"Hey Dad, Look!"

Father and daughter at John Jay Pool on the East River.

Summer in the city.

August 26, 1969, my Aunt Joan went into labor. I bet Tommy Smith a quarter it would be a girl while we sat on his 516 East 82nd Street frying in the mid day 94 degree heat.

"Want to go to the pool?" Smitty suggested.

"Nah, I don't have a bathing suit." I was too lazy to walk one block to my grandmother's to get one also knowing I'd probably be ordered to go to three stores.

"I'll give you my father's?" Smitty offered. Since I was loopy from the heat, I said yes.

Sonny Smith, Tommy's father weighed north of 225 I was 152 when I was 15. (the day before I was weighed at tackle football practice with the OLGC Rams). Sonny's boxer trunks could of doubled as surrender bloomers for my big grandmother.

After we put our sneakers and junk into the wire baskets and got our wrist bands, I ran outside to a blast of heat and jumped in the John Jay water holding the suit up with both hands. The material came up all around me like a science fiction sized jelly fish. I didn't care, the zipper was broken and that became my main concern. I spent my pool time juggling: holding my trunks up and keeping my stuff locked up. I won a quarter though. Joan had a girl, Christine. Uncle Mommy was her Godmother, and I'm her Godfather.

Happy Birthday, Chris!

Check out my New York City memoir, "I Hate the Dallas Cowboys - tales of a scrappy New York boyhood." Available at Logos Book Store and online at Amazon or Barnes and Noble. The book has 109 Amazon five star reviews out of 109 total reviews posted. We're pitching a perfect game. My old world echoes TV's "The Wonder Years" ~ just add taverns, subways and Checker cabs.

You can also purchase my photography portfolio,"River to River - New York Scenes From a Bicycle" on Amazon.

John Jay 2013

Smithy & Ray Bellinger, 83rd St. @ 1969

Christine's 1969 baptism, Mom & Tom & Chris

New Photography Exhibit ~ Opening Reception hosted by Yorkville Creperie @ Tuesday, Oct 1st @ 7-9 pm

My storytelling developed on the tenement roofs and stoops of Yorkville. They carried outside the neighborhood when Dad and I began bike riding in 1961. Down Carl Schurz Park and along the East River facing the lighthouse on Welfare Island. Later, longer trips to my country estate, Central Park, and further west to the Hudson River, we'd zigzag along Riverside Park up to Grant’s Tomb, and our crowning expedition, reaching the George Washington Bridge.

Each trip, Dad brought along his Yashica 44 camera. Following his methods taught me to carefully look around for something striking, surprising or simply beautiful. He regularly demonstrated to me how being patient paid off for a good shot. I couldn’t wait for his photos to be developed at the pharmacy. Even if it was a familiar place, Dad found something new in the light or angle he chose.

These trips with Dad 50 years ago are still alive in my photographs ~ you can see this is true in my new photography exhibit hosted by Yorkville Creperie.



Please join me for the opening reception of “Yorkville & NYC Scenes From a Bicycle,” this Tuesday, October 1, 2013 from 7 to 9pm.

All are welcome. Refreshments will be served.

Pictured here are nine photographs in the exhibit.

Thank you, Yorkville Creperie, for inviting me to exhibit my work.

“Yorkville & NYC Scenes From a Bicycle”

Thomas R. Pryor Photography

@ Yorkville Creperie

1586 York Avenue (bet 83rd & 84th Street)

Opening Reception: Tuesday, October 1st @ 7pm to 9pm, refreshments will be served.

Yorkville Creperie Exhibits My Photography ~ Opening Reception @ Tues, Oct 1st @ 7-9 pm

Two nights ago it was cloudy at dusk and I walked through the bushes on the east side of Carl Schurz Park's 87th Street bridge leading to Gracie Mansion. The cloudy sky looked pleasing over the statue of Pan. 

Here are shots from there, the Drive inside Carl Schurz and the path leading out of the park at 84th Street and East End Avenue.

Yorkville Creperie at 1586 York Avenue is currently hosting an exhibit of my photography. The work will be on display through the end of this year. All framed work is for sale and my photographic prints are available for purchase @ Thomas R. Pryor Photography. There is a price list on the wall at Yorkville Creperie. The manager has a flyer describing the exhibit with the price list and my background. Please ask your Creperie server or the manager for a copy.

Also on display are photographs of the Creperie storefront and The Saloon storefront from 1960 and 1962 when they were known as Joe's Candy Store and the Old Timer's Tavern. One is my first photo of Dad and his pals in the bar looking out, and the other is my Dad's shot of my cousin Bobby, Rory and I on Christmas Day with my first two wheeler. That bike and Dad's camera kicked off my interest in photography when we rode all over Manhattan every weekend we could.

There's an opening reception for the exhibit on Tuesday, October 1st @ 7pm to 9pm next door the Creperie in The Saloon. Everyone is welcome, refreshments will be served. Come visit Yorkville, we'll have a nice time.

