The R.M.S. Titanic went to its watery grave in the Atlantic Ocean on the morning of April 15, 1912. Few cities felt the tragedy as deeply as New York City.
At the end of its maiden voyage, the luxurious ship was set to dock at the White Star Line’s Pier 59, near today’s Chelsea Piers. Instead, 706 dazed survivors picked up by the R.M.S. Carpathia disembarked a few blocks away at Pier 54—greeted by a crowd of thousands desperate for news about the iceberg that sank the ship and the whereabouts of family members.
Influential and lesser-known residents went down with the ship, including Macy’s owner Isidor Straus and his wife, Ida, and John Jacob Astor IV (the son of Mrs. Astor, the society leader). Their absence was felt immediately in a city stunned with grief.
In response to so much tragedy, no time was wasted planning a monument to the lives lost—one that would function as not just a memorial but also as a guiding light for ships in New York Harbor.
“The Seaman’s Benefit Society has undertaken the task of collecting the funds for the erection of a permanent memorial to the men and women lost on the Titanic in the form of a lighthouse tower on the new Seaman’s Institute at the corner of Coenties Slip and South Street,” wrote the New York Times on April 23, 1912.
The lighthouse memorial, which would have a lantern gallery and a fixed green light viewable as far away as Sandy Hook, was to be topped by a time ball that dropped down a pole at noon, so seaman could set their chronometers (and Lower Manhattan dwellers could set their watches).
Though it honored everyone who went down with the ship, the memorial would be “in memory of the engineers who sent their stokers up while they went to certain death; the members of the heroic band who played while the water crept up to their instruments; and of the officers and crew who put duty above personal safety,” noted the Times.
“It will be given in memory of those in the steerage who perished without ever realizing their hopes of a new land, the America of endless possibilities.”
Putting the memorial on top of the new Seaman’s Institute was also a fitting choice. This organization, launched in 1834 as the Seaman’s Church Institute, helped take care of the thousands of sailors who came to New York City on the many vessels over the years that made shipping and trade a powerhouse of Gotham’s economy.
The cornerstone for the Institute’s new building went in the ground on the morning of the sinking of the Titanic. One year later, the completed building—featuring dormitory rooms, a bank, library, and chapel—hosted a dedication service for the Titanic Memorial Lighthouse perched on its roof.
The lighthouse, designed by Warren & Wetmore (the architects behind Grand Central Terminal) went into service that November, according to the South Street Seaport Museum.
For the next 55 years, as ship traffic decreased in New York Harbor and South Street’s fortunes turned, the Titanic memorial with its time ball stayed in service on the roof. In 1968, the Seaman’s Institute moved to a new headquarters on State Street. The top of the Titanic Memorial was given to the South Street Seaport Museum.
But it wasn’t until 1976 when the memorial lighthouse went up on a triangular corner at Pearl and Fulton Streets (now known as Titanic Memorial Park), held in place by a concrete podium. The time ball is also gone; it’s been replaced by an ornamental sphere.
Here it still stands, a memorial to a maritime disaster that hit the city hard and remains in the public imagination.
I’m not the only one who has noticed it could use some TLC. A group dedicated to restoring the monument has formed, according to a 2022 New York Times piece. But a costly restoration of a relic not many passersby notice remains uncertain.
PHOTO PHOTO OF THE DAY
THE ROOF OF THE SOUTH PORTION OF BLACKWELL HOUSE IS LOOSING SHINGLES. I AM TRYING TO RECOLLECT IF THE ROOF WAS REPLACED (OR JUST PATCHED) 3 YEARS AGO AFTER A MULTI-MILLION DOLLAR RESTORATION PROJECT.. TYPICAL OF ISLAND PROJECTS THAT WERE DONE WITH SHODDY CONSTRUCTION AND CORNERS CUT. HOPEFULLY RIOC WILL REPAIR THE ROOF VERY SOON OR THE HOUSE WILL FACT MORE DAMAGE.
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
The Netherlands Consulate General in New York announces FUTURE 400, a vibrant, two-year celebration of the 400 years since the Dutch arrived in New York. This event series will bring together artists and thinkers from both New York and the Netherlands for performances, talks, art exhibits, and more.
On Tulip Day, April 7th, over 200,000 tulips will take over Union Square Park, welcoming thousands to pick their own bouquet from the array. The Consul General of The Kingdom of the Netherlands in New York will present a new tulip variety to the city, called FUTURE 400. It will commemorate this year’s anniversary of the first Dutch settlement and honor another 400 years of collaboration between the nations.
A rendering of “Biosignature Preservation” on Park Avenue, a sculpture by Jorge Otero-Pailos which will be part of his forthcoming exhibition “Analogue Sites” on Park Avenue Exhibition
Jorge Otero-Pailos’ Analog Sites lines Park Ave this month with large steel pieces wrought from a fence that once surrounded the former U.S. Embassy in Oslo. The sculptures aims to raise awareness of the importance of American modern architecture and the preservation of mid-century embassies as they stand amongst Park Avenue’s mid-century modernist landmarks and the Park Avenue Armory. Originally placed in Oslo, the series will be on display until October 2024.
