Sharon Ann Stern, age 77, of New York, New York passed away on Tuesday, July 25, 2023.
This afternoon I learned that Sharon Stern passed away last night. She was a resident of Goldwater Hospital long before there was a Roosevelt Island. Sharon was 77 years old and she lived in an apartment in 540 Main Street since the late 1970’s. Sharon was one of a group of Goldwater residents who moved into their own apartments when the community was built.
I had met Sharon at Goldwater in the 1960’s and from then on we met occasionally and kept in touch when we visited and discussed our cats.
Sharon wrote poetry and published “Armature” in 2002*. Sharon struggled with staff to assist her and sadly she only left her home the one or two days a week when she could safely manage. She had episodes when her wheelchair failed and left her stranded. She would not travel off the island due to bad experiences.
Sharon would attend synagogue services and wrote extensively using a computer. She rejected many assistive devices to make her work easier.
A few years ago she marveled at reaching 75 years of age.
May she be a rest now and we remember her constant determination.
POET, TUTOR Sharon Stern breathes with a respirator.Credit…James Estrin/The New York Times
A Life Changed but Not Destroyed by Polio
Barron H..Lerner, M.D.
Jan. 26, 2009
Polio may seem like a distant memory. But thousands of people still live with the effects of the disease every day. And many are only in their 60s.One of them is Sharon Stern. In 1954, at age 9, she developed the dreaded “summer plague.” Although she experienced some recovery early on, she has had no use of her four limbs ever since. Unless you happened to visit an enclave of several dozen disabled people on Roosevelt Island in New York City, you would never meet her.I first met Ms. Stern, the cousin of a friend, in the lobby of her apartment building. She had steel-gray hair with bright eyes, and was carefully wrapped into her electric wheelchair.The wheelchair contained a portable respirator, connected by a tube to a mouthpiece. Most people take breathing for granted. But while awake, Ms. Stern must continually create a seal with her lips on the mouthpiece to receive air. At 12 times a minute, 16 hours a day for more than 50 years, that is a lot of effort. (A tight mouth seal enables her to sleep safely). Ms. Stern’s polio narrative is familiar. She was a healthy girl until she developed a severe headache. A doctor performed a spinal tap on the family’s kitchen table.
Her parents took her to a Brooklyn hospital, but her paralysis spread. When she began to have trouble breathing, a sign of severe bulbar polio, she was taken by ambulance to another hospital. There she was placed into the machine alternately praised as a lifesaver or condemned as a “steel casket”: the iron lung.Except for their heads, patients were encompassed within iron lungs. Using changes in air pressure, the machines breathed for the patients, basically moving their paralyzed respiratory muscles. Portholes provided access to patients’ bodies.But the portholes were a mixed blessing. It was not uncommon for the seals to loosen, causing them to fall open; that allowed outside air to enter and stop the iron lungs from working.Unable to get air, patients could not call for help. Ms. Stern recalls several times when — probably turning blue from lack of oxygen — she finally got the attention of a passerby who fixed the machine.Some children could not be saved. When a young girl in her ward died, Ms. Stern remembers being terrified of telling her parents: she thought they would expect her to die, too. The death haunted her for years, especially when she heard the song “The Darktown Strutters’ Ball,” which the girl’s father often sang to his daughter.When it became clear that Sharon’s case would not reverse quickly, she was moved to Goldwater Hospital on Welfare Island (now Roosevelt Island). There she began a grueling program of physical therapy aimed at restoring her ability to walk and breathe on her own.Neither of those goals was met. One day at age 11, she realized she would never ride her bicycle again. She remembers how she cried.
But there were other goals. The philosophy of Goldwater’s polio ward and its sponsoring organization, the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, was uplifting: “No matter how physically disabled we were, we could do anything in life.” By 1957 Sharon had left the iron lung, able to use less restrictive breathing devices that could be mounted on a wheelchair. Aside from an 18-month period at home, she spent her teenage years at Goldwater. The staff, busy with rehabilitation, often neglected other things. “Teenage sexuality was ignored in the hospital,” Ms. Stern told me, “although it was very much on our minds.”Nevertheless, there were high jinks. Once, someone was able to smuggle some wine onto the ward. Ms. Stern was out of the iron lung by then, but the nurse put her back in temporarily to ensure that her tipsy young patient did not stop breathing.Ms. Stern left Goldwater in 1976, moving into an apartment in a building designed for people with polio and other disabilities. That year she also earned a bachelor’s degree in English from Empire State College. She has tutored children and adults in reading and math, and written more than 1,000 poems.Still, when pressed, Ms. Stern acknowledges feeling “battered by life.” Most of her friends have died or moved away. And it is hard to find and hire aides, who must be available for her around the clock. Since the passage of the Americans With Disabilities Act in 1990, perhaps the most public face of disability was that of Christopher Reeve. He represented the patient-activist, fighting the system and crusading for research.But most physically disabled people live quiet lives, striving for normalcy and deriving meaning and pleasure from their accomplishments. Thus, Ms. Stern shuns terms like victim, survivor and physically challenged, referring to herself not by what she cannot do but by what she does: “I’m a poet, a tutor, a client of the home care agency and an employer of my staff.” Barron H. Lerner teaches medicine and public health at Columbia University Medical Center.
“ARMATURE’ is available on line for purchase.*
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CENTRAL NURSES RESIDENCE WHERE 475 STANDS NOW ED LITCHER AND GLORIA HERMAN GOT IT RIGHT
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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
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A century ago this year, Josephine Baker traveled on a one way ticket from Philadelphia to New York City, having left her recently-wed husband behind.
