Spaniard Spaniards, or Spanish people, are a Romance ethnic group native to Spain. Within Spain, there are a number of national and regional ethnic identities that reflect the country's complex history, including a number of different languages, both i ...

s in New York City originally settled in Little Spain,( es, Pequeña España) a Spanish-American neighborhood in the

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

borough A borough is an administrative division in various English-speaking countries. In principle, the term ''borough'' designates a self-governing walled town, although in practice, official use of the term varies widely. History In the Middle A ...

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

, during the 20th century.

History

"Little Spain" was situated on 14th Street, between

Seventh Seventh is the ordinal form of the number seven. Seventh may refer to: * Seventh Amendment to the United States Constitution * A fraction (mathematics), , equal to one of seven equal parts Film and television *"The Seventh", a second-season e ...

and Eighth Avenues. A very different section of

Chelsea Chelsea or Chelsey may refer to: Places Australia * Chelsea, Victoria Canada * Chelsea, Nova Scotia * Chelsea, Quebec United Kingdom * Chelsea, London, an area of London, bounded to the south by the River Thames ** Chelsea (UK Parliament consti ...

existed on a stretch of 14th Street often referred to by residents as ''Calle Catorce'' ("Street Fourteen") or as "Little Spain". The Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe (No. 229) was founded in 1902, when Spaniards started to settle in the area. Although the Spanish business have given way to such nightclubs as Nell's and Oh Johnny on the block between Seventh and Eighth Avenues, the Spanish food and gift emporium known as Casa Moneo has been at 210 West 14th since 1929. In 2010 the documentary ''Little Spain'', directed and written by Artur Balder, was filmed in New York City. The documentary pulled together for first time an archive that reveals the untold history of the Spanish-American presence in Manhattan. They present the history of the streets of Little Spain in New York City throughout the 20th Century. The archive contains more than 450 photographs and 150 documents that have never been publicly displayed. Other important commerces and Spanish business of Little Spain were restaurants like La Bilbaína, Trocadero Valencia, Bar Coruña, Little Spain Bar, Café Madrid, Mesón Flamenco, or El Faro Restaurant. The Iberia was a famous Spanish dress shop. The heart of the

Spanish American Spanish Americans ( es, españoles estadounidenses, ''hispanoestadounidenses'', or ''hispanonorteamericanos'') are Americans whose ancestry originates wholly or partly from Spain. They are the longest-established European American group in th ...

community in that area were the two landmarks: the Spanish Benevolent Society and the Roman Catholic Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe, founded at the turn of the 19th century, being the first parish in

with mass in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

and

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

. Just like with other immigrant neighborhoods of Manhattan, such as

Little Italy Little Italy is a general name for an ethnic enclave populated primarily by Italians or people of Italian ancestry, usually in an urban neighborhood. The concept of "Little Italy" holds many different aspects of the Italian culture. There are ...

, Little Spain celebrated a feast day; that of St. James. It was held in June, and was held until the mid-1990s. During this festival, the saint's image was the symbol of the feeling of the Spanish community and paraded down the street 14, which was cut to traffic for a week. In this time, food festivals were taking place shows of typical Spanish folklore. Virginia Admiral and her son, Robert Anthony De Niro Jr., moved to a top floor studio at the 219 West 14th Street, owned by the Galician entrepreneur José García. According to investigations, Robert De Niro was living during the 1950s at the heart of Little Spain after the divorce of his parents.

References

External links

*
La Vanguardia.

Official Web Presence of the Spanish Benevolent Society.
{{coord, 40, 44, 21, N, 74, 0, 4, W, region:US-NY, display=title Neighborhoods in Manhattan Former New York City neighborhoods Spanish-American culture in New York City Spanish communities in the United States West Village