Hester Street (Manhattan)

Historically a center for Ashkenazi Jewish immigrant culture, more recently it has been absorbed by Chinatown, although some kosher and Jewish-owned stores remain.

Through her mother she was related to prominent Dutch families of the Hudson Valley, including the Bayards and the Van Cortlandts.

[5] The Franklin Building Association held its second regular monthly meeting at Washington Hall, on December 3, 1851.

[6] On April 15, 1912, an investigator reported that a parlor house on Hester Street had three inmates (prostitutes) who were waiting to entertain customers.

The novel tells the story of a young girl growing up in an immigrant Jewish household in the Lower East Side of New York City in the 1920s.