There’s a lot of white in this depiction of a blustery winter day in the New York City of 1911: white snow on the street, stoops, and light poles; white-gray skies filling with factory smoke (or smoke from ship smokestacks?) across a grayish river.
Then there’s the violent white brushstrokes of howling wind against the red brick buildings. The wind is painted so viscerally, you can almost feel the icy snow and biting cold (and sympathize with the woman shielding her face in her coat, holding on to her hat).
“City Snow Scene” is an early work of Stuart Davis, a Pennsylvania native born in 1892 who is much better known as a Modernist painter. As a 17-year-old launching a career in New York, he fell under the thrall of early 20th century Ashcan artists and their gritty depictions of urban life.
The painting was auctioned by in 2012 by Christie’s, which had this to say about it: “Through bravura brushwork and a simplified muted palette, Davis succeeds in rendering a dreary winter’s day in lower Manhattan.”
“With a generous application of whites, Davis works up the surfaces to portray the texture of the snow which is juxtaposed with the more carefully applied reds he employs to develop the architecture in the background,” per Christie’s website.
“Broad, heavily applied strokes of black are the only device Davis employs to represent the pedestrians with the exception of a few simple touches of orange that delineate the faces of the primary figures in the foreground.”
It’s how a New York City winter used to be—and is once again in winter 2025.
DYLAN BROWN SPOTTED ROSIE ENJOYING A STROLL IN THE SNOW
PHOTO OF THE DAY
The caption actually states that we’re on East 79th Street between Avenues A and B—a reminder that both avenues originally extended all the way through the Upper East Side. Avenue A is York, and Avenue B is East End Avenue, which starts at 79th Street.
What’s this little boy doing on the rock-strewn ground of a stoneworks business beside the East River—close enough to what was then called Blackwell’s Island that the octagon tower of the lunatic asylum is within view? The caption says he’s drinking water from a spring.
An actual spring on the north side of East 79th Street? It’s hard to believe, but in fact Manhattan used to have plenty of springs. Some remain buried underground, only appearing during building construction, per this New York Times article. Today, you can still find springs in Central Park.
It should be noted that the photographer, James Reuel Smith, made a name for himself at the turn of the last century taking photos of springs and wells in northern Manhattan and the Bronx, documenting these vanishing waterways and the people who still drank from them. A book of his photos was published posthumously in 1935.
Who is this boy, with his heavy cap and delicate lace-up boots? I’m guessing he’s part of a family that moved uptown to the new tenement rows of Yorkville, where working-class and poor parents, mostly immigrants, toiled in factories, breweries, and on the waterfront.
The East Side Settlement House would be built on East 76th Street in 1903, offering activities and educational support for kids as well as their parents. But for now, an undeveloped stretch of land near the East River apparently made do as a play space, at least for this boy.
East 79th Street looks pretty rough in this photo. But within a decade or so, undeveloped areas like this would soon be cleaned up and turned into housing lots. What would become of this boy? With no way to know for sure, we’ll have to assume that he grew up and made his way.
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
A closer look at the art of Hisako Hibi and Matsusaburo Hibi
Hisako Hibi, Floating Clouds, 1944, oil on canvas, 19 1/16 × 23 × 1 1/2 in. (48.4 × 58.4 × 3.8 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the American Women’s History Initiative Acquisitions Pool, administered by the Smithsonian American Women’s History Initiative, 2023.6.1
In 2023, SAAM acquired exemplary paintings by two groundbreaking figures of American art: Hisako Hibi and Matsusaburo Hibi.
Both were part of the vibrant and diverse art scene that thrived in San Francisco between the World Wars. Immigrants from Japan, they met in San Francisco in the late 1920s, when Hisako (née Shimizu) was studying oil painting at the California School of Fine Arts. Matsusaburo was already an established figure, having played a central role in organizing the East West Art Society, an association that brought together artists and art traditions from Europe and Asia. The couple married in 1930 and later moved to Hayward, California, where Matsusaburo opened a school for Japanese language and art. Even as they had two children, both continued to exhibit regularly, Hisako becoming one of only three Japanese American women to have work included in the Golden Gate International Exposition of 1939-40.
However, little of the art Hisako and Matsusaburo Hibi created before World War II survives today. As with scores of other Japanese Americans, the events of the war sharply impacted the Hibis’ lives. In one of the worst civil rights violations in the history of the United States, the issuing of Executive Order 9066 in 1942, following the attack on Pearl Harbor, mandated the mass removal and incarceration of people of Japanese descent from the West Coast. Given about a week to prepare and told to bring only what they could carry, the Hibis had no choice but to leave their paintings behind. The Hibi family would spend more than three years in government detention, mostly at the Topaz Relocation Camp in the high desert of Utah. When the war ended, they moved to New York City. Matsusaburo died of cancer less than two years later, in 1947. By the time Hisako returned to California in 1954, their earlier artwork could not be found.
