Robert Motherwell, Capriccio, 1961, color collotype and photo-silkscreen on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase, 1965.47
Robert Motherwell, Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, 1973, color lithograph poster, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Telamon Editions Limited, 1976.152.2
BURGOYNE DILLER
Burgoyne Diller, Untitled, 1930, ink on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Halley K. Harrisburg and Michael Rosenfeld, 1999.85.6
The American Abstract Artists (AAA) group was formed in 1937 with the aim of exhibiting nonobjective art, educating the public, and encouraging dialogue among abstract artists. Among the artists who participated in AAA exhibitions and meetings were Burgoyne Diller, John Ferren, Dwinell Grant, and John Sennhauser, who shared an interest in pure geometric form and balance of color. Diller’s drawing is an example of the artist’s early austere style and interest in spatial relationships.
Unable to sell such works during the depression, Diller accepted a position as co-director of the Mural Division of the New York Federal Art Project of the Works Progress Administration, where he played an important role in the promotion of abstract art in America. While the public preferred a more readable and realist style, Diller managed to hire abstract artists for several major mural projects, including murals at the New York World’s Fair of 1939 – 1940 and the Williamsburg Housing Project.
Burgoyne Diller, Untitled, 1948, graphite and crayon on paper, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Halley K. Harrisburg and Michael Rosenfeld, 1999.85.1
A pioneer of American abstraction, Ferren created this composition during a seven-year sojourn in Paris. He began his career as a sculptor, but turned to painting after he saw an exhibition of work by Henri Matisse and recognized the power of color. In the mid-1930s he worked at Stanley William Hayter’s printmaking workshop in Paris, Atelier 17, where he was encouraged to imprint his engraved and inked plated on wet plaster. When the plaster block dried, it showed the lines of the plate. He then carved into it to create à bas-relief sculpture of modeled and curved planes. Blue in Space resembles one of these carved plasters, translated into two dimensions with the planes defined by the rich colors of soft pastels.
Graphic Masters II: Highlights from the Smithsonian American Art Museum, 2009
BROOKLYN SURROGATE COURT AND POST OFFICE ANDY SPARBERG AND SUMIT KAUR GOT IT!!!
FRIDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
ORIGINAL WPA HEADQUARTERS IN WASHINGTON, DC
THURSDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
OVERPASS ON WEST STREET TO NEW JERSEY FERRY TERMINAL GLORIA HERMAN GOT IT !!!
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Deborah Dorff All image are copyrighted (c)
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SIMPLE, DIRECT MESSAGING WAS THE HALLMARK OF THE 1930’S ART FROM THE WORKS PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION. SOME AREAS THAT WERE PUBLICIZED BY THE WPA WERE TRAVEL, HEALTH, NUTRITION AND LATER NATIONAL SECURITY.
TODAY IS TIME FOR A SUMMER TRIP…
FROM THE ARCHIVES
WEEKEND, JULY 30-31, 2022
THE 741st EDITION
W.P.A. ART GOES
ON A
SUMMER TRIP
LOCAL ATTRACTION NEAR THE 1939 WORLD’S FAIR, WHO KNEW?
Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Deborah Dorff All image are copyrighted (c)
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
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Feiner, left, at a Perkins&Will design review meeting in 2016, is credited with having transformed the architecture of federal buildings.
Photo courtesy Perkins&Will
Edward A. Feiner, who spearheaded the General Services Administration’s design excellence program as GSA’s chief architect from 1996-2005, died on July 1. The cause of death was a brain tumor. Feiner was 75.
“Ed’s intellect, his passion, his energy,” and his outsized personality made him “a force to be reckoned with,” says Leslie L. Shepherd, Feiner’s second-in-command at GSA and successor as chief architect.
“He changed the design and construction of public buildings,” adds Shepherd, who left his post in 2016 and is currently a vice president and national director of GSA programs at Leo A Daly, a multidisciplinary design firm.
In announcing his retirement from GSA in early January 2005, Feiner, then 58, said, “I felt this was a very good time to do it, because we have some very good leadership [at GSA] that believe in the importance [of] design and GSA’s role as a leader in design and construction.”
He added that his biological clock was running out. “This can’t be a nursing home,” he said, hoping change would come “in an elegant and graceful manner.”
ALFONSE D’AMATO FEDERAL COURTHOUSE, EAST ISLIP, NY, RICHARD MEIER AND ASSOCIATES-ARCHITECTS
Crew Cut and Cowboy Boots
The New York City native, known for his unbridled enthusiasm, his crew cut and his cowboy boots, joined GSA in 1981. After leaving in early 2005, Feiner worked at architect-engineer Skidmore Owings & Merrill and the Las Vegas Sands Corp. before landing at Perkins&Will in 2009, where he became director of the firm’s design leadership council.
When Feiner retired from GSA, Robert C. Hixon, Jr., who spent nearly 35 years at GSA before moving to the Architect of the Capitol’s office in 2004, said, “Ed has done a phenomenal job.”
Comparing the boxy buildings GSA built in the 1960s and 70s and the ones constructed after the design excellence program began, in 1994, Hixon called the difference “unbelievable.”
GSA’s construction excellence program was then shaped after the design excellence program. Even State Dept. buildings were affected by GSA’s design excellence, says Shepherd, who had breakfast every week with Feiner for the last 17 years and was at his bedside when he died.
