Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Mother and Children (1876). Photo by Ben Davis. FOR YEARS THIS PAINTING WAS ON A LANDING AND NOT IN CLEAR VIEW AT THE MANSION. NOW IS IN PLAIN SIGHT!
Comtesse d’Haussonville” by Jean-Auguste-
THE FRICK HAS RELOCATED FROM IT’S CLASSICAL MANSION ON FIFTH AVENUE FOR THE NEXT FEW YEARS WHILE THE MANSION IS RENOVATED AND UPGRADED.
IN THE MEANTIME THE ARTWORK IS DISPLAYED IN THE BREUER MODERNIST BUILDING ON MADISON AVENUE.
ENJOY THE SIGHT OF THE GRAND ARTWORK IN IT’S NEW ENVIRONMENT. (TIMED TICKETS AVAILABLE ON-LINE)
Rembrandt’s 1658 “Self-Portrait “is among the first works visitors see after entering Frick Madison. (Nick Garber/Patch)
Johannes Vermeer, Officer and Girl. Photo by Ben Davis., Mistress and Maid
“Vétheuil in Winter” by Claude Monet (Nick Garber/Patch)
The third floor has a room devoted to Spanish art, including works by Velázquez and El Greco. (Courtesy of the Frick Collection)
The “Vermeer room” on Frick Madison’s second floor. (Courtesy of the Frick Collection)
“Purification of the Temple “by El Greco (Nick Garber/Patch)
Asian porcelain from the Frick Collection. (Nick Garber/Patch)
The European and Asian Porcelain Gallery at the Frick Madison. Photo by Sarah Cascone.
the Normandie Only Ed Litcher got it. The Normandie could be mistaken for the Queen Mary
The stacks were taller on the RMS Queen Mary than the SS Normandie
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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UPPER EAST SIDE PATCH
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New York City is built around one of the world’s greatest harbors. Over the years, many forts have protected the harbor from invasion. But feared invasions never took place and few shots were fired, not that is after the war of the Revolution. However, a great sea battle did take place just off the coast.
There’s an ongoing theme here: A threat is identified, plans are prepared, and implementation is slow (budget problems and conflict among authorities). By the time construction is (and if) completed, it is often outdated.
To learn more, read on.
The Dutch built a fort to protect their settlement but in 1664 when an English expedition demanded the colony’s surrender, Governor Peter Stuyvesant felt the colony wasn’t able to defend itself. Stuyvesant regretted that his requests for troops and defensive resources from the Dutch West India Company had not been met, though some folks feel that the Dutch leaders, including the Governor’s son, were reluctant to engage in a battle that would damage their community. On September 8, Stuyvesant surrendered New Netherland to the English. Still, battle or not, the Dutch would continue to run much of the city and the Hudson Valley.
Critical fighting took place around New York during the American Revolution. When the British left Boston, it was clear that they would soon invade New York City. In June and July 1776, Washington’s troops hastily constructed many forts, on the east shore of the East River, in the city and Fort Washington in northwestern Manhattan and Fort Constitution (later Fort Lee) across the Hudson in the town later named for it. Both forts were just south of the George Washington Bridge. A barrier was placed in the Hudson between the two forts to prevent ships passing.
The story of the battles of Long Island, Brooklyn, Manhattan and the retreat to New Jersey are fascinating and illustrate the desperate conditions the Revolutionary forces faced in the early days of the war. No significant action took place in the harbor, but of interest to this tale, from very large to very small:
• At its peak, the British fleet numbered over 400 ships, including 73 war ships. It delivered 32,000 troops to Staten Island. This was one of the largest fleets in history.
• On September 6, the submarine Turtle made the first recorded submarine attack in history in New York Harbor. This one-man hand-powered submarine had been built the previous year by David Bushnell, an inventor from Connecticut. Turtle was equipped to attach a bomb to a ship, but the mission failed.
British Landing, Kip’s Bay, September 15, 1776 patriottoursnyc.com/the-battle-of-new-york/
After the war, the U.S. government launched a massive fortification building program around the Harbor. Dr. Thomas W. Matteo, Staten Island Historian, provides more detail: “For the most part, the defense of New York’s harbor was left to the State government and its governor, Daniel Tompkins… At the outset of hostilities, he personally oversaw the defense of New York. After turning down a Cabinet appointment, Tompkins was appointed the Commander-in-Chief of the Third Military District by President Madison in October 1814. Tompkins appointed several aids-de-camp including Washington Irving. Also serving under his command was a young officer by the name of Ichabod Crane.
By 1814, New York City was defended by 900 pieces of artillery and 25,500 men. This is probably why the citizens did not panic when five British war vessels were spotted off the coast of Sandy Hook on August 18th, 1814. They never came any closer.”
One fort is of particular interest to us Islanders: Hell Gate, connecting the East River with Long Island Sound and the Harlem River, was protected by a fortification constructed on a small island in the middle of the waterway. It was designed to defend against any back door penetration of the harbor from Long Island Sound.
These forts would have provided an impressive defense of the harbor during the War of 1812, but were never used and obsolete in a few years.
Castle Clinton Courtesy Museum of the City of New York
After the war, a new series of larger forts on the Atlantic Coast was proposed, but funding was slow, and most were not begun until the 1830s. New York received six major forts under this program; initial plans for the latter four of these are said to have been drawn up by Robert E. Lee during when he was post engineer at Fort Hamilton in the 1840s. When war broke out in 1861, much of this construction was still incomplete and several forts were still unfinished in 1867.
Another major building study was begun in 1885 for a replacement of existing coast defenses. Most of its recommendations were adopted, and construction began in 1890 on new batteries and controlled minefields to defend New York City. Plans were elaborate and involved the most advanced weaponry. But when the Spanish–American War broke out in early 1898, most of the new batteries were still years from completion, and it was feared the Spanish fleet would bombard the US east coast
Again, concern heightened as the European War opened (and some New Yorkers feared a German invasion). New harbor defenses were constructed but many of its large weapons were removed and transferred to the European theater when the US entered the war. During the War and in the interwar period, major changes were made in the organization of coastal defense and new weaponry introduced (and removed).
10-inch disappearing gun at Battery Granger, Fort Hancock, New Jersey Wikipedia
After the Fall of France in 1940 the Army decided to up gun all existing heavy coast defense guns to protect against attack by sea and air. But this was never a threat. Instead, during the winter of 1941-42, the greatest battle in the sea around New York took place.
When Germany declared war on the US (the day after Pearl Harbor) our east coast offered easy pickings for German U-boats. These months were known among German submariners as the “American Shooting Season” when their submarines attacked merchant shipping and Allied naval vessels along the east coast. From February to May 1942, 348 ships were sunk, for the loss of two U-boats. The cumulative effect of this campaign was severe; a quarter of all wartime sinkings – 3.1 million tons and the eradication of much of the US coastal shipping fleet.
My father who was stationed at Fort Eustis, Virginia at this time said that he and my mother could see from the shore ships blazing after being torpedoed. I can’t verify the story, but it’s not impossible. Sinkings were a nightly occurrence.
Several reasons for this disaster. The American naval commander, Admiral Ernest King, as an apparent anglophobe, was averse to taking British recommendations to introduce convoys, US Coast Guard and Navy patrols were predictable and could be avoided by U-boats, inter-service co-operation was poor, and the US Navy did not possess enough suitable escort vessels. Without coastal blackouts, shipping was silhouetted against the bright lights of American towns and cities such as Atlantic City until a dim-out was ordered in May.
The dim-out was less severe than a blackout. Times Square’s neon advertising went dark. Office buildings and apartment houses had to veil windows more than 15 stories high. Stores, restaurants and bars toned down their exterior lighting. Streetlights and traffic signals had their wattage reduced, and automobile headlights were hooded. Night baseball was banned in the war’s early years at the Dodgers’ Ebbets Field and the Giants’ Polo Grounds. (Yankee Stadium did not yet have lights.) The Statue of Liberty’s torch did not glow.
