With its signature two-toned design and illustrations, the mock newspaper encouraged polite passenger etiquette and promoted local attractions.
Fred Cooper, “10th Biennial International Water Color Exhibition/Brooklyn Museum” (1939) (all images courtesy Poster House unless noted otherwise)
Decades before the New York City subway cars were lined with advertisements for niche dating apps, personal injury lawyers, prescription weight loss medicines, and alternative internet browsers, the interiors of many of the city’s trains were adorned with editions of the two-toned mock newspaper known as The Subway Sun.
Primarily produced between 1936 and 1965 under the artistic direction of late cartoonists Fred Cooper and Amelia Opdyke Jones, the imitation periodical campaign by the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT) fulfilled a variety of purposes in the subway system for over five decades. It encouraged polite passenger etiquette, but also promoted local attractions as a way to entice New Yorkers to use public transit — from the Metropolitan Museum of Art to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden.
Fred Cooper, “The Cloisters” (1938)
Now, Manhattan’s Poster House is shining a light on the series for the first time in the new exhibition From the Bronx to the Battery: The Subway Sun, on view in the museum’s entry foyer through November 2. Curated by Es-pranza Humphrey, the show features 17 original in-car posters from the museum’s permanent collection, produced between 1937 and 1939. They showcase Cooper’s unique type design and signature illustration style that would eventually became the series’s defining aesthetic.
When The Subway Sun initially appeared in 1918 as a weekly promotional campaign for the IRT, the posters mainly focused on service announcements, operating expenses, and rules of conduct. They imitated the appearance of genuine newspapers, heavily laden with text and scarcely featuring illustrations. This design, however, shifted within a few years after the campaign began to incorporate advertisements for local sights and activities as a means to increase ridership.
Fred Cooper, “Rose Display/Brooklyn Botanic Garden” (1937)
Cooper was an established graphic artist and political cartoonist when his designs for The Subway Sun first launched in the 1930s. His illustrations, which consisted of balloon-headed caricatures and one-of-a-kind lettering, often plugged public sights and events by blending helpful information with amusing characters. “His design adds a level of humor and familiarity, as these are posters that people would interact with during their rides on the IRT,” Humphrey, the museum’s assistant curator of collections, told Hyperallergic.
Fred Cooper, “Free Concerts/Metropolitan Museum of Art” (1938)
In a half-page ad for free weekend concerts at The Met, audience members are depicted together with massive Neo-Assyrian antiquities. Another bright-red poster promoting a rock garden display at the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx revisits people of the Stone Age, depicting a child complaining to their mother about a dinosaur calf that is seen ravaging a bed of campanula cochlearifolia (fairy thimble) in the background. A 1939 ad promoting the 10th Biennial International Water Color Exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum gives a literal interpretation of the arts medium through an illustration of artist at an easel while half submerged in a lily pond.
Fred Cooper, “N.Y. Botanical Garden/Rock Garden Display” (1938)
In the 1940s, Cooper was succeeded by Jones, who also gave the publication a distinct voice. Many of her ads reminded riders how to be courteous to their fellow subway passengers by advising against inconsiderate behaviors like blocking train doors and manspreading — issues that continue to plague the transit system today.
VACATION TIME
After the last few months and a hip replacement, it is time for a week off the island. I will return soon and looking forward to seeing you. Judith Berdy
CREDITS
HYPERALLERGIC Judith Berdy
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
Thursday, June 12, 2025 Untapped New York Issue #1469
Shooter’s Island (Kill Van Kull)
This 43-acre island straddles the border between New York and New Jersey and derives its name from the hunting activities that took place here during the Colonial Era. As New York grew into an industrial port, the island accommodated an oil refinery and shipyard during the 19th century.
Today, the island is owned by the Department of Parks and Recreation, with the Audubon Society managing wildlife research. Many prominent historical figures from George Washington to Theodore Roosevelt and Prince Henry of Prussia once made use of the island, with the former utilizing it as a location to drop off covert messages during the Revolutionary War.
Hoffman & Swinburne Islands (Lower New York Bay)
This duo of artificial islands rests close enough to Staten Island’s shore that a proposal once existed to fill the gap between the landmasses to create a park. Such a proposal might not have existed if the planners had known that the islands originally hosted quarantine stations during the height of immigration into the U.S. in the late 19th/early 20th centuries.
Constructed entirely of iron in order to keep the structures as airtight as possible, the facilities on the islands included a crematory and a mortuary for the less fortunate patients. Advances in the medical treatment of infectious diseases led to the decline of such facilities, with these two closing in 1923. Having been owned by the Department of Parks and Recreation since 1966, the islands were ironically preserved in order to maintain the “natural” topography of New York Bay.
North & South Brother Islands (East River)
Another duo of islands, these brothers are common in name only. North Brother‘s backstory features elements that have become typical for the avid New York historian, with a history of housing the sick, the addicted, and the condemned in confined spaces away from the public. The tuberculosis pavilion has been documented by photographer Christopher Payne, and much literature has been written about the site.
For what South Brother lacks in foreboding tales of the infirm, it makes up for in humorous eyebrow-raising real estate ventures. Originally the property of Jacob Ruppert–the owner of the Yankees largely responsible for bringing Babe Ruth to New York–the island’s only structure burned down in 1909. After Rupper sold the island, the real estate transactions went something like this: private ownership to public ownership to private again to public again, with prices ranging from $10 from an investment firm in 1975 to $2 million of Federal Grant money in 2007.
Rat Island (City Island Harbor)
Gulls are the only living creatures attracted to the island.
As is to be guaranteed in New York, for every obscure real estate venture, there is always one that tops the last. Enter Rat Island, a 2.5-acre mass of bedrock and broken glass with no vegetation. To the average investor, the island is as devoid of value as it is devoid of life. But you won’t be able to discourage Alex Schibli, a former Port Authority employee and City Island resident who purchased the island for $176,000 in 2011.
