Visiting New York City anytime soon? Are you looking for an Authentic New York Experience – a place that embodies the Big Apple Dream? You know, the dream where you overcome your modest roots to achieve wild success and travel the world, only to go on a real estate search for a starter home that would, due to the neighborhood’s charms, become your forever home with the love of your life?
Then take the 7 train to the 103rd street stop in Corona, Queens and visit the Louis Armstrong Museum where Pops and his wife Lucille set up house and stayed put. It’s got the make-yourself-at-home feeling of Graceland with just the right amount of Liberace glam to remind you that, even though you’re in one of the most humble of celebrity homes, Pops and Lucille knew how to live large without going too over the top.
The lovely Japanese garden at the Louis Armstrong Museum.
My friend tipped me off to this place a couple of years ago, and I’ve been dying to go ever since she told me the address was in Queens and not some fussy Uptown nabe. Why did he end up in Queens? Please skip Google and take the tour to find out, and be glad that he did. It’s easy to get there, and though the neighborhood’s surely changed since Pops’ time, I think he’d be thrilled to know that there are about a million places to get rice and beans on the walk from the subway to his house. What’s his house like? Here’s how Satchmo summed it up in a letter he wrote about his neighborhood:
“After all, we have a very lovely home. The house may not be the nicest looking [out] front. But when one visits the interior of the Armstrong home, they see a whole lot of comfort, happiness, and the nicest things.”
Pops working in his den (scan of a postcard at the museum)
To see the house you’ll have to take a guided tour that leaves at the top of the hour. Before my visit I knew the Louis Armstrong basics: he was a jazz genius who grew up dirt poor in New Orleans—my Dad saw him live once and confirmed he was one of the greatest entertainers who ever lived—and based on pictures and interviews I’ve seen of him, I also thought he was a pretty wonderful person who had a big heart.
The tour confirms all of this, and more. During the tour I learned more about the man than his music, which is probably why, after the tour, I felt like he was a favorite uncle whose door was always open to me.
What brought him to life?
His letters! He wrote tons of letters – happy, chatty ones in a loopy script that were filled with hot-shit puns, good cheer, and whatever thoughts crossed his mind. He was a guy who soaked up experiences like a sponge and was just as eager to share them with anyone who wrote him.
His bathroom! It’s a sight to see, and all I’ll say is Liberace would have felt right at home if he needed to use the facilities.
That voice! The tour is punctuated with a lot of fun recording snippets of him just talking about stuff. I loved hearing him say he dug the Beatles, give a mini art history lesson, and excitedly talk about his den – a true place of his own where he could practice, practice, practice his art and archive his recordings.
Far-out fabulous: the basement steps.
Behind every man is a good woman, and behind Louis’ good woman is silver-glitzy, jazzed out wallpaper. Basement stairs decked out in leopard carpet. And a baby blue Electrolux vacuum cleaner. You have Lucille Armstrong to thank for making such a fabulous, memorable home.
While I never met Lucille Armstrong, I grew up with one of her kindred spirits: my Mom. The more I walked through the rooms of the Armstrong house, the more I felt freakishly at home. You see, my mom’s an interior designer, and has spent countless hours selecting just the right wallpaper for some of the finest houses in Massachusetts, not to mention the one I grew up in. She also is a clean freak, and one look at that Electrolux and the checked hose that you had to COIL AND NOT FOLD SO IT WON’T SNAP sitting sweetly in the upstairs closet of the Armstrong home rocketed me back to my ‘70s childhood in a way I wasn’t expecting. I know my mom would LOVE the kitchen, too, with its lacquered blue cabinets and disco ball teakettle.
My Mom also had something in common with Pops: they both loved Cadillacs. Even though we didn’t have a garage, I know Pops speaks for my Mom in his description of what it was like to drive around his neighborhood in his dream car:
“The kids in our block just thrill when they see our garage gate up and our fine Cadillac ooze on out. They just rejoice and say, Hi Louis and Lucille, your car is so beautiful coming out of that raise up gate. Which knocks me out.”
The Cadillac’s not there these days, but its spirit, as well as the love and warmth of its previous owners, live on in their lovely home in Corona, Queens.