Kitty
I’m haunted by Kitty Genovese, who was murdered 41 years ago, on March 13, 1964. The New York Times reported at the time:
For more than half an hour 38 respectable, law-abiding citizens in Queens watched a killer stalk and stab a woman in three separate attacks in Kew Gardens.
The lede was slightly exaggerated but close enough to the truth to make the neighborhood notorious. You’ve probably read something about the case, and, if not, you can “Google it”. Kitty’s murder has been used as a touchstone or plot point in movies, books, teevee shows and even a famous comic book. It’s been tossed around like a football in various political debates and psychological theories. It’s easy to overlook the life of the young woman who died.
Although, I’d known about this crime since I was taught about it in high school, I, like many people, assumed that it took place in Manhattan, surrounded by high-rise apartment buildings. You really need to walk around Kew Gardens to realize how shocking it is, and surely was then, that such a crime could take place here. Kew Gardens is a neighborhood of small shops, single family houses and a scattered handful of apartment buildings that go no higher than six stories. People in the neighborhood have a “nodding” relationship with each other, if not always actual friendships.
I can imagine living in the neighborhood with Kitty, who was young, short, tomboyish, independent, tough, plucky and pretty cute, actually. I could imagine having a crush on her, and hoping to “bump into” her at the supermarket or the local bar. I can imagine the gut-wrenching hole she would leave in the neighborhood’s street scene.
Last year, being the 40th anniversary of the crime, caused many media outlets, including the Times, to revisit the old story and many of the surviving witnesses. A key part of the story was Kitty’s “roommate,” Mary Ann Zielonko, who had the grim task of identifying the body, and who faded from the original story. Emboldened, I guess, by 35 years of gay liberation and probably just sick-to-death of being white-washed from the story, Mary Ann finally came out as Kitty’s lover. It’s hard to believe that the portrait of Kitty Genovese has been so incomplete for so long. This begs many questions. Was the attack a hate crime? (The more chilling probability is that it was a completely random attack by a psycho-sexual serial killer). Did her neighbors know about her sexuality? (Could residents of Kew Gardens in 1964 wrap their brains around homosexuality?). Was this the reason no one called for help? (Could neighbors distinguish her cries from the typical bar fights at the Old Bailey?).
Forty-one years later, Kew Gardens residents understand better than most New Yorkers that we have an obligation to be our brother’s and sister’s keeper. The “Eyes” on the street will monitor lover’s spats, unaccompanied children, reckless drivers – and watch for the first sign of real trouble, often calling the police before that first sign. We’re trying to live down the Kitty Genovese experience. I don’t think it’s something we should try to forget. We should keep Kitty Genovese in our minds as we actively and consciously try to progress beyond big city alienation. It could have happened anywhere, but it did happen here.
Wal-Mart Free NYC
Vornado Realty has dropped Wal-Mart from its Rego Park development plans. This happened the night after Newsday published my letter, so clearly I was the straw that broke the camel’s back. In all seriousness, the plan was killed by some very effective, aggressive lobbying by the city’s labor unions, particularly UFCW 1500 and the Central Labor Council. The initial plans for that failed Wal-Mart were announced in December, and the plan was dead by late February. In that short time, organized community opposition in the form of coalitions of small business, civic and religious activists, students and shoppers did not have a chance to develop. They are still sorely needed. Wal-Mart has already announced plans to move into Staten Island and to beef up their presence on Long Island.
The Wal-Mart Free NYC Coalition has launched an excellent website full of resources so that you can recruit your civic and activist organizations into the fight to keep Wal-Mart out of our city. I urge you to visit the website and and join the coalition. Also, be sure to join SEIU’s Purple Ocean membership organization, dedicated to fighting Wal-Mart on the national level.
The World of Tomorrow
I have a geeky affinity for World’s Fairs that’s a tad anachronistic for a red. World’s Fair geeks are a bit like Disney fans or Michael Jackson supporters: optimistic naifs who believe in all that is good, pure and innocent and who view the future through rose-colored glasses. At their peak, World’s Fairs were heavily commercialized, globally competitive and naively focused on different themes of progress through technology. That’s why I find them so attractive.
