Event: Harlem Skyscraper Cycling Classic this Sunday

One Sunday in June, several years ago, my wife and I decided that it was a perfect day to take our bikes out and explore the neighborhood.  Get some use out of the bikes we never use quite enough.


It was a lovely day.  We loved seeing the brownstones, the flowers our neighbors planted in tree beds, the warm sun splashing our faces as we rode around Harlem's open spaces.


We rode east down 120th Street and crossed Mount Morris Park West, heading toward Fifth Avenue....and promptly found about 30 professional and semi-professional road bikers in brightly colored spandex bearing down on us at high speed!  What the heck was that?!? we wondered as we jumped the curb to get out of the way.


Turns out, we unwittingly rode right into the middle of the oldest continually held bike race in New York City - the Harlem Skyscraper Cycling Classic.  This Sunday, June 20th, the 37th annual Classic will be held at Marcus Garvey Park.  From the Classic press release:

"Cycling in New York City has a long and storied tradition dating back to the 1800's when Madison Square Garden was first built for track cycling," said Senior Vice President for New York City Sports Marketing Andrew Gould. "The sport of cycling has continued to flourish in New York City throughout the years, due to world-class events such as the Harlem Cycling Classic, and it brings me tremendous pleasure to add a new chapter to this event by awarding the prestigious NYC Mayor's Cup to this year’s winners."

The David Walker Memorial Pro/Am starts at 4:00 p.m. (I'm guessing this is what we were almost run over by).  FYI, according to last year's NYT write-up:

Created as a Father’s Day event in 1973 by David A. Walker, a community affairs police officer who also brought double Dutch to public schools, the race has molded several generations of New York cycling talent, including Nelson Vails, a former bicycle messenger and a silver medalist at the 1984 Olympics.

There will be a series of children’s and community races from 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.  Each child who competes will be given a free helmet and T-shirt. Winners of the children’s races will each receive a free bicycle.

There will also be live performances by hip-hop icons Biz Markie and Mister Cee and other performers. New York City’s famed Wafels & Dinges and Frites & Meats food trucks will be at the event for all in attendance.   Check it out!  I'll stay off the course.

Update: 3 Stabbing Victims Not Related, Attacker Still At-Large

I saw an update on the stabbing that occurred the morning of May 28th and knew Monitor readers would want an update.  Perry Jenkins was one of the victims and reports in the New York Daily News that:

"This guy just walked up to me, and he started mumbling," said Jenkins. "I was just trying to get home, and I got stabbed. I thought he was punching me."

He said he didn't realize he was being stabbed until his attacker was hovering over him.

"I looked up and I saw the knife," he said. "It was like a large butcher knife that you have in your kitchen that you use to chop onions."

Jenkins insists that he did not know the attacker or the other two victims.  The attacker is still at-large.  Which begs the question - how does somebody stab three people at a crowded subway stop and get away in Marcus Garvey Park?  It'd be hard enough to evade police in Central Park, but little Marcus Garvey Park?  

Event: Groundbreaking for Richard Rodgers Bandshell

The Monitor reported on the ground-breaking of the new amphi-theatre earlier this week.  I had the pleasure to attend the event today, which gave ample praise to all the effort undertaken by our community to secure the funding and put the plans in place to reconstruct the outdoor stage.  According to Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe, the new bandshell will be renamed The Richard Rodgers Bandshell and will be the premier outdoor performance stage in New York City's parks.

Mary Rodgers-Guettel, Executive Board Member of The Rodgers Family Foundation, spoke on behalf of the Foundation who contributed $1 million to the project.  She was gracious and self-effacing, noting that her father loved growing up in this area and would have loved to know that the community would benefit by construction of the new bandshell.  She is one of the daughters of composer Richard Rodgers, who grew up across the street at 3 West 120th Street and contributed $150,000 to the cost of the amphitheatre when it was first built in the 1960's.