The iconic Tiffany & Co. flagship store unveiled an art exhibition in partnership with renowned architect Peter Marino, who led the transformation of the iconic store’s interior. TItled Culture of Creativity, the exhibition is a testament to Tiffany & Co.’s long-standing connection with the art world. It features nearly 70 works of art from the Peter Marino Art Foundation by artists like Louis Comfort Tiffany, Damien Hirst, Rashid Johnson, and Peter Marino himself. Also on view is a beautiful range of 19th-century pieces from Marino’s personal collection of Tiffany silver. The exhibit runs through May 20th at the Tiffany & Co. flagship store on Fifth Avenue and 57th Street called The Landmark. Complimentary tickets can be reserved through the Tiffany website.
The world-famous American Museum of Natural unveils a new exhibit on April 2nd, Grounded by Our Roots. The exhibition features gorgeous works by five up-and-coming Indigenous artists. These thirteen pieces, including paintings, prints, clothing, and sculptures, showcase modern Indigenous art inspired by the beautiful visual traditions of the Northwest Coast.
Artists include Hawilkwalał Rebecca Baker-Grenier, a fashion designer who debuted her first collection at New York Fashion Week in 2022, as well as Alison Bremner Naxhshagheit, an artist of many media who explores the present-day Tlingit experience. The exhibition will be on view in the Contemporary Art Gallery in the Museum’s Northwest Coast Hall, and is included with all admission.
Rendering Courtesy of LeMonde Studio
Baseball season is back! Fans of this iconic New York sport are called to Lou Gehrig Plaza for the launch of Home Run, a new installation by LeMonde Studio in partnership with the 161st Street Business Improvement District and the Québec Government Office in New York. The unvileing of the sculpture, which depicts a giant baseball bat and ball, will take place on the Yankees’ first home game of the season on April 5th!
Preparatory sketch of Rose B. Simpson’s site-specific commission for Madison Square Park Conservancy,Seed Courtesy of the artist and Madison Square Park Conservancy
As a part of the milestone twentieth anniversary of Madison Square Park Conservancy’s art program, Rose B. Simpson will unveil her new public art exhibition, Seed. This outdoor exhibition features nine towering sculptures in both Madison Square Park and Inwood Hill Park. Set in bronze and steel will be figures depicted in gatherings on the grounds of the parks.
The pieces draw from Simpson’s own background as well as the history of Manhattan Island. Simpson illuminates the notions of interconnectedness and our natural relationship with the ground we walk on. Seed is on view from April 11th through September 22nd.
PHOTO OF THE DAY
WONDERFUL STUDENT DESIGNS IN THE WINDOWS OF F.I.T. AT SEVENTH AVENUE AND 27TH STREET
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
The Memorial Scrolls Trust is pleased to announce a scroll gathering in New York City to celebrate MST’s 60th anniversary on Sunday afternoon April 7, 2024, 3pm at Temple Emanu-El of New York. The planning committee has been hard at work to create an afternoon that will be an everlasting memory for all participants. MST Scrolls from New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and other states are being invited for a reunion of these scroll survivors. The last time we held a gathering here in 2019, we had 75 scrolls and 800 people. We hope that you will join in. It will be a remarkable event.
This group of 1,564 scrolls which were collected by the Jewish Community in Prague during the Nazi occupation represents the vibrant cultural and religious life of Czech Jewry that once existed. These sacred objects survived when 85% of Czech Jews were murdered in the Shoah. After being collected, stored, moved and eventually sent to London, these scrolls are the tangible links from past generations to today. Help us honor the Jews killed in the Holocaust and celebrate the continuity of Jewish life today.
Program: The program will be held at Temple Emanu-El, 1 E.65th Street (at Fifth Avenue) in NYC. Please enter on 66th street. Our speakers will include Mr. Jeffrey Ohrenstein, Chairman and Trustee of MST, and Ms. Lois Roman, Trustee of MST. There will be a parade of the scrolls, music and other festivities. The program will be appropriate for all ages, from children to seniors.
Registration:
All attendees MUST pre register. Tickets are free.
IF YOU ARE PLANNING ON ATTENDING JOIN THE MEMBERS OF THE RIJC AND CONTACT JUDITH BERDY TO TELL US YOU ARE ATTENDING …. JBIRD134@AOL.COM
Come together for this commemorative service for the Czech scrolls from the Memorial Scrolls Trust (MST) that are being cared for in the New York metropolitan area. Dozens of scrolls and their caregivers will assemble for a program filled with music and reflection. Guest speakers will include MST chairman Jeffrey Ohrenstein and trustee Lois Roman. In addition, we will hear from Miles Laddie, author of 1564 Scrolls.
Please enter using the West 66th Street entrance to Temple Emanu-El. Pre-registration is required.
WEDNESDAY PHOTOS
RIOC’S TIKKET SYSTEM WORKS THESE ARE THE SMALL REPAIRS THAT MAKE LIFE BETTER ON THE ISLAND TRANSFORMER BOX FOUND OPEN ON WEST PROMENADE, ON SUNDAY REPAIRED ON MONDAY
STREET LIGHT OUT OPPOSITE SUBWAY REPAIRED THE NEXT DAY
ADDITIONAL GRAB BAR ADDED IN LADIES ROOM CULTURAL CENTER.
I arrived at our station this morning to find a dust condition in the station. Apparently our station was thorough cleaned over the weekend. When the first trains came through the tunnel at 5 a.m. they brought cement dust that was in the tunnel between 63/Lex station and Roosevelt Island.
The MTA staff was apologetic and promised a thorough cleaning again this week.
I arrived at the Queensbridge station at 8 a.m. for the ceremonial reopening of the F train service. Lots of press coverage and MTA press staff (only positive comments). Richard Davey, NY Transit President gave a brief speech and chatted with the media.
