Much to my chagrin I've never blogged about the massive New York documentary series by Ric Burns. It's probably because it first came out in 1999, eight years before this blog started, and it was and is a rather weighty thing to describe.
In short, it started out in 1999, as an seven episode PBS series about the first almost-400 years of NYC history. Then, in 2003, a new episode came out about the city right after 9/11. Now, twenty-plus years later, there are two new episodes about NYC in the first quarter of the 21st century -- dealing with the Great Recession, COVID, Trump etc.
You can watch the original episodes here and then the new episodes on PBS (at least for a little while). While it's a very longgggggg series, it is the definitive (and continuing) telling of the NYC story.
(I remember watching this documentary the fall after I returned from college. It felt like a nice homecoming!)
Something was in the air in NYC in the fall of 1982 -- literally. The voices of Howard Stern and Alison Steele took flight in the ears of the city's radio listeners, and things were never quite the same afterwards.
Howard was very young at the time and had just started at the now defunct WNBC radio in NYC. It was a legendarily bad run for him but, in 1985, he was fired and went over to 92.3 K-Rock where he would soar into legend.
Alison Steele was a different but nonetheless interesting case. She had started out in rock radio in the late 1960s at WNEW and then, in the late 70s, left. For a while she did voiceover and commercial work, and even DJ'd for an airline (I think it was TWA). But in the fall of 1982 she returned to WNEW -- the Nightbird flew again for the grateful listeners of NYC. She would remain at WNEW until 1989 where she would then move over to overnights at K-ROCK -- and would go off the air just before Howard came on. She would stay at K-ROCK until her untimely death in 1995.
But all of that was to come. Here is Alison's first show back at WNEW in October, 1982, exactly 44-years ago today:
And hey, if you want to, here's a lil' bit of Howard's first day at WNBC -- and in NYC radio! -- in September 1982, before Howard and Alison's fates intertwined:
Remember, this is why America is great: you can tell your leaders they suck and then replace them. Outcomes are not promised, nothing is guarenteed -- it goes back and forth, the hampster wheel keeps turning -- but we have the power to try to make things better -- if we so choose to do, individually and together.
Last year I blogged about how the 5th season of the HBO anthology series True Detective is to be set in Jamaica Bay in Southern Queens.
Nothing else was (or is) known about this season except that its two main leads have been cast: Nicholas Cage and Antonion Banderas will star and will be, one assumes, heading to shoot in the swamps of NYC next year.
Cool. They're great, legendary actors. Can't wait to see it! And I'll keep updating about this season when more info comes out.
Okay, so this isn't a regular review, it's more of an anecdote: I took my kid to the "Dan & Phil: Hard Launch" show in Brooklyn because she's a huge fan of their show. It was a wild audio-visual comic experience, and just about everyone there was an emo-kid in their parents (save my kid and me and some other family members who went).
Anyhoo, the show went on at the Kings Theater in Brooklyn (lot of posts about Brooklyn lately). It was my first time there and it's a really gorgeous, huge, and cavernous theater. It used to be a movie palace and was beautifully restored as a live theater. I strongly urge you to go see a show there -- I didn't really care about "Dan & Phil" (although they were entertaining and my kid was happy) but man, oh, man, that theater is awesome.
Social media is a tool, meaning it can be used for good and ill. When someone celebrates a milestone, or someone passes away, it can be beautiful to see the outpouring of support and condolensces from people and strangers far away.
But more often than not social media is used to bully people.
Being a celebrity bestows many benefits -- perhaps the biggest one of all is that the public and the media pays attention to the stuff you say or post online, no matter how inane. In short, being a celebrity gives you power, and how you use it is important.
We appear to be living in a period of wontonness, where people with power and wealth are using it to abuse. And Ms. Clarkson, one would think, would be better than that. But apparently not. She's no ... idol.
It was only a matter of time before the goons from ICE caused havoc in NYC -- and they have, in Marble Hill.
I understand that people want to deport "illegals" but not this way. ICE is out of control. They're shooting and killing people all over America and it's an outrage. Previous administrations deported way more people without all this violence. It has to stop!
A year before Mr NYC started, a publication dedicated to New York politics called City & State debuted. It's a rare animal -- a publication devoted to local and state politics and government that does quality journalism without bias, and is a staple for New Yorkers who want to understand the who, what, where, and why about how they are governed.
