Happy 40th anniversary Fineline Tattoo

A photo posted by Fineline Tattoo (@finelinetattoonyc) on Aug 12, 2016 at 9:16am PDT

The shop at 19 First Ave. between First Street and Second Street celebrates 40 years today (details here). It is the oldest tattoo shop in Manhattan.

In February 2013, we interviewed Fineline owner and founder Mike Bakaty.

I had tattoos from when I was a kid and when I was in the Navy, so I looked around the city and there was nothing here. Tattooing was banned in the city from 1962 to 1997, when we moved into this shop. At the time, the nearest place was up in Yonkers called Big Joe’s. I spent two years going up there, hanging out, watching and gleaning information. I was in the process of getting my old work covered up and I’d be asking questions and everybody would shut up. They didn’t give up the information. And the more they shut up, the more interested I became. Fortunately, there was a guy visiting up there that became a key figure in modern tattooing, named Zeke Owen, who was the first to give me any real information. And by 1976 I started tattooing.

Mike passed away in January 2014. Mike's son Mehai Bakaty had worked with his father for many years ... and is now running Fineline. You can read an interview with Mehai this week at BoweryBoogie and DNAinfo.

Package theft from an East 11th Street lobby

An EVG reader shared this:

My building on East 11th Street between Avenue A and B had some packages stolen yesterday. After reviewing the security footage we saw the guy in the purple shirt hanging out on the sidewalk pretending to be on the phone and then he followed the USPS guy in after he was buzzed in.

He then proceeded to fill his large bag with the packages that were just delivered and left.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Watch this man help himself to packages from an East 7th Street lobby

Another report of stolen packages from an East Village lobby

Watch this guy take all the packages from an East 3rd Street building lobby

Activity at the long-vacant corner of 14th Street and Avenue C

An EVG reader noted that workers arrived yesterday at 644 E. 14th St., the long-empty lot on the southwest corner of Avenue C. Nothing too major to point out, other than some freshly churned dirt (from some soil testing?) and newly painted plywood.

In any event, it marks the first there has been much here to note in the way of construction activity.

Last month, The Real Deal reported that Brooklyn's Rabsky Group sold the property to Opal Holdings for $23 million. (Per their website: "Opal Holdings targets value-added or opportunistic properties in the office, retail, residential and hotel sectors, to be repositioned or redeveloped.")

Not sure at this point what might be repositioned or redeveloped. Maybe the R&S Strauss auto parts store, which closed in April 2009? (It was demolished in early 2015.)

There are approved permits for a 14-story building totaling 63,932 square feet, with 8,064 square feet for retail ... and 21,991 square feet for a community facility. However, it's unclear if these are the plans that Opal would stick with moving forward.

Whenever construction actually commences, crews will likely have to contend with some serious de-watering activity... the developers two blocks to the west at 438 E. 14th St. have said that they found unusually elevated groundwater levels and exceedingly soft and unstable soil owing to the presence of an underground stream.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Development back in play for East 14th Street and Avenue C

More details on the sale of 644 E. 14th St.

Here comes a 15-story retail-residential complex for East 14th Street and Avenue C

Prepping the former R&S Strauss auto parts store for demolition on East 14th Street and Avenue C

City OKs 15-story mixed-use retail-residential building on 14th and C

14th and C now waiting for the Karl Fischer-designed 15-story retail-residential complex

14th and C still waiting for its Karl Fischer-designed retail-residential complex

Report: New owners for the empty lot at 14th Street and Avenue C

Plywood arrives for 131 Avenue A; new Cajun restaurant on the way?

Workers yesterday erected plywood around 131 Avenue A, the former 10 Degrees Bistro and Flea Market Cafe between St. Mark's Place and Ninth Street.

Back in December, CB3 OK'd a beer-wine license for the owners of Shoolbred's and Kingston Hall (and formerly Ninth Ward) on Second Avenue. The CB3 meeting notes refer to the new establishment as "a New Orleans Cajun restaurant." (Per the meeting notes, the applicants were seeking a full-liquor license; they also faced opposition from several nearby block associations.)