Schibli claims that he has always wanted an island getaway, but perhaps he’s realized that such a development would be impractical on a landmass that is known for being completely submerged during average summer thunderstorms.
Ellis Island’s Abandoned Southside Hospitals
While Ellis Island has become one of New York City’s top tourist attractions, drawing over two million visitors per year, the 22-building South Side hospital complex is hidden in plain sight, just to the left of disembarking passengers headed towards the Great Hall. Looking at its desolate, skeletal frame now, it’s difficult to imagine its backstory as one of the largest public health undertakings in American history.
But the abandoned Ellis Island Hospital complex—once the standard for United States medical care (and later transformed into the FBI headquarters when the island served as a detention center)—has been left to decay for nearly 60 years. Join us for our upcoming hard hat tour, guided by a Save Ellis Island docent, where we’ll uncover its many, buried secrets. In this experience, you’ll visit the contagious disease wards, and the autopsy rooms, and have exclusive access to places usually closed to the public.
Mau Mau Island (Mill Basin)
Islands have historically played strategic roles for nations and their militaries, and those in New York City are no exception. While the battles on Long Island and Manhattan have been well documented, the naval skirmish that took place on Mau Mau is a little less well-known. That might have had more to do with the post-battle bar hop, though.
In 2011, the artist collective Swimming Cities hosted a raucous day of competitive naval events that pitted “gangs” sailing homemade vessels against one another. The manmade island sits across from Marine Park golf course and has attracted little media attention–save for the construction of a bird sanctuary–since.
High Island (City Island Harbor)
A stone’s throw from New York City’s most treasured obscure landmass, City Island, High Island has also proved a cozy home, first for sharks and then for humans. The bungalow dwellers were kicked out in 1962 to make way for a radio transmission tower, which was hit by a small plane just one day before owner WCBS switched to an all-news format. A new tower has stood in place since the incident and has a daytime broadcast frequency range from Cape Cod to Cape May.
Isle of Meadows (Fresh Kills)
Image courtesy The City of New York and Freshkills Park by Daniel Avila
This 100-acre plot of land is as natural as they come, which is why the Audubon Society has fought so hard for its preservation over the years. Plans for its inclusion in the Fresh Kills Landfill were met with volatile opposition in the early 1990s, and today the island consists entirely of a nature preserve. Once declining populations of herons, ibis, and egrets now call the island home, and it has been considered one of the most crucial such refuges in the New York area.
Hart Island
Home to the largest tax funded cemetery in the world, Hart Island has been the final resting place for over 800,000 since 1869. Jacob Riis documented the island in his book, How the Other Half Lives, and estimated that 1 in 10 New Yorkers were buried on the island by the end of the 19th century. Like North Brother Island, it has often been associated with society’s unwanted, though a recent interview with a former resident indicates that it did not always bare a haunting persona.
The decaying castle structures on Bannerman Island were built near the town of Beacon, New York by Scottish-American entrepreneur Francis Bannerman as warehouses for his business “Bannerman’s,” a catalog business for war surplus (including munitions and large artillery).
The Bannermans discovered the island by accident while canoeing on the Hudson and purchased it from an eccentric husband and wife duo named Mary and Anthony Taft for $600 (plus $1000 in notes that were paid off over two years). The Bannermans had to promise in writing that the island would not go back to its past use as a haven for illegal alcohol and prostitution. Francis Bannerman built the structures gradually. He was not an architect but would draw elements on napkins and envelopes based on castles he saw on travels to Europe, and give the sketches to his construction workers to build.
The current state of the structures is the result of a number of unfortunate incidents. In 1918, Francis Bannerman died and his family lost interest in maintaining the buildings. The powerhouse exploded in 1920, sending debris all the way across the Hudson and blowing out some of the warehouse windows. The gradual construction of the warehouses meant that buildings were supported by one another, lending a fundamental weakness to the design. In addition to the natural toll of time, a particularly harsh winter in 2010 led to the collapse of two major walls of the tallest warehouse.
Chimney Sweeps Islands
The decaying castle structures on Bannerman Island were built near the town of Beacon, New York by Scottish-American entrepreneur Francis Bannerman as warehouses for his business “Bannerman’s,” a catalog business for war surplus (including munitions and large artillery).
The Bannermans discovered the island by accident while canoeing on the Hudson and purchased it from an eccentric husband and wife duo named Mary and Anthony Taft for $600 (plus $1000 in notes that were paid off over two years). The Bannermans had to promise in writing that the island would not go back to its past use as a haven for illegal alcohol and prostitution. Francis Bannerman built the structures gradually. He was not an architect but would draw elements on napkins and envelopes based on castles he saw on travels to Europe, and give the sketches to his construction workers to build.
The current state of the structures is the result of a number of unfortunate incidents. In 1918, Francis Bannerman died and his family lost interest in maintaining the buildings. The powerhouse exploded in 1920, sending debris all the way across the Hudson and blowing out some of the warehouse windows. The gradual construction of the warehouses meant that buildings were supported by one another, lending a fundamental weakness to the design. In addition to the natural toll of time, a particularly harsh winter in 2010 led to the collapse of two major walls of the tallest warehouse.
Like High Island, the Chimney Sweep Islands lie just beneath City Island’s nose. Or, at least, just across Pelham Bay. Both are part of a group of 20 islands situated within the borders of Bronx County known as the “Devil’s Stepping Stones.” With a history of waxing and waning fortunes, they have provided both key landmarks for sailors during the 18th century and have hosted asylums.
As with much of the New York area’s etymology, the island group’s namesake harkens back to Native American origins. According to folklore, the “Devil’s Stepping Stones” are believed to have been formed during a skirmish between a local tribe and the Devil. Every time the Devil set his foot down into the water, a small landmass emerged. Regardless of the accuracy of such tales, the names are indicative of the barren nature of these uninhabited land formations, most of which are composed entirely of bedrock and are devoid of any discernible vegetation.
