5 comments about Babe Ruth Slept Here: The Baseball Landmarks of New York City.

1. Resisler uses crisp, clean prose to lead us on a fascinating tour of New York City sites relating to baseball--from Lou Gehrig's birthplace to where Billy sunday preached to where Rusty Staub served ribs it all here in a great book.



2. In amusing vignettes, the author takes us from place to place, and from one era to another, in the annals of baseball. Each page opens the reader to entertaining narratives of baseball's interesting locations and exciting personalities. A grand slam.



3. Having borrowed the book from a friend and having read it with great pleasure, it has been placed on my Christmas wish list. It will provide me with a guide on future tours into New York to see the many sites related to baseball events that Reisler has done such an excellent job of describing.



4. There is a lot of history in New York City and the surrounding area, much of it baseball and the author certainly covers it well. Although much of what is in the book can certainly be found in other baseball books it is still a worth while read. I realize it would have added much to the size of the book, but I would have liked to see more pictures such as of the present site of Lou Gehrig's birthplace on page 162 and of The Lambs' Club on page 212. I found a few errors of which a few are inevitable, I suppose. On page 196 the author says Bob Friend was the winning pitcher after the Giants' last game in the Polo Grounds (1957) and nine years later he was the winning pitcher in the first game at Shea Stadium (1964). This would be seven years. On page 73 the name of Billy Jurges was spelled "Jurgez". The most glaring mistake, however, came on page 80 when it is mentioned that Lou Gehrig was honored at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1940. The correct year, of course, is 1939. I would give the book a tough three stars, maybe even closer to four, but that Gehrig mistake really bothered me.



5. This is a very unreliable book. I'll offer one example: the article on the original Polo Grounds at 110th Street between 5th and 6th Avenues. The article gets that location right, and that's about all. (1) Contrary to what the author says, the Metropolitans played at the Polo Grounds from the beginning of the club. (2) The author hasn't figured out which team was which. Jim Mutrie did not call the Metropolitans "giants," and they did not become the Giants. The Giants were a separate team, also organized by Mutrie and his money-man Day. The Mets were around for three years (1880-82) before Mutrie and Day founded the Giants, getting them a slot in the National League while assigning the Mets to the American Association. The Giants started out being called the "New Yorks," or the "Nationals" for their membership in the National League; and they were the ones Mutrie or Day called "giants" and who acquired that as their name. (3) So it's wrong to say that "It turned out that the Polo Grounds also served as home to another local team of note, the Nationals." The Nationals were the same team as the Giants, and they didn't "turn out" to play at the Polo Grounds too--Mutrie and Day decided to have both the Mets and the Giants play at the Polo Grounds from the moment they founded the Giants. (4) The park wasn't a "rectangular sliver of land," which makes it sound much skinnier in one dimension than the other. One side was the crosstown block from 5th to 6th Avenues, one eighth of a mile. The other side was the two uptown blocks from 110th to 112th Street, totalling one tenth of a mile. That is, the park was 528 feet in one dimension and 660 feet in the other--a 4-5 ratio, which isn't much of a sliver; it's not all that far from a square. Elsewhere the author refers to the park's "vast expanse of land," which is correct but makes "sliver" sound even stranger. (5) Further on he tells us that the Mets "joined the American Association in 1882 and the following year, at about the same time they became the Giants, joined the National League." Dead wrong, as we've already seen--they were two separate teams in two separate leagues. (6) Finally, he tells us "A more unfortunate fate awaited the Polo Grounds, which burned down in 1889." This is false. The Polo Grounds met its demise when New York City decided to complete the street grid in that area--much of which had only existed on maps before this--and sent city inspectors to cut down the Polo Grounds fence to make room for 111th Street to pass through. Day and Mutrie fought the city and even got the state legislature to pass a bill granting the Giants a variance and suspending the construction of 111th Street; but the governor, an advocate of local rule, vetoed the bill and the Giants lost their home. This was early in 1889, and it was in that season that the Giants moved uptown to the new park at Coogan's Bluff, which was named the Polo Grounds after the old park even though polo would never be played there. The only Polo Grounds that burned down was one of the versions of the Coogan's Bluff park, which burned in 1911, twenty-two years after the original Polo Grounds ceased to exist. Clearly the author has done some cursory reading in the sources on the old Polo Grounds, but he's misunderstood or forgotten most of what he read, and gets almost the whole story of this first park of the New York Giants wrong.