A LOT has happened in New York in the last twenty years -- multiple governors, mayors, and other state and local officials have come and gone, the city and state becoming firmly Democratic while also, bizarelly, producing its first president (a Republican!) since FDR.
There's have been tremendous victories and failures in those two decades and, for its 20th anniversary, City & State has a great summary of the players and plays that have written the last 20 years of New York history.
Based on the blog’s recurring themes, tone, judgments, nostalgia, and observations over many years, The Code of Mr NYC can be understood as an informal moral philosophy of urban life: love your city fiercely, pay attention to the world around you, preserve what is worth preserving, distrust pomposity, and try to live with curiosity, humor, memory, and a certain New York toughness.
Love New York without pretending it is perfect.
New York is complicated, contradictory, beautiful, vulgar, historic, changing, and occasionally absurd. Its flaws are part of its character.
Pay attention.
Notice buildings, streets, neighborhoods, people, restaurants, music, movies, politics, history, and the strange little events that everyone else walks past. A meaningful life requires actually looking at the world.
Know your city's history.
Today's New York is built on yesterday's New York. Remember the people, places, disasters, triumphs, eccentrics, artists, politicians, and ordinary citizens who created it.
Preserve what deserves to survive.
Progress is not automatically improvement. New buildings, new money, new technology, and changing tastes should not erase everything distinctive about the city.
Accept that change is inevitable—but judge it honestly.
Nostalgia has value, but the past wasn't necessarily better. One person's golden age can be another person's nightmare.
Be skeptical of power, wealth, and self-importance.
Money and status do not automatically confer wisdom, taste, virtue, or legitimacy. Watch what powerful people actually do rather than what they claim to represent.
Respect competence.
Good institutions depend on capable people doing their jobs well. Leadership is not merely about the person at the top; it is also about choosing good people and giving them responsibility.
Don't take politics—or politicians—too seriously.
Politics matters, but political rhetoric can become theater. Look for facts, consequences, hypocrisy, and the gap between promises and reality.
Keep your sense of humor.
The world is frequently ridiculous. The proper response is sometimes outrage, sometimes sadness, and sometimes simply: You have got to be kidding me.
Have opinions, but remain capable of changing them.
Love and dislike need not be absolute. A person can admire one work by an artist while disliking the rest of their career, or appreciate an era while recognizing its ugliness.
Remember the people who mattered.
Death does not make someone's cultural contribution disappear. Remembering artists, neighbors, public figures, friends, and ordinary New Yorkers is a form of gratitude.
Take pleasure seriously.
Good food, music, movies, books, travel, beautiful places, baseball, architecture, nightlife, and simple experiences are not distractions from life. They are life.
Have some basic civic manners.
You don't have to become polite in the suburban sense. But don't make life unnecessarily difficult for everyone around you: move right on the sidewalk, don't block subway doors, and recognize that public space belongs to other people too.
Be yourself, even when you're a little weird.
New York's greatness comes partly from its tolerance for eccentricity. Conformity is not a virtue merely because it is conventional.
Don't confuse sophistication with cynicism.
You can see corruption, stupidity, hypocrisy, commercialization, and decline without becoming incapable of appreciating beauty or goodness.
Stay curious until the end.
The city keeps producing new stories. Keep investigating them. Keep wandering. Keep learning. Keep finding things worth writing about.
In one sentence
Love the city, remember its past, question its present, enjoy its pleasures, resist its bullshit, respect other people, and never stop paying attention.
That, more than any particular political or cultural position, seems to be the underlying ethical worldview of Mr NYC: a stubborn belief that paying attention to the world—and caring enough to remember it—is itself a moral act.
In just three days Mayor Z managed to make the President of the United States his little bitch, forced DoorDash to cough up over $100 million in wages that it stole from NYC delivery folks, and then hosted an international conference of mayors.
He's practicing realpolitick, the art of the possible, a exemplar of maturity, iron will, and focus.
This guy is 34 years old -- I have pimples older than him -- but he seems to be a leader wise beyond his years and those of other much older elected officials. Damn.
This is leadership, a masterclass in what a leader can and should be. I sure hope he keeps it up!
This is not normal -- and, for once, it's a good thing.
The most right-wing president in American history just visted the most left-wing mayor in NYC history, and had a great meeting at Gracie Mansion! And the POTUS went to Hizzoner! It seems that, for some reason, Trump is super-charmed by Mamdani and they work well together.