They aides eventually gathered the staff and guest and headed to the train. The F train arrived, full of passengers and a mob of press crowded into the car for the 3minute ride to the Island.
Up the escalator to be greeted by Gerald Ellis, Mary Cuneen, Bryrant Daniel, Paul Krickler and TOUCHDOWN the Cornell mascot bear.
TOUCHDOWN was the star of the station.
Lots of smile and photos.
Time for me to descend back downstairs for an appointment in Manhattan.
Judy Berdy
What a welcome sight
Press briefing describing work completed with Jaime Torres Springer and Richard Davey.
How many film crews can you fit onto an escalator?
Greg Morrisett and Touchdown from Cornell welcome the VIP’s.
Richard Davey admiring the “Double Take” mosaic wall by DIana Cooper, a project of MTA & DESIGN
Maybe TOUCHDOWN can get an orange vest and greet rider more often.
MONDAYPHOTO OF THE DAY
The Workhouse, located where 10 River Road now stands.
PHOTO OF THE DAY
This beautiful kitty was our favorite kiosk visitor on Sunday
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
New York State Environmental Conservation Officers (ECOs) recently took part in rescuing a grey seal from John F. Kennedy Airport in Queens, a harp seal on Staten Island, and another at Shinnecock Bay in Suffolk County on Long Island.
On February 22nd, ECOs McGhee, Vandenbos, Simmons, and Paschke assisted research biologists from the Atlantic Marine Conservation Society with a seal capture in Shinnecock Bay, in the town of Southampton.
Biologists took samples from the seals to support ongoing research by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Marine Mammal Health and Stranding Response Program, which coordinates national responses to stranded seals and whales, before releasing them unharmed.
Biologists also attached satellite tags to the seals to help monitor population movements. The Southampton Town Marine Patrol also participated.
On March 19th, ECOs Keegan and Milliron responded to John F. Kennedy International Airport in Queens County for reports of a grey seal on a runway.The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey escorted the Officers across several runways to the seal and discovered it hiding under a vehicle. The ECOs captured the seal and placed it in a carrier before transporting it to the New York Rescue Center for evaluation.A few days earlier, on March 13, Lieutenant Gates and ECO Clinger responded to a call about a distressed harp seal that had washed ashore on Staten Island and did not move for approximately 24 hours. The Officers assisted in transporting the seal to the New York Rescue Center for treatment.Harp seals are predominantly found in the cold waters of the North Atlantic and Arctic oceans. Seals are protected under the Marine Mammal Protection Act. The public is reminded to always keep a safe distance from marine mammals.To report a live seal that appears to be sick or injured, call the New York Stranding Hotline at 631-369-9829 and speak with trained biologists.For more information on Atlantic Marine Conservation Society, visit their website. Illustrations, from above, provided by DEC: Grey seal discovered under Port Authority vehicle at JFK Airport; and ECO Paschke monitors captured seal pulled from Shinnecock Bay before it was returned to the water unharmed.
OFTEN NEW YORK ALMANACK PUBLISHES STORIES OF RESCUES PERFORMED NY NYS FOREST RANGERS AND OTHER AGENCIES OF PERSONS WHO WENT HIKING IN THE WOODS, COMPLETELY UNPREPARED FOR THE WINTER ENVIRONMENT. READ THE ACCOUNT OF THIS PERSON WHO WAS RESCUED. THANKS TO THE RANGERS WHO RESCUE NY FOLKS IN THE WILDERNESS.
Overnight Rescue at Mount Marcy Saves Freezing Unprepared Hiker
On Friday, March 22 at 9:45 pm, as a major late season storm was bearing down on the Adirondacks, Ray Brook Dispatch received a call from a woman reporting her 33-year-old son from New York City was overdue from hiking Mount Marcy and Gray and Skylight mountains in the High Peaks.
At about 10:30 pm, Forest Ranger Mecus located the subject’s vehicle at Adirondak Loj in Keene Valley. Rangers Adams and Duchene attempted to retrace the subject’s itinerary, going up and over Mount Marcy and down to Four Corners.
At 4:25 am, Ranger Mecus completed searching the trail and campsites to Lake Colden Outpost, before heading up to climb to Four Corners with Colden Caretaker Raudonis. Ranger Evans served as Incident Commander at the Adirondak Loj.
Due to the urgency of the snowstorm potentially hiding footprints or other clues to the hiker’s location, 15 Rangers were sent out early Saturday morning. Ranger crews were sent in from Elk Lake, Upper Works, the Garden Trailhead, and a larger team from the Adirondak Loj, to perform a grid search on the Mount Marcy summit cone.
At 8 am, Ranger Mecus’ search crew located a single set of boot tracks near the Feldspar lean-to. The crew followed the tracks up the Lake Arnold trail to where the tracks lost the trail and started following the north branch of the Opalescent River on the northwest face of Mount Marcy.
At 10:10 am, they found the subject at 4,000 feet in elevation, with his clothes frozen to his body and suffering from hypothermia and frostbite.
Rangers used a patient care kit to change the hiker’s wet clothing, feed him, and provide warm liquids before walking him to the trailhead where they were met by Lake Placid EMS at 3:25 pm.
EMS took the subject to the hospital for treatment and the rescue operation was completed a little after 5 pm.