The space has been sitting dormant in recent months. There had reportedly been gas issues in the building, which ultimately led to the eviction/closure of next-door neighbors Nino's and Yoshi Sushi. Perhaps landlord Citi Urban has those gas issues resolved.

H/T Lola Sáenz

Previously on EV Grieve:
New-look Flea Market Cafe shows itself on Avenue A; reopens March 11

Flea Market Cafe reopens today, and here's the menu

Was the fire at Flea Market yesterday suspicious?

On Avenue A, Flea Market Cafe is now Ten Degrees Bistro

The Marshal seizes 10 Degrees Bistro on Avenue A

10 Degrees Bistro won't be reopening on Avenue A

Team behind Shoolbred's and Ninth Ward vying for 10 Degrees Bistro space on Avenue A

Chi Snack Shop opening in the former Mamoun's space on St. Mark's Place

[EVG photo from December]

You may have noticed renovations in recent weeks at 22 St. Mark's Place, the former Mamoun's space between Second Avenue and Third Avenue. (Mamoun's relocated to 30 St. Mark's Place in May.)

Per EVG correspondent Steven, signage went up yesterday at No. 22 for Chi Snack Shop...



...which is going to be an Asian snack shop serving a variety of candies, cakes and other desserts. Workers said the Snack Shop should be open in two weeks.

Rescheduled 'Romeo + Juliet' plays tonight in Tompkins Square Park

Last week's free film in Tompkins Square Park — the 1996 version of "Romeo + Juliet" with Claire Danes and Leonardo DiCaprio — was rained out. So the organizers are doing a make-up screening tonight.

The evening includes a food fair/fest starting at 5 with vendors from the Eastville Restaurant Collective, which includes GG's, Boulton & Watt and Huerta's.

Check the Films in Tompkins Facebook page for any updates on tonight's screening.

And tonight's free film is also the last one of the six-week summer series. One rainout of out six. Not bad compared with previous summers.

Cab collision on 9th Street and 3rd Avenue

EVG reader Charlie Chen shared these photos from last night around 10 ... showing the aftermath of a cab collision on Ninth Street at Third Avenue...





There isn't any official word on cause or extent of injuries. Charlie saw one passenger in a neck brace at the scene and EMTs placing another passenger on a stretcher.

Logan Hicks back at work on the Houston/Bowery Mural Wall

Logan Hicks, known for his photorealistic stenciled paintings, was up early (out late?) at the Houston/Bowery Mural Wall today... redoing the work — titled "Story of My Life" — that he began in late July that got wiped out by the heat and torrential rain. (Workers have refurbished the wall with weatherproof panels.)

And several readers have said there are security guards here 24/7 via landlord Goldman Properties to see that the wall isn't the victim of hijinks.

Workers take drastic action against unattended chairs in Tompkins Square Park

Chairs, you have been warned!



Photos today by Derek Berg

Feltman's of Coney Island now open on St. Mark's Place

[Joseph Quinn points to the to-go window at 80 St. Mark's Place.]

As a follow-up to yesterday's post... the Feltman's of Coney Island stand is now open for business at the William Barnacle Tavern at Theatre 80, 80 St. Mark's Place between First Avenue and Second Avenue.

You can grab a hot dog to go from the sidewalk window or have one inside the Tavern. Feltman's toppings are sauerkraut, chopped onions, shredded cheddar, chili and their own Spicy Apple Cider Vinegar Mustard. (No ketchup or pump cheese, sorry!) They are also selling Coney Island Knishes.

The revived Feltman's brand is owned by brothers and Brooklyn natives Michael and Joseph Quinn.

The Feltman's hours are for now Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday from 1 p.m. to 11 p.m.; and 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday.

Feltman's is named after Charles Feltman, purportedly the inventor of the hot dog as well as the restaurant that was located in Coney Island from 1870-1954.