The roots of my World’s Fair obsession lie in my last semester at Queens College, which, due to my dedication to activism over education was an autumn super-senior semester. The year was 2001. I had finished my courses in Labor Studies and Journalism, and budget cuts prevented me from taking that last Economics course, “Economics of the Labor Force,” (what the hell kind of economy would we have without labor?) that would have earned me a second Associates degree, so all I had left was to burn through 15 elective credits. I had fun and took art classes and studied urban planning, a budding interest at the time.
The Chicago World’s Fair of 1893 is a hallmark of urban planning. It was the first World’s Fair held in America, and its theme center, the “White City,” a collection of gleaming white buildings of uniform height and roman architecture inspired civic leaders to ask “Why don’t our cities look like that?” Developed by disparate market forces, American cities lacked the thematic unity of European cities like Versailles and Dresden. The World’s Fair inspired cities to consider zoning laws that would emphasize aesthetics as well as practical usage. World’s Fairs continue to be influential on American society through the 1939 New York World’s Fair.
The world as we know it changed forever two weeks into my final semester in college. Campus lore has it that dozens of students and faculty gathered below the Goodman-Chaney-Schwerner clocktower on Tuesday, September the 11th, and watched the Twin Towers collapse on the horizon. I wouldn’t know. I didn’t leave my basement for a week.
When I returned to campus, I began reading about the 1939 World’s Fair, New York’s first. The most striking physical element of the fair was its theme center: two perfect geometrical shapes in art deco style, the Trylon and Perisphere. The Perisphere was a 300 foot high globe, inside of which were held presentations on “the World of Tomorrow.” The Trylon was a three-sided spike that rose 700 feet in the air. It was a skyscraper, visible from Manhattan.
It is immediately reassuring, in a perverse way, to read of a skyscraper – a landmark – that was here and then gone. That is New York, after all. It’s always changing. It’s amazing that so many of us claim to love it. Love what? The memories of what used to be?
Beyond the iconography, the 1939 World’s Fair featured more of that naive faith in constant advancement through technology that is all the more shocking and enviable since it came right before the worst horrors of the century. Corporate exhibits extolled the virtues of automation, which would provide us all with more leisure. General Motors presented a working model of the city of the future (which looked a lot like Brasilia) in which cars and highways would zip us through our commutes. Television was publicly unveiled and promised to be the most amazing educational tool man had ever created. The people who went to the World’s Fair could not imagine that such inventions could have downsides. They certainly couldn’t imagine inventions of pure evil and destruction, like nuclear bombs. And I’m sure they couldn’t imagine objects of wonder like skyscrapers and aeroplanes could be converted into weapons of mass destruction.
It’s not like ugly reality didn’t come crashing in on this Fair. The second World War broke out at the end of its first season. The nations of Poland and Czechoslovakia ceased to exist in the rest of the world, although their pavillions continued operation at the World’s Fair. In the midst of the global tensions, the Soviet Union withdrew its exhibition, which featured a giant statue of a working man holding aloft a red star as though he was grabbing a strap on the Lexington Avenue subway.
When the Fair reopened for its second season, the theme became “For Peace and Freedom,” and advertisements emphasized the many flags of the world flying together. That, too, was endearingly naive.
In the end, the Trylon and Perisphere also became weapons of destruction. They were torn down, and their steel frames were converted to armaments for the war effort.
Fairgoers who attended General Motors’ “Futurama” exhibit were given a button to wear that bragged: “I have seen the future.” But they hadn’t, the lucky bastards.
For more information: The Iconography of Hope: the 1939-1940 New York World’s Fair
A Happy Fun Adventure
I killed a cat today. I was walking Elana back to the J train. She asks if we could go to the cheap fruit stand and buy some pineapple. I tell her it’s a little out of the way, but we go anyway. We turn the corner and walk down Jamaica Ave. under the elevated train tracks. Before we walk ten feet we spot a cat in the road. “Ooh, kitty,” she says in that voice that’s affected for babies and kittens, “get out of the way if you don’t want to get hit.”
