The tune, a slow and deliberate
waltz, was devised by Lawlor. He had been singing at Charlie Murphy's Anawanda (Democratic) Club, for a Ladies' Night with a good party. On his walk home, he thought to himself that he sang everyone else's tunes, and he should write one of his own. He couldn't think of anything on his long walk home, but during the night the tune and theme came to him - from the walk itself. The next day, he went downtown to John Golden's hat store, where Blake worked, and hummed the melody for him. The melody was very similar to an 1892 song called "
Daisy Bell (Bicycle Built for Two)" by British composer
Harry Dacre. Blake took a liking to the
3/4 tune, and had Lawlor repeat it several times. "You get the music on paper," he told Lawlor, "and I'll write the words for it." Lawlor returned to the store in about twenty minutes with the musical notes written, and Blake was halfway through the lyrics, having been interrupted by a customer. He finished the words in another half-hour. The tune and words became familiar and well known throughout New York City. It was first made famous by
Lottie Gilson, and it had staying power because the melody was
catchy and easy to sing. The words were a shared vision of Lawlor and Blake, and recall their childhood neighborhoods and those who grew up with them. It was a universal longing for youth, yesteryear, and place, although it was also idealized because both Lawlor and Blake had grown up quite poor. Lawlor said that he envisioned a "big husky policeman leaning against a lamppost and twirling his club, an organ grinder playing nearby, and the east side kids with dirty faces, shoes unlaced, stockings down, torn clothes, dancing to the music, while from a tenement window an old Irish woman with a checkered cap and one of those old time checkered shawls around her shoulders, looking down and smiling at the children." During Smith's 1928 campaign, the urban-centric tune proved symbolic of a campaign that failed to find its footing in America's more rural areas, where
Herbert Hoover was more popular. Until 1996, it also was used as the post parade song for the
Belmont Stakes, the third race in of horse racing's
Triple Crown. Then, the management of the Belmont, trying to appeal to a younger demographic, decided to alter tradition and changed the post parade song to
"New York, New York". As a result, there was speculation that a jinx had fallen over any horse attempting to win the Triple Crown. Although four horses between 1979 and 1996 had already failed to win the Triple Crown after winning the
Kentucky Derby and the
Preakness Stakes, another eight horses failed after the song was changed, seven as competitors, and one,
I'll Have Another, who was scratched the morning of the race because of lameness. It was said that the ghost of Mamie O'Rourke would never let another Triple Crown winner emerge unless and until
The Sidewalks of New York was reinstated as the post parade song for The Belmont Stakes. The alleged curse ended when
American Pharoah won the Triple Crown with his wire-to-wire win at the Belmont Stakes on June 6, 2015.
Max Fleischer and his brother
Dave Fleischer made a
cartoon The Sidewalks of New York with the song in 1925, using the
DeForest Phonofilm sound-on-film process. The Fleischers re-released the song on 5 February 1929 with a new soundtrack in the
RCA Photophone system. Both cartoons used the "
follow the bouncing ball" gimmick. Although the song achieved cultural success shortly after its release, its two authors had sold its copyright to
Howley, Haviland, and Company, and earned only $5,000 for their efforts.
The Sidewalks of New York appeared in a 1954 medley (along with two other 1890s songs, "
Daisy Bell" and "
The Bowery") in a version by
Don Cornell,
Alan Dale, and
Buddy Greco.
Bing Crosby included the song in a medley on his album
On the Sentimental Side (1962). It is also a standard among
barbershop quartets. The durability of the song was demonstrated once again in 2011, on the tenth anniversary of the
terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, when recording artist
Richard Barone and collaborator Matthew Billy wrote additional lyrics to reflect the fallen towers and honor the victims of the attack. While celebrating the perseverance of the city itself, the revised song was released as a single (
The Sidewalks of New York 2011), receiving strong airplay and favorable reviews. ==Lyrics==