And that's a great thing for the city.
The usual boring subjects are breaking the POTUS' and Hizzoner's respective balls over this meeting but here's the thing: this is called governing, realpolitick, dealing with what is and not what you want it to be, getting stuff done, engaging in politics as the art of the possible, not just winning elections.
Sadly this should be normal but isn't much these days. But, as a New Yorker, I'll take it!
Twenty-years ago, before they'd be on Furious, Hope Davis and Campbell Scott appeared together on another show, the short-lived Six Degrees.
Based on the premise first introduced in Six Degrees of Seperation, it's about six different New Yorkers whose lives intersect in various odd ways. They are: Carlos, a public defender struggling with his job; Mae, a recent NYC-transplant with a mysterious past; Laura, an interior designer mourning her husband killed in Iraq (very 2006); Damien, a limo driver and ex-con, trying to live a straight-edge life; Whitney, a high-powered PR woman, Laura's best friend, and with a cheating finance; and Steven, a photographer who just came back to town and who is struggling to reestablish a relationship with his ex-wife and son.
If you're an NYC-junky, this show was for you. But with a premise like this, it needed to be great and it just ... wasn't. It was okay. The main problem is that for a show centered around six people, they needed to be more interesting and their problems needed to be more dramatic. They weren't. The premise was cool but sadly the show didn't really make it compelling. The characters and their storylines were rather boring.
So why am I remembering it?
Well, obviously, because it was a very intensely NYC-show and, naturally, it caught my interesting. Even though the show's drama was underwhelming, it was one of the few shows that really made you feel like you were in the city, and that was unusual (outside of the Law & Order franchise).
Also, it had a great cast: the aforementioned Campbell Scott, Hope Davis, along with Bridget Moynahan (someone also nice to look at) as well as Erika Christiansen (who had been really good in Traffic a few years earlier), and other. They'd all go on to do better stuff.
Another thing is a little more personal: first, one of the creators was a guy named Raven Metzner who I actually went to school with. I also remember one day, leaving my house and walking to work, when I walked by this show being shot on the street early one morning -- and I saw Hope Davis and Bridget drinking coffee and waiting to shoot between setups.
Finally, another reason I remember this odd, long-gone and forgotten show: besides the fact that this show came out preceisely 20 years go, but it was also on just before I started this blog and moved in with my girlfriend.
Six Degrees ran for a few episodes between September and November of 2006, then was pulled from ABC's schedule, then came back in March 2007 and was finally cancelled for good (in fact its last episode airs on March 30, 2007, three days after this blog began). So I remember it here not because it was a great show but because it was truly NYC show and that it was on during an inflection point in my life -- and this was a show all about that!
I'm happy to say that my life has been so busy lately that I haven't been able to watch much television. However, after returning from vacation, I caught up on the new Hulu show Furious and, damn, it's crazy.
It's rare that you see an NYC show set in NYC that crosses between the high and low of the city, that goes from domestic violence shelters to high rise luxury apartment buildings, and devles into a subject matter that we'd all rather look away from -- the horrors of sex trafficking.
This series is clearly based on the Epstein case since, at the center of Furious, is a wealthy man named Jay Easton. The story involves a young ex-NYPD cop/current FBI agent named Alice (the amazing Emmy Rossum) who pairs up with a cranky middle-aged agent named Nora (the even more amazing Quincy Tyler Bernstine) and her best guy-friend Danny (Scott McNair), a sad-sack cop, as they investigate a series of murders involving wealthy men. Their work leads to a realization that all of these men were attackhed to a sex trafficking ring, and are meeting their doom at the hands of a young woman named Catherine (played by an insanely talented actress named Lola Pettigrew), a former victim of the ring. Alice, Nora, and Danny's work is greatly complicated by their messy personal lives along with colleagues and supervisors who are interfering their work.
Furious is a show about corruption, greed, sick lust, buried secrets, and how the misbehavior of wealthy and powerful people can leave a massive trail of broken lives and human destruction. This show is not for the faint of heart but it's incredible, stunning drama.
