Lawlor returned to the store in about twenty minutes with the musical notes on paper, and Blake was halfway through the lyrics, having been interrupted by a customer.
Lawlor said that he envisioned a "big husky policeman leaning against a lamppost and twirling his club, an organ grinder playing nearby, and the east side kids with dirty faces, shoes unlaced, stockings down, torn clothes, dancing to the music, while from a tenement window an old Irish woman with a checkered cap and one of those old time checkered shawls around her shoulders, looking down and smiling at the children.
The song became popular right after it was published, and decades later had a huge renaissance when Al Smith used it as his theme during his three failed presidential campaigns in 1920, 1924, and 1928.
[1][3] Over the years, Blake wrote the words to many songs, including some others with Lawlor, such as "Pretty Jenny Slattery", "Every Boy Has Quarreled with His Sweetheart", "The Best in the House is None Too Good for Reilly", "I Did My Drinking When The Drinking Was Good", but none came even close to matching the popularity of "The Sidewalks of New York".
He and Lawlor sold the rights to "The Sidewalks of New York" for $5,000 to the music publishers Howley, Haviland, and Dresser, so they did not get any residuals.
When his story became known, Smith, who had by then retired from politics, arranged for the Emergency Unemployment Relief Committee to provide an apartment for the three Blakes at 407 West 22nd Street, and Max Mayer, who then owned the rights to Sidewalks, arranged for the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers to provide a $25 weekly pension even though Blake had never even been a member of the organization.