Return to Leading Tours

I am very happy to be leading tours in New York City again. My first back was September 24, where I led my Secrets of Scott and Fitzgerald Tour from Times Square to Central Park. My upcoming tour is brand new, and one that is quite unique. In partnership with the Woodlawn Cemetery and Conservancy, I am now leading my newest: Dorothy Parker and the Talk of the Town New Yorkers Tour. The next one Continue Reading →

RIP Commodore Hotel aka Grand Hyatt

My friends of the Guides Association of New York City, of which I’m a proud member, tipped me off to the news today that the Grand Hyatt Hotel is going to be razed. This is sad because 2019 is the centennial of the hotel’s opening. I was immediately reminded of the hotel because it’s an entry in my 2005 book A Journey into Dorothy Parker’s New York (Roaring Forties Press). I wrote a chapter about Continue Reading →

Dorothy Parker Birthday in 2 Boroughs

I added a blog post on my site dorothyparker.com about the celebration on Wednesday, Aug. 22, for the 125th anniversary of Dorothy Parker’s birthday. She was born Dorothy Rothschild on Aug. 22, 1893, in Long Branch New Jersey. I’m leading a walking tour, and then heading right over to Brooklyn to the New York Distilling Company for the big party. The Shanty will be the spot to be in NYC that night! Read about the Continue Reading →

Cocktail Book Talk on a Rooftop

Last night I got the opportunity to do something I’ve not done in a couple of years. I didn’t know how much I missed it until I actually was doing it. This was a quick book talk about Under the Table: A Dorothy Parker Cocktail Guide, which was my third book and was published five years ago. Our financial planner, Steve Gross of Ameriprise, hosted a really nice cocktail party on the rooftop lounge of Continue Reading →

Tours of Algonquin Round Table, Dorothy Parker Homes

The first public walking tours of 2018 will be in January and February. The walks are led by Kevin C. Fitzpatrick, author of The Algonquin Round Table New York and A Journey into Dorothy Parker’s New York. Algonquin Round Table Tour Mondays, meet at the Algonquin Hotel 10:45, walks begin at 11:00. 29 January 5 February 12 February 26 February Advance tickets required, click here to book. Dorothy Parker’s Upper West Side Wednesdays, meet at Continue Reading →

Dorothy Parker Reviews the Ziegfeld Follies

On Saturday I debuted my W.C. Fields History Walking Tour as part of Fields Fest, a 6-week celebration of the life of the great comedian. Dorothy Parker was a huge fan of Fields. In my book The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide, I was really happy to be able to include a photo of Parker and Fields together. One of the parts of the tour I wanted to do, but didn’t for Continue Reading →

Goldwin Starrett and the Influenza Pandemic of 1918

All of my book research is starting to cross over, and I am reminded of this today because it is the ninty-eighth anniversary of the death of Goldwin Starrett, the young architect of the Algonquin Hotel, in 1918. It was only this month that I started really reading a lot more about the influenza pandemic of 1918-1919, a global disaster that killed 21.5 million worldwide, with 675,000 deaths in the United States. I’m currently writing Continue Reading →

As Curtain Closes on Ziegfeld, Remember Dorothy Parker and the Ink She Spilled

The Ziegfeld name is back in the news in New York. It is for a small item—that is only important to a few people—the few souls who like going to a movie theater in a cavernous space of more than 1,000 seats. Newspapers and bloggers in New York are probably writing about the Ziegfeld name for one of the last times, and that is sad. It is because the movie theater that was built in Continue Reading →

F.P.A. on New Year’s Day 1922

Dorothy Parker gave this signed photo to her friend and mentor F.P.A. and his family. Photo courtesy of Anthony Adams. Heywood Broun and Ruth Hale had one of their famous New Year’s Eve parties to close out 1921. They lived in a brownstone at 330 West 85th Street, a townhouse that Broun had won the mortgage at a poker game. He later lost the apartment the same way. That night was one of their most Continue Reading →

Dec. 12 Signing at Princeton Club of New York

I’m happy to announce I will be signing and selling copies of all 5 of my books: A Journey into Dorothy Parker’s New York, The Lost Algonquin Round Table: Humor, Fiction, Journalism, Criticism and Poetry From America’s Most Famous Literary Circle, Under the Table: A Dorothy Parker Cocktail Guide, Dorothy Parker Complete Broadway, 1918-1923, The Algonquin Round Table New York: A Historical Guide. Do your holiday shopping in one place. Come to the Princeton Club Continue Reading →