‘Greenpoint’ is arguably now a term for rock climbers. According to climbing blog Planet Mountain the term means ‘climbing a sport route with the holds but using trad[itional] gear such as nuts and camming devices.’
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Occupy Broadway began sometime after 6pm on Friday evening in the plaza near the TKTS booth in Times Square. A group of five people singing songs with guitars and percussion. A banner with ‘Occupy Broadway.’ People in makeup so that you can’t tell if they are going to perform later, or on break from whatever theater they work at; or both.
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In the summer of 2011, a large mural of Bradley Manning appeared in my neighborhood in Brooklyn, NY. Straddling the nexus between Williamsburg and Greenpoint, the image had “Hero” written above the smiling face of the world’s most famous whistleblower, who had supposedly leaked hundreds of thousands of secret U.S. documents to Julian Assange and Wikileaks.
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Morning
There were maybe two hundred people at Liberty Park when we arrived at 7, and several hundred amassing at the Red Cube across Broadway. We found a Starbucks to take care of business and returned to the Cube. Found our third friend in the crowd, which took some twenty minutes of shuffling in the dense crowd – a theme for the day.
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Tomorrow is November 17th. How many thousands of us will come out with Occupy Wall St? How many children and mothers and elderly will I see and remember to scold myself for ever being afraid of a cop? What Unions will join? How many students? And dayshift people? Homeless and teachers, religious folks. Signs that will make me laugh.
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By the time the crowd reached 116th Street there must have been 400 of them, clanging and shouting and marching south down the west side of Broadway in the warm early afternoon sun. Who? What? By this time, almost two-months into the occupation at Liberty Plaza, one just assumes that commotion anywhere has to do with Occupy Wall Street.
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The New York Historical Society hosted its History Makers Gala honoring Henry Kissinger at the Waldorf on Monday night.
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It was a Friday, and Liberty Plaza was boisterous with drums, conversation, and the ubiquitous People’s Mic. Immediately I met CJ Phillips, who was pushing a cart adorned with cardboard signs detailing his homelessness. When I asked to speak with him, he handed me a three-page document outlining who he was and how he had been mistreated by government services and corrupt private enterprises. As a story of a person’s frustrated attempts for help from the health care and social services systems in the US, it is familiar.
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In 1929 the NYTimes wrote that, “People do not travel for pleasure on Newtown Creek.” Those of us on the Working Harbor Committee’s “Hidden Harbor Tour” of Newtown Creek disagreed, as we traversed the 3.5 mile long estuary on a sunny Sunday.
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Joseph Lentol has been the New York State Assembly Member for Brooklyn’s District 50 (which includes Greenpoint, Williamsburg and Fort Greene) since 1983. He is also Chair of the Assembly’s Committee on Codes, tasked with reviewing criminal justice legislation. He previously served as Assistant District Attorney in Kings County before he began holding elected office in 1972.
I spoke with Assemblyperson Lentol over the phone on October 19th.
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