It was not exactly burning like a wildfire, it was more subtle than that. It was a combination of fire and abandonment, well documented in Lisa Kahane's book "Do not give way to evil, photographs of the South Bronx, 1979-1987.
Not really so scary - just depressing.
I used to go up there a lot, to go to Fashion Moda. Also I was renovating lofts and suppliers were still there.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fashion_Moda
http://www.amazon.com/Not-Give-Way-...F8&qid=1463063274&sr=8-1&keywords=lisa+kahane
Fred,
I was building a loft on Grand Street which was the fringe of Soho back then 40 years ago.
As far as wildfires go in the Bronx, with suspected arson, abandoned buildings were mostly left to burn.
At one time an artist painted the plywood covering the windows along the blocks of bordered up buildings that were victims of arson to disguise their abandonment making them look occupied. You could see this driving on the Bruckner. It created a double take upon a closer approach and became sad commentary.
My friend Oscar grew up in the Southside of Williamsburg and is about my age, and he was shot 5 times. He said that half the guys he grew up with are dead. On South 3rd Street by the firehouse basically drugs were legalized. Oscar told me that truck drivers were directed not to stop at the light at the Meeker Street exit coming off the BQE because their cargo would get jacked by a crew waiting in ambush. The driver would be held at gunpoint if he stopped, meanwhile bolt cutters were used to breach the lock, and a full tractor trailor would be emptied into smaller vehicles by an organized crew working an assembly line.
Greenpoint and Williamsburg were two hoods hit very hard in the eighties by drugs and AIDS. These were foresaken neighborhoods that were left for dead. Into the 90's they were places to avoid unless you were looking for trouble. Many young people died.
Back in the day the way drug traffic was controlled was that the police tried to keep drugs out of residential sections of neighborhoods by restricting drug sales from residential parts of the hood and creating zones that were safe for drug dealers. It was like in the HBO series "The Wire." This was the best the police could do.
Also remember going to a storefront in Queens (I lived in the Suburbs of Long Island) as a kid. Basically you put your money through a hole and then your bag of dope was dispensed. You never saw the dealer. It kinda worked like a soda machine, except you were buying drugs and it was a storefront on Merrick Bull-A-Vard.
Alley Pond Park on the outskirts of Queens had the upper parking lot set up as a haven for drug sales. It was like a large outdoor flea market. To get to the upper lot you passed cops hanging out in the lower lots. No one ever got arrested, hassled, or stopped buying drugs, and the cops were basically doormen or gate keepers. Basically drugs were legalized in certain parts of the city and were part of police policy.
Also in the early eighties the lower Eastside began to gentrify after Soho was developed. Walking around there was rather sketchy. One would get solicited openly for either sex or drugs, and if you were not there for either sex or drugs you were immediately profiled as an artist who was gentrifying their neighborhood and were in serious danger of assault.
Chinatown was a place where it was understood where it was controlled by violent youth gangs collectively known as "the long hairs." Before the gangs wore three piece suits and carried 38's members of the Ghost Shadows and Flying Dragons used martial arts, and they extorted lots of money from Chinese businesses.
One time I went to Chinatown to get some lunch when I was working on Broome Street. Back then I had long hair, and I didn't wear it in a ponytail. I got in line to order some food, but the owner came from behind the counter and asked me in English, "What do you want."
When I replied, "A quart of roast pork fried rice," the owner immediately abandoned all his other customers and ran in the back to fill my order. When I went to pay him he looked confused and didn't want to take my money. Evidently he thought I was a gang member testing him.
In many-many ways I miss the old New York.
Cal
