Later gator. Cake Shop closed on New Year’s Eve. (Photo: Nick McManus)
Another venue spent New Year’s Eve saying their last goodbyes to regulars and anyone else with a drink in their hand. For the last few years, Cake Shop was running on borrowed time. Back in 2012, when the gritty bitty Lower East Side venue’s Ludlow Street neighbor, The Living Room, closed up shop after more than 15 years in business, it seemed like it was only a matter of time.
This week and next, we present a series of longer pieces unraveling the histories of storied buildings.
The Astral’s Franklin Street exterior
The Astral in Greenpoint has status in the National Register of Historic Places and as a New York City landmark, but not for the murder and mayhem that has emanated from 184 Franklin Avenue since its completion as housing for Charles Pratt’s employees link 131 years ago, in 1886.
(Photo: Nicole Disser)
Police say the body of a 27-year-old woman was discovered yesterday afternoon inside the Lillian Wald Housing Project on Avenue D. An autopsy is forthcoming. [ABC 7]
A Long Island Rail Road train crashed while pulling into Brooklyn’s Atlantic Terminal yesterday morning around 8 a.m., sending 106 people to the hospital. There were no fatalities. [NY Times]
Canal Street diner Cup & Spoon managed to stay open despite a weekend fire that began on the third floor of its building. [Bowery Boogie] More →
FESTIVALS
Under the Radar
Wednesday January 4 through Sunday January 15, various showtimes at The Public Theater and other spaces: $20 and up
Ah yes, it’s that time again, when the slew of January performance festivals sail in every winter to overwhelm you with a seemingly endless supply of shows. One of these is The Public Theater’s Under the Radar festival, which presents a wide variety of music, performance, and more from artists based across the U.S. and all over the world.
Doomed Love
Friday January 6, 7:30 pm at Spectacle: $5
It’s been an awful long time since I’ve seen a movie at Spectacle… who am I kidding? I was pretty much lost for the two or so weeks when I was forced to go without this $5 standby, cini-mini home for everyone from underground-art house weirdos and to -sploitation freaks. I forgive you Spectacle workers, I guess you too needed to watch Law & Order with your family and drunkenly cry yourself to sleep in your childhood bedroom where Frank the teddy bear has been replaced by a mostly-empty bottle of desperately cheap whiskey.
Over the Eight says goodbye at their New Year’s Eve comics celebration (Photo: Nick McManus)
Last year was a rough one for cultural spaces of all kinds in New York City, so it was somewhat fitting (if not totally sad) that a slew of local spots said their peace-outs during New Year’s Eve festivities. Among the departing establishments that went out with a bang on one of the drunkest night of the year was Over the Eight, a Williamsburg bar which closed up shop after “three and a half years” of “slinging cheap drinks and treasured times” (as we heard back in November when the owners first announced their departure).
This week, we continue with our series of longer pieces unraveling the histories of storied buildings.
Jeff Davis, self-proclaimed King of Hoboes, pictured in the January 16, 1913 Tacoma Times. (Image courtesy of Washington State Library, via Chronicling America.)
Heckles and howls echoed through the meeting rooms of 64 East 4th Street on February 1, 1913. “Down with How and his postage stamp philanthropy!” yelled Jeff Davis, the self-proclaimed King of the Hoboes. “He has never given us any of his mythical millions!”
A handgun-toting robber stole four iPhones recently from Kevin Wireless, a Myrtle Avenue storefront. [DNA Info]
Applications for 63 units of affordable housing are now being accepted on Bushwick’s DeSales Place at the site of a former convent, where studios will rent for as low as $519/month. [DNA Info]
Acting Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez announced last week that in 2016, Brooklyn saw the lowest number of shootings in more than a decade. [DNA Info] More →
(Flyer via Bossa Nova Civic Club)
Synthicide: Three-Year Anniversary
Thursday January 4, 10 pm to 4 am at Bossa Nova Civic Club: FREE
Even if right now the weather’s making you feel like your bones will never dry, your shoes will always be soggy, and that possibly your muscles will continue spazzing forever and ever, hold on for two more days. And in the mean time, repeat over and over “Free, free at last!” Slowly, your hands will start to defrost, color will return to your face, and a your eyes will even start to twinkle. By the time Thursday rolls around you can let it all out, by placing your booty on the Bossa Nova dance floor as soon as you’re able for the venue’s third annual Synthicide party.
This week, we continue with our series of longer pieces unraveling the histories of storied buildings.
View of 444 Broadway as The Olympic Theatre, year unknown. Photo courtesy of The Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Photography Collection, The New York Public Library.
James Norman knew exactly what he was doing when he walked into 444 Broadway in the spring of 1862. And the woman he shot knew, too. The music was loud, drinks were flowing, and he was a jilted man. He gave $100 dollars (a hefty sum in 1862) to buy furniture to his fiancée Kate White, a waitress at the concert saloon on the ground floor of the building. She ran away with the money, never to be heard from again. They had met one of the many times he must have come in drunk, sweaty, and groping. It’s not hard to imagine why she took the money and ran.