Explore the real-world places that appear in Jailbird by Kurt Vonnegut. Each location on the map shows what happens there in the novel, the real history of the place, and what's there today. Featured locations include Grand Central Terminal, Empire State Building, Union Square, Cooper Union Great Hall, Harvard Yard and 7 more.
42nd Street & Park Avenue — Starbuck arrives in Manhattan
Walter F. Starbuck, freshly released from the minimum-security prison after his Watergate-related conviction, comes into New York City to start over. He is an aging, bewildered ex-convict returning to a city he knew in earlier decades, and the bustling hub frames his first day of freedom. From here he begins the encounters with people from his past that drive the memoir.
The current Beaux-Arts terminal opened in 1913, replacing earlier stations built by Cornelius Vanderbilt's railroad interests. It was saved from demolition in the 1970s after a campaign supported by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and the 1978 Supreme Court decision in Penn Central v. New York City.
Grand Central is a working commuter rail hub and major tourist attraction, known for its celestial ceiling in the Main Concourse, the Oyster Bar, and the Vanderbilt Hall events space. It is open to the public daily.
Visit: Grand Central Terminal (landmark)
350 Fifth Avenue — Starbuck's job and the RAMJAC corporate world
In the world of the novel, Starbuck is pulled into the orbit of the vast RAMJAC Corporation, a conglomerate that owns nearly everything, and Manhattan's skyscraper landscape stands for that power. Starbuck is a gentle, ineffectual figure who has been repeatedly swept up by the rich and powerful, from the Nixon White House to the corporate suites of New York. The towers of Midtown embody the money culture that shaped and eventually jailed him.
The Empire State Building was completed in 1931 in just over a year, designed by Shreve, Lamb & Harmon. It was the world's tallest building until the World Trade Center's North Tower topped it in 1970.
The building is a major tourist attraction with observation decks on the 86th and 102nd floors. It is also a working office tower and a National Historic Landmark.
Visit: Empire State Building Observatory (landmark)
14th Street & Broadway — Radical rallies and labor memory
Union Square is the historic gathering place of New York's radicals and labor agitators, the world that Starbuck's old friend Kenneth Whistler and his beloved Mary Kathleen O'Looney connect to in the novel. Starbuck recalls the idealism and the persecutions of the labor movement, from the Sacco and Vanzetti era through the Red scares. It anchors the novel's reflections on socialism, unionism, and the cost of dissent.
Union Square has been a site of mass political demonstration since the 19th century, including the first Labor Day parade in 1882 and many rallies of unions and socialist groups. The surrounding area housed the Communist Party and the garment-trade unions in the early 20th century.
Union Square Park is a busy public park with a well-known Greenmarket, statues, and regular public gatherings. It remains a center for protest and public speech.
Visit: Union Square Park (park)
7 East 7th Street — Platform for speech and reform
The novel's discussion of labor politics and the persuasive power of public speech finds a natural home in New York's historic forums for reformers. Starbuck's memories of the radical orators and strike organizers of his youth echo the kind of oratory associated with Cooper Union. It stands for the tradition of American dissent that Starbuck once flirted with and later betrayed.
The Cooper Union Foundation Building opened in 1859 and its Great Hall hosted Abraham Lincoln's famous 1860 address. It has hosted suffragists, labor leaders, and civil rights advocates ever since.
The Great Hall still hosts public lectures, debates, and events. Cooper Union remains a private college of art, architecture, and engineering.
Visit: The Great Hall at Cooper Union (historic site)
Cambridge, MA — Starbuck's Harvard education
Starbuck, the son of a family of servants to the wealthy Cabot-like Brahmins, attends Harvard, where he befriends Leland Clewes and later Kenneth Whistler. There he is drawn into leftist circles and an episode that later comes back to haunt his government career. His Harvard years are the root of the memoir's tangled story of friendship, betrayal, and class.
Harvard Yard is the historic core of Harvard University, founded in 1636. Its brick buildings and gates date from the 18th to early 20th centuries, including Widener Library, completed in 1915.
Harvard Yard is open to visitors, with student-led campus tours available. The surrounding Harvard Square is a lively district of bookstores and cafes.
Visit: Harvard Yard (landmark)
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, D.C. — Starbuck's Nixon-era role
Starbuck serves as a minor aide in the Nixon White House, and the Watergate scandal ensnares him in a small, almost comic way that sends him to prison. He has a long record of Washington service dating back to the New Deal era, and his career unfolds in the shadow of presidents. The memoir treats his fall as one more example of how ordinary, well-meaning men are crushed by great institutions.
