Davida Siwisa JamesHamilton Heights and Sugar Hill
Alexander Hamilton's Old Harlem Neighborhood Through the Centuries
DAVIDA SIWISA JAMES lived in Morningside Heights as a child and Sugar Hill as a young woman. She has a BA in English from UCLA and attended Penn State Dickinson Law in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. She has been a university public relations director, a freelance journalist for the twice Pulitzer Prize-winning Virgin Islands Daily News, and has a twenty-year management career in performing arts finance and marketing. She has published nonfiction books, essays, poems, a play, and an award-winning short story, "The Commute." She resides in Los Angeles, CA.
Author's Historical Note ix
Dyckman and Hamilton Maps xi
Note on Spelling xiii
Preface xv
The Neighborhood xxi
1. Dutch Beginnings and Native Americans 1
2. The Making of Harlem Heights 9
3. Harlem Land Grants, Mount Morris, and a Revolution 22
4. Harlem Grange and the Duel 38
5. The Jumels, the Street Grid, and Audubon 55
6. The Bailey Mansion, St. Luke's, and a Building Boom 76
7. The Great Migration and the Morris Museum 100
8. The Hamilton Museum and the Hamilton Theatre 124
9. The Harlem Renaissance 139
10. The Heights Identity and the Black Mecca 170
11. Jazz Clubs, The Numbers, and Firsts 193
12. The Advent of the Sixties, Generational Changes, and the Arts 212
13. A Neighborhood's Changing Face 236
14. Parlor Jazz and the Great Renovation 253
15. Changing Demographics and a Revived Hamilton Heights 279
16. Bailey House, Jazz, and the Renaissance Remix 302
17. Where It Leads 336
Afterword 345
Addendum A: Excerpted Harlem Ordinances and Land Patents 349
Addendum B: Photos Past and Present 353
Acknowledgments 355
Notes 359
Selected Bibliography 375
Index 383
