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Tag: Emma Goldman

Louise Bryant

Louise Bryant was always her own person, and always somewhat of a paradox. She was a fearless journalist, activist, suffragist, and talented writer, who was also a study in contradictions — a chronic dissembler who sought the truth, a free love advocate who was prone to fits of jealousy, and a communist who twice married wealthy […]

East Village Building Named for President Felled by Anarchist; Also Home to ‘Hope,’ and Art By Koons

No. 111-115 East 7th Street is one of the more striking tenements in the East Village.  First of all, it’s seven-stories.  It’s also covered in beautiful Renaissance Revival detail. There’s much more to this landmarked structure than that, however.  It’s name appears to be a salute to a recently-fallen U.S. President, struck down by an […]

Romany Marie’s, Feeding and Defining Village Bohemianism

That village, the labyrinth of streets and lanes… into which those restless individuals seeking political or social or cultural change began settling after 1910 consisted mostly of buildings grown dingy since prosperous New Yorkers had begun moving northward…Marie was one of those newcomers. — Robert Schulman from Romany Marie, Queen of Greenwich Village Born and […]

Jo Davidson’s “Plastic History,” Featuring His Village Friends

This is one in a series of posts marking the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District.  Check out our year-long activities and celebrations at gvshp.org/GVHD50.  Jo Davidson may not be a household name, but his work is familiar to many New Yorkers.  Born on March 30, 1883, Jo Davidson grew up on the Lower […]

East Village Building Blocks Tour: the LGBTQ East Village

While the neighboring West Village may have the more well-known sites, the East Village contains a rich assortment of places connected to LGBTQ history, including the homes of noted artists, writers, musicians, and activists. It also holds a vast array of performance venues and gathering spaces that attracted and helped launch the careers of many […]

    Emma Goldman, Birth Control Crusader, Arrested

    Emma Goldman, anarchist and feminist, advocate of free speech, free love, birth control, and the eight-hour workday, was arrested in New York City on February 11, 1916. Charged with violating the Comstock Act, an 1873 law banning the transportation of “obscene” matter, the courts interpreted distribution as transportation. Goldman later spent time in jail for […]

    John Reed: Journalist, Revolutionary and Villager

    John “Jack” Silas Reed was an American journalist, poet and communist activist at the beginning of the 20th century whose writing about revolutionary events and radical causes made him a very polarizing figure in this country and abroad. He is probably best known as the author of Ten Days That Shook the World, his account […]

    15 Trailblazing Women of Greenwich Village and the East Village

    Greenwich Village is well known as the home to libertines in the 1920s and feminists in the 1960s and ’70s. But going back to at least the 19th century, the neighborhoods now known as Greenwich Village, the East Village, and Noho were home to pioneering women who defied convention and changed the course of history, […]

    November 22, 1909: A Frail 23 Year Old Woman Ignites the Strike of the 20,000 at Cooper Union

    On November 22, 1909, a frail 23-year-old woman, who’d been brutally beaten by strike-breakers, was helped up onto the stage of the Great Hall at the Cooper Union. Leaders of the labor movement – all men – had been speaking for hours to a crowd of thousands, speaking out against poor garment factory working conditions […]

    Labor History in the Village

    Some of the most important events and most prominent figures in the labor movement bear strong connections to the Village and East Village.  Without these courageous individuals, or the events connected to them, we might never have had fair wages, better working conditions, or the right to collective bargaining.  Below are a few standout homes […]

    The Espionage and Sedition Acts

    The Espionage Act was passed on June 15th, 1917, shortly after the United States entered World War I in April of that year. Its goals included limiting interference with recruitment efforts and preventing the support of enemies of United States during wartime. In his message to Congress, President Woodrow Wilson warned that the war would require a […]

    Local Landmark: Tompkins Square Library

    Note: This is an updated version of a post originally written by Drew Durniak  Since it opened on December 1, 1904, the Tompkins Square Branch of the New York Public Library has served as an important community resource.  Situated on East 10th Street between Avenue A and Avenue B, the building itself was designated an […]

      East 4th Street and its Political Past

      This post is the second of a three-part series called Histories of Fourth Street, from East to West, a collaboration between GVSHP and the students in NYU’s Fall 2015 Intro to Public History course. Each group of students was tasked with preparing a presentation around a particular topic concerning a section or block of Fourth […]

      Rose of the Ghetto

      There are still a few seats available for our free public program this Thursday evening at the Jefferson Market Library. The subject is the life and times of Rose Pastor Stokes, known to our presenter, Kate Pastor, as “My Great Great Aunt Rose of the Lower East Side.” Kate herself is a Bronx-based journalist who […]

        Happy Birthday, Mabel Dodge Luhan

        By the time Mabel Dodge (also known, in recognition of her four husbands, as Mabel Evans Dodge Sterne Luhan) set up her weekly salon in her apartment at 23 Fifth Avenue in Greenwich Village in 1912, she had already been twice married and once divorced, gave birth to a son, and had attempted to take […]

        East Village Tenement Housed “the Most Dangerous Woman in America”

        Anarchist and revolutionary thinker Emma Goldman, known for her political activism, writing, and speeches, can claim East 13th as her home in the early twentieth century. Goldman was known for supporting a wide-range of controversial causes, including free speech, birth control, women’s equality, union organization, and workers’ rights. She was considered, by the Federal Bureau […]