TODAY, SATURDAY, MARCH 30TH IS THE LAST DAY OF EARLY VOTING JOIN US TO CAST YOUR BALLOT IN THE PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY 9 A.M. TO 6 PM. AT GALLERY RIVAA 527 MAIN STREET
OR
ELECTION DAY IS TUESDAY, APRIL 2 AT PS/IS217 6 A.M. TO 9 P.M.
MARCH 30, 2023
THE FRICK COLLECTION
REOPENS AFTER
RESTORATION AND RENEWAL
THE YEAR
ISSUE # 1211
THE FRICK COLLECTION
Frick Collection Reveals Plans for New Second-Floor Galleries
The Frick Collection announced details about the transformation of the second floor of the original Frick home, on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City. The changes will make accessible to the public for the first time when the institution reopens in its renovated and expanded home in late 2024. Designed by Selldorf Architects, with Beyer Blinder Belle serving as Executive Architect, the project marks the most comprehensive upgrade to the Frick since opening nearly ninety years ago.
The mansion’s second floor originally served as the private living quarters of the Frick family and subsequently became the institution’s administrative offices after the residence was converted to a museum in 1935. The restoration of a suite of ten rooms and their transition into galleries will, for the first time, enable the public to experience more of the Frick’s historic buildings and remarkable collection, which has expanded significantly over the decades.
A highlight of the second floor will be the rare opportunity to experience two rooms as they were installed when the Frick family lived in the mansion. This includes a new gallery in what was the Frick family’s Breakfast Room and the Boucher Room, which is being returned to its original upstairs location in the private sitting room — or boudoir — of Adelaide Childs Frick, the wife of founder Henry Clay Frick.
In a further series of second-floor galleries, visitors will experience installations inspired by the personal collecting interests of the Frick family through time, including beloved Renaissance gold-ground and Impressionist paintings. Also on view will be significant collections that have more recently entered into the museum’s holdings — some of which have yet to be regularly exhibited —ranging from ceramics to rare portrait medals and including the first permanent display of the Frick’s important clocks and watches collection.
Complementing the galleries of the Frick’s first floor, which include the Oval Room, East and West Galleries, Fragonard Room, Dining Room, and Living Hall, the second-floor galleries will provide entirely new opportunities for visitors to engage with the Frick’s holdings and historic spaces.
Restoration and preservation of architectural and decorative features — including ceiling murals, marble fireplaces, and elaborate carved woodwork — are bringing the intimate rooms of the former residence back to life, with varied arrangements of smaller-scale paintings, sculptures, and decorative objects from different schools and periods. Most art displays on this floor will preserve the traditional blend of objects for which the Frick is known, with select galleries centered on one period or medium.
Two of the new spaces are being restored to their appearance from when the Frick family resided in the house: the Breakfast Room and the Boucher Room. The Breakfast Room — ideally situated for morning light with its east-facing windows — has been reinstated as the family had decorated it, presenting the museum’s treasured holdings from the French Barbizon school of landscape painting, including works by Corot, Rousseau, and Daubigny.
Visitors will also experience the original Boucher Room, which adorned the boudoir of Adelaide Childs Frick (1859–1931). When, after several years of transformation, the residence opened as a museum in 1935, the eight panels by Boucher depicting the Arts and Sciences were moved to the ground floor to make them accessible to the public.
The second-floor room is now being returned to its appearance from when Adelaide Frick was alive. The series of paintings will be presented in a full suite of restored wall paneling, complemented by a series of other works and details from the same period: a marble chimneypiece; delicate Sèvres porcelain; important French furniture that has been treated and reupholstered; and the eighteenth-century wood flooring that originally graced this Gilded Age boudoir. All of these elements have been painstakingly disassembled, treated, and relocated upstairs to complete the gallery’s setting.
Further rooms will pay tribute to the individual collecting interests of the Frick family members. The original bedroom of Henry Clay Frick (1849–1919), which has become known at the museum as the Walnut Room for its sumptuous wood paneling, will present a selection of portraits, one of the founder’s favored genres.
Highlights include Romney’s famed 1782 portrayal of Lady Hamilton, which once again will hold pride of place over the room’s mantelpiece, as well as Ingres’s exquisite Comtesse d’Haussonville (1845), one of the most iconic paintings in the Frick’s holdings.
Another thematic gallery will feature Impressionist paintings, which were considered modern art during Frick’s lifetime and which Frick chose to display in the family’s private quarters.
Other rooms pay tribute to the significant role that the founder’s daughter Helen Clay Frick (1888–1984) played in shaping the collection during her father’s lifetime and for decades after his death. This includes an installation of early Italian Renaissance paintings, a particular passion of hers — including prized works by Cimabue, Piero della Francesca, and Paolo Veneziano —presented in Helen’s former bedroom.
Additional galleries and spaces on this floor will afford visitors the chance to look closely at exceptional holdings that have come to the Frick as major gifts. The Frick’s collections have grown in a focused and complementary manner over the decades, with more than half of the institution’s holdings coming from acquisitions after the original bequest of Henry Clay Frick.
Many of these collections have been shown only in part or temporarily because of space constraints. These new gallery installations include a presentation of French faience ceramics, the bequest of Sidney R. Knafel; remarkable works of Viennese Du Paquier porcelain given by Melinda and Paul Sullivan; and a special display of rare portrait medals from the unparalleled holdings of Stephen K. and Janie Woo Scher.
