On Wednesday July 6, the plywood wall was removed from the front of the MTA’s East River Ventilation shaft across from the Roosevelt Island F Train subway station to unveil the Double Take mosaic by artist Diane Cooper.
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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
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
As revealed tonight at a Community Board 8 meeting the Andrew Haswell Green Park just across from the island is scheduled to be open this December.
A set of steps and a ramp will head down to the waterfront, to view Roosevelt Island.
Under the pavilion with the Alyce Ancock sculpture will be a walkway leading to the new in water esplanade to 54th Street.
When asked if there were public bathrooms on the over 2 mile long walkway, the answer was no, maybe in the future! How can any city approve a public park without bathrooms?
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TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART, CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacoooper.net
NEW YORK CENTRAL EMBLEM AT THE POUGHKEEPSIE METRO NORTH STATION
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
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM
NYC ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION COMMUNITY BOARD 8 JUDITH BERDY
TONIGHT I WAS AT THE SUBWAY STATION ADMIRING THE NEW WALL ART “DOUBLE TAKE” BY DIANA COOPER. UNFORTUNATELY, THE SUBWAY PLAZA IS A MESS.
THE FRUIT VENDOR HAS HAD A MAKESHIFT STRUCTURE FOR YEARS. WHICH TO SAY THE LEAST IS A MESS, ESPECIALLY WHEN IT IS CLOSED AND COVERED WTIH OLD TARPS AND FOUR POLES OF BLUE TAPE AND CEMENT BUCKETS.
THE LATEST HOT DOG VENDOR HAS APPEARED AT THE SUBWAY STATION. JUST AS MESSY AND UGLY AS THE ONE THAT WAS FINALLY REMOVED FROM THE TRAM PLAZA.
WHAT IS HAPPENING AT RIOC? ARE WE SO DESPERATE FOR VENDORS THAT WE DO NOT SET STANDARD FOR THEIR APPEARANCE, SANITATION, HOURS AND LICENSING?
THESE TWO EXAMPLES AT THE SUBWAY ARE JUST TOO MUCH. IT IS TIME FOR RIOC TO CLEAN UP OUR SUBWAY AREA AND HAVE VENDORS WHO CARE ABOUT THE AREA.
MOST COMMUNITIES HAVE STANDARDS FOR STREET VENDORS. IT IS APPARENT THAT ANYTHING GOES HERE,
MAYBE WE CAN CALL ON OUR LOCAL ARCHITECTS AND DESIGNERS TO COME UP IWTH A BETTER STRUCTURE.
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
TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART, CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacoooper.net
ANOTHER 10 YEAR PROJECT. THE PLANS FOR RESTORATION OF THE LIGHTHOUSE STARTED IN 2011 AND THE WORK WAS COMPLETED LAST YEAR. IT WAS WORTH THE WAIT, BUT NO EXCUSE FOR PROJECTS TO GO ON AN ON FOR A DECADE.
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
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM JUDITH BERDY
TIK TOK @ rooseveltislandhsociety CHECK OUT OUR TOUR OF BLACKWELL HOUSE ON TIC TOK
MTA Arts & Design today announce the installation of a new permanent artwork on Roosevelt Island by Diana Cooper, Double Take. It is located across from the F train subway stops and is part of the East Side Access project that brought Long Island Rail Road service to Grand Cenrtal Madison.
Cooper was initially inspired by the visual experience of traveling through the Hugh L Carey Tunnel and moving from and artificial underground environment into a world of steel, glass and stone in Manhattan, with buildings set at different angles and punctuated by blue skies and waterways and the greens and browns of New Jersey.
When she visited the MTA site, Cooper was struck by how similar her experience was to the one subway riders have when they arrive on Roosevelt Island. Riders leave the reflected light of the subway tunnel to scale long metallic escalators and emerge into a building with large glass window and views of the island greenery an the blue of the East River.
