New York City

No one — and certainly not I — can do justice to New York City's place in the lives of most of our immigrant ancestors. All one has to do is look at the number of people in this project who are associated with New York. The best description of the City at the time our families arrived is in Irving Howe's wonderful World of Our Fathers (1976). There are other splendid books about New York — and the Bronx, my particular corner of it — in the 1950s. I particularly like New York Streetscapes (2003) by Christopher Gray.

The park across the street, 1957: Reservoir Oval from the roof of our building. Manhattan and the Empire State Building in the distance.