It is no surprise then that the Chimney Sweep Islands, whose name was probably derived from the fact that they look like chimney sweep tools, have never been inhabited by humans. Rather, flocks of seagulls and blue herons have long called them home, and they have now become popular with kayakers as a resting place.
ONE YEAR AGO
“DOUBLE TAKE” BY DIANA COOPER WAS REVEALED OUTSIDE OUR SUBWAY STATION
CREDITS
UNTAPPED NEW YORK Judith Berdy
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
Wednesday, June 11, 2025 NYC Municipal Archives Issue #1468
Many pieces of New York have been lost over the years – from the days before European settlers arrived through the more recent places we loved, the restaurants we knew and even the sports teams we lost to California, New Jersey and elsewhere. One of the lesser-known losses – as infamous and smelly as it was – is Barren Island, which was located on the southeast shore of Brooklyn, on the way to the beach at Jacob Riis Park. Some of its history can be found in the Municipal Archives – largely in late 19th century state and local Health Department investigations – and in the digital collection of images from the early 20th century.
Houses built on stilts over swamp land, Barren Island, Brooklyn, 1937. Photographer: Edwards. WPA Federal Writers’ Project Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.
Historical records indicate that the Canarsee Native American tribe used what became known as Barren Island as a fishing outpost in the early 17th century and later “signed over” much of it to Dutch settlers. Largely unoccupied for many years, by the mid-19th century it had become a vast dumping ground where tons of waste and dead animals like horses, cattle, dogs, cats, rats and many other species from Brooklyn, Manhattan and The Bronx were rendered in several large factories on the island.The grease extracted from the waste yielded more than $10 million in profits annually.
Street scene, Barren Island, Brooklyn, January 1938. Photographer: Sam Brody. WPA Federal Writers’ Project Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.
The residents, an ethnically diverse mix of blacks and poor European immigrants from Italy, Ireland and Poland, mostly worked in the factories and rendering plants, or service industries like grocery stores and bars. There also was a school, PS 120, and a church.
Catholic Church, Barren Island, Brooklyn, January 1938. Photographer: Sam Brody. WPA Federal Writers’ Project Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.
The Island inhabitants apparently became accustomed to the odors and noxious fumes from the island’s incinerators, but people living in the rest of Brooklyn complained long and loud about the stench. Finally, in October 1890, Governor David Hill responded to complaints about the “nuisance” on Barren Island “which affected the security of life and health” throughout Brooklyn by ordering a State Health Department investigation. The report from that investigation, contained in the archives, noted that a rendering plant operated by Peter White’s Sons received the carcasses of all dead animals collected on the city’s streets. “On an average there are over two thousand hogs kept on the premises… and the dead animals are dismembered and boiled and oils extracted therefrom,” the report said, noting that the odors were carried along to Rockaway Beach and other neighborhoods, “rendering those inhabitants sick and destroying the comfort and enjoyment of their homes.” The report also noted that a fertilizer plant on the island received “large quantities of fish,” which were allowed to accumulate on loading docks. “The smells from those fish factories are so powerful that it is impossible to keep the doors or windows of dwelling houses open when the wind blows from the direction of Rockaway, and many persons have been made sick…” The report recommended that the factories take measures to contain the odors and that state health inspectors make regular visits.
P.S. 120, Barren Island, Brooklyn, ca. 1905. Lantern slide. Board of Education Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.
The results were mixed at best. An 1896 report from the Brooklyn Department of Health – Brooklyn did not become part of New York City until 1898 – found that nuisances were still rife on the island five years after the state report. “This bureau, together with the sanitation bureau and the inspector of offensive trades has kept a close watch of the manufactories situated on Barren Island,” but noted that as long as rendering and fertilizer companies exist, there will be noxious odors and complaints. A subsequent inspection “found at the rendering plant dock three garbage scows, two of them being full and the other about half full… the plant is running night and day.” An inspection report for January 1896 found the carcasses of 21 dogs, 17 cats, 35 rats, along with numerous dead cattle, sheep and horses, which led to the naming of the nearby Dead Horse Bay. The City stopped dumping its garbage there in 1919. Complaints worsened in the early 20th century and the island’s population dwindled from a high of about 1,500 to several dozen by 1936, when City Parks Commissioner Robert Moses ordered the eviction of all residents as part of his plan to expand Marine Park. Before that happened, many of the buildings were abandoned and crumbling, as can be seen in 1930s-era photographs in the Archives.
Abandoned rendering factory, Barren Island, Brooklyn, January 1938. Photographer: Sam Brody. WPA Federal Writers’ Project Collection, NYC Municipal Archives..
The island eventually vanished as the city used landfill and tons of sand to connect it to the rest of Brooklyn. It later become the home of Floyd Bennet Field and eventually part of Gateway National Park area. Now, it is gone and largely forgotten – yet another piece of the lost New York.
Municipal Airport Floyd Bennett Field (remains of incinerator on Barren Island), July 27, 1934. Department of Bridges, Plant & Structures Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.
Demolition of 227 ft. reinforced concrete chimney at Floyd Bennett Airport on March 20th, 1937. NYC Municipal Archives Collection.
Floyd Bennett Field – aerial, May 7, 1970. Department of Marine and Aviation Collection, NYC Municipal Archives.
MOON OVER L.I.C.
A WAXING GIBBOUS PHASE MOON VISIBLE LAST EVENING
CREDITS
NYC MUNICIPAL ARCHIVES STUART MARQUES
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
After nearly two years of extensive restoration, the soaring Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Arch at Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn, New York, has reopened to the public. The completion of the nearly $8.9 million project was celebrated last week in a ribbon-cutting ceremony hosted by the New York City Department of Parks and the Prospect Park Alliance (PPA), which oversaw the refurbishment of the 80-foot-tall Beaux-Arts landmark.