Cooper’s designs consider the geometric forms found in the ventilation building, the Queensboro Bridge, the MTA subway station, Louis Kahn’s FDR Memorial ad Roosevelt Island Tram set against the grand backdrop of the East RIver. The wall designs marry abstract geometric thapes with organic forms, based on photographs she took of the river, as well a hand drawn imagery of fluid forms with colors that evoke the island’s grass and trees. The gate design refers directly to the building’s louvers but it is more colorful, playful and permeable. Her hope is that people will be transported smoothly and delightfully from the canyons of the MTA to an island surrounded by a river, with mountains of skyscrapers and backdrop.
“Upon arriving or departing, the Roosevelt Islanders and visitors are greeted by Diana Cooper’s colorful mosaic and metal artwork” said Sandra Bloodworth, Director, MTA Arts & Design. It is quite exciting to see the realization of Double Take- and it will do just that, you stop in your tracks for the double take! One that will make you say, “wow/’
Diana Cooper explained “On first visiting the site I was struck by its visual potential. One emerges from the subway to see sky, a bridge, water, a ventilation structure, and Manhattan behind it all. That’s quite a mix. I wanted to pull all these elements together and somehow capture in a single work the dynamic energy latent in the experience. My aim was to blend the rigid geometric elements with fluid color to capture the play of light on the water especially. It was an exciting project opened up new avenues in my artistic practice.”
About Diana Cooper Diana Cooper is a New York-based mixed-media artist whose abstract works area inspired by patterns found in nature and the artificial human environment which she transforms and translates into her own visual language. A former Rome Prize fellow (2004). Cooper has exhibited at numerous galleries and institutions , including the Brooklyn Museum of Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art Cleveland, PS 1 MOMA, the Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art, and the New Museum of Contemporary Art. She has completed several public commissions, including at the Jerome Parker Campus , Staten Island, commissioned by NYC Department of Cultural Affairs Public Art for Schools and the Moss Arts Center at Virginia Tech. She holds a BA from Harvard and an MFA from Hunter College.
TO SEE MORE OF DIANA COOPER’S ART, CHECK OUT HER WEBSITE: dianacoooper.net
CITY HOME RESIDENTS RECEIVING COMMUNION AT CHAPEL OF THE GOOD SHEPHERD ALEXIS VILLAFANE & NINA LUBLIN GOT IT RIGHT
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM\ JUDITH BERDY
MTA Arts & Design encourages the use of pubic transportation by providing visual and performing arts in the metropolitan New York area. The Percent for Art program is one of the largest and most diverse collections of site-specific public art in the world, with more than 350 commissions by world-famous, mid-career and emerging artists. Art & Design produces Graphic Arts, Digital Art, photographic Lightbox exhibitions, as well live musical performances in stations through its Music Under New York (MUSIC) program, and the Poetry in Motion program in collaboration with Poetry Society of America. It serves the miiions of people who rely upon MTA subways and commuter trains and strives to create meaningful connections between sites, neighborhoods an people.
Painters such as James McNeill Whistler and Childe Hassam exported the streetscape from Paris to America by creating various impressionistic vistas or bird’s-eye city views. As society became increasingly urbanized, art took a less genteel direction. Members of New York Ashcan movement urged painters to drop orthodoxy and depict the bustling streets of the city.Although not an “organized” school of painting, the unity of the group consisted in a desire to grasp urban realities. The name ashcan (dustbin) was initially hurled against these artists as a term of derision – it became a banner of distinction.As committed urbanists, these painters were both observers and participants. John French Sloan, Robert Henri and friends created a dynamic record of metropolitan street culture. Although attacked by their opponents as being “devotees of the ugly,” these artists looked for aesthetic vitality in ordinary life.
