General sources
Department of Records and Information Services (sometimes called DORIS)
Archivists Round Table of Metropolitan New York (ART):
ART Archive Guide (NB: This guide is no longer maintained by the ART, but they gave me permission to share the files with you. Some of the information may be out of date.)
Anthony Robins’ article on archives
On-line tutorials
Chris Grey’s copyrighted article, “A Guide to Researching the History of a New York City Building”
Avery Library:
Avery: Art & Architecture guides
Andrew Dolkart: Hints on Researching New York City Buildings
Other:
Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts Guide to Research
New York Public Library,“Who Lived in a House Like This? A Brief Guide…”
Don’t reinvent the wheel
Landmarks Preservation Commission:
Formal LPC letter about landmark status
Neighborhood Preservation Center (NPC) web site:
New York State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO):
National Register of Historic Places (NR)
To use it:
- Agree to terms
- Best to “Proceed as Guest” for now.
- On the at the top of the page, click on “Search”
- Select “National Register”
- Fill in the “listing name” and choose the appropriate county (Manhattan=New York County, Brooklyn=Kings County, Staten Island=Richmond County, Bronx=Bronx County, Queens=Queens County).
- At the bottom left, click on “Search”
- On the new screen, at “Results” click on the “View” icon
- To see the nomination, DO NOT click on the “Nomination” tab (that would be too simple!)
- Instead, click on “Atts.” (“Attachments”)
- Click on “Legacy NR Nomination Form” or “Legacy NR Photo” – whichever you’re interested in.
- Save it to your desktop as a pdf
Two things to remember:
- This is very new – still has bugs
- Play around with the site – go exploring, there’s a lot of stuff here.
Buildings information
Location of Buildings Department branches – go to “Contact Buildings” and select your borough.
Chris Gray’s Metropolitan History site – NB search page
Also of interest:
ZOLA – Zoning and Land Use Maps:
Be sure to play around with some of these sites – especially the amazing NYC map which is a portal to all city on-line resources. See if you can find the NB for your building (or any other building you’re interested in). And then see if you can locate and download the Landmarks Commission report on the Look Building, from both the LPC and the Neighborhood Preservation Center web sites (to familiarize yourself with their use), and then the National Register nomination for that building.
Two articles of interest:
New-York Historical Society Quarterly Bulletin (1937) – article on street numbering changes
Harry Macy, Jr., Before the Five-Borough City: The old Cities, Towns and Villages….
For fun:
Oldest video footage of New York City (I’m not responsible for whatever ad plays first…)