Archives for local history

Forward & Out

Forward & Out

Forward & Out is composed of 49 episodes, was made for the LGBTQ+ community, and was produced by the White Plains Cable station. The show was produced from 1993 through 1996, and was broadcast from January 1994 through January 1997. At its peak, Forward & Out was broadcast via cable and over-the-air to 1.2 million households in primarily the NY/NJ/CT area and as far away as Philadelphia. The show’s mission was to stimulate pride and raise self-esteem within the LGBTQ+ community by promoting a positive image, and to encourage greater tolerance and acceptance of LGBTQ+ people. Forward & Out hosted
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May 20, 2024 2:23 pm | by | No Comments
Categories: Featured, Homepage, and Local History.
Tags: Forward & Out, Katharine Andriotis, LGBTQ+ history, and local history.

People & Stories Oral History Project: Isabel Villar

People & Stories Oral History Project: Isabel Villar

Isabel Villar, 1948-2023 Isabel Villar, the founding Executive Director of El Centro Hispano in White Plains, died July 12 from ovarian cancer. In 2015, she participated in our library’s People and Stories oral history project. The link to her story is below. Isabel Villar is the Executive Director of El Centro Hispano, an organization that supports the Hispanic Community in White Plains. She is also a longtime resident of White Plains, arriving from Cuba in the late-1960s. In this oral history, Villar describes the experience of being a Hispanic immigrant in White Plains. She tells stories about her first educational
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July 30, 2023 10:30 am | by | No Comments
Categories: Library News, Local History, and Oral History.
Tags: Cuban-American History, El Centro Hispano, Hispanic-American History, Immigration, Isabel Villar, local history, oral history, People & Stories, and white plains history.

Local History: Ina Sugihara Jones

Local History: Ina Sugihara Jones

Ina Sugihara Jones was a Japanese American activist and multi-coalition builder who lived in White Plains from 1977 to her death in 2004. She was born in Las Animas, Colorado in 1919, and moved with her family to Long Beach, California in the 1930s. Educated at Long Beach Community College and the University of California, Berkeley, she was able to “voluntarily” migrate to the East Coast in 1942 and avoid internment in the War Relocation Authority Camps set up after the attack on Pearl Harbor. She was a founding member of the New York branch of the Congress of Racial
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May 12, 2023 11:40 am | by | No Comments
Categories: Library News and Local History.
Tags: Asian American Native Hawaiian Pacific Islander Month, Ina Sugihara Jones, Japanese American Citizens League, and local history.

Local History: Police Spying

Local History: Police Spying

Local and State Police Spying in the 1960s and 70s Thursday, May 4th, at 7:00 p.m. Zoom Click here to register. This program will address the hidden history of how state and local police contributed to the climate of political repression and surveillance during the Vietnam era. While it mainly focuses on state police surveillance of college activists and suspected “subversives,” it also details how local police in New Rochelle, Yonkers, and Mt. Vernon monitored social movements during the 1960s and 70s. Importantly, it also talks about how civil liberties groups and concerned citizens joined together to end political investigations
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May 1, 2023 9:00 am | by | No Comments
Categories: Library News.
Tags: local history, Police spying, and Seth Kershner.

Edward Steinberg Photo

Edward Steinberg Photo

Edward C. Steinberg (1942-2018) worked for White Plains from 1970 to the mid-1990s in the Urban Renewal Agency and later as Commissioner of Planning. He helped build the Galleria, the Transportation Center, the Public Safety Building, the Westchester Mall, and the Federal Courthouse. He was also a photographer, and recently his widow donated three of his photographs to our local history collection. One is of the Transportation Center, one shows workers pouring cement, and the other the demolition of a building.  Part of the pouring cement photo is shown below (it doesn’t say what building it was for, unfortunately). Feel
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January 24, 2023 10:59 am | by | 2 Comments
Categories: Featured, Homepage, and Local History.
Tags: local history and white plains collection.

The Construction of the Kensico Dam

The Construction of the Kensico Dam

Tuesday, January 17th 2:00–4:00 p.m. Community Room Click here to register. James Maxwell, Historian at the Town of Mount Pleasant, will give a PowerPoint presentation on the building of the Kensico Dam. He will start with the original dam built in 1885, continue on to construction of the current one in the early 20th century, and end in the 1970s. The presentation's photos and postcards are from the Mount Pleasant Historical Society's collection as well as New York City's archives.
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January 6, 2023 10:00 am | by | No Comments
Categories: Library News.
Tags: Kensico Dam, local history, and westchester history.

