Results tagged “waltwhitman”

When one man's family history pointed towards an association with Walt Whitman, research efforts resulted in a new website archiving the poet's old stomping grounds. Whitman's Brooklyn looks at the borough, where Whitman moved at the age of 4, during the mid to late 1800s.

MOVIES: With another version of Hairspray hitting the big screen this summer, it seems to be a season of decades past and, of course, hair! Movies With a View brings back the musical tale of Central Park hippies, small town boys headed to Vietnam and the '60s as they show the film Hair tonight.

Staten Island needs some cheerleaders every once in a while, especially after their ice cream flavor was named after their landfill. The NY Times has a piece on the borough's historian, "Brooklyn has Walt Whitman to sing praises of its 'ample hills.' Manhattan has Woody Allen to capture its outsize style and neuroses. And Staten Island? Well, Staten Island has Thomas W. Matteo for a borough historian to chronicle its glories, its goofs and, yes, its landfill."

It had been a few days since anyone had seen Haydee Soto or her children, 13 year old Valerie Rivera and 15 year old John James Bordoy at the Walt Whitman Houses in Fort Greene. A smell had been coming from the family's apartment, so neighbors and relatives asked the police to open the door, only to find a grim scene. The dead bodies of Soto, Rivera, and Bordoy, as well as Hector Viera, in different rooms. Police believe Viera killed the three with a baseball bat and then committed suicide by overdosing (a hypodermic needle was found in his arm). The bodies were so badly beaten that the NY Times says that "it made it unclear what had caused their deaths," but City Councilwoman Letitia James said, "All indications are that it was a murder-suicide." The Post on the crime:

Cops theorized that Viera first killed the mom in the living room while her children were at school, then dragged her body into her bed to make it seem as if she were sleeping. They suspect he then separately killed each of the children as they arrived home.

While the NY Times delicately writes the relationship between Soto and Viera was "murky," the Daily and Post report that Soto and Viera were half-siblings may have been lovers as well. While Soto would call Viera her brother, the Post reports that Rivera told friend Carmen Tirado about her mother and Viera, saying Soto "doesn't like to be by herself." Tirado told the Daily News, "He always slept in her room. Valerie didn't believe that was her uncle, because why would her uncle sleep with her mom? In the street, he acted like she was his girl." Soto and Viera's family, however, deny the allegations. Bordoy's aunt said about Bordoy and Rivera, "They were great kids. Their father is destroyed." Bordoy had muscular dystrophy and used a wheelchair.

Revere Sugar Factory, by lachance on Flickr. Gowanus Lounge is reporting that demolition of the dome began today, but is progressing slower than expected.

Sergeant James Rector had just left work at a police recruiting office near the Walt Whitman Houses in Fort Greene when he saw a teenager pointing a gun execution-style at a man on the street. Rector yelled for 17 year old Eric Hines to stop and identified himself as a police officer, but Hines shot him twice. Rector, while hit in the ankle and butt, managed to shoot 11 rounds at Hines, hitting him in the leg and on the right side. Rector is recovering from his wounds while Hines died from his injuries. Hines's initial target was treated for a shot in the leg and was also questioned by police.

Last night Gothamist attended the 4th annual benefit for the Academy of American Poets at Alice Tully Hall and was reminded that reciting poetry aloud is really a wonderful thing. As the kick-off to National Poetry Month in April, a panel of celebrity readers including William Wegman, Mike Wallace, Dianne Weist, Alan Alda and Meryl Streep read a few examples each from a variety of American poets. Great poets like William Carlos Williams, Sylvia Plath, Robert Frost, Langston Hughes and Kenneth Koch were represented in the mix, with a highlight for the night coming from musician Wynton Marsalis's lyrical reading of Sterling A. Brown's "Ma Rainey -- a poem he punctuated by breaking into song a cappella during one portion.

Sylka and John, Flag Makers

NY Times Ethicist Randy Cohen announces to readers (Gothamist assumes he means all NY Times readers, though he just mentions "Book Review" readers) that he wants their suggestions to make a literary map of Manhattan, places where literary characters walked, brooded, or traipsed. Email suggestions to bookmap@nytimes.com (there are more rules and regs, like having page numbers and quotes, here), credit will be given to the first person who sends in a submission for a particular book. And, friends, Lyle, Lyle Crocodile has already been submitted:

Bernard Waber places Lyle, Lyle Crocodile for us: "This is the house. The house on East 88th Street." But where on East 88th Street? The clue comes in an illustration: the amiable reptile stands on his front stoop looking at a house to his left marked No. 234. That puts Lyle's own house at No. 236. Alas, a visit to the block shows not the charming brownstone where Lyle lolled but an ordinary tenement. Lyle's house, like Lyle, is a fiction. As it happens, Harriet the Spy lives in the same neighborhood, in a house on East 87th. You'd think someone as clever as she would have noticed a crocodile around the block.

The map will be published in June. Gothamist loves this idea, but while Cohen hopes for maps of Chicago and London next, we wonder about a map of the outer boroughs (think Jonathan Lethem, Walt Whitman).

Daniel Nester, Proofreader/Editor/Poet

Jeff Croteau, Librarian in G-Training

Mayor Bloomberg says, "Poem in Your Pocket Day offers all New Yorkers a unique way to celebrate and reflect on the beauty and power of language. We are proud to launch an initiative that celebrates literacy and poetry, and the meaningful role they play in all of our lives. I'll be carrying a poem on April 30, and I encourage all New Yorkers to do the same." Gothamist would like to know what poem Mayor Bloomberg is carrying - will it be about getting elected with voters who just don't understand? Or making lots of money? Or not being a dynamic speaker?