Report: Police take action against heroin users in Tompkins Square Park

[A reported OD in the Park earlier this summer via Derek Berg]

The Post reports that the NYPD yesterday sent officers into Tompkins Square Park "to deal with junkies openly shooting up heroin." (The Post headline: 'Crusties' shooting up heroin in Tompkins Square Park finally get the boot.)

The action was apparently taken after an unnamed nearby business owner called 311 to complain. The Post reports that this 311 call was later returned by someone in Internal Affairs.

We'll let the Post tell the story:

The business owner said his partner recently asked a cop on patrol why nothing was being done to stem the scourge and was told: “Well, if we don’t catch them doing it red-handed, we can’t search them for drugs.”

The business owner, who asked not to be identified by name, got fed up and called 311, and received a call back the next day from a stunned Internal Affairs Bureau cop.

“He was flabbergasted,” recalled the source, who said the investigator called the situation “inexcusable” and vowed to “get to the bottom of it.”

And...

“It’s well known they have issues in the park at times, and they deal with it on an ongoing basis,” the spokesman said, adding that cops have made 63 drug-related busts there so far this year.

This was the fifth consecutive year that the rate of deaths from heroin-involved overdoses increased throughout New York City, according to Department of Health statistics.

Meanwhile, the 9th Precinct tweeted this from yesterday...

Our #NYPD Conditions Team spending the day in Tompkins Square Pk talking to visitors & listening to concerns pic.twitter.com/DAcNOFaVhI

— NYPD 9th Precinct (@NYPD9Pct) August 16, 2016

Media reports about an influx of homeless people and drug users in Tompkins Square Park last July prompted the arrival of an NYPD patrol tower.

Out and About in the East Village

In this ongoing feature, East Village-based photographer James Maher provides us with a quick snapshot of someone who lives and/or works in the East Village.



By James Maher

Name: John Von Hartz
Occupation: Writer
Location: 2nd Street between 1st Avenue and 2nd Avenue
Time: 11:15 on Tuesday, Aug 16

We moved to the East Village in 1965, and everybody thought we were crazy. We were, because it was really tough down here – a very heavy welfare, drug area, but it was all we could afford.

I was a writer, and once you’re a writer you’re always a writer. I worked for Time Life Books for years, the hard cover books about art, science, boating, anything. It was very interesting, and I got paid and paid fairly well for the time. It was like getting paid for a graduate program. Then I freelanced. Kathy, my wife, is an ace teacher. She teaches English as a second language. So we strung along somehow.

We discovered very quickly that you could buy brownstones for a reasonable amount of money, and the idea that you could own a brownstone in Manhattan seemed inconceivable for our socio-economic level, but we found one for what boiled down to $19,000 for three floors.

We lived in two of the floors and rented out the top one. We struggled with that for six or eight years, especially because we didn’t know that much, but we would hire people, we would watch what they did, and we would try to do it ourselves. We got pretty good at tiling and plumbing. We learned that if you can take care of a three-story brownstone, you can probably take care of the Empire State Building, because it’s all pretty much the same. There’s a plumbing core and an electrical core. It’s just segmented out. Just with the Empire State Building, there’s more of it, but the basics are the same.

So we grew confident that way, and then finally the area just got to be too noisy and too crazy for us, so we found a house. It was five stories, with ten apartments, a front and back apartment on each floor, and it was $64,000, which we couldn’t afford. But we figured we’d try it and see if it worked out. Turned out it did, but we went through very difficult times with it.

The main thing was that it was a working-class neighborhood, and so it had its ups and downs depending on what was happening on the street. Then in the 1980s, or late 1970s, the druggies started moving in. We would have to go out after dinner many nights. Somebody would come around, the word would go around, there would be a line formed behind him, the drugs would mysteriously appear from a runner on a bicycle, get handed out, and the users would disappear as quickly as they had formed, so it was very hard for the cops to catch them.