Under the program, a board composed of GSA and private-sector members—architect peers—reviews submissions from design firms and draws up a short list. After much study, the peer-review panel ranks the submissions and GSA selects a winner.
Feiner personally reviewed and approved the conceptual designs of all federal courthouses developed by GSA from 1985 through 2005. He said in a 2005 interview with ENR that after putting design firms through the “torture” of GSA reviews and his own comments, “part of me wanted to be in that back room,” where the private architects on the peer review panel grappled with how to react.
The position of supervising architect of the U.S. dates back to the early 19th century at the Treasury Dept. But it was abolished in the 1930s. In 1996, Robert Peck, GSA’s Public Buildings Service commissioner at the time, decided to re-establish the chief architect’s position and picked Feiner, who basically, but unofficially, had been the agency’s lead design official.
“Ed’s accomplishment consisted of coming from within and knowing how to institutionalize the change,” Peck said, at the time of Feiner’s retirement.
OKLAHOMA CITY FEDERAL BUILDING, BENHAM ARCHITECTURE
GSA’s Green Buildings Standard
As chief architect, Feiner also set the course for GSA’s green buildings standard and for a performance-based approach to designing federal buildings for security.
He is a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects. His other honors include the Augustus St. Gaudens Award in 1997 from the Cooper Union Alumni Association, the AIA Thomas Jefferson Award for public architecture, an ENR Newsmaker award in 2001 for the design excellence program and the Presidential Rank Award for Meritorious Service in 2003.
Before his tenure at GSA, Feiner spent 11 years with the Naval Facilities Engineering Command, interrupted by a job with Gruen Associates. At NAVFAC, he focused mainly on planning, and rose to be become head of its master planning branch.
Feiner is a graduate of Cooper Union with a bachelor’s in architecture and the Catholic University of America, with a master’s in architecture in urban design.
At the time of Feiner’s retirement from GSA, then Public Buildings Service Commissioner F. Joseph Moravec said his “commitment to the proposition that our public buildings should reflect the best aspects of American civilization has helped to establish our agency as one of the nation’s premier patrons of architecture. His work has had a profound impact on communities across the country, and his legacy will endure as long as our buildings stand.
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An early postcard shows horse drawn vehicles, omnibuses and motorcars passing the colorful Beaux Arts wonder. In 1906 when the Singer Sewing Machine Company announced its plans for a new headquarters building, engineering and technological advances had already changed the face of downtown Manhattan. Steel skeletons made higher buildings possible and passenger elevators made them feasible. But not everyone was excited about the prospect of skyscrapers. In 1902 A. J. Bloor warned in The Architects and Builders’ Magazine that “calamity is also in store for the public” and later that year wrote to the editor of the New-York Tribune saying “firemen are ‘afraid’ of the skyscraper. They have good reason to be.” Despite it all, the skyscraper was here to stay. The rush was on to build taller and costlier office buildings. On July 22, 1906 the New-York Daily Tribune wrote of the $75 million worth of new buildings going up in Downtown—including the soaring Singer Building. In an article titled “Vast Sums, Vast Piles” it singled out the planned structure. “The Singer Building is to be the one that the visitor to New York will go to see on his first day in town…[It] will be thirty-six stories high, but what will make it yet more remarkable is the fact that twenty-five of these stories will rise up like a tower, almost as high in itself as the Washington Monument, from a fundamental building of eleven stories in height….The architect, Ernest Flagg, says that there will be no exposed woodwork throughout the building. Its cost will be $1,500,000.” Flagg had designed the existing Singer Building at No. 561 Broadway. A proponent of providing adequate sunlight and ventilation, he worried about the shadowy “ravines” that could eventually result from sheer walls of masonry lining the narrow streets of the Financial District. His design for the new Singer Building would exemplify his push for towers narrower than the base, allowing sunlight to filter onto the streets.
The newspapers were quick to draw comparisons to existing buildings. “With the exception of the Eiffel Tower the Singer Building will be the loftiest structure in the world,” asserted The New York Times. “It will be nearly 60 feet higher than the Philadelphia City Hall, more than 200 feet higher than the Park Row Building or The Times Building and over 100 feet higher than any of the famous spires of Europe, with the exception of those of the Cologne Cathedral, which rise 512 feet above the ground.”
A sketch in 1908 showed the tower in relation to other landmarks like the Washington Monument — A History of the Construction of the Singer Building (copyright expired)
Construction would take two years to complete and New Yorkers followed the progress with riveted interest. By January 2, 1907, as the skeleton rose, plans had changed and an additional five floors were added to the height. “The tower of the Singer Building will have forty-one floors containing offices, and will be thirteen stories higher than any other structure now standing in the city,” said the New-York Tribune. Flagg’s Beaux Arts design—sometimes tagged “Second Empire Baroque”—was lavished with ornamentation. At every seventh story, on all four sides of the tower, were cast iron balconies supported by ornamental wrought iron brackets. The window openings were graced with ornamental iron railings with French scrolled designs. The architect used dark red face brick, combined with 1,500 cubic feet of North River bluestone for the base courses, windowsills, entrance steps, and other trim; as well as 4,280,000 pounds of limestone. Terra cotta details went so far as to include three entire balconies of the material on each of the four facades fabricated by The New Jersey Terra Cotta Co.