John Jay Pool August 26, 1969

August 26, 1969, my Aunt Joan went into labor. I bet Tommy Smith a quarter it would be a girl while we sat on his 516 East 82nd Street frying in the mid day 94 degree heat.

"Want to go to the pool?" Smitty suggested.

"Nah, I don't have a bathing suit." I was too lazy to walk one block to my grandmother's to get one also knowing I'd probably be ordered to go to three stores.

"I'll give you my father's?" Smitty offered. Since I was loopy from the heat, I said yes.

Sonny Smith, Tommy's father weighed north of 200 I was 152 when I was 15. (the day before I was weighed at tackle football practice with the OLGC Rams). Sonny's boxer trunks could of doubled as surrender bloomers for my big grandmother.

After we put our sneakers and junk into the wire baskets and got our wrist bands, I ran outside to a blast of heat and jumped in the John Jay water holding the suit up with both hands. The material came up all around me like a science fiction sized jelly fish. I didn't care, the zipper was broken and that became my main concern. I spent my pool time juggling: holding my trunks up and keeping my stuff locked up. I won a quarter though. Joan had a girl, Christine.

Here are photos from 1969: Tommy Smith, Ray Bellinger ~

Uncle Mommy and me, godparents at Christine's christening

and a link to photos of John Jay Pool, Cherokee Place and 78th Street.

Surrounded by Water ~ A Gift

Pictures here were taken on the 69th Street Pier, the Brooklyn landing for the Staten Island ferry that ceased service in 1964 when the Verrazano Bridge opened. The views from the pier: Bay Ridge, The Narrows, New York Bay, Staten Island and lower Manhattan in the distance about 8 miles away.

A Facebook photo album with other photos is at this link.

Yorkville Creperie changed the dates for my photography exhibit in their restaurant. The tentative date for the opening reception will be Tuesday, October 1, 2013 in The Saloon next door to Yorkville Creperie. I will confirm this week.

Carl Schurz Memories ~ Next "Stoops to Nuts" @ Aug 13 ~ Photo Exhibit @ Yorkville Creperie after Labor Day

Kids in Carl Schurz playground

After a week of stomach pain I felt OK yesterday and took old writing notebooks down Carl Schurz Park. I laid them across a checker table to see what I've missed.  I have countless Yorkville stories but this exercise always helps me find an old memory or a good word still in there unused.



Looking up towards the playground from the checker table reminded me how kids end up in Emergency Rooms.

At the northern end of Carl Schurz playground is a semi-circle area we called the "Horse Shoe." The path that winds around the "Horse Shoe" dips down towards the river and the wall climbs from two feet to 12 feet across from the Hockey Field.

Tommy's work station

In the 1960s, a fleet-footed and skinny athletic kid with a good grip on his sneakers, say Freddy Muller, would take a running start at the high wall and drive one foot off the stone block, push himself up off that first sneaker, plant his second foot higher on the ridged stone and with his outstretched arm grab the fence above him and pull himself onto the ledge at the top of the wall. Freddy walked the ledge triumphantly, one hand in the air waving or he climbed over the fence at one of the light poles into the "Horse Shoe."(easy access at the pole where you didn't have to worry about getting your nuts caught on a spike).

Wall up to playground and Horse Shoe

If a clumsy chunky want-to-be athletic kid tried to do the same thing. Say me! Here goes!

I felt my love handles jiggle as I ran my fat ass over the grass towards the wall. I planted my worn-out Keds sneaker somewhere on the stone, this lifted my Husky dungarees and me a few feet in the air but with no further momentum I fell backwards before my second foot got anywhere near the wall. Freddy had a good laugh and a great view of me on the ground from the top.

Repeated tries raised the odds I'd be visiting Doctors Hospital Emergency Room. And I did, twice.


Our next "City Stories: Stoops to Nuts" storytelling show is Tuesday, August 13th @ 6pm @ the Cornelia Street Cafe. Our artists: Lorraine Hartin-Gelardi; Jim Hawkins and Karen Pillsworth. I'll host and tell a Yorkville yarn. Admission is $8 and that includes a free drink. Time Out Magazine thinks this show is a swell thing to do.

The week after Labor Day, The Yorkville Creperie will host a reception to open a two month exhibit of my photography. I'll announce the opening date next week. 

Yorkville Creperie

1586 York Avenue

between 83rd & 84th Street

There are new photos and new galleries at my site, "Thomas R. Pryor Photography."

Visit and view places you love: Yorkville, Carl Schurz Park, Central Park, Hudson River, Around NYC, Scenes From A Bicycle. Upcoming galleries: Coney Island and Rockaway Beach.

Prices are reasonable. Get a piece of Yorkville and NYC on your walls. Gift your friends who miss the old neighborhood.

Stop by "Thomas R. Pryor Photography."

The Drive towards the Triboro

82nd St last light

500 block 82 St

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York & 82nd

Up York from 82 St