Born an illegitimate child in a St Louis ghetto on June 3, 1906, Freda Josephine McDonald had a dismal childhood of poverty living in an area of rooming houses, run-down apartments and brothels near Union Station. The city was beset by racial tension and violence.
Independent and streetwise, Josephine was fourteen when she started performing with the busking Jones Family Band playing ragtime on street corners. Entertaining the crowd outside the Booker T. Washington Theatre, the band was invited by its manager to join the Dixie Steppers, a traveling group of vaudeville performers.
After ending the tour in Philadelphia, she found work as a chorus girl at the Gibson Theatre on the corner of Lombard Street and Broad Street. There she met and married Willie Baker, a Pullman Porter in his mid-twenties.
She started her career in New York in 1923 as a chorus girl in Shuffle Along, a landmark vaudeville revue in African-American theater by Noble Sissle (lyrics) and Eubie Blake (music). In September 1924 she performed in their two act Broadway musical Chocolate Dandies.
When the show closed in the spring of 1925, she took up an engagement at Harlem’s Plantation Club. Chicago-born impresario Caroline Dudley Reagan was a white patron of the club. She had a particular (commercial) interest in African-American music and recognized Baker’s talent.
In spite of doubt and anxiety, Josephine could not resist the offer to join the cast of a revue and travel to Paris where Reagan in consultation with her friend André Daven, artistic director of the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées, had booked the theater for a series of performances.
Daven himself had taken advice from the Cubist painter Fernand Léger who suggested that hiring an Afro-American troupe would give the theater a much needed financial boost. It was there that Baker’s spectacular career took off.
A Match Made in Heaven
On September 15, 1925, young Josephine Baker joined twenty-five black performers (thirteen dancers, twelve musicians) who were set to sail for Cherbourg on Cunard’s flagship SS Berengaria. The company included pianist Claude Hopkins and his orchestra, dancer and choreographer Louis Douglas, blues singer Maud de Forest and the celebrated clarinettist Sidney Bechet. Rehearsals for the Revue Nègre took place during the crossing.
The show was produced by Rolf de Maré, a wealthy Swede living in Paris who was the founder of the vanguard dance group Ballet Suédois (Swedish Ballet). The Revue was staged at the Champs-Élysées Theatre on October 2, moved to the Theatre de L’Étoile in November, and was later shown in Brussels and Berlin, concluding in late February 1926.
On her arrival in Paris, Paul Colin had just been hired by André Daven as a set designer for the theatre. Born in Nancy in 1895, he had studied there under the Art Nouveau artist Eugène Vallin.
Having fought in the First World War, Colin settled in Paris and started work as a poster artist who incorporated modernist elements in his emerging stylistic repertoire. He was commissioned to create a poster advertising the Revue. After observing Baker in rehearsal, he enthusiastically invited her for a modeling session at his studio.
Colin’s poster in red and black colors shows Josephine in a tight white dress with short hair slicked back and fists on hips, appearing between two black men, one wearing a hat tilted over his eyes, the other with a broad smile. The Cubist distortion renders the rhythm of jazz. This joyous poster kicked off the careers of both Baker and Colin and would have a huge impact in the field of French poster art.
The Revue Nègre became a massive success. Baker performed three songs, but it was dancing with her Senegalese partner Joe Alex that thrilled audiences. They performed a “Danse Sauvage,” an uninhibited pas-de-deux in which both scantily clad performers were decorated with feathers and beads. The show opened to rave critical reviews and made Josephine an instant star.
The meeting of Baker and Colin was fortuitous for both of them. Baker found a devoted supporter who introduced her to vanguard artistic circles. Colin found a Muse who helped launch a career in which he produced some 1,900 posters and hundreds of stage and film sets. It made him the pre-eminent graphic creator in France. After a brief love affair, Paul and Josephine maintained a long-lasting personal and creative partnership.
Baker left the Revue in 1926 to star in her own show at the Folies-Bergère. The original troupe disbanded, but Baker’s star continued to rise as she performed to wild acclaim in clubs and theaters across Paris.
In her first acting role in the 1927 silent film La sirène des tropiques, she performed her legendary Charleston routine. Social jazz dance had arrived and Baker was its high priestess. That same year, aged twenty-one, she published her Mémoires with thirty illustrations by Colin.
Also in 1927, Colin mounted a spectacular event called the “Bal nègre” which was attended by three thousand Parisians. During the late 1920s, Parisian nightclubs began hosting similar events which became main inter-racial social spaces.
Jazz & Art Deco
The musical language of American jazz differed fundamentally from the well-tempered European grammar that, at the time, had come under attack from young musicians who no longer were prepared to accept the cultural status quo. The “génération du feu” – a generation that had experienced the flaming hell of trench warfare – turned away from tradition.
For aspiring practitioners and composers, jazz represented a perpetual opposition to tired systems of musical establishment. The drive for continuous innovation was recognized by French modernists who used jazz as a strategic ploy to break well-established aesthetic rules and regulations. Post-war Paris was ready for Josephine Baker and eager to swing.
In 1929 Paul Colin created a portfolio entitled Le tumulte noir, soon to be acknowledged as a masterpiece of Art Deco graphic design capturing the exuberant musical culture that dazzled Paris. Published in an edition of five hundred copies and containing a title page, four pages of text (including a dedication by Josephine Baker) and forty-five sparkling lithographs printed on both sides of twenty-two sheets, it gave a name to the passion for African-American music and dance that Baker epitomized.