The Hibis’ story underscores the vulnerability of historic Asian American art. Although the Japanese were the first group of Asian immigrants to significantly participate in American modernism, their contributions have been largely invisible in scholarly and public conceptions of U.S. art and culture. Family members, a few committed collectors and art historians, and institutions dedicated to preserving Japanese American history and culture have been most responsible for protecting their work and bringing it to public attention. It remains now for large art museums such as SAAM to contribute to the recuperation and reintroduction of artists like Hisako and Matsusaburo Hibi to the history of American art—through acquisitions, exhibitions, and new scholarship.
Thanks to a crucial introduction provided by the scholar ShiPu Wang, I had the opportunity to meet Ibuki Hibi Lee, the daughter of Hisako and Matsusaburo Hibi, in 2022. In an apartment in San Francisco, I was astonished to see the number and variety of artworks cared for by Ibuki and her family members for decades. Four paintings, now in SAAM’s collection, stood out immediately, two of which were created while the Hibis were incarcerated at Topaz.
Matsusaburo George Hibi, Coyotes Came Out of the Desert, 1945, oil on canvas, 26 15/16 × 23 × 1 1/2 in. (68.4 × 58.4 × 3.8 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Catherine Walden Myer Fund, 2023.5
Matsusaburo’s Coyotes Came Out of the Desert (1945) depicts a group of animals roaming the camp barracks, seemingly in search of prey. The painting may relate to an actual event—the artist inscribed on its back: “It was a hard winter in Topaz the snow [lay] deep. Big [coyotes] came out of the desert right up to the camps and no one dared to go out of the doors.” But the work also masterfully conveys an atmosphere of dread and unease, emotions surely felt by the inmates as they lived under surveillance and grappled with the loss of their freedoms.
Hisako’s Floating Clouds(1944) is similarly both specific and universalized, grounded in observed reality yet transcendent in theme. While many of her camp paintings feature small figures in the landscape, here she omits the ground entirely, directing our gaze past the geometric rooftops of the barracks to the luminous clouds above. Hisako later inscribed on the back of the canvas: “‘Free, free’….I want to be free/ Free as that cloud I see up above Topaz.” Trapped in an oppressive environment and surrounded by barbed wire and watchtowers, it is no wonder she turned to the sky for solace and mental escape. In its boundlessness, the sky suggests freedom as well as connection—it is shared by everyone on earth. The sky Hisako gazed at from Topaz was the same sky all Americans looked up to from across the vast United States.
Hisako Hibi, Peace, 1948, oil on canvas, 26 1/2 × 22 5/8 × 1 1/8 in. (67.3 × 57.5 × 2.9 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the American Women’s History Initiative Acquisitions Pool, administered by the Smithsonian American Women’s History Initiative, 2023.6.2
After the death of her husband, Hisako supported her family working as a seamstress in a garment factory. Despite financial hardship, she continued to paint and grow as an artist, her work becoming more colorful and driven by her imagination. Some of her New York paintings reflect the artist’s anxiety and isolation at the time, depicting the city as a frightening, nightmarish landscape. Others, such as Peace (1948) are more hopeful statements. The painting shows a beatific angel facing down weapons of war, subject matter that reflects Hibi’s deeply held pacificism and ongoing engagement with art as a means of personal and spiritual consolation.
In 1953, after more than 30 years in the United States, Hisako Hibi finally gained American citizenship, thanks to the passing of the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, which made naturalized citizenship available to immigrants born in Asia. The following year, she returned to San Francisco, where she remained until her death in 1991. During the 1960s, her paintings became, in her words, “brighter and much freer” in expression. She experimented with materials and techniques, painting at times with twigs, pebbles and driftwood rather than using a brush. She also looked beyond European painting traditions, for the first time explicitly drawing on Asian aesthetics in her brushwork and compositions. Autumn (1970) is a stunning late work, an almost purely abstract composition whose magnetism hinges on Hibi’s delicate, gestural brushwork and canny activation of empty space. She renders the glory of fall foliage with intense color and touches of the brush that echo Asian calligraphy. Hibi exhibited actively during this period of her life, becoming an esteemed figure in Bay Area art communities. In 1985, the San Francisco Arts Commission granted Hibi an Award of Honor for her achievements.
