21H.235 | Fall 2009 | Undergraduate

Metropolis: History of New York City

Readings

Readings for each week are taken from the required books, listed on the Syllabus, and additional texts cited in the schedule as they appear.

WEEK # TOPICS READINGS
1

Introduction

Irving, Washington. Diedrich Knickerbocker’s A History of New-York. Chicago, IL: W. B. Conkey, 1806. Book I, chapter V; Book III, chapter III; Book VI, chapter V; Book VII, chapter XI.
2 Haudenosaunee: The people of the longhouse

Ordeal of the Longhouse, chapters 1-4.

Island at the Center of the World, chapters 1-4.

Pilkington, Walter, ed. “Speech of Onoonghwandekha at the Funeral of a Seneca, 7 April 1765.” In The Journals of Samuel Kirkland: 18th Century Missionary to the Iroquois, Government Agent, and Father of Hamilton College. Clinton, NY: Hamilton College, 1980, pp. 23-25.

3 New France, New Netherland, New England, New York

Goodfriend, Joyce. Before the Melting Pot: Society and Culture in Colonial New York, 1664-1730. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994, chapters 1-3. ISBN: 9780691037875.

Wilder, Craig Steven. In the Company of Black Men: The African Influence on African American Culture in New York City. New York, NY: NYU Press, 2005, chapter 1. ISBN: 9780814793695.

Reps, John W. The Making of Urban America: A History of City Planning in the United States. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992, chapter 6. ISBN: 9780691006185.

4 Trade and social transformation

New York Before Chinatown, chapters 1-3.

Chants Democratic, chapters 1-2.

White, Shane. Somewhat More Independent: The End of Slavery in New York City, 1770-1810. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2004, chapters 1-2. ISBN: 9780820323749.

Copeland, David A. “The New York Public Education Controversy, 1753-1744.” Debating the Issues in Colonial Newspapers: Primary Documents on Events of the Period. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2000, chapter 13. ISBN: 9780313309823.

5 The greatest city in North America

Crabgrass Frontier, chapters 1-2.

Blackmar, Elizabeth. Manhattan for Rent, 1785-1850. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991, chapters 1-2. ISBN: 9780801499739.

City of Eros, chapters 2-4.

Asbury, Herbert. The Gangs of New York: An Informal History of the Underworld. New York, NY: Vintage, 2008, ISBN: 9780307388988.

Dickens, Charles. American Notes: A Journey. London, England: Chapman and Hall, 1842, chapter 6.

Whitman, Walt. “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry.” In Leaves of Grass, 1855.

6 The era of the Civil War

Schecter, Barnet. The Devil’s Own Work: The Civil War Draft Riots and the Fight to Reconstruct America. New York, NY: Walker & Co., 2007, chapter 4. ISBN: 970802715081.

Commager, Henry Steele, and Milton Cantor, eds. “Mayor Fernando Wood’s Recommendation for the Secession of New York City.” In Documents of American History, Vol. 1: to 1898. 10th ed. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1988. ISBN: 9780132172745.

Kuo Wei Tchen, John. “Quimbo Appo’s Fear of Fennians: Chinese-Irish-Anglo Relations in New York City.” Bayor, Ronald H., and Timothy J. Meagher, eds. In The New York Irish. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997, chapter 5. ISBN: 9780801857645.

Blackmar, Elizabeth, and Roy Rosenzweig. The Park and the People: A History of Central Park. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998, chapters 1-2. ISBN: 9780801497513.

7 Metropolis: post-bellum New York City

The Monied Metropolis, chapters 4-6.

Pratt, John W. “Boss Tweed’s Welfare Program.” New York Historical Quarterly 45 (1961): 396-411.

Plunkitt, George Washington, and William L. Riordon. “On The Shame of the Cities,” “Brooklynites: Natural-Born Hayseeds,” and “Tammany Leaders Not Bookworms.” In Plunkitt of Tammany Hall. New York, NY: McClure, Philips, & Co., 1905. Chapters 7, 10, and 11.

Steffens, Lincoln. “New York: Good Government to the Test.” The Shame of the Cities. New York, NY: McClure, Philips, & Co., 1904.

8 The house of labor

Moore, Deborah Dash. At Home in America: Second Generation New York Jews. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1981, chapter 2. ISBN: 9780231050630.

Working Class New York, Introduction & chapter 2.

Doyle, Joe. “Striking for Ireland on the New York Docks.” The New York Irish, chapter 14.

Hood, Clifton. 722 Miles: The Building of the Subways and How They Transformed New York. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004, chapter 4. ISBN: 9780801880544.

9 Crime: disorganized and organized

Fried, Albert. The Rise and Fall of the Jewish Gangster in America. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1994, chapter 4. ISBN: 9780231096836.

Joselit, Jenna Weissman. Our Gang: Jewish Crime and the New York Jewish Community, 1900-1940. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1983, chapter 6. ISBN: 9780253203144.

English, E. J. Paddy Whacked: The Untold Story of the Irish American Gangster. New York, NY: Harper, 2006, chapter 5. ISBN: 9780060590031.

10 Sexuality, gender, and race

Gay New York, chapters 5-9.

Selections of Bruce Nugent’s interview in Kisseloff, Jeff. You Must Remember This: An Oral History of Manhattan from the 1890s to World War II. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000, pp. 285-289. ISBN: 9780801863066.

Lewis, David Levering. When Harlem was in Vogue. New York, NY: Penguin, 1997, chapter 7. ISBN: 9780140263343.

11 The suburbanization of the American Dream

Crabgrass Frontier, chapters 9-10.

Caro, Robert. The Power Broker. New York, NY: Knopf, 1974, chapters 34-39. ISBN: 9780394480763.

12 The urbanization of America’s decline

Wilder, Craig Steven. A Covenant with Color: Race and Social Power in Brooklyn. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2001, chapter 9. ISBN: 9780231119078.

Working Class New York, chapters 11, 15.

Kim, Kwang Chung. Koreans in the Hood: Conflict with African Americans. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999, chapter 6. ISBN: 9780801861048.

Sánchez Korrol, Virginia E. From Colonia to Community: The History of Puerto Ricans in New York City. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1994, chapter 2. ISBN: 9780520079007.

Rieder, Jonathan. Canarsie: The Jews and Italians of Brooklyn Against Liberalism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987, chapter 1. ISBN: 9780674093614.

13 Urban revival in the age of corporatism

Working Class New York, chapters 16-18.

Articles on gentrification and Times Square revitalization

Course Info

Instructor
Departments
As Taught In
Fall 2009