Colin’s vivid colours and lines expressed the Parisian fascination with all things black. Josephine herself is portrayed twice in this set. In one print she wears a skirt of palm leaves; in another her famous one of yellow bananas.
A double sheet rendering an orchestra performing against a fragmented Art Deco cityscape of ocean liner, skyscrapers and construction equipment, points to the band of the Revue led by Claude Hopkins. Another print shows Parisians ecstatically dancing the Charleston.
Art Deco proved a perfect stylistic means to honour the African-American contribution to French and European popular culture of that era.
Negrophilia & Stereotype
Minstrel shows had reached London from the United States in the early 1840s and became the hottest musical attraction of its era. The fashion soon crossed the Channel to France. During the late 1840s Parisian cafés-concerts introduced the new sensation, featuring French singers with blackened faces and outlandishly red lips. By the turn of the century, these shows had become part of an entertainment scene in which African-Americans were typically portrayed as boisterous, but somewhat dim-witted characters.
To describe the passion for black culture, French critics used the term “négrophilie.” African art objects found their way into Parisian museums and art shops as a result of colonial trade. The vogue was inseparable from the latest tendencies in art and literature.
Henri Matisse, Georges Braque, Pablo Picasso and many other vanguard artists were attracted to African artifacts. Otherness intensified the clash between modernists and traditionalists: African carvings versus classical statues; jazz versus chamber music; Charleston versus ballroom dancing; banana skirt versus tutu.
Post-war Paris, on appearance, was becoming “color blind.” Baker’s beauty and blackness were intrinsic to her stage success. On the other hand, there can be no doubt that the Revue Nègre relied on (erotic) stereotypes of blackness. Baker’s “Danse sauvage” was an astute piece of exhibitionist art born from her understanding of racial stereotypes in general and their specific appeal in French cultural taste of the 1920s.
Baker’s sensual persona and revealing costumes were intrinsic to her success in Paris, but even more so were French stereotypes of the primitive and erotic African “Other.” It poses an intriguing question: who was exploiting whom?
An element of stereotyping was evident in Paul Colin’s poster as well. The suggestive pose of “La Baker” is intensified by the two male archetypal caricatures with thick red lips and frizzy hair. These types were lifted directly from the old minstrel show images.
Joie de Vivre
The 369th Regiment of African-Americans, known as the “Harlem Hellfighters,” spent 191 days in French front line trenches, more than any other American unit and suffering 1,500 casualties in combat. Once the soldiers returned home, racial tension had not dissipated and remained rampant. Many former black soldiers decided to remain in France and turn to entertainment or hospitality for sources of income.
France may have had its own checkered colonial past, but the nation was grateful for the heroic participation of these soldiers on its behalf. Thankfulness alone however does not explain the astounding success of African-American music and dance in post-war France. Neither does the incredible professionalism of some of its performers.
Victory in war was won at a crippling cost. Of the eight million Frenchmen mobilized into the army, 1.3 million had been killed and almost a million were crippled for life. Large parts of its industrial and agricultural heartland in the northeast were devastated and depopulated. The value of the currency had collapsed; the economy was in tatters.
The psychological wounds caused by the strain of protracted warfare went deeper. The nation was battered and bruised by years of relentless fighting and the loss of so many young lives. A country in mourning had lost its vitality and famous “joie de vivre.”
African-American performers lifted the French out of a state of collective depression. Their rhythm, movement, energy and colour helped them to their feet and taught them to smile again.
Paul Colin’s work reflects that renewed drive in a fusion of French style and African-American vibrancy. It is to the artist’s credit that the old stereotype references were eliminated from Le tumulte noir. He created an iconic document in which the admiration for African art and African-American performers has found an exuberant expression. Colin’s portfolio is a dignified tribute to the spirit of Josephine and a celebration of the Jazz Age in Paris.
Follies Flop
Ex-pat artists in Paris shared the enthusiasm for Baker’s performances. Writers such as F. Scott Fitzgerald and E.E. Cummings were inspired by Josephine’s beauty and sensuality. Ernest Hemingway referred to her as the “most sensational woman anybody ever saw. Or ever will.” Their devotion may have motivated her to return to the United States.
In 1936, she traveled to New York City to appear in a Ziegfeld Follies production on the Winter Garden Theatre stage with Fanny Brice and Bob Hope. The response was far from triumphant. A racist review in Time (February 10, 1936) typified Baker’s negative reception by theater-goers.
Its critic claimed that to a Manhattan audience Baker was “just a slightly buck-toothed young Negro woman whose figure might be matched in any night club show, whose dancing & singing could be topped practically anywhere outside France.”
Having cancelled her contract, a disheartened Baker returned to Paris. Before leaving, she divorced her estranged husband Willie Baker. Her ties with the United States were broken and she became a French citizen. Europe’s highest paid entertainer, she made her final triumphant appearance on the Paris stage at the age of sixty-nine. For once, Broadway had missed the (show) boat.
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BROOKLYN ARMY TERMINAL ANDY SPARBERG AND ARON EISENPREISS GOT IT RIGHT
THE VIEW OF “DOUBLE TAKE” FROM THE ROOF OF THE SUBWAY STATION. TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART AND PHOTOGRAPHS CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacooper.net
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
NEW YORK ALMANACK
Illustrations, from above: Detail of photo of Joséphine Baker in 1940, photographed by Studio Harcourt; Paul Colin’s poster for the Revue Nègre; Baker and her partner Joe Alex in the “Danse sauvage”; Josephine Baker’s Mémoires with thirty illustrations by Paul Colin, 1927; Colin’s announcement of the “Bal nègre,” 1927; Cover of Paul Colin’s Le tumulte noir, 1929; Colin’s lithograph of the Revue Nègre band led by Claude Hopkins in Le tumult noir, 1929.