Hisako Hibi, Autumn, 1970, oil on canvas, 39 1/8 × 32 1/4 × 1 1/2 in. (99.4 × 81.9 × 3.8 cm), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the American Women’s History Initiative Acquisitions Pool, administered by the Smithsonian American Women’s History Initiative, 2023.6.3
SAAM is grateful to acquire these rare works from the Hibi family. By entering the museum’s collection, Hisako and Matsusaburo Hibi’s paintings will be discovered by new generations of admirers—whether on display in SAAM’s galleries, on the museum’s website and social media, in open storage, or on loan to other institutions. The impact of such encounters is intangible yet significant. A work of art previously unknown to the general public holds the potential of a revelatory perspective. It offers a window into another human being’s experience and vision and does so across expanses of geography and time. Despite the racial injustice and personal loss they confronted during their lives, the Hibis created lasting works of art in which beauty mingles poignantly with pain, resilience and hope.
PHOTO OF THE DAY
My morning view on a clear cold day about 7 a.m., 30 minutes before the sun rises.
CREDITS
SMITHSONIAN AMERICAN ART MUSEUM JUDITH BERDY
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
When we think about the past, how do we know what we know about it? Sure, someone can tell you that something happened, but what about events and actions that took place beyond the reaches of living memory?
For archivists, the answer to this question is simple: the documentary record. Our ability to authenticate what we know (or challenge what we think we know) about the past rests in the security, integrity, and accessibility of the archival record.
And in New York City, as you may imagine, the written, photographic, and electronic records of all the iterations of City government, from European contact to the present, have been at serious risk of loss and destruction at various times in their history.
Prior to the early 1950s, New York City had no centralized archive to preserve and make available local government records. New York State laws governed the practices of other municipalities, but New York City was exempt from those requirements.
Although the Municipal Library had existed, as a unit of the New York Public Library, to collect, preserve, and make available government publications and reports, there was still no real program to address the collection of unpublished material produced by NYC government. The situation at the time of the creation of the Municipal Archives in 1950 was dire.
In 1900, as part of a major (and in some cases, first) attempt to understand what historical records were available in the United States, the American Historical Society established the Public Records Commission.
Professor Herbert Osgood, of Columbia University, surveyed the records of NYC government as part of this survey. His findings, cited “neglect” and “loss” and described records in various offices “indiscriminately heaped together in a large pile on the floor and covered with dust.” His descriptions are enough to make any concerned citizen cringe (or cry).
Over ensuing decades, various mayors tried to rectify the problem, ordering collections be kept by the New York Public Library, and making other ad hoc attempts at fixing the enormous problems facing the city’s historical records. Study after study confirmed the findings, but there were no comprehensive attempts providing for the sustainability of the archival records.
Enter Rebecca B. Rankin, founding Librarian of the Municipal Library. As a result of her advocacy, Mayor La Guardia convened a committee in 1939 to deal with the issue.
The Mayor’s Municipal Archives Committee took stock of the situation, finding that historical records were stored in over 2,000 locations, in “offices… basements, attics, piers, and bridgeheads.”
Crucial to Rankin and the Committee’s advocacy for a comprehensive records program was the finding that 20% of working space in municipal buildings in 1940 stored unused records. Then, as now, city real estate was not cheap.
The result: In 1943, the City bought the Rhinelander building at 238 William Street for use as a central repository for government records.
In 1952, on the eve of Rankin’s retirement, the New York Times reported that moving to a central storage system had saved the City over $1,200,000 in storage costs since 1942. The Municipal Archives had begun.
Archival material began to trickle in, and a system for taking in active city records was established. The archival collection, consisting primarily of the historical records of the Office of the Mayor, totaled only around 14,000 cubic feet at the outset (now it is around 225,000 cubic feet and growing).
In 1953, the center, still managed by the NYPL, was renamed the Municipal Archive and Reference Center (MARC).
However, the records program was beleaguered by lack of staff and lack of proper equipment due to a decrease in funding after World War II. The MARC was not functioning. Some agencies did not use the services that MARC provided, since they weren’t compelled by law to do so, and historic records of the City were spread among a variety of agencies, historical societies, and other libraries.
In addition, space at the Rhinelander was running out, as the MARC accumulated nearly 15,000 cubic feet of records per year. As the City attempted to grapple with the ever-increasing volume of records, plans were even made to refurbish the spaces in the arches of the Brooklyn Bridge to store the extensive records generated by the Office of the Comptroller. This odd plan was eventually deemed a stop-gap measure to a larger problem, and discarded.
Mayor Lindsay eventually forged ahead, commissioning a Mayor’s Task Force on Municipal Archives in 1965. The Task Force presented their findings in a 1966 report that concluded: “New York City’s past, even its very recent past, is threatened with obliteration.”
The Task Force recommended the convening of a Public Records Commission to deal with the issues and, in 1968, MARC moved out of the purview of the NYPL and was established as part of the new Municipal Services Administration. The storage facility was also moved, from the Rhinelander building to 23 Park Row.
