Stephen Rex Brown Jeff Greenberg, the owner of Elan Antiques.

Elan Antiques stayed in business for 23 years, but it couldn’t survive the ailing economy.

“2008 was really the death knell,” said Jeff Greenberg, the owner of the store at Bleecker and Lafayette Streets, just a few blocks away from the temporarily shuttered Billy’s Antiques. “I wasn’t able to recover. It kept getting worse — I really haven’t seen it get better.”

Mr. Greenberg, 58, said that he had been on a month-to-month lease for several years, and that a new tenant — it’s not certain who — had made a large offer on his space. “I can’t bear ill will — that is business,” he added, noting that his current rent is under the market rate. Read more…

In 2008, Barack Obama got 86% of the vote in Manhattan, and crowds flooded St. Marks Place to celebrate. The East Village tends to be a liberal neighborhood, see. Evidence: this “East Village Other” cover from 1967 making light of Lyndon B. Johnson’s State of the Union address (a blog with an unpublishable name posted it on the heels of President Obama’s address to Congress last night). Decades after the hippie era, it’s still hard to find a Republican in this cradle of anarchy.

To find out just how hard, we hit the streets with cameras rolling yesterday and lo and behold, we found one! Watch the video above, and tell us: are you, too, an East Village Republican? Have you ever had to bite your tongue while talking politics at a local dive because you didn’t want the bartender spitting in your drink? Don’t be shy: None other than Johnny Ramone once said that “punk is right wing.”

Daniel Maurer Lisa Burriss and Cafe Khufu owner
Paul Said.

A longtime East Village resident’s request for a beer-and-wine license sparked a crisis of conscience among Community Board 3 members last night, who wrestled with whether to give a good neighbor the benefit of the doubt or remain committed to a hardline stance against new booze-selling establishments on quiet streets.

At last night’s board meeting, Lisa Burriss, 32, a public housing advocate and native resident of the Lower East Side, asked the board to support her application for a beer-and-wine license at Cafe Khufu, the hookah lounge and cafe on Third Street between First and Second Avenues that she manages. In 2009, the board recommended that the State Liquor Authority turn down the cafe for wine and beer, noting in its decision that “Community Board #3 has taken the position that it does not want the City to permit eating and drinking establishments on side streets where they are not zoned or to extend such noncompliant use to eating and drinking establishments.”

Earlier this month, the board’s S.L.A. Licensing committee once again recommended that Cafe Khufu stay dry, but at last night’s meeting of the full board, personal considerations trumped policy. Testimony by several members turned the tide of opinion in favor of Ms. Burriss, a former director of organizing at Good Old Lower East Side
Read more…

Matt Rosen Mosaic Man’s latest.

The East Village’s most ubiquitous street artist is in the midst of a particularly prolific period, and he shows no signs of slowing down.

Matt Rosen Jim Power, alongside Porchetta co-owner Matt Lindemulder.

This morning, “Mosaic Man” Jim Power alerted The Local to his new pig mosaic, which he had just delivered to to Porchetta on East Seventh Street.

Recently, Mr. Power unveiled signage for Tompkins Square Bagels and the new location of The Bean.

The Local will probably get a firsthand look at the porcine mosaic any day now. We just finished off a punch-card for a free sandwich, and those burnt ends are irresistible.

Good morning, East Village.

Above: footage of 13th Step celebrating the Giants win on Sunday.

Marky Ramone tells City Room that he never actually wore the leather jacket being auctioned off as his own. He posted on Facebook: “It’s a fake. Yes, I had more than one coat. But this is not mine.” Update: The auction house tells City Room that it has taken the jacket off the block while it investigates its authenticity.

Speaking of CBs nostalgia, Gothamist quotes from a press release for “Bye Bye CBGB.” Opening at the Clic Gallery in SoHo on Jan. 30, the exhibition of Bruno Hadjadj’s sketches, photographs, and video from the last 48 hours of the rock club’s existence promises to pay “testament to the incredible endurance of CBGB’s influence.”

