“How’m I doin’?”

Love him or hate him- Ed Koch did some good for the Big Apple at a time when our great city desperately needed him. So long Ed Koch. The memory of him standing at subway entrances and on street corners asking, “How’m I doin?” will forever live on in New Yorkers’ memories. I’m not sure if he ever really had the time or the patience to stop and listen to the answers but at least he asked, gimmick or not. Highly criticized for his slow response to the AIDS crisis in the 80s, among other things, his 3rd and final term as mayor did not end well. Still, he did pull NYC from the very real threat of bankruptcy and in my opinion, left it a safer and better place to live. Here is Robert McFadden’s NY Times article and take on Koch’s life and service.

Koch passed away on Friday of heart failure, the very same day that Koch, the new documentary about his life and reign as mayor was released. We’ll miss you Ed, for a while you were truly the face of New York and one will go down in history as one of its great mayors.

{Image Credit: Dennis Caruso/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images}

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