Five Points Manhattan Walk and (Free) Lunch -- New Date and Time

Saturday, November 3: 11:00AM-1:30 PM

"Will anyone say that it is safe to the general health, humane to the poor, creditable to our civilization, or in any manner right and proper that these Dens should continue as they are – human packing houses and fountains of Disease and Vice?" So asked an 1850 New York newspaper in an article on of the "Dens of Death," cellar residences in the neighborhood of Five Points in Lower Manhattan. Once sensationalized as a center of sin and debauchery, this neighborhood can now be recognized as a diverse, complex and fascinating part of our evolving city history.

Tours of the neighborhood were popular in its heyday of infamy – "proper" New Yorkers venturing downtown to see if the fantastic tales the newspaper spun were in fact true. This Saturday – November 3^rd --we'll take a slightly different venture. Come along for a stroll around the historical Five Points area, seeking out the remaining landmarks and noticing the changes in the area, now occupied by a popular city park, the southern edge of Chinatown, a city jail, and a court house. We'll then have lunch at a great Thai restaurant near the park, and have an informal discussion of what we saw in the rich neighborhood around us, only a short walk from Broome Street.

Meet in Broome lobby at 11:00AM with your walking shoes on. We'll walk for about an hour and then have a Thai lunch.

RSVP to Colin, Downtown Scenes Faculty Affiliate, – colincheney@gmail.com

We're also screening GANGS OF NEW YORK, Martin Scorsese's "historical" tale of Five Points, on Friday night, so please attend this also to get a little bit of myth, a bit of truth, about the neighborhood.

Please read the following two websites to have a little primer on the background of the area and in history:

Urbanography – A brief commentary on Five Points , including newspaper accounts from the 1840s and 50s -- http://urbanography.com/5_points/index.html

National Geographic –Article published at the time when Martin Scorsese's GANGS OF NEW YORK premiered: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/03/0320_030320_oscars_gangs.html