As I began to reflect on my old Harlem Neighborhood in Sugar Hill, I started doing research for a nonfiction historical account of its growth over the centuries. After seeing both the theatrical play and the screen version of “Hamilton” it brought up memories of growing up as a teen in Hamilton Heights. The two neighborhoods overlap and intersect.
I started gathering my thoughts, making some notes, writing a few drafts, researching grants and publishers…all with the end goal that I became inspired to write a historical nonfiction book about the beautiful Hamilton Heights AND Sugar Hill Neighborhood I called home as a young woman many decades ago.
I am very proud that the book will be out in fall 2023 as part of Fordham University Press’s “Empire State” imprint. Starting, of course, with the Dutch arrival on the island of Mannahata and the land of the Lenape people in the early 1600’s, to the Harlem land divisions in the early 1700’s, then George Washington camped out in 1776 a very short distance from my old apartment, and then Alexander Hamilton building The Grange, the only home he ever owned, in 1802. I hope to do justice to the history of this lovely neighborhood. Fingers crossed.