I would primarily go out, because we couldn’t get Kathy killed, and I’d just say, ‘Look we don’t want this. This is a family block here. We don’t want any trouble. Just stay away and we’ll all live happily ever after.’ They’d say, ‘We don’t want any trouble either.’ By god it worked. It took a long time and we worked with the police. We did a lot of things, but at that time the police, I won’t say they were in on it totally, but they were a lot more in on it then they were not in on it. The city was awash with drug money, and the whole area east of Avenue A was [filled with] abandoned buildings and drug-selling centers. Limousines were pulling up with UN plates on them with kids running out from the limousines to get the drugs for the diplomats. It was just a scene from a bad movie.

In time, [our street] settled down, and then we started seeing a terrific gentrification in the late 1990s maybe, which some of that was okay, but it just got… typical New York, there’s no middle ground. It’s all or nothing.

A lot of the characters on the streets have been forced out by the high rents. Our building was able to get higher rents, but that wasn’t really the point. We were surviving. We wanted artists and writers and other people to be able to live down here. Our interest wasn’t in real estate. We just happened to be people who had to live in New York and lucked into a building.

But I have to say this, and I say this every time I till this story – we didn’t know what would happen when we bought our building in 1973. The city was going broke, the middle class was abandoning it, the federal government and Ford had said drop dead to New York. We put everything we had into that building and we could have so easily been wiped out. I’m not talking about trying to make a fortune, I’m talking about just being destroyed, wiped out. We were very lucky. We rolled the dice and won that way. Nobody knew what would happen, or if they knew they weren’t willing to take the chance.

Now this is like a regular upper-middle-class neighborhood with fancy cars on the street. I couldn’t have imagined it. Cars were just fair game when we were first here. Tires were stolen or slashed, windows broken, radios stolen. It was a different ballgame.

James Maher is a fine art and studio photographer based in the East Village. Find his website here.

91 E. 7th St. is for sale

[Top 3 photos from Feb. 23]

Back in late February, we spotted several small "building for sale" signs at 91 E. Seventh St. at First Avenue...





However, the listing never appeared online and no one ever got back to us with more info.

Now, though, the listing (the 12-unit building is also known as 118 First Ave.) arrived on Streeteasy this week.

Per the listing:

1. Deli $14,300 lease expire 8/31/2016
2. Store $4,300 lease expire 8/31/2016
3. 3 bedrooms R/R style VACANT(2,900)
4. 3 bedrooms R/R style VACANT (2,900)
5. 3 bedrooms R/R style R/C $140
6. 3 bedrooms R/R style R/C $147,97

One retail tenant is Golden Food Market... the other space must be the Caracas Arepa Bar To Go space, which shares the 91 E. Ninth St. address. (The People's Pops stand did not return to this corner this summer.)


[Photo from yesterday]

The asking price for the building: $6.9 million.

DOB records show a partial vacate order on the address for "illegal hotel rooms in residential buildings."

Report: Incoming condos for 13th Street and University Place will start at $6 million

Back in July we spotted the renderings for the new condoplex coming to University Place and 13th Street ... 6 residences above a retail space.

Curbed yesterday got the initial details on the pricing:

Prices on these apartments, which will each measure about 2,600 square feet, will start at a staggeringly high $6 million, though developers Ranger Properties and KD Sagamore Capital haven’t revealed more detailed pricing info beyond that or released info on the priciest pad in the building.

There's also a teaser site for the Morris Adjmi-designed building, which is officially 116 University Place.

The corner previously housed University Place Gourmet as well as several adjacent storefronts, including Bennie Louie Chinese Laundry.

Developer Ranger Properties paid $22 million for the lot, and closed down the businesses and moved out the residents

Previously on EV Grieve:
Major changes coming to University Place and East 13th Street

How about some more condos for University Place

Here's what's left of the block of University Place that once housed Bowlmor Lanes


[13th and University in June 2015]

The 4th annual MoRUS Film Fest starts tomorrow evening

Here's the rundown via the EVG inbox...



