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New
York Almanac ->
September
New York City in September
The Brooklyn Labor Day Carnival
This Month:
....Average monthly temperature in September : 69° ...
head downtown to the Feast
of San Gennaro on Mulberry Street
for a 10-day festa of zeppoles, sausage & peppers, music,
carnival rides, religious processions and street parades...
...then
to Brooklyn at the West
Indian-American Day Parade for a combination food festival
and carnival along with one of the "jumpin' -est parades
this side of the Caribbean, featuring wild and colorful
costumes, music and dance throughout Labor Day weekend...
...plus,
don't miss the New
York Film Festival at Lincoln Center for a two-week
long extravaganza offering first-run features and indy films
...
September 5
|
September 1
....dapper and witty Mayor
Jimmy Walker - who presides over the city as one of
New York's most popular mayors throughout most of the Roaring
20's - cannot account for certain personal expenditures
(including a $1 million deposit to his bank account) and
is forced to resign this day in 1932...
September 2
...the complete orchestral score for Porgy
and Bess, later praised as the first and finest American
opera, is completed this day in New York in 1935 by its
composer, George Gershwin ...
September 3
... English explorer Henry
Hudson sails into New York Harbor and up the river later
named for him this foggy morning in 1609 ...
September 4
...inventor Thomas Edison hits the switch on his new
power plant on Pearl Street, illuminating downtown with
a total of 800 light bulbs in one square mile area today
in 1882. By the following year, Pearl Street Station has
508 subscribers and lights 12,732 bulbs...
September 5
... so named for its resemblance to a clothes iron, the
Flatiron
Building is the city's tallest when it is completed
this day in 1902. The building soon attracts a crowd of
men who gather to get glimpses of women's dresses being
blown up by the winds created by its triangular shape at
23rd Street and Madison. "23
skidoo!" (scram) is an expression later made popular
when city police attempt to chase gawkers from the area
...
September 6
...Hurricane
Isabel forms out in the Atlantic this day in 2003, later
sweeping up the Eastern coast to cause damages totaling
$90 million in New York and leaving over a million New Yorkers
without power ...
September 7
... the world's first attempted submarine attack occurs
this day in New York Harbor in 1776 as the new American
invention dubbed "The
Turtle" confronts the British flagship HMS Eagle
...
September 11
|
September 8
... Governor
Peter Stuyvesant surrenders New Amsterdam to the British
this day in 1664 without a shot being fired. The town will
soon be renamed New York ..
September 9
... a New York City teacher's strike keeps over one million
students out of school this day in 1968. The strike lasts
until mid-November when students stage a protest over canceled
vacations and lengthened school days to make up for lost
time...
September 10
...21-year-old Nathan
Hale is the nation's first spy when he volunteers to
sneak behind enemy lines and report on British troop movements
in New York (also see September 22...)
September 11
...hijacked by Arab extremists, two American Airline jetliners
crash
into the 110-story Twin Towers at the World Trade Center,
resulting in their collapse and the deaths of almost 3,000
this day in 2001...
September 12
... the first Rosh Hashanah observance in America occurs
in New Amsterdam by some 27
Jewish refugees (who recently arrived fleeing persecution
in Brazil) this day in 1654...
September 13
...called "the longest living thing in New York City"
(having been planted by Dutch governor Peter Stuyvesant
on his farm in 1647), the Stuyvesant
Pear Tree on 13th Street and Third Avenue is felled
when it is struck by a wagon this day in 1867...
September 14
...35,000 freshmen pour into the City University of New
York, up from about 20,000 a year earlier, as open admissions
begins this day in 1970...
September 13
|
September 15
... the first heroine of the Revolutionary War Mrs.
Robert Murray entertains General Howe (whom she had
dated back in England) at her Murray Hill estate on 36th
Street, allowing American forces time to retreat this day
in 1776 ...
September 16
...the new Metropolitan
Opera House opens tonight at Lincoln Center in 1966
with the world premier of Samuel Barber’s Antony
and Cleopatra starring Leontyne Price and Justino Díaz
...
September 17
... kicking off one of the most bizarre and sensational
murders in city history, John
C. Colt (brother of Samuel Colt, the handgun inventor)
argues with local printer Samuel Adams and in a fit of temper
brains him with a hatchet this day in 1842. Adam's decomposing
body is later found in a trunk on a steamship bound for
New Orleans, but Colt stands trial and is sentenced to the
gallows for the grisly slaying. Languishing in the Tombs
prison, Colt is found with a self-inflicted stab wound through
the heart just hours after marrying his sweetheart, Caroline
Crenshaw, in a ceremony granted as a last request ...
September 18
...the toast of London, Fanny
Kemble arrives in New York this day in 1832 and almost
immediately begins kvetching about rude New Yorkers, the
hotel service, and all those mosquitos...
September 19
....newly-arrived immigrants from Naples first celebrate
the Feast of San Gennaro on Mulberry Street in Little Italy
this day in 1926. The one-day celebration later grows into
a week-long festa of religious processions, parades,
clams on the half shell, and fried zeppoles ...
September 22
|
September 20
...the New York Stock Exchange was forced to close for the
first time in its history as a result of a banking crisis
during the financial panic
of 1873...
September 21
...the Great
Fire of 1776 erupts this day at the Fighting Cocks Tavern
at Whitehall Street as strong winds spread the flames to
about 400 buildings, demolishing about one-quarter of the
city....
September 22
...days after after he volunteers for the dangerous post,
Nathan Hale is revealed as a spy for the American forces
and utters, "I only regret that I have but one life
to lose for my country" before he is hanged by the
British in Manhattan this day in 1776 ...
September 23
...During a world summit, demonstrations occur daily outside
the United Nations building where Soviet premier Nikita
Krushchev bangs his shoe on his delegation's desk this week
in 1960. Meanwhile, Cuban leader Fidel Castro is thrown
out of his hotel for allegedly plucking and cooking chickens
in his midtown suite...
September 24
...Babe Ruth bids farewell to the New York Yankees this
day in 1934 in his final game at Yankee Stadium. The Yanks
lose to Boston 5-0...
September 25
...Evita,
starring Patti LuPone, opens at the Broadway Theater tonight
in 1979 and goes to play for 1568 performances...
September 26
...West
Side Story opens on Broadway this night in 1957 at the
Winter Garden Theatre with the New York Times finding "the
material...horrifying, but the workmanship admirable..."
September 27
...thousands of horses are dead or lay dying throughout
New York during the Great
Epizootic this day in 1872 when the "horse flu"
leaves the city without horse-drawn cable cars, fire engines,
ambulances or any other means of transportation, as Belmont
Park and other racetracks closed their gates ...
September 26
|
September 28
...a policeman exclaims "You can't do that on Fifth
Avenue!" as a woman is arrested for smoking while riding
in an open automobile this day in 1904. Although smoking
is not strictly illegal, woman indulging in the habit in
public is still a "dreadful" social taboo ...
September 29
...Macy's department store major competitor, Gimbels, closes
its doors at 33rd Street and Broadway this day in 1986 ...
September 30
...in the most-watched prize fight in history, 70 million
TV viewers watch as Muhammad Ali beats Ernie Shavers at
Madison Square Garden to claim the heavyweight championship
boxing crown this night in 1977 ...
-->
October
|
...taking
Manhattan to the Web.