Food For Struggling Actors
Courtesy of The New York Public Library
Here’s a Great Depression era story that feels like it comes from the pen of a contemporary New York Times reporter. I found in a folder of the America Eats sources in the New York City Municipal Archives in lower Manhattan some 10 years ago. It’s about food in a New York City hostel and a good fit for our series eating while poor. Hostels are inexpensive dorm like housing for typically younger and less well off travelers that exist around the world. In the basement of a church off Times Square is a hostel for needy actors that serves meals at modest prices. There are also restaurants dealing in foods for pennies near it. At least one eatery sold meals for pennies such as a bowel of hot oatmeal for four cents. I recall some similar eating experiences while in graduate school and renting an apartment in Guatemala City. In route to the archives I sometimes purchased bags of fresh cut up fruit from a street vendor then and a freshly made warm cinnamon and raisin bun with icing from the restaurant/bakery Rey Sol that was big enough to work as breakfast and a midmorning snack. What’s your most memorable hostel like meal?