Even before construction was completed the Singer Building was an attention-getter. On August 29, 1907 Prince Wilhelm of Sweden was taken to the 29th floor. The prince stayed for half an hour taking in the panorama. “It is simply magnificent,” he told reporters. “Beyond all doubt it is the grandest sight I have ever beheld in my life.” The prince was especially interested in visiting the rising skyscraper because most of the ironworkers were Swedish-born. “He was told by the Engineer that, probably on account of their early training on ship masts and other high places, Swedes were found to be the safest men on the ‘tail jobs’ of any of the nationalities which work at them.” Less than two months later crowds on the sidewalk below gazed in amazement as not a Swede, but an Italian, was raised 612 feet from the pavement to install the ball on the top of the flagpole. “The highest point above the sidewalk ever attained by a man outside of a balloon in New York was reached yesterday by Ernest Capelle, steeplejack, who placed the golden ball on the top of the flagpole that surmounts the Singer Building in lower Broadway,” reported the New-York Tribune on October 11, 1907.
A miniscule Ernest Capelle can be seen at the top of the flagpole on October 10, 1907 — New-York Tribune October 11, 1907 (copyright expired) Prior to going up the flagpole Capelle dismissed questions of fear. “Afraid! Why, it’s no better—or worse—to fall off a little country church steeple than it is to fall off this pole.” Having affixed the ball onto the flagpole, Capelle then had to gold leaf it. “With the ball once in place, the crowd saw him puttering about the top as he lay back in the rope sling that held him. He was putting the gold leaf on the ball, but this was not evident until he had finished and slipped down a few feet.” Inside the building, Flagg lavished the public spaces with costly materials. According to the building’s chief engineer Otto Francis Semsch “Nowhere…in recent work has greater advantage been taken of the possibilities of the enrichment of marble by the use of decorative bronze than in the Singer Building.”
Bronze railings and medalions compliment the several different types of marble. At the end of the hall is the bronze-cased Master Clock that regulated all the “secondary clocks” throughout the building.– A History of the Construction of the Singer Building (copyright expired)
The entrance “doorway” was a 24-foot high bronze grille. Inside, the marble columns and walls were embellished with more than 3,600 lineal feet of cast bronze molding plus 80 bronze medallions bearing the trademark of the Singer Manufacturing Company. The elevator doors, stair railings, interior balconies, office doors and the master-clock on the main stairs in the lobby were all of bronze. Thirty-eight tons of ornamental bronze were used. The executive offices of the Singer company covered the entire 34th floor. Here were Oriental rugs, custom-designed Empire-inspired mahogany furniture and carved woodwork. Semsch commented “Such furniture appeals to the discriminating man and creates the right impression upon all who see it.”
The Directors’ Room upon opening in 1908 — A History of the Construction of the Singer Building (copyright expired)
The building was completed in 1908 and the newspapers scrambled to print lists of staggering figures couched in hyperbole. “It contains 136 miles of various kinds of metal piping,” reported The Sun on June 28. “The telephones, elevators electric lights, fans and clocks require 3,425 miles of wire, which if stretched out would extend from the top of the Singer Building to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, with 300 miles left over. “The steel used in the construction of the Singer Building if made into ¾ uinch wire cable, would reach from New York to Buenos Ayres, a distance of 7,100 miles. The total length of the steel bearing columns in the building is about ten miles.
The lobby ceiling was a masterpiece of plasterwork. The “skylights” in the domes were electrically lighted. A History of the Construction of the Singer Building (copyright expired) “The terra cotta floor blocks in the building, if spread out on a plane, would cover 8.96 acres. Placed end to end they would extend 97 miles, or further than New York to Philadelphia.” And so on. For eighteen months it would proudly hold the title as tallest building in the world. The observation tower opened on the 42nd Floor on July 1 of that year. Never before had New Yorkers seen the city from so lofty a perch. The Evening World remarked “It gives a sightseeing radius of thirty miles in all directions and being the highest observation tower in the world, it affords a vew never before possible except from an airship.” The Safe Deposit Company of New York took about 10,000 square feet in the basement of the new building, signing a 20 year lease. The term “basement,” however, was misleading. Ornate columns and arched vaults upheld a series of domes in the cathedral-like space. Semsch said that the specially-designed and constructed level “offers its patrons the most secure, elaborate and convenient means for the safe keeping of valuables.”
The Singer Building was the first in New York to be dramatically lit at night. This postcard’s boast “Highest building in the world” would last only 18 months.
