Thing #5

   
Thing #5: Go see a historic monument or marker.

This one was pretty easy to knock off the list. This is New York! So many notable things have happened here! So many places are famous for one thing or another. The real question was then, what to choose.

I decided that the Village and its environs were a good place to do a little historic site hopping. We could bike there (we're always looking for excuses to take the bikes out), and we could hit up a few different not-so-on-the-map places.

 Site 1: Teddy Roosevelt's childhood home. 

Did you know that President Roosevelt grew up in Manhattan? I certainly didn't. Here was his house, though, just sitting there on a quiet block of 20th Street. 

Site 2: Margaret Sanger's clinic. This unobtrusive building was the site of a bold new idea: giving women access to birth control. Controversial then, and strangely controversial in recent days. After we left I wished I had gotten a photo of both Nils and I - he is, after all, the product of family planning. As am I.

Site 3: the Triangle Shirtwaist building. I remember being a middle school student and learning about the Triangle Shirtwaist factory fire. The women working there had been locked in the 8th, 9th, and 10th floor factory to prevent unauthorized breaks. When the fire broke out many jumped out the window to their deaths. It was apparently a turning point of sorts for the rights of factory workers. At any rate, I'm glad no one can lock me in my office.

And then, since it was getting close to Nils's nap time, we cut short our tour of progressive New York history (another day, Stonewall Inn) and headed home. But not before a little bit of playground time.