Enter the notorious fiscal crisis that besieged the city in the 1970s. Once again the MARC suffered from a lack of adequate funding and staff. In 1977, with yet more advocacy by Municipal Librarian Eugene Bockman and City Council President Paul O’Dwyer, local law 49 established the Department of Records and Information Services as a mayoral agency and provided capital funding to refurbish the Hall of Records at 31 Chambers Street.
The law requires that the Archives “preserve and receive all city records of historical research, cultural or other important value.” Finally, New York City’s records were legally required to come to a specific agency, giving birth to a centralized record-keeping system and protecting the integrity, security, and accessibility of New York City government’s historical record.
A version of this essay by Rachel Greer was first published on the New York City Municipal Archives Blog. The Municipal Archives preserves and makes available New York City government’s historical records. Records include office documents, manuscripts, still and moving images, vital records, maps, blueprints, and sound recordings. Learn more about historical records the Municipal Archives at their website.
Illustrations, from above, from the NYC Municipal Archives: Storage room, NYC Department of Records and Information Services, n.d.; Rebecca Rankin, probably late 1930s, Director of the Municipal Reference Library from 1920-1952; and the Hall of Records at 31 Chambers Street in lower Manhattan, mid-1980s.
In 2013, the RIHS acquired 180 architectural drawings of Goldwater Hospital. These included original blueprints and updates of the building over the years. After storing the rolls of plans in our Octagon office, they were relocated to our storage area during a building renovation. During this period, we reached out to the Municipal Archives and proposed transferring the plans to them. This process would be straightforward as the plans originated from a municipal agency. At the time, the Archives were relocating from the Surrogate Court Building to a new site in Industry City, Brooklyn. Finally, in 2021, we received permission to transport the files to Brooklyn. Fortunately, the plans have now been organized, cataloged, and are conserved in a newly built conservation space.
Plans in Goldwater kitchen waiting to be sorted
Plans in RIHS Octagon Office
Plans in the Municipal Archives
STOP BY THE KIOSK 12 NOON TO 5 P.M. DAILY EXCEPT TUESDAYS ALL CHARGES ACCEPTED
ROOSEVELT ISLAND COLORING BOOK $10- TRAM HOLIDAY STOCKING $ 35- “IMAGES OF AMERICA- ROOSEVELT ISLAND” $25- HELL GATE BRIDGE MODEL $40- CROCHET TRAM ORNAMENT $20-
CUDDLY-STUFFED SLOTHS IN 3 SIZES $12, $18, $24
CUDDLE PUPS AND KITTENS $12-
IMPORTED HANDMADE DOG SWEATERS $ 35- (LIMITED STOCK)
IMPORTED HANDMADE GONDOLA PILLOWS $55-
HANDMADE IMPORTED CROCHET ORNAMENTS $20-
EXCLUSIVE HOLIDAY GREETING CARDS $3.50 EACH
JULIA GASH TAPESTRY THROW IS BACK!! $75-
JULIA GASH ROOSEVELT ISLAND PORCELAIN ORNAMENT $20-
JULIA GASH EXCLUSIVE DESIGN NOTE CARDS 10 PACK $18-
JULIA GASH ROOSEVELT ISLAND TOTE $22-
JULIA GASH ROOSEVELT ISLAND BABY BIB $10-
KIDS BOOKS LONELY PLANET TRAINS, LONELY PLANET AIRPORTS $ 10- 100 FIRST WORDS LITTLE NEW YORKERS, LITTLE GENIUSES $10- ZOOM! BEEP! VROOM! $11-
ADULT BOOKS IMAGES AMERICA ROOSEVELT ISLAND, QUEENSBORO BRIDGE, LONG ISLAND CITY $25- DAMNATION ISLAND $18- ZINES MANDY CHOI, SHEEP IN THE CITY $ 6-
NELLIE BLY’S TEN DAYS IN A MAD-HOUSE $12-
OUR COLORING BOOK IS BACK $10-
SQUEEZE TAXI $5- SMALL, $8- SMALL
NOTHING IS BETTER
GRAND CENTRAL TERMINAL ALL DRESSED UP FOR THE HOLIDAYS
CREDITS
JUDITH BERDY NEW YORK ALMANACK
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
When photographer and urban explorer Joseph Anastasio stumbled upon an abandoned passenger car sitting dormant in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, it was like an apocalyptic scene from the latest season of The Last of Us. The derelict car was a forgotten prototype from the Brooklyn-Queens Connector – commonly known as the BQX – a $2.7 billion light-rail project that never saw the light of day. Check out more of Anastasio’s photos below and find out what happened to this failed transit project Untapped New York has been following since 2016.