Meanwhile, upstairs, tenants enjoyed ultra-modern conveniences. There was a central, building-wide vacuum system, a refrigerating plant for the cooling of the drinking water (which was filtered), and an amazing electric clock system. “Secondary clocks” were installed throughout the building and were actuated by the master clock in the lobby. The master clock was wound daily by an electric motor that was powered by the electric plant in the building. “The magneto apparatus is released every half minute, thus generating a positive and strong current, and operating the secondary clocks throughout the building,” explained Otto Semsch in his “A History of the Singer Building Construction.” Not everyone loved the building. The New York Globe scoffed “For anyone but an eagle, the occupancy of a perch over 600 feet up is a matter of sentiment rather than reason, and until there is a balloon fire-rescue service established, there ought to be some limit to our real estate owners’ appropriation of the skies.” The newspaper called it an “architectural giraffe.” Unfortunately, extremely tall buildings not only offered a stunning view, they offered a convenient means of suicide. Albert Goldman, an agent for the Mutual Life Insurance Company, was one of the early victims. On August 10, 1916 Police Headquarters received a letter from Goldman. “The writer said he had decided to end his life by jumping from some high building down town, and begged the Police Commissioner to forgive any annoyance he might cause by his act,” reported The New York Times a day later. With scores of “high buildings” as possible choices, orders were sent from headquarters to post guards at all skyscrapers in the Financial District. A few minutes before a policeman arrived at the Singer Building, Goldman flung himself from the observation platform. The Times was a bit lurid in its details. “Lower Broadway and the cross streets were thronged at the time, and thousands saw Goldman’s body in the last hundred feet or so of its drop and heard it strike the pavement, their attention having been drawn by the shrieks of persons who had happened to be looking at the tower when the man made his leap into space. The body struck the mansard roof at the thirteenth story, bounded over the eave and almost across Broadway to the sidewalk in front of the windows of McCue Brothers & Drummond, opposite the entrance to the Singer Building.” It was the first suicide from the Singer Building and it unnerved the Superintendent, A. J. Bleecker who ordered the tower closed to visitors for several days. “This is the first occurrence of its kind we have had here,” he told reporters, “and as all such deeds are known to prompt others to similar acts, we have decided not to risk a repetition through morbid suggestion.” It was not the observation platform that served as the jumping point for Austin Adams, Jr. The 59-year old wheelbarrow manufacturer visited his attorney at the offices of Douglass Moore and Grover C. Snifflin regarding business matters on October 15, 1930. The firm had its offices on the 24th floor. When Adams arrived, Moore was out of the office so, according to The New York Times, he “put aside his coat, hat and umbrella and began reading a magazine to wait for his lawyer.” When Sniffin, who was sitting at a desk in the same room, walked out for a few moments, he returned to find Adams missing. The man had thrown himself out of the office window, falling to his death on the 14th floor setback. “The police said that Adams was apparently depressed over business difficulties.” Despite the newspaper-selling tragedies, the glorious Singer Building drew little undue attention. For decades it served as one of New York’s foremost tourist attractions and indisputably one of the handsomest structures in the city. Then on November 16, 1961 the Singer Manufacturing Company announced that after more than half a century in its iconic headquarters, it had leased six floors at 30 Rockefeller Center. The Singer Building was put on the market. Two years later United States Steel assumed control of the property. The firm bought up surrounding structures and on August 22, 1967 The New York Times said “The first signs of demolition activity are marking the beginning of the end for a historic office building in downtown Manhattan.” In its place United States Steel planted a 50-story tower. The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission had been established in 1965. But it was still testing the legal and preservationist waters. In September 1965 it had designated the Jerome Mansion on Madison Square a landmark, deeming it “priceless.” Now, the same year that the Singer Building was schedule for demolition, the Jerome Mansion was bulldozed to the ground. Alan Burnham, executive director of the Landmarks Preservation Commission praised the Singer Building. “The building held the seeds of modernity,” he said. But he excused the Commission in its resistance to landmark the structure. “If the building were made a landmark, we would have to find a buyer for it or the city would have to acquire it. The city is not that wealthy and the commission doesn’t have a big enough staff to be a real-estate broker for a skyscraper.” So as the head of the LPC spoke like a businessman rather than a preservationist, demolition continued. On March 27, 1968 it was well under way. “Yesterday the lobby looked as if a bomb had hit it,” remarked The New York Times. “The Italian-marble surfacing and the bronze medallions with the Singer monogram were stripped from many columns and were being offered for sale. “Holes pocked the elaborately sculptured pendentives that support the series of domes forming the ceiling. Plaster flaked onto a floor strewn with wood, shattered brick and discarded coffee cups.” Since the last brick was removed from the site, the Singer Building remains the tallest building in the world to be purposefully demolished. On the site rose the 54-story U.S. Steel Building, later renamed One Liberty Plaza.
LIBERTY BELL, PHILADEPHIA ALEXIS VILLAFANE, GLORIA HERMAN, NINA LUBLIN, JINNY EWALD, ARON EISENPREISS, HARA REISER, LAURA HUSSEY, & ED LITCHER ALL RANG IN EARLY!
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Deborah Dorff All image are copyrighted (c)
Sources
DAYTONIAN IN MANHATTAN
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There were two Meneely bell founderies, based on either side of the Hudson River in New York state.
The first Meneely bell foundry was established in 1826 in West Troy (now Watervliet), New York,by Andrew Meneely, a former apprentice in the foundry of Benjamin Hanks. Two of Andrew’s sons continued to operate the foundry after his death, and it remained a family operation until its closure.
The second Meneely bell foundry was established in 1870 by a third son, Clinton H. Meneely, across the river in Troy, New York. Initially he was in partnership with George H. Kimberly, under the name Meneely & Kimberly; this second foundry was reorganized in 1879 as the Clinton H. Meneely Bell Company, then later as the Meneely Bell Company.
Like its related competitor, it remained a family operation until its closure. Business cards for both of the competing Meneely bell foundries appearing in the Troy Daily Times May 20, 1891 The two foundries competed vigorously (and sometimes bitterly) with each other.
Together, they produced about 65,000 bells before they both closed in 1952.
1891-05-20 dueling Meneely ads. Our bell was made by Meleely & Co., West Troy. Next time you are at the Farmer’s Market, check out the markings on the bell and hanger.
The bell placed awkwardly on a concrete slab with the inappropriate benches around it. Not a pleasant site, since trash blows into the area and the walk is never power washed.
Kids love to look into the bell to discover there is no clapper.