The installation of the Frick’s second floor has been designed by the curatorial team led by Deputy Director and Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator Xavier F. Salomon with Curator Aimee Ng, Assistant Curator of Sculpture Giulio Dalvit, and Assistant Curator of Decorative Arts Marie-Laure Buku Pongo, in association with the Frick’s longtime exhibition designer, Stephen Saitas.
About Henry Clay Frick
Henry Clay Frick (1849 – 1919) founded the H. C. Frick & Company coke manufacturing company, was chairman of the Carnegie Steel Company and played a major role in the formation of U.S. Steel.
As a founding member of the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club, he wasin large part responsible for the alterations to the South Fork Dam that caused its failure, leading to the catastrophic Johnstown Flood in 1889, which killed 2,208 people.
Frick’s vehement opposition to unions also caused violent conflict, most notably in the 1892 Homestead Strike, which all but destroyed the Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel Workers and led to the death of about 15 people and the injury of dozens more.
Frick had extensive real estate holdings in Pittsburgh and throughout the state of Pennsylvania and later built the Neoclassical Frick Mansion in Manhattan (a National Historic Landmark) on Fifth Avenue, between 70th and 71st streets in Manhattan, and upon his death donated his extensive collection of old master paintings and fine furniture to create the Frick Collection.
The Frick Madison closed on March 3, 2024, and the Henry Clay Frick House is scheduled to reopen in late 2024. Learn more here.
NEW LONELY PLANET KIDS BOOKS $10-
AT THE RIHS VISITOR CENTER
GO NYC GO
BY ISLAND RESIDENT KEN ANDERSON 416-
Every day, NYC wakes up and is on the go.
Cars, taxis, trucks, and buses move to and fro.
If you want to join the fun, buckle your seat
as we drive on every road, bridge, and street!
CREDITS
THE FRICK COLLECTION
ROOSEVELT ISALND HISTORICAL SOCIETY
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
TIME OUT: I WILL BE WORKING EARLY VOTING THIS WEEK AT OUR ISLAND POLL SITE IN THE GALLERY RIVAA. STOP BY TO CAST YOUR BALLOT IN THE PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARY AND SAY HELLO. BE BACK AFTER EASTER WITH MORE STORIES.
Manhattan’s MacDougal Street was named after merchant Alexander McDougall, a Scottish immigrant who hailed from the Isle of Islay. A rebellious character, he had been actively involved in the Revolutionary War.
In later years, McDougall represented New York in the Continental Congress and became the first President of the Bank of New York. Until their reckless destruction in 2008 to make space for New York University’s law school, the buildings from number 133 to 139 were landmark addresses in the history of Greenwich Village.
Manhattan’s MacDougal Street was named after merchant Alexander McDougall, a Scottish immigrant who hailed from the Isle of Islay. A rebellious character, he had been actively involved in the Revolutionary War.
In later years, McDougall represented New York in the Continental Congress and became the first President of the Bank of New York. Until their reckless destruction in 2008 to make space for New York University’s law school, the buildings from number 133 to 139 were landmark addresses in the history of Greenwich Village.
Village of Dreams
During the last decades of the nineteenth century, Europe’s major cities were in the grip of militant radicalism. Vienna experienced a number of uprisings. Rumors that the Emperor himself was a target abounded in and around the capital, especially since the assassination in 1898 of Empress Elisabeth of Austria by the Italian anarchist Luigi Lucheni.
Born in 1869 in Bohemia (then part of the Austria-Hungarian Empire), Hippolyte Havel was educated in Vienna where he associated himself with radical circles. Anarchism in the late nineteenth century was literally a “movement on the move.”
Activists lived under constant threat of arrest and moved from country to country. Many would eventually end up in the United States. American anarchism was established by political refugees from Paris, London, Madrid, Rome, Berlin, Moscow or Vienna.
Havel had started his career as a journalist, but was arrested in 1893 after delivering a blazing May Day speech. Having served eighteen months in prison, he was deported from Vienna. Soon after he was re-arrested for taking part in an anarchist demonstration in Prague. Expelled from the country he traveled to Germany, spent time in Zurich and then moved on to Paris.
After a series of bomb attacks in the 1890s, the French authorities were not inclined to tolerate subversive activities and by 1899 Havel was living “down and out” in London. There he met the political activist Emma Goldman whose orthodox Jewish family had fled anti-Semitism in Lithuania and settled in the United States in 1885. The pair became lovers.
In September 1900 Havel accompanied Goldman to Paris where an attempt was made to stage an international anarchist congress (for which Peter Kropotkin wrote a contribution on Communism and Anarchy), but the police intervened and prevented the event from taking place.
Returning with Emma to the United States, Havel settled in Chicago. He was one of six anarchists arrested and briefly detained in the city on September 7, 1901, accused of plotting with Leon Czolgosz who had murdered President William McKinley on the grounds of the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York.
All over the nation anarchists were hunted down, but repression breeds resistance. Havel had no intention of being silenced.
In 1903 Emma Goldman had settled in an East Village tenement at 208 East 13th Street. When in 1906 she founded the journal Mother Earth (“A Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature”), she ran her office from the neighboring tenement (No. 210). Arguably the most influential anarchist journal in America before the First World War, it was banned by the federal government in 1917. Havel became her associate and collaborator even though their love affair had ended.
Art & Anarchy
A flamboyant character, Havel spoke several languages and expressed himself in a fluent style of writing, but he was not academically minded and never produced a full-length book. A revolutionary with a fondness for drink, Havel’s heroes were activists who adhered to Johann Most’s “propaganda of the deed” and accepted violence as a legitimate means of achieving political ends.