There's a suggested donation of $7 a film, or $20 for the whole festival. You can find more details on tickets and the films here. The Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space (MoRUS) is located at 155 Avenue C between Ninth Street and 10th Street.

Tuesday's parting shot

Photo from Second Avenue and Fourth Street by Derek Berg

[Updated] Not so sweet plumbing issue KOs Sugar Cafe on East Houston

EVG regular ‏@fnytv notes that 24/7 Sugar Cafe on the corner of East Houston and Allen Street is closed for now... signage on the door points to an undisclosed plumbing issue...



... and they won't reopen until the problem is resolved... there's no other info available at the moment. The phone goes unanswered. Workers have also emptied the cafe's display cases...



Updated Aug. 27

The cafe is back open

For 1-week only: Rev. Jen's Troll Museum returns

Back in June, longtime downtown performance artist Reverend Jen Miller was evicted from her longtime Orchard Street apartment, which also doubled as the Troll Museum.

Starting tonight, the Museum will make an encore presentation. (H/T Vanishing New York!)

Per the Facebook invite:

[T]he kind folk at Chinatown Soup, just a few blocks from where Rev. ran her museum are willing to host the museum for a week of art, fun and most importantly, TROLLS. Expect a killer opening, weird performances, drawings, paintings, plays, a troll hair-dressing station, a troll-coloring book station, shit that's for sale, a "Troll Parade" and informative monologues about the importance of Troll Commerce.

The show opens tonight at 7 ... and runs though Aug. 23. Chinatown Soup, a community art space, is at 16B Orchard St between Hester and Canal.

Feltman’s of Coney Island bringing its hot dogs to the William Barnacle Tavern on St. Mark's Place

The revived Feltman's of Coney Island brand will have its first full-time restaurant space starting tomorrow when owner Michael Quinn opens in the William Barnacle Tavern at Theatre 80, 80 St. Mark's Place.

This is the latest step for Quinn, a Brooklyn native and Coney Island historian, to bring Feltman's back. Last summer, Quinn launched several Feltman's pop-up shops, first at Ditmas Park bar Sycamore then later at Augers Well on St. Mark's Place as well as at the Parkside Lounge on East Houston.

Feltman's is named after Charles Feltman, purportedly the inventor of the hot dog as well as the restaurant that was located in Coney Island from 1870-1954. (Read more about Feltman at the Coney Island History Project here.)

Quinn thinks that he has found a good match with Theatre 80 operator Lorcan Otway.

"Lorcan and I are both native New Yorkers and historians who believe in the preservation of NY history and small businesses. It's not often in this hostile environment that you find a landlord who believes in what you are doing and actually wants you there," Quinn said. "We found out that some of the performers who played at Theatre 80 a century ago got their start as singing waiters at Feltman's in Coney Island like Eddie Cantor."

At Theatre 80, Feltman's takes over for the recently departed Crêpes Canaveral.

Quinn, who works on the project with his brother Joseph, also started selling the packaged hot dogs in several NYC retail outlets yesterday.



And there are still plans for opening a Feltman's restaurant in Coney Island ... though it won't be anywhere near as gargantuan as the original block-long endeavor, billed as the world's largest restaurant in the 1920s.

At Theatre 80 between First Avenue and Second Avenue, the Feltman's hours are for now Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday from 1 p.m. to 11 p.m.; and 6 p.m. to 11 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday.

Said Quinn: "Lorcan told me that he loves that fact that Feltman's is going from what was the largest restaurant in the world at Coney Island to the smallest kitchen on St. Mark's Place."

Out East quietly announces itself on 6th Street

As previously reported, veteran restaurateur Peter Kane (Bowery Meat Company, Stanton Social, Essex & Beauty, etc.) is one of the applicants behind a new project in the works for 509 E. Sixth St. between Avenue A and Avenue B.

The venture, serving "new American cuisine," is called Out East, which has been added to the front door here...