Built between 1889 and 1892, Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Arch was designed by John H. Duncan as a commemoration of Union Army forces that fell in the Civil War. It is one of three Civil War triumphal arches in the city, which include the Washington Square Arch and the entrance to the Manhattan Bridge.
The arch hosts bronze statuary groupings honoring Union forces who died in the Civil War. (photo Maya Pontone/Hyperallergic)
Ribbon-cutting ceremony at the restored Grand Army Plaza Arch
The recent makeover, funded by former Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration, consisted mainly of repairs that replaced the roof and inner steel beams, fixed broken stonework, and reconstructed its interior spiral staircases. It also added a new internal drainage system and redesigned the monument’s evening lighting to highlight its bronze statuary groupings designed by Brooklyn-born sculptor Frederick MacMonnies. These works, which are located on its roof and north-facing pedestals, depict the goddess Columbia, a female personification of the United States, and Union Army soldiers and sailors; the grouping on the right side of the arch includes the city’s only public statue of a Black Civil War sailor.
The right statuary grouping includes the city’s only public statue of a Black Civil War sailor. (photo by Paul Martinka, courtesy the Prospect Park Alliance)
“This is where people say, ‘Okay, meet you under the arch… It’s kind of the heart and thoroughfare of the borough,” Morgan Monaco, president of the PPA, told Hyperallergic at the ribbon-cutting ceremony.
Previously delayed due to pandemic slowdown, the restoration was expected to wrap in the fall of 2023. However, as PPA’s Director of Architecture and Preservation David Yum told Hyperallergic, the restoration team that worked on revamping the arch encountered dozens of unforeseen challenges, one of the most difficult being addressing decades of moisture and water damage to the five-layer roof.
The arch hosts many works of bronze statuary, including a depiction of President Abraham Lincoln on its interior (photo Maya Pontone/Hyperallergic)
The restoration included a comprehensive cleaning of the arch’s inner spiral staircases, which lead up to the trophy room and roof. (photo Maya Pontone/Hyperallergic)
“ After decades of water, it was almost impossible to get all the moisture out, so that took us months and months [to figure out,]” Yum said. “It’s one thing when it’s one or two materials, but when it’s five materials, it’s really challenging.”
The entire project required extensive research into the monument’s materials and structural framework. Because the original blueprints for the memorial arch were lost to time, the PPA’s in-house team of architects had to rely on physical surveys from previous restorations and detailed scans of the arch’s interior developed with radar and magnetic technology. They used laboratory testing to trace the existing stonework mortar back to a quarry in Rosendale, New York, and replaced fractured stonework with matching stone from a Maine quarry. Additionally, the bronze and cast-iron spiral staircases and entrance gates were cleaned scrupulously in a process that required them to be completely disassembled and reassembled.
View of the arch’s trophy room today (photo Maya Pontone/Hyperallergic)
At last week’s ceremony, attendees got an up-close peek at the monument’s restoration, including a tour up the arch’s staircases and overhead Trophy Room. While no longer open to the public, these interior spaces were previously used as a public arts exhibition space in the 1980s and a storage for a Puppet Library collection in the early 2000s (which is currently located in Roosevelt Hall at Brooklyn College).
Alongside the work on the arch, the restoration of Grand Army Plaza has also involved repairs to the Bailey Fountain and landscaping improvements to the surrounding berms. The completion of the archway shortly follows the opening of the bronze sculpture installation Monuments to Motherhood (2024) by New York City-based artist Molly Gochman, which went on display directly across from the triumphal structure in late April.
Wanted!
This wonderful large format print of a balloon festival on the Island in1977 was on our table and being admired by many visitors. Suddenly it was gone! Whether on purpose or accidentally, we would appreciate this photo from our archives being returned. Contact jbird134@aol.com if you have information on this photo.
THE GRAND BLOOMING DOGWOOD (?) OUTSIDE BLACKWELL HOUSE
CREDITS
HYPERALLERGIC Judith Berdy Vesper Moore
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
CELEBRATING ROOSEVELT ISLAND DAY ON FIREFIGHTERS’ FIELD
Monday, June 9, 2025 New York Almanack Issue #1466
The new site for Roosevelt Island Day was a great success. Having a large field with separate spaces for different activities was a wonderful idea. Spread out over Firefighters’ Field, there were lots of new activities and space to spread out. Also, this location attracted many visitors from the Tram and Ferry, an additional plus on this sunny Sunday. Thanks to all the RIOC staff and community organizations for a great event.
Our new tram has arrived, ready to greet all and have no problems with crowding.
Masahiro Carson, a transit aficionado gave details to a visitor about T train service changes and new route for the Q102 bus.
Volunteers at the RIHS table Michael Stewart, Tom, Matthew and Moriko Carson, Masahiro & Takeru Carson. Our other volunteers: Gloria Herman, Ellen Jacoby, Dylan Brown, Tom & Sharon Carson,Tana Blevins, Sheila Waldron & Judith Berdy.
Masahiro explaining the complexities of transit to his peer group
RIOC AND THE RIHS RECEIVED PROCLAMATIONS FROM ASSEMBLY MEMBER REBECCA SEAWRIGHT. ACCEPTING WERE DHRU PATEL AMIN, CFO OF RIOC AND JUDITH BERDY OF THE RIHS.
Wanted!
This wonderful large format print of a balloon festival on the Island in1977 was on our table and being admired by many visitors. Suddenly it was gone! Whether on purpose or accidentally, we would appreciate this photo from our archives being returned. Contact jbird134@aol.com if you have information on this photo.
CREDITS
Judith Berdy Vesper Moore
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
The tradition of freak shows in Europe dates back to the sixteenth century. Medical “monstrosities” became standard components of traveling exhibitions. During the nineteenth century such shows caught the imagination of large viewing (and paying) audiences.
