On United Nations Day commemorate what was once a unique multi-ethnic neighborhood.

From the 1840s through the 1960s waves of immigrants lived on Manhattan’s Lower West Side.  Eminent domain actions for the Battery Tunnel and WTC sites ended what was New York City’s and possibly the nation’s most diverse and integrated neighborhood for its time. Twenty-seven nationalities were noted here in 1917. Various Nordic, Middle Eastern and Slavic immigrants lived in the small area from the WTC to the Battery west of Broadway. Hear about this displaced vibrant community from Joe Svehlak whose family immigrated from Moravia to Washington Street in the early 1900s. View the few significant remnants of the old neighborhood, including the Downtown Community House, tenements, Federal townhouses and a former Syrian Church. Learn about the struggle to preserve the history of this lost neighborhood in the shadow of Wall Street, and see a new park with reference to the Arab literary heritage of “Little Syria”.

$25 / $30