We were pleasantly surprised to find that Browning Frames and Prints had opened at 37 Cranberry Street. As a matter of fact, we've been there and were very impressed with the level of service and friendliness from Katie and Joe at the store. They've got great old maps and prints for sale as well. Worth the trip. Can't wait to get our cool vintage Willow Street photo back framed and ready to hang up at the BHB metroplex.
After our story about Jack Biblo's bookstore at 48 Hicks Street, we received this email from Bob who is looking for two of the store's employees.
In late 2002 – early 2003 I sold a number of books to Frances Biblo at her Hicks Street storefront, via a couple [Al and Gail] who were working with her at the time, who also lived in Brooklyn. He came to my apartment and evaluated the books, she was only in the shop, but put me in contact with a friend of hers who wanted to buy my elk antlers.
When I told her about my William Burroughs collection, she said I should contact her if I ever wanted to sell it, because she wanted to surprise her husband with it (he'd expressed interest in it when he saw it, but I wasn't prepared to part with it at that time). I just (stupidly, ofcourse) assumed the bookshop would always be there and I could find them again if I wanted. Then when I Googled Frances Biblo, I found she'd died almost two years ago! So now I'm hoping that you were associated with her, or the bookshop, or this couple who were working with her some years ago, and could pass on to me information as to reaching her. Please respond, even if it's to say youhave no idea who I'm trying to find.
Are you Al or Gail? Know them? Let us know. And sorry, Al, for blowing the surprise.
Anyone who was riding the A train last week knows that pain of MTA delays. Nabe blogger City Crab writes about a recent incident on a train with a "sick passenger".
City Crab: The Woman Who Had to Get to Work: This morning there were no tears, but there was the shaking. We had a sick passenger on the train — "sick passenger" is the term the MTA uses to describe anyone having a health issue while on the subway. It always bothered me to hear the word "sick" in this way — they would call a man having a heart attack a sick passenger, and I do not call that sick.
Saturday and Sunday were action packed days for nabe residents. Saturday saw the inaugural Booklyn Book Festival at Brooklyn Borough Hall, while Sunday played host to the 32nd Annual Atlantic Antic street festival.
We got to the Brooklyn Book Festival just in time for "Only the Dead Know Brooklyn," a panel reading of works by famous deceased Brookyn authors. Actor Roger Guenveur Smith kicked it off with very inspired readings from Walt Whitman's "Leaves of Grass" (with an interjected, improvised anti-Iraq war message at one point, a marijuana smoking gesture at another). The actor summed up Whitman's legacy by calling him America's "first hip hop poet". As for the other panels at the Fest held inside Borough Hall, they were way over capacity with many folks lined up outside not able to get in. Hopefully organizers will address this issue next year as the outdoor panels were very enjoyable.
The 32nd Annual Atlantic Antic took place on Sunday, stretching from Hicks Street to Fourth Avenue. We strolled along part of the way and got to see Sahadi's Specialty and Fine Foods sponsored Belly Dancing, Manchester United v. Arsenal match on TV at Floyd, saw many folks downing pints of Six Point Craft Ales' Atlantic Antic Amber (debuted here), and most notably the PJ Hanley's yummy pig (pictured above). Speaking of food, Sahadi's also had some superfantastic falafel sandwiches at their storefront stand and Mrs. Fink enjoyed a delicious seafood paella from La Mancha.
The former Taco Madre location at 118 Montague Street is being quickly prepared to become Tenda Asian Bistro. On our stroll home from the Atlantic Antic this afternoon we noticed a sign in the window which not only promises a swift opening but also that it will thrill residents with its "world famous chef".
A Google search for Tenda Asian Bistro yields no results. Anyone have more info?
7 Columbia Place (map)
Townhouse
$2.1 Million
Broker: Sotheby's
Open House today 3:30 PM – 5:30 PMThis wonderful 1830's clapboard house is situated on a quiet, tree-lined block steps from the Brooklyn waterfront. An unusual center staircase makes for beautifully proportioned rooms. Four bedrooms, 6 fireplaces, a front porch & west facing garden are among the best features that complete this magical retreat. It is in need of a loving restoration & refurbishment.
28 Pierrepont Street, Garden (map)
2 bed, 3 bath, coop$1.75 Million
Broker: Harborview Realty
Open House today 1 PM – 3 PMJust in! Spacious 2700 SF duplex with landscaped garden on prime Brooklyn Heights block. Two bedrooms as well as large family room and office. Master bedroom features en-suite bathroom. Laundry room, fireplace, wood floors, alarm system, built in bookcases, central air conditioning, tons of storage including storage freezer. Completely renovated. Steps to the Promenade and Montague St. Low maintenance.