Human exhibits were presented for public entertainment and the parade of “freaks of nature” was a booming business. With the expansion of colonialism, the emphasis changed from physical to racial characteristics. Displays of exotic but “backward” populations (“human zoos”) became common in the 1870s in the midst of imperialist ambitions.
This social phenomenon also inspired a remarkable venture at the beginning of trade relations between the independent United States and Imperial China. P. T. Barnum may be considered the “father” of the American freak show, but he was not the first to sense its commercial opportunities.
Tea & Opium
Formerly named Canton City, Guangzhou has a long history as a trading port. During the Tang Dynasty (618-907) many foreigners settled in the city, establishing a network of commercial ties.
Muslim merchant Sulaiman al-Tājir (“Solomon the Merchant”) left a travelogue of his visit to the city in 851 in which he observed the strict control over the movement of foreigners and the steep rates being charged for imported goods. He pointed at the city’s sizeable Muslim community and commented upon local tea consumption. Solomon admired the quality of local porcelain.
Trade between China and Europe began during the sixteenth century. Portuguese and Spanish traders brought silver from the Americas in exchange for silks. Having settled in Macau, the Portuguese monopolized the early foreign trade with China.
In 1685 the nation’s legendary Kangxi Emperor (1654-1722) permitted Western merchants to trade in Canton, but their freedom of movement was limited. They could deal with the “Cohong” only, members of which were official representatives of the Emperor.
The “foreign devils” (European traders) worked out of rented offices called “factories” in a walled off part of the city that combined warehouses and offices with living quarters. Their vessels were required to anchor downstream on the Pearl River. The British East India Company soon dominated commercial dealings.
Payments were demanded in silver Spanish dollars minted from mines in the New World. As the Qing Imperial Court refused opening its internal market to foreign goods, Britain could not sustain its deficits and needed a substitute currency.
Opium appeared as a new form of exchange. Rapidly expanding through the 1800s, India-grown opium was traded illegally for bullion (“specie”) with local smugglers and reinvested in tea for importation to British and American markets.
Growing Anglo-Chinese friction over the practice started the First Opium War in 1840. Two years later, the defeated Qing Empire was forced to sign the Treaty of Nanking (1842) that ceded Hong Kong to Britain, eliminated trading restrictions and opened five new ports to foreign trade.
Old China Trade
The British East India Company had long been selling Chinese goods to the colonists, but no American ship is believed to have had ever sailed beyond the Cape of Good Hope. Prior to 1783 Britain did not permit the colonies access to Asian markets.
The Company’s so-called East Indiamen were amongst the most powerful merchant ships ever built and dominated the trade routes. American contacts with China started after the Revolution when American merchants took over from the British.
During the uprising armed privateers, backed by the infant American government, had preyed on British commercial shipping. Their crews were ready to take on a new challenge.
The three-master Empress of China was built in 1783 as a privateer, but refitted for trade after the war. Leaving New York Harbor on February 22, 1784, she became what is believed to have been the first American vessel to enter Chinese waters.
Organized by Robert Morris (1734-1806), a financier from Philadelphia, and captained by former Philadelphian U.S. naval officer John Green, she returned to New York on May 11, 1785, after a round voyage of fourteen months and twenty-four days, opening up what today is known as the “Old China Trade.”
She also transported former army officer Samuel Shaw (1754-1794) to Canton who would act as the first American consul to China. This profit-driven venture acquired political significance.
The nation’s ability to access Canton was seen as a statement of the Republic’s independent intentions. The Empress of China marked the entry of America as a serious player into global trade markets.
(The next ship to engage in the China trade was the Experiment, a sixty-foot-long sloop captained by Stewart Dean of Albany. It left in the spring of 1785 for China, 14,000 nautical miles away.)
The Empress of China carried silver as trading currency and thirty tons of ginseng. A traditional medicine in China used for restoring strength to the infirm, American ginseng was found in abundance in the Appalachian Mountains.
Its export opened the Chinese market to merchants (other commodities were added in the process, including furs, metals, cotton and sandalwood). The Empress returned with a rich cargo of eight hundred chests of tea and a huge quantity of porcelain.
Canton ware is a cobalt blue and white porcelain, the ceramic recipe of which was a closely-guarded secret. Manufactured in Ching-Te Chen province (the “Capital of Porcelain”), plates and dishes were sent to Canton for decoration by professional artists who, working on an “assembly line,” painted a single element before passing it to the next workstation. The hand-painted subjects of tea houses, pagodas, foot bridges, meandering waterways, mountains and small figures were popular.
Porcelain was exported in large quantities by East India cargo ships, serving at the same time as ballast to keep the vessel stable. From 1784 to circa 1850, about two million pieces were exported to North America.
Canton ware was inventoried at Mount Vernon, the Virginia home of President George and Martha Washington, in the late 1790s.
Flood of Imports
A few Chinese migrants may have crossed the Pacific during the first decades of trading contacts, but their movements were barely recorded. In 1847, a former cook on a packet liner named Ah Sue, opened a store on Cherry Street, Manhattan, selling tobacco.
He also ran a small boarding house renting rooms to sailors. Ah Sue set a pattern for fellow newcomers, although their number remained low. According to the 1875 census there were 157 Chinese immigrants living in the city of New York.
Knowledge of the country therefore was limited, but the colonies were familiar with Chinese imports. From the mid-1600s onward, an array of products was imported from Canton.
Quantities of tea, silk and porcelain were available in these early years, both by legal and illegal means. Dutch smugglers were active in bringing tea to the colonies from Batavia. American pirates also circumvented the East India Company’s monopoly. The United States became hooked on tea.
The American China trade flourished after independence in spite of the risk of pirate attacks on bullion carrying ships. Merchants and investors were keen to explore the trade. The demand for Asian goods made the gamble worthwhile. It marked the beginning of America’s international trade.
