In his new book, Jonathan Ezra Goldman offers a panoramic view of New York City in the 1920s, unearthing stories of everyday life at the margins. Looking at entertainment, politics, art, technology, crime, shopping, eating, and recreation, the book portrays sweeping events like the Harlem Renaissance and Prohibition through individual experiences which counter the era's popular conception of ballooning wealth and uproarious celebration. Hidden Histories takes readers to an all-female police platoon, a Black amusement park shut down before it opened, an Arabic literary salon, socialist Puerto Rican cigar factories, Chinatown funerals, lesbian cafes, overcrowded jails, toxic dumps, and Ku Klux Klan recruitment offices, along the way uncovering little-known anecdotes about well-known figures such as Marcus Garvey, Dorothy Parker, and Babe Ruth. Goldman spotlights the challenges and triumphs of a city beset by crowds, automobile traffic, and rapidly changing technology and urban infrastructure, as well as Jim Crow practices, exploding anti-immigrant sentiment, and the violent treatment of political dissent.

Shirley J. Yee, Professor Emerita at the University of Washington, Seattle, joins in conversation.