The multiple murders of James (Husted) Germond; his wife, Mabel; and their two children, Bernice and Raymond, at their Dutchess County farm in November 1930 is one of the most famous crimes ever committed in the Hudson Valley.Despite contemporary attention from Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Pinkerton Detectives, and more recently from amateur sleuths and the press, the Germond murders went unsolved until Dr. Cookingham’s investigation.On the July episode of Crossroads host Clare Sheridan welcomed Dr. Vincent Cookingham who spoke about his book The Germond Family Murders: A Forensic Conclusion to a Cold Case (Outskirts Press, 2019).You can listen to the podcast here: https://on.soundcloud.com/F158SCrossroads of Rockland History, a program of the Historical Society of Rockland County, airs on the third Monday of each month at 9:30 am, right after the Jeff and Will morning show, on WRCR radio 1700 AM and www.WRCR.com. Join host Clare Sheridan as we explore, celebrate, and learn about our local history, with different topics and guest speakers every month. Our recorded broadcasts are also available for streaming on all major podcasts platforms.The Historical Society of Rockland County is a nonprofit educational institution and principal repository for original documents and artifacts relating to Rockland County. Its headquarters are a four-acre site featuring a history museum and the 1832 Jacob Blauvelt House in New City, New York. www.RocklandHistory.org
Prohibition in St. Lawrence County: Booze, Badboys & Bootleggers
During Prohibition, some Northern New York families made a living as smugglers, bootleggers, and booze runners. During the first year of Prohibition alone, a Watertown police officer leaped from a moving taxi onto a fleeing car to arrest Massena bootleggers; Federal agents raided Ogdensburg by land and sea to crack down on rum-running; two Potsdam ministers helped federal agents conduct righteous speakeasy raids; a high-speed chase down the streets of Massena led to the arrest of Potsdam bootleggers; an Ogdensburg mayoral candidate defended the city’s leading speakeasy owner; 12,000 quarts of liquor were seized on a ship docked at Cardinal, Ontario by Prescott Customs agents after the booze showed up in Ogdensburg; an ALCOA crane operator’s suicide in Massena was blamed on bootlegging, smuggling, and gambling; Governor Fred Scozzafava crashed into the New York Central train in DeKalb while hauling a load of smuggled booze; burglars robbed the U.S. Customs House for booze at Rouses Point; Cranberry Lake, Norfolk, Pyrites, and others were raided; and Federal G-Men led raids across Northern New York.
The St. Lawrence County Historical Association will host James Reagen on Thursday, July 13th at noon for a talk about his book as part of their Brown Bag Lunch Series. There is a $5 suggested donation. The Association is located at 3 East Main Street in Canton, NY.
In her new book Revolutionary Things: Material Culture & Politics in the Late Eighteenth- Century Atlantic World (Yale University Press, 2023), Ashli White of the University of Miami, explores the circulation of material culture during the America, French, and Haitian revolutions.White argues that in the late eighteenth century, radical ideals were contested through objects and in texts. She considers how revolutionary things, as they moved throughout the Atlantic, brought people into contact with these transformative political movements. Focusing on a range of objects — ceramics and furniture, garments and accessories, prints, maps, and public amusements — White shows how material culture held political meaning for diverse populations. Enslaved and free, women and men, poor and elite—all turned to things as a means to realize their varied and sometimes competing visions of revolutionary change.On Monday, July 17, 2023 from 6:00 pm to 7:00 pm, White will be speaking at a virtual and in-person event at the Massachusetts Historical Society. The in-person reception starts at 5:30 pm and the program will begin at 6:00 pm. Masks are optional for this event. Click here to register to attend in person.The virtual program begins at 6:00 pm and will be hosted on the video conference platform, Zoom. Registrants will receive a confirmation message with attendance information. Click here to register to attend online.This event is free for MHS Members. $10 per person fee (in person). No charge for virtual attendees or Card to Culture participants (EBT, WIC, and ConnectorCare).
The new book Here in Manhattan: A site-by-site guide to the history of the world’s greatest city (Sutherland House Books, 2023) by Tom Begnal tells the story of Manhattan, ranging from Fort Washington to Wall Street, bridging important history and pop-culture moments. Here in Manhattan is a site-by-site guide to the wonders of the city.Here in Manhattan takes a look at where Edgar Allan Poe liked to sit and think and Cab Calloway used to perform, where the first Oreo was baked and America’s first pizza joint opened, where “Crazy Joe” Gallo got whacked and Jimi Hendrix opened a recording studio, where General George Washington battled the British and J.P. Morgan was bombed, where Dustin Hoffman screamed at a cabby and Marilyn Monroe felt the breeze, and more.Tom Begnal has been in editing for forty years, and has worked for August Home Publishing, Madrigal Publishing, and The Taunton Press. He has written ten books for Cedar line press, F&W/Penguin/Random House Publishing, Sterling Publishing Company, and Wellfleet Press (The Quarto Group). He has three grown children and lives in Kent, Connecticut with his wife.