CB3 OK'd a liquor license for the space last month. The paperwork (PDF) filed at the CB3 website ahead of the meeting revealed a fairly large establishment — a two-level restaurant space with 38 tables for 104 diners plus two small bars seating 16 people total.

Here's what CB3 had to say about the applicant via the official July meeting notes:

Community Board 3 is approving this application for a full on-premises liquor license although this is a location in an area with numerous full on-premises liquor licenses because 1) this applicant has experience operating numerous licensed businesses without complaints within this community board district, 2) the applicant has demonstrated support for this application, in that it has furnished fifty-two (52) signatures from area residents in support of its application, and 3) there is an existing restaurant at this location with a full on-premises liquor license.

Well, there isn't an existing restaurant at this location. The space is empty. The last full-time tenant here was Kion Dining Lounge maybe about seven years ago. As far as we can recall, the last tenant here was a pop-up bar from the folks behind the Buenos Aires Restaurant during the 2014 World Cup.

Former Teavana still waiting to be converted into a Starbucks

Back in March, the Starbucks-owned Teavana closed on Broadway and East Ninth Street. This was one of those locations that was to become a regular old Starbucks by April.

A walk by the space the other day shows that it remains an empty storefront for now. (There are approved work permits for a renovation on file at the DOB.)

Meanwhile, on this block, the former Radio Shack is becoming ... a Wells Fargo bank branch next door to the Chase branch.



The Broadway-and-East-Ninth-Street space previously housed Silver Spurs, the diner that closed in December 2013 after 34 years in business.

Pop-Up Trash Trivia on Avenue A

Welcome to your life...

Village Style Vintage Shop moving away from the neighborhood

The shop, part of the L Train Vintage family, is leaving its Seventh Street storefront... the sign on the door notes a relocation to Bushwick in October...



The rent for the storefront between Avenue A and First Avenue is $9,750 per month.

Their No Relation Vintage clothing shop remains open for now on First Avenue between 12th Street and 13th Street.

Former Moonstruck Eatery for rent on Avenue A

The former diner space at 167 Avenue A is now for lease.

According to the listing at Eastern Consolidated, the asking rent is $150 per square foot... and the space between 10th Street and 11th Street is 3,680 square feet... (We heard that they are offering it for $35,000 a month. For real.)

The listing also notes that one of the neighbors is Isis Seafood. WTF?



There was talk of a fish market at 171 Avenue A some years ago.

Anyway.

Moonstruck Eatery closed in July after one year of business.

Mystery kegs at Nino's

Nino's has been closed since last October on Avenue A and St. Mark's Place.

A few people explored taking over the space... but the former pizzeria remains on the rental market.

And over the weekend these [presumably empty] kegs arrived inside the storefront.



Curious who they belong too, given that there any adjacent businesses that are even open... and Nino's didn't serve beer.

FULL full reveals at 100 Avenue A and 26 Avenue B

On Saturday, workers removed the rest of the sidewalk bridge in front of 100 Avenue A... showing off the retail space here between Sixth Street and Seventh Street...



...that will house a Blink Fitness Center later this year.

And at 26 Avenue B, the plywood came down in front of the new residential building between Second Street and Third Street...



We weren't sure if No. 26 was going to have a retail component — looks as if it's just an entrance for the five homes here... thanks to a commenter. The work permits show a 1,600-square foot commercial space on the ground floor for an eating/drinking establishment....



Previously on EV Grieve:
[Updated] 6-story apartment building ready to rise from the former Croxley Ales beer garden

[Updated] Report: 28 Avenue B has been evacuated

1st look at the all-new 26 Avenue B

DumplingGuo is now open on 2nd Avenue

The restaurant offering dumplings and hot pot is now open on Second Avenue at 12th Street.

DumplingGuo began life as Dumpling Go here, and closed for parts of the spring and summer for a revamp.

We posted a copy of their menu here.

NY Grill & Deli opening later this week on Avenue A and 12th Street

The storefront renovation on the southwest corner of Avenue A and 12th Street is winding down. The signage/awning arrived on Saturday.

