20 Years Ago in Magazines: Billy Idol, Susan Orlean, David Dinkins

Twenty years ago in the magazines, what was happening? Well, a young rock star named Billy Idol had just had a serious accident and was getting hit on by women like crazy!

And, running on a platform of hope and change, David Dinkins was the mayor of New York City!


In the New Yorker, Nordstrom’s opened in Paramus and Susan Orlean was there.

Cheating back a little to the end of 1989, the special New York magazine issue on downtown is a thing to behold. Downtown was “discovered”!

Someone opened a very expensive cheese shop in the wilds of downtown!

And a rich person moved downtown and all their friends laughed at them.

Downtown, the new Czechoslovakia.