Bleecker Street
Coordinates: 40°43′49″N 74°0′9″W / 40.73028°N 74.00250°W
Bleecker Street is a west–east street in the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is most famous today as a Greenwich Village nightclub district. The street connects a neighborhood today popular for music venues and comedy, but which was once a major center for American bohemia. The street is named after the family name of Anthony Lispenard Bleecker, a banker, the father of Anthony Bleecker, a 19th-century writer, through whose family farm the street ran.[1]
Bleecker Street connects Abingdon Square (the intersection of Eighth Avenue and Hudson Street in the West Village) to the Bowery and East Village.
History
Bleecker Street is named by and after the Bleecker family because the street ran through the farm of the family. In 1808, Anthony Lispenard Bleecker and his wife deeded to the city a major portion of the land on which Bleecker Street sits.[2]
Originally Bleecker Street extended from Bowery to Broadway, along the north side of the Bleecker farm, later as far west as Sixth Avenue. In 1829 it was joined with Herring Street, extending Bleecker Street northwest to Abingdon Square.
LeRoy Place
LeRoy Place is the former name of a block of Bleecker Street between Mercer and Greene Streets. This was where the first palatial "winged residences" were built. The effect was accomplished by making the central houses taller and closer to the street, while the other houses on the side were set back. The central buildings also had bigger, raised entrances and lantern-like roof projections. The houses were built by Isaac A. Pearson, on both sides of Bleecker Street. To set his project apart from the rest of the area, Pearson convinced the city to rename this block of the street after the prominent international trader Jacob LeRoy.[3][4][5][6]
Transportation
Bleecker Street is served by the 4 6 <6> B D F M trains at Bleecker Street/Broadway – Lafayette Street station. The 1 2 trains serve the Christopher Street – Sheridan Square station one block north of Bleecker Street.
Traffic on the street is one-way, going southeast. In early December 2007, a bicycle lane was marked on the street.
Notable places
Landmarks
- Bayard–Condict Building
- Bleecker Street Cinemas, closed in 1991
- Lynn Redgrave Theater, formerly known as Bleecker Street Theater
- Our Lady of Pompeii Church, Carmine Street
- Washington Square Park
- Bleecker Sitting Area[7] contains a sculpture by Chaim Gross and won a Village Award.[8]
Night spots
- The Bitter End at 147 Bleecker Street
- Cafe Au Go Go was at 152 Bleecker Street
- (Le) Poisson Rouge at 158 Bleecker Street
- The Village Gate was at 160 Bleecker Street
Restaurants
- John's of Bleecker Street, famous pizzeria established in 1929
- Kesté, highly rated Neapolitan style pizzeria established in 2009
Former
- Music venue Cafe Wha?, where Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Bruce Springsteen, Kool & the Gang, Bill Cosby, Richard Pryor, and many others began their careers
- The CBGB club, which closed in 2006, was located at the east end of Bleecker Street, on Bowery.
Notable residents
- James Agee lived at 172 Bleecker Street, above Cafe Espanol (1941–1951)
- Mykel Board
- Robert De Niro grew up on Bleecker Street
- Robert Frank
- Mariska Hargitay
- Alicia Keys
- Cookie Mueller lived at 285 Bleecker Street, above Ottomanelli's (1976–1989)[9]
- John Belushi lived at 376 Bleecker Street (1975)
- Craig Rodwell lived at 350 Bleecker Street (1968–1993), from which he organized New York's first gay pride parade.[10]
- James Roosevelt at 58 Bleecker Street[11]
- Edward Thebaud
- Mark Van Doren
- Dave Winer
In popular culture
Literature
- Valenti Angelo's 1949 novel The Bells of Bleecker Street is set in the Italian American community in that neighborhood.
- Nobel laureate Derek Walcott has written a poem about Bleecker Street entitled "Bleecker Street, Summer."
- In Marvel Comics, 177A Bleecker Street is the location of Doctor Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum.
Film and television
- Much of the film No Reservations (2007), starring Catherine Zeta-Jones and Aaron Eckhart, is set in a restaurant on the corner of Bleecker and Charles Streets. The name of their fictitious restaurant is 22 Bleecker.
- In The WB series What I Like About You, Holly and Valerie live in an apartment on Bleecker Street.
- The Matthews family in Girl Meets World live near Bleecker Street and frequent the Bleecker subway station.
Music
- Japanese pop star Ayumi Hamasaki visited Bleecker Street during recording of her (Miss)understood album. The pictures were later published in Hamasaki's famous "Deji Deji Diary" that is published in each issue of ViVi Magazine.[12]
- Iggy Pop discusses dying on Bleecker Street in his song "Punk Rocker".
References
- ↑ Moscow, Henry (1978), The Street Book: An Encyclopedia of Manhattan's Street Names and Their Origins, New York: Hagstrom, ISBN 0823212750, p.29
- ↑ Crane, Frank W. (November 18, 1945). "Many Titles in 'Village' Area Traced Back to Old Ownerships; Admiral Warren, Who Gave Greenwich Its Name, and Aaron Burr Appear Frequently – Trinity and Rhinelanders Big Holders". Real Estate. The New York Times. p. 121.
It was Anthony Bleecker, one of the most prominent members of the family, who with his wife deeded to the city the greater part of Bleecker Street in 1808.
- ↑ Harris, Luther S. (2003). Around Washington Square : an Illustrated History of Greenwich Village. Johns Hopkins University Press. p. 83. ISBN 0-8018-7341-X.
- ↑ Burrows, Edwin G. & Wallace, Mike (1999), Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898, New York: Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-195-11634-8, p. 459
- ↑ "Changing Types of City Dwellings: Statuary Marble Mantels Indicated the Fashionable Home of Former Age" New York Times (November 22, 1914)
- ↑ "LeRoy Place" Moving Uptown, New York Public Library exhibition
- ↑ "NYC Parks — Bleecker Sitting Area". Retrieved 29 May 2015.
- ↑ "Bleecker Street Sitting Area Renovation". GVSHP. Retrieved 29 May 2015.
- ↑ Curley, Mallory (2010). A Cookie Mueller Encyclopedia. Randy Press.
- ↑ Nagourney, Adam (June 25, 2000). "For Gays, a Party In Search of a Purpose; At 30, Parade Has Gone Mainstream As Movement's Goals Have Drifted". New York Times. Retrieved January 3, 2011.
- ↑ Jim Naureckas. "Bleecker Street: New York Songlines". nysonglines.com.
- ↑ "Ayumi Hamasaki". Memorial Hamasaki — DataBase pour Ayufans.
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