Born in Akron, Ohio, Michael Henry Adams, a writer, lecturer, historian and activist, lives in Harlem. A graduate of Columbia University's graduate historic preservation program, his books include Harlem, Lost and Found; An Architectural and Social History, 1765-1915, Monacelli Press, 2001 and Style and Grace; African Americans at Home, Bullfinch, 2002. Currently he's at work on the forthcoming Homo Harlem, A Chronicle of Lesbian and Gay Life in the African American Cultural Capital, 1915-1995. He is a passionate supporter of President Barack Obama.

Blog Entries by Michael Henry Adams

Great Houses of New York: River House, the Best Address, Part IV

1 Comments | Posted November 11, 2009 | 10:06 PM (EST)


A great deal has changed at 435 East 52nd Street since the River Club lost its yacht basin in the late 1930's. Or, for that matter, since the Times sensationally reported on May 6, 1939,

"Customs Raid on Ayer Penthouse Brings Seizure of $25,000 in Attire; Clothing and Gems,...

Read Post

The Pride of Precious Jones

2 Comments | Posted November 9, 2009 | 01:20 PM (EST)


Warning: Spoiler alert!!! Do not read further if you haven't already seen the movie "Precious"!

Few have responded to Lee Daniels' newest offering with indifference. In the New York Times A. O. Scott gushed,

"Push achieves an eloquence that makes it far more than a fictional diary of extreme...

Read Post

The Preservation Elite Meet: At a Party Downtown, for a Good Cause

1 Comments | Posted October 29, 2009 | 10:26 AM (EST)


In New York and much of the rest of the country, 100 years ago, whether building a school, a store, a factory, or a power plant, great care was often taken to provide it with the same architectural dignity as a European palace. The confluence then, of the 'City Beautiful...

Read Post

Great Houses of New York: The River Club, the Best Address, Part III

6 Comments | Posted October 27, 2009 | 10:17 AM (EST)


Except for having no golf course, the River Club at 447 East 52nd Street is as close to a country club as one could find in the middle of New York City. Headquartered on five levels at the base of River House, in addition to more conventional recreation facilities it...

Read Post

Great Houses of New York: River House, the Best Address, Part II

1 Comments | Posted October 22, 2009 | 11:51 AM (EST)


Even now, in the midst of the 'Great Recession', there are at River House, many quietly detailed duplexes and an intact triplex maisonette, commanding superlative views and phenomenal prices. Some apartments, however, are not quite as grand as others and none as improbable as the long subdivided suite at the...

Read Post

Great Houses of New York: River House, the Best Address, Part I

1 Comments | Posted October 21, 2009 | 11:33 AM (EST)


How odd that Harlem's leading inn of the 1850's-1870's, River House, stood above the banks of the East River. What an ironic coincidence that the architect for the 1930's most deluxe tower for the affluent also led the team that planned the Harlem River Houses, some of the nation's first...

Read Post

The Black Elite Meet Uptown

1 Comments | Posted October 20, 2009 | 10:06 AM (EST)


Mounting the serpentine stair, emerging into the dimly lit cavernous hall, one was embraced by the ever louder sonorous sounds of Sonatas by Chopin. Billed as Collections, Spring Season 2010, Harlem's Fashion Row, the showing of creative apparel I attended Thursday night was extraordinary! There surely could not have ever...

Read Post

Lynden Miller, Carolyn Kent: Ladies Who Perfected New York's Parks

1 Comments | Posted September 24, 2009 | 01:52 PM (EST)


Anyone who has sat in lazy contentment in the lush and leafy 'secret' garden at the northernmost extent of Central Park, a once desolate location where unsuspecting visitors were routinely robbed, knows that a book about Lynden Breed Miller's vital work is long overdue.

Certainly Bette Midler thinks so. She...

Read Post

Meet the Black Elite!

1 Comments | Posted September 18, 2009 | 06:42 AM (EST)


2009-09-18-P1020202ED.jpg

Designer B. Michael and Mrs. David Paterson smile at Christie's

With fashion week at an end, many things go on. One is the exhilarating tumult of social events focused around charitable or commercial causes near and dear to African Americans, and more specifically, to...

Read Post

Thompson's a Tiger! Who Knew?

3 Comments | Posted September 16, 2009 | 04:42 AM (EST)


No. It's not City Comptroller William C. Thompson, Jr.'s widely anticipated victory over long shot New York City council member Tony Avella, in the Democratic mayoral Primary that the title alludes to. Unlike the election of Cyrus Vance, Jr., which effectively makes him Robert M. Morgenthau's successor as Manhattan's next...

