Today I take you on a NYC Gangster tour to explore the final night of Monk Eastman’s life. The story begins in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, then we show the Williamsburg Bridge, head to 14th St, and then finish up back in Williamsburg at the location where Monk Eastman’s wake and funeral service were held.
Be sure to check the playlist for all of my NYC Gangster stories.
Today I am sharing a video that I took along Metropolitan Ave in Ridgewood, Queens. The purpose of the video is to show you how Metropolitan Ave looks today, compared to what it looked like in 1940. Fortunately I was able to find images of every story along Metropolitan from 1940 in a two block radius.
Be sure to check out my YOUTUBE CHANNEL for all of my hundreds of uploads.
This is just a now and then project that I am going to be doing on Youtube.
Back with a story today about the history of Scrabble in Jackson Heights, Queens, New York. Join me as I lead you through the origins of the board game Scrabble, how it was developed and where it was originally played. We are at the Community United Methodist Church which is where the inventor of the game, Alfred Mosher Butts, first tested out his invention and where through trial and error the game was developed. The church is located in the neighborhood of Jackson Heights, Queens, New York.
Today I am in Little India New York in Jackson Heights, Queens. This was an area that I used to visit weekly back in the 1990s but I haven’t been back there in over 20 years now. In little India you can get an array of beautiful foods, all cooked authentically which differs from Little India in Manhattan, where they cook the food for a Western audience.
The NYC History video today is at the Elks Lodge in Queens where ECW held their wrestling shows at the Madhouse of Extreme. This is more of a personal story rather than an out and out NYC history video, when I used to come to the Elks Lodge in the 1990s to watch ECW Wrestling. There are a couple of other items in the video, the Boca Juniors football themed restaurant and the First Presbyterian Church.
The Betts Family cemetery located in Maspeth, Queens, dates all the way back to 1713, when the patriarch of the family, Capt. Richard Betts
The Betts Family cemetery located in Maspeth, Queens, dates all the way back to 1713, when the patriarch of the family, Capt. Richard Betts dug his own grave just a few days before he died at the age of 100. Yes, he dug his own grave when he was 100 years old 🙂 The Betts homestead occupied this part of Long Island starting in 1656, originated by Capt. Richard Betts and his family. The last burial to take place at the Betts family cemetery was 1877. The Betts cemetery now lies within the confines of Mt. Zion Jewish cemetery, and Mt. Zion maintains the upkeep of the old Quaker cemetery on its grounds.
The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, on March 25, 1911
The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City, on March 25, 1911, was the deadliest industrial disaster in the history of the city, and one of the deadliest in U.S. history. The fire caused the deaths of 146 garment workers – 123 women and girls and 23 men – who died from the fire, smoke inhalation, or falling or jumping to their deaths. Most of the victims were recent Italian or Jewish immigrant women and girls aged 14 to 23.
The factory was located on the 8th, 9th, and 10th floors of the Asch Building, at 23–29 Washington Place, near Washington Square Park. The 1901 building still stands and is now known as the Brown Building, which is part of and owned by New York University (NYU). The building has been designated a National Historic Landmark and a New York City landmark.
Today we visit the GoodFellas diner film location in Maspeth, Queens for our NYC Stories video
Today we visit the GoodFellas diner film location in Maspeth, Queens for our NYC Stories video. This is where the stars, Robert De Niro and Ray Liotta awaited word of Joe Pesci’s character being named a made man. The diner was originally called the Clinton diner and it is located in Maspeth, Queens.
Today I pay a visit to the site of the old Long Island Baseball Grounds in Maspeth, Queens. Back in the 1800s, up until 1893, the baseball grounds here were home for several years to the New York Cuban Giants. Aside from the Giants a whole host of future hall of famers also played at this ballpark.
Old Brooklyn Dodgers Ballparks: https://youtu.be/gojm8ii-pRE
Feldman’s Park: https://youtu.be/Sk0YM6gEFuA
Baseball stopped being played here in 1893, but that doesn’t mean that the area doesn’t have a story to tell, and I am here to tell you that story. The Cuban Giants were the first fully salaried African-American professional baseball club. The team was originally formed in 1885 at the Argyle Hotel, a summer resort in Babylon, New York. Initially an independent barnstorming team, they played games against opponents of all types: major and minor league clubs, semiprofessional teams, even college and amateur squads. They would go on to join various short-lived East Coast leagues, and in 1888 became the “World Colored Champions”. Despite their name, no Cubans played on the team. The “Cubes” remained one of the premier Negro league teams for nearly twenty years, and served as a model that future black teams would emulate.
Walking In NYC 