Ghosts of 42nd Street : A History of America's Most Infamous Block

Rating:
Summary: THE book to read about 42nd Street
Review: 42nd Street's spectacular renaissance has unleashed a torrent of recent books chronicling the thoroughfare's rise, fall and re-birth. One of these, "Down 42nd Street," was a huge disappointment, littered with factual inaccuracies and nearly incoherent in its recounting of the epic 1990s re-development saga. (See my March 30, 2002 review of this book for specifics.)

Anthony Bianco's "Ghosts of 42nd Street" suffers from no such shortcomings. Indeed, one of this book's central strengths is its detailed "insider's" account of the street's 1990s metamorphosis. Rebecca Robertson is depicted as a genuine heroine, envisioning earlier than most - certainly before anyone in the government bureaucracy - that the rehabilitation of the turn-of-the-century theaters would be the linchpin in restoring 42nd Street's luster. Robertson was prescient in foreseeing that office development would follow the theaters' revival.

42nd Street has always been filled with characters and we meet many of them. For example, there's Marty Hodas, a struggling 1960s entrepreneur who emerges as "The King of Peeps," before running afoul of federal tax laws. Then there's Seymour Durst, the obstreperous developer who waged a clever campaign to block re-development, but whose family would build the first new office tower.

There's a lot of interesting New York City history here as well. We learn, for example, that the financier August Belmont was the catalyst behind changing the name Long Acre Square to Times Square. The New York Times publisher Adolph Ochs ostensibly had nothing to do with it, though it was Ochs himself who conceived the New Year's Eve ball dropping festivities in 1906. There's also a vivid account of the demise of legendary architect, bon vivant and habitual lady's-man Sanford White at the hands of a jealous husband.

If you read only one book about 42nd Street, this is certainly the one.




Rating:
Summary: A Welcome Departure
Review: Let me get my one complaint out of the way. This book should be titled, "Ghosts of WEST 42nd Street" because it just about completely ignores 42nd Street east of 6th Avenue.

That said, Anthony Bianco's "Ghosts of 42nd Street: A History of America's Most Infamous Block" is a welcome departure from the spate of books about 42nd Street that seem to come out at a rate of one a month. Mr. Bianco's approach is all-encompassing, not just focusing on the crime or the theater, the squalor or the glamour. There is an encyclopedic amount of information here, as he spans the decades. And yet, the book is very compressed and easy to get through. Mr. Bianco's writing is very fluid.

The cast of characters is familiar, as are many of the anecdotes. However, there are plenty of tales that will surprise the reader, even one that is very familiar with the history of this piece of midtown real estate. Pick up a copy and you will enjoy.

Rating:
Summary: A Welcome Departure
Review: Let me get my one complaint out of the way. This book should be titled, "Ghosts of WEST 42nd Street" because it just about completely ignores 42nd Street east of 6th Avenue.

That said, Anthony Bianco's "Ghosts of 42nd Street: A History of America's Most Infamous Block" is a welcome departure from the spate of books about 42nd Street that seem to come out at a rate of one a month. Mr. Bianco's approach is all-encompassing, not just focusing on the crime or the theater, the squalor or the glamour. There is an encyclopedic amount of information here, as he spans the decades. And yet, the book is very compressed and easy to get through. Mr. Bianco's writing is very fluid.

The cast of characters is familiar, as are many of the anecdotes. However, there are plenty of tales that will surprise the reader, even one that is very familiar with the history of this piece of midtown real estate. Pick up a copy and you will enjoy.