The White House has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in 1800. The Nixon administration, which lasted from 1969 to 1974, ended with the Watergate scandal and Nixon's resignation.
The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president. Public tours require advance requests through members of Congress, and the White House Visitor Center is open nearby.
Visit: White House Visitor Center (museum)
2650 Virginia Avenue NW, Washington, D.C. — Scandal that ruined Starbuck
The Watergate break-in is the scandal behind Starbuck's conviction, and he serves time for a modest part in the cover-up. Vonnegut treats it ironically, as a ridiculous episode that nonetheless destroys careers. Starbuck's confession and his term in prison launch the novel's frame story of release and return.
The Watergate complex was built in the 1960s and became infamous after the June 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee offices. The scandal led to President Nixon's resignation in 1974.
The Watergate complex remains a mix of residential apartments, offices, and a hotel. It is a private complex, and visitors can view it from the outside and from the adjacent Potomac riverfront.
45 Rockefeller Plaza — Corporate power in Midtown
The corporate empire of RAMJAC is imagined as an overwhelming force in American life, and Rockefeller Center is the most famous example of that kind of Manhattan power complex. Starbuck, an ex-convict in a rumpled outfit, passes through a city dominated by massive private fortunes. The contrast between his smallness and the monumental business world underlines the novel's satire of wealth.
Rockefeller Center was built by John D. Rockefeller Jr. during the Great Depression, with construction from 1930 to 1939. It is a National Historic Landmark and a major example of Art Deco design.
The complex hosts offices, shops, NBC Studios, Radio City Music Hall, and the Top of the Rock observation deck. Its plaza is famous for the Christmas tree and ice rink.
Visit: Rockefeller Center (landmark)
42nd Street & Sixth Avenue — Starbuck's wandering on his first day
On his first day out of prison, Starbuck wanders Manhattan on foot, taking in a city that has changed enormously since his youth. Public spaces like Bryant Park are places where a displaced older man can rest and reflect on his past. His walking tour of the city shapes the memoir's structure, with each stop drawing a memory of old friends and betrayals.
Bryant Park was named for poet William Cullen Bryant in 1884 and sits behind the New York Public Library's main branch. It was the site of the Crystal Palace exhibition in 1853 and was restored in the early 1990s after decades of neglect.
Bryant Park is a popular public park with lawns, cafes, a winter ice rink, and seasonal markets. It is free and open daily.
Visit: Bryant Park (park)
Fifth Avenue & 42nd Street — Reading and research in the city
Starbuck, an educated man who once held a respected post and loves history, seeks out the city's cultural landmarks as he tries to find his footing. The library represents the learned world that he once belonged to and that his scandal has cost him. His reflections on his own education and on the radical books and ideas of his youth are tied to such places.
The Stephen A. Schwarzman Building opened in 1911 and was designed by Carrère and Hastings. The marble Beaux-Arts landmark is guarded by the lions Patience and Fortitude.
The library is free to the public with reading rooms, exhibitions, and guided tours. The Rose Main Reading Room is among its best-known spaces.
Visit: Stephen A. Schwarzman Building, New York Public Library (library)
Greenwich Village — Bohemian radicalism and memory
Greenwich Village has long been a home for radicals, writers, and idealists, and Starbuck's memories of his left-wing friends from the 1930s connect to such places. The novel's ideal of kindness and solidarity, embodied by Mary Kathleen O'Looney, is rooted in this milieu. Starbuck's return to New York brings him back into contact with the surviving ghosts of that vanished world.
Washington Square Park was a burial ground and parade ground before becoming a park in 1827. Its marble arch, completed in 1892, commemorates the centennial of Washington's inauguration.
The park is a lively public space with a fountain, chess players, and performers. It is surrounded by New York University buildings.
Visit: Washington Square Park (park)
Downtown Indianapolis — Vonnegut's Midwestern roots
Vonnegut's characters are drawn from a broad American landscape, including the Midwest where the family of Kenneth Whistler and Sacco-Vanzetti-era labor causes echo. Indiana's history of Eugene V. Debs and labor organizing in the Midwest informs the novel's sympathetic view of socialism. The Indianapolis connection also reflects the author's own origins and the book's blend of memoir and fiction.
Indianapolis was founded in 1821 as Indiana's planned capital. Terre Haute, nearby, was the home of Socialist leader Eugene V. Debs, whose speeches and imprisonment are referenced in the novel.
Downtown Indianapolis includes the Indiana Statehouse, Monument Circle, and the Kurt Vonnegut Museum and Library. The museum preserves the author's work and celebrates his legacy.
Visit: Kurt Vonnegut Museum and Library (museum)
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