Genealogy: Leaving a Legacy

Genealogy: Leaving a Legacy

Genealogy: Leaving a Legacy: Telling your Ancestors So Your Family Will Listen Thursday, December 8th 7:00–8:00 p.m. Click here to register for this Zoom program. You have invested countless hours documenting your family tree. Now learn different techniques and methods to tell your ancestors’ stories so they will be passed down and enjoyed by future generations. Presented by Genealogist Sarah Gutmann.
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November 22, 2022 1:30 pm | by | No Comments
Categories: Library News.
Tags: genealogical research, genealogy, genealogy workshop, genealogy workshops in westchester, genealogy workshops in White Plains, local history, and Sarah Gutmann.

Daughters of America: Digest of the Day

Daughters of America: Digest of the Day

Recently a member of the local Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) chapter viewed the Local History Room’s file on the DAR.  She noted that the last item in the file belonged to the Daughters of America, not the DAR, and was curious what that group was. The item in question is a 36-page booklet called Digest of the Day, published in 1930 by the Daughters of America’s Martha Washington Council No. 8 in White Plains. According to The International Encyclopedia of Secret Societies and Fraternal Orders, the Daughters of America was “a female auxiliary to the Junior Order of
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November 12, 2022 9:48 am | by | No Comments
Categories: Featured, Homepage, and Local History.
Tags: Daughters of America, local history, white plains collection, and white plains history.

Biography of a House

Biography of a House

“Who's Been Sleeping in My Bed?” Researching the Biography of a House Thursday, October 27th 7:00-8:00 p.m. Click here to register for this Zoom event. In this presentation, house historian Beth Potter will talk about ways to flesh out the “biography” of a house-not the history of the building per se, but the stories of the people who lived there. Who celebrated birthdays in the living room, what special recipes were created in the kitchen, were any residents in the military – those are just some of the questions that can be answered using newspaper records, church records, etc.
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October 25, 2022 4:29 pm | by | No Comments
Categories: Library News.
Tags: biography of a house, local history, local history events, and research.

Photos wanted: Winbrook, WP malls

Photos wanted: Winbrook, WP malls

Two of the original five buildings in the Winbrook apartments (now officially called Brookfield Commons) have been razed and replaced. The three still in use will eventually meet the same fate. The White Plains Mall will be leveled and replaced by a large residential and retail development called Hamilton Green. And the Galleria Mall, which lost its anchor stores when Sears and Macy’s closed, may be demolished whole or in part for a redevelopment that would dramatically change its appearance. As these buildings which were once fixtures in downtown White Plains disappear, we would like to keep a visual record
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May 3, 2022 5:11 pm | by | 1 Comment
Categories: Featured, Homepage, Library News, and Local History.
Tags: history of White Plains, local history, White Plains Galleria, White Plains local history, White Plains mall, white plains new york, and winbrook.

Remembering Jesse Murry

Remembering Jesse Murry

Jesse Murry was a Black, gay art critic, curator and painter. He was born in 1948 in North Carolina and later moved to nearby Greenburgh to live with an aunt. As a youth he spent a lot of time reading at the White Plains Public Library and became friends with the director, Isabel Duncan Clark, who ended up becoming his legal guardian. He studied at Sarah Lawrence College and lived in a White Plains apartment in the 1970s before moving to New York City in 1979. In the last 14 years of his life he wrote for Arts Magazine, taught
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December 8, 2021 11:18 am | by | No Comments
Categories: Authors & Books, Featured, Homepage, Library News, and Local History.
Tags: Jesse Murry, library history, local history, and White Plains Public Library.

The Westchester County Jail Riots of 1981

The Westchester County Jail Riots of 1981

Thursday, July 8th 7:00–8:00 p.m. Click here to register. Jails and prisons that offer little in the way of rehabilitation. Drug laws that unfairly target people of color. These conditions plague today’s criminal justice system. Forty years ago, they were also the focus of complaints by Westchester County Jail inmates, leading them to stage an unprecedented uprising. Seth Kershner, a researcher at the University of Massachusetts, discusses the July 1981 uprising at Westchester County Jail–three riots in three days that caused one million dollars in damage. Although inmates hoped to amplify complaints about racism in the county’s criminal justice system,
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June 29, 2021 12:13 pm | by | 1 Comment
Categories: Library News.
Tags: criminal justice, local history, local history programming, prison system, and Westchester County Jail Riot of 1981.

Genealogy Workshop: African Americans in Records

Genealogy Workshop: African Americans in Records

African Americans in Public Records Prior to 1870 Monday, June 14th 7:00–8:00 p.m. For information on attending, click here. In this presentation, genealogist Cynthia Maharrey covers: Things to consider before and during your research General information about African American genealogical records An abbreviated case study Examples of records from Reconstruction to the 1840s that hold genealogically significant information concerning free and enslaved African Americans
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June 10, 2021 9:00 am | by | No Comments
Categories: Library News.
Tags: african american genealogy, Black History, genealogy, local history, and records.