Historically, creative milieus have clustered in urban areas where housing was relatively cheap, attracting a diverse group of migrants, artists and students. These densely populated and overcrowded sites were soon littered with small workshops, bakeries, cafés and eateries.
Their maze-like streets proved difficult to police and offered a perfect hiding place for controversial thinkers and activists. Interactions were intense, forging tight and often rebellious community bonds.
Although the image of Greenwich Village as a progressive “republic” of free spirits won popular acceptance during the mid-1910s, it reflected only a small part and brief period (between 1913 and 1918) of local life.
Most residents were not bohemians. Their lives were not shaped or determined by the influx of young artists and activists, but by continuous migration and changes in ethnic composition that affected local conditions.
The small Village community of radicals centered on Washington Square where Fifth Avenue ends at Stanford White’s triumphal arch. Inspired by his experiences in Vienna and Paris, Havel recognized the primacy of “creative spaces” such as cafes, salons and cabarets where anarchist ideas could be discussed away from the formality of political discourse.
Such gatherings cemented solidarity between anarchists and artists which he considered crucial for the movement’s expansion. They were natural allies who challenged the bounds of conventional thought in order to bring about renewal, be it artistic or social.
The association of anarchism with the arts had been stressed as early as 1857 by Pierre-Joseph Proudhon. In his essay on the painter Gustave Courbet the philosopher stressed the social mission of the artist by giving visual form to the struggle of working classes in a bourgeois society.
Havel brought his European heritage to Greenwich Village. He argued that the cultural avant-garde had a vital role to play in the revolutionary struggle.
Playwright Eugene O’Neill served a brief apprenticeship as co-editor of Havel’s journal Revolt before it was closed down for its opposition to the nation’s involvement in World War One. This involvement sparked the writer’s interest in anarchist activity (he portrayed Havel as Hugo Kalmar in his play The Iceman Cometh).
Polly’s Restaurant & The Liberal Club
Havel claimed to have come up with the idea for a Village restaurant as a platform where radicals could eat and talk revolution. In 1913, his then lover Polly Holladay opened a modest bistro in the basement of a townhouse at 137 MacDougal Street located just below Washington Square Park. Originally named The Basement, it became known as Polly’s Restaurant.
Born in Evanston, Illinois, Polly immersed herself in the bohemian atmosphere. Havel served as cook and waiter, while she handled finances and engaged with customers. The bistro’s walls in yellow chalk paint were hung with local artists’ work.
With its wooden tables crammed together, Polly’s soon became an alternative eatery of choice for a set of patrons that included novelists Theodore Dreiser and Sherwood Anderson, playwright Eugene O’Neill, political activist Emma Goldman as well as the imposing figure of Max Eastman, editor of the magazine The Masses. It was a creative space where Village residents sat down to discuss art, politics and revolution.
Havel took center stage for his verbal power and “volcanic outbursts.” He gained notoriety for addressing patrons of the restaurant as “bourgeois pigs” (throwing insults at clients was a feature of the European cabaret culture). He always reserved a table and bench for Emma Goldman and her lover, fellow Lithuanian activist and editor of her journal, Alexander Berkman.
The bistro was home to the Heterodoxy Club, a woman’s forum founded in 1912 by the extraordinary Marie Jenney Howe (biographer of the French novelist George Sand) to lunch and discuss radical feminist strategies.
A “heterodite” defined herself as a woman “not orthodox in her opinion” which allowed for members of diverse political views and sexual orientations to exchange ideas and in doing so define American feminism (a new word at the time, borrowed from the French).
The upstairs space from Polly’s basement was occupied by the Liberal Club which, founded in 1912, billed itself as a social meeting place for “those interested in new ideas.” Henrietta Rodman was the most outspoken of its female members in their demands for “free love,” birth control and equal rights.
Several of them took part on March 3, 1913, in the eventful women’s suffrage procession along Washington’s Pennsylvania Avenue (the day before President Woodrow Wilson’s inauguration).
The club also became notorious for its annual costume ball, a bacchanalian event known as the Pagan Rout, held at nearby Webster Hall at 125 East 11th Street. The location became even more popular when a passage was created into the neighboring building where the brothers Albert and Charles Boni ran their Washington Square Bookshop.
Books & Plays
Opened at 135 MacDougal Street in 1913, the Washington Square Bookshop gained a central place in the Village community. Members of the Liberal Club used the shop as a library, “borrowing” books to read in the comfort of the club and return them when finished.
The Boni brothers never made a profit out of the business. In 1915, they decided to give up bookselling and focus on publishing instead (their company would eventually become Random House). They sold the shop to Frank Shay.
Born Frank Xavier Shea in 1888 in East Orange, New Jersey, he changed the spelling of his name in order to associate himself with Shays’ Rebellion (an armed uprising led by Revolutionary War veteran Daniel Shays against tax rises in Western Massachusetts). He would run the Washington Square Bookshop for about two years and became closely involved with the arrival of theater in the Village, both as an actor and a publisher.
In 1916, the Provincetown Players opened the Playwrights’ Theatre at 139 MacDougal Street, next to Polly’s Restaurant and the Liberal Club. This collective of artists, writers and theatre lovers produced plays for two seasons in Provincetown, Massachusetts (1915/6), and six seasons in New York City (1916 to 1922).
