The Year of Tony Bennett

It’s funny; sometimes when people who are well-off ask me where I’m from and I say Astoria, they laugh at me because it’s so down compared to the big skyscrapers in Manhattan. That’s really another form of prejudice. But I secretly laugh back at them, because I know that the greatest part of New York City is Astoria, since it’s where the secretaries, the teachers, the writers, the promising actors and actresses and directors live. Before they become famous, many of them start out there—as do the firemen and the policemen; everyone who makes the whole city work. You name it, they run it—and they take great pride in doing things right. And I loved growing up there.

Tony Bennett