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Manhattan

Inwood Arts Pioneer: Aimee Le Prince Voorhees

In the early part of the twentieth century a pioneering woman named Aimee Le Prince Voorhees and her husband Harry built a pottery works in the shadow of Inwood hill. In this pastoral setting, lacking any modern conveniences, Voorhees created a world-class pottery studio and inspired a future generation of artists, ceramicists and sculptors. [...]

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Fort George Amusement Park

In 1895, on the same spot where George Washington and his band of Revolutionaries defended a British assault after the Battle of Brooklyn, a glorious and magnificent amusement park rivaling Coney Island opened near the northeastern end of Manhattan. The Fort George Amusement park was located in what is now Highbridge Park between 190th and [...]

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A Potter’s Lament

“There were other trees, many decrepit. In the middle was a kiln where an Indian princess taught ceramics under dubious auspices. She had a son who didn’t work. Both were on relief, and the relief checks were delivered to the princess at a mailbox fastened to a tree. The hullabaloo about disturbing the princess, the [...]

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Inwood in 1886

The below article originally appeared in the New York World on December 26, 1886. While much in Inwood has changed since this description was first set into type, much has remained the same. The original clipping is housed the the genealogy room of the New York Public Library. “Few New Yorkers are familiar with the [...]

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Inwood’s Mount Olympus: The Seaman Mansion in 1869

Old Seaman Mansion in Inwood New York City

A while back I wrote a history of the old Seaman mansion that once stood on the grounds currently occupied by Park Terrace Gardens. Today the only trace of the Seaman estate is the crumbling marble arch located down the hill on Broadway. The following description from 1869 finds the home occupied by its original [...]

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215th Street Stairs

Generations of Inwood residents have trudged up and down the familiar stairs which connect Broadway with Park Terrace East. The steps themselves have stood frozen in time as the surrounding neighborhood reached maturity. The stairs are a familiar sight to anyone who has ever passed through Inwood. The ancient passageway was built in an era [...]

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Tornado on the Hudson

In the summer of 1901 Gotham suffered the deadliest heat wave in New York City history. From June 29-July 6th at least 989 individuals perished in weather so hot it melted asphalt and drove scores of New Yorkers insane. For a solid week New Yorkers cursed, collapsed, threw themselves into wells, leaped to their deaths [...]

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The Old Nagle Cemetery

In mid-17th century Jan Nagle and Jan Dyckman traveled to the New World and settled in northern Manhattan. For more than two centuries the families farmed the land, raised cattle, planted orchards, built bridges and homes and even intermarried. And while Dyckman is a familiar Inwood name, largely thanks to the preservation of the post-Revolutionary [...]

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