One of the employees told EVG regular Greg Masters, who took these photos, that NY Grill & Deli is expected to be open later this week.





Poppy's Gourmet Corner, the previous tenant here, closed at the end of January.

RIP Ernest Russell

[Photo by Legacy Russell]

Longtime East Village resident Ernest Russell, a photographer and artist, died on July 31. He was 72. He is survived by his two daughters Angola Russell, a lawyer, and Legacy Russell, a writer, curator and artist.

Legacy shared the following tribute with us.

Before there was AOL, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat — there was DIGITALMAN. DIGITALMAN to many of us is Uncle Ernest, Ernie, Uncle Junie, Daddy, El D, Big E, ER, F STOP, ZERO, The King of St. Mark’s, or one of my personal favorites — coined by my dad’s late friend John — “Oooyyy-knee”. (Dad hated that one.)

The energy my dad brought into the world was electric.

In a recent telephone conversation with poet Fred Wilson, Fred told me of how he met my dad via his connection with the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). He encountered dad for the first time in a picket line. Dad turned to him and asked, “Hey man, you wanna get arrested today?” When Fred hesitated, dad repeated the question: “Do you wanna get arrested today, or not?”

Growing up with my dad meant there were lessons constantly being doled out, and constantly questions being asked. In moments where I came home from school frustrated or upset about something that had happened with a classmate or teacher, he often reacted by telling me, “Legacy, you gotta get tough.”

As I grew older, when faced with professional obstacles and looking for advice, dad would hand me packages wrapped in brown paper, usually from a cut up Trader Joe’s shopping bag and marked with an all-caps Sharpie signature: “FOR LR LOVE DAD”. Inside, nine times out of ten, was a copy of Sun-Tzu’s Art of War. Where dad pushed me to have a thicker skin, he also never hesitated to cry with me, fight with me, laugh with me, dance with me, sing with me. His ability to be both brave and vulnerable at the same time was inspiring. I collected copies of Sun-Tzu’s treatise as gifted by dad over the years; they often made appearances at birthdays or Christmas. In college when my phone would ring late at night, I would answer to hear jazz playing in the background; dad and I would talk about the day and at some point inevitably he would ask, “Legacy, are you reading Art of War? Are you sure you’re paying attention?”

I paid attention. As a kid I watched my dad like a hawk trying to figure him out. To some degree, he was always a mystery to me. Fiercely independent, creative, compassionate, silly, loving, outrageous, irreverent, I wanted to know every part of him, I so wanted to crack the case of the first man I fell in love with. No matter how much I knew about him, I never knew it all, there were somehow always things he said or did that surprised me.

In moments where it felt like there was no order, there was always a method in place, and often one with a flair. When I was a kid he would take me on nighttime bike rides around New York City; we’d fly across town and stop off at La Taza del Oro on 8th Avenue where we’d sit on stools and eat heaps of black beans and yellow rice. On the way home, I’d sit on the bike’s crossbar, sweating in my helmet in the summer heat, and when I started to fall asleep dad, worried that I would fall off, would chirp loudly, “Stay alert, Eyes-of-the-Moon!”

When I decided I was finally old enough to walk to school alone I came to dad preparing for a fight, dad shocked me by granting me permission to do so without missing a beat; I later found out that the strange sense that someone was following me for those first months was in fact dad himself running behind me, hiding in shops and behind trees when I would look over my shoulder. In times where I raised an eyebrow, Dad said it best, “Legacy, don’t you know that I’m a fool?”

When I first started rebelling as a teenager, sneaking around and breaking curfew to hang out with friends, dad, a legendary night owl who was often up until three or four in the morning playing on his computer, would be awake and waiting for me when I got home. I’d unlock the door and step into the brightly lit room of our studio apartment and he would turn around in his computer chair with his finger next to his mouth like Dr. Evil, “Legacy — what am I? A frickin’ idiot?” He always told me that he had “spies in the neighborhood” which is inevitably how he somehow knew I was drinking 40s at Union Square with characters dad deemed less than desirable, or was now wearing fishnets and a plunging neckline when I had walked out of the house in a decent turtleneck and pants.

