92nd Street Y (92NY)
1395 Lexington Avenue | also 158 East 92nd Street, 1381 Lexington Avenue, 1393 Lexington Avenue | Carnegie Hill | built 1930
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The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1900
Jacob Schiff pays for the first YMHA building at 92nd Street, designed by Arnold Brunner
The Young Men's Hebrew Association moved from 42nd Street to Lexington Avenue near 58th Street in 1886 and to East 59th Street in 1895 before it found a lasting home. The banker Jacob Schiff, who had first given it a rowhouse at 65th Street and Lexington Avenue, financed a new building on this corner. Arnold W. Brunner, who designed many synagogues around the turn of the century, was the architect, and it opened in 1900. This original building stood on the lot until the present one replaced it in 1930.
“Schiff would finance the construction of a new building at 92nd Street and Lexington. Designed by Arnold W. Brunner…”
Source: Wikipedia
- 1930
The Y replaces its original building with the current one
The Young Men's Hebrew Association had occupied a building at this Lexington Avenue corner since 1900, designed by Arnold W. Brunner and financed by philanthropist Jacob Schiff. In 1930 that structure was replaced with the building standing today.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1935
Director William Kolodney turns the Y into an arts center
William Kolodney joined the Y as educational director in 1935 and opened centers for jewelry-making, dance and poetry, along with a nursery school. The push toward arts programming laid the groundwork for the literary and performance events the Y became known for.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1941
Future star Tony Curtis makes his acting debut in a Y production of Thunder Rock
Bernard Schwartz, a Harlem-born son of Hungarian-Jewish immigrants, was an active member of the Y's athletics and clubs. On February 7, 1941, he made his first stage appearance in the Y's own production of Thunder Rock. Seven years later he signed a contract with Universal, took the name Tony Curtis, and went on to Some Like It Hot and The Defiant Ones, which earned him an Oscar nomination.
Source: jta.org
- 1948
Harry Belafonte makes his off-Broadway debut at the Y in Sojourner Truth
The Harlem-born singer and actor Harry Belafonte appeared on the Y's stage in Sojourner Truth, a play about the Black abolitionist put on with the American Negro Theatre. In his memoir he recalled that it brought his first critical praise, in a column by Eleanor Roosevelt, who had come to see it. He returned to the Y many times, including to open its 1955-56 children's series with folk songs.
Source: jta.org
- 1953
Dylan Thomas gives the first reading of Under Milk Wood at the Poetry Center
On May 14, 1953, Dylan Thomas and a cast of actors gave the first reading of his play Under Milk Wood at the Y's Poetry Center, with Thomas reading the First Voice. He was still writing it that day, on the train from Boston, and handed the last lines to the actors as they got ready to go on. He died that November, less than six months later.
Source: Wikipedia
- 1955
Arthur Miller reads from Death of a Salesman at the Y with Mildred Dunnock
Arthur Miller took the stage on February 2, 1955, to read excerpts from Death of a Salesman. Beside him was Mildred Dunnock, who had played Linda Loman in the original Broadway cast. The play had taken both the Pulitzer for Drama and the Best Play Tony back in 1949. A photograph shows the playwright smoking in the Y's greenroom before the reading.
Source: jta.org
- 1960
Nineteen-year-old Joan Baez makes her New York debut at the Y
Joan Baez, just 19 and still on the edge of fame, gave her first New York City concert at the Y in November 1960. Later that month Vanguard released her debut album. Though she was not Jewish, one of its best-known tracks was Donna Donna, an English version of the Yiddish folk song Dos Kelbl, which had been written in the early 1940s.
Source: jta.org
- 1960
Alvin Ailey premieres Revelations
On January 31, 1960, the 29-year-old choreographer Alvin Ailey premiered Revelations at the 92nd Street Y. Set to African American spirituals, the dance traces a journey from slavery to freedom and became his signature work. The Y had presented modern dance, including Martha Graham's, since the late 1930s.
Source: jta.org
- 1964
Truman Capote reads from In Cold Blood at the Y
On December 6, 1964, Truman Capote gave a reading at the Y from In Cold Blood, his account of the 1959 murders of the Clutter family in Kansas. The scene was later recreated in the 2005 film Capote, starring Philip Seymour Hoffman.
Source: jta.org
- 1966
Leonard Cohen gives the first public performance of The Stranger Song at the Y
Leonard Cohen came to the Y to read his poetry on February 14, 1966. During the evening he sang The Stranger Song in public for the first time, a lyrical folk song about a puzzling relationship between two people. Later that year he performed it on Canadian television, in his debut on the CBC.
Source: jta.org
- 1967
Elie Wiesel gives his first reading at the Y and returns for decades
In February 1967 the Holocaust survivor and future Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel made his first appearance at the Y, reading from his 1966 novel The Town Beyond the Wall. He became a regular, lecturing more than 180 times over nearly fifty years on subjects including the Talmud, Hasidism and the Holocaust. The Y keeps those talks in its Elie Wiesel Living Archive.
Source: jta.org
- 1972
The organization rebrands itself the 92nd Street Y
After merging with the Young Women's Hebrew Association in 1945 to form the YM-YWHA and absorbing the Clara de Hirsch Home for Working Girls in the 1960s, the organization adopted the name 92nd Street Y in 1972.
Source: Wikipedia
- 2012
The Y launches GivingTuesday as a reply to Black Friday and Cyber Monday
On November 27, 2012, the Y launched GivingTuesday, an annual day of charitable giving held on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. It was conceived as a counterweight to the Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping rush. The campaign's coordinating nonprofit was housed in the Y's Belfer Center for Innovation and Social Impact until 2019, when it became an independent organization.
Source: jta.org
- 2014
Philip Roth gives his last public reading at the Y
On May 8, 2014, Philip Roth stood on the Y's stage for what turned out to be his final public reading. He read an excerpt from Sabbath's Theater, his 1995 novel that won the National Book Award for Fiction.
Source: jta.org
Further reading
- 92nd Street YWikipedia
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