Live Taping: Person Place Thing
Woolworth Chapel, Woodlawn Cemetery, Jerome Avenue Entrance.
Saturday, November 1, 2025 3:00 PM
Person Place Thing, Live Taping Featuring Woodlawn's Adrian Untermyer
Saturday, November 1, 2025, 3:00 PM
Woolworth Chapel
From placing a piano in the Port Authority Bus Terminal to fighting for the Astor Place Cube’s ability to freely spin, attorney and Woodlawn Conservancy Vice-Chair Adrian Untermyer wears many hats — including as guardian of the legacy of his great-great-grandfather, Woodlawn “resident,” and notable Westchester gardener Samuel Untermyer. We’ll cover it all in a special live recording of the public radio show and podcast series Person Place Thing hosted by Randy Cohen, who formerly served as The New York Times’ Ethics columnist. Untermyer will also serve as musical guest for this episode, performing on his bright red electric piano within Woodlawn’s historic Woolworth Chapel.
About Adrian Untermyer -- Adrian Untermyer is an attorney, urbanist, and historian who fights for stronger cities and communities. Untermyer is also creator and host of Wrecking Ball, a podcast series covering historic preservation, the law, and the great City and State of New York.
Untermyer currently serves as Chief of Staff for a major passenger railroad and previously served as Deputy Director of the Historic Districts Council, a preservation group that fights to save buildings and neighborhoods across New York City. He is a frequent panelist and commentator on planning, preservation, and transportation issues impacting New York and the nation and his writing has appeared in The New York Times, Gotham Gazette, and the Transportation Law Journal.
In 2016, Untermyer was featured in The New York Times for his successful plan to improve the Port Authority Bus Terminal by creating a performing arts center inside. Untermyer has also given lectures and tours for groups ranging from the National Park Service to the New York Adventure Club, and worked on the management team of the Urban Justice Center, an antipoverty legal services group.
Untermyer currently serves as Vice-Chair and Treasurer of the Woodlawn Cemetery Conservancy, Vice-Chair of the New York Preservation Archive Project, and Trustee of the Historical Society of the New York Courts. He is also an accomplished keyboard player who has appeared in Europe, Canada, and the Caribbean.
About Randy Cohen -- Randy Cohen’s first professional work was writing humor pieces, essays, and stories for newspapers and magazines (The New Yorker, Harpers, the Atlantic, Young Love Comics). His first television work was writing for "Late Night With David Letterman" for which he won three Emmy awards. His fourth Emmy was for his work on Michael Moore’s "TV Nation." He received a fifth Emmy as a result of a clerical error, and he kept it. For twelve years he wrote "The Ethicist," a weekly column for the New York Times Magazine. He is currently the creator and host of Person Place Thing, a public radio program.
Person Place Thing is an interview show based on the idea that people are especially engaging when they speak, not directly about themselves, but something they care about. Guests talk about one person, one place, and one thing with particular meaning to them.