Shay played the role of Scotty in their production of Eugene O’Neill’s Bound East for Cardiff, the play that launched the dramatist’s career. From his bookshop he published three volumes of The Provincetown Plays (1916), landmark collections of the group’s earliest productions.
Shay’s activities were interrupted when conscripted in 1917. He fought the draft on the basis of his pacifist beliefs, but did not succeed. He served in the Headquarters Company of the 78th Division in France and saw action in the battles of Saint-Mihiel and the Forest of Argonne.
Demobilized in June 1919, Shay returned to New York and opened a tiny bookshop at 4 Christopher Street, West Village, and remained engaged in publishing volumes and anthologies of plays. He kept in touch with the latest literary developments.
When novelist and poet Christopher Morley visited the shop in April 1922, he reported his first sight of the blue-covered first edition of James Joyce’s Ulysses, recently published by Sylvia Beach’s Shakespeare & Company in Paris.
Deportations Delirium
Politically the Village was no longer the same as the First Red Scare took hold of its community. From April through June 1919 several bombings were carried out nationwide aimed at judges, politicians and law enforcement officials, including the Washington home of newly appointed Attorney General Alexander Mitchell Palmer. The latter responded by creating a division of intelligence agents led by the young lawyer J. Edgar Hoover. The aim was to crush the “Reds.”
Tensions between activists and agencies increased sharply after the raid on the headquarters of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in the East Village on November 11, 1919, leading to violent street clashes between opposing political camps. The 1917 Espionage Act and the 1918 Anarchist Exclusion Act were used to justify the onslaught. Temporarily, Village radicalism went underground.
On December 21, 1919, the Federal government assembled 249 “undesirable” left-leaning East European immigrants onto the US Army transport Buford (nicknamed the “Soviet Ark”) and expelled them to Russia.
It was reported in The New York Times as “A merry Christmas present to Lenin and Trotsky.” Or as the jubilant Saturday Evening Post put it: “The Mayflower brought the first builders to this country; the Buford has taken away the first destroyers.”
On January 16, 1920, the ship arrived in Finland and the deportees were transported by train to the Russian border. Amongst them were Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman.
The impact of the intervention caused a persecution frenzy. Palmer and Hoover organized a massive roundup of radicals. By early January 1920, the Palmer Raids led to thousands of arrests and hundreds of deportations (described in 1923 by Louis F. Post as the “Deportations Delirium”).
The project turned into a festival of retribution based on dubious constitutional grounds and a disregard for civil rights. It should be a reminder to who partake in the present debate on democratic values.
An extremist is someone who engages in violence for political or religious ends. Any definition of radicalism must therefore be fit for purpose in a particular context. What matters is how people act, not what they think. Only those who resort to (or incite) extreme methods should be confronted.
Democracy encourages contrarian debate, even if an argument may offend the majority or unsettle the status quo. No nation can progress without heretics. Galileo was sentenced to life imprisonment for his perceived insult of the church while claiming the earth orbited the sun.
THURSDAY & FRIDAY PHOTO
LIST OF DAILY BAKED GOODS AT MEDITERRANEAN EATERY NINA LUBLIN., THOM HEYER, JOAN BROOKS, & GLORIA HERMAN GOT IT RIGHT
Text by Judith Berdy
Illustrations, from above: Demolition of historic McDougall Street buildings in 2009 (courtesy Village Preservation); Edwin Wright Woodman’s “Portrait of Havel,” published in September 1901 in The Minneapolis Journal (Library of Congress); cover of the inaugural issue of Emma Goldman’s anarchist magazine Mother Earth, March 1906; Polly’s Restaurant at 137 MacDougal Street, NYC circa 1915; poster of the Liberal Club’s annual ball, “Pagan Rout III,” 1917, signed by “Rienecke” (probably Rienecke Beckman); and the I.W.W.’s New York City headquarters after a Palmer Raid, 1919.
CREDITS
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
William Kentridge’s video animation of historical figures on view at Moynihan Train Hall
ISSUE # 1209
AARON GINSBURG
6SQFT
Images courtesy of Amtrak
A cast of historical figures is watching travelers as they bustle through the waiting area of Moynihan Train Hall. Created by South African artist William Kentridge, “We Will Make Shoes from the Sky” is a multi-panel video animation featuring characters based on famous people from history, including several Black leaders like James Baldwin, Josephine Baker, and Aimé and Suzanne Césaire. The installation is currently on view on the digital screens in the main waiting area of Moynihan Train Hall.
“We Will Make Shoes from the Sky” depicts characters who are based on real figures from eras in history, including people who fled Vichy France at the end of World War II and traveled to destinations in North and South America.
Other figures were part of the Negritude movement, which was a “consciousness of pride in the cultural and physical aspects of African heritage,” according to a press release. The movement, which started in Paris, was led by the famous Martinique writer Aimé Césaire and his wife Suzanne Césaire, a teacher, scholar, anti-colonial, feminist activist, and surrealist.
The installation gives passengers traveling through the train hall a chance to stop and think about trailblazing figures who fought for freedom and individuality.
The characters featured in the animation are also the cast of “The Great Yes, The Great No,” Kentridge’s highly-anticipated theater production. Developed for the Luma Foundation, the show will debut in Arles, France in 2024 in partnership with the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence.
“We Will Make Shoes from the Sky” is part of the Art at Amtrak public art program, in its third year. Curated by Debra Simon Art Consulting, the program displays diverse art projects designed to enhance the travel experience at Amtrak stations. The program began at NYC’s Penn Station in June 2022 and expanded to Moynihan Train Hall last summer.
