Before the hippies, yuppies, preppies, Gen Xers, millennials, and hipsters there was the Beat Generation. Reeling from the effects and outcomes of WWII "Beatniks" rejected conservative values and materialism. They went on a spiritual quest to understand the human condition, and experimented with psychedelic drugs, and sexual liberation and exploration. Their searching was the precursor to the mass cultural change wrought by the boomers in the 60s and 70s.
Side Bar: I just recalled my brother Paul, older by seven years, with his buddies in high school dressed in a beret and sporting goatees beating on bongo drums trying vainly (he's an engineer) to emulate a beatnik. If you're old enough to remember the 50s TV show Dobie Gillis, Bob Denver (of later Gilligan's Island fame) played Maynard G. Krebs. He also was a sanitized and satirized representation of beatniks. Famous line was "Work?!"
Synonymous with this movement is Greenwich Village. The name still conjures a bohemian community of writers, artists, gays, drugs, diversity, music, crime, and living on the fringe. They settled here because rent was cheap, and drugs available. Their names still echo today; Ginsberg, Kerouac, Boroughs; along with their written legacies: Howl, On the Road and Naked Lunch.
Howl: Poem by Allen Ginsberg
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix, angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz,
who......
Living in our 'hood, in and around Greenwich Village, SoHo, TriBeCa, Chelsea and the Meat packing district, provides us constant "out the door" activities without ever getting on a subway or in a taxi. There are museums, retail shops, gyms, parks, people watching, and great restaurants (we prefer the local, not Michelin). It's noisy, congested, dense (we do miss our view), but the people are very friendly and go out of their way to help. After one month (this is posted two weeks later) we are lovin' it.
Side Bar: I just recalled my brother Paul, older by seven years, with his buddies in high school dressed in a beret and sporting goatees beating on bongo drums trying vainly (he's an engineer) to emulate a beatnik. If you're old enough to remember the 50s TV show Dobie Gillis, Bob Denver (of later Gilligan's Island fame) played Maynard G. Krebs. He also was a sanitized and satirized representation of beatniks. Famous line was "Work?!"
Synonymous with this movement is Greenwich Village. The name still conjures a bohemian community of writers, artists, gays, drugs, diversity, music, crime, and living on the fringe. They settled here because rent was cheap, and drugs available. Their names still echo today; Ginsberg, Kerouac, Boroughs; along with their written legacies: Howl, On the Road and Naked Lunch.
Howl: Poem by Allen Ginsberg
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix, angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz,
who......
of us didn't want to (and many of us did) get on the road in our teens or early 20s dreaming of Jack Kerouac as we barreled down a two lane highway in some remote state disconnected from family and accountability. Who of us today don't still try and get our kids to take to the road before they settle down?
Quintessential Road Trip
Groenwijch, meaning green district in dutch, was a farming community some three miles from the port city of New Amsterdam. The area includes the now separate neighborhood of West Village. Like most of the original settlements, the main roads paralleled the shoreline with perpendicular roads to facilitate moving goods to and from the river. In the 1820, the then New Yorkers escaped to Greenwich to avoid the Cholera epidemic that was sweeping the city.
After the Cholera Epidemic many who escaped for the clean and fresh air decided to remain. They filled in the Hudson shoreline and extended the narrow twisting and turning tree-lined streets. The charming brownstone residences of Bleeker and Perry Sts, with stoops on the sidewalk; up half level to a three-up, one-down home are archetypical of any movie setting of a New York neighborhood. Today Greenwich's four zip codes have the most expensive home prices in the US!
Brownstone walk-ups
Just east of 4th on Christopher St is arguably the birthplace of gay civil rights in our country; from elimination of anti-sodomy laws, to "Don't ask Don't Tell, to the "Same Sex Marrage" decision by the Supreme Court. In 1967, in an outgrowth of the beat generation and Greenwich lifestyle, The Stonewall Inn opened as an LGBT bar in West Village. Despite payoffs by the mafia owner's there were often police raids. In 1969 following one such raid the arrests didn't go as smoothly as planned because the Patty-wagons (Irish cops) arrived late. Bystanders began protesting, and cheering, the arrests. After a rough arrest of one woman the LGBT crowd went "berserk" and the scene became violent. It took until 4:00 am to control the scene. Within two years there were gay rights groups in every major city in the US, Canada and Australia demanding more civil rights. General Sheridan of Civil War fame now shares his statue and park with commemorating the Stonewall Inn riots. Ironic, considering his attitude toward another minority: "The only good indian is a dead indian" is attributed to him.
General Sheridan Park with LGBT statues
General Sheridan looking away from the Stonewall Inn
Greenwich Village proper, located east of West Village and north of SoHo, is focused around Washington Park and New York University. Washington Park is one of our favorites in the city. The first month here on the waning warm summer Sundays we'd grab our NYTimes, Starbucks and head for the benches. We'd sit in the leafy shade around the splashing fountain. Between absorbing what has to be the best newspaper in the country, we'd gaze at the inscription on the Washington Arch or be transfixed by the assortment of people: students studying, The Rock imitator practicing martial arts, or drugged out "Bagel Bun" lady discussing life on the streets with her likewise altered compatriots. Washington Park was once a potters field to bury the indigent (there's a separate African cemetery for slaves and free blacks just recently discovered in Lower Manhattan that's now a Nat'l Park). There was also a stream running through the area that still flows in a conduit underground whose entrance is marked on a building.
Robin with NYTimes in Washington Park
Watching People play around the fountain with Washington Arch in Background
Living in our 'hood, in and around Greenwich Village, SoHo, TriBeCa, Chelsea and the Meat packing district, provides us constant "out the door" activities without ever getting on a subway or in a taxi. There are museums, retail shops, gyms, parks, people watching, and great restaurants (we prefer the local, not Michelin). It's noisy, congested, dense (we do miss our view), but the people are very friendly and go out of their way to help. After one month (this is posted two weeks later) we are lovin' it.
Next Posts: The rest of New York and Environs
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