The Tenement Museum shares stories of immigrant families who once lived at 97 Orchard Street, a tenement on the Lower East Side on Manhattan. We believe these stories are as vital to America's history as the stories of presidents, industrialists, railroad men, shipping magnates, politicians, or the scores of others whose histories are taught every day in schools across the nation. We salute our nation's immigrants as urban pioneers, who helped to create the New York City we known today.
We believe that history is a valuable resource for understanding contemporary issues. Historical perspective can shed new light on what's going on in our world today. In our programming, we aim to talk about the present as well as the past.
In this blog you'll find lots of historical information about New York, the Lower East Side, and 97 Orchard Street. We'll post about new research we've done on families who lived in our building, photographs of objects we've collected, and reviews of new history books we've read. We'll also keep you updated on contemporary immigrant issues, as they relate to the themes and stories that come up on our tours. And we'll provide updates on the wonderful Tenement Talks that we host weekly in our bookshop.
I hope you'll hang in there as we get a feel for this blogging thing, and I hope you'll email us with suggestions or questions for what you'd like to see or read about.
Cheers!
Hi! I am loving reading this history! my grandparents lived in NY in the 30's or 40's i think...i forget. the were the children of immigrants, and my husband is an immigrant. i was born here, but my heritage is colourful and i love learning about my ancestors, and what a struggle it was back then, because as my husband and i struggle today buidling our lives, we learn from the past. they had different morals back then, and made it through some of the roughest times with their lessons. we have more advantages today in many ways, but lack some crucial things they had then. thanks for creating the museum and not letting that precious piece of our past go to waste, and thank you for helping link past and present to future!
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