Jefferson Market CourthouseOn March 22, 1912, John Sloan made a diary note referring to his new studio in Greenwich Village: “Found a loft with fine North by West light. Eleventh floor of a new triangular building at 4th Street and Sixth Avenue.” Built in 1907, the space offered a wonderful sight of Village life that would inspire him throughout his prolific career. In 1922 he painted the building in a nocturnal vista – titled “The City from Greenwich Village” – with the Sixth Avenue Elevated speeding past.From his studio, Sloan had a view of Jefferson Market Courthouse. Once the site of a tall et.octagonal wooden fire tower and a market place for local produce, the Gothic Courthouse (serving the Third Judicial District) with its signature clock tower replaced the original structures at Sixth Avenue & 10th Street
The building, a New York City landmark (now restored as a library), was designed by architects Frederick Clark Withers and Calvert Vaux. It was completed in 1877 as part of a group of brick and limestone buildings. Both architects were born and educated in England. Both based their efforts on the High Victorian Gothic style.Having settled in New York City, they joined up as partners. Their 1874 design of the Courthouse with its sloping roofs, gables, pinnacles and stained glass windows, brought a corner of Victorian London to Greenwich Village. The frieze on the outside of the building contains scenes from Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice.The building housed both a police and civil court whilst the arched basement was used as a holding area for prisoners. John Sloan loved the red-brick building and in 1917 he painted “Jefferson Market, Sixth Avenue,” one of many cityscapes. His real interest however was concerned with happenings inside the court.Sloan was a regular visitor of the Night Court to observe the human drama when men and women were brought inside and charged, typically for drunkenness, brutishness, prostitution or petty crime. Fascinated by the tragicomedy enacted, he appreciated these sessions as more stirring than “the great majority of plays.” Some of the cases that reached the court were truly dramatic.
Trial of the CenturyJefferson Market Courthouse had been center of national attention in June 1906 when Harry Kendall Thaw, son of a Pittsburgh coal and railroad baron, appeared before the magistrate and was remanded without bail for murder. The popular press described the case as the “trial of the century.”Stanford White was New York City’s most famous architect of the Gilded Age. Many edifices raised by his firm McKim, Mead & White were masterpieces of American architecture. His commissions included a Madison Avenue mansion for J. P. Morgan (now the Morgan Library) and the Vanderbilt Mansion in Hyde Park. Between 1879 and 1915, his firm built more than 900 clubs, hotels, museums, universities, libraries and theaters. He was also responsible for New York’s ornate Penn Station.
A tall and flamboyant character, Stanford was a collector of costly art and antiquities. He was also a sexual predator. For some considerable time he was able to conceal his obscene behaviour behind the veneer of being a married man with a luxurious self-designed family home and weekend retreat named Box Hill in Saint James, Long Island.White also maintained a multi-story apartment with a rear entrance at 22 West 24th Street. One room, painted in green, was outfitted with a red velvet swing which he used as a means to groom under-age girls. His victims came from struggling families, youngsters who were unlikely to resists the lure of his wealth and “generosity.” One of these girls was Evelyn Nesbit, an aspiring model and actress. In 1901, with approval of her mother, White offered Evelyn his help in getting a foothold in professional circles.Having moved mother and daughter from a boarding house into a hotel, he showered Evelyn with money and gifts. Early in their acquaintance, White invited the teenager to his apartment for dinner. He spiked her champagne with a drug and raped her after she passed out. She was sixteen years old.
Evelyn married Harry Thaw in 1905, a young man with a history of mental problems. He became obsessed with White’s rape of his wife and was consumed by hatred towards a man who appeared to be the toast of society. On the evening of June 26, 1906, Harry and Evelyn enjoyed a meal at Jean & Louis Martin’s fashionable restaurant, before attending the opening-night of the musical revue Mam’zelle Champagne at the rooftop theatre of Madison Square Garden (designed by Stanford White). Thaw noticed that White was amongst the diners who made their way to the theatre.During the show’s final song “I Could Love a Million Girls,” Thaw got up and approached White with a pistol. He fired three shots at point-blank range, killing his fifty-two year old adversary on the spot. At the trial, Thaw was acquitted by reason of insanity and committed to a mental asylum until his release in 1915. Never before had Jefferson Market Courthouse seen a more sensational trial, but there was more drama to come.