Brooklyn Record: On Sunday, September 17th, car traffic will vanish on one of Brooklyn's busiest stretches of road. Downtown Brooklyn neighborhoods will ring out the summer with a huge celebration — it's time for Atlantic Antic. The street festival, which will be celebrating its 33rd year, runs for a mile and a half along Atlantic Avenue between 4th Avenue and Hicks Street…Unlike every other street festival in the city, this one is made up of actual neighbors. Local shops open out onto the street selling their wares, and churches draw in passers-by with song as they sell food made by the congregation. There are stages on every block and bands, drums circles, and soloists perform for their neighbors. At Clinton Street, the local Middle Eastern community hosts traditional music and belly dance performances sponsored by Sahadi's.
"Greg" (his real name) writes in with this quote Antic lyric from "Shadrach" by the Beastic Boys:
"Cause I'm out pickin' pockets at the Atlantic Antic
And nobody wants to hear you 'cause your rhymes are so frantic."
Photo via atlanticave.org
Opening today at the Brooklyn Heights Cinema I & II is the R-rated thriller, Haven (trailer; watch the first 8 minutes). It stars Bill Paxton as a crooked businessman laundering his ill-gotten gains in the Cayman Islands and Orlando Bloom as a star crossed lover.
The Associated Press' Christy Lemire writes: White-collar criminals and dangerous thugs, haves and have-nots, sex and drugs, all mixed together in a secretive, tropical setting: “Haven” has the makings of a decadent nighttime soap, but none of the components of a cohesive, satisfying film.
Brooklyn Heights Cinema I & II
70 Henry Street
718 – 596 – 7070
Brooklyn Borough Hall plays host to the first annual Brooklyn Book Festival this Saturday (9/16). Brooklyn Beep Marty Markowitz says the festival "will celebrate Brooklyn’s international reputation as an enclave of hip, multi-ethnic writers who represent some of the greatest names in literature today."
Brooklyn authors attending include music writer Nelson George (Hip Hop America), Steve Hindy (Beer School: Bottling Success of the Brooklyn Brewery), Jennifer Weiss (Brooklyn by Name) and our favorite comic book loving theologian, Rabbi Simcha Weinstein (Up, Up and Oy Vey).
Food Maestro located at the doomed 60 Henry Street location has been closed in the evenings on our walk home from the subway and in the morning on our way to work. Has it been open at all this week? Mrs. Fink mentioned a sad sign in the window over the weekend reading simply, "close [sic] for the rest of the day".
Glamour magazine dating blogger/Brooklyn Heights resident Alyssa Shelasky bares her soul each day via her blog "See Alyssa Date" (watch her video). This week she's given very special advice from her friend/Soprano's star the very recently divorced Jamie Lynn Sigler. How did Shelasky meet the TV actress? "We met thru friends in New York, and escaped to a spa in Scottsdale, AZ the next weekend!" she writes.
Shelasky's love life is an open book to her readers and they are asked to vote on who she should date next or to weigh in on more existential matter such as should her friend Sigler see a therapist.
She also blogs about her dates from Brooklyn Heights. Perhaps you know this guy:
Surprise of the week: I ended up grabbing a drink with the gorgeous guy from the nabe, who I became overly attracted to at Rite Aid the other day! When I tracked him down at the local coffee shop this morning, we exchanged numbers, and like any good Brooklyn boy, he was confident, aggressive and made things happen. We met for dinner at a candle-lit French cafe in the 'hood, and he was as sexy and magnetic as I'd imagined.
Besides Sigler's desire to set her friend up with her brother, what advice does she have for our intrepid blogmistress? "Love will come to you, but first you need to love yourself."
In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Brooklyn Heights residents persuaded “Power Broker” Robert Moses to re-route his plans to ram the BQE through the heart of the neighborhood and to halt bulldozing Willowtown in the name of progress.
The woman who led the resistance against Moses on his Willowtown proposal was Mrs. Darwin James, heiress to the Underwood Typewriter fortune and wife of banker Darwin James (who coincidentally gave Moses his start in public service and backed his 1933 run for mayor of NYC). The man who pushed for the creation of our Brooklyn Heights Historic District, Otis Pearsall knew Mrs. James.