In my kick today about politicians of our community, I must mention that none of the local politicians showed up for the groundbreaking (no Scott Stringer, no Bill Perkins, no Inez Dickens, no Keith Wright, no Charlie Rangel), but all sent representatives to let the small crowd (full of influential locals) how important the event was to them.  Matthew Washington, Chair of Community Board 11 did give a brief talk about the park and how important it is to the community and I was very impressed with him.

The Marcus Garvey Bandshell and Amphitheatre, today:

The Richard Rodgers Bandshell, March 2011:

News: Erratic Perkins Votes FOR Charter School Expansion

I admit, I'm a couple days behind the news on this one, but I just had to comment on this story when I saw it.  Bill Perkins, New York State Senator from Harlem, has been a staunch opponent of charter schools for years.  He's issued press releases.  He's held protest rallies.  He convened a "hearing" in April on oversight of charter schools, packing the room with anti-charter school teacher's union retirees (and did not schedule a follow-up as promised).

But knock me over with a feather, when it came to an election year vote on charter schools, he cast a YEA vote to more than double charter school numbers in New York. Notes the Wall Street Journal:

On Friday, the legislature passed a sweeping bill to raise the cap to 460 from 200, and Mr. Perkins voted in favor of it. But the senator had voted against a similar effort in the past and earlier introduced his own version of legislation that would have curbed the schools. 

Why, oh why, would Perkins do such an about-face?  Did he realize that returning support to the teacher's unions who have supported him so well was not in the interest of Harlem parents?  Was this a matter of conscience?  Or was this politics, with a primary opponent now in the race for State Senate, primarily on the issue of charter schools? From the New York Post:

Perkins' long-standing and vocal opposition to charters had enraged many parents and provoked the primary challenge from Basil Smikle.

Yesterday, charter-school parents accused Perkins of changing his vote in hope of saving his political hide.

"It would've been political suicide for him to continue on the path he was on," parent Karl Willingham said at Harlem Success Academy II.

"He's vulnerable."

It all comes down to the numbers.  Also from the Wall Street Journal:

In 2006, 23,000 people voted in a gubernatorial primary in Senate District 30, which includes most of Harlem, much of the Upper West Side and some of Washington Heights. Pro-charter voices like that figure. There are an estimated 10,000 children enrolled in 16 Harlem charter schools, or about 20% of all Harlem children. In addition, about 14,000 children are on waiting lists for Harlem schools, though not all reside in Harlem.

If you're a Harlem parent who has your child in a good, safe, orderly charter school and your local state senator is on a crusade to force your child back into the not-so-good, sometimes dangerous, mostly disorderly public school system, you think you might go vote in the primary election and support the pro-charter school candidate?  I think Perkins did that math too. (Photo from NY Post)

Event: Amphitheater Groundbreaking this Thursday

After many years of planning, the work on the amphitheater in Marcus Garvey Park will begin!  And you're invited to the groundbreaking - this Thursday, June 3rd at 11am at the amphitheater.

The amphitheater in Marcus Garvey was a gift from composer Richard Rogers, who grew up across the street.  It was built in 1969 and currently accomodates 1600 guests and is designed to allow for a 75 person orchestra.  The renovated amphitheater will seat more people, benches with seatbacks will be installed, sight lines will be improved, and back of the house facilities improved, amongst other renovations and improvements.  The estate of Richard Rogers donated $1 million to the renovations, the other $4.2 million coming from other sources.

Memo: Who was Lenox Avenue named after? When was it co-named Malcolm X Boulevard?

Since moving to Harlem, I've often wondered who Lenox Avenue was named after.  Sure, it's pretty clear who Malcolm X was and it even makes sense that a major thoroughfare in Harlem was named for him.  But everybody seems to refer to the road as "Lenox".  So who was Lenox and what did he do to get such a major road named for him?  I decided to look into it.

The NYC Department of City Planning website gives a brief history of Lenox Avenue:

First known as Sixth Avenue, the portion of the Boulevard above Central Park from West 110th Street/Central Park North to 147th was named Lenox Avenue in 1887 after a millionaire philanthropist and book-collector. James Lenox donated his private collection as part of the founding material of the New York Public Library.