The cat looks dazed. It’s walking in front of cars, slowly and off-balance. It stands in front of a car that’s stopped at the red light. The light changes, and the driver has to back up and turn to avoid the cat, who’s barely moving. We surmise that it’s been hit by a car and debate what to do. “There’s an animal hospital nearby,” I say. She starts emptying her bag so that we can have something to carry the cat in, but the cat’s still walking into on-coming traffic. I need to get him out of the road now. I walk towards the cat and bend to pick him up, but I hesitate. He’s a mess. I don’t even know how to carry a healthy cat, let alone a badly injured one.
Some guy yells at me from down the street. He’s carrying lumber, I assume for the construction site two blocks away. “Jus’ pick up da fuckin’ cat,” he yells helpfully, “he ain’t gonna hurtcha.” This guy’s one of these New York characters. I don’t see him picking up the goddamn cat. But I do, finally. I’m not gonna put him in a bag, though, like roadkill. I carry him in my arms. He’s dirty and he smells, and I worry about my dry cleaning bill, to tell the truth.
Elana’s shaken up. She apologizes for not being much help, and says she has to walk ahead of me because it’s too upsetting. I ask her if I’m holding the cat right. She tells me I am. Because she’s walking ahead, she gets to the animal hospital first. When I walk in the lobby, she’s already talking with the vet, who’s explaining the situation. It’s about the delicate matter of the cost. The city-run animal shelter is a few blocks further, he tells us. They won’t charge, but they are required to euthanize strays. We ask him how much money, and he says about $50, just enough to cover the expense, which we agree to pay.
He brings us to an examination room, but he has a few other matters to attend to before he can examine the cat. I put the cat on the table and he starts walking in a daze again. He’s gonna walk right off the table. I hold him down a bit by petting him. “Calm down, kitty,” I say in that baby/kitty voice. I joke with Elana that “I guess I bought myself a damn cat, if he pulls through.” I see the cat’s face for the first time, and see now why Elana had to walk ahead. He’s a gooey mess. His mouth is open in the shape of an “o” and it’s oozing green snot. He’s still restless, but I calm him and he curls his body against my arm.
The vet returns. He feels the cat’s body and doesn’t think anything’s broken. “I’m not sure he was hit by a car,” he says. “If he’s unspayed, he’s probably feral.” The vet checks and is right. This is nobody’s cat. He was sick, and walking in the street to die. Elana leaves the room. The vet asks me to stay with the cat for a moment while he gets the medicine. When he returns, his assistant brings me to another room where I can wash my hands while he puts the cat down.
I join Elana in the lobby. She apologizes again, but she felt dizzy, which is understandable. I tell her I need to go to the ATM. She says she has her checkbook with her, but I tell her my bank has an ATM just two blocks away and that I’ll be back in five minutes.
The ATM is across the street from the fruit stand that we wanted to go to. I go inside, but there are no pineapples. Of course.
When I return to the animal hospital, Elana’s settling up the bill with the vet. It’s only $35. I give her a $20. We leave and separate. She, to Williamsburg; me, to the dry cleaner.
At the cleaners, I empty my pockets and remove my coat. The lady at the counter does the usual inspection. “Missing a button,” she notes. “Yeah, and this pocket’s torn and the lining’s all ripped up,” I tell her to make clear that I won’t hold the establishment responsible for that. “I just have to make do for the rest of the season,” I continue. “Yes, more storms coming,” she says in her Chinese accent, while fishing through a container of loose buttons. “A ha,” she says, as she finds a perfect match for my missing button and smiles.
This story has no moral, except that we should all heed Bob Barker’s advice and spay and neuter our pets. I would have taken that coat to the cleaner another day, and she would have found the button then instead, or I would have just thrown that old coat out in the spring. God does not work in mysterious ways and all things do not happen for a reason. I suppose we gave that cat some comfort in his last minutes, but I didn’t stay for his last minute. I left to wash my hands.