Battle of White Plains, the Movie

Battle of White Plains, the Movie

In anticipation of our country’s 250th birthday in 2026, we have uploaded “The Battle of White Plains,” the movie, to our YouTube Channel. The 25-minute black and white film, which re-enacts the battle, was made over two weekends in the fall of 1977 near Silver Lake. It debuted at the White Plains Public Library on June 1, 1978. According to Joe Ryan, founder and president of the Living History Education Foundation, who played a Continental soldier in the movie, “The film was created on a limited budget with a lot of local volunteer help. It provided valuable experience for those
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March 8, 2021 3:04 pm | by | 3 Comments
Categories: Featured, Homepage, Library News, and Local History.
Tags: film, local history, Observances and Celebrations, revolutionary history, The Battle of White Plains, U.S. History, white plains, and white plains history.

100 Years of Suffrage: Slide Show

100 Years of Suffrage: Slide Show

On August 18, 1920, a twenty-three year old representative in the Tennessee state legislature cast the deciding vote to ratify the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which states “The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.” Tennessee became the 25th state to ratify the amendment, giving it the three-fourths of the states needed to become the law of the land. This was the culmination of over 70 years of work by thousands of women in the U.S. to win
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August 18, 2020 1:55 pm | by | No Comments
Categories: Featured, Homepage, Library News, and Local History.
Tags: local history, slide show, video, and Women's Suffrage.

Library Launches Documenting COVID-19 Collection

Library Launches Documenting COVID-19 Collection

We're living in unprecedented times. Many of us are working from home and adapting to shared living spaces, childcare demands, and social isolation. Others have had health challenges or find themselves unemployed. Meanwhile, we hear examples of adaptation and education, creativity and bravery. Our lives have continued in new ways. For these reasons, the Library—with your help—is creating a new collection: Documenting COVID-19: White Plains Experiences. The Library wants to hear about you, what you're doing, how you're doing, what you see outside your window. Contributions to the Library’s collection can be anything, from a three-line poem to a 200-page
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May 7, 2020 10:47 am | by | No Comments
Categories: COVID-19, Director's Corner, eNewsletter, Featured, Homepage, Homepage Kids, Homepage Teens, Kids, Library News, and Teens.
Tags: collection, coronavirus, covid-19, and local history.

Meet the Authors: Himmelfarb & Massena

Meet the Authors: Himmelfarb & Massena

This post has expired and the events have already occurred. Copies of the book that is mentioned can be purchased at the Everyday Healthy Cafe on the first floor of the Library. White Plains in the 20th Century (Arcadia Publishing) is a 130-page compendium of photographs of White Plains throughout the 1900s compiled by former White Plains librarian Ben Himmelfarb and current city archivist Elaine Massena. They gathered 200 photographs largely from the collections of artist/photographer John Rosch (1854-1949) and longtime White Plains city historian Renoda Brown Hoffman (1909-2005) to show how a village-turned-city (in 1916) evolved over 100 years.
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November 12, 2019 9:52 am | by | 8 Comments
Categories: Authors & Books, Director's Corner, eNewsletter, Library News, and Local History.
Tags: adults, author event, Ben Himmelfarb, books, Elaine Massena, local history, white plains collection, and white plains history.

Introducing the New Local History Room!

Introducing the New Local History Room!

The White Plains Public Library has a Local History Room again! We now have a dedicated space for people interested in local history and genealogy to explore the White Plains Collection. We are having an opening event on Thursday, December 7th, from 6:30 PM to 8:30 PM. We will open up the new space and highlight two local amateur historians. An exhibit created by Colleen Fay that documents the suffrage movement in Westchester will be on display and we will hear a presentation from Nate Levin about the historical narratives that compete to define the movement. We will have refreshments,
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December 4, 2017 5:55 pm | by | No Comments
Categories: Homepage and Local History.
Tags: archives, city directories, local history, local history programming, oral history, People & Stories, suffrage, white plains collection, white plains history, and White Plains History Roundtable.

Local History: Addicts & Addiction Pt. 3

Local History: Addicts & Addiction Pt. 3

As earlier blog posts showed, public discourse about drugs and addiction changed from focusing on morality and personal responsibility during the 19th century to a focus on culture and racial identity during the early 20th century.  When drugs and addiction are discussed today, we often hear that criminal justice reform and electoral politics are the central issues influencing the course of addiction and the treatment of addicts in our society. The White Plains Collection has many resources you can use to discover what happened during the 1960s as the modern era of “drug culture” developed and what people were thinking
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November 17, 2017 10:47 am | by | No Comments
Categories: Local History.
Tags: addiction, addiction treatment, addicts, alcoholics, alcoholism, cocaine, heroin, local history, mental health, mental illness, narcotics, rockefeller laws, westchester committee on alcoholism, white plains collection, white plains history, and white plains youth bureau.