5 Points

I SLEPT TILL 11AM! WHOO-HOO!! God did THAT feel good. The dogs slept till 11am right with me, which made it even better, and ultimately possible!

I watched Gangs of New York Last night, I had it DVR'd, and it was a gory, good movie. I hated all the fighting but I loved all the sex and mystery to it all. Worth watching. What is even more interesting to me, is that the whole story time matches up to other stories, although at different times, such as FrankMcCourt's books and Malachy McCourt's books. And to the civil war. It's helps me to put things into perspective. And to think that we thought all the massacres were happening in the south, but I have never ever recalled hearing any of that about New York, about Irish Catholics being dragged off the boats straight to war, and about the political and social upheaval of the 5 points. 5 points was never even MENTIONED to me before, although it was notoriously known as NYC's slum and was written about by such visitors as Charles Dickens and Walt Whitman. That's just another example of things they don't tell you in history books. I did find this small site on the 5-points, describing how urban archeological digs actually found the remains of the 5 points. A documentary was done on the 5-points that would probably be interesting to see.

Other Resources for the Interested: http://urbanography.com/5_points/
This site has LOTS of drawings and excerpts from actual newspaper articles in the 5 points in the 1850's. By Gregory J. Christiano. Gregory also reviewed the movie Gangs of New York.

RecommendedBooks In Print
The Gangs of New York: An Informal History of the Underworld, by Herbert Asbury, Jorge Luis (Forward).
Five Points: The Nineteenth Century New York City Neighborhood that Invented Tap Dance Stole Elections and Became the Worlds Most Notorious Slum,” by Tyler Anbinder
Empire City: New York Through the Centuries, Kenneth T. Jackson and David S. Dunbar, editors.
Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898, by Edwin Borrows and Mike Wallace.
New York by Gas-Light and Other Urban Sketches, by George G. Foster, Originally published in 1850, edited by Stuart M. Blumin, 1990

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