Hell's Kitchen (Manhattan)

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Location of Hell's Kitchen in Manhattan
Ninth Avenue with a view of the Time Warner Center and the Hearst Tower

Hell's Kitchen (also Clinton or Midtown West ) is a neighborhood in the New York borough of Manhattan . Hell's Kitchen is roughly between 34th Street and 57th Street, and between Eighth Avenue and the Hudson River .

Names

The name Clinton is reminiscent of the former Governor DeWitt Clinton , after whom a park in the neighborhood is named. Midtown West, on the other hand, is derived from the neighboring Midtown business district . The name Hell's Kitchen translates as: “ Hell's kitchen ”, translated into German: “Devil's Kitchen”. The origin of the name is controversial. It could indicate the circumstances under which Irish immigrants lived there in the 19th century. But it could also have been derived from a slum in London . Or the name could come from a gang that performed there at the time. Another possible origin of the name is also mentioned in the novel Sleepers : A family of German origin named Heil is said to have lived in the area and operated a restaurant there called Heil's Kitchen . From Salvation's Kitchen will then take the time Hell's Kitchen become his. In the crime drama series CSI: New York , the name is traced back to the high crime rate as well as the many gang activities and gang wars in the quarter during the 20th century (up to the 1980s). There is talk of the following legend: “An experienced cop and his young colleague watch a commotion. The younger one says: 'The neighborhood is pure hell!' To which the elder replies: 'In hell there is still a comparatively mild climate. This is Hell's Kitchen. ”“ The name Clinton is more commonly used in New York today.

history

Hell's Kitchen ca.1890

The great famine in Ireland in the middle of the 19th century led to mass emigration of Irish to the USA. These settled in slums , shantytowns and unauthorized settlements in the periphery of the big cities. After the American Civil War (1861-1865) there was another population surge. Since there was a lack of governmental order, residents formed gangs and gangs. One of the most powerful in the early twentieth century was the brutal Gopher Gang , first led by One Lung Curran and later Owney Madden . The violence escalated in the 1920s. In particular, the competition in the illegal alcohol business during Prohibition resulted in bitter fighting and deadly violence. Owney Madden prevailed in these fights and became one of the most feared gangsters in town. After the introduction of the container ships, the West Side piers declined. Many residents became unemployed and slipped into social misery, the construction and completion of the Lincoln Tunnel also had negative consequences for the district.

The Irish mafia gang Westies was founded in 1965, and in the 1970s they formed an alliance with the powerful Italian-American mafia gang Gambino family . With the introduction of the RICO law and the condemnation of its leaders, the heyday of this gang of criminals ended in the mid-1980s. Today, Hell's Kitchen is no longer shaped solely by the working class of Irish descent. As a result of gentrification , Americans of different ethnic backgrounds and students have moved in over the past few decades.

Occurrence in culture and fiction

People from Hell's Kitchen

Singer Alicia Keys , ice hockey player Joe Mullen , actors James Cagney , George Raft , Timothée Chalamet , Sylvester Stallone , Josh Peck and Robert De Niro, and writers Lorenzo Carcaterra and Benjamin Appel come from Hell's Kitchen. Famous gangsters who come from or have worked in Hell's Kitchen include: Bill Dwyer , Owney Madden , Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll , Eddie McGrath , Mickey Spillane , Edward Cummiskey , Tom Devaney , James Coonan and Mickey Featherstone .

Hell's Kitchen is the headquarters of the Church of Satan .

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Clinton / Hell's Kitchen. (No longer available online.) Klara Madlin Real Estate, archived from the original on November 20, 2008 ; Retrieved May 18, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.klaramadlin.com
  2. Mac to Lindsay in CSI: NY , Season 8, Episode 16 "Irish Blood" - German first broadcast on February 25, 2013 on VOX.
  3. Bayor, Ronald H. and Meagher, Timothy J. (1997): The New York Irish , pp. 217-18. JHU Press. ISBN 0-8018-5764-3 .
  4. ^ English, TJ (2006): The Westies: Inside New York's Irish Mob , p. 39. Macmillan. ISBN 0-312-36284-6 .

Web links

Commons : Hell's Kitchen  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 40 ° 46 ′  N , 74 ° 0 ′  W