The Gold Coast along Long Island’s North Shore is most often celebrated as a showcase for the rich and famous in the early 20th Century. A decidedly different aspect of that reputation comes into view when you consider the years leading up to America’s entry into the First World War.The Morgan Bank, headed by J.P. Morgan, Jr. with his estate in Glen Cove, played a pivotal role in financing and supplying Britain in the early years of the war. Other famous North Shore families, notably former president Theodore Roosevelt of Oyster Bay, pushed for United States entry into the war.Richard Welch presents this story in his book Long Island’s Gold Coast Elite and the Great War (History Press, 2021). He details the world of the Gold Coast and its prominent families, along with their important industry connections and political leanings. From financial dealings to political activism, large scale rallies, and even pushing their own children to serve, these families helped bring America into the war.At the outbreak of World War One, the Gold Coast of Long Island was home to the most concentrated combination of financial, political and social clout in the country. Bankers, movie producers, society glitterati, government officials and an ex-president mobilized to arrange massive loans, send supplies and advocate for the Allied cause.The efforts undercut the Woodrow Wilson administration’s official policy of neutrality and set the country on a course to war with Germany. Members of the activist families – including Morgans, Davisons, Phippses, Martins, Hitchcocks, Stimsons and Roosevelts – served in key positions or fought at the front.Historian Richard F. Welch reveals how a potent combination of ethno-sociological solidarity, clear-eyed geopolitical calculation and financial self-interest inspired the North Shore elite to pressure the nation into war.The latest episode of the Long Island History Project podcast features Richard F. Welch discussing his book. You can listen to the episode here.The Long Island History Project is an independent podcast featuring stories and interviews with people passionate about Long Island history. It is hosted by academic librarian Chris Kretz.
THE ORIGINAL LAMP IN THE RI LIGHTHOUSE. THERE IS NO LAMP IN RESTORED LIGHTHOUSE MATT KATZ AND HARA REISER GOT IT RIGHT
THE VIEW OF “DOUBLE TAKE” FROM THE ROOF OF THE SUBWAY STATION. TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART AND PHOTOGRAPHS CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacooper.net
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
On October 21, 1941, 46 days before Pearl Harbor, The National Academy of Sciences Uranium Committee met in the office of Dr. William C. Coolidge, director of the General Electric Research Laboratory in Schenectady. This top-secret meeting was historic for two reasons. First, the Schenectady deliberations became the basis of the first U.S. governmental report unequivocally affirming the feasibility and urgency of producing an atomic bomb. At that time, U.S. and British scientists feared that Nazi Germany was working on the bomb.
Second, the meeting marked the beginning of J. Robert Oppenheimer’s high-level involvement in government efforts to develop an atomic bomb. Oppenheimer, of course, would later go on to lead the Manhattan Project’s Los Alamos Laboratory in New Mexico that designed, constructed, and detonated the first atomic bomb.
The National Academy of Sciences Committee Members
The Committee chair was Nobel Laureate Dr. Arthur Compton from the University of Chicago. Compton was appointed by Vannevar Bush, President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s science advisor. There was question whether it was feasible to produce a nuclear fission bomb in time to make a difference in the Second World War.
The National Academy of Sciences, a most prestigious body, was ideally suited to be the final arbiter of such scientific questions and to appraise the military value of nuclear energy. The Committee, formed in April 1941, had met several times and had issued two previous reports. This was to be the last meeting and the final report of the Committee.
The vice-chair of the Committee was Dr. Coolidge, a physical chemist. Under Coolidge’s leadership, General Electric had gained considerable experience in nuclear research. In fact, GE had expressed to Compton willingness to make a nuclear reactor for producing plutonium on an experimental basis. Prominent GE scientists included Dr. Kenneth H. Kingdon and Dr. Herbert C. Pollock, who both would go on to work for the Manhattan Project at the Berkeley Radiation Lab.
Arguably the most famous member of the Committee was University of California physicist Ernest Lawrence, recipient of the Nobel Prize for the invention and application of the cyclotron at his Berkeley Radiation Lab. On September 21, 1941, he was visited in Berkeley by British physicist Marc Oliphant who described promising research related to the feasibility of making an atom bomb. (After his Berkeley meeting, Oliphant also visited Dr. Coolidge in Schenectady where he briefed him on the British research program).
Britain, locked in a life and death struggle with Germany, desperately needed the U.S. to join the scientific race. Lawrence, convinced of the urgency of the task, brought his Berkeley colleague, theoretical physicist Robert Oppenheimer, into the Oliphant meeting with its secret revelations.
Lawrence was apparently indiscreet in involving Oppenheimer because Oppenheimer did not have security clearance. Furthermore, Lawrence felt that the National Academy of Sciences Committee needed the expertise of somebody of Oppenheimer’s caliber and prevailed upon chairman Compton to bring him to the Schenectady meeting as an “invited consultant.”
Other members of the Committee included: G. B. Kistiakowsky, Harvard chemist and explosives expert; W. K. Lewis, MIT chemical engineer; R.G. Mulliken, University of Chicago chemist; J.C. Slater, MIT physicist; J.H. Van Vleck, Harvard physicist and future Nobel Laureate. Also added to the Committee were engineering experts O. E. Buckley, Bell Telephone Labs and L. W. Chubb, Westinghouse Electrical and Manufacturing.
Dr. Coolidge offered to accommodate everyone at the Mohawk Club on lower Union Street.
The Committee Meeting and the Report
In light of the British progress in their atomic bomb program and other related developments in the U.S., the meeting of the National Academy Committee was called to determine the cost, development time, and potential destructiveness of an atomic bomb. The minutes of the meeting were taken by Lawrence and are archived at the U.C. Berkeley Bancroft Library.
The meeting exposed Oppenheimer for the first time to the latest research from U.S. and British scientists. His major contribution at the meeting was to estimate how much uranium -235 would be required to make the bomb. For the final report, he helped estimate the destructiveness of an atomic bomb explosion.