Delving still deeper into the neighborhood’s music heritage: Dangerous Minds posts some footage of Lead Belly, the blues and folk legend who lived at 414 East 10th Street. Researching Greenwich Village History writes that while living in the East Village, the bluesman would often stop into the Avenue B apartment of Elizabeth Barnicle, an NYU professor and folklorist, to record songs. Read more…

Daniel Maurer

Okay, so they didn’t garner any votes when we asked you to pick the neighborhood’s wildest wheels, but these two lookers – a Dodge Dart Swinger and a Ford Fairlane 500 – are still two of our favorites. Imagine how delightful it was to see these green machines perpendicularly parked at the corner of East Sixth Street and First Avenue on this fine, sunny day. If you own either (or both) of these, e-mail The Local. We want a ride!

This nugget of news from an online auction house fits right in with the upscaling of The Bowery. City Room reports that a leather jacket once worn by drummer Marky Ramone (of The Ramones, obviously) is currently going for $3,146. An employee at the auction house says that it does not come with any lingering odors of stage sweat. Meanwhile, a more affordable option for Ramones fans: the new Dee Dee and Johnny Wacky Wobblers.

Ellen Wallenstein

Surrounded by books and diaries, Judith Malina lives on Clinton Street, in an apartment above the basement space that for five years has housed the Living Theatre, the avant-garde theater group she co-founded in 1947. The actress, writer, and director thinks of the Lower East Side, her “spiritual home,” as a well of inspiration: “It inspires me every minute when I walk out on the street,” she recently told The Local. “It’s so rich in the history of art, of experimentation, of social progress, of anarchism. This is really so much the hub of what has happened and what I think will happen next.”

What better place, then, to pose the questions – as her new interactive play “History of the World” sets out to do – of “Who are you in history?” and “Who are you in the Beautiful Non-Violent Anarchist Revolution yet to come?” Before we answered that, we asked Ms. Malina a few questions of our own – about her favorite local spots, of course. Read more…

Suzanne Rozdeba Tommy Waters (right) and picketing electrical workers.

Electrical workers with Local Union 3 were picketing this morning outside Saint Brigid’s Church on Avenue B.

About 20 members of the union had been standing outside the church since 7 a.m. Tommy Waters, the picket captain, said they were on strike against Denmar Electric, a contractor doing electrical work for the church’s renovation.

“These workers have been on this job, working on St. Brigid’s, for over a year now. It’s an ongoing project,” he said. “They were told by the owner of Denmar Electric on Jan. 6 that he would have no more use for them.” Read more…

Scott Lynch

Good morning, East Village.

Teresa Pedroza, a resident of the Riis Houses, tells DNA Info that her family has raised more than $5,000 for the funeral of Dashane Santana, her granddaughter who was killed while crossing Delancey Street.

With the Board of Standards and Appeals holding a hearing about rooftop additions at 514-516 East Sixth Street today, Off the Grid reiterates its stance that “it is clear that the construction is inappropriate, out of scale and detracts from the character of the buildings and the streetscape.”

The Indypendent notes the opening of “Street.Life.Live” at the 14th Street Y, featuring the work of photographers Rebecca Lepkoff, Silvianna Goldsmith, Marlis Momber, Anna Sawaryn, and Shell Sheddy. The exhibition of photos of the Lower East Side from 1968 to the present “serves as a reminder of a time when things weren’t as rosy in the Lower East Side, a neighborhood that includes enclaves such as the East Village, Chinatown and Little Italy. Images of run-down houses and anti-drug protests remind viewers of darker times, when even the photographers themselves feared for their safety. ” Read more…

View full graphic

Recently released 311 complaint data reveals a veritable who’s-who in the neighborhood’s ongoing struggle with nightlife.