Mae West on Welfare IslandBefore becoming a film star and sex symbol in Los Angeles, Mary Jane “Mae” West had started her stage career in New York City. Born in Brooklyn, her father John Patrick West was a prize fighter; her Bavaria-born mother a corset and fashion model. By the age of fourteen Mae worked on the vaudeville circuit. She made her Broadway debut in September 1911 as a singer and dancer in the revue A La Broadway at the Folies-Bergere in West 46th Street.Mae West’s major ambition was to challenge Victorian morality. Using the pen name Jane Mast, she set out to write and produce her own plays. Her first comedy-drama Sex premiered April 26, 1926, at Daly’s 63rd Street Theatre in which Mae herself starred in the role of the prostitute Margy LaMont.
The play received scathing reviews. Critics used terms such as crude, inept or vulgar, but the loudest objections came from the army of moral crusaders. In spite of the negative press, Sex drew large audiences. It was the only play on Broadway that season to stay open through the summer and into the following year (375 performances for a combined audience of 325,000 people).After persistent complaints from members of the Society for the Suppression of Vice, the NYPD raided the theatre in February 1927. Members of the troupe were charged with obscenity. Mae was taken to Jefferson Market Court House, where she was prosecuted and sentenced to ten days at the workhouse for “corrupting the morals of youth.” She could have paid a fine and been let off. Always keen to attract publicity, West accepted the prison sentence and made the most of the opportunity. While incarcerated on Roosevelt Island (then known as Welfare Island), she dined with the warden and his wife. She informed reporters that she had worn silk panties while serving time in lieu of the “burlap” other inmates had to wear. West turned her jail stint into a celebration. She served eight days with a reduction of two days for “good behavior.”Mae became a national figure with journalists following her every move. The “bad girl” was turned into an idol, an unflappable character who had climbed the ladder of success wrong by wrong.
Village RepublicThe bohemian intellectuals who gathered at Greenwich Village in the 1910s inspired both social and aesthetic movements. Many of the participants were products of an Ivy League education, but they tended to shun conventional career moves. Instead, they sought to combine art and politics.The first issue of The Masses appeared in January 1911. Dealing with a range of current social issues such as freedom of speech, racial equality and sweatshop labor, the journal represented the Village spirit. John Sloan acted as its art editor and held that position until January 1916. Under his direction, ample space was given to the visual arts with a multitude of political cartoons and striking covers.The Village fostered a Parisian salon culture where lavish parties were thrown by socialites and cultural radicals (including Sloan’s patron Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney). Socialists, anarchists, feminists and modernist artists met at these get-togethers in a festival of subcultures. They added a novel aspect to the demand for change that would become a vital part of future social agitation – protest as a celebration. The “struggle” of old was replaced by a playful projection of alternative options. Modernism in art became linked to an array of progressive political positions.Stanford White was raised at 118 East 10th Street in a row of Renaissance Revival buildings, East Village, designed in 1861 by James Renwick. He would leave his mark on the locality. By imitating a Roman triumphal monument, White’s marble arch in Washington Square Park, a fixture of Greenwich Village, was designed to commemorate the centennial of George Washington’s inauguration in 1789.On January 23, 1917, John Sloan and fellow painter Marcel Duchamp, poet Gertrude Dick, and three actors of the local Provincetown Playhouse climbed the spiral interior staircase of the Arch. In an act of mock insurrection, the six “Arch Conspirators” hung Chinese lanterns and red balloons, spread out blankets, sipped tea, recited poems and fired cap pistols, declaring Greenwich a “Free and Independent Republic.”
In true Village style, the rebels objected to America’s foreign policy on the eve of the nation entering the First World War. Soon after the stunt was brought to an end, federal government moved to suppress public expressions of dissent by arresting pacifists and deporting ‘alien’ radicals. The Village would never be the same again.