Photo by Joseph Anastasio
Origins of the BQX
The BQX was conceived before the DeBlasio administration. The original idea can be traced back to the late-urban planner Alex Garvin who became known for the “Ground Zero: The Rebuilding of a City.” But Christopher Torres, the former deputy director of the Friends of the BQX, credits an article written by New York Times critic Michael Kimmelman for the vision behind the BQX.
In 2014, Kimmelman published an op-ed suggesting the city return to its roots and adopt a streetcar system independent from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). He invokes the term “desire lines” to describe emerging neighborhoods along the Brooklyn and Queens waterfront that were largely underserved by the existing subway lines. Hoping to bring Kimmelman’s idea to fruition, Friends of the BQX proposed an 11-mile streetcar line that would run along the East River From Astoria, Queens to Red Hook, Brooklyn.
Image courtesy of NYCEDC (2017)
In 2017, Friends of the BQX hosted a press conference at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The organization unveiled a prototype of the BQX, a 46 by 9-foot passenger car designed by Alstom SM. The French rail transit designer previously worked in other major cities like Miami and Toronto. The prototype looked quite futuristic. It had a sleek exterior, open gangways, and bright red seats.
When Anastasio, author of Brooklyn Navy Yard: Beyond the Wall, found the abandoned prototype back in March, he “was surprised at how abandoned it felt: with panels falling off and quite a bit of liter inside the two cars.” It appears that the seats were removed as well. “Overall I was surprised at how narrow it was,” he continued, “The seats were laid out funny. It just felt oddly uncomfortable.” You can see before and after photos below.
By the time of the prototype unveiling, the project was beginning to hit its stride. Friends of the BQX had assembled a formidable board of directors, including representation from developers, city agencies, and business improvement districts—a who’s-who of Brooklyn and Queens power brokers. Through canvassing, cold-calling, and engagement workshops, the non-profit also gathered over fifty thousand signatures from residents supporting the project, many of whom resided in New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) facilities.
Why the BQX Was Never Built
While the inspiration for the BQX preceded DeBlasio, the project was both a beneficiary and a victim of his administration. Before the pandemic, New York was trying to capitalize on the tech boom taking over cities like San Francisco. When Long Island City emerged as the leading candidate to host Amazon’s new headquarters, it was clear the subway was no longer sufficient, especially in the outer boroughs where young professionals were beginning to settle. In comes the BQX. The project was to be funded through deferred financing, essentially that means it would have been funded retroactively using the property taxes it would generate. This has become standard real estate practice in New York, paving the way for unprecedented real estate projects like Hudson Yards.
It’s nothing new for transit proposals to be co-opted by politicians hoping to give their constituents something tangible to rally behind. But with Governor Hochul’s controversial decision to hastily suspend congestion pricing–leading to $16.5 billion in budget cuts at the expense of subway extensions–depoliticizing public transit has never been more relevant. As a community-led project, the BQX claimed to do just that, bring ingenuity and efficiency to an antiquated transit system. “For the first time in over 100 years,” Torres said, “transit was back in the hands of the city.” The Friends of the BQX hoped to build off the success of previous grassroots organizations that mobilized public works initiatives, namely the Friends of the High Line.
But it wasn’t clear whether the BQX would fill the transit void on the Brooklyn-Queens waterfront. Opponents of the plan argued that sections of the initial route were redundant with the MTA’s existing G line. Torres rejects the notion that the project was mutually exclusive from existing subway lines however, “The BQX was part of a holistic plan, one that included bolstering the MTA.” As a result, the route was constantly being tweaked and pivoted away from residential neighborhoods like Sunset Park to more commercial markets like Downtown Brooklyn. As consulting fees mounted, the project’s $2.4 billion price tag grew. When Amazon withdrew from its Long Island City project, the $40 billion the BQX had promised to generate in tax revenue seemed suddenly out of reach. Covid’s impact on the city’s budget was the nail in the coffin.
OUR SUBWAY STATION IS GETTING A LONG NEEDED CLEANUP:
ROOF PAINTED WALLS PAINTED RED INTERIOR TRIM PAINTED OUTDOOR VENTS CHANGED OUTDOOR DRAINS CLEANED WINDOWS CLEANED- DE GRAFFITTED AND POLISHED BOOTH SCRUBBED AND VENTS CLEANED UPPER LEVEL BENCHES VARNISHED BROKEN METALWORK REMOVED LOWER LEVEL AND MORE
BROKEN METAL WORK REMOVED AND A REALLY CLEAN UPPER LEVEL. IT EVEN SMELLS CLEAN!!!