The Meneely name is on the iron saddle holding the bell at an awkward position.
Stains have not been removed from the bronze.
RIHS Calendar…Coming Events this fall
FREE Roosevelt Island Historical Society Lecture Series in conjunction with the New York Public Library. Attend in person at the NYPL Branch, 504 Main St., or on Zoom. Registration links will be posted.
Tuesday, September 20, 6:30–7:30
Pack Horse Librarians Before there were bookmobiles, there were Appalachian women who delivered books, Bibles and magazines on horseback during the Depression. Jeffrey S. Urbin, Education Specialist and Director of the Pare Lorentz Film Center at the Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum in Hyde Park, talks about this little known activity of the Works Progress Administration (WPA).
Tuesday, October 18, 6:30–7:30
A Queer History of the Women’s House of Detention Hugh Ryan, historian and author of The Women’s House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison, sheds light on this Greenwich Village Landmark that, from 1929 to 1974, incarcerated many women simply for the crimes of being poor and insufficiently feminine.
Tuesday, November 15, 6:30–7:30
Benedict Arnold: Hero Betrayed Before he was a turncoat, he was an American hero. James K. Martin, Professor Emeritus at the University of Houston and author of Benedict Arnold, Revolutionary Hero: An American Warrior Reconsidered, reveals the strategic genius of Arnold, his essential contributions to the Revolutionary War, and his mistreatment at the hands of his superiors.
Tuesday, Dec. 13, 6:30–7:30
Back Number Budd Victorians did not consider old periodicals valuable and did not save them, which severely limited the resources of researchers—unless they knew Robert M. “Back Number” Budd. Prize-winning author Ellen G. Garvey, PhD, tells about this African-American dealer who stockpiled millions of newspapers that he collected from hotels, clubs and libraries.
SARATOGA RACE TRACK ENTRANCE ED LITCHER, TRACY ROBILOTTO AND LAURA HUSSEY GOT IT RIGHT.
MONDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
(A LITTLE LATE) THE ROMAN BATHS, BATH ENGLAND ED LITCHER, LAURA HUSSEY GOT IT RIGHT
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated:
WIKIMEDIA JUDITH BERDY
RIHS (C) FUNDING PROVIDED BY ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE GRANTS CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE BEN KALLOS DISCRETIONARY FUNDING THRU DYCD
In the more than two hundred years of its existence, the historic village of Ballston Spa in Saratoga County, NY, has possessed one building which achieved national, perhaps even world-wide, renown.
I refer, of course, to the Sans Souci Hotel, which graced the east end of Front Street near Milton Avenue for some 84 years in the 19th century. To more precisely orient the modern reader, while you are enjoying your favorite beverage in a well-known Ballston tea shop, which is exactly opposite the north end of Low Steet, you are sharing the space previously occupied by the main lobby of the Sans Souci Hotel and metaphorically rubbing shoulders with the likes of Joseph Bonaparte, ex-king of Spain and brother of Napoleon.
It is Nicholas Low, owner of the tract which became Ballston Spa, and a man who knew how to think big, to whom must be given the credit for guiding and financing the project which breathed life into the idea of this village becoming a successful resort.
He was advised that the best way to profit from his holdings was to attract visitors to the mineral spring located at the southwestern edge of his property. So Low first built in 1792 a lodging house and a bathing facility hard by the original spring and just opposite the hotel which later became Brookside.
Very soon, more springs were discovered to the east of the original one, in the valley of Gordon’s Creek, an area known as the Flats. From the initial steps to capitalize upon these new resources came the idea of a larger hotel located on high ground slightly to the east of the Flats.
It is said that the name comes from the 18th century royal palace called the Sanssouci (meaning carefree) in Potsdam, Germany. Another common assertion is that the design of the building was copied from either the Potsdam palace or from the more famous Palace of Versailles in France. There is no evidence that either of the latter is true.
However, the source of the building plans seems indeed to have been Europe, acquired somehow by that famous reprobate Gouverneur Morris and possibly conveyed to America by his servant, a native of Germany, Martin Bromeling, who was to play an important part in the project.
Construction of the hotel started in the summer of 1803 with Martin Bromeling being paid $1500 to be the superintendent of the work for the period through 1805. Andre Berger, an immigrant from France, and said to be a protégé of Low, also was involved. Berger would be the hotel manager on startup. Captain James Hawkins, who owned a local carpentry firm, did the bulk of the construction of the all-wood building.
The hotel had a frontage of 160 feet facing east-west along Front Street and was three stories high (see the photograph of the hotel ca 1875). At each end were wings about 150 feet in length also three stories in height facing to the north. This gave the hotel almost an E shaped footprint Initially the hotel’s capacity was said to be 150 guests, but later on 300 was the advertised figure.
Ancillary buildings included a workshop, and woodshed and, across Washington Street, a bathhouse, ice house, wash house, coach house and stables. Other work involved canalizing Gordon’s Creek to reduce flooding of the Flats, and constructing a conduit known as the “Waterworks” to supply water from a reservoir further uphill around the area of the current High Street.
One of the lasting features of the hotel was added early in the construction when 30 young trees were planted. Furniture installed included 526 chairs, 139 beds and 50 tables.