An analysis of commercial noise complaints submitted to 311 between January 2010 and October 16, 2011 finds that some familiar faces like La Vie, Sin Sin Lounge and Nublu are near the top of the list. The data, which represents the most recent 311 complaints available on NYC Open Data, shows that the undisputed champion of noise complaints in the East Village is Sutra Lounge. The hip-hop lounge had a whopping 265 complaints during the 22-month stretch — 116 more than the runner-up.

“We have the number one most vigilant neighbor, that’s what it really means,” said Ariel Palitz, the owner of Sutra and a member of Community Board 3. Read more…

Some morsels of food news today: Zagat Buzz reports that Shanna Pacifico is leaving Peter Hoffman’s Avenue B restaurant, Back Forty, to be chef at his reboot of Savoy in SoHo. Meanwhile, Grub Street hears that The Smile (now getting competition from the newly relaunched Acme as NoHo’s sceneiest spot) is opening a takeout-oriented offshoot on Howard Street near Crosby Street.

Kim Davis was good and thorough during his recent tour of East Village biscuit destinations, but something occurred to us: he overlooked 7-Eleven’s $1 biscuit! We asked our trusted chowhound to swallow his pride and give it a nibble. Here’s how it stacked up against the others.

Lauren Carol Smith

Ninety years ago, the New York columnist O.O. McIntyre was complaining that the Bowery wasn’t what it used to be. He detected “the faint rustle of silk.” What he couldn’t have anticipated was the faint rustle of hungry bargain-hunters unwrapping hot, steamy dollar biscuits, sold at the front counter of a spanking new 7-Eleven.

A review? Well, the biscuit tasted biscuity, thanks no doubt to the “natural butter flavor” listed along with dozens of other ingredients on the wrapper. It was more soggy than dry, its texture contrasting sharply with the springiness of the pale pork patty. “Spices,” the wrapper duly noted, and in fact I found pepper flakes in the sausage, responsible for the warm after-burn in the throat. Read more…

Over the weekend, The Local revisited the 1960s and The East Village Other. Before we return to the present-day, let’s dip back still further in time, with composer David Amram‘s memories of collaborating with Beat legends and jazz masters in the 1950s. This passage, written in 2003, is excerpted, courtesy of Paradigm Publishers, from his forthcoming book “David Amram: The First 80 Years.”

Burt Glinn David Amram playing the French horn at the
Five Spot, 1957.

“Go east of Avenue A when you move to New York,” said artist Joan Mitchell, the Summer of 1955 when she encouraged me to dare to leave Paris and come to live in New York City. “Go to the Lower East Side. It still has that soulfulness you are always talking about. Charlie Parker lived there. Artists like Franz Kline, and so many others still do. It’s the real New York. You’ll find it a haven from the Philistines. It’s an island within an island.”

When I came back home to the USA to live in New York, I moved to my sixth-floor walk-up railroad-flat apartment at 319 East Eighth Street (now torn down and rebuilt), between Avenues B and C in the Fall of 1955.

Joan Mitchell was right. The Lower East Side, now called the East Village, was an island within an island. There were still a handful of old men with pushcarts selling vegetables, pots and pans, used clothes and rags on the streets, and even a horse and wagon that was run by a man who claimed to be a gypsy prince who sharpened knives.

Yiddish, Spanish, Ukrainian, Russian, Romany and Polish were so frequently spoken that most of the East Village’s residents could say a few words in all the languages that filled the air. Their tapestry of sounds were accompanied by the delicious aroma of slowly simmering cabbage, blintzes, shashlik, arroz con pollo, pierogi and clouds of various dishes using enormous amounts of garlic and fried onions. Read more…

Noah Fecks

Good morning, East Village.

EV Grieve notices Department of Building permits indicating that a 7-Eleven is bound for the former J.A.S. Mart space on St. Marks Place.