UNTAPPED NEW YORK
JUDITH BERDY
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
Yesterday was a beautiful day and after too many days on the rock, I decided to to take the ferry to Wall Street to check out The Conwell Coffee Hall. Ranyee, my intrepid travel companion met on the ferry (she came from 90th St.) and sailed south. Conwell is located at 6 Hanover St. A five minute walk and the massive banking hall was in front of us.
We stepped up to the counter where our transactions were ordering coffee and light bites. We had delicious sandwiches, smoked salmon for me; cheese, egg on a croissant for Ranyee. Served at a table by a wait-person, with a linen napkin, real cutlery and dishes, an elegant ambiance. Much more relaxing than most coffee chains.
Our next stop was One Wall Street. After walking through throngs of tourists in narrow Wall Street, One Wall entrance is around the corner. The newly minted super-luxury condominium was guarded by a young man who politely denied us entry into to the sanctuary. He told us the Red Room is under restoration and temporarily closed. From a press release I gather that Primtemps the Parisian department store will open in the building.
Next door was the entrance to a year-old Whole Foods, the most lovely market I have seen in Manhattan. We found the coffee bar ($3.50 for a cappuccino, a bargain), sat in the lower level cafe and wandered the aisles of all kinds of eats and treats. Wide aisles, free water refill stations and restrooms, made this a popular stop for families from afar to take a break from sightseeing.
Walking down Exchange Place more condo conversions were evident. Number 25 has a luxurious lobby and its grand lamps stand guard on this narrow street.
Down the street, the newly re-opened Delmonico’s stands guard with her red and brownstone structure.
Across the street a Brazilian Bank has a lovely entrance.
On Hanover Square the Queen Elizabeth September Garden offers a shaded park with a touch of the grand British Commonwealth in the paving stones. One local, while waiting for his lunch to be delivered, discussed the neighborhood changes after living there 20 years.
This wonderful food delivery man from Grub Hub comes from a former French Colony, Guinea!! Magnifique
Pavers from Australia Turks & Caicos, Ascension Island, and the Antarctic Territory are an interesting reminder of the British Colonial days.
The former India House, now a club, is newly restored and looking out of the park.
Ready for the PRIDE PARADE on Sunday, this DOT vehicle was parked off Water Street
Arriving back at the NYC Ferry pier, I found there were crowds of riders on long lines, waiting for the 3 presidential helicopters to depart. There was no river traffic south of the Brooklyn Bridge. After a half hour, lines moved and we were on our way home. Just another afternoon in New York.
AVOIDING POLITICS
TWO FUN MOVIES
FAR AWAY,
A TURKISH WOMAN ESCAPES HER FAMILY TO AN ISLAND IN CROATIA
NO PRESSURE A CITY CHEF ESCAPES TO THE THE POLISH COUNTRYSIDE
BOTH ARE FROM NETFLIX
CREDITS
JUDITH BERDY UNTAPPED NEW YORK
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
IT IS IMPORTANT THAT YOU ATTEND THIS MEETING ON MONDAY.
THIS MEETING HAS BEEN HELD YESTERDAY WITH THE COLER RESIDENTS AND STAFF.
THERE ARE MANY QUESTIONS TO BE ASKED ASKED:
WHY DO WE NEED A “500 YEAR FLOOD MITIHGATION PLAN” FOR COLER?
THE FLOODING IN 2012 CAME FROM THE STEAM TUNNEL UP INTO THE BASEEMENT, NOT FROM THE RIVER. A SEAWALL WILL DO NOTHING IF WATER COMES FROM THE STEAM TUNNEL (WHICH IS NOW CLOSED, BUT NOT COMPLETELY SEALED).
FEMA HAS AUTHORIZED $90,000,000 TO BE SPENT ON THE PROJECT, BUT THESE PROJECTS USUALLY HAVE VASTLY MORE COSTS AND TAKE YEARS TO COMPLETE.
COLER’S ENTIRE INFRASTRUCTURE WAS RELOCATED AFTER 2012 HURRICANE SANDY AND ALL UTILITIES ARE ON THE SECOND LEVEL OR ABOVE. THERE IS NO VITAL INFRASTRUCTURE IN THE BASEMENT, THE ONLY AREA TO FLOOD IN 2012. SOME ADJOINING PARKING AREAS ALSO FLOODED BUT DID NOT ENTER PATIENT AREAS.
THIS PROJECT WILL TAKE AT LEAST 32 MONTHS OF MASSIVE CONSTRUCTION AND DISRTUPTION. GIANT PILES WOULD HAVE TO BE SUNK INTO THE BEDROCK (10-30 FEET DOWN AROUND THE WALLED IN AREAS). IMAGINE LIVING WITH THIS AROUND YOUR HOME FOR YEARS.