No New Yorkers actually saw a German U-Boat. The wonderful scene in Woody Allen’s Radio Days when the boys see a U-Boat surface close off a Brooklyn beach never occurred, But a U-boat did land a team of four saboteurs at Amagansett, Long Island on June 13, 1942 (and another four landed in Ponte Vedra, Florida on June 16, 1942), armed with explosives and plans to destroy factories, bridges, tunnels, powerplants and waterworks. One member of the group that landed eventually turned himself over to the FBI and confessed the entire story. All eight saboteurs were arrested and six were executed in Washington D.C. on August 8, 1942.
One other WWII New York harbor story: After the French liner SS Normandie (renamed USS Lafayette as a US troop carrier) burned at dock, fear of sabotage soared. The Navy reached out to well-known Mafia boss Lucky Luciano then serving a 30-50 year sentence for compulsory prostitution at the Clinton Prison facility. The Navy offered him a deal; a reduction of his sentence for information and assistance in their operation. Luciano agreed. Luciano ordered that any suspicious activity along the docks and waterfronts be reported to the authorities. Luciano also apparently guaranteed that there would be no strikes among the dock workers.
Keep warm. Keep safe. Get your vaccination. Stephen Blank RIHS
The Downtown Alliance is taking over Water Street this month with two new art installations enriching the street’s scenery. February 28, 2021 Sources
Designer studio Hou de Sousa’s “Ziggy” at 200 Water Street brilliantly combines steel structure and vibrant lights with cords, and FANTÁSTICA’s “Out-of-Office” transfers the workspace environment to an outdoor setting, seemingly responding to the current time as people are no longer commuting to offices for work due to the pandemic.These artwork are lit at night in brilliant colors.
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 Roosevelt Island Historical Society
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The Battery Maritime Building is a building at South Ferry on the southern tip of Manhattan Island in New York City. Located at 10 South Street, near the intersection with Whitehall Street, it is composed of an operational ferry terminal at ground level, as well as a hotel and event space on the upper stories.
The Battery Maritime Building was designed by the firm of Richard Walker and Charles Morris and constructed by Snare & Triest Co. The project’s construction was overseen by C. W. Staniford, the chief engineer of the city’s Department of Docks, as well as assistant engineer S. W. Hoag Jr. It was inspired by the Exposition Universelle and is the only remaining ferry building in that style in Manhattan.
The Battery Maritime Building contains three ferry slips, numbered 5, 6, and 7. These are the three easternmost ferry slips of a never-completed larger terminal: the Whitehall Street Ferry Terminal, which was proposed to contain seven slips when it was constructed in 1906–1909.]
What is now the Battery Maritime Building was originally served by ferries traveling to 39th Street in South Brooklyn (now the neighborhood of Sunset Park in Brooklyn). The Staten Island Ferry terminal comprised slips 1, 2, and 3, which served ferries to St. George Terminal in St. George, Staten Island. The unbuilt slip 4 was to serve ferries from both Staten Island and South Brooklyn.
The three sections were designed to be built independently of each other with a visually identical style. The westernmost slips were drastically rebuilt in 1956, but the easternmost slips remain as a part of the modern Battery Maritime Building.
Facade Ironwork and window panels on balcony Entry bay, north elevation Railing between column on balcony Architectural metals including stamped zinc and copper, rolled steel, and cast iron were used in the building’s design.[8][20] These materials are more widely used on the water-facing side, to the south, than on the other facades.
Ferry slips 5, 6, and 7 are spanned by tall steel arches, which are supported by four pairs of pilasters with ornate capitals.
Slip 5 can accommodate vessels which load passengers from either the bow or the sides. Slips 6 and 7 can accommodate 149-passenger vessels which load passengers from the bow.
The entrances to each of the slips can be sealed with elaborate swinging gates. Above the ferry slips is a penthouse with a row of double-hung windows.The land-facing side, along Whitehall Street to the north, consists of five bays of sash windows, flanked by six pairs of columns that are topped by decorative capitals and brackets.
The columns supporting a hip roof, and the second floor of the land side contains a balcony with an elaborate railing. The balcony forms a loggia that measures 15 feet (4.6 m) wide; a similar loggia was also planned for the Staten Island Ferry terminal and center wing.[ The vaults under the porch roof utilize Guastavino tiles.
The second story had a direct connection to the South Ferry elevated train station, the Staten Island Ferry terminal, and Lower Manhattan.
The windows contain large frames with glazed glass and cast-iron mullions. Between these are connecting walls with wire lattice work, attached to the facade’s “I”-shaped steel stanchions. The steelwork on the remainder of the building contains decorative motifs such as paneled lattice work, raised moldings, and elaborate cross bracings.
Unlike in other structures of the same era, the steel structural members were left exposed without any cladding.
The roof was intended as a recreational area. Originally, the portion of the roof devoted to this purpose was clad with 1 Welsh red tiles, set in cement and laid on a layer of ash concrete. The other sections of the roof were made of gravel roof.
A skylight was installed in the center of the roof during one of the building’s restorationsIn the 2021 hotel conversion, a glass-clad addition was constructed on the roof.
Spires and cupolas were also installed atop the water-facing side these design features had been part of the original design but were removed in the 1930s.
Including bulkheads, the Battery Maritime Building is approximately 104 feet tall, as measured from the sidewalk of South Street.
The superstructure is made of steel framework and reinforced concrete floor slabs, which are finished with terrazzo. The main floor-girders vary in depth from 8 inches (200 mm), for I-beams, to 45-inch (1,100 mm) box girders. The ceilings are made of wire lath and finished in plaster. The columns of the superstructure vary in size; the larger columns are generally 25 inches (640 mm) thick and are built up of riveted steel sections.
Along the waterfront, the building rests upon thick concrete structural piers set over wooden piles, driven into the riverbed to the rock surface. Along the land, the concrete structural piers descend to the rock 20 to 30 feet (6.1 to 9.1 m) deep. Subway tunnels run directly under the terminal.
The interior has many decorative steel columns, beams, and molded ceilings, much of which dates from the original design.[ The terminal’s first story contains a waiting area along South Street. The waiting area was originally accessed by two vestibules and contained a smoking area, ticket office, and other booths[
The walls and furniture of the waiting area were decorated with wood, and the entire space was initially illuminated by a large skylight.
Behind the waiting area, to the south, was a passageway 40 feet (12 m) wide. This passage connected the two transverse driveways to slips 5 and 7, each measuring 51 feet (16 m) wide. It served as a vehicular loading area for wagons and motor vehicles.
The modern terminal contains the waiting area, ticket area, and restrooms for the Governors Island ferry line.
The building was originally constructed with a large second-story waiting room known as the Great Hall. The Great Hall measured 60 feet (18 m) wide and 150 to 170 feet (46 to 52 m) long,] with a ceiling about 30 feet (9.1 m) high.
The interior contains iron columns and stained glass windows and, as in the first floor, had wooden furnishings. Had the center wing of the Whitehall Street Ferry Terminal been completed, it would have formed a single, more massive concourse connected to the Staten Island Ferry slips. The third floor contained office space that could be used by the New York City Dock Board or rented out to other tenants.
Early 20th century
Ferry lines from Manhattan to Staten Island began operating under the municipal authority of the Department of Docks and Ferries in 1905, and ferries from Manhattan to Brooklyn were taken over by the city the following year.[ After the consolidation of these ferry lines, plans for the Beaux-Arts Whitehall Street Ferry Terminal in Lower Manhattan were approved by the city’s Municipal Art Commission in July 1906 and Walker and Morris were named as architects later that year.
The structure was to replace an earlier building on the site that had operated since 1887.
Walker and Morris’s plans were approved in February 1907 and a budget of $1.75 million was allotted to the work. The separate sections of the Whitehall Street Ferry Terminal were designed so they could be constructed separately while remaining visually similar. Work started on the Brooklyn ferry slips first, followed by the Staten Island ferry slips in 1908.A simple cornerstone-laying ceremony for the Brooklyn ferry terminal took place in September 1908.
The terminal was completed by 1909. The present Battery Maritime Building comprised the terminal’s eastern wing and became known as the South Street Ferry Terminal, while the ferries to Staten Island used the western wing, which became the Staten Island Ferry’s Whitehall Terminal. The city took over the Atlantic and Hamilton Avenue ferry lines from the Union Ferry Company in 1922. As part of the takeover, the two ferry lines were relocated from Union Ferry’s Whitehall Street slips to the municipally operated South Street ferry slips.
