Life in the 50s
- Manners and appearance are highly important. All women would be wearing skirts, hats, and gloves.
- While researching, most of the information I found was about family life. At first, I found this unhelpful as it wasn’t directly tied to the play, but I realized how important the household was at this time. This puts into context just how awful the boy’s home life is and how imperative Juror 3’s situation with her son is.
- Women at this time were expected to be homemakers and mothers first, while men were the primary breadwinners. If women did have jobs, it would likely be as a secretary, clerks, and in education.
Courtroom/Jury Procedures
- People would dress up for jury duty – this is a very important event.
- Jurors are not allowed to research the law or the case while in jury duty. If they come across outside information, they must tell the court and not mention it to another juror. This is important information, because a lot of my behaviors in this play would be breaking the rules and could make the case a mistrial.
- African Americans were not allowed to serve on juries in New York until 1895, and women weren’t allowed to serve until 1937. Even after the integration of juries, people of color were still severely underrepresented since jury pools were largely pulled from voter registration.
- This document is not from the correct time period, but provided plenty of information about jury duty in New York. thejuryproject.pdf (nycourts.gov)
New York and the El
- This is a map to I used to help me contextualize the layout of the city. The courtroom is in Manhattan, and I believe the boy lived in the Bronx. Map of NYC 5 boroughs & neighborhoods (nycmap360.com)
- This is a map of the el train from 1928. I used this while researching where the train would have passed through and where the boy possibly was. Based on this map and further research, I came to the conclusion that the killing took place in Mott Haven, which is a neighborhood in the South Bronx. Routes of the Interborough Rapid Transit Company. | Library of Congress (loc.gov
- I used this website to visualize the outside of the apartment. The tenement between two elevated train lines | Ephemeral New York (wordpress.com)
- I used this article to visualize what the tenement, and the crime scene, may have looked like. https://www.archives.nyc/blog/2019/5/16/the-early-tenements-of-new-yorkdark-dank-and-dangerous