ALL TREES AROUND COLER AND PROBABLY NEARBY WOULD BE REMOVED OR PERMANENTLY DAMAGED.
MOST IMPORTANT:
COLER IS A PERMANENT HOME TO 500 RESIDENTS. MANY COLER RESIDENTS DO NOT GO OUT OF THEIR UNITS OR OFF CAMPUS.
MOST OF THE PLANS INCLUDING MASSIVE BERMS (OR HIGH MOUNDS) WOULD BIOCK ANY VIEW FROM THE MAIN FLOOR.
THE EAST SIDE OF THE BULDING WOULD HAVE A MASSIVE WALL TO BLOCK ALL VIEWS EXCEPT THE PARKING LOT FROM MAIN FLOOR.
PSYCHOLOGICALLY, THIS PLAN WOULD DAMAGE THE RESIDENTS AND STAFF.
IT IS TIME TO GO BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD, COME UP WITH A REASONABLE SOLUTION ANTHE PROPOSE TO COLER AND RIOC A REASONABLE SOLUTION, THEN PROPOSE IT TO THE COLER COMMUNITY AND IT REST OF THE ISLAND RESIDENTS,.
THE COLER COMMUNITY AND OURS ARE VERY ACTIVE POLITICALLY AND KNOWLEDGEABLE & WILL MEET ANY CHALLENGE HEAD-ON.
PRESENTING THE PLAN TO A SKEPTICAL COLER COMMUNTY.
A 2017 PLAN, THAT WAS NOT ADAPTED, THE ONLY IMAGE AVAILABLE LEADING TO CONFUSION
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
DYLAN BROWN PRESENTED A GREAT OVERVIEW OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF OUR ISLAND FROM THE 1960’S TO THE PRESENT TIME. A FULL AUDIENCE WAS TREATED TO THIS TIMELAPSE OF WHAT WAS IMAGINED AND THRE RESULTS ALMOST 50 YEARS LATER. GREAT WORK DYLAN!
THE PROGRAM WILL BE AVAILBLE SHORTLY ON THE ROOSEVELTISLANDER BLOGSPOT.
A SPECIAL THANKS TO DANIELLE SHUR OF THE NYPL BRANCH THAT GRACIOUSLY HOSTS OUR PRESENTATIONS.
WEDNESDAY
MARCH 20, 2024
GREAT PROGRAMMING IS COMING FROM THE R.I.H.S.
ISSUE # 1208
JUDITH BERDY
UPCOMING PROGRAMS
TREASURES REDISCOVERED This is an original poster that publicized the exhibit “Welfare Island: An Interim Report” which was presented at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for two weeks October 6 through October 19, 1970
Did you know that there was a scale model of the future island exhibited at the Met in 1970?
This is just one historical item that is stored in our office/archive in the Octagon
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Quayola, Storms. Photo courtesy of Times Square Arts.
A stormy sea will take over Times Square this March as images of frothy, crashing waves fill the giant billboard screens. Presented in collaboration with Artnet, the Times Square Arts Spring Midnight Moment series kicks off with London-based artist Quayola’s digital video series, Storms. Storms is a digitally rendered version of the ocean, with realistic waves that collide on a stormy night. Known for her immersive audiovisual installations, Quayola captures the crashing waves of Cornwall, England’s sea, to show the challenging relationship between nature and technology. Storms will be on view from March 1 to March 31.
Credit to Woomin Kim
Love arts and crafts? Material for the Arts textile artist Woomin Kim plays with an assortment of materials and quilts to make The Warehouse, a series of textile works inspired by the MFTA’s expansive inventory of art supplies. In her solo exhibition, Kim examines themes of immigrant life through landscapes filled with a clutter of objects like discarded mannequin pieces, clothes, furniture, and a whimsical horse. The quilts hang together in colorful pieces. Kim’s work shows visitors what can be created with the materials and found objects at MFTA and how you can give the formerly discarded items a new home. The installation will be on view until April 12.
Courtesy of Shushank Shrestha
The Rubin Museum of Art will close its physical museum this fall, so don’t miss out on the new exhibit Reimagine: Himalayan Art Now! Reimagine features 32 contemporary artists from across the globe and a collection of artworks that explore diverse perspectives of heritage, culture, and identity. The exhibition marks the museum’s 20th anniversary year and will be on view from March 15th to October 6th, 2024.A centerpiece of the exhibition is a large-scale installation by Asha Kama Wangdi. The site-specific piece is made of hundreds of repurposed prayer flags from religious sites. Wangdi’s installation will cascade down the museum’s spiral staircase. Bidhata K C’s interactive piece Out of Emptiness highlights connections between discarded objects and broader themes of life. LuYang explores Buddhism through a 3D animation of the Wheel of Life. Prithvi Shrestha’s paintings make a commentary on technological effects. Roshan Pradhan’s piece uses robots to explore the topic of gender. Tenzin Mingyur Paldron’s Power, Masculinity and Mindfulness also highlights gender fluidity as an outlet of their own experience of coming out as transgender. Uma Bista’s photo series Stay Home, Sisters showcases cultural taboos surrounding women.