WSJ MAGAZINE
Hotel Conversion
After the exterior renovations were completed, the EDC and GIPEC started advertising for proposals to redevelop the interior .
In 2006, the city considered opening a food market in the building. The marketplace idea, modeled after the San Francisco Ferry Building, subsequently proved infeasible because the second floor lacked a loading dock.
Through only a combination of financial difficulties and doing business with the City of New York various characters were involved which today has become a hotel operated by Cipriani, which will open this year. We think!
M. FRANK, ALEXIS VILLEFANE, HARA REISER, GLORIA HERMAN GOT IT RIGHT ARTURO DI MODICA JUST PASSED AWAY.
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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Eco Dev Art Installation and Misc. Winter Shots on Monday, Feb. 8, 2021 in New York. (Ann-Sophie Fjello-Jensen/Alliance for Downtown New York)
85 Broad Street in Lower Manhattan is now home to two new light sculptures. Hungarian artist Viktor Vicsek created the piece entitled “Talking Heads.” It features two 21-foot tall heads covered in 4,000 LED lights. The lights change to create different facial expressions as the heads communicate.
The interactive sculpture “C/C,” designed by Singapore-based artist Angela Chong, is a bench made of contoured acrylic panels bound by steel. It performs a rainbow-colored LED light show at night while casting interesting shadows during the day.
A sweeping survey of KAW’S career from his roots as a graffiti artist to a dominating force in contemporary art, KAWS: WHAT PARTY highlights five overarching tenets in the artist’s practice. You will be immersed in the art of KAWS through the various sections of the exhibition.
Renowned for his pop culture-inspired characters in paintings and sculpture and playful use of abstraction with meticulous execution, the show covers drawings, paintings, bronze sculptures, objects and monumental wooden sculptures of his well known COMPANION character. Museum visitors can digitally interact with the art through AR (augmented reality) app on their smartphones. The exhibition is on view through September 5, 2021.
Installation View of The Seances aren’t helping I, 2021 Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner. Image The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Photo Bruce Schwar
The séances aren’t helping by Carol Bove will be the second commission featured on the facade of The Met Fifth Avenue. The spaces Bove’s work will fill have historically been empty. Though the niches were intended to contain art, they were empty for 117 years. Bove’s four massive works are sculpted into nonrepresentational forms that “resonate with modernist styles such as Art Deco and abstraction.”
Bove’s piece contrasts the classical style of Richard Morris Hunt’s facade design, which “subtly calls for us to reevaluate and reckon with the legacies of tradition.” The tile also, The séances aren’t helping, further emphasizes the ongoing struggle to reckon with our past. The sculptures will be on display until November 2021.
Photo credit Happy Monday
An exploration of light continues at the South Street Seaport with works entitled Electric Dandelions, Hands of Inspiration and Daisies. All three installations are walkable throughout the cobblestone streets of the district and come to life at night. though they are also viewable any time of day.
Electric Dandelions are 28-feet tall sculptures lining Fulton Street. They are constructed from steel and acrylic spheres featuring a seemingly endless interactive display of LED animations. Artist Abram Santa Cruz and the LA-based art collective Liquid PXL created the work in collaboration with Art House Live and Fired Up Management.
Hands of Inspiration by Kareem Fletcher uses multicolored patterns to represent themes of diversity, unity, and equality through a series of works displayed in the windows of 193 Front Street in partnership with the South Street Seaport Museum. Daisies presents a range of multidisciplinary work in the form of an outdoor walkable gallery. Curated by artist Paige Silveria, the series of art and photography draws inspiration from the vibrantly wrought cult classic 1996 film “Daisies”. The work is best viewed after dark.
Courtesy of Chelsea Market
Scattered throughout Chelsea Market this month visitors will find a series of mixed-media artworks by Brooklyn-based artist Voodo’ Fe. The works honor all of the February and March celebrations of Black History Month, Valentine’s Day, and Women’s History Month. The art speaks to “to a diverse range of issues, feelings, and pop culture,” depicting famous figures such as Kobe Bryant, Harriet Tubman, Frida Kahlo, Ruth Bader Ginsburg among others.
A new addition to the exhibit this month is a special collaboration with Run DMC frontman Darryl “DMC” McDaniels. The collaborative piece, titled “Me and my microphone,” consists of a series of real-life paintings that can be experienced through an augmented reality app. Visitors can now download the Arloopa application and scan their mobile devices over the artwork to see it come to life. Voodo’ Fe’s show is free to all visitors of Chelsea Market and is on display throughout the entirety of the Market’s main concourse through the end of March 2021.
Courtesy of the artist
The work of Rashid Johnson employs a wide range of mediums to explore the themes of art history, individual and shared cultural identity, personal narratives, and materiality. His work often includes diverse materials rich with symbolism and personal history. The mosaic Untitled Broken Crowd is composed of handmade ceramics, wood, brass, oyster shells, spray paint, wax, soap, and mirrors the soaring piece spans 14 by 33 feet. Located at 200 Liberty Street at Brookfield Place, visitors will be able to contemplate Johnson’s extraordinary piece mounted in the lobby entrance. The glass facade of the building also allows the piece to be highly visible from the surrounding streets.
Photo courtesy Tishman Speyer
Tom Friedman’s stainless steel sculptures are instantly recognizable, like a modern-day, oversized Giacommeti sculpture. You may have previously seen a series of his sculptures along the Park Avenue malls between 2015 and 2016. Now, at the entrance to Rockefeller Center’s Channel Gardens, you’ll find his work, Looking Up.
Described as a “quasi-human figure gazing up to the heavens,” Looking Up was created from crushed aluminum foil pans through lost wax casting which keeps the imprint of the original materials on the steel. Looking Up will be on view until March 19, 2021. Also on view at Rockefeller Center’s main plaza and in the underground concourse is Hiba Schahbaz’ site-specific exhibition, “In My Heart,” which features prints of a mythological garden.
Photo courtesy Port Authority of New York & New Jersey
We love art exhibitions in unlikely places, and there may be no place more unlikely than the Port Authority Bus Terminal. The latest installation is inside the Six Summit Gallery, on the first floor of the bus terminal’s South Wing.
The exhibition “Journey to the Sky” showcases fifteen local and regional artists, eight from New York City, and others from New Jersey and Connecticut (with a handful from outside the area including California and abroad.
You can take a local historic landmark with a visit into Blackwell House. The house is open to the public Wednesday thru Sunday from11 a.m. to 5 p.m. (closed 2-3 p.m.)
No entries for this building across from Battery Park. This was the ticket office on the ground floor for the United States Lines, Transatlantic shipping. There were separate entrances for First Class and Cabin Class Passengers.
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)
UNTAPPED NEW YORK
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View Down 29th from the Rooftop (2008) Pen & Watercolour 29.5 x 84cm
About Marco Luccio
Biography
Marco Luccio is an award-winning artist whose work is represented in over 25 major public collections both nationally and internationally.
As a professional full time artist he has held 36 major solo exhibitions, exhibited in over 150 group, curated and award shows and received several commissions.
Luccio has been collected in various private, public and corporate collections, including the New York Public Library, the Museum of the City of New York, the New York Historical Society and the National Gallery of Australia.
His work has been shortlisted for many major awards including the 2010 and 2009 Dobell and the 2013 Adelaide Perry Prize for Drawing.
Bridge and the Pipes Roosevelt Island (2013) Etching on Velin Arches 20 x 24.5cm Edition of 50
DRYPOINT ETCHINGS
I met Marco Luccio a few years ago when he was in New York doing drypoint etchings of Roosevelt Island. He was constantly looking for locations on the island to sketch his work. He captured the vibrancy of the City in black and white so beautifully.
