Diamond Street: The Story of the Little Town With the Big Red Light District

I am waiting for a great director such as Bob Altman to buy the rights for the film. I happened upon this gem researching our genealogy. No! Our ancestors were not in the Hudson NY sex scandal. Our ancestor was a founding father of New Rochelle. As the family grew many moved along the Hudson.In November of '06 Mr Robert Altman, the great director, passed away. G-d bless him for all the wonderful entertainment he created for us.Would someone ask Robert DeNiro or Sophia Coppula to make this film?

This was part of my families stories. Yes they were in on it.

I love Hudson, NY and the book shows Hudson in its glory. When Diamond St. flourished, so did the economy of Hudson because the Ladies always paid cash and kept the downtown businesses alive. As a young woman I was stunned when I realized how far and wide Hudson was known.

I liked it. Very interesting information about a very old town, Hudson NY. Intriguing. I would recommend it or pass it on.

Interesting, you have to be from Hudson and be born at least prior to 1960 to appreciate it.

This is not an easy book to read and review—not, mind you, because the prose is particularly troublesome, but rather because we just moved here (from Brooklyn), and I’ve now read about this city’s past. Yes, DIAMOND STREET is a kind of biography—but of a city, viz., Hudson, New York. Diamond Street itself is the former name of present-day Columbia Street, which runs parallel and just three blocks north of the street we now live on. It was originally named not after any claim to the jewelry trade, but rather as a tribute to Hudson’s biggest gangster at the time, “Legs” Diamond. Reading DIAMOND STREET a month after arriving here and setting up shop is tantamount to falling in love and proposing marriage, then finding out that your bride-to-be has slept with nearly everyone in town … for a fee. Hudson is as pretty, architecturally speaking, as any town or city I’ve ever lived in or even just visited. But like most things ornamental, you have to look beneath the surface to discover the real substance (or lack thereof). I will say this much before I turn my review over to direct quotes from the author … Hudson (and specifically, Promenade Hill Park) is home to one of the most beautiful pieces of sculpture I’ve ever laid eyes on: St. Winifred, by George E. Bissell. That piece, standing high and overlooking the Hudson River, has elicited from me a daily ritual of only minor accord: a hike down from home and a respectful visit. When I find other people sitting in the park (rather seldom), my ritual requires me to suggest to them that they, too, pay their respects to St. Winifred if they haven’t already. Such a practice has likely garnered me a reputation as a somewhat loony old white man (as the park is situated right next to some predominantly black housing projects), but that’s fine. For those few who are then curious enough to investigate for themselves, I suspect my suggestion does not seem outlandish. In any case, now to some quotes, most of which will give you just a taste of what’s in store (or at least in print!) in DIAMOND STREET. On p. 59, we find “Hudson remained a criminal’s playground, partially because the constables couldn’t stop them, and partially because the streets were so dark, no one could see them anyway.” For another aspect of dear domestic Hudson, we find this on p. 128: “(o)ne afternoon, when groping around in a dark bedroom for his toolbox, he found something other than his wire cutters. He had stumbled upon his sleeping beauty, and she just happened to be in the mood to offer free samples. All that vocational training had paid off after all.” Perhaps it would help to provide some context here, as these citations are not meant to suggest a current date. On p. 166, we read: “(j)une 23, 1950, and the big story in the local papers is the upcoming Soap Box Derby. Young Craig Thorn has been chosen to organize the race down the hill on upper Columbia Street by the hospital, and local merchants are busily sponsoring area youngsters in the construction of their cars. Out near Chicago, over 50 people have been killed in the nation’s worst airline disaster ever. The ultra-modern New Jersey Turnpike is nearing completion, and the start of the Korean War is two short days away—an editorial in the Daily Star has called for bomb shelters to be built in the city’s schools, with atomic-proof buildings to be erected later. But all this seems distant as the weekend gets under way.” And finally this, on p. 185: “Hudson is a small town where everyone knows everyone else. The mayor went to school with the cop who married the sister of the lawyer whose wife is the accountant to the businessman. It is a place full of Mom and Pop stores, even if those stores happened to be a whore house and a floating crap game. As in any other small town, the people have grown up accommodating one another, looking after each other’s children, helping with household chores, and keeping the state troopers from raiding the neighborhood house of ill fame.” What more is there to say about Hudson, New York—other, that is, than to conjure up those famous few words from The Wizard of Oz: “There’s no place like home … There’s no place like home.”RRBHudson, NY24 May 2020

I grew up in Hudson, but the Red Light District was way before my time. Still, I knew some things about that era through conversations in the family. There was even talk that one of my uncles had met his wife there. Hmmm. The book was fun to read and the pictures enjoyable.

I grew up in Hudson and never realized the many faces the little city had. Even my parents never told me everything was was to know about this naughty little red light district.Being a writer myself, Hudson had inspired me to write several short stories that took place in its contiguous towns and districts. Finally, my first novel of horror, Spook Rock, inspired by a place where we once swam, fished, picnicked, and just plain had a wonderful time, takes place in Hudson and once again its surrounding little towns where I once lived.Who said history can't be fun?