TREE TO BE REPLACED OUTSIDE NYPL BRANCH. THIS TREE HAS BEEN NEGLECTED AND HOPEFULLY NYPL AND THE YOUT CENTER TAKE BETTER CARE OF ITS REPLACEMENT CHRISTINA DELFICO
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
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM\ JUDITH BERDY
Illustrations, from above: John Sloan’s “The City from Greenwich Village,” 1922 (National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC); Sloan’s, “Jefferson Market, Sixth Avenue,” 1917 (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts); Harry Thaw – Stanford White headline in the New York American on June 26, 1906; Mae West poster advertising her 1926 play Sex in which she played the lead role; John Sloan’s “Arch Conspirators,” 1917 (Metropolitan Museum of Art).
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CHECK OUT OUR NEW WALL OPPOSITE THE SUBWAY STATION. MORE NEWS ON TUESDAY.
SHORT ON PICKLE BALLS? WE HAVE THEM FOR YOU AT THE RIHS VISITOR CENTER KIOSK. $3- EACH!
STOP BY OUR DISPLAY IN THE RIVERCROSS DISPLAY WINDOW. THIS SCENE IS THE SOUTH OF FRANCE WITH MATISSE INFLUENCES WITH CHAMPAGNE ON THE TABLE. BON VOYAGE!
COME TO THE BEACH AND ENJOY SOME PARADISE THIS SUMMER.
CHECK OUT SHIRTS OF THE RIHS PAST AND UNIVERSAL STUDIOS
PART OF THE WINDOWS IN THE SMALLPOX HOSPITAL CHRISTINA DELFICO GOT IT RIGHT
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM\ JUDITH BERDY ROOSEVELTISLANDERBLOGSPOT.COM RIHS ARCHIVES DIANA COOPER MTA ARTS & DESIGN
TIK TOK @ rooseveltislandhsociety CHECK OUT OUR TOUR OF BLACKWELL HOUSE ON TIC TOK
The story starts in February, 2013 when the RIHS asked RIOC to find a better design for the wall outside the vent shaft building across from our subway station.
When at a RIOC Operations Committe meeting I learned of the project and that a brick wall was the idea planned for the wall. the RIOC Operations Committee approved the idea and informed New York Transit.
Little did I know this would be a 10 year odyssey.
The first step was for architects to come and examine the site. They arrived by subway and commented on the ugly site of the vent shaft building obstructing the Manhattan skyline.
A time later MTA Arts for Transit (now MTA Art & Design) held a meeting with a committee of professional including curators, artists, political representatives and staff to select a group of artists to be asked to submit designs. After reviewing the work of about 25 artists the group was down to five candidates.
After submissions by three artists (two were not available) Diana Cooper was chosen.
This was just the beginning of the project that suffered from many delays.
The mosaic (96 feet long and 8 feet high) was manufactured in Italy and spread it out on a driveway before being cut into sections to be shipped to the States. Photo is from 2015.
Look closely and see the numbers for the sections where the mosaic will be cut into sections.
In April of 2022 the wall was installed and promptly covered up to protect it during the remaining construction of the LIRR tunnel beneath,
Diana Cooper last April during wall installation.
Today Rick texted me that the wall was revealed and here is his photo!!!!!
Tomorrow the gate will be installed and we are waiting for No Parking signs (so the mosaic does not get damaged)
Thanks to a wonderful supporter SANDRA BLOODWORTH who shepherded this project thru all kinds of obstacles and would anually tell me that it would be finished some day, The day is here and all are thrilled that Diana Cooper’s Double Take is reality.