Dennis RedMoon Darkeem blends indigenous culture and inspiration from old maps in his poster, Direct Connection on Turtle Island. Darkeem depicts a colorful version of the New York City skyline sitting on the shell of a turtle as the sun rises in the background. The entire scene is bordered by a wampum, a traditional indigenous bead. Catch a Line by Erin Robinson celebrates subway travel and the graphic design of New York City subway maps through a vibrant collage of subway lines and symbols.
Just off the coast of Astoria, Queens, at the confluence of the Harlem and East Rivers, is a narrow tidal channel. Hell Gate. Its fast currents change multiple times a day and it used to be riddled with rocks just beneath the surface. Even today, visitors to Randall’s Island Park can see the swirling churn and watch pleasure boaters struggle through. American author Washington Irving wrote an essay about it: “Woe to the unlucky vessel that ventures into its clutches.”
But many a vessel did venture into those clutches over the centuries. Traversing it could save sailors navigating between New York Harbor and Southern New England days of travel around Long Island. This expediency often came at a cost. Hell Gate is the final resting place of literally hundreds of ships. Most of them are forgotten but one continues to captivate. Because down there, under the minor maelstroms, is the promise of gold.
The East River runs up from New York Harbor with Manhattan on one side and first Brooklyn then Queens on the other. At Randall’s Island it splits. To the west, it becomes the Harlem River, which skirts around the top of Manhattan to join the Hudson. In the other direction, it connects to the entirety of Long Island Sound—but it’s easy to miss that this connection comes only via a single, slim channel. Each time the tide turns, the Atlantic forces its way through this passage in one direction or the other, with the discharge of the Harlem River adding to the chaos.
Hell Gate, seen in a Hammond’s map from 1909, is where the East River skirts two islands. On the upper left, it turns into the Harlem River and connects to the Hudson. At the upper right, it leads out. to Long Island Sound. THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY DIGITAL COLLECTIONS/PUBLIC DOMAIN
“Because those volumes are large, and the opening at Hell Gate is small, it means the velocity is going to get very high and that makes it difficult to navigate,” says Roy Messaros, a coastal engineer and professor of hydraulics at New York University.
“Even on a calm day the current is boiling,” says John Lipscomb, who regularly patrols New York Harbor on a 36-foot wooden boat for the environmental nonprofit Riverkeeper. “It’s a boisterous place. There are whirlpools and the wind against the tide causes interesting, short, aggressive waves. You pay attention when you’re in Hell Gate.”
That’s today. Conditions in the past were even worse. Most rocks in the area have now been removed to facilitate navigation, but Hell Gate used to be a minefield. It sounded like Hell, too. The whirlpools could be heard from “a quarter of an hour’s distance,” according to one 17th-century Dutch traveler. During the 1850s, it was estimated that about one in 50 ships that crossed Hell Gate was either damaged or sunk.
“You’re talking about centuries of navigation,” says Bronx Borough Historian Lloyd Ultan. “Everything from rowboats to large ships have been sunk by hitting those rocks. One on top of the other on top of the other on top of the other.”
Out of all those wrecks, one in particular has obsessed people for over 240 years—HMS Hussar. The whole gamut of underwater exploration technology has been employed in the search for its purported treasure, from 18th-century diving bells to modern sonar scanners. The cast of characters who have invested significant time and money into salvaging the ship is equally wide-ranging. Thomas Jefferson had a go, as did the inventor of the modern submarine. Alongside crews of schemers and hustlers, serious underwater archaeologists have tried, too. Most recently the most prominent attempts to find the wreck were the brainchild of a Bronx man who calls himself Joey Treasures.
The coveted ship was a frigate of the Royal Navy that arrived in British-occupied New York during the Revolutionary War, in November 1780, reportedly carrying the payroll of British troops in gold coins. Shortly after arriving in the city, Hussar set sail for Gardiner’s Bay on the eastern end of Long Island (though some accounts say it was headed to Newport, Rhode Island). While traversing Hell Gate it hit a submerged formation known as Pot Rock and began taking on water. The ship drifted down the East River until it sank to a depth of 60 to 80 feet, somewhere off the coast of the Bronx. This much is known. The rest, much like the waters of Hell Gate, is murky.
Accounts differ on how many, if any, