From 1939 until 1941, the New York City Department of Taxation collaborated with the Federal Works Progress Administration (WPA) to take photographs of each building in the five boroughs. Known then as the “Real Property Tax Card Record System for the City of New York,” the initiative started in 1938 when the Department of Taxation […]
The subject of how much government can and should invest in infrastructure and public works is a hot topic of debate, especially now. Such conversations often point back to the era of the New Deal when the federal government channeled our tax monies to local investments and funded and built much of New York City’s […]
For twenty four years, the entire existence of the organization, the International Workers Order (IWO) was headquartered at 80 Fifth Avenue (southeast corner of 14th Street), an elaborately-detailed Renaissance Revival style office building designed in 1908 by Buchman and Fox. This progressive mutual-benefit fraternal organization was a pioneering force in the U.S. labor movement, which […]
This is one in a series of posts marking the 50th anniversary of the designation of the Greenwich Village Historic District. Click here to check out our year-long activities and celebrations. The Greenwich Village Historic District has been home to more artists over the years than one could possibly count; we’ve identified more than one […]
This picturesque wintry scene of Christopher Street was painted by Greenwich Village resident and artist Beulah Bettersworth in 1934. Looking west from Hudson Street along Christopher, it shows the Ninth Avenue El Christopher Street Station and St. Veronica’s Church beyond. Currently, this painting is part of the permanent collection of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. […]
Many today are too young to remember that the name LaGuardia didn’t always just refer what is frequently called the worst airport in America. Rather, it also referred to a three-term New York City mayor often cited as New York City’s best mayor (and arguably both its first Italian-American and first Jewish mayor), who championed political […]
The Vesuvio playground, one of the few green spaces in the newly designated Sullivan-Thompson Historic District, is a true haven for South Village children. In the 1920s, the New York City Parks Department started buying land for playgrounds in the then-Italian-immigrant community.
On April 8, 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act. This act granted the President the authority to establish programs such as the W.P.A. (Works Progress Administration, later renamed the Work Projects Administration) to combat the Great Depression. There are many great examples of the W.P.A.’s efforts throughout the Village and East Village.
On April 8 1935, the creation of the Works Progress Administration was approved by Congress as a part of FDR’s New Deal. The New Deal was born at the height of the Great Depression as a series of economic programs that focused on the three R’s- Relief (for the unemployed and poor), Recovery (of the […]
