Sewage, Sex, and Sickness in the Five Points

This two hour walking tour is a deep dive into the dirty history of the Five Points neighborhood in NYC, once called "the foul core of New York City's slums" and an area of "moral leprosy." In a way, it's also a ghost tour, as we'll be exploring a geography (streets and natural features) erased by development and redevelopment. We will uncover the lives of the people who lived in this area (now Chinatown) from 1800 - 1900, discussing how sewage, sex, and sickness pervaded a neighborhood filled with the "poorest of the poor" until it was razed and rebuilt starting in 1897. This is not a tour for the faint of heart! Your guide for this tour is a graduate of the Sanitation Foundation's Trash Academy and has a Master's of Public Administration from Columbia University. This topic is her passion!