The hotel was ready to receive its first guests in the summer of 1805. Andre Berger was the manager, or boniface, the 19th Century term for his job. Original documents disclose that the total project cost to Low was $43,000 and that James Hawkins’ company took home $26,300 (61%) of this sum. (I asked an expert if Hawkins did good work for that impressive pay. It turns out that at best it might be judged inconsistent. – something to do with the doors not opening correctly at the “Grand Opening”!)
The hotel did very well during Nicholas Low’s ownership, which lasted through the 1822 season. Andre Berger seems to have been manager for that entire period. But in early 1823 Low sold the hotel and all his Ballston Spa property to Harvey Loomis. Loomis held on to the hotel for about ten years but thereafter the ownership changed frequently, because of competition from the rising power of Saratoga Springs and the failure of the original springs at Ballston Spa.
In 1849, for the first time the Sans Souci was out of the hotel business and converted into a Law School. This sabbatical lasted till 1853. In 1863 the hotel was converted into a “ladies seminary” but returned to hotel work in 1868, partly because new mineral springs were being developed again in Ballston Spa by the deep drilling technique. Indeed, the Sans Souci Hotel in 1870 activated its own “spouter” by drilling in the rear of the building, directly behind the main lobby.
Nevertheless, time was running out for the venerable institution. The hotel closed permanently in 1883 and was sold to Eugene F. O’Connor in 1887. He was intent on developing the hotel lot for an opera house and retail space, so he had the hotel demolished in the winter of 1887-88.
But in an important sense it lives on still in the form of its spring. The spring operated as a retail outlet of potable mineral water until 1967. Later, the water was piped to a free drinking fountain at Wiswall Park until a few years ago. The spring water is still available at the Medbury Spa on Front Street.
A LITTLE MORE HISTORY
History
The village was first settled in 1771. In 1787 Benajah Douglas, grandfather of 1860 presidential candidate Stephen A. Douglas, built the first tavern and hotel at Ballston Spa. It was located near the natural spring.[6]
In 1803, Ballston Spa’s Sans Souci Hotel, at the time the largest hotel in the United States, was built by Nicholas Low. Presidents, senators and governors stayed there, as well as many wealthy private citizens.[7] Ballston Spa was incorporated as a village in 1807.
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
Sources NEW YORK ALMANACK
Photo of Sans Souci Hotel, Ballston Spa, ca 1875.
Sam McKenzie received a PhD in Chemistry from St. Andrews in Scotland, then worked in the petrochemical industry for 33 years. Since 2015 he has been a volunteer researcher for Brookside Museum. His research interests have included the history of the Mineral Springs of Ballston Spa, and is now studying the lives of the brothers Isaac and Nicholas Low.
FUNDING PROVIDED BY ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE GRANTS CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE BEN KALLOS DISCRETIONARY FUNDING THRU DYCD
This pile of masks is history. As a collector of all types of ephemera, face masks will be memory of the Covid Pandemic. Ours is not a political statement, but one of personal and group protection. We care for ourselves, for our family and neighbors and have one on-hand.
The first ones I obtained were homemade. We were happy to have them no matter what protection they offered.
This homemade mask was made by a voter in 2020. He brought me one when we were swamped with votes at Wagner JHS.
Our neighbor located fabric featuring Roosevelt Island, which has been very popular seller in the kiosk.
Who ever thought that a mask would become a collectable from a new hotel?
Our friends at Materials for the Arts provided us with hundreds of wonderful masks made by Kate Spade. Just in time for the holidays, they were most appreciated gifts.
Prepared for a Pandemic Time parade Macy’s had Santa masks for participants.
You cannot lower your mask at any City Hospital. Kids and parents sizes are available!
With the help of a pineapple and mangos these cotton masks are ready to be used, though not reccommended now. Maybe there will be a new use to protect the fruit.
Some tropical decor on the counter with an new floral addtion
Though never worn, these theme masks stack up on the shelf!
Forgot your mask? The tram and red bus staff will provide one of these to you!
MONDAY PHOTO
Send your response to: rooseveltislandhistory@gmail.com THERE ARE TWO ILLEGALLY PARKED MOTORCYCLES PARKED OUTSIDE ISLAND HOUSE. NEITHER CYCLE HAD A LICENSE. WHEN CALLED PSD, REFUSED TO RESPOND. SUNDAY 5P.M.
WEEKEND PHOTO
THE WAVERTREE at the South Street Seaport Museum Hara Reiser, Aron Eisenpreis, Ed Litcher, Gloria Herman all know their ships!!
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Deborah Dorff All image are copyrighted (c)
Sources
Judith Berdy
GRANTS
CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE BEN KALLOS DISCRETIONARY FUNDING THRU DYCD
Tucked away from view as you walk north of the Coler entrance is the resident garden. This oasis provides a wonderful area to enjoy nature and being out-of-doors. The last few years the garden has provided respite from the isolation of quarantine.
Jovemay Santos, Director of Therapeutic Recreation and Mr. Melrose Barnes, a resident and great gardener can be found in the garden early on summer mornings watering and tending the vegetable garden.
Thru work with other island groups, the Roosevelt Island Garden Club, I Dig to Learn, Angelica Program, and the financial support of the Coler Auxiliary the garden has been enhanced and become a popular retreat. Many events are held in the garden including BBQ’s which are most popular.
FROM THE ARCHIVES
WEEKEND, JULY 23-24, 2022
THE 734th EDITION
THE RESIDENT GARDEN
AT COLER
The ceramic carp have been the centerpiece of the garden and the plantings form a lovely meditative spot.
Small rock gardens are spaced under the giant magnolias.
