Unique NY: Vy Higginsen's Guide to New York - 10 issues, 1975-1978

HIGGINSEN, Vy, edited by

Published by Unique Magazines, Inc, New York, 1978

Periodical. Ten issues: September '75, Volume 2, Issues 1-2 and 9-10; Volume 3, Issues 3 and 11; Volume 4, Issues 2 and 3; and Volume 5, Issue 6. Narrow tall octavos and small quartos. 48 pages each, save for the special "Restaurant Issue," which runs to 60 pages. Heavily illustrated from photographs. Stapled wrappers. Seven issues with the mailing label of contributing photographer Vance Allen on the front cover. (Allen is pictured in a charming staff photograph in Volume Three, Issue 11.) A very good set: wrappers with modest general wear and soil, "Winter Sport" issue with ringmarks on the cover, one issue with a tiny inked note inside, and one with some dampstaining along the bottom edges and a small chip and tear. A nice collection of a rare city guide celebrating Black life and culture in 1970s New York. First published in November 1974, *Vy Higginsen's Guide* billed itself as the place to find information on the city's discos, concerts, theater, shopping, restaurants, and music, as well as a publisher's note from Higginsen for each issue. The magazine certainly did that, and expanded into art and books, fashion, business, New York's Latin and Caribbean communities, snapshots from local events, interior design, and the city's Black history. Two of the magazine's major highlights are the dozens of profiles of Black New York professionals across a variety of fields, as well as profiles of Black-owned New York City restaurants and small businesses. Higginsen is a well-known New Yorker with an impressive career in print and broadcast media, as well as the theater. (We borrowed the banner sentence from a New York Public Library blog post celebrating Higginsen, by librarian A. J. Muhammad.) She worked at *Ebony* and *Essence*, and was one of the first women to have a primetime radio show, at WLIB in the 1970s. Among her many other ventures and accomplishments, she co-wrote with her husband the musical *Mama, I Want to Sing*-the story of her sister, Doris Troy (of "Just One Look" fame)-which has toured extensively both at home abroad, and been restaged many times, recently for its 40th anniversary at the theater in which it premiered. Issues of Higginsen's guide to New York are surprisingly uncommon. *OCLC* locates a collection at the Schomburg Center and a single, generic entry. A nice collection of a rare magazine and city guide that served as a prominent New York woman's love letter to life there in the 1970s. Seller Inventory # 623303

Bibliographic Details

Title: Unique NY: Vy Higginsen's Guide to New York ...
Publisher: Unique Magazines, Inc, New York
Publication Date: 1978
Binding: Softcover
Condition: Very Good
Edition: First Edition.