Discover the History of the Lower East Side with Roberta Gratz by Bike!
SACRED SITES BIKE TOUR
With Preservationist Roberta Brandes Gratz
Sunday, May 17 from 10 am to 1 pm
Explore the history, architecture and preservation of Lower Manhattan and Brooklyn – by bicycle! Urban journalist, preservationist and Museum at Eldridge Street (MAES) founder Roberta Brandes Gratz and MAES Deputy Director Amy Stein-Milford lead a tour of New York City’s historic houses of worship. Participants will visit churches, synagogues and temples that have been constructed over the past 200 years and that reflect the rich religious and cultural life of immigrants in New York City.
The tour will highlight sites important to the African American, English, Greek, Eastern European Jewish, Italian, Chinese and Hispanic immigrant experience in America – from the grand 1887 Eldridge Street Synagogue to St. Augustine’s Church and its Slave Gallery to Plymouth Church of the Pilgrims to more recent Buddhist temples. These sites express their rich history and traditions of the cultural groups that built them. The tour will also visit non-traditional sacred sites: a newspaper building, movie theater, and eatery, examining how these businesses were, in a sense, sacred to the immigrants who made their homes here on the Lower East Side.
Details:
$18 per person. You must be 18 or older to participate. Bikes are not provided and you are required to bring your own helmet. RSVP required.
RSVP: hgriff(at)eldridgestreet.org or call 212.219.0888 x205
Meets at:
Museum at Eldridge Street
12 Eldridge Street
Between Canal & Division Streets