Momo, Coler’s healing hound knows a shady spot to relax while gardening takes place.
Jovemay and Mr. Barnes are usually in the garden early in the morning watering in tending the vegetable plants.
The vegetables include cucumber, peppers, zucchini, tomatoes and herbs are in elevated planters which are easy for residents to use.
YOU CAN SUPPORT THE COLER GARDEN TAX DEDUCTIBLE DONATION CAN BE MADE TO THE COLER HOSPTIAL AUXILIARY. ALL DONATIONS WILL BE GREATLY APPRECIATED AND USED TO UPDATE AND IMPROVE FACILITIES FOR THE RESIDENTS. E-MAIL US AT: JOVEMANY.SANTOS@NYCHHC.ORG
Some of the seals at the Central Park Zoo have the best deal in the City this summer!! Andy Sparberg, Nina Lublin, Jay Jacobson, Alexis Villafane, Hara Reiser, and Vicki Feinmel all got it right!
Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Deborah Dorff All image are copyrighted (c)
SOURCES
Judith Berdy
GRANTS
CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE BEN KALLOS DISCRETIONARY FUNDING THRU DYCD
Good news is that our City temperature is not rising as rapidly as in other parts of the country. Bad news is that we’ve got other things to worry about.
The hottest day in NYC history was July 9, 1936, when the temperatures reached 106 degrees. This was the most severe heat wave in our country’s modern history, with 3,000 people dying and some 30 years before air conditioning became widely accessible..
New York Times, July 19, 1936
According to the Daily News, “heat was humanly bearable only because the humidity, at 44 percent, was low. If it were twice as high … human life would be almost impossible.” And the Times claimed that “In the canyons of the financial district men and women reported the heat waves visible.” It was so hot that Mayor Guardia let out all city employees from work at 1:45 pm and thousands of WPA workers were given a half-day. Fire hydrants were pried open in every neighborhood. In Red Hook, Brooklyn and in many other places, the hydrants lowered the water pressure so much that residents above the second floor were unable to get water in their homes. And on Park Avenue “so many hydrants were in emergency use that the waters mounted above the curb and the cars splashed through six and eight inches of it.” “In the great shopping districts in the Thirties, the pavements became so soft in the late afternoon that the crosswalks were dotted with rubber heals that were caught in the asphalt and tar as women passed by. In some spots the asphalt blistered.”
“Coney Island, the Rockaways and other metropolitan beaches again had their hundreds of thousands of city folks cooling off in salt water, including thousands who had remained all night on the Bach sand.” Tens of thousands of New Yorkers, looking for relief, slept in city parks throughout the night. The mayor authorized most parks to remain open and police were directed not to harass people who slept on benches or on the ground. And even Robert Moses flew in for the rescue, authorizing that all city swimming pools remain open until midnight.
The 10 hottest days in New York City history, according to the National Weather Service: 1. July 9, 1936 — 106 degrees 2. July 22, 2011 — 104 degrees (tied) July 21, 1977 — 104 degrees (tied) Aug. 7, 1918 — 104 degrees 5. July 6, 2010 — 103 degrees (tied) Aug. 9, 2010 — 103 degrees (tied) July 3, 1966 — 103 degrees (tied) Aug. 26, 1948 — 103 degrees 9. July 15, 1995 — 102 degrees (tied) July 10, 1993 — 102 degrees
More? Since 1870, high temperatures of 100° or hotter have occurred in 31 years, about once every five years. The longest span without any 100-degree days was 16 years, between 1882-1897. More recently, there was a 10-year span between 1981-1990, and eight years between 2002-2009. In the ten-year years between 2010-12.
What about hot summers?
New York’s five hottest summers (since 1869) have all occurred since 1960: 2010, 1966, 1993, 1983 and 1999. The summer of 1966, New York’s second hottest on record, recorded the hottest average monthly high temperature. Although July 1999 was the hottest month on record based on mean daily temperature (average of the day’s high and low), the average high in July 1966 was hotter than July 1999 by 0.1-degree, 90.3° vs 90.2°. However, July 1999’s average low was 3.5 degrees warmer (72.6° vs 69.1°) and that’s what easily put it on top. Eight Julys have had a mean temperature of 80.0° or higher (the most recent was in 2020). The first time it happened was in 1952.
Another way of looking at hot summers is at the concentration of the hottest days. Records dating back to 1872 show that the most 90°days in a year has been 39 – and this happened twice – in 1991 and 1993. However, while 1991’s occurred over a lengthy span of 23 weeks, 1993’s were more concentrated, occurring over five fewer weeks. While 1991 experienced 90°temperatures during 24% of the summer season, 1993’s corresponding figure was 31%. Yet, neither of these hot summers come close to 1999. Although that year had ten fewer 90°, they were concentrated in a sixty-day period. And 1988 wasn’t far behind, with 33 90°days over 77 days (43% concentration).
No doubt, it’s getting hotter. Nationally, the average summer temperature in the past five years has been 1.7ºF warmer than it was from 1971 through 2000. But temperature increase here has been less than in other places and may be increasing slower. (Only one of the city’s hottest summers has come in this century.)
But the Western region’s temperature over the past five summers averaged 2.7ºF warmer than in 1971-2000, more than any other region in the contiguous US. And perhaps it’s getting worse. Summer in the West in 2021 was 4.5ºF warmer than the 1971-2000 avg; summer temperatures in Reno have risen 10.9°F on average since 1970, making it the fastest warming city in the nation during the hottest months.
