Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of the Avid Reader. Today our guest is Fran Leadon, author of Broadway: A History of New York City in 13 Miles published in April by Norton.

Mr. Leadon is an Associate Professor at City College and worked with Norval White and Eliott Willensky in publishing the AIA Guide to New York City, Fifth Edition (Oxford University Press, 2010)

And he is from my home town of Gainesville Florida.

Broadway is not just a street or an Avenue or a Boulevard. It is Broadway with a capital everything. The great White Way, Times Square, Union Square, The Woolworth Building, the Flatiron, the Ansonia. It is a street that defines a city. And what Mr. Leadon has done here is to encapsulate that street in its thirteen miles into the history of a place, a place that everyone in America and most people around the globe can identify with. Through copious research and a map of each mile to keep you centered, the book transports you in time and place and gives you an intimate picture of times forgotten and remembered, buildings that burnt down and were replaced and buildings that weren’t. After you read this book you will have a new understanding of this great city, a city that in good portion defines America.