The Ed Koch I Remember
I always wanted to have Chinese food with Mayor Koch. Not the fancy, red carpeted, multi-starred uptown Moo-goo-gai-pen kind. The downtown, “friends in low places,” real thing—Chinatown. Koch picks the...
View ArticleRemembering Eugenia Sheppard
“What a relief to write, at last, that a fashion collection is frankly, definitely and completely hideous.” Bold words of power. The author: Eugenia Sheppard, society/fashion columnist with clout,...
View ArticleA Happy Valentine’s Birthday to Mayor Bloomberg
“And because no matter who you are, if you believe in yourself and your dream, New York will always be the place for you.” So true, Michael Bloomberg, and Happy Valentine’s/Birthday to you. Cupid drew...
View ArticleSix Degrees of Roy Cohn
On a perfect New York day, a 12-year-old girl running in jodhpurs and riding boots was hailing a cab on Park Avenue and 92nd Street. As the cab swerved toward her at an “I’m yours” angle, a man in a...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Le Club’s Kennedy Grade Fame
On a way-too-cold November night, Le Club, an intimate, often-wild, ultra-private club in the East Fifties in Manhattan was “it” for way more than 15 minutes. Way more. That’s what happens when Jackie...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Old (Equestrian) New York & Love of Claremont
“Claremont was a treasure, a very special element of New York City life. Its loss is still felt in many, many New York hearts,” muses Claremont Riding Academy’s erstwhile owner, Paul Novograd. Culpa...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: The Once Expensable 3 Martini Lunch
Jackie Kennedy said it: “I don’t think that there are any men who are faithful to their wives.” Enter the three-martini lunch and the birth of the “Master of the Universe,” who may have slurred his way...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Bloomberg Proposes No Smoke, No Mirrors
“God likes to watch. He’s a prankster. Think about it. He gives man instincts. He gives you this extraordinary gift, and then what does He do? I swear for His own amusement, His own private, cosmic gag...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: The Debutante, The Straw & Studio 54
“Look, there’s a debutante doing cocaine,” said the quasi-awestruck woman who had made it past the ropes and into the inner sanctions of Studio 54 somehow. Definitely a first this one. The famous...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: “There’s no Elaine’s without Elaine”
The first time I met Elaine she scared the sh*t out of me, and I don’t scare easily. I’m a New Yorker, after all. The culture at Elaine’s jumpstarted the Studio 54 mentality: Can you get a good table...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: The Golden Age of Sotheby Parke Bernet
“Vice-President Rockefeller is here and would like to look at our porcelain collection,” the receptionist on the other end of the line whispered, thrilled. I swallowed a panic attack. Then choked on...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Baryshnikov Arrives
“When Misha was in Russia, he had to leave everything behind; absolutely everything, including a white poodle that he loved. When he was ready, we bought him a black poodle, named La Goalie,” said Remi...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Who’s the Boss?
New Yorkers have been trained never to gawk, trip, or (heaven forbid!) photograph celebrities. If you are witness to this kind of behavior, scowl at the culprit. They are obviously not one of us. I was...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Society’s Child in Disguise
On a Saturday night in New York, I am walking outside a movie house on Lexington Avenue with two friends. Wendy is one. She is tall, New York schooled (Chapin) and in Town & Country and W as often...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: My Coney Island Daddy
“Daddy, come back,” my little sister demanded, as the last of my father’s ashes splattered into the Coney Island waters. Fishermen at the end of the pier caught on to where my father was headed, and...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: New York School Daze
“The only, and I repeat, only “A” in this class goes to a new girl who came from a school where they didn’t even speak English,” bellowed a white-bunned, aristocratic looking woman from behind a desk...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Mother’s Little Hamptons Helpers
My friend Roxanne was the quintessential East Hampton mother’s helper: She watched over her “summer children,” cooked, did as little spot cleaning as possible, and digested criticism as best as she...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Marrying on the Up and Up
“It’s as easy to fall in love with a rich man as a poor man,” insisted my grandmother, as if excavating a fool proof philosophy she’d once patented. Patent or not, she lived her mantra. Then she...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Once Upon a Date
My mother and her best friend agreed: They got married so they’d have dates on New Year’s Eve for decades to come. One New Year’s Eve, when my friend Roxanne and I did not have dates, we went to a...
View ArticleVintage Gossip: Seduced by Polo
What do you give the woman who has everything? The Argentine polo player, of course: the trophy must-have from the pricey fields of Bridgehampton to Palm Beach. Let the games begin. There’s an adage in...
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