The Post identifies the the man who was killed on the L train tracks on Saturday morning as Brian Omara of Garden City. The Daily News writes that later in the day, around 10 p.m., another man was struck and killed by an L train at the Sixth Ave. station.

As previously reported here, The Times writes that religious leaders are opposing the creation of an East Village historic district. “Almost a dozen houses of worship, including the late-19th-century Cathedral of the Holy Virgin Protection and a crumbling century-old synagogue, argue that they are dependent on donations and that including them in a landmark district would make simple projects like repairing a window or fixing a roof more expensive and bureaucratically time-consuming.” In August, Ido Nissani, an architect and member of the Meseritz Synagogue on East Sixth Street, complained to The Local that “people who never stepped foot in this building now feel entitled not only to have a say, but to even have control over the building.” Read more…

Drawing by Bill Beckman, Nov. 1966.

I first knew Walter Bowart around 1963 or ’64 when he was a bartender at Stanley’s Bar, located at 12th Street and Avenue B. Bowart was an artist who did some design work in early 1965 for LeMar, the Committee to Legalize Marijuana, which operated out of my Peace Eye Bookstore located in a former Kosher meat store on East 10th Street between Avenues B and C.

Allen Katzman I had known since 1961 when he helped run open readings at various east-side coffee houses, such as Les Deux Magots on East Seventh, and later the Cafe Le Metro on Second Avenue. Katzman was known at the time mainly as a poet.  (During his time at EVO, Katzman spelled his first name Allan.)

During the summer of 1965, Bowart, Katzman and others, including the artist Bill Beckman, Ishmael Reed, Jaakov Kohn, and Sherry Needham, decided to found a newspaper. Poet Ted Berrigan, as I recall, came up with the name, The East Village Other, with “Other” coming, of course, from Rimbaud’s famous line of 1871, “Je est un autre,” I is an Other. Another account has Ishmael Reed coining the name. (The participants in the Dada movement argued for 50 years over who first thought of the name “Dada.”) Read more…

Jane Wilson John Jonas Gruen, 1965.

Until John Jonas Gruen decamped for the Upper West Side with his wife, the painter Jane Wilson, and their daughter Julia, he lived at 317 East 10th Street, around the corner from the headquarters of The East Village Other. While covering the burgeoning neighborhood, the journalist befriended EVO editors Allen Katzman and Dan Rattiner. He recently told The Local, “I was the one who brought the East Village phenomenon to Clay Felker, one of my editors [at the New York Herald Tribune], who suggested I write all about it.” Mr. Gruen captured the era in a Nov. 29, 1964 article in the Herald Tribune’s Sunday supplement (the precursor to New York magazine), and then later in his 1966 book, “The New Bohemia,” a portion of which is excerpted here.

Jefferson Poland [was] an East Villager [who] made a name for himself by creating the League for Sexual Freedom, an organization devoted to, among other things, the legalization of prostitution. But Poland is also something of a clairvoyant in that he sensed a need for an East Village newspaper, a neighborhood paper that would function for the area as The Village Voice does so successfully for Greenwich Village.

The gap has now been filled by The East Village Other, a biweekly publication started in October 1965 by Walter Bowart, a 27-year-old painter who gave it a slim, but provocative kickoff with one thousand dollars and an excess of drive. With typically offbeat headquarters located on Tompkins Square Park, The Other currently boasts a circulation of 7,000 and champions the causes of New Bohemia. The style is one of humorous candor and immediacy designed to reach the same mass-media audience that so fervently responds to the folk-rock wailings of Bob Dylan. Bowart has said: “I came to the conclusion that most official journalism was a big fat opinion. Because of the superego conditioning of this society, most reporters are only spewing out status quo propaganda. I wanted an intrepid broadside paper, like Poor Richard’s Almanack or The Tatler. I was ready to gamble a thousand bucks on three issues and now we’re here to stay because no one else is speaking to the New Left with laughter.

“My hero,” Bowart concluded, “is Will Rogers.” Read more…