In Old New York: A Classic History of New York City [Hardcover]

Thomas A. Janvier (Author), Edwin Burrows (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 2000

Novelist and antiquarian Janvier brings us this insightful, charming, and droll look at Manhattan history. The city's past is revealed through sketches, diaries, scenes of daily life, and wry illustrations such as "A Winter Night in Grove Street, " "A Privateersman Ashore, " "The Conflagration in 1776, " "Home for Aged Couples, Hudson Street."

Janvier pays special attention to now-lost features of many famous neighborhoods, including:
-- The forgotten brooks and byways of Greenwich Village
-- The colleges and backyard tennis courts of Chelsea
-- The parks and farms of Tribeca
-- And the shanties, barns, and castles of the Upper East and West Side

Illustrated throughout with maps, etchings, and entertaining line drawings, plus a new map pinpointing all the locations in the text, In Old New York is like a walking tour of Manhattan past and is a rare treat for New Yorkers and history buffs everywhere.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Today's New Yorkers are famous for both their fierce loyalty to their hometown and their intense desire to tell you how they can make it better. Things were no different in 1894, when historian and social commentator Janvier first published this meticulously detailed, floridly anecdotal and occasionally cranky love letter to his adopted home, reprinted here with a helpful new introduction by Brooklyn College history professor Edwin G. Burrows. After painstakingly outlining the city's early growth and development, Janvier, a self-trained historian, rants that an 1807 city commission charged with laying out the city's streets threw away "the magnificent opportunity... to create a beautiful city." By creating Manhattan's now famous grid of streets and avenues, they thwarted continued development of the complex, interlocking networks of ponds, woods and small neighborhoods that had made up the city until then. It's a classic clash between romantic idealism and "progress," present in the writings of Jane Jacobs and other modern urbanologists. Janvier is best when describing the quirky, intricate history of Greenwich Village and the development of Chelsea around the Episcopal Theological Seminary, citing both as examples of his small-is-beautiful philosophy. A man of his time, Janvier's nativism and racism are omnipresent: he is as likely to state that "even the bad smells have foreign names" as he is to rhapsodize about sylvan glades. Still, this long-out-of-print classic adds welcome historical perspective to contemporary urban studies. (Mar.)

Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Histories of Manhattan abound, but most cover the late 19th century through World War I and Prohibition, etc. When Janvier says old, however, he means it: this 1984 volume stretches back to pre-Colonial times when the wicked city was no more than woods with a handful of settlers and Indians waiting around for Bloomies to open. An excellent match for some of the later histories that only cover this period in brief.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press; 1st edition (April 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312242824
• ISBN-13: 978-0312242824
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #996,557 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful history with humor, June 20, 2009

By 

Carol H. Novak "Web Master @ Nerwolfe.org" (NYC) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: In Old New York: A Classic History of New York City (Hardcover)

This book, written in the late 1890s, shows the NYC that disappeared slowing over the preceding 100 years. What a read. Inside New York's birth and growth, so to speak. An opinionated perspective that shows that in some ways things never change.

9 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars For all New Yorkers, March 23, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: In Old New York: A Classic History of New York City (Hardcover)

This book provides great insight into New York City's past. For all those with a passion for this city, this book is a must. Great historic facts and photos!