Posted on 01/27/2009 3:36:09 PM PST by xtinct
While many U.S. cities worry that their economies are deteriorating to the level of the 1930s Great Depression, New York City fears reliving a more recent decade that features strongly in city lore.
The 1970s were a low point in city history as a fiscal crisis almost pushed it into bankruptcy, crime rates soared, and homeless people crowded sidewalks as public services crumbled.
Almost a million people fled New York's Mean Streets during the decade for the safer, more stable suburbs, a population decline that took more than 20 years to reverse.
When discussing the current crisis, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, now seeking a third term, promises that he will not allow the city to return to the darkness of those days, although he stresses that it faces "giant financial problems."
"I know some are concerned that city services will erode," he recently told reporters. "Let me remind you that the city went down that road in the 1970s ... I can just tell you that we are not going to make that mistake again."
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
OK, speaking of the trends from the 1970s: being that I was just a little tot at the time, what was up with all the gay guys hanging out by the West Side piers trying to act rough and tough? Looks rather comical when viewed from 2009.
Ah, that’s the one episode of “Seinfeld” that some stations are still too touchy to air...
<>There was a pretty square spot on Madison in the thirties called 'A Quiet Little Table in the Corner' that was nothing but plush seated booths for two each with a red bead curtain for privacy. You hit a button if you wanted a waitress. Imagine the possibilities...
I knew all the after hour spots on the westside and up in Harlem...pretty wild stuff.
The Bronx and Zoo were clean, the Mets played at the Polo Grounds and the Giants at Yankee Stadium.
You could buy all kinds of schlock on 42th Street and never get panhandled or mugged.
How could we forget Horn & Hortacks(?)?
Broadway was entertaining and the big fancy movie houses.
A round trip student ticket to the city on the NY Central cost me all of $0.50.
I make sure not to be ANYWHERE in Manhattan when the PR parade is going on.
Never see the thugs that hang out at that sorry excuse for a celebration at the Pulaski Day parade...
The Italians may be disappearing, but I’ve come across some great pizza in New Jersey from places owned by Albanians.
Horn and Hardhart’s....I forgot about them. We just called it the automat. Blueberry pie for fifteen cents. HoJo had counters all over the place too.
Coney Island was the place to be, not Fire Island.
Palisades Park for girls.
Islip Dragstrip too.
Taxi Driver being the best.
Good movie -- but in my humble opinion, "Dog Day Afternoon" and "Serpico" are the definitive New York City movies of the 1970s.
And anyone who wants to read a fantastic real-life book that stands as the definitive social commentary on the "bad old days" of New York City should try to get your hands on a copy of Report From Engine Co. 82 -- a classic non-fiction book by a New York City firefighter. It's (obviously) about the life and times of a firefighter in New York City's busiest fire station at the time, but it is -- first and foremost -- a scathing commentary on the decay of the city as evidenced by the sheer chaos of a firefighter's typical day.
Author Dennis Smith seems to look upon the preponderance of false alarms as a metaphor of sorts for the collapse of the entire social structure in the city's worst neighborhoods. And he's not referring to an accidental false alarm or an over-anxious person who smelled smoke somewhere in a building that turned out to be nothing . . . he's talking about the idiocy of completely useless @ssholes who would activate alarm boxes just for the sake of having something exciting happen in the neighborhood.
My memory of the book may be hazy, but I seem to remember the author pointing out that Engine Co. 82 responded to more false alarms in a typical day in the late 1960s and early 1970s that all of the combined fire departments in Switzerland answered in an entire year. And I think I remember him saying that the term "false alarm" can't even be translated into Japanese.
Pacino fan? Man, Al has gone to hell since "And Justice for All."
"Dog Day Afternoon" was based on a true incident that occurred in Midwood, although it was filmed on 7th Avenue in Park Slope (that pizzeria featured in the movie was still there until about five years ago. It ALWAYS comes back to pizza). Best scene in the film is when Al is talking on the phone with Chris Sarandon.
Preferred French Connection over Serpico. Despite Friedkin's overindulgent homage to Nouvelle Vague handheld cameras, you have to love a movie whose main chase scene was filmed in ACTUAL traffic on 86th street in Brooklyn (where Tony Manero would strut just six years later).
Yup, we were the same size. I got rid of my spandex & those outfits long ago, when I discovered that donating them to the Goodwill was a tax deduction.
But back in the day, I had a spaghetti strapped, lavender silk handkerchief dress with the handkerchief hemline that I desperately loved. Ironically, a couple years ago I had to go to a "scene and be seen" kind of party. I took my friend and her 17 yr old daughter with me shopping for a dress. At the department store, low and behold, what dress does the teenager bring me to try on? A shorter version of that same 1970's dress in the same color! I thought "this is never going to work", but I tried it on & it looked great on me. I bought it.
And no, I'm not a size 4 anymore, either -- but what the heck -- my husband loves me with a little more meat on me anyway. I was kind of a scarecrow back then, although I certainly didn't think so at the time!
Man, you are so right about that... other ethnic foods are affected too. We went to a diner (Greek owner) the other day in downtown Brooklyn and got a couple of the Greek dishes - totally awful. All the kitchen staff seemed to be Mexican. Pizza: a terrible situation. I was saying to my husband: maybe we should just eat out Mexican and see if that fixes our problem, LOL?
Now I take my grandson out to Riverhead...it's where the Wal-Mart crowd gathers in the Hamptons.
I got shot at in Coney Island, right by Cropsey Ave. He missed.
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I'll see you in my dreams...
My mother, who missed NYC so much, that I got taken to lots of NYC-set films (minus the more violent ones, which I didn’t get to see until much later) from the late ‘70s onward. Did you get dragged in to see Pacino’s “Author ! Author !” ? Well, I was 8, but had a crush on Ari Meyers for years...
If you have Netflix, you can see Pacino at his cheesiest in "Cruising" online.
I just finished watching one of the most underrated movies of all time (mainly because it's an action/shoot-em-up movie but is extremely realistic and well done, with great character development and storylines) . . . "Heat" with both Al Pacino and Robert DeNiro.
I've heard it described as the quintessential "Los Angeles movie."
Have got admit, Albanians can cook. In Jersey, we used to get these rolled sausages called Cevapcici from some Albanians and they were delicious.
But unfortunately when you said "Jersey", "pizza" and "Albanians", my first thought was the Fort Dix Six!
I'll wear the dress, because in my dreams it still fits!
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