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Harlem in Disorder: A Spatial History of How Racial Violence Changed in 1935

Max Newman assaulted

At 10.30 PM, Max Newman, a thirty-six-year-old white man, was closing his grocer’s store when a group of Black men allegedly attacked him. They beat him around the head, leaving him with cuts and bruises on his forehead. An ambulance was called, and a doctor treated Newman’s injuries at the scene. Newman was one of three white storeowners allegedly attacked by groups of Black men. Joseph Sarnelli was also closing his store, and his assailants tried to steal razors. Herman Young was hit by a rock thrown from a crowd during a period of looting.

Newman appeared only in lists of the injured. Two lists included some details of the circumstances he which he suffered those wounds. The New York Herald Tribune provided the details that he was beaten by a group of eight black men, when the assault occurred and that an ambulance treated. The New York American described a smaller group of five men, and did not mention the timing or the ambulance. The reports in the Home News, New York Evening Journal and New York Post only listed Newman’s injuries. The Home News and New York Evening Journal did include his home address, 3200 Rochambeau Avenue in the Bronx.

Two different locations for the assault were reported. The list published in the New York Herald Tribune reported the store was at 2774 8th Avenue, “near 138th St", but that address was actually near 148th Street not 138th Street. It was too far north to fit the other events of the disorder around that time.  However, the list in the New York American located the store at 2274 8th Avenue, which was near 122nd Street not 138th Street. The business survey identified both addresses as white-owned grocer’s stores. The area around 122nd Street saw windows being broken and violence intensifying around 10:30 PM as groups moved away from 125th Street. The assault fits that context so has been mapped at 2274 8th Avenue.

 

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