ABSTRACT
T hough SoHo in its prime as an artists’ colony did notattract political radicals, the industrial slum that preceded SoHo was a no-man’s-land briefly providing refuge to the Students for a Democratic Society. As Steve Tappis remembers it, “In the late spring of 1968, right after the student strike at Columbia University, New York Regional SDS was evicted from its offices on Union Square West. After a few weeks in a new office we were again evicted. We found out that the FBI and the New York City Red Squad pressured the landlords to get rid of us. It seemed impossible to find a new office.
