By Leila Amin Attempting to explain human behavior during an event as unfathomable as the Holocaust can seem like an impossible task. However, although a nation of bystanders was crucial to its implementation, so too was an army of active perpetrators, each of whom had to undergo a transformation of their own in order to
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50th Anniversary of Stonewall: Remembered through Dramatic Work
By Celeste Kaufman Phoenix Lindsey-Hall, a ceramicist, photographer, and mixed media artist, has a story to tell; and what better time to share her story than during the celebration of the Stonewall uprising? She explores themes related to queer communities, and the violence perpetrated against them. Originally focusing on photography, earning degrees from Parsons School
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Then&Now: 501 Hudson and Christopher Street
By Brian J. Pape, AIA, LEED-AP Then: This March 1933 photo (matching an earlier 1927 photo) of the once four-story-corner-building-next-to-a-3-story-mixed-use rowhouse, describes both as 501 Hudson Street and 131 Christopher Street. Even the GVHD Designation Report of 4/29/69 describes these addresses as one lot, though clearly they are not one building. The 12 over 12
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A Fifties State of Mind
By Barbara Riddle John Cassavetes, the Stonewall Inn and the end of the Cold War are all connected in my mind by two words. Two words that describe what we badly need during these politically insane times: resistance and hope; hope and resistance. My thoughts were triggered during a book reading/signing I recently attended, a
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Stonewall Uprising, 1969: A 50-Year Celebration
By Robert Heide and John Gilman Yes, we were there the night of June 28th, 1969, and all the rest of those famous nights whose impact has been felt around the world. This year’s annual Gay Pride Parade will celebrate the 50th anniversary of that date, and is expected to be attended by a record
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A View from the Kitchen
By Isa Covo Here is what happened when women took matters into their own hands. Recently I read an article about some Palestinian women and children from Jubbet ad-Dib, a Bedouin village, who one day, and without warning, stormed the offices of their district council and demanded clean water and electricity for their village. They
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Notes From Away: The Past Is History
By Tom Lamia “The past is never dead. It’s not even past,” is from William Faulkner and often used to show literary cool when saying there is nothing new under the sun. I am going to use it here to make a different point—that in older societies the past is revered and relevant. One such older society is
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A Tribute to Ralph David Abernathy and Martin Luther King Jr.
By Michael Duane Johnson Seven months ago, George Capsis, Publisher of the WestView News, in the Village of Manhattan, offered me an opportunity to write a piece for his paper about myself. I could not find the words or spirit until now to do so. I have no idea who I really am. For the
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Five Milestones of Technology That Made Us What We Are Today
By Josef Eisinger© After musing in these pages about the evolution of life on Earth (WestView News, Feb. 2019) and about the rapid pace of technological innovations (WestView News, Jan. 2018), I propose to select in this article five technological landmarks that arguably had the greatest influence on human behavior in their wake. This is,
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9/11 Tiles for America
By Dusty Berke The 9/11 Tiles for America is the only grass-roots tribute to the tragic events of 9/11 that remains in the West Village on the corner where it first began. It was created by Lorrie Veassey, the owner of Our Name is Mud, a local paint-your-own pottery shop, as a way to brighten
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THEN AND NOW: The New School for Social Research Celebrates 100 Years!
By Brian J. Pape, AIA, LEED-AP For the first decade of its existence, beginning in 1919, the New School for Social Research and Alvin Saunders Johnson (1874-1971), a co-founder and leader of the institution from 1922 through 1945, operated out of six renovated brownstones on West 23rd Street. Johnson and others had been on the
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My Time at The New School—1958
By Les Plosia If The New School is anything like it used to be, count me a big fan. Then in my upper 20s, I would tool south in my MG convertible on the West Side Highway two evenings a week from my junior editing job at Prentice-Hall publishing house on the New Jersey side
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Greenwich Village: Reminiscence
By Harry Rissetto I grew up in Greenwich Village during the period between Robert Moses’ proposed freeway and John Lindsey’s plans for a tourist mecca. I recently spent parts of a year back there and tried to connect my memories and current impressions. The West Village during the ‘50s and ‘60s was mostly middle class
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Greenwich Village: What’s in the Name?
By Brian J. Pape, AIA Greenwich is a fairly common place name, a city in CT, a village in upper NY, NJ, RI, and of course, Greenwich England. Place-names typically have meanings that were significant to the settlers of a locality. When talking about place names, there is a specific term, toponymy, whereas “the etymology
