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A review by brianlokker
St. Marks Is Dead: The Many Lives of America's Hippest Street by Ada Calhoun
4.0
St. Marks Is Dead is a lively cultural history of St. Marks Place, the three-block stretch in New York City’s East Village between 3rd Avenue and Avenue A that’s effectively an extension of E. 8th Street. The book’s subtitle, “The Many Lives of America’s Hippest Street,” accurately describes both the street, which has a rightful claim to the “hippest” label, and the scope of the book, which explores the many cultural incarnations of St. Marks Place through the years.
As a child in the 1970s, author Ada Calhoun lived with her parents in an apartment on St. Marks Place. She doesn’t pretend to be among the hippest or coolest of the denizens of the neighborhood—in fact, she says that as a child she dreamed of being a farmer. But she can certainly claim an intimate familiarity with the neighborhood as it existed during her time there. And she has done a great job of researching and describing the history of the street and the surrounding neighborhood in other eras, beginning in the 1600s, when the only residents were the Lenape and the Dutch, right up to the gentrified, post-hip era of the 21st century.
St. Marks Place wasn’t always hip, but it has always been interesting. In the early 1900s, anarchist Emma Goldman made her home in the neighborhood, and the street became a headquarters for radicals and union organizers, acquiring the nickname “Hail Marx Place.” During Prohibition, St. Marks Place attracted mobsters and crime. In the 1950s, the Beats claimed St. Marks Place for their own. They were followed by hippies and punks. The street featured more than its share of chaos, danger, and debauchery, and for many young people, that was a big part of the attraction.
This book appealed to me because I enjoy learning about cities and New York City in particular. For most of my life, I lived in the northern New Jersey suburbs just a few miles outside Manhattan. I actually didn’t go into the city all that much when I was younger, and when I did I gravitated mostly to the West Village. So I don’t have much of a personal tie to the St. Marks Place neighborhood or the East Village (although I did go to a couple of protest meetings at St. Marks Church in the 70s, and I saw the Ramones at CBGB, and then much later, for a few years in the early 2010s, I taught a course at NYU around the corner from St. Marks Place).
Nonetheless, I found St. Marks Is Dead to be a fascinating micro-history of a place that had an outsized influence on popular culture. The book is quite detailed, chock full of names (some well-known, some not) and places, which for some readers could be a little overwhelming. But I do recommend the book, especially if you’re interested in New York City history, in urban history in general, or in the development of popular American culture in the second half of the 20th century.
As a child in the 1970s, author Ada Calhoun lived with her parents in an apartment on St. Marks Place. She doesn’t pretend to be among the hippest or coolest of the denizens of the neighborhood—in fact, she says that as a child she dreamed of being a farmer. But she can certainly claim an intimate familiarity with the neighborhood as it existed during her time there. And she has done a great job of researching and describing the history of the street and the surrounding neighborhood in other eras, beginning in the 1600s, when the only residents were the Lenape and the Dutch, right up to the gentrified, post-hip era of the 21st century.
St. Marks Place wasn’t always hip, but it has always been interesting. In the early 1900s, anarchist Emma Goldman made her home in the neighborhood, and the street became a headquarters for radicals and union organizers, acquiring the nickname “Hail Marx Place.” During Prohibition, St. Marks Place attracted mobsters and crime. In the 1950s, the Beats claimed St. Marks Place for their own. They were followed by hippies and punks. The street featured more than its share of chaos, danger, and debauchery, and for many young people, that was a big part of the attraction.
This book appealed to me because I enjoy learning about cities and New York City in particular. For most of my life, I lived in the northern New Jersey suburbs just a few miles outside Manhattan. I actually didn’t go into the city all that much when I was younger, and when I did I gravitated mostly to the West Village. So I don’t have much of a personal tie to the St. Marks Place neighborhood or the East Village (although I did go to a couple of protest meetings at St. Marks Church in the 70s, and I saw the Ramones at CBGB, and then much later, for a few years in the early 2010s, I taught a course at NYU around the corner from St. Marks Place).
Nonetheless, I found St. Marks Is Dead to be a fascinating micro-history of a place that had an outsized influence on popular culture. The book is quite detailed, chock full of names (some well-known, some not) and places, which for some readers could be a little overwhelming. But I do recommend the book, especially if you’re interested in New York City history, in urban history in general, or in the development of popular American culture in the second half of the 20th century.