Diary of George Templeton Strong

GTS kept a diary from 1835 to 1875 (2,250 pages). He observed the events of the day in New York City. His family was well placed to know the influential people, as they were prominent real estate attorneys. What astounds me is how he can casually mention riding, eating, or socializing with so many big names in history. You and I might read 30 or 40 biographies of influential New Yorkers, but GTS had lunch with them. This guy can name drop like no one I have ever seen before. But for him, its everyday life. It's wonderful for us as history lovers to have close up, personal views of major historical figures in their daily life. By no means is GTS a show-off. He was just in a good place at an interesting time. He is good enough to share it with us.
I found a lovely study aid for reading GTS. He often mentions specific New York events and he dates each diary entry. This allowed me to subscribe to a newspaper archive and look up the events mentioned in the Tribune, Times or the Herald. It gives a wonderful multi-dimensional effect to GTS study. It was fun to think I was reading the exact same newspaper GTS read on that day.