PERSON OF THE DAY
Sandra Bloodworth is Director of Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) Arts & Design, in New York, an award-winning public art program that has transformed New York’s century-old transportation network into a first-rate museum. Bloodworth joined the MTA in 1988 and became director in 1996. Over three decades, Bloodworth has shepherded works of art installed in subway and rail stations including those by Nick Cave, Elizabeth Murray, Yoko Ono, Jacob Lawrence, Kiki Smith, Yayoi Kusama, Ann Hamilton, Firelei Baez, Vik Munoz and Alex Katz. Under her leadership, MTA Arts & Design has gained increasing renown as a leader in art in the field of public transportation by creating a collection of nearly 400 public artworks that are beloved by millions. Bloodworth is the recipient of the Sloan Public Service Award and the Gari Melchers Award from the Artist’s Fellowship.
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
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM\ JUDITH BERDY ROOSEVELTISLANDERBLOGSPOT.COM RIHS ARCHIVES DIANA COOPER MTA ARTS & DESIGN
TIK TOK @ rooseveltislandhsociety CHECK OUT OUR TOUR OF BLACKWELL HOUSE ON TIC TOK
Today I spent the day in the kiosk mostly with Barbara Speigel
I love to meet the visitors and chat with them. We had many countries represented: Britain, Scotland, Argentina, Ecuador, Colombia, Costa Rica, New Zealand as well as Toronto and states from Florida to Indiana to Chicago to California.
Most folks were in a great mood and trying to figure out what to do on the island since Southpoint Park was closed.
A visitor from Barcelona told me the city was so expensive after she visited the Empire State Building, top of the Rock, One Vanderbilt and The Edge.
The family from Costa Rica now living in Orlando commented on the number of alligators in Florida, more that in Costa RIca,
An Austrian architect who was so disappointed he couldn’t visit the FDR Park, I promised him that it would be open tomorrow.
Many people told me of staying in the city for 5 days straight and had to see “everything.”
We only heard compliments about our city and some commented how safe it was after reading about it overseas.
Vintage Poster, Courtesy of Macy’s, Inc.
Macy’s first-ever fireworks show was a celebration of Macy’s 100th Anniversary, rather than America’s birthday. On July 1st, 1958, over the Hudson River, a million people watched the store’s first-ever large-scale pyrotechnics show. It wasn’t until 1976, in partnership with The Walt Disney Company, that Macy’s 4th of July fireworks shot became an annual tradition. That year, the fireworks were set off in honor of America’s bicentennial. The show was first televised in 1991.
This year, Macy’s 47th fireworks show will feature 30 different colors and shapes, 60,000 firework shells, and an arrangement of 2,400 shell effects per minute. Altogether, it takes 50 miles of cabling and 1,600 lines of computer-programmed cues to run the show. This new hi-tech production is quite different from how the show was programmed in the 1970s when computer-generated cues were not nearly as quick or efficient. The fireworks used to be manually launched from the barges by a single person with one metal rod.
TUESDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
A postcard from the 1970’s Operation Sail sailing by Goldwater Hospital an the tram passing by. Artist Litiitzia Pitigliani for the MTA
MEN OF THE DAY
ARMANDO CORDOVA – TRAM MANAGER CYRIL OPPERMAN – BUS MANAGER
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
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM\ JUDITH BERDY (C) R.H..MACYS
TIK TOK @ rooseveltislandhsociety CHECK OUT OUR TOUR OF BLACKWELL HOUSE ON TIC TOK
Since 1976, millions of spectators have gathered throughout the city on July 4th to marvel at the grandeur of Macy’s annual Independence Day fireworks. Whether it’s over the East River or Hudson River, Macy’s has always put on a jaw-dropping display from barges on the water, synchronized to music. Yet, what we see as a New York 4th of July tradition actually began as something unrelated to the holiday
Vintage Poster, Courtesy of Macy’s, Inc.
Macy’s first-ever fireworks show was a celebration of Macy’s 100th Anniversary, rather than America’s birthday. On July 1st, 1958, over the Hudson River, a million people watched the store’s first-ever large-scale pyrotechnics show. It wasn’t until 1976, in partnership with The Walt Disney Company, that Macy’s 4th of July fireworks shot became an annual tradition. That year, the fireworks were set off in honor of America’s bicentennial. The show was first televised in 1991.