Much to the frustration of Compton and Lawrence, the engineers and chemists on the Committee refused to give an estimate of the cost and time necessary to process uranium and turn it into a bomb, the very purpose for which the meeting was called. There simply was not enough data. Therefore, Compton relied on his own rough estimate: 3 to 5 years and a total cost of several hundred million dollars.
As it turned out, it took three years and eight months to detonate the first bomb (in August, 1945). The final cost was $1.5 billion, but this involved using multiple methods of making fissionable material.
The final report, written over the next few weeks by Compton with input from Committee members and Oppenheimer, recommended that full effort toward making atomic bombs is essential to the safety of the nation and of the free world – a fission bomb of superlatively destructive power will result from bringing together a sufficient mass of element U-235.
The report was presented to Vannevar Bush on November 6, 1941 and to President Roosevelt on November 27. On December 7, 1941, Japan declared war on the United States. Germany followed suit on December 11.
Oppenheimer and his Legacy
The following year Robert Oppenheimer was chosen by director of the Manhattan Project General Leslie Groves (who was born in Albany) to lead the scientists and engineers of the Los Alamos Laboratory in the complex task of making the first atomic bomb. The stakes and time pressures were incredibly high. In many ways, Oppenheimer was an unusual choice. He had no management experience at all and he had been connected to persons in various left-wing groups deemed to be subversive.
Nevertheless, Oppenheimer proved to be an excellent choice and deserved the accolade, “Father of the Atomic Bomb.” The meeting in Schenectady, mentioned prominently in many histories of the atomic bomb, was an important milestone in his personal story as well as the nation’s quest for the atomic bomb.
Illustrations, from above: portrait of J. Robert Oppenheimer; portrait of William C. Coolidge; telegram from Lawrence to Compton; GE nuclear scientists H.C. Pollock and K.H. Kingdon in lab, 1940; and GE Buildings 5 and 37, home to the R & D Center.
Martin A. Strosberg wrote this essay for the Schenectady County Historical Society Newsletter, Volume 61. Become a member of the Society online at schenectadyhistorical.org.
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INTERIOR OF STEAM PLANT BELONGING TO NYC HEALTH+HOSPITALS, NOW CLOSED
THE VIEW OF “DOUBLE TAKE” FROM THE ROOF OF THE SUBWAY STATION. TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART AND PHOTOGRAPHS CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacooper.net
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
TERRACE OUTSIDE MANHATTAN THEATRE CLUB ALEXIS VILLAFANE GOT IT RIGHT
WEDNESDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
THE VIEW OF “DOUBLE TAKE” FROM THE ROOF OF THE SUBWAY STATION.
TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART AND PHOTOGRAPHS CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacooper.net
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
JUDITH BERDY MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM
Today I was walking up Broadway from 29th Street north to Greeley Square. Suddenly the once drab scene is boasting a new Virgin Hotel and some great restorations of the grand old buildings. The wholesale jewelry scene seems to be thriving with remodeled and updated shops. The Gilsey stood out with its bright ivory paint and a wonderful clock at the top of the domed corner.
Peter Gilsey was a Danish immigrant who made his fortune in America as a merchant. Not content with his success, Gilsey bought up properties in Midtown, where the north-bound theatre district was emerging. He recognized that this area would soon need a first-class hotel. In 1868 he purchased the last farm in Midtown from Caspar Samlar and with that, his location was set; including the grounds of the Saint George Cricket Club.
Gilsey commissioned architect Steven D. Hatch to design his 300-room structure. Gilsey envisioned a hotel that would rival the downtown hotels that catered to the carriage trade. And he understood that in order to entice the wealthy, he would have to spend money. Gilsey’s new hotel cost him $350,000 in post-Civil War era dollars–more than $6.5 million today.
The Gilsey House opened in 1872. The rooms were outfitted in costly woods like rosewood and walnut. The carved fireplace mantles were of the finest marble. Gilt bronze chandeliers hung from elaborate plastered ceilings. The exterior was a visual feast — arches, columns, angles; Hatch’s fantasy rose from the sidewalk to the roof in an explosion of cast iron ornamentation.
Under the exuberant cast iron cresting of the mansard roof cap an enormous clock rests on cast iron mermaids that are far too high from the street to be seen. Extraordinary garlands of full-blown roses in incredible detail swag under the eaves — again, so far from the street level and they cannot be appreciated. But the architect and Gilsey knew these details were there.
Rendering of the future venue
The Gilsey House was an instant success. The bar, the floor of which was inlaid with silver dollars, became a world-wide destination. Celebrities like Samuel Clemens, Diamond Jim Brady and Oscar Wilde passed through its halls.
Troubles for the Gilsey House began in 1904 when legal battles between the Gilsey family and the hotel’s operator boiled over. On December 12 of that year the proprietor ordered all guests out of the hotel with essentially no notice. Although things returned to normal soon, the hotel’s problems continued and it finally closed in 1911.
Shortly thereafter the wonderful cast iron columns that projected over the property line were removed and the building, once host to the wealthiest guests in the world, became a seedy loft building.
By the 1970’s the future of the Gilsey House was doubtful at best. Water leaked into the building, rust attacked the structure and floors sagged.
Amazingly, in 1980 Richard Berry and F. Anthony Zunino purchased the Gilsey and converted it to residential co-ops. Cosmetic restoration using fiberglass reproductions of the columns and other architectural details were installed and, for the time being, brought the Gilsey back to life.
Astonishingly, the ground floor details–normally the first to be lost under pseudo-modern facades–remain. In 1991 the co-op board backed an actual restoration and today the Gilsey House is proud and stately again. Unfortunately, picture windows replace arched 19th century designs and the important projecting columns will, no doubt, never be replaced.