This show was created by Liz Merriweather which is a suprise since her previous hit was the sitcom New Girl. The cast is incredible, and it includes the always wonderful Hope Davis as Jay Easton's Ghislaine Maxwell-like daughter, Jake Lacey as Alice's abusive ex-boyfriend, and Campbell Scott as Easton's lawyer (and one of Catherine's victim). There's also an actor named Steve Wray who plays a disabled friend of Alice's and he is so good, so funny, I hope he gets an Emmy.
So watch this show. Then remember to keep your love ones close.
This past summer in NYC was so eventful that I need to write a short second part about NYC's Summer of '26!
First, there were the political primaries where two incumbent members of Congress lost and a new generation of leaders won at the state and federal level.
Second, I spent a week in Brooklyn with friends and saw and did lots of great stuff on the cusp of America's 250 birthday.
Third, I went to Maine and ate well and saw lots of natural beauty.
Fifteen years ago this week Occupy Wall Street began. I blogged about it extensively at the time -- yes, I've been doing this that long -- and now what was real time coverage has turned into a piece of NYC and American history. You can read the entire Mr NYC OWS Archive if you'd like!
And you call also listen to this interview with the great late-night NYC cable TV host Robin Byrd and also read my own extensive archive of her.
On this first day of September, the summer of 2026 is winding down. Soon the autumnal equinox will be upon us, vacations will end, the air will turn crisp, kids will return to school, the leaves will turn, and thoughts will drift towards the holidays and year's end.
And yet ... and yet ... the summer of '26 in NYC is one for the history books.
Unlike most summers that vanish from the public memory year-after-year, this soon to-be-gone summer has left some traces that will not soon be forgotten.
Even two months ago, at the beginning of July, some in the media were calling it The Summer of New York. Here's a roll call of what happened:
America celebrated its 250th anniversary on July 4th with Sail4th in New York harbor!
Crazy weather (thanks global warming!) with massive thunderstorms, high heat, and the smoky orange haze that blanketed the city due to the Canadian wildfires.
Even a documentary about NYC's favorite adult star Robin Byrd!
And soon we will have a more serious milestone as we remember the 25th anniversary of 9/11/2001.
What a wild, historic summer!
And here's something that might make 2026 the Summer of NYC into the Year of 2026: this fall are the midterm elections. If, some way, some how, the Democrats take back control of both houses of the US Congress, that means that the President of the United States, the Senate Majority Leader, and the House Speaker will all be from NYC. That'll be even wilder and more historic!
The greatest rock band ever to come out of NYC -- The Velvet Underground -- had a short life in the late 1960s. It would only be decades later that they would be considered one of the greatest and most influential bands of all time.
Still, during their brief existence, the Velvets toured the country. In the late 1960s they travelled to Dallas and their outdoor performance, and later another performance at a club, were recorded and can be seen/heard here.
There's actually very little footage of the Velvets during their time as a band so this is a rare and interesting treat, a small window into the past.
Here's a fascinating article about the battle between owners and shareholders of the Pierre, the gorgeous hotel/apartment building on 59th Street -- across from its brethern the Plaza and the Sherry Netherland. It's a story of rich people vs. other rich people, corruption vs. stubborness, Old New York money and taste vs. global wealth and crassness.
It's an Only in NYC story!
FYI: the main dining room of the Pierre is where the legendary tango scene from Scent of a Woman took place.
Dolly Parton has died and I don't want to believe it but so it goes. Anyway, NYC is remembering the music legend by giving her the ultimate tribute -- illuminating the Empire State Building in her trademark pink.
And if you want to understand the true greatness of Dolly, a perfect example of her musical and performance genius, listen to her beautiful song "Butterfly" and watch her SNL monologue from 1989 -- part of it, uh ... doesn't really hold up but it shows you what a good sport Dolly was. RIP.
Late last year a small film came and went that didn't get a lot of fanfare but is actually really good.
Called Is This Thing On?, it's about a middle-aged couples in suburban NYC who seperate. The forlorn husband finds himself accidently turning to stand up comedy to deal with his new, unwanted life, while he soon-to-be ex-wife tries to keep their old life and their kids lives going as before -- just without him.
This movie is something you don't get a lot these days -- a very funny, wonderfully acted story about regular people leading their lives. It was directed by Bradley Cooper, the movie star (who has a supporting role), and it stars Will Arnett and Laura Dern as the erstwhile couple and they excellent. Also in the cast are Christine Ebersole as the mother-in-law and the great actor Ciaran Hinds who plays the father -- and gives a beautiful, understated performance.
