The Tuneful Twenties

From silly songs like Billy Jones’ Yes! We have no Bananas to Ethel Waters asking Am I Blue, the Jazz Age was much more than jazz. Spin the dial on your 21^st century RCA Radiola at www.Pandora.com to hear the hits of the 1920s – static optional. 

Dogging it in the 20s

In honor of the recent 136th Westminster Kennel Club dog show and their Best in Show winning Pekinese, Ch Palacegarden Malachy, let’s celebrate the Westminster Dog Shows of the 1920s.

Terrorists Attack – 81 Years Before 9/11

As the Trinity Church bells chimed noon on September 16, 1920, a horse-drawn buggy parked at the corner of Wall and Broad Street exploded. Thirty-eight people died and 400 sustained injuries from the blast, the resulting fire or from the cart’s contents – 500 pounds of cast-iron shrapnel. Across the street at the banking firm of J.P. Morgan and Company, J.P.’s son, Junius, lay among the injured.

A Tenement Time Capsule

I recently explored Manhattan’s West side: the Polyclinic Hospital where Rudolph Valentino died in 1926 (now apartments across from a city park with silver tables reflecting February’s sun, winter greenery and walk-up ethnic restaurants), and 66^th & Broadway – the original site of Frank E. Campbell’s Funeral Chapel. Enjoyable excursions all but the star of my visit was the Lower East Side Tenement Museum.