Chronicles of Old New York: Exploring Manhattan’s Landmark Neighborhoods
Can a 260-page book do justice to Harlem, Turtle Bay, SoHo, Greenwich Village, and other landmark Manhattan 'hoods, both extant and long-gone? No. And yes. Roman, a real-estate broker and third-generation New Yorker, covers ground familiar to most locals, and maybe others: SoHo has the most cast-iron buildings in the world; Chinatown was populated by men because women weren't allowed to emigrate; the Dakota was the city's first high-end apartment building. Fortunately, the author peppers his effort with less familiar factoids as well: NYU's first building was built by Sing Sing prisoners; Congress exempted John D. Rockefeller, Jr. from gift taxes to facilitate the donation of land that the UN was built on. Though accounts can be cursory (the Lower East Side gets four pages), and the author sometimes announces the obvious ( "America was thrilled when World War II ended"), the book includes walking tours and a guide to townhouse architecture, and packs a good bit of history into one handy source. It's not for the specialist, but New Yorkers will learn a few new things, and history-minded tourists will find it a useful addition to their other guidebooks.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.