:
May 3–4: Jane’s Walk NYC, including the free premiere of Quenching Brooklyn’s Thirst: The Pre-Catskill Water Supply and possibly another walk TBD (Gotham’s got an afternoon match, so I’m thinking maybe a morning Columbia Street Waterfront District garden crawl; also, if you know anything about the history of why there are so many community gardens along Columbia Street, please get in touch)
May 17–18: Bay Ridge Constitutionals, four fixtures before and after Saturday’s Viking Festival and Sunday’s Norwegian Day Parade (use code NORWAY25 for $18.14 tickets for these tours)
June 22: I celebrate the summer solstice (kinda) with three tours from morning to sunset (use code RUNAROUND for half-off tickets for those tours)
Stuff I Wrote
I recently reviewed Extremely Unique Dynamic, which I sadly enjoyed less than I wished. New pieces coming up soon on the restoration of the 1999 film Compensation, a look at GoodFellas through a Long Island South Shore lens, a reflection on meticulous obsession in Matt Wolf’s documentaries, and full coverage of Athena Film Fest uptown next month, too.
Stuff I Wrote… and Recorded!
Last month I got into the studio (at the Brooklyn central library; disabuse yourself of the Electric Lady imagery in your mind) and recorded the rough cuts of the NYC Ferry audio project! Here’s a preview before the final cuts end up on the ferry.nyc site, and (possibly — they’re still figuring it out over there) embedded in the NYC Ferry app (right next to where you get your tickets and check the timetables and stuff!). Once the full project is available — likely sometime in Q2 — that will certainly make its way in this newsletter.
Stuff I’m Baking
A huge batch of English muffins, for part two of Archestratus’s To Live and Rebuild in LA bake sale fundraiser. (I will not be in Greenpoint myself, but all the baked goods should be good.)
Something from the Archive
Back on the Brooklyn water beat, as of this past Wednesday! Starting to turn the corner on dots to connect in getting this tour together, though wrangling my pages of notes and photos in the next six weeks or so is going to be a bear. I’m getting into a fun part in my research where my focus has turned to the post-1898 period of Brooklyn water, when the city has become a borough and new sources of supply could not come soon enough. To that end, two highlights:
This map (from the Merchants’ Association of New York’s reports on the city’s water supply from 1900) does a great job of pointing out the many pumps and wells that made up part of Brooklyn’s water supply in this era (along with all of Queens and Staten Island’s). But it also has one of those off-putting “Australia is at the top” sorts of qualities to it. It’s like if you put the Cartographers for Social Equality into a time machine and made them all government reformers.
And here is a photograph of a ceremonial spade for the groundbreaking of the Catskill Aqueduct in 1907, part of the commemorative program of ceremonies put together by the Board of Water Supply (which had its own glee club and provided much of the entertainment that day). George B. McClellan, Jr. got to wield this fancy shovel to “turn the first pieces of sod” for the project, three years after he staffed the controls of the first subway train from City Hall to 103rd Street. We don’t talk about McClellan fils nearly as much as we should, especially compared to his Civil War general father.
Some Sensory Stimuli
![A white bus (with a blue strip along the front grille and the sides) operating in the rain. The digital rollsign of the bus reads "B16: Lefferts [Gardens]/Prospect [Park] Sta."](https://assets.buttondown.email/images/4a2eddea-5afd-450e-8148-829632f9d2f8.jpg?w=960&fit=max)
I’m giving myself a wide berth for what constitutes “sensory stimuli” this time around. Thus far I have featured taste, vision, and sound, but I think more than anything else I have made it a point to emphasize the essences of these senses that coalesce into a vibe. And this time around the stimuli are mostly vibes-first, senses-second, but it’s something I rhapsodize about to friends, family, and acquaintances, so here goes: this issue’s shoutout is Riding the B16 Bus on a Saturday Morning.
It’s the confluence of the route and the timing here, more than anything else. The B16 (termini: Shore Road and 4th Avenue in Bay Ridge; the Prospect Park station of the Q and the Franklin Avenue Shuttle) is itself a pretty clutch route on any day, a rare diagonal connector from Southwest to Central Brooklyn. But the B16 on a Saturday morning is next-level. From Bay Ridge along Shore Road (not far from the Bay Ridge Greenmarket, in the back half of the Walgreens parking lot, 9408 3rd Ave., when in-season Saturdays May through November) and then on 86th Street, then up Fort Hamilton Parkway past the N train station (and past the grocery store/local institution Three Guys from Brooklyn, 6502 Ft. Ham. Pkwy, and my one of my favorite Chinese bakeries, Shun Fa, 6221 Ft. Ham. Pkwy) to 56th Street, the bus heads into Borough Park. In the middle of Shabbos.
And then with barely any cars on the street — just mostly Satmar folks going to shul — we’re just flying up 14th Avenue for twenty blocks. Before you know it, we hit Warp 2 or whatever and are already at Green-Wood’s Fort Hamilton gatehouse within mere minutes. At that point, I usually get off in Windsor Terrace (perhaps for brunch at Batata, 3021 Ft. Ham. Pkwy) and either walk over to the southwest corner of Prospect Park or hop on a Citibike to points north or east. But one could stay on as the bus goes down Caton Avenue alongside the Parade Grounds (here is where Cinderella’s carriage typically becomes a pumpkin, as far as speed is concerned) and up Ocean Avenue to the Prospect Park Zoo (where Chrisinda and I once had a great outing to see the sea lions before walking across the park to get dinner at Java, 455 7th Ave.) and the southern entrance of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
Or you can stay on all the way to the northern end and hop on the train, potentially continuing the diagonal-ness of it all on the shuttle. Perhaps to the Brooklyn Museum (by way of the Botanic Garden stop on Eastern Parkway); a vegan Ethiopian brunch or lunch at Ras Plant Based, 739 Franklin Ave., off the Park Place stop (the only single-track station, and the only station just serving a shuttle, in the whole city); or all the way to the C train on Franklin and Fulton for whatever is open that morning. (I once had a B16-to-the-shuttle trip to get dinner with friends at Hart’s, 506 Franklin Ave., which was one of my dumber esoteric transit itineraries.) And then you can hop back on the train to the bus and get home before havdalah. A top-tier conveyance for a top-tier Saturday.
How’s Reading The Power Broker Going, Daniel?
Holy smokes I did it! I wrapped up the holidays by finishing the last 300 or so pages and celebrated by visiting the New-York Historical Plastic Inevitable (as a member of the 2018 NYC museum softball league champion Hyphens, you can take that punctuation from my cold, dead hands) for The Power Broker at 50 exhibition that just got renewed to August. And now I am handing the book off to you, hopefully! Reply if you want my copy for free; pickup available anywhere in Manhattan or Brooklyn west of Prospect Park). Makes for a great yearlong (or more) read, and if you’re desperate, a decent doorstop.
A Cat
Fairy is up for adoption! She’s getting adopted straight out of our place, no café time planned (long story), but would make a great addition to anyone’s home and family!
Hope to see you in the streets soon! I’ll be back in touch just before Opening Day in the Bronx and Flushing Meadows (can you believe we got Soto?). Until then, consider forwarding this newsletter to a friend, and stay safe out there.