Until the Treaty of Nanking it was a free trade arrangement whereby products were manufactured specifically for the American market. Production was based on a business model that relied upon the Chinese genius for imitation.
Having transported exclusive European items to Canton (shawls from Italy, tapestry from Belgium, perfume from France), replicas were churned out en masse by local manufacturers.
Selling cheaply produced items whilst pretending class and status, became a lucrative trading stratagem. Design theft in the Far East was stoked by American merchants. Boatloads of cargo made their way to the United States to satisfy the desire for oriental and exotic goods.
In 1832 a vessel named Howard returned to New York from China. Soon after, its owners placed its cargo up for auction. For the Carnes Brothers this had been a first foray into the Canton market. Up until then, they imported luxury goods from France. The emergence of an affluent urban middle class had prompted the venture. The surviving auction catalogue of the Howard shows an intriguing trend.
Absent were standard items that characterized the trade (teas, porcelain or jade). Instead, the merchants offered an assortment of “pongee” fabrics, silk shawls, decorated window blinds, fireworks, backgammon boards, snuff boxes, colored paper, walking canes, lacquered furniture and folding fans.
The Carnes Brothers aimed at creating a new market of fancy non-necessities to an emerging group of (female) shoppers. They also introduced a novel promotional ploy.
The Chinese Lady
Attempting to draw attention to their sales, the Brothers decided upon the strategy of exhibiting a young Chinese lady in a “home” decor of opulent furnishings. They approached Captain Benjamin Obear, whose ship Washington was setting sail for Canton, to arrange a deal on their behalf.
It is not known how and on what terms Obear persuaded the parents to part with their fourteen-year old daughter, but on October 17, 1834, a Cantonese youngster arrived in Manhattan.
Listed on the passenger list as “Auphinoy,” she was given the anglicized name of Afong Moy (her true name is unknown as are the details of her family background). The first reported female Chinese immigrant to the United States, she was treated as a commodity.
Her first “performance” took place in November 1834 at Obear’s Manhattan home at No. 8 Park Place. Seated in a throne-like armchair and dressed in silk, her bound feet were displayed on a stool (foot binding tales created enormous curiosity).
A lithograph of “The Chinese Lady,” produced in 1835 by Charles Risso and William R. Browne, recreated the settings of Moy’s presentation.
She was surrounded by a range of goods, lanterns, mirrors, curtains, wall hangings, paintings, vases, lacquer furniture and ornamental boxes – the sort of items that the Carnes Brothers were putting up for sale. The aim was strictly commercial.
Not only did New Yorkers enjoy a “meeting” with an exotic Chinese woman at her imagined residence, but they were also offered the opportunity to acquire elegant items for an affordable price.
Assisted by an interpreter, Afong would occasionally walk around the room and encourage visitors to make a purchase. The exhibition created excitement and journalistic attention.
As she represented a culture that was alien to Americans, thousands paid the entrance fee of fifty cents to see this “Unprecedented Novelty” (including Vice-President Martin Van Buren). Sales soared.
In January 1835, the exhibition was taken on tour. In Philadelphia she suffered the indignity of white doctors examining her feet (a violation of privacy in Chinese culture).
In March, she was presented to Andrew Jackson in Washington DC, the first American President to meet a Chinese person while in office. She visited Maryland and South Carolina, before returning to New York in June that year.
On arrival, a new manager by the name of Henry Hannington had taken over. He organized a whirlwind of tours for her. Over a period of six months she traveled over a thousand miles.
Back in Manhattan where Hannington ran his “Grand Moving Dioramas” at the City Saloon, an amusement house on Broadway, he transformed Moy’s role to an onstage “oriental” spectacle.
He made her display her unbound feet, eat with chopsticks and sing a Chinese song to audiences. His operations collapsed during the 1837 financial panic. Those responsible for Afong’s arrival had disappeared from the scene. By 1838, she entered a poorhouse in Monmouth, New Jersey.
She reappeared a decade later as an exhibit in P. T. Barnum’s American Museum, on the corner of Broadway and Ann Street, being reduced to a freakish spectacle of “otherness.”
Beginning in July 1847 at Niblo’s Garden in Manhattan, she began touring again, at times appearing on stage with Charles Stratton, better known as “General Tom Thumb” (a little person who would become a global celebrity).
Within a few years, she was replaced by a younger Chinese woman whose feet were even smaller than hers.
Chinatown
Moy’s last public exhibition took place on February 21, 1851, after which she disappeared from the public eye. There is no evidence that she ever returned to Canton; her name has not been traced in any census or death records.
The “interaction” between Moy and the public fed and formed early perceptions of Chinese culture, but to some observers such displays raised ethical questions about exploitation. Protests were voiced against the abusive manipulation of a young “disabled” foreign woman for commercial gain.
The New-York Mirror refused to print any reference to the Chinese Lady and her “little feet.” The anger, however, was not directed against the men who profited from her appearances, but turned against a cultural system that allowed for women to be physically deformed.
It was believed, therefore, the duty of missionaries to bring the gospel to China. Lacking accurate information, stereotypes emerged of a stagnant Empire which allowed western authorities to justify imperialism as a “noble” quest to civilize that section of humanity.
Stock images would re-emerge during the economic hardships of the 1870s when, after a period of mass Chinese male immigration (and recruitment by mining and railway bosses), resentment against incomers raged in California in particular.
Large numbers of migrant workers fled the region and moved towards Manhattan. Settling in the surroundings of Mott Street, a new and vibrant district of immigrants emerged that would later be named Chinatown.
STOP BY THE RIHS TABLE ON SUNDAY AT RI DAY
AN YOU IDENTIFY THIS ISLAND CELEBRITY AND FRIEND?