Art at Amtrak is currently presenting another art installation below Moynihan Train Hall in the Amtrak concourse at Penn Station. Created by NYC-based artist Rico Gatson, “Untitled (Collective Light Transfer)” covers the concourse with captivating geometric compositions that fill the otherwise bland space with a “pulsating energy.”
The installation is on view in the upper-level rotunda between the 8th Avenue Amtrak departure concourse and the 7th Avenue NJ transit concourse through the summer.
DYLAN BROWN PRESENTED A GREAT OVERVIEW OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF OUR ISLAND FROM THE 1960’S TO THE PRESENT TIME. A FULL AUDIENCE WAS TREATED TO THIS TIMELAPSE OF WHAT WAS IMAGINED AND THRE RESULTS ALMOST 50 YEARS LATER. GREAT WORK DYLAN!
THE PROGRAM WILL BE AVAILBLE SHORTLY ON THE ROOSEVELTISLANDER BLOGSPOT.
A SPECIAL THANKS TO DANIELLE SHUR OF THE NYPL BRANCH THAT GRACIOUSLY HOSTS OUR PRESENTATIONS.
WEDNESDAY
MARCH 20, 2024
GREAT PROGRAMMING IS COMING FROM THE R.I.H.S.
ISSUE # 1208
JUDITH BERDY
UPCOMING PROGRAMS
TREASURES REDISCOVERED This is an original poster that publicized the exhibit “Welfare Island: An Interim Report” which was presented at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for two weeks October 6 through October 19, 1970
Did you know that there was a scale model of the future island exhibited at the Met in 1970?
This is just one historical item that is stored in our office/archive in the Octagon
WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT TO FUND OUR ARCHIVAL WORK TO MAKE OUR COLLECTIONS MORE AVAILABLE AND EASY TO USE. PLEASE USE OUR DONATION LINK BELOW TO MAKE A DONATION FOR OUR ARCHIVES AND AN EXHIBIT OF OUR COLLECTION IN UPCOMING MONTHS.
ALL DONATIONS ARE TAX DEDUCTABLE AND WILL BE ACKNOWLEDGED.
This letter arrived in my mailbox today and tells one more story of our island’s past. Thanks
The Sid Kaplan photo of the trolley station under the Queensboro Bridge brought back vivid memories of my youth in Manhattan and Queens. My father was an oral surgeon and his rounds took him to Welfare Island once a month from the end of his stint in the Army in 1955 through the mid-1960’s. While we never rode the trolley, we accessed the Island from Queens many times via what everyone called the “Upside Down” building. In that structure, elevators (for automobiles, trucks and people) connected the middle of the bridge with the land below. Several times, after coming up in the elevator in our automobile, we waited while the westbound trolley to the “city” stopped to pick up or drop off passengers. I was captivated by this little “train” which traversed the bridge and I begged to take a ride.
My request was not granted — I was probably four — but ever-after I watched for the orange and cream cars and was always delighted to see them.
Then, one day, they stopped. “The electric company”, my Dad explained, “made a deal with the city to run cables over the bridge – and under the road – where the trolley tracks used to be”. I was heartbroken. “Why? Why??”, I asked my parents. “Why couldn’t the trolley continue running above the electric cables like all the automobiles?” “Well,Luddy”, said my Mother, “the trolley is obsolete….”
Obsolete? How could something so wonderful to my innocent eyes go away? Alas, this was the first of so many things in my life to disappear “forever”. Penn Station and the Singer Building in Manhattan met a similar fate to my beloved trolley. Luckily, Grand Central remains and a lot of other trolleys in other cities have been saved, or rebuilt or expanded. How great would it be if those Queensboro Bridge streetcars – and a modernized “Upside Down” building – still connected our Island to Manhattan and Queens?
If there is a lesson in this, it is that something which today is “obsolete” may one day be quite valuable – and useful. But I can tell you – from personal experience – that this notion is of little comfort to a small boy riding over the bridge, looking in vain for the quaint trolleys of another time, never to run again. guy ludwig
Get this image on: Flickr ] Creator: hjw3001 Copyright: Henry Wagner
TREASURES REDISCOVERED
This is an original poster that publicized the exhibit “Welfare Island: An Interim Report” which was presented at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for two weeks October 6 through October 19, 1970
Did you know that there was a scale model of the future island exhibited at the Met in 1970?
This is just one historical item that is stored in our office/archive in the Octagon
WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT TO FUND OUR ARCHIVAL WORK TO MAKE OUR COLLECTIONS MORE AVAILABLE AND EASY TO USE. PLEASE USE OUR DONATION LINK BELOW TO MAKE A DONATION FOR OUR ARCHIVES AND AN EXHIBIT OF OUR COLLECTION IN UPCOMING MONTHS.
ALL DONATIONS ARE TAX DEDUCTABLE AND WILL BE ACKNOWLEDGED.
… WITHOUT YOUR VOICE, WE WILL LOSE THE Q102 — WHICH PROVIDES DIRECT, DAILY SERVICE BETWEEN ROOSEVELT ISLAND & QUEENS PLAZA, CONNECTING TO MANY BUSES & SUBWAYS BEWTEEN MANHATTAN, BROOKLYN & QUEENS — SERVING ROOSEVELT ISLAND FOR OVER 50 YEARS …
