By Michael Hirsch About 25 years ago, I became a resident of the Upper East Side of Manhattan. I had moved to New York City while attending Pratt Institute, and after stops in Brooklyn, Greenwich Village, and the Upper West Side relocated to my current home. The neighborhood’s name came with the development of Central Park in 1850, which formed its western boundary. The East River, 59th Street, and 96th Street are the neighborhood’s other borders. In the late 1870’s, the elevated subways on Second and Third Avenue brought explosive growth to the area, resulting in many low-rent tenement buildings.