The Civil War churns on. The mysteries of “whaleing” are discussed. Josephine Baker opens at Carnegie Hall. George Washington sits for his portrait, a police detective checks in on a dispute over one dollar, and planes fly into the World Trade Center. The writers of Mad magazine are kept bitter and irreverent by their low pay, and an 1859 visitor to Central Park speculates that the place will be “lovely in A.D. 1900, when its trees will have acquired dignity and appreciable diameters.”

The history of New York emerges in excerpts from diaries in "New York Diaries: 1609 to 2009," a collection researched and edited by Teresa Carpenter. Searching through archives for everyday diaries as well as the published journals of the famous and semi-famous, Carpenter organizes her book by day rather than by year, beginning on January 1 and finishing on December 31, each day containing a range of different years. This helps her create a portrait of the city by chronological collage, rather than a timeline account of inevitable progress.

The most fascinating entries provide less of a synopses of current events, more the simple documentation of a day. One of the more famous diarists from the book, Mark Twain, chronicles a day he spent visiting the Russian Baths after getting over a cold. With characteristic caustic wit, he leaves us with a clear image of the time and a treasure of a location in New York.