One of America's first great Italian neighborhoods was once in East Harlem, once filled with more southern Italians than Sicily itself, a neighborhood almost entirely gone today except for a couple restaurants, a church and a long-standing religious festival.

This is, of course, not New York's' famous "Little Italy," the festive tourist area in lower Manhattan built from another 19th-century Italian neighborhood on Mulberry Street. The bustling street life of old Italian Harlem exists mostly in memory now.

If you wander around any modern American neighborhood with a strong Italian presence, you'll find yourself around people who can trace their lineage back through the streets of Italian Harlem. Perhaps that includes yourself.

But it's not all warm nostalgia and fond recollections. Life could be quite hard in Italian Harlem, thanks to the nearby industrial environment, the deteriorating living conditions and the street crime, the early years of New York organized crime.

So who were these first Italian settlers who left their homes for what would become a hard urban life in upper Manhattan? What drew them to the city? What traditions did they bring? And in the end, what did they leave behind, when so many moved out to the four corners of the United States?

Visit the Bowery Boys website for more adventures into New York City history

This show was produced by Kieran Gannon.

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Share your love of the city’s history with a Bowery Boys Walks gift certificate! Our digital gift cards let your loved ones choose their perfect tour and date.

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A star of the New York City skyline is reborn -- the Waldorf Astoria is reopening in 2025! And so we thought we'd again raise a toast to one of the world's most famous hotels, an Art Deco classic attached to the Gilded Age's most prestigious name in luxury and refinement.

Now, you might think you know this story -- the famous lobby clock, Peacock Alley, cocktail bars! -- but do we have some surprises for you.

The Waldorf Astoria — once the Waldorf-Astoria and even the Waldorf=Astoria — has been a premier name in hotel accommodations since the opening of the very first edition on 34th Street and Fifth Avenue (the location of today’s Empire State Building).

But the history of the current incarnation on Park Avenue contains the twists and turns of world events, from World War II to recent diplomatic dramas. In essence, the Waldorf Astoria has become the world’s convention center.

Step past the extraordinary Art Deco trappings, and you’ll find rooms which have hosted a plethora of important gatherings, not to mention the frequent homes to Hollywood movie stars.

To celebrate the renovated hotel's reopening this spring, the Bowery Boys present a newly re-edited and re-mastered version of their original show from 2016.

This show was re-edited and remastered by Kieran Gannon.

Join us on Patreon for extra podcasts and lots of other goodies

Share your love of the city’s history with a Bowery Boys Walks gift certificate! Our digital gift cards let your loved ones choose their perfect tour and date.

Grab a Bowery Boys tee-shirt, mug or water bottle at our merchandise store.

There were very few history podcasts around back in the year 2008, but the Bowery Boys Podcast was certainly here ... and so was The Memory Palace, hosted by Nate DiMeo, presenting small, often forgotten vignettes from history in a descriptive, narrative format.

In this special interview episode, Greg talks with Nate on the occasion of his new companion book "The Memory Palace: True Short Stories of the Past" (Penguin Random House) which features many of his fable-like historical portraits, including many from New York City history -- from revolutionary amusements on Coney Island to less frequented corridors within the Metropolitan Museum of Art

And Greg and Nate go deep on the relationship between history and memory, on the reliability of memory to help us relive the past and how our own experiences can help fill in the gaps within histories that seem lost to us today.

Featuring a couple of elephants, the Wallendas, Parks and Recreation, the X-Men, a very large painting of Versailles, and the big secret about the monster hiding in your closet right now.

Listen to episodes of The Memory Palace here. it's also available on Spotify, Apple and the other podcast players, the same places you find the Bowery Boys.

This episode was produced by Kieran Gannon.

To donate to those affected by the California wildfires, head over to these verified fundraisers at GoFundMe

Join us on Patreon for extra podcasts and lots of other goodies

Share your love of the city’s history with a Bowery Boys Walks gift certificate! Our digital gift cards let your loved ones choose their perfect tour and date.

Grab a Bowery Boys tee-shirt, mug or water bottle at our merchandise store.