Under the George Washington Bridge (2016) Etching on Velin Arches paper 24.5 x 24.5cm 5http://Empire from the Chrysler Building (2013) Etching on Velin Arches 24.5 x 20cm
Smokestacks and the Queensboro (2008) Drypoint on Velin Aches 30 x 60cm Unique State Framed:
The Flatiron from the Side (2013) Etching on Somerset Buff paper 24.5 x 20cm Edition of 50
PAINTINGS
The Flatiron and the Cars (2018) Acrylic on Canvas
In the summer of 2018 Luccio returned to New York to capture the city in oil paints. His vibrant colors and techniques exuded the activity of the city.
He was lucky enough to paint in a space on the top floor of the Chrysler Building. Melanie Colter and I joined him to see the city from this perch.
The casement window of the Chrysler Building do open for a breeze. We were inside the top of the great arches.
This is one of the supports for the building, with Melanie’s assistance
This Chrysler Building space is used as an active office, with great views and even a stairway to a balcony.
NEW YORK POSTCARDS
In 2019 Luccio returned to New York with a wonderful collection of art done on postcards. They were short stories with great charm on a small canvas.
The Albatross Project
Undertaken in collaboration with Melbourne-based company Rock Posters, you may have already seen Luccio’s poster during solitary walks around Melbourne and Sydney. Or, if on Instagram, you may have seen the poster shared by passers-by who have noted the striking image – an etching of two albatrosses lovingly touching each other’s beaks, accompanied by the words ‘LOVE’, ‘HOPE’ and ‘TRUST’.
In keeping with the times, Luccio has created space for this project to slowly evolve and emerge. It allows for discovery of the works and engagement with them in ‘real life’ rather than in the (currently forbidden) context of an art gallery. It is a social gift from an artist driven to contribute to and communicate with a wide array of single-person audiences. Members of the public are encouraged to capture and share their responses to the works via the hashtag #lovehopetrust
Why the Albatross? For Luccio, the albatross is a symbol of both isolation and social fidelity. The albatross is often ‘at sea’, and many of us may find ourselves, metaphorically, in a similar position having had our usual modes of life taken from us in the blink of an eye. Yet, according to Luccio, “with love as the driving force, trust in the process, and hope for the future we can also emerge to a new reality enhanced by the reflection on meaning that enforced solitude tends to provoke”.
TO SEE MORE OF MARCO LUCCIO’S WORK INCLUDING PHOTOGRAPHY, VIDEOS, AND LOTS MORE GREAT ART, CHECK OUT HIS WEBSITE: MARCOLUCCIO.COM
HUDSON YARD “&” TRAIN ENTRANCE Municipal Building, 1 Centre Street ANDY SPARBERG, HARA REISER, VERN HARWOOD, JAY JACOBSON, ARON EISENPREISS GOT IT RIGHT
Today is issue number 300. How that happened is unknown. It is a fun project, a way to communicate with so many friends, neighbors, family, islander, off-islanders and whom-ever finds us and adds their names to the FROM THE ARCHIVES mailing list. This keeps people up-to-date on activities, though some are limited.
I always feel bad when I see a newspaper article or publication that I want others to know about. This way we can spread the word of wonderful event, places and people.
People ask me why we do FROM THE ARCHIVES? Why not? In a pandemic we could sit home and feel useless, but instead this is more fun and a daily mission that I am doing.
The RIHS Board gives great support and we all realize that we are reaching about 200 persons a day who open our editions, from the over 700 subscribers we have. The total is 60,000 times FROM THE ARCHIVES has been read!
Melanie has been our graphics artist, coach, ideas person and giving so much encouragement.
Deborah nightly posts the latest edition on our website after sending me a note on typos. I make many spelling errors and not blaming spellchecker.
Thanks to the loyal gang that every morning send me their answers to the PHOTO OF THE DAY. Last week we had 12 people guess the photo, a record.
Send us your comments, critiques, suggestions and submissions. Stephen Blank has written great articles recently and more to come from him this week.
March 18th is our first anniversary send me your suggestions and contributions for our anniversary issue.
JUDITH BERDY
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 Sources
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated PHOTOS BY JUDITH BERDY / RIHS (C) FUNDING PROVIDED BY ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE GRANTS CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE BEN KALLOS DISCRETIONARY FUNDING THRU DYCD
Clementine Hunter, Melrose Quilt, ca. 1960, fabric, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Barbara Coffey Quilt Endowment, 2014.5
Clementine Hunter was born on a Louisiana plantation where her grandparents had been slaves. When she was twelve, her family moved to Melrose Plantation in Natchitoches Parish to work as sharecroppers. Clementine worked as a field hand, cook, and housekeeper. The Henry family bought Melrose in 1884; they restored architectural structures on the property and moved historic log cabins from the area onto the property. When John Hampton Henry died, his wife Cammie made Melrose a retreat for visiting artists. Hunter’s exposure to artists and some leftover paints led her to own artistry. She painted quotidian stories she felt historians overlooked—primarily the activities of the black workers. She also made pictorial quilts. This one depicts several notable buildings at Melrose, including the Big House, Yucca House, and African House, in which Hunter painted a now-historic mural of plantation life in 1955.
Clementine Hunter, Untitled (Magi Bearing Gifts), ca. 1970-1980, paint on an albany slip whiskey jug, Smithsonian American Art Museum, The Margaret Z. Robson Collection, Gift of John E. and Douglas O. Robson, 2016.38.36
Mary Jackson, Low Basket with Handle, 1999, sweetgrass, pine needles, and palmetto, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Marcia and Alan Docter, 2001.61 Mary Jackson’s coiled baskets show her love for African basketmaking traditions as well as her desire to create contemporary designs. This basket has a wide and shallow body that appears more decorative than functional, but the tall arching handle allows the user to carry more than might appear possible. Jackson invested the piece with a lively quality, weaving the handle so that the patterns appear to leap up, creating a graceful arc before returning to the body. “The technique is the same; the material is the same as in the traditional baskets; it’s just stretching the tradition to the limit of an art form.”
Gayleen Aiken, A Dream Theatre Organ, Way Out Back of Old House at Midnight, after 1970, oil on canvas with glitter, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Herbert Waide Hemphill, Jr., 1998.84.1
Mattie Lou O’Kelley, Farm Scene, 1975, oil on canvas, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Herbert Waide Hemphill, Jr., 1998.84.28
Mattie Lou O’Kelley painted images inspired by her memories of growing up on a Georgia farm. She created colorful scenes in which the sun is always shining, the people are happy, and the crops are plentiful. O’Kelley left school when she was still young to help on the family farm. Although life was difficult, she chose only to highlight the good memories in her paintings. The perfectly shaped hills, trees, and clouds in Farm Scene create a landscape that is too good to be true.
Ellen Oppenheimer studied glassblowing at college and now designs neon pieces in San Francisco. Her first experience in working with fabric came after graduation: her father was throwing out several of his old ties and Oppenheimer reclaimed them, joining the different materials together to form her first quilt. She uses the technique of “machine inlaying” to create her pieces, which allows odd shapes to be incorporated into the design without the stitches showing. Oppenheimer’s quilts combine vibrant colors with patterns she prints herself. They often employ a single, continuous line that twists and turns through the maze of fabrics, representing what the artist feels are “the convoluted journeys that we take to get exactly where we started.”
Elena Karina, St. Theresa, 1979, glazed porcelain, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase, 1980.99
Elena Karina used a variety of techniques such as casting, carving, and impressing the clay to create porcelain sculptures that simulate the marine life found in the tide pools on California beaches. She bisque fired each piece first, which changes the clay into a ceramic material and allows for the addition of stains and underglazes without risk of damaging the object during the higher temperature glaze firing. In St. Theresa, the undulating exterior paired with the threateningly sharp interior creates the illusion of a creature emerging from its home in a bed of coral. While the origin of the title of this piece is unclear, Karina once explained how she names her sculptures: “I make the pieces first and the title comes later. Each piece has a definite character, so I try to choose a name that fits.” (Elena Karina: New Porcelain Vessels & Drawings, Everson Museum of Art, 1979) “I am really interested in the manipulation of certain shapes—which I think of as my alphabet—it’s a kind of vocabulary of shapes I have built up: the clusters of cones, the fan shapes, the bulbous pearl, crescents … I like to play with them, to combine and recombine them … pushing a certain gesture until I have pushed it as far as it will go.” The artist, quoted in Elena Karina: New Porcelain Vessels & Drawings, Everson Museum of Art, 1979
TOMORROW, MARCH 2 AT 6 P.M.