3 comments about Beat Generation in New York: A Walking Tour of Jack Kerouac's City.

1. It would be next to impossible to find these places on your own. Even more impossible to learn as much about each of the sites as is presented in this guide. Each tour follows a logical route and there are plenty of stops that you probably never would have thought of--eg. Serpico's apartment, the former site of Thomas Wolfe's East 8th St. apartment. Using this guide is a great way to see the Village, East and West. And the insight will keep you reading even as you're moving to the next stop. Take your time. Spread the tours over a couple of afternoons. And linger for a while in Washington Square.

   A great companion to this book is "The Beat Generation in New York." I wouldn't recommend carrying this heavy book around with you, but after you've finished the tours, open the book to look at the pictures taken at many of the places you've just visited.




2. of course anyone who lives in new york city can tell you where the white horse and cedar tavern are, but do they all know that where sam goody now stands on sixth avenue and ninth street is the very same place that the cafeteria kerouac wrote about extensively in visions of cody once stood?

   this book is filled with a lot of well-known and plenty of not so well known places where various members of the beat generation ate, performed, lived, got drunk in, or otherwise played out their lives. the tours are broken down by area and there are clear directions to help you find where you're going (even if the place no longer exists). each tour also begins with a street map of the area covered and clearly numbered destinations, which was very helpful, although i did wish that the book had also come with an overview map of all manhattan and destinations so that i could more easily combine tours or skip around to places of interest if i didn't want to follow a complete tour.

   each stopping place in the tour book includes a paragraph or two on why the place is important to beat history and who/what occured there. although the title of the book claims that new york was "jack kerouac's city," the tours really include many of the other important beat figures as well as a few others that were influenced by the beat movement, such as bob dylan.

   this is a great way for beat aficionados visiting new york to get a taste of the city, and a fun way for locals to spend an afternoon or two discovering new spots and seeing familiar places in a new light.




3. Having moved to New York not long ago, I've been devouring the history and architecture of the city. This book blends the best of both, adding a third party to the mix -- literature. Dividing the city -- mostly Manhattan -- into eight two-hour walking tours, this guidebook offers literary references, beat-gen biographical information, and urban commentary in a useful, insightful style. The book is due an update -- the Gotham Book Mart has moved and several once-vacant lots are no longer undeveloped -- but this book has made for several wonderful walking weekends, and I know I'll retrace my steps in the future.

No comments about High Rise Low Down: Who's Who and What's What in New York's Most Coveted Apartment Houses.

1 comments about The Finger Lakes Book: A Complete Guide, Second Edition (A Great Destinations Guide).

1. This book has a lot of background historical information that is very interesting and cool to know, but there are many restaurants listed which no longer exist (I went looking for several and couldn't find them). I also think that if you're going to write a general interest sort of guidebook, you should spend a little time on possible children's attractions, particularly places to eat with kids. However, we did do some fun things based on her book that we would never have found otherwise. If you buy this book, call before you go.

3 comments about Radical Walking Tours of New York City (2nd ed).

1. I've tried several of Bruce's actual Radical Walking Tours, which he still conducts in person. He researches, writes and organizes his work better, or more consistently, than he sometimes delivers it in person. But they are always stimulating as social history, leftist political history, labor and industrial history, and even humor. Easily among the best tours I've tried here in NYC and I've tried several.

   Many "stops" in his tours have changed my very sense of certain NYC blocks & neighborhoods.

   This book is also fascinating browsing history as well as one of the coolest specialty travel guides I've looked over. Good for new and veteran New Yorkers alike.




2. I wanted more information on the events and places than he provided. No doubt that Mr. Kayton is a terrific tour guide and NYC needs more scholarly guides; the typical guide in this great city is HORRENDOUSLY inept and ignorant. Other parts of the city, aside from the Lower East Side and Villages should have been covered - I can't imagine that no radical never called Murray Hill, Times Square, Turtle Bay, etc., home.