There are lots of movies about glamorous people in NYC living glamorous lives but this movie is about the regular, hardworking people dealing with their careers, their families, and their own sense of worth. You should see it!
I've always had a love-hate opinion of the novelist Bret Easton Ellis. For the most part I don't think he's really that talented, most of his books are boring, and, in the interviews I've heard with him, he sounds like a massive asshole.
However, I do think his 1991 novel American Psycho is absoutely brilliant and, in a depressing way, it seems more relevant than ever. It's a classic.
Ellis is from LA and lives there now but, in the late 1980s and 1990s, he lived in NYC. He recently returned to the city after a long absence to promote his new TV show and, in this interview, he talks about his life in NYC.
What's funny is that, for many, the NYC of the '80s and '90s was a rough, terrible time of crime, crack, AIDS, and decay. But for Ellis it was a golden age, a wonderful fun time that he misses. Apparently he doesn't know how anyone could live in 2020s NYC!
It's a reminder than one person's paradise can be another person's hell -- and vice versa.
Part of what makes New York City fascinating -- but also sometimes tough to talk about and understand -- is that this "city" isn't really a city in the traddional sense. The Merriam-Webster and other dictionaries define a city simply as a "large or important municipality in the U.S. governed under a charter granted by the state."
That's it. And NYC certainly fits that definition.
But its size and geography and population make it unlike most other cities, both in the United States and the world at large. (This list gives 10 examples of the differences between NYC and just about every other city in the world.) As I've blogged about before, NYC isn't a single city -- its several cities joined up together.
And that's what makes NYC not a city but an empire -- dozens of islands containing several different cites and towns and villages and arable land stiched together to become a whole greater than the sum of its parts.
The size and scope and unwieldy nature of the five boroughs is so complex, so various, so wild and huge that the best way to understand NYC is not as a city but as an urban empire -- or, as the poet Emma Lazarus famously called it, a collossus.
Empires don't just spring to life out of nowhere, they are built over time. And here's the story of building the NYC empire -- past, present, and future:
A new entry into this genre is the Amazon Prime show Sterling Point.
It's about a prim and proper Brooklyn teenager named Annie and her dopey but funny brother Connor who inherit an island in Canada from their estranged grandfather -- and go to check it out.
Lots happens. Friends and lovers are made and lost and made again, buried family secrets are revealed, some pot is smoked, some sex is had, and some silly and serious situations ensue.
It's a great time. The main cast is young, gorgeous, and talented, the adult actors are excellent, and the show manages to be both very funny and emotionally dramatic at once. Really good.
I'll admit I'm biased because, yes, it's a show about displaced New Yorkers but it also takes place somewhere I know and love very well.
Sterling Point is a gorgeous, fun end-of-summer treat.
Growing up in the 1980's and '90s I saw a lot of cigarette ads in magazines, on top of taxicabs, and various other places all over NYC. The most memorable one of which was this:
As old as I am, however, I grew up too late to see cigarette commercials on TV. But there used to be some interesting ones, includes some set in NYC. And even though cigarette commercials have been banned in the USA for over 50 years, that hasn't stopped foreign countries from using NYC for their TV cigarette commercials.
Fascinating stuff.
But NYC was actually one of the leaders in anti-smoking commercials and, don't forget, this was the first big city in the world to ban public smoking. Now that's ... Kool.
In the depths of COVID back in 2020 I had the luck of finding the Emmy-winning, Oscar-nominated costume designer Jean-Pierre Dorleac on social media. He was an funny, outrageous "shit poster", telling stories of his Hollywood past and his raw, unfiltered opinions of the various people he knew and worked with.
Most of all, Dorleac was the costume designer on the early-1990s show Quantum Leap which was, and remains, one of my favorite shows ever.
When I contacted Dorleac in those dark days to see if he would do an interview for Mr NYC, I was happily shocked when he agreed. And he gave a lively one for this little blog and for that I'm eternally grateful. Most of all, I was interested in how he costumed the Quantum Leap characters in different decades, especially bringing NYC to life in the 1950s, 60's and '70s.
Sadly Dorleac has passed away at the age of 83. He certainly had an interesting life and he made a great contribution to the culture. Heck, just the costumes he designed for Dean Stockwell on Quantum Leap were enough to burn him into legend!