And we’ve not experienced the extreme heat waves that have devastated other areas: An historic heat wave in the Pacific Northwest sent temperatures climbing more than 30° higher than average. Portland broke records three days in a row, peaking at 116 °F, a heat wave that killed nearly 200 people in Oregon and Washington.
So far, we’ve been spared the worst of temperature change, but bigger problems may lie ahead. Flooding.
We know that sea levels along New York’s coast have already risen more than a foot since 1900 and that New York’s coastal counties are home to more than half of New Yorkers.
What’s coming? Some say that by 2100, sea levels will be 18 to 75 inches higher than today along New York’s coastlines. Others: “In a worst-case scenario, much of Manhattan would be submerged by 2300” if current greenhouse gas emission rates are not curbed. A group of researchers found that, although New York City used to only have flooding of 7.4 feet or more every 25 years, that could start happening every five years as early as 2030. It also predicted a 5-to-11-inch sea level rise in New York City between 2000 and 2030.
Even limiting global warming to a best-case scenario of 1.5° C warmer would still cause irreparable harm. Sea levels in the metropolitan area have risen by almost 9 inches since 1950, and the pace is accelerating — increasing by 1 inch every seven to eight years. Currently, 120 square miles of New York City is only 6 feet above high tide, making it prone to storm flooding. These areas are home to nearly a half-million people, 1,500 miles of road, 100 public schools — all estimated at more than $100 billion in value, according to the research organization Climate Central. Hurricane Sandy’s highest flood level was measured at 9 feet above the high tide in 2012. Extreme flooding is estimated to increase by about 20% if sea levels rise roughly 6 inches more than 2020 levels by 2040, according to the IPCC report. This fallout doubles if seas rise to nearly 2.5 feet more.
Finally, on average each year, approximately 370 deaths are heat related. This is made up of an estimated 360 heat-exacerbated deaths, which happen when heat worsens existing chronic conditions such as heart disease, and 10 heat stress deaths, which are caused directly by heat. The average annual number of heat-related deaths represents about 2% of all deaths each warm season from May to September. We are aware that neither summer heat nor its effects are distributed evenly across the city. But perhaps that’s another RIHS article.
Just to end this hot story at a different degree, what about the coldest day in New York City? According to AccuWeather, the 10 coldest days in New York City history are: Jan. 24, 1882, with 6° degrees below zero Feb. 10, 1899, with 6 degrees below zero Dec. 29, 1917, with 6 degrees below zero Feb. 5, 1918, with 6 degrees below zero Dec. 30, 1933, with 6 degrees below zero Dec. 31, 1917, with 7° degrees below zero Feb. 8, 1934, with 7 degrees below zero Feb. 15, 1943, with 8° degrees below zero Dec. 30, 1917, with 13° degrees below zero Feb. 9, 1943, with 15° degrees below zero
The winter of 1934 was one of the coldest on record. It was so cold that the Raritan Bay shipping channel completely froze over, permitting folks to skate from Staten Island to New Jersey.
But upstate (I think that’s the part north of Westchester) wins. According to The Weather Channel, the coldest temperature ever seen in New York State was 52° below zero set at Old Forge, a hamlet in upstate Herkimer County, on February 18, 1979.
The Peace Pagoda was presented to Londoners by the Venerable Nichidatsu Fuji (affectionately nicknamed ‘Guruji’ by his close friend Mahatma Gandhi) in 1984. Founder of the Japanese Buddhist movement, Nipponzan Myohoji, Guruji stated that ‘Civilisation is not to kill human beings, not to destroy things, nor make war; civilisation is to hold mutual affection and to respect one another’. Following the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he pledged to build pagodas worldwide as shrines to peace. The Battersea pagoda was constructed by nuns, monks and other followers of the Nipponzan Myohoji sect and was completed in 1985 just weeks after Guruji died at the grand old age of 100.
RIHS (C) FUNDING PROVIDED BY ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE GRANTS CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE BEN KALLOS DISCRETIONARY FUNDING THRU DYCD
Maybe it is myth to sit in a gazebo and catch the cool breezes, or just better than thinking of trying to stay cool in 90+ degree heat. Stay cool and enjoy the images.
Beyond the fountain in the Italianate section of the Conservatory Garden stands the Wisteria Pergola.
Cop Cot is a small wooden shelter built in 1984—one of several Central Park rustic structures created with rough-hewn logs in intricate designs.
Wagner Cove
Ladies Pavilion
Ladies sitting under shaded chairs on the west promenade in back of Good Shepherd
A pavilion outside City Home
It may not have the glamour of a classic gazebo, but the permanent tent outside Coler offers a shelter and great view of the river. It is paved and used for many events.
OYSTER BAR, GRAND CENTRAL TERMINAL ED LITCHER, ARON EISENPREISS, ANDY SPARBERG, LAURA HUSSEY, JAY JACOBSON, JANET KING, HARA REISER, GLORIA HERMAN, NINA LUBLIN, ARLEE BESSENOFF, ALEXIS VILLAFANE ALL GOT IT RIGHT!!
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Deborah Dorff All image are copyrighted (c)
Sources
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS CENTRAL PARK CONSERVANCY
FUNDING PROVIDED BY ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE GRANTS CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE BEN KALLOS DISCRETIONARY FUNDING THRU DYCD
Ladies Pavilion
