errata

August 2008: The ForgottenBook, released in September 2006, is now two years in the rearview mirror. The day I was phoned by Matthew Benjamin at HarperCollins in 2003 inquiring whether I'd like to do a book based on Forgotten NY remains the luckiest stroke so far in my life. The next three years, spent simultaneously working on the book, two jobs and Forgotten NY the website, were the busiest years in my life and the release of the ForgottenBook, which I celebrated with ForgottenFans at Chumleys in Greenwich Village....

FORGOTTEN NEW YORK
HarperCollins, ORDER from Amazon: paperback or hardcover

...remains one of the highlights from the past few years. (Chumleys hasn't fared well the last couple of years; a wall collapse forced it to close and in mid-2008 there was no word on whether it will again resume displaying my book jacket again). Meanwhile my heartfelt thanks go to Matthew and Phil Friedman at HarperCollins, both of whom have since left the company, for giving me this opportunity.

Forgotten NY The Book has sold steadily if unspectacularly; it rose to the 500s in Amazon the day I was interviewed by Brian Lehrer on WNYC, October 23, 2006, a perch it has not been able to match since. Hopefully, though, it will be a book that sells well for years, as many reference books about NYC seem to do. I had hoped to do Forgotten NY II, or Son of Forgotten, with HarperCollins, but I'm told that the economic climate isn't right at the moment.

In Jaunary 2007, I had turned in a list of errata and corrections to Matthew Benjamin for any second printing FNY would have. Since that isn't going to appear soon, I'd like to list here the errors that are most immediately apparent, three of which, oddly enough, touch on Mark Twain:

p. 157, reference to Hotel Griffou: It's doubtful Mark Twain could have been a regular at the hotel; in the 1880s he was living in Hartford, traveling in Europe, and spending his summers at Nook Farm in Elmira.

p. 162, Chelsea Hotel: Same as above.

p. 175, Fr. Duffy was the pastor of Holy Cross Church, which is still on W. 42nd, West of Eighth.

p. 259: second column, second paragraph: The Innocents Abroad was a travel book, not a novel

p. 262: The Long Island 45: should be William K. Vanderbilt, Jr.

p. 317: second column, fourth paragraph: Heyerdahl "had to move out in the early twentieth century": if he built the stone house in the early 1800s, that suggests he was in that location for a hundred years

p. 328, second column: The Hewitt is one of the last physical links to the General Slocum tragedy of June, 2004: obviously, I meant 1904.

There are other whoppers, I'm sure; let me know and I'll post them here.

Meanwhile, I'll be shopping for other publishers and there may yet be other ForgottenBooks on the horizon! Thanks to Nigey Lennon for her assistance on this page.