It’s always exciting for me to find glimpses of old New York captured on film at unexpected moments and I’ve got a real find to share with you today. The Florenz Ziegfeld produced 1929 musical movie ‘Glorifying The American Girl’ was filmed at the Astoria Studios in Long Island and apparently they decided to do a little location work in the city. One spring day in 1929 (I’ll tell you in a moment how I’m arriving at the date) they took the crew to Grand Central Station to film both an interior scene and a couple of exteriors. The interior unfortunately doesn’t show the big view of the station–it sticks with the track entrances and can be found at 41:56. At 43:20 they move outside to the Vanderbilt Avenue covered entrance for a nice little moment where a woman gets hit by a car. (There’ll always be a New York). At 44:13 we get an all too brief piece of POV traffic which is from a car heading down Vanderbilt Avenue.

Now–here’s where the money shot starts. At 45:08 the car-lady is loaded into an ambulance on a stretcher parked by the entrance. The car pulls out and at 45:35 we cut to a POV through the car window. During this incredible shot we watch as we pull out onto Vanderbilt, take a hard left turn and race through traffic narrowly avoiding a collision with a another car. Forty-second Street is right in front of us. We see a sign that says ‘LINCOLN’ on some scaffolding. This is the Lincoln Building which was under construction at the time this was filmed (it opened in 1930 and still stands). Urged on by a traffic cop we make a scary-hard left and are on Forty-second street with a trolley heading towards us. A boring little scene between the two lovers in the backseat of a different car interrupts things, but at 45:06 we’re back on the road, chasing a cop on a motorcycle and heading for another trolley. On the right you can see a theater marquee. After lots of back-and-forthing trying to get a clear image I finally was able to determine that the movie showing there on that day was ‘Kid Gloves’ starring Conrad Nagel (his name is also on the marquee). This was a part-silent part-talkie movie released on March 23, 1929 (why they were still putting one toe in the water with the sound/silent combo is beyond me). Persistent research has yet to yield the name of the theater, nor was the film advertised in the New York Daily News (a wonderful old tabloid that can be found on the invaluable newspapers.com)–not right away. But an ad for the film does appear in July of that year, playing at a theater in Harlem. This would have been its play-out engagement since, in a perfect example of endemic racism, Harlem didn’t get to see a movie until the white audience was finished with it. So I think we’re safe to say that what we have here is a lovely view of mid-town New York in April/May, 1929. Finally, the shot is facing east and you’ll see what appears to be a bridge a few blocks away. That’s the old Third Avenue Elevated Train, with its incredible encased twin stair entrances in perfect view. And that’s all they filmed…