NYC in the 1970s
Books, movies, reportage. Just follow the photos....
Video
Rubble Kings
From 1968 to 1975, gangs ruled New York City with unfocused rage and escalating bloodshed. Rubble Kings chronicles life during this era of gang rule, tells the story of how a few extraordinary, forgotten people did the impossible, and how their actions gave birth to hip hop culture, impacted New York City and the world over.
Decade of Fire
In the 1970s, the South Bronx was literally, on fire. Black and Puerto Rican residents were blamed, even as they fought to save their homes. Vivian Vazquez Irizarry pursues the truth around the fires, uncovering racist policies and neglect that shape our cities.
Terminal Bar: The short film
One of my favorites, the 2003 Sundance Jury Prize winner for short films, Sheldon Nadelman took thousands of black and white photographs over a ten year period while bartending at the Terminal Bar at 41st & 8th Avenue, Times Square's most notorious watering hole of the 1970s. Murray Goldman, the bar's owner since 1957 was Sheldon's father-in-law as well as the filmmaker's grandfather.
» And the incredible Terminal Bar vignettes
The Garbage Can - where Nadelman started
Porters, Bouncers and Bartenders
Photo essays
Life Magazine: The Reapers, 1972
In August 1972, LIFE magazine published an intimate and even-handed article on the mounting problems associated with street gangs in New York, focusing on the Reapers in the South Bronx. With powerful color pictures by a young photographer named John Shearer.
Underage (boy) Prostitutes of New York, Late 1970s
Incredible photos by Stephen Shames. The article should be taken with a grain of salt, it mentions crack dens, but crack cocaine didn’t emerge until the mid 1980s. Freebase cocaine was just starting to get a toehold.
Esquire Magazine: New York in the '70s: The Photos
An unfiltered and (mostly) unsentimental look, 50 images offer a glimpse into the city and the people living in New York City during this turbulent era.
Meryl Meisler: The Immigrant Lower East Side of the 1970s
Photographer Meisler shows the bustling Lower East Side 50+ years ago when it was a tight-knit immigrant community.
NY’s Lower East Side in the 1970s and 1980s
Photos by Meryl Meisler and Camilo José Vergara
International Photography Magazine: Dark side of New York City (1970s)
By 1970, the city gained notoriety for high rates of crime and other social disorders. The subways were unsafe due to crime. Prostitutes and pimps frequented Times Square. Central Park was the site of muggings and rapes. Homeless persons and drug dealers occupied boarded-up and abandoned buildings. The NYPD was under investigation for widespread corruption.
Marcia Bricker Halperin: 1970s Hell’s Kitchen
A lifelong New Yorker, Halperin has been photographing the characters and landscape of New York for almost 50 years.
The Daily Mail: Leland Bobbe’s gritty 1970s photographs
Bobbe captured New York when it was a city in decline as crime soared and hundreds of thousands of its inhabitants fled to the suburbs.
Journalism, History & Reportage
Gothamist: Welcome to Fear City
Originally published in 2015 by NYC historian, Kevin Baker (who also wrote two of my favorite vintage NYC books: Dreamland and Paradise Alley) this article walks you through the Ford to NY: Drop Dead era of NYC (my favorite era of NYC!)
Ephemeral New York
Founded and edited by native New Yorker Esther Crain, chronicles a constantly reinvented city through photos, newspaper archives, and other scraps and artifacts that have been edged into New York’s collective remainder bin.
EV Grieve
Things that you may or may not be interested in about the East Village and nearby neighborhoods.
Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York
Jeremiah Moss’ (t/n Griffin Hansbury) bitterly nostalgic look at a city in the process of going extinct
The Rialto Report
Ashley West and April Hall’s oral history, audio, photo, and documentary archives from the golden age of adult film in New York, and beyond
Books and Films
Bookshop.org: Dirtygirl Diaries Reading List
Sex, sexwork, crime & criminals. Times Square, addiction, alcoholism and recovery. It's all here, including several anthologies that include my stories as well.
Too many films to list, but I’ll try
The Panic in Needle Park
Taxi Driver
Dog Day Afternoon
Serpico
Cruising
Across 110th Street
Death Wish
The Warriors
Superfly
Cotton Comes to Harlem
Sheila Levine is Dead and Living in New York
Midnight Cowboy
Looking for Mr. Goodbar
Taking of Pelham One, Two, Three
Fort Apache the Bronx
Black Caesar
Three the Hard Way
Willie Dynamite
80 Blocks from Tiffanys
Trick Baby
Coffy
What an amazing resource this post is