Knickerbocker Village

Join us to learn about the strange beginnings of the Knickerbocker Village housing development, whose fruition began with the bizarre ambitions of an eccentric millionaire and his secret builders’ club where participants swore oaths of silence!

Since the Colonial period of Dutch New Amsterdam, the Lower East Side has seen a variety of homes to meet the needs of its ever-changing immigrant population and the demands of a growing metropolis. From farm estates to row houses, and tenements to housing projects like Knickerbocker Village, we will explore the evolution of housing on the Lower East Side, the tricks of the Roaring Twenties real estate market, and what “affordable” housing meant in the past and today. 

Andrew Fairweather is a librarian at the Seward Park branch on New York's Lower East Side, where he has been working for more than ten years. He enjoys giving lectures on a variety of subjects, from literature, to philosophy, to local history and genealogy.