A Tale of Two Waterworks
Talk by Jeffrey Kroessler presented as part of NYC H20’s Ridgewood Reservoir for the 21st Century
Tuesday, Mar 2, 2021 6:00pm–7:15pm
In conjunction with the current Community Partnership Exhibition Ridgewood Reservoir for the 21st Century situated around the historic Watershed Model at the Queens Museum, We are pleased to host A Tale of Two Waterworks, talk by Jeffrey Kroessler presented by NYC H20. The presentation will be followed by Q&A with attendees. This event will take place on Zoom. To join please see queensmuseum.org The history of the water systems of New York City and the once independent City of Brooklyn is not only a story of engineering triumph, but a story about the public spirit. Clean water was essential for economic prosperity, health, sanitation, and municipal growth. When New York reached into Westchester and the Catskills for water sources, and when the City of Brooklyn tapped the Long Island aquifer, what were the environmental, economic and political factors in play? A Tale of Two Waterworks will explore the history of the two water systems, how and why they were built, how they determined the city’s future, and the story behind their unification.
Jeffrey A. Kroessler is the Interim Chief Librarian of the Lloyd Sealy Library, John Jay College of Criminal Justice. He is the author of New York, Year by Year, The Greater New York Sports Chronology, and the forthcoming Sunnyside Gardens: Planning and Preservation in a Historic Garden Suburb.
Image Credits: (black and white image) Drawing with aerial view of the two rectangular-shaped reservoir basins built in NYC in 1842, prior to the construction of Central Park, showing the larger oval-shaped reservoir which would replace them in1858. (color image) Lithograph,1859, showing the original two Ridgewood Reservoir basins in the City of Brooklyn, completed by 1858.
Image Credits: (black and white image) Drawing with aerial view of the two rectangular-shaped reservoir basins built in NYC in 1842, prior to the construction of Central Park, showing the larger oval-shaped reservoir which would replace them in1858. (color image) Lithograph,1859, showing the original two Ridgewood Reservoir basins in the City of Brooklyn, completed by 1858.
Members of FDNY Engine Company 49* The Engine Company was stationed here until 1958 when the RI Bridge opened. It could be trainees or firefighters here for training Andy Sparberg recognized 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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The IND Sixth Avenue Subway opened to the public December 15, 1940 – 80 years ago. It was the fourth and final rail transit tunnel to burrow below Herald Square, making that location the most complicated and challenging piece of subway construction in New York history. Let’s look further at the unique underground history at this location.
The first New York City subway route built here, the BMT Broadway subway, opened in January 1918 as part of a longer route that opened between Rector Street and Times Square, providing through service to and from Brooklyn via the Manhattan Bridge. Due to Broadway’s diagonal slant here, the two subway routes cross an “X” pattern following their respective streets, with the midpoint of the “X” at about 32nd Street. The IND goes beneath the BMT. Eight different routes, four on each line, intersect here, forming the third busiest NYC subway station, with nearly 40 million annual fares collected in the years prior to 2020. The only busier stations are Times Square with about 64 million annual fares, and Grand Central-42nd St. with about 46 million fares.
Those facts are impressive enough, but two additional sets of tunnels opened at this location in 1910, before any of the subways. Let’s find out a little more.
PATH 33rd St. Station Originally was a block north, relocated here to 32nd St. in 1939 to make rom for IND Tunnel. photo www.nycsubway.org
The oldest, and deepest tunnels are four that you can’t see – the Long Island RR-Amtrak tunnels, opened in September 1910, that are deep below 32nd and 33rd Streets and travel east-west into and out of Penn Station, a block to the west. There are four tracks total, two under each street, all part of the Pennsylvania Railroad’s massive early 20th century project that built the station, connecting tunnels on both sides, and the Hell Gate Bridge. Right afterward came the Hudson and Manhattan (H&M) 33rd Street terminal station, opened in November 1910, the last piece of a two-track line that originally opened in 1908 as far north as 19th Street and Sixth Avenue. Popularly known as the Hudson Tubes, and now known as PATH (Port Authority Trans-Hudson Corporation), it is a subway-type service connecting Manhattan with Hoboken, Jersey City, and Newark. The PATH moniker dates from 1962 when the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey bought the Hudson Tubes from its bankrupt private owners.
The Sixth Avenue line, built most recently (1940), passes underneath the Broadway BMT line, above the LIRR-Amtrak tunnel, and goes around the PATH tunnel. Because the Sixth Avenue tunnel had to be threaded through this already-existing maze, it dips down in the middle of its station, with either end at a higher elevation. Both the PATH and IND tunnels follow Sixth Avenue. As PATH predates the IND subway by about 30 years, its tracks are closest to the surface of Sixth Avenue.
As if this wasn’t complicated enough, the IRT Sixth Avenue elevated was still running above everything when subway construction started and had to be supported as the subway tunnel was being built below. In December 1938, the elevated was closed and its removal was completed in April 1939, easing the work for the new subway.
Because the PATH tunnel was already there, the 1940 IND subway was limited to two tracks between 34th and West 4th Streets. North and south of those locations it was built with four tracks. This constraint would be corrected in 1967 (see below). But there’s even more to this history – the IND Sixth Avenue subway caused major changes to the Hudson Tubes (H&M) as well. The IND station construction required the original H&M 33rd Street terminal to move one block south. The old station was closed in December 1937 and subsequently demolished, with terminal operations temporarily moved to the then-existing 28th Street station. The new relocated station opened in September 1939, still known as 33rd Street and still in use today. At the same time, the 28th Street station was closed, as the new station featured exits to 30th Street. The next PATH station to the south was, and remains, 23rd Street. In fact, the original Sixth Avenue subway plans suggested capturing the PATH tunnel for subway use – but because PATH train cars are smaller than IND cars, the idea was scrapped because the PATH tunnel would require major rebuilding.
Namesake for Herald Square, Long Forgotten New York Newspaper
A final chapter to the 34th Street BMT-IND complex was completed in November 1967, as part of the Chrystie Street Connection project in Lower Manhattan. A deep tunnel opened below Sixth Avenue, under both the PATH and IND local tracks between 34th and West 4th Streets, connecting the previously interrupted middle tracks. This work began in 1961 and allowed full four track service below Sixth Avenue; ever since B and D trains have used this routing.
On the following pages are a track diagram and some photos, both historical and contemporary. The next time you use 34th Street-Herald Square, walk the length of one of the two Sixth Avenue platforms (B, D, F, or M trains), and then walk up the ramps at the north end, or use the escalator, to get an idea of the complexity of this station. And give a thank you to the engineers and construction workers who made it all possible.
The Parachute Jump is a defunct amusement ride and a landmark in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, along the Riegelmann Boardwalk at Coney Island. Situated in Steeplechase Plaza near the B&B Carousell, the structure consists of a 250-foot-tall (76 m), 170-short-ton (150 t) open-frame, steel parachute tower. Twelve cantilever steel arms radiate from the top of the tower; when the ride was in operation, each arm supported a parachute attached to a lift rope and a set of guide cables. Riders were belted into a two-person canvas seat, lifted to the top, and dropped. The parachute and shock absorbers at the bottom would slow their descent.
The ride was built for the 1939 New York World’s Fair at Flushing Meadows–Corona Park, also in New York City. Capped by a 12-foot (3.7 m) flagpole, it was the tallest structure at the Fair. In 1941, after the World’s Fair, it was moved to its current location in the Steeplechase amusement park on Coney Island. It ceased operations in the 1960s following the park’s closure, and the frame fell into disrepair.