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INSTAGRAM @ roosevelt_island_history
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Columns from the City Hospital that was on this site at the Southpoint Park entrance
WEDNESDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
THE VIEW OF “DOUBLE TAKE” FROM THE ROOF OF THE SUBWAY STATION.
TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART AND PHOTOGRAPHS CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacooper.net
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
The gilded Brooklyn Paramount Theatre is being restored to its original glory and will reopen as a world-class entertainment venue next year. Entertainment giant Live Nation, which will revive and operate the nearly 100-year-old theater, revealed plans and new renderings during a community board meeting last month. According to the company, the LIU Brooklyn Paramount Theatre will be able to accommodate 2,600 people. Located at 385 Flatbush Avenue Extension, the theater is scheduled to open in the first or second quarter of 2024, as first reported by Brownstoner.
The Paramount first opened its doors in 1928 and served as a movie theater and music venue until it was taken over in 1962 by Long Island University, which converted its opulent music hall into a gym and removed its stage.
The university retained the theater’s iconic gilded latticework ceiling and converted the upstairs office into an academic space. During its heyday, the theater hosted legendary performers, including Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Miles Davis, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Buddy Holly, and many more.
Plans to restore the Paramount to its original grand appearance first surfaced in 2015, when the former operator of Barclay’s Center, Mikhail Prokhorov’s Onexim, announced a $50 million plan to give the theater a facelift and once again use it as an entertainment venue. However, the plans were discarded after Prokhorov sold the Brooklyn Nets and the arena company.
Rendering of the future venue
Renderings courtesy of Live Nation via Brooklyn Community Board 2
During a presentation to Brooklyn Community Board 2’s Health Environment & Social Services Committee in June, representatives from Live Nation released renderings of the new entertainment venue and described their plans in depth. They also gained full approval from the board for the venue’s liquor license, which will serve patrons indoors until 4 a.m.
The renderings show that the theater’s original elaborate detailing in the music hall’s ceiling and walls will be retained, as well as the detailed columns in the lobby. A new box office will be created as well. The theater will predominately host music events, but will also be used for family shows, comedy, sporting events, special events, community events, and private programs for Long Island University.
Renderings courtesy of Live Nation
Live Nation is conducting outreach with local tenant associations at the nearby Whitman and Ingersoll housing projects to provide employment to residents seeking jobs. While largely approved by the committee, Committee Member Jeffrey Ryan took issue with the theater’s lack of minority investors, citing the neighborhood’s large African-American population and the theater’s association with world-renowned Black artists over the years.“It’s important that Live Nation should be thinking about contributing to the community in a large way. In the United States, Brooklyn has one of the largest Afro-American communities, and it’s important that a percentage of those dollars stay in our community and that the people of the community benefit from having a venue such as the reopening of the Paramount Theatre,” Ryan said.All security guards will be Live Nation employees, and the security check for show attendees will take place in the entry lobby with guests lining up outside of the building before the doors open. A second set of doors between the entrance lobby and the main lobby will be closed during performances to prevent sound from leaking out into the surrounding area and disturbing the community.The theater’s famous Wurlitzer organ is being preserved as part of the restoration project. The organ is only of two models in operation, the other being at Radio City Music Hall.
WE ARE NOW ON TIK TOK AND INSTAGRAM!
INSTAGRAM @ roosevelt_island_history
TIK TOK @ rooseveltislandhsociety CHECK OUT OUR TOUR OF BLACKWELL HOUSE ON TIC TOK
THE VIEW OF “DOUBLE TAKE” FROM THE ROOF OF THE SUBWAY STATION.
TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART AND PHOTOGRAPHS CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacooper.net
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
The kiosk has a new group of friends, SLOTHS. They are available for adoption (for a reasonable fee).
These two sloths have discovered our new Candylab Lone Cactus Motel.
Vicki is teaching Pickle Ball to this sloth!!
Ellen is nurturing on of our junior sloths,
Barbara has had the Costa Rica sloth experience so she is our staff pro!
WE ARE NOW ON TIK TOK AND INSTAGRAM!
INSTAGRAM @ roosevelt_island_history
TIK TOK @ rooseveltislandhsociety CHECK OUT OUR TOUR OF BLACKWELL HOUSE ON TIC TOK
Ellen, Vicki and Judy checked out “Double Take” opposite the subway.
WEDNESDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
THE VIEW OF “DOUBLE TAKE” FROM THE ROOF OF THE SUBWAY STATION.
TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART AND PHOTOGRAPHS CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacooper.net
TUESDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
Behind the counter at the R.I. U.S. Post Office
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN ART MUSEUM **** EPHEMERAL NEW YORK
William Glackens, Beach Umbrellas at Blue Point, ca. 1915, oil on canvas, 26 x 32 in. (66.1 x 81.3 cm.), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Ira Glackens, 1968.1
When social realist artist William Glackens visited Coney Island in the late 1890s, he had a bounty of kaleidoscopic scenes he could have immortalized in paint: the double-dip chutes of Steeplechase Park, the aquatic animals at Sea Lion Park, or the mass of humanity crowding the boardwalk and bathing pavilions.
But what captured his interest and imagination? A small wooden fruit stand perched on the sand.
It’s a curious choice out of all the attractions at Sodom by the Sea, as Coney was known in its golden era. But Glackens’ “Fruit Stand, Coney Island” manages to draw out much more emotion and drama than seen at first glance.