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NEW YORK ALMANACK
Illustrations, from above: Detail from Risso & Browne’s “Afong Moy, the Chinese Lady,” 1835 (New York Public Library); A reverse-glass export painting of Canton’s harbor and its European “factories,” 1805; Artist unknown, “The Production of Tea,” 1790-1800 (Peabody Essex Museum); Fan depicting the Empress of China on the far left, the only traced image of the ship, ca. 1784. (Historical Society of Pennsylvania); A collection of Canton ware. (Porter-Phelps-Huntington House, Hadley, Massachusetts); William John Huggins, “The Indiaman Asia,” 1836 (Royal Museums Greenwich); Risso & Browne’s “Afong Moy, the Chinese Lady,” 1835 (New York Public Library); and the Port Arthur Chinese Restaurant, at 7-9 Mott Street, ca. 1900, one of the first banquet halls of Chinatown
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
The Neo-Gothic Trinity Building at 111 Broadway, next door to Trinity Church, was constructed around its bank vault in 1907! Today there is a bar and restaurant in that bank vault!
The 70-ton vault was commissioned in 1904 by the New York Realty Bank and constructed upstate in Hudson, NY before being placed on a barge and sailed down the Hudson River. Once it reached Lower Manhattan the vault was loaded on to railroad tracks, which were constructed just to get the vault up the hill from the bank of the river to the Broadway location. The vault still sits on these tracks to this date!
Designed by Francis H. Kimball, the Trinity and US Realty Building was constructed around the bank and rose to a height of 308-feet when it was completed in 1907. Adjacent to Richard Upjohn’s 1846 Trinity Church and inspired by its neo-gothic architecture, the skyscraper is actually two separate 21-story slab buildings that rise straight from the street with no setbacks – separated by Thames Street and only linked by a steel footbridge.
In 2006 the bank vault was restored to repurposed as Trinity Place, a bar and restaurant inside the former vault, giving the public an opportunity to see the historic site first hand. Trinity Place still houses both restored vault doors, one leading into the bar and the other into the restaurant, which was historically used as a secret meeting room for the board of directors and still has its original brass chandelier. The 5″ thick steel walls that surrounded the vault are still visible.
CAN YOU IDENTIFY THIS ISLAND CELEBRITY AND FRIEND?
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NYCURBANISM
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
VISIT THE RIHS TABLE AT THE RI DAY CELEBRATION THIS SUNDAY, JUNE 8th AT FIREFIGHTERS FIELD.
THE RIHS WILL BE DISPLAYING 50 YEARS OF ISLAND PHOTOS FROM RESIDENT AND FAMILIES.
WE WILL ALSO BE DISTRIBUTING BOOKS FROM THE NYPL. STOP BY OUR TABLE AND JOIN THE FUN!
JP MORGAN
23 WALL STREET
Thursday, June 5, 2025 NYCUrbanism Issue #1463
In 1869 J. Pierepont Morgan co-founded Drexel, Morgan & Co. with businessman Anthony Drexel, setting their vision on the southeast corner of Wall and Broad Street between Federal Hall and the New York Stock Exchange for their new headquarters. Three years later the bank paid $250,000 in gold for the site, setting records as the most expensive lot of that size in the world. Drexel, Morgan & Co. would hire architect Arthur D. Gilman to design a six-story French Second Empire style building clad in Vermont marble with a mansard roof and a prominent entrance on the chamfered corner topped with a sculpted pediment and two statues depicting Europe and America.
The entrance of the Drexel Building (left) with the original (top) and current Stock Exchangeb (bottom) across the street.
Current Stock Exchange
The building opened in 1873 with the bank designating the first floor as a banking hall with offices above. In 1882 the building was the center of attention when Thomas Edison flipped a switch, illuminating the structure with 600 electric lights. By the 1890s the renamed J.P. Morgan & Co. was the country’s most powerful investment bank, helping to transform the U.S. economy and financing some of the country’s strongest financial players including the U.S. Steel Corporation; the world’s first billion-dollar corporation and the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, which dominated northeast regional rail traffic during the first half of the 20th century.
The building would temporarily close on April 1, 1913, the day J.P. Morgan died, and less than a year later the Drexel Building would be demolished, with a new building rising on what had become the most valuable lot in the country, completed a year later. Designed by Towbridge & Livingston (architect of the 1912 Bankers Trust Building diagonally across the Street), the new unadorned limestone building that would replace Drexel was drastically smaller, only four stories tall, contradicting the cardinal rule of Wall Street development where taller buildings have always replaced shorter ones over time. Today JPMorgan Chase & Co. is one of the largest banks in the world.
VISITORS TO THE RIHS KIOSK TODAY
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NYCURBANISM
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
The 309-foot New York World Building (officially known as the Pulitzer Building) was the tallest skyscraper in the world when it opened in 1890. Located on Newspaper Row (today’s Park Row) across from City Hall and next to the Tribune, Times, Herald, and Sun newspaper buildings, it served as an office building and vertical factory, with newspaper production starting in the tower’s dome – under the publisher Joseph Pulitzer’s direction – with photoengraving, editorial and reportorial staff meeting and compiling photographs and news stories in the sun-light upper floors. Production then traveled down to the linotype composing room, then to the giant presses in the cellar, where newsprint paper making machines printed 48,000 8-page papers per hour. Paperboys waited outside on the curb for the cut, pasted and folded papers to be distributed.
Designed by architect George B. Post (NY Stock Exchange) the skyscraper featured an ornate red sandstone facade. The dome at the top of the world housed a public observation deck where visitors could ascend a flight of stairs to a cupola where they would be greeted with a 360-degree view of the city.By the mid-19th Century, the newspaper buildings had moved from Park Row, with the Herald going to 34th Street (Herald Sq) and the Times going to 42nd Street (Times Sq). But in January of 1953, the New York Times reported the fateful news for the World Building, which neighbored the entrance to the Brooklyn Bridge: “The doom of the historic World Building at 63 Park Row was forecast yesterday as the City Planning Commission approved a $5,266,000 plan drafted by Manhattan Borough President Robert F. Wagner Jr. for rearrangement and reconstruction of the street system at the Manhattan plaza of the Brooklyn Bridge.”