This year, Macy’s 47th fireworks show will feature 30 different colors and shapes, 60,000 firework shells, and an arrangement of 2,400 shell effects per minute. Altogether, it takes 50 miles of cabling and 1,600 lines of computer-programmed cues to run the show. This new hi-tech production is quite different from how the show was programmed in the 1970s when computer-generated cues were not nearly as quick or efficient. The fireworks used to be manually launched from the barges by a single person with one metal rod.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – JUNE 29: Workers preparing fireworks for the Macy’s Fourth Of July Fireworks show on June 29, 2023 in New York City. (Photo by Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images for Macy’s, Inc.)
The onboard preparation of shells and firing mortars still takes up to 12 days, but this year’s barges have 50 pyrotechnicians on hand. On the barges, they hand-load each one of the shells into the mortars and then hand-wire those shells into the computer.
Macy’s 4th of July fireworks presentation for 2023 began like all the others that came before it, with an original musical score. The fireworks display was developed to match and synchronize with the chosen song. This year’s 25-minute arrangement features an original version of From Sea to Shining Sea, performed by the United States Army Field Band under composer Ray Chew. The new effects to match, produced and designed by Pyro Spectaculars and Souza, include a mile-wide waving flag with red crackling pistil shells, pyrotechnics that are much more detailed and vibrant than what you may have seen in 1976.
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
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM\ JUDITH BERDY UNTAPPED NEW YORK (C) R.H..MACYS
Photographic portrait of nature photographer Ansel Adams — which first appeared in the 1950 Yosemite Field School yearbook. The camera is probably a Zeiss Ikon Universal Juwel.
Photograph of the Hoover Dam (formerly Boulder Dam) from Across the Colorado River; From the series Ansel Adams Photographs of National Parks and Monuments, compiled 1941 – 1942, documenting the period ca. 1933 – 1942.
Full side view of adobe house with water in foreground, “Acoma Pueblo [National Historic Landmark, New Mexico].”; From the series Ansel Adams Photographs of National Parks and Monuments, compiled 1941 – 1942, documenting the period ca. 1933 – 1942.
Close-up of leaves, from directly above, “In Glacier National Park,” Montana; From the series Ansel Adams Photographs of National Parks and Monuments, compiled 1941 – 1942, documenting the period ca. 1933 – 1942.
Front view of entrance, “Church, Taos Pueblo National Historic Landmark, New Mexico, 1942” [Misicn de San Gercnimo] (vertical orientation); From the series Ansel Adams Photographs of National Parks and Monuments, compiled 1941–42, documenting the period ca. 1933–42.
FRIDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
SIGN FROM CAPRI PIZZARIA LOCATED AT 524 MAIN STREET UNTIL 1980’S ALEXIS VILLAFANE & NINA LUBLIN GOT IT.
MONDAY PHOTO
FOR AGES A BUNCH OF METAL SUPPORTS SAT ON THE HILL BETWEEN THE FIRE HOUSE AND AVAC. IT SEEMS TO BE A NO-MANS LAND. RIOC STAFF WANTED TO MOW THE LAWN AND FDNY REFUSED TO MOVE THE METAL SUPPORTS. THERE SEEMED TO BE A STANDOFF BETWEEN FDNY & RIOC. A COMMENT SENT TO THE FIRE COMMISSIONER ON THE FDNY WEBSITE BROUGHT ACTION. THE PARKING LOT NEXT TO THE BUILDING WAS REPAVED, THE TREES TRIMMED, GRASS CUT AND ALL THE JUNK WAS REMOVED FROM THE AREA.
WHEN I WAS NOTIFIED THAT THE JOB WAS DONE, THERE WERE 10 CC’S ON THE E-MAIL!
JUDYB
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
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM\ JUDITH BERDY WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
