Sugar Hill is a neighborhood in the northern part of Hamilton Heights, which itself is a sub-neighborhood of Harlem, a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan. The neighborhood is defined by 155th Street to the north, 145th Street to the south, Edgecombe Avenue to the east, and Amsterdam Avenue to the west.The name originated in the 1920s, when the area became a popular place to live for wealthy African Americans.
Named to identify the “sweet life” in Harlem, it was a popular residential area of rowhouses for wealthy African Americans during the Harlem Renaissance, including W. E. B. Du Bois, Thurgood Marshall, Adam Clayton Powell Jr., and Duke Ellington. Langston Hughes wrote about its relative affluence in relation to Harlem in his essay “Down and Under in Harlem” published in The New Republic in 1944.
Sugar Hill was made a municipal historic district by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission in 2000. It is also a National Registered Historic Place.
Rap group The Sugarhill Gang and rap record label Sugar Hill Records pay homage to the neighborhood in their names.
Sugar Hill is mentioned in the lyrics to the jazz standard “Take the A Train” by Billy Strayhorn. It is also referred to by rapper AZ’s “Sugar Hill” on his album Doe or Die.
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sugar hill is a place that should be given more do then it gets will you let all this history to just not not be honered..
Eric,
You are on point and we have to do a better job of doing that.
HW
I LOVE HARLEM GREW UP THEIR MY FAMILY IS THEIR
It’s actually called Sugar Hill East!!! I lived there for quite some time.. There were a lot of Changes within the last 8 years.. for example.. anytime you can walk into the Liquor Stores between 145 and 150th… those Plastic Front’s were removed and replaced by open spaces and even water servers for Dogs…. The heavy stuff was replaced by Exotic Wines and such.. and the Lotto Machine was gone…. however, Brands is still Open with the exoctic wines and such with the Lotto Machine on 145th and Broadway!!!!!! 1 block down from the Park! The Pathmark is extremely expensive and the best deals are caught at Met Supermarket’s. Just make sure you keep an eye on the dates on Your food… otherwise, extremely LouD and Noisey!