Tag Archives: east village

THE DUKE OF ROCK by Peter Nolan Smith

2012 Back in the 80s and 90s Tompkins Square Park in the East Village had several basketball courts. Full-court games were played next to the handball courts closest to Avenue B and East 10th Street. Half-court games was located against the fences of the asphalt baseball field on Avenue A. Players were split between neighborhood […]

SEPTEMBER 1, 1978 – JOURNAL ENTRY – EAST VILLAGE

Flowers are exploding all across the East Village community gardens. The temperature is in the 90s. The air in our apartment has no oxygen. The streets only have a little more. Alice and I have lived together for the last month. I haven’t worked a day. Alice is heading home to West Virginia for Labor […]

FAMOUS FOR NEVER on Sale

FAMOUS FOR NEVER A STORY OF FAME AND MISFORTUNE BY PETER NOLAN SMITH Rome wasn’t burnt in a day. – James Steele MANGOZEEN BOOKS 2024 In the 1970s city politicians launched countless projects to stem the tide of ‘white flight’. None of the doomed programs achieved their goals and the population of the Lower East […]

AUGUST 17, 1978 – JOURNAL ENTRY

I’ve lost track of time. Alice keeps nagging me about money. I have none. I’m living on a bagel and pizza a day whenever I’m not a lunch waiter at EBASCO CORP. downtown on Vestry Street. Guadalcanal asked, “How bad can it be? Are you still sleeping together?” “No, I’m on the couch in the […]

Lisa Takes A Bath 1978

My apartment at 256 East 10th Street was a relic of tenement living. There were no electrical outlets in the bedroom. A water closet had a pull chain for the overhead tank. Warped wooden floors spread to crumbling plaster walls traveled by tribes of cockroaches. Girls didn’t like the insects, but they loved the bathtub […]