He tells the New York Preservation Archive Project, “She was a very interesting and energetic woman, who was tremendously keen on the Heights. And she invested personally; when a lot of houses along Columbia Heights were in jeopardy, she bought those houses just to preserve them, then ultimately sold them off when she found opportunities to put them in strong hands. And she did many things that I could go on about in terms of getting young people, as they began to arrive in Brooklyn Heights, interested in the Heights… She took [my wife] Nancy and me under her wing, along with other people, when we arrived on the Heights, and she had parties at her house at which she tried to have all these young people introduced to one another.”
Pearsall and his wife were part of a new generation of Brooklyn Heights residents — young professionals interested in preserving the neighborhood’s history and beauty. Inspired by Boston’s Beacon Hill Historic District, he proposed what was a radical idea for New York City at the time — instead of landmarking buildings, landmark an entire neighborhood. How he and the Brooklyn Heights Association arrived at the borders we now know was the product of a difficult decision — not to stop the construction of the “new” Cadman Plaza (the BHA did successfully lobby for “larger, family size” apartments to be built on the site). “I made a judgment that we dare not risk this whole new idea and the possibility that we could actually get the preservation of Brooklyn Heights officially in place through a designation. I didn’t want to risk that by dragging in the future of Cadman Plaza.”
The movement for the Brooklyn Heights Historic District began in the fall of 1958 when the Brooklyn Heights Association and Pearsall met at the First Unitarian Church. Later the BHA and another local group who had been protesting the Cadman Plaza project – Community Conservation and Improvement Council (CCIC) – joined forces.
Using New York State’s recently passed Bard Law – which gave cities the authority to save “places, buildings, structures, works of art, and other objects having a special character or special historical or esthetic interest or value” – the group went into action.
They gained support from the community and The Brooklyn Heights Press. Publisher Richard Margolis wrote in an editorial supporting the project, “The community would be free of all the predatory monsters that traditionally devour a neighborhood–the crowded rooming houses, the super block-high income developments, the institutional dormitories.”
In August 1967, after nine years of legal and legislative wrangling, the Brooklyn Heights Historic District was established.
For an excellent in depth account of the process visit the New York Preservation Archive Project
While BHB is not in the business of endorsing any political candidates, the Connor vs. Diamondstone State Senate Democratic nomination faceoff has been quite nasty. Just ask our mailbox or our pals at Brooklyn Papers who refused to endorse either candidate. This fact is not lost on Nicole Brydson at the New York Observer.
NY Observer: Connor – A Nasty Shameful Campaign: State Senator Marty Connor hovered somewhere between upbeat and desperate when talking this afternoon about his chances of fending off a challenge tomorrow from Brooklyn landlord Ken Diamondstone.
"Oh certainly, I will spend somewhere between $180,000-200,000 dollars, which to me is a lot of money for a state Senate primary," he said this afternoon in a phone interview in which he called his opponent's campaign literature a series of "gross distortions" of his record.
Connor says he has put out six district-wide mailings of his own. (We asked him to send us copies. We're still waiting. This guy, at least, doesn't like them.)
Connor said he regretted the negativity of the campaign and said he hoped it would be decided on issues.
"I hope it will come down to people being concerned about public education, healthcare and affordable housing. Frankly, people have been bombarded with twelve very nasty negative mailings from my opponent. He is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money."
May the "best" man win.
A beautiful view from the Promenade, we never wanted. And so we pray.
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Brooklyn Bugle Cobble Hill Blog
Open Thread: Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Brooklyn Daily Eagle Tries to Create Controversy Where There Is None
Let’s Make It Happen: Rename Squibb Park to Adam Yauch Park
SAT Scores For 200 Students Nixed at Brooklyn Heights’ Packer Institute
Brooklyn Heights Cinema At 70 Henry Street To Be Razed, After All
Brooklyn Heights Rallies For Montague Street Retail Corridor
Montague Street Revitalization Continues With Launch Of Ruby And Jenna
Squadron (Figuratively) Pours One Out for Beastie Boy, Brooklyn Heights Native Adam Yauch in NYS Senate
Temporary ‘Photoville’ Village Coming To BBP Pier 3 This Summer
Fun, Food & Wine at Brooklyn Heights’ Willowtown Fair
Fun at Brooklyn Bridge Park
Heights’ Downtown Neighbor Reclaims Residential Rights
Last Minute Weekend Suggestions
Brooklyn Heights Rallies For Montague Street Retail Corridor
Montague Street Revitalization Continues With Launch Of Ruby And Jenna
Subway Service Alerts: This Weekend and The Following Week
Brooklyn Heights Cinema At 70 Henry Street To Be Razed, After All
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