So Lenox donated his book collection to the NYPL?  And that gets a major avenue of the city named after the guy?  Should I start collecting books?

Turns out that it wouldn't help.  Lenox helped found the Presbyterian Hospital in NYC in 1868 and his book and art collection eventually became a whole library unto itself.  From Wikipedia:

James Lenox (19 August 1800 - 17 February 1880) was an American bibliophile and philanthropist, born in New York City. A graduate of Columbia College, Lenox was a founder of the Presbyterian Hospital in New York City. His collection of paintings and books eventually became known as the Lenox Library and later became part of the New York Public Library in 1895. In 1913, the collection was moved to the central library. The Frick Collection stands on the library's former Fifth Avenue site. Lenox Avenue in Harlem is named for him.

He is buried in the New York City Marble Cemetery.

His book collection included an extensive collection of Bibles, including the first Guttenberg Bible in the U.S.   When he founded the Presbyterian Hospital of New York City, he demanded “be open to all, without regard to race, creed, or color,” and the Presbyterian Home for Aged Women.  He became president of the American Bible Society and distributed bibles to the men fighting for both the North and the South in the Civil War.  He made many charitable gifts during his lifetime, and was the rare breed that sought to hide them from the public eye.

Hell of a guy!  (No pun intended related to his bible collection).

A number of NYC streets and avenues were renamed (or co-named) in 1987, including Lenox Avenue, which was co-named Malcolm X Boulevard.  

Memo: How Mount Morris got its name

One of the most interesting features of the Mount Morris Park Historic District is the large hill in the middle of Marcus Garvey Park, formerly known as Mount Morris Park.  "How did the actual hill get its name?" I wondered.  So I did some digging.

"A Glance At Harlem" published in 1893 gives an early account of the history around the hill:

As early as 1636 the pioneers of Dutch civilization made their appearance in the fertile plains at the foot of the rocky height to which they gave the name of Slang Berge, or Snake Hill, now called Mount Morris. ... Under the shadow of Snake Hill they laid out a village.

James Riker's Revised History of Harlem, published in 1904, notes that the hill we know as Mount Morris was in the early 1600's the largest of at least a couple hills in the area that the Dutch called Ronde Gebergte, or Round Hills.  

One is an abrupt wooded eminence, by modern innovation styled Mount Morris, but which the Dutch called the Slang Berg, or Snake Hill, from the reptile tribes that infested its cleft rocks and underbrush even within the memory of the living. 

The Historical Guide to the City of New York, published in 1909 by the City History Club, says that the name "Slang Berg" or "Snake Hill" came from  the snakes that infested it.  Many sources identify the species of snakes as rattle snakes.

As to the name Mount Morris, the Twentieth Annual Report, 1915 of the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society, summarizes that:

As to the origin of the name of Mount Morris, we are as yet in doubt. It has been suggested that the park was named after Robert H. Morris, who was Mayor from 1841 to 1844, but if such was the case, it was so named before he was Mayor, because it appears on the Colton map of 1836 as Mount Morris, and in resolutions concerning assessments for taking the land, adopted by the Common Council before Mr. Morris was Mayor, the square is so designated.

It has also been suggested that the Harlem Race Course, which gave the name to the farm of which Snake Hill was a part, may have been owned and operated by some member of the Morris family who later owned the well-known Morris Park Race Course in the Bronx. They were New Yorkers, old in the racing business, but of this we have no confirmation.

Riker has the last word on the name Mount Morris, who notes that the longtime owner of the land surrounding Mount Morris was the Benson family, from approximately 1650 to 1839, when taken by the City:

Among the oldest of our historic names, significant for reference, and entering into the corporate titles of our churches, our railway and navigation companies, etc.. how preposterous the suggestion that this time-honored designation is become useless, and should be ignored! Rather cherish it, together with the more local names within Harlem, many of which it has been our good fortune to rescue. Apropos of this—has justice been done the worthy pioneers of Harlem, in selecting names for the streets, avenues and places? Mount Morris, from its former owners, would surely find a more significant name in Mount Benson.