In 1955 the building was demolished to make way for an on-ramp to the Brooklyn Bridge. The iconic Tribune Building next door would also be demolished to make way for the Brutalist Pace University
World Building elevation drawing
World Building demolition, 1955. Tribune Building on the right before demolition.
THE BIRDS ARE LONG GONE
TIME TO CLEAN OFF THE BLACKWELL HOUSE NEST AND BIRD DROPPINGS!
CREDITS
NYCURBANISM
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
Defining a New Era for American Women: The New York Woman Magazine
Tuesday, June 3, 2025 New-York Historical Blog Issue #1461
The 1930s was a time of immense change for American women. This was especially true for women working in New York City, who saw their professional, economic, and social opportunities rapidly expand during this decade.
Historians predominantly characterize the 1930s in the United States as an era of economic turmoil due to the Great Depression. Nevertheless, women joined the urban workforce in unprecedented numbers. The rate of working women rose to 24%, with nearly 50% of single women in employment. In New York alone, there were 13 million women employed by the end of the decade, compared to 10.5 million in 1930. The majority of these women worked in clerical jobs in the rapidly expanding American corporate sector or in teaching and nursing. Some trailblazing women also achieved careers in law, finance, publishing, and politics.
American cities thus became hubs of opportunity for ambitious—mostly single—women. Indeed, 1930s New York embodied the exciting, liberating possibilities that the modern metropolis could hold for American women, as the epicenter of commercial, technological, cultural, and social innovation in the United States.
The New York Woman captured the emergence of the urban career woman as a defining figure of modern New York. The magazine became one of the best-selling publications of the 1930s. Written and “edited for the women of metropolitan New York,” the magazine sold out within 24 hours when the first issue hit the shelves on September 9, 1936.
Published weekly on Wednesdays, The New York Woman catered to the urban career woman’s interests in:
“LOVE – MARRIAGE – POLITICS – PERSONALITIES – SOCIETY – MOVIES – THEATRE – DANCING – FASHION – BEAUTY – COOKING – DECORATING – WHERE TO BUY – WHAT TO DO – HOW TO HAVE FUN!”
Copy from the inaugural issue of The New York Woman, September 9th, 1936. The New York Historical.
While attending to conventionally ‘feminine’ topics of fashion, dating, and beauty—topics that still dominate contemporary women’s magazines—The New York Woman’sinclusion of detailed articles on politics, career advice, and financial management underline how women’s lives were being reshaped during the 1930s. Rather than presenting a principal concentration on housekeeping and domestic affairs, as women were gaining access to professional institutions and the public sphere of the modern metropolis, The New York Woman reflects how magazines began to offer more diverse content to women readers, which better reflected the new realities of their urban lives.
The magazine’s weekly column, “Soundings: Opinions of the New York Woman,” printed select readers’ correspondence with the magazine editors, covering topics ranging from whether America should join the Second World War to whether it was ‘proper’ for single women to drink alcohol at bars in the city. The publication also offered profiles of prominent career women in New York, many of whom worked in traditionally male-dominated industries. These ranged from Judge Justine Wise Tulin, the first New York woman to hold a judicial post higher than a magistrate, to women working as political advisors on the 1936 Presidential election campaigns
“9 to 5…five to nine.” Profile of Barbara Schaffa, a woman “typical of the girl all busy men desire; the smart, self-sufficient secretary,” in the October 7, 2025 issue of The New York Woman. The New York Historical.
While detailing the latest fashion trends through exquisite watercolor illustrations in its weekly feature, “Today Along Fifth Avenue,” TheNew York Woman challenged many reductive myths around style and beauty. Its writers questioned the youth-centered ideas of beauty and glamour that had defined the 1920s flapper era. Instead, in such articles as Inez Calloway Robb’s “40 Becomes ‘The Fashionable Age,’” The New York Woman profiled Wallis Simpson, arguing that women of all ages could embody the glamour and excitement of modern America.
The “Today Along Fifth” feature, in the October 7, 1936 issue of The New York Woman. The New York Historical.
“40 Becomes ‘The Fashionable Age,’” featuring a profile of the American socialite Wallis Simpson, in the October 7, 1936 issue of The New York Woman. The New York Historical.
The magazine also ran features on a range of topics relating to life in the Big Apple. These included articles designed to improve domestic life. Readers could browse reviews for appliances tailored to cooking in a small apartment kitchen, guides to New York nursery schools, fashionable color schemes for decorating an apartment, and advertisements for new apartment buildings in the city (from the Savoy Plaza to the El Dorado). New York nightlife was another prominent topic. Notable features surveyed fun things to do in New York for less than $5, lists of the best restaurants and bars to visit on a Saturday night, reviews of new Broadway shows and movies, and ideas for quick but tasty dinners to cook for guests.
“She knew what she wanted!” Making the case for the new woman in the October 7, 1936 issue of The New York Woman. The New York Historical.
The New York Historical’s collection of The New York Woman magazine offers fascinating insight into New York women’s aspirations, ideas, concerns, and daily lives in the 1930s, and illuminates how American women’s lives were changing rapidly during this decade. Whereas magazine readership is waning in the twenty-first century, this collection underlines the centrality of magazines to early-20th-century American culture. As The New York Woman declared to its readers: “To live successfully in New York, read The New York Woman.”
PRIDE FLAG RAISED OVER MAIN STREET
CREDITS
Written byDr. Angelica De Vido. De Vido is the 2024-2025 Mellon Foundation-Robert David Lion Gardiner Fellow at The New York Historical.
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