Despite proposals to either demolish or restore the ride, disputes over its use caused it to remain unused through the 1980s. The Parachute Jump has been renovated several times since the 1990s, both for stability and for aesthetic reasons. In the 2000s, it was restored and fitted with a lighting system. The lights were activated in 2006 and replaced in a subsequent project in 2013. It has been lit up in commemoration of events such as the death of Kobe Bryant. The ride, the only remaining portion of Steeplechase Park, is a New York City designated landmark and has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
*********************** Correct Answers: ED LITCHER, THOM HEYER, JAY JACOBSON, JINNY EWALD, M. FRANK, ARON EISENPRISS, ALEXIS VLLEFANE, CLARA BELLA, ANDY SPARBERG, HARA REISER, NANCY BROWN, VERN HARWOOD, ARLENE BESSENOFF &, LISA FERNANDEZ
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 Roosevelt Island Historical Society
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Raymond F. Almirall was a Brooklyn architect best known for civic buildings around the city.
At the dawn of the 20th century, Raymond F. Almirall was an up-and-coming Brooklyn architect with a promising future. After his education at the L’ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, he returned home and began an association with New York City government that led to his design of libraries, hospitals, asylums and public baths.
Almirall had been chosen as a member of an advisory commission in charge of building the Carnegie Libraries. He was also the secretary of the group.
Andrew Carnegie had put aside millions of dollars for the building of libraries in the United States, his native Scotland and other nations. Brooklyn got money to build 21 Carnegie branches, and Almirall designed three of them.
Carnegie money was earmarked for branches only, but the Brooklyn Public Library was in need of a new Central Library, which would be financed by the city. What an opportunity this would be for any architect to design such a lasting public project, and Raymond Almirall was in the catbird’s seat. In 1908, Almirall was chosen to design the new Central Branch.
The Beaux-Arts-led City Beautiful movement was shaping public spaces in America’s cities. What could be more beautiful than Brooklyn’s Grand Army Plaza, already a City Beautiful site, with the Arch, entrance to Prospect Park, the fountains and the new Institute of Arts and Science still growing on Eastern Parkway?
Almirall’s new Central Library would join McKim, Mead & White’s grand museum in Classically inspired glory. It was to be a huge, domed four story structure, complementing the nearby museum.
Almirall plan for new Central Branch, 1907. Photo via Brooklyn Public Library
The new library would have a large central dome and entrance at the apex of the building, with colonnades along both sides, running along both Eastern Parkway and Flatbush Avenue. It would have had the latest accoutrements of library science.
Almirall planned reading rooms, classrooms, music rooms, an auditorium, a children’s library, research and rare book rooms, lunch rooms, miles of stacks, and an underground garage with conveyor belts for transporting books, book elevators, and rooms dedicated to cataloging and restoration and repair.
The new library would also have a first-aid station, a newspaper room, telephone and stenographer’s rooms, and the back sorting rooms would have tracks for carts to run along, for transporting books. The cost was estimated to be $4,500.000.
Ground was broken for the library in 1912. By 1913, the foundation had been dug out, and part of the west wall along Flatbush Avenue had been built. Then the money ran out, and work was halted. It would not begin again for another 30 years, the poster child for incompetence in city building projects.
At a time when Almirall should have been basking in the glow of his magnificent new library rising to join the Institute of Arts and Sciences, he was taking on other projects, designing his final Carnegie Library branch further down Eastern Parkway, at Utica Avenue, and designing churches and Seaview Hospital buildings.
Then, the curse of civic responsibility occurred — jury duty. In 1919, Almirall was impaneled as a grand juror in investigations of city corruption under the administration of Mayor John F. Hylan, who was mayor of NYC between 1918 and 1925.
Hylan, whose nickname was Red Mike, had grown up in Bushwick, and was a train conductor with the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Corporation until he was fired for almost running down his supervisor. He became a lawyer, and in 1918, with the sponsorship of Tammany Hall and William Randolph Hearst, became the dark horse candidate for mayor, and won.
Almirall’s persistence in getting to the bottom of the muck in the Hylan administration made an enemy of Red Mike. Some say that the reason the library project was stopped in its tracks was Hylan’s doing. Others blame the economy, World War I, poor city planning, other political in-fighting and an overblown project. In the end, Almirall would never see his library finished.
After World War I ended, Almirall moved his family back to France, where he stayed till around 1929. During that time he was chosen as one of the architects adding their expertise to the restoration of the Palace of Versailles, damaged during the war. His was a principal role in that restoration, and in gratitude, France made him a Chevalier of the Legion of Honor.
While in France, he also designed several other buildings. He came back to the United States and took up residence in Hempstead, Long Island.
By 1929, the year Almirall came back from Paris, the Flatbush wing of the Central Library had crawled to exterior completion, and the project halted again for lack of funds. Then the Great Depression hit.
During the 1930s, the public mindset toward architectural styles had changed. Gone were the Beaux-Art Classical details, the ornate columns and columns. Art Deco, with its flat surfaces, clean lines and ornamental relief was in vogue.
Almirall’s unfinished library stood awkwardly along Flatbush Avenue like a beached ocean liner. The city chose new architects for the project, Alfred Githens and Francis Keally, who kept the Almirall footprint. The foundations had been dug and were sitting there for 30 years.
They kept the walls of the Flatbush wing and tore down everything else, stripping the walls of ornament and detail, and eliminating the fourth floor. They designed a brand new building around what they had retained, and work began on this less expensive Art Deco design in 1938.
WIKIWAND IMAGE
While the library is certainly great in its own right, and a very beautiful and successful building, it must have been a huge slap in the face to Raymond Almirall, who lived to see them tearing down what would have been his finest and most monumental creation.
A year later, after poor health had put him in Lenox Hill Hospital, Chevalier Raymond F. Almirall died at age 69 on May 18, 1939. His funeral mass at the Church of St. Ignatius Loyola on Park Avenue was attended by a delegation of the Institute of Architects and the Society of American Engineers, organizations of which Almirall had been a member.
He left behind his wife, two sons and a daughter. He was buried in Green-Wood Cemetery, home to many other great architects and visionaries. He did not live to see the new Central Library open with much fanfare and ceremony on February 1, 1941. One wonders if he would have liked it.
In the 1930s, architects Githens and Keally were commissioned to redesign the building in the Art Deco style, eliminating the expensive ornamentation and the fourth floor. Construction recommenced in 1938, and Almirall’s building on Flatbush Avenue was largely demolished except for the frame, but some of the original facade along the library’s parking lot is still visible. Completed by late 1940, the Central Library opened to the public on February 1, 1941. It was publicly and critically acclaimed at the time.
The second floor of the Central Library opened in 1955, nearly doubling the amount of space available to the public. Occupying over 350,000 square feet (33,000 m2) and employing 300 full-time staff members, the building serves as the administrative headquarters for the Brooklyn Public Library system. Prior to 1941 the Library’s administrative offices were located in the Williamsburgh Savings Bank on Flatbush Avenue.[5]
ANDY SPABERG, SUSAN RODESIS, JAY JACOBSON, VERN HARWOOD, HARA REISER, GLORIA HERMAN, LAURA HUSSEY, ALL GOT IT
A NOTE FROM MITCH ELLINSON
Thanks for your article on the Bloomingdale Asylum. There is just one extant asylum building still on Columbia’s Morningside Heights campus. According to Wikipedia, it was built as a residence for wealthy male inmates. It has had many uses over the years. It is currently the home of La Maison Francaise. Here are some pictures of it to the right of Low Library, the administration building. It was moved and stripped of its veranda when the Columbia campus was built. Judith Berdy
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 Roosevelt Island Historical Society
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The first, main building as it appeared in 1831. artist Archibald L. Dick, from View in New-York and its Environs (copyright expired)
Students graduating from King’s College in May 1769 had other things to think about than lunatics. Agitators were promoting anti-government sentiments and within months the Golden Hill incident, followed by the Boston Massacre, would spark full-blown military revolution.
Nevertheless Dr. Samuel Bard addressed the need for a “public infirmary” for the insane during his speech that afternoon. Another professor, Dr. Peter Middleton, said Bard’s case was “warmly and pathetically set forth.”
A campaign for public donations, or subscriptions, was initiated and on June 13, 1771 the petitioners were granted a charter for the Society of the Hospital in the city of New York, in America. War slowed the progress of the project; but according to The North American Review in 1837, “The New York Hospital was opened for the reception of patients in 1791. Apartments were then appropriated to lunatics; but the accommodations being inconvenient, a new and separate building was erected in the immediate vicinity of the general hospital, and opened in 1808.”