I recently came across this YouTube channel called NYC Crime Spot that tells (or retells) the stories of the city's most infamous crimes and criminals.
For example you can learn about the real Stacks from Goodfellas or about the Mafia Cops. Fascinating, old-school stuff.
Even though NYC is safer than ever with crime at record lows, it's always fascinating to learn more about the sometimes sordid underbelly of the worls' greatest city.
Last night I went to the Mets-Dodgers game and, yeah, the Mets lost.
Still, it was one of the more interesting games I've gone to because there was a lot of "extra."
First, it was "Japansese Heritage Night" so there were lots of Japanese people there. And there were also a ton of Dodgers fans. I've never been to a New York home baseball game with that many fans from the other city's team. I didn't realize there were that many Angelinos in NYC but apparently there are. It was weird.
Second, they were shooting a movie at this game. This announcement greeted us as we made our way into Citi Field:
And we saw some movie camera guys shooting during the game:
Also, upon our arriving we were given this wristbands. Stay tuned to find out why!
Then we sat down to watch the game. It sucked. But I did manage to get a cookie bucket and record one of two Mets' homeruns.
And once the game was over, we were treated to a East Coast-West Coast Hip Hop fireworks show -- presumably in honor of the East Coast-West Coast baseball game we'd just witnessed.
And the lights in our wristbands began to glow and yours truly got to be part of a massive rap fireworks lightshow. I managed to keep it real, get jiggy with it, and illuminate the NYC night sky. Yeah boyeeeeeee!
So I got to be part of Japanese heritage, appear in a movie, eat out of a bucket, and partake in a bad-ass fireworks show. Aww yeahhhhhh!
Mr NYC is a long-running personal Blogspot blog that describes itself as:
“Blogging the soul of the world's greatest city. Part of the NYC underground.”
Main Topics
Based on recent and historical posts, the blog focuses on:
New York City culture and history
Local politics and current events
Queens, Brooklyn, Manhattan, and other neighborhood stories
Transportation, architecture, and landmarks
Personal travel observations
Photos and videos from around NYC and beyond
Notable Characteristics
The blog appears to have been active for many years, with posts dating back well over a decade.
It presents itself as an independent voice covering both popular and lesser-known aspects of New York City life. [
Recent posts include topics such as:
Central Park horse carriages
Theodore Roosevelt Birthplace National Historic Site
Yankee Stadium history
Little Neck Bay photography
Travel writing about Kennebunkport, Maine.
Social Presence
The author also appears to maintain related social media accounts, including:
A Bluesky account associated with the blog name and content.
A Facebook page describing the project as “Capturing the spirit and psyche of the world's greatest city.”
Overall Impression
The blog is best described as a local-interest NYC culture blog that mixes:
urban history,
commentary,
neighborhood observations,
photography,
and
personal essays,
with a strong affection for New York City and its unique character.
These people, for now. City and State has published this exhaustive list of the people working in the Mamdani administration.
It's an impressive group of experienced public servants -- and it's a good reminder that the most important thing mayors and all good leaders do is to hire people to run an organization. All the greats also have great deputies -- Augustus had Agrippa, Henry VIII had Cromwell and Wolsey, Catherine the Great had Potemkin, Martin Scorsese has Thelma Schoonmaker, and Mayor Z has Dean Fuleihan.
Just a reminder that A's hire A's, B's hire C's, C's hire D's, and so on (look at the Trump administration, an F president hiring F- people). Mayor Z is an A!
A kid named Henry, born on the Lower East Side of Manhattan in 1859, moved with his family to the West when he was three years old. He grew up to be the most famous killer and criminal of the Old West -- before he was gunned down by the Sheriff Pat Garrett in New Mexico in 1881.
Billy lived to be only 21 years old and yet his legend continues to this day. Movies, songs, books, etc. have practically cannonized this punk kid from NYC who wrote a short, dark chapter in the story of American Manifest Destiny.
Billy was born at 70 Allen Street, in what was then a super-crowded Irish immigrant community. As the Civil War raged, his family got out of town -- way out of town -- migrating to as far West as they could go, beyond what was then the United States and into "the Territory."
His time in NYC was obviously so short, and he was so young, that Billy probably had no memory of NYC. But obviously he inherited the city's grit and toughness -- and it made him a feared and legendary character in the Old West and to this day.