The bright yellow bananas and red, white, and blue American flags are blasts of color under the white-gray storm clouds looming over the beach. Individual vignettes of the people at the stand tell their own stories: children dip their toes in the water, older girls adjust their appearance, a mother looks down at the baby she cradles. Each vignette represents a different stage of life, particularly women’s lives.
The American flags tell us it might be the Fourth of July. Coney Island would have been packed with thousands of revelers—mostly working-class day trippers who came on ferries and trains with dimes in their pockets to pursue the pleasures, and vices, of Coney’s seaside attractions.
There’s an Old Masters feel to the painting, which may not be accidental. With Robert Henri in 1895, Glackens “made the pilgrimage to Paris, where he soaked up the improvisational brushwork of the French Impressionists as well as the brooding palate of Old Master paintings he saw on a bike trip through the Dutch countryside,” stated a 2007 New York Newsday article on Glackens, above in a 1908 self-portrait.
The influence of his trip to Europe likely rubbed off on the young artist, who was just 28 at the time he painted the fruit stand. The more you look into the painting, the more you see.
SEND YOUR SUGGESTIONS ON WHAT TO DO WITH THIS OUT OF DATE OBJECT
FROM NINA LUBLIN: Today’s Pix — Maybe Diana Cooper can paint over it? Maybe the artists of the MST&DA or the Girl Scouts or Island Kids can create some art to paint over 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) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN ART MUSEUM EPHEMERAL NEW YORK NSU ART MUSEUM, FORT LAUDERDALE IMAGES COURTESY NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY JUDITH BERDY ROOSEVELT ISLAND HISTORICAL SOCIETY
Before Flushing Meadows-Corona Park was transformed to accommodate the World’s Fairs of 1939 and 1964, America’s first World’s Fair took over Bryant Park in midtown Manhattan. The centerpiece of that fair in 1853 was the Crystal Palace, an impressive dome-topped glass structure that took up nearly an entire square block. At the time, it was the largest building in the western hemisphere. Deemed “The Finest Building in America,” the Crystal Palace made New York City a must-visit travel destination, but it was sadly short-lived. To celebrate the 170th anniversary of the Palace’s opening, we’re sharing a talk from our Untapped New York Insiders On-Demand archive where Justin Rivers, our Chief Experience Officer, talks about the history of this lost building!
The Crystal Palace was designed by architects Georg J. B. Carstensen and Charles Gildermeister. It was built to house the Exhibition of Industry of All Nations, a global exhibition that is largely considered America’s first World’s Fair. The design was inspired by the Crytal Palace built in Hyde Park, London, for the Great Exhibition of 1851. Carstensen and Gildermeister’s Palace took the shape of a Greek cross that stretched from the Croton Reservoir Distributing Center that once stood where the New York Public Library is now to Sixth Avenue. One of the best views of the Crystal Palace itself was seen from the top of the reservoir walls. The Palace’s frame was made of steel and cast iron, and it was topped off with a large glass dome at the center.
The massive scale, expansive walls of glass, and beautifully ornate wrought iron details of the building made it an impressive sight to behold. Inside, there were even more wonders to explore. Visitors to the fair were wowed by the most technologically advanced inventions of the era at the Exhibition of Industry of All Nations. One notable invention that made its debut at the fair was Elisha Otis’s elevator. Visitors could also admire fine art from all around the world. Another attraction that drew visitors to the Exhibition was the Crystal Palace’s neighbor, the Latting Observatory. At more than 300 feet tall, it was the tallest manmade perch on the continent at the time. It quite literally brought New Yorkers to new heights (without the use of Otis’ elevator!).
Both the Crystal Palace and Latting Observatory made New York City a tourist destination. The structures were modern marvels that visitors flocked to New York City to see in person. The attention on New York’s Reservoir Square, as the area was known before the park, helped advance midtown development. Before the Exhibition of Industry of All Nations, the land where Bryant Park is now was a potter’s field, and the surrounding area was drastically less populated than Lower Manhattan.
Sadly, the Crystal Palace would not survive much longer than the run of the Exhibition. After the fair closed in November 1854, the building was leased as a special events space. It became the new home of the Fair of the American Institute, an event similar to the World’s Fair but smaller in scale. Just four years later, in October 1858, the gleaming structure was destroyed in a raging fire. In his book, The Finest Building in America: The New York Crystal Palace 1883-1885, author Edwin G. Burrows describes how “flames enveloped the dome throwing ‘great waves of lurid light’ over a throng of spectators” before it collapsed “‘with a tremendous crash,’ taking down the remainder of the roof and causing the outer walls to cave in.”
The cause of the fire was not immediately clear. Some blamed arson, though the authorities were never able to name a suspect. Others blamed alleged flaws in the building’s design. One eyewitness believed the building came down after a rupture in the gas line because the gas pipes were made of latex rather than wrought iron. However, a representative of the company who installed the pipes swore they were all wrought iron, and there was no evidence to suggest otherwise. To this day, the true cause of the fire remains unknown. Though the Crystal Palace no longer stands, we have the recollections of those who visited, artistic sketches, a few rare photographs, and the lingering mystery of its demise to remember it by.
WE ARE NOW ON TIK TOK AND INSTAGRAM!
INSTAGRAM @ roosevelt_island_history
TIK TOK @ rooseveltislandhsociety CHECK OUT OUR TOUR OF BLACKWELL HOUSE ON TIC TOK
Correction of web address TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART AND PHOTOGRAPHS CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacooper.net
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
UNTAPPED NEW YORK IMAGES COURTESY NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY JUDITH BERDY ROOSEVELT ISLAND HISTORICAL SOCIETY
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