3. This is a guidebook with a hard left political point of view on absolutely everything (as in communist or anarchist, not liberal). Not to be alarmed, however. My evaluation of the book is especially for those, like me, who do NOT share these views. Rather than off-putting, I found Kayton's historical comments to be concise, virtually always intersting, and highly relevant to an appreciation of the neighborhoods in question. The Greenwhich Village walk, for ecample, focuses on sites that have been the homes of famous leftists (John Reed, Emma Goldman, the Rosenbergs), left-leaning writers (Edna St. Vincent Millay), alleged bad guy capitalists (Mayor Jimmy Walker, Mayor Ed Koch), as well as important places in the history of labor (the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire), abolitionism, civil rights, gay rights (the Stonewall Inn demonstrations), and anti-war protest. The slice of New York history that these places represent comes alive from a perspective that resembles the participants'. Finally, Kayton's humor and energy more than outweigh the silliness of some of his views. I recommend it if you're looking for something different.

3 comments about The Buddhist Guide to New York: Where to Go, What to Do, and How to Make the Most of the Fantastic Resources in the Tri-State Area.

1. I'd read a little about Buddhism but not really gotten around to figuring out how to practice it until I came across this little gem, which erased all my excuses for procrastinating - I don't know where to go, what if they don't speak English, how am I supposed to act? The author lays it all out and, from reading about the different schools of Buddhism and the individual character of temples and practice centers, I was able to identify several places I wanted to try. You will learn so much!



2. I bought this book mainly to get a better feel for the various Buddhist sects proliferating today, as the book has a great capsule overview of what the focus of each main group is. However, the book is book insightful and amusing, and will save the novice Buddhist visitor or tourist many a misstep or faus pas, not to mention wasted time. Wilson gives great, easy to follow information and covers not only NYC but I think the whole state. Definitely goes in my bag the next time I take a trip north!



3. Jeff Wilson, a Buddhist who practices in the Pure Land tradition, has written an indispensable guide to Buddhist practice in New York City...

   His book is very reader friendly and gives a tremendous feel for all the various places to practice which are available in the tri-state area...the book is a must have for both the experienced practitioner who wants to have a guide and the new practitioner who is looking for a sangha...

No comments about Zagat 2008 New York City Book & Map Pack.

No comments about Freeing the Angel from the Stone A Guide to Piccirilli Sculpture in New York City.

5 comments about A House on the Heights.

1. Only reason I'm docking it a star is the typically tiresome bloviations of gadabout dilettante Georgie in the introduction. The presence of Georgie between the same covers as Truman might have some value for bulmics, but to me it's just repulsive. Beloved Truman wrote all too little, and Georgie keeps typing, typing, typing! When will it all end?



2. I rated this one four stars because I can't help compare it to my two personal favourites, 'Music For Chameleons' and 'In Cold Blood.'
   Nonetheless, this book has all the beautiful Capote observations in it as well. Whenever Capote describes something or someone I am completely amazed. The visuals he brings forth in the readers mind are like no other. This one's a quick read. I was a lil' angry it was short because I wanted more beautiful sentences.



3. I'll post a more extensive review later, when I've had time to do more than scan the book. But I want to warn buyers that it's a very slim, undersized book of only 43 pages, with lots of space between the lines. If Capote was paid by the word for this article-turned-book, he didn't make much.



4. Yes, it is a tiny book. Even though I read the review here that mentions that, when it arrived this week I was surprised. It is something he wrote for a magazine way back when. The Brooklyn he wrote about has changed, yet again. Did any of us think we would live to see Brooklyn become so expensive you couldn't afford to live there! It has happened, my friends. This book is a history of the borough and the area. NYC changes like the fall leaves. It grows and grows and changes and changes. He captured the Brooklyn of his time so elloquently you feel as if he lived 100 years ago. I am going to give this book to all my friends for the December holidays. It will fit nicely in a Christmas stocking. Truman Capote's books, now more than ever, are a must read. Other than Dominick Dunne, who do we have that writes so well and transports us to these exotic places with exotic people we would never have an opportunity to meet? You will put this book in a special place so everyone can see it. I already have.



5. Short, descriptive, life in Brooklyn Heights as seen through Capote's keenest of powers of observation. A lot of space between the lines invites reading between the lines . . . . Plimpton's intro is as Fun as the little book.

No comments about Rails-to-Trails New York: The Official Rails-to-Trails Conservancy Guidebook.