Read Post

The Dazzle of a Rising Star

1 Comments | Posted September 11, 2009 | 03:53 AM (EST)


Meeting living legends who have always fascinated from afar is certainly exhilarating. But probably even more satisfying are those rarer occasions when one realizes that one is encountering a force of nature, one which most of the rest of the word has yet to discover!

Nonetheless New York has a...

Read Post

A House in the Hamptons?: Historic Vacation Spots of the Black Elite

13 Comments | Posted September 3, 2009 | 01:18 PM (EST)


2009-08-29-Prince_Kunle_Omilana_and__Princess_Keisha_Omilana3ed.jpgBeautiful, prosperous black Americans at their ease in high-summer;
Prince Kunle Omilana and Princess Keisha Omilana


It's an iconic notion, the secure Kennedy compoundat Hyannis Port, Massachusetts, that's recently been in the news. Here, season after season, assured of belonging , different...

Read Post

Recalling Carolyn Kent : Of Irreplaceable Artifacts and Friends

1 Comments | Posted August 24, 2009 | 12:08 AM (EST)


2009-08-27-mha050.jpg

We are often told, rather contradictorily, and generally by the same people, parents, teachers, and employers, that, 'no one is indispensable, that anyone can be replaced...' Not so, Carolyn Cassady Kent, our friend, the fevered champion of preserving Upper Manhattan's architectural heritage. She...

Read Post

Good Hair? Bad Hair? Great Style!

7 Comments | Posted August 7, 2009 | 12:32 PM (EST)


2009-08-06-good_hair_chris_rock.bmp

One wonders, have Sasha or Malia Obama ever been told that their hair was bad or nappy and unlovely. Did their mother, or her mother, ever hear taunts questioning their beauty?


Read Post

Newport: Yesterday's Seaside Paradise, Part I

5 Comments | Posted August 6, 2009 | 12:05 PM (EST)


2009-08-06-JA0729_Slocum_2__072908_0EB1832.jpg

The Obamas aren't coming here to vacation, but it's fairly certain that one hundred or even fifty years ago they would have! Long and widely chronicled, despite a reputation as a tourists' trap, Newport is resonate of the romance of history. An idealic spot,...

Read Post

Gates's Arbitrary Arrest: It Happens in New York Too

16 Comments | Posted July 27, 2009 | 10:50 AM (EST)


2009-07-23-813d62cd4a7843218e9ec7603631c45d.jpg


Fairly consistently, many whites view the arrest of Harvard's distinguished scholar, Henry Louis Gates, as justified, even as most blacks do not.

Context, as Judge Sonia Sotomayor attempted to point out, before backtracking, while not everything, remains all-important. Getting undressed, so long...

Read Post

Harlem Chic

Posted July 27, 2009 | 04:39 AM (EST)


2009-07-27-CottonClub1936.jpg


Not since the original Cotton Club, where a young and lovely Lena Horne got her start, closed in 1936 as Harlem's ultimate in-place have there been so many chic spaces uptown in which to make the scene.

Read Post

Great Houses of New York: Louis Tiffany's Treasure Trove!

Posted July 27, 2009 | 02:32 AM (EST)


2009-07-27-29scap.1.190.jpg

Positioned directly across the avenue from the imposing Waldo Mansion that houses Ralph Lauren's flagship store today once stood a more exhilarating building, among the most notable that ever existed in the city.


2009-07-28-72andMad.jpg

Read Post

Why I Hate dogs: Useful Advice for Summer Guests and Hosts

13 Comments | Posted July 20, 2009 | 06:42 PM (EST)


2009-07-17-Picture004.jpg


I love to entertain, as extravagantly as I can. I also enjoy being a house guest.

2009-07-17-edPicture588.jpg


2009-07-17-Picture574.jpg

2009-07-17-Picture593.jpg


But tell me,...

Read Post

Happy 100th Birthday NAACP: New York Landmarks of Black Greatness

2 Comments | Posted July 14, 2009 | 11:21 AM (EST)


2009-07-11-obama1.jpgAmerica's first black President, Barrack Obama, is to address the NAACP at their centennial convention this week in New York

Were the successful efforts of the Abyssinian Baptist Church and black leaders they marshaled to kill the landmark designation of Harlem's historic Renaissance Casino something...

Read Post