Sir Winston Churchill is one of the most revered people who ever lived. The 20th century British statesman and Prime Minister was one of the Allied leaders who, in the Darkest Hour, defeated Nazi Germany in World War II and thereby saved Western Civilization.
And even though he was the quintessential Englishman, Winston Churchill was half-American -- specifically, he was half-Brooklyn.
Sir Winston's mother was from Cobble Hill, Brooklyn. Lady Jennie Jerome Churchill was born there in the then-City of Brooklyn in 1854 and, at the age of 20, married Lord Randolf Churchill (giving birth to Winston, her oldest son, in 1875).
Long-story short: one of history's greatest statesman was brought into the world via 21 year-old Brooklyn gal who was one of the first "dollar brides" -- i.e. a rich American given in marriage to the historical but broke British nobility.
Although her famous son would overwhelm her memory, Jennie Jerome had a fascinating -- and scandalous -- life all of her. Many lovers (including a future King Edward VII), a younger second husband (only 16 days older than Winson!), major philanthropic initiatives, and she played a major role in Winston's early political career -- although her death in 1921 precluded her seeing her son's ultimate triumph.
You should read and watch (below) about her amazing life.
Even though Jennie Jerome lived almost her entire adult life in England, she hasn't been forgotten in her hometown. Up in the Bronx there's a playground named in her honor. And doubtless, without the NYC grit she gave her eldest son, the history of the world would be very different.
Back in the 1980s and '90s, when MTV was actually a music channel, they had programs that showcased different kinds of music like Yo MTV Raps, the metal show Headbangers ball, and 120 Minutes that focused on "alternative" music and grunge.
120 Minutes was created by a guy named Dave Kendall who was actually a music journalist. The show as on late Sunday nights for, you guessed it, two hours, and Kendall hosted it for a few years.
And on the night of September 29, 1991 -- just as I was starting my freshman year of high school -- Kendall hosted the premiere of a music video called "Smells Like Teen Spirit" by the band Nirvana. At that moment it might have seemed like a it was just another video and song by just another band but this moment would change music and cultural history forever.
So yesterday in NYC we recorded record high heat -- 100F degrees! -- plus a massive thunderstorm plus a massive dirty smoky orange haze that set over the city due to wildfires up in Canada.
This city has experienced all kinds of wild weather -- massive blizzards, hurricaines, floods, even hazes before -- but to have this weird combination is rare.
Recently I spent a night in Kennebunkport, Maine. It was my first time in the Pine Tree State and -- wow! -- it's beautiful.
Maine is much in the news these days for political reasons but most of the time it's a quiet, sleepy place up north.
In my mind it's The Place Beyond Boston, even more remote than Vermont and New Hampshire, basically a piece of Canada captured within the Lower 48. In Maine, the pace of life is slower, time is more important than money, and culturally it's actually more French-Canadian than American.
Several years ago the humorous write Drew Magary wrote a piece for GQ called "Maine: Do We Need It?" that dissects the vagaries of this odd place.
Unlike northern Maine -- where both its residents and geography have more common with the Wildings in the land beyond the Wall in Game of Thrones -- southern Maine is gorgeous tourist trap. Kennebunkport is its crown jewel, a beautiful seaside town with charming shops, great restaurants, and nice bed and breakfasts.
When we got there, we visited one of the beautiful private beaches (thanks to some family friends). Then we stayed at the Kings Point Inn which I highly recommend, is reasonably priced, gives you breakfast, and has a jacuzzi bathtub. The friendly guy at the front desk talked about how much he loves his town and state, and gave us a nice map -- even showing us directions to Walkers Point, summer home of the Bush family (don't worry, we didn't go). For dinner, we ate a place called Hurricaine -- while the service was slow and it was crowded, the food was amazing. After dinner we walked around the charming streets, getting ice cream, and enjoying the relaxed vibe of the place. I took lots of pictures which, you'll see here, and drank in its beauty.
A couple of interesting things: 1) Apparently the Bush family was in-residence on Walkers Point and good ol' George W. was there celebrating his 80th birthday. 2) Did you know that Maine used to be part of Massachusetts? It became independent in 1820 as part of the Missouri Compromise -- Maine joined as a free state, Missouri as a slave state. 3) There's actually two townd, Kennebunkport and Kennebunk that are divided/joined by a bridge and make us this area. 4) If you go to Maine, you better like seafood.