When I announced as a little girl that I wanted to be a writer, it was dad who had me practice reading my poetry and short stories aloud. When I got super into Shakespeare and entered into a competition at school to perform a soliloquy of Lady Macbeth’s, dad videotaped me rehearsing for hours: “What beast was ’t, then, / That made you break this enterprise to me?”

In the mid-90s, Dad encouraged me to write to black theatre critic Margo Jefferson at The New York Times and ask her to be my mentor. I wrote a pithy letter to Margo, asking simply if, no big deal, we could just meet weekly to critique my new work; eventually Margo responded saying she wouldn’t be able to meet weekly, but that she’d love to keep in touch. Years later, when, in a curiously elegant twist of fate, Margo ended up on the Advisory Board of a journal for which I am now Visual Arts Editor, she wrote me saying, “I still have a letter from you! And imagine my delight when I read about your life and work in the Times a few years ago.”

Dad was a proud member of a diversely eclectic creative and political community. Though always a Harlem boy at heart, he claimed the East Village as his primary stomping ground where, for many years, he hosted friends and family for gatherings at the apartment, or twilight walks and conversations in this very park. In a 1964 New York Times article, dad, a member of the steering committee of East River CORE, was quoted saying, “Emergency repairs are no substitute for a decent school . . . That's why we’re marching.”

Dad spent a lifetime marching, instilling in me the importance of civil rights, vibing deeply with a mantra of equality and justice for all. He also believed in the power of self-love as a politic itself, a key component for collective action. “Love self!” he always reminded me,“You cannot love someone else or stand up for someone else without understanding how to love and defend yourself first.” Both dad and my mom Kamala were the first people in my life to teach me that black lives matter in their demonstrating how to build that self-love and love for others, an enduring lesson that has shaped how I see the world and a key part of my purpose within it.

Dad, you done good. Thanks to you and mom for gifting to me the most wonderful life, you two most wonderful parents. Ernie, we are going to miss you fiercely. And don’t you worry, we’ll keep fighting the good fight in your honor.

Week in Grieview

[@nyyankeedog out for a ride. Photo by Bobby Williams]

Permits filed to demolish 5 buildings on 11th Street to make way for new hotel (Monday) ... Preservationists say city ignored pitch to designate part of 11th Street as a historic district (Tuesday)

Report: Red Square has been sold for $100 million (Wednesday)

Target offers details about its flexible-format store opening summer 2018 on 14th and A (Friday)

Debate over commercial overlay for 255 E. Houston St. and surrounding blocks continues (Thursday)

Box Kite Coffee now looks to be reopening on St. Mark's Place (Thursday)

4 years of Out and About in the East Village (Wednesday)

Former Mercadito space on Avenue B will be home to Guac (Friday)

On 10th Street, Prime & Beyond has closed; popular Japanese steakhouse coming next (Monday)

Workers are putting in the foundation for the return of the Alamo (Wednesday)

The Quad Cinema reopening pushed back to the fall (Wednesday)

Reader report: M2M to move; Wagamama on the way (Wednesday)

Cafe-office space in the works for Cooper Square dorm retail space (Monday)

Roof fire at 190 Bowery (Monday)

Former Barbone space for rent on Avenue B (Monday)

Signs of life at Lanza's (Friday)

The VNYL will feature Long Island Iced Teas on tap, candied-bacon quinoa sushi (Thursday)

The Christodora House in print now, and soon, on TV (Tuesday)

The PokéSpot opens on Fourth Avenue (Friday)

Kotobuki back in action on Third Avenue (Thursday)

Double rainbow (Thursday)

... and last week someone put up this memorial flyer with a rose on St. Mark's Place where performance artist Klaus Nomi once lived ... he died on Aug. 6, 1983, at age 39...