The governors of the New York Hospital, “with a view of introducing a course of moral treatment for lunatic patients,” applied to the State for aid. In 1816 an act was passed granting $10,000 per year to the Hospital until 1857–a princely sum equal to nearly $175,000 today.
The Review explained “A piece of ground containing eighty acres, near the Hudson river, about seven miles from the city of New York, was purchased; and on a dry, elevated and pleasant spot, fronting the Bloomingdale road, the building now called the Bloomingdale Lunatic Asylum was erected.”
Bloomingdale History
The Federal-style stone building was completed in 1821, “and to it were immediately removed all the lunatics in the old hospitals in the city.” The building could accommodate 200 patients.
The complex was enlarged with the addition of two buildings in 1829 “for the more violent.” Patients and visitors could stroll the park-like setting of gardens and winding walkways. Inmates worked the orchards and vegetable gardens.
In 1836 much of the unused 80 acres was sold off, reducing the campus to 40 acres. By then the Bloomingdale Asylum had received 1,915 patients. Of these, 828 were considered cured, 399 were “relieved,” and 146 died.
Following the opening of the Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell’s Island in 1839–intended for insane paupers–the Bloomingdale Insane Asylum accepted only paying patients.
The New-York State Register, in 1845, described the institution with glowing praise. It “is pleasantly situated near the banks of the Hudson River…laid out in gardens, pleasure grounds, gravel walks and farm lots, well adapted to the unfortunate inmates.
“The building is erected on one of the most elevated and healthy sites on the Island, and sufficiently retired for the comfort and convenience of the patients.” The fact that the asylum was “sufficiently retired” from the city most likely gave more comfort to citizens than to patients.
Miller’s Strangers’ Guide to the City of New York offered a pleasing picture of the Asylum in 1866. “The sudden opening of the view, the extent of the grounds, the various avenues gracefully winding through so large a lawn the cedar hedges, the fir and other ornamental trees, tastefully distributed or grouped, the variety of shrubbery and flowers.”
In 1857 Phelp’s Strangers and Citizens’ Guide to New York City had noted that “it is necessary, before a patient can be admitted into the Bloomingdale Asylum, that a lunacy-warrant from any two justices of the peace, or police magistrates, issued upon the evidence of two reputable physicians as to the alleged fact of insanity be procured” and that “payment of board (which is always in advance) must be arranged.”
The artist of this etching added a family of deer to render a tranquil atmosphere. from the collection of the New York Public Library
The procedure for pronouncing a patient insane was important. In the mid-19th century declaring one’s inconvenient relative a lunatic or “incompetent” was a common means of disposing of the problem. It was used, for instance, by men who had grown tired of their wives, or by those who greedily eyed the fortunes of their relatives.
State laws contributed to the problem. When S. J. Hopkins had his wife, Maria, committed in 1857, he was freed of all financial obligations. As was pointed out in court, “By statute she is to be supported by her mother. The marital right of the husband is gone the very moment she becomes insane…The husband, therefore, is not responsible for her support.”
So when doctors at the Bloomingdale Insane Asylum quickly found Maria quite sane and released her, Hopkins was infuriated. When the carriage carrying Maria and her three brothers arrived at the Recorder’s Office in August to make her discharge official, Hopkins tried to assault her. She was escorted safely into the building by a police officer.
The Recorder’s release of Maria’s to her brothers “was followed by a spontaneous burst of applause from the spectators, and especially from the ladies,” reported The New York Times on August 27, 1857. But the article ended “The husband, after their departure, expressed his determination to his friends to assert and obtain the right to the control of his wife.”
The accusations of illicit commitment continued. Two cases made headlines in 1872–those of Theresa Drew and Rosa McCabe. Both women received court hearings on August 13. The proceedings prompted The New York Herald to dramatically explain that many New Yorkers suspected “barbaric cruelties exceeding the most startling records of fiction,” and that “victims of jealousy or hate or revenge [were] dragged from their homes, and, upon the mere pretence [sic] of insanity, thrust into the gloomiest dungeons of an insane asylum, and there, helpless and remediless, left to linger and suffer and die.”
Theresa Drew was described by the Herald as “as large, muscular but pale faced woman of some forty years. She wore a lilac colored striped dress, with white shawl and bonnet trimmed a la mode.” Her interview with the judge and doctors resulted in her being deemed sane.
The case of Rosa McCabe was shocking. Now known as Sister Mary, she wore the habit of the Order of Stanislaus. The Herald explained she “had sought retirement from the pomp and vanities of the world by becoming a nun…Here, as the story goes, a priest sought to make her yield to his vile passions, and upon her refusal she was charged with being insane and removed to the Bloomingdale Asylum.”
Whether Sister Mary was sane or not was not concluded during the hearing. But the writer for The New York Herald felt the idea of an insane nun was more believable than an immoral priest. “This story of the unsaintly procedure of a priest may of course be purely the hallucination of her dethroned reason.”
The Bloomingdale Insane Asylum had faced a far different scandal in 1870. Although patients were charged between $8 to $30 per week–upwards of $565 today–an inspection by the Sanitary Committee of the Board of Health on December 1 that year yielded disturbing findings.
“There are eight water-closets in the house,” reported The Times, “the excrement from six of which pass through a seven-inch iron pipe, which…empties itself into a cistern right under the windows of the female ‘lodge.'” The human waste traveled “about a half a mile until it finds its level in a stagnant pool in Manhattanville…The water is muddy enough and the smell sickening enough, when it leaves the Asylum ground and enters the open street, to have it indicted as a nuisance.”
Worse yet was damning publicity that stemmed from the secret journal kept by a prominent banker, J. P. Van Vleck. According to his lawyer, in 1871 he was arrested “while sitting at his breakfast table, and was taken, without a word of explanation,” to the Asylum. During his 16-month commitment, he kept “a minute diary.”
Once released, the scandal spread beyond New York. On August 15, 1872 the Pennsylvania newspaper, The Elk County Advocate, reported “Although subjected to no special indignity, he says that the treatment of the insane by the keepers is simply revolting.”
The banker’s case appeared to be another of false commitment. “The gentleman who was dismissed yesterday was never treated medically during his entire imprisonment, and his manner and general intelligence prohibit the belief that he is of unsound mind. He does not yet know by whom he was incarcerated or on whose medical certificate.”
Van Vleck’s diary and the subsequent publicity led Governor Hoffman to appoint a commission “to examine the charges against the Bloomingdale Lunatic Asylum,” one week later. John D. Townsend, Van Vlecke’s attorney detailed charges to a New York Times reporter:
“The insane, he said, were kicked and choked until blood spurts from the mouth and nostrils–some being driven to suicide by systematic cruelties. He commented on the report of the overseers, making out everything to be ‘lovely’ in the Bloomingdale Asylum, and said that the officials were fully prepared for the visit of the Committee, and had everything arranged for the inspection.”
The officials may have tidied up the Asylum for the Committee’s inspection, but a former employee, George K. Irwin, provided ammunition for Van Vleck’s lawsuit. The Wheeling West Virginia Daily Intelligencer reported he provided affidavits “relating many cruelties resulting in death, by parties connected with the Asylum, that the food is poor, that the inmates receive foul treatment, that vile practices generally obtain there.”
A New-York Tribune reporter faked insanity to get inside, and then spirited out reports of the conditions. The New England Journal of Medicine, in September 1872, was offended, writing “We are glad to observe that the expression of the public press is almost universally condemnatory of the exploits of a Tribune reporter, who thought it sharp to feign insanity and get himself lodged in Bloomingdale, for the purpose of surreptitiously obtaining facts. Such sneak-practice betokens neither great shrewdness nor a proper sense of honor.”
The Journal urged that “popular judgment should be suspended” until the investigations were completed. “It is easy enough to arouse a prejudice against an institution about which so much mystery hangs as is inevitable and necessary with an insane asylum.” The article stressed that “sensible people” would give the Asylum the “benefit of every doubt.”
The Asylum was cleared of gross wrongdoing and the disgrace soon faded.
