Facts & Findings - East Village History Project

Last week, preservationist Rob Hollander told NPR that he wants the East Village History Project he co-founded "to be the defining institution of the East Village the way the Tenement Museum is the defining institution of the Lower East Side." In conjunction with a new visitor's center, the project offers public tours, exhibits, and performances - as well as loads of online information about a neighborhood with a very colorful history. Case in point? In his NPR interview, Hollander went on to describe the Bowery's past as a playground for the working-class, comparing the theater scene there to a "riot."

An 1871 illustration of Bowery nightlife from the Project's online gallery.