Somewhat expectedly, of course, stories of sane relatives being committed unfairly, continued. One of these was the 30-year old Susan Dickie who was declared insane in 1871. The South Carolina newspaper The Newberry Herald reported on March 6, 1878 that she was committed “on the certificate of a physician who had only seen her for ten minutes, and who knew no more about her complaints or the nature of her antecedents than he did about the back of his head. He got a good fat fee for his opinion.”
The newspaper floridly complained that the doctor thereby “deprived a fellow-being of her liberty, and consigned her to a living tomb and the fellowship of maniacs for seven long years.”
Susan Dickie’s commitment followed the death of her father and the reading of his will. She was to received one-sixth of the income of his $900,000 estate. Only after she was noticed by “a few persons who knew nothing of her history,” according to the Louisiana newspaper The Bossier Banner, was her insanity questioned. Susan was released after a thorough examination. The Bossier Banner reported on March 21, 1878 “For six years she has been for the most part a solitary little woman, the occupant of a little room among imbeciles, idiots and maniacs. To-day she comes out to enjoy all the pleasures of reunion with old friends and the practical and pleasant consolations obtainable with $7,000 a year.”
The Bloomingdale Insane Asylum played an important part in the defense of Charles J. Guiteau following his assassination of President James A. Garfield on July 2, 1881. In attempting to prove that Guiteau was insane, his attorney presented the 1829 records of the Asylum, which documented that his grandfather, Dr. Francis W. Guiteau “died there insane.”
A witness named Scoville testified that he knew Francis Guiteau when he was about 16 or 18 years old in Utica, New York. He was “disappointed in love,” said Scoville. When he challenged his rival to a duel, the pistols were loaded with blank cartridges. Guiteau, realized that he had been made a fool of. The “shame of it, united with disappointed affection for the lady of his choice, dethrone his reason and he became insane.”
His grandfather’s insanity did not sway the jury and Charles J. Guiteau was executed on June 30, 1882.
On February 23, 1889 the Mississippi newspaper the Woodville Republican reported on the wealth of the Bloomingdale Asylum, which it called “the richest institution of the kind in the world.” The 50 acres of land, it said, was worth more than $6 million. And its patients nearly all came “form the highest classes of society.”
The newspaper mentioned some of the wealthy inmates, including John Travers, son of a recently-deceased Wall Street tycoon. “His share of the…estate was $300,000.” The article said “The richest patient at present is Howard Meyer, son of the New Brunswick millionaire, who has an income of $7,000 a year devoted to his support.”
But living and being treated at the Bloomingdale Asylum was expensive. The writer added “This may seem like a large sum, but when one sees how physicians and others who minister to the rich charge for their services it soon melts away.”
At the time of the article the Asylum was poised to move. The land on which it stood had become far too valuable for the facility to remain there. On May 19, 1888 The New York Times had reported “The site occupied by the asylum is confessedly the finest for residence purposes on Manhattan Island…It embraces some 558 building lots, of an average value of from $5,000 to $8,000 per lot.”
Public opinion played a part in the proposed move as well. As Morningside Heights developed, “protest upon protest was accordingly made by interested parties against the presence of the madhouse within city limit,” explained The Times. The article reported that the Asylum would be moved to White Plains and the old buildings demolished.
In 1897 Columbia University moved onto the former site of the Asylum. Half a century, in 1947, later Horace C. Coon wrote his history of the institution, Columbia: Colossus on the Hudson. He started his book with the tongue-in-cheek comment “It is no accident, perhaps, that the present site of Columbia University was once occupied by the Bloomingdale Insane Asylum.”
Mario Cuomo Bridge, better know as the new Tappan Zee Bridge
Aron Eisenpreiss, Clara Bella, Andy Sparberg, Alexis Villefane, Hara Reiser, Jay Jacobson, Lisa Fernandez, Laura Hussey, Gloria Herman, Arlene Bessenoff, Nina Lublin, 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 Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff All image are copyrighted (c)
A DAYTONIAN IN MANHATTAN
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EDITORIAL For years we have been told about the living hell at the City run asylum on Blackwell’s Island. We see here that the private asylum not only took your money but you were treated just as poorly.
DIRECTLY ACROSS FROM CORNELL TECH A NEW WATERFRONT WALKWAY/PROMENADE IS TAKING SHAPE. ENJOY WATCHING THE GIANT CRANES AND BARGES WORKING IN THE RIVER.
A rendering of the East Midtown Greenway, as it will appear looking north near East 54th Street. (New York City Economic Development Corporation)
The creation of the East Midtown Greenway (EMG), a 1.5-acre public space stretching from East 53rd to 61st Streets along the waterfront, got underway Friday. The project, to be completed by 2022, is part of the Manhattan Waterfront Greenway initiative to wrap the entire perimeter of Manhattan with accessible public spaces and safe bicycle paths. The midtown space will close one of the largest remaining gaps in the $250 million city initiative, announced by Mayor de Blasio in 2018, to connect 32 miles of Manhattan waterfront esplanade.
The Manhattan Waterfront Greenaway project will close gaps in Inwood, Harlem, and East Harlem, as well as the East Midtown space. The goal is to connect neighborhoods to their waterfronts and add about 15 acres of open space. The planned esplanade will connect the bike paths that line the city’s perimeter so that cyclists can safely circle Manhattan without veering off into city streets.
After a six-month delay during the pandemic, construction has resumed on the long-awaited project adding a new eight-block stretch to the East River Esplanade.
The East Midtown Greenway will stretch between East 53rd and 61st streets, creating new waterfront access and public space and bringing the city closer to its long-held goal of creating a continuous, 32-mile loop around Manhattan.
The existing esplanade runs north above East 60th Street and into East Harlem. Construction started in November on the new $100 million greenway, which will be built directly above the East River, but came to a halt in the spring as the coronavirus took hold.
Now, even as the city faces a severe fiscal shortfall that has thrown a wrench into many capital projects, the greenway will be allowed to restart construction since work had already begun when the pandemic hit.
RENDERINGS FOR THE PROJECT
(FINAL PLANS MAY HAVE CHANGED)
Portion will be over the water. Remember when there was a temporary roadway in this area when the FR Drive was being renovated?
MARK YOUR CALENDARS FOR OUR EVENTS
UPCOMING PROGRAMS ON ZOOM Registration will be available before each event All events are at 7 p.m.
Tuesday, March 16 “Abandoned Queens” Author Richard Panchyk takes us on a journey through Queens’ past. Revealing haunting reminders of the way things used to be, he describes fascinating, abandoned places, including the chilling Creedmoor Psychiatric Center, the meandering remains of the country’s first modern highway, a defunct airport reclaimed by wilderness, an eerie old railroad line in Forest Hills, and a destroyed neighborhood in the Rockaways.
Tuesday, April 20 “Mansions and Munificence: the Gilded Age on Fifth Avenue” Guide, lecturer, author and teacher of art and architecture, Emma Guest-Consales leads a virtual tour of the great mansions of Fifth Avenue. Starting with the ex-home of Henry Clay Frick that now houses the Frick Collection, all the way up to the former home of Andrew Carnegie, now the Cooper-Hewitt Museum, she takes us through some of the most extravagant urban palaces the city has ever seen.
Tuesday, May 18 “Saving America’s Cities” Author and Harvard History Professor Lizabeth Cohen Provides an eye-opening look at her award-winning book’s subtitle: Ed Logue and the Struggle to Renew Urban America in the Suburban Age. Tracing Logue’s career from the development of Roosevelt Island in the ‘70s, to the redevelopment of New Haven in the ‘50s, Boston in the’60s and the South Bronx from 1978–85, she focuses on Logue’s vision to revitalize post-war cities, the rise of the Urban Development Corporation.
WEDNESDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
Can you identify this photo from today’s edition? Send you submission to
PILOT HOUSE THAT WAS RESTORED AND IS NOW INFORMATION BOOTH AT SOUTH STREET SEAPORT MUSEUM HARA REISER 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) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
UPPER EAST SIDE PATCH NYC/EDC 6SQ FT
FUNDING PROVIDED BY ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE GRANTS CITY COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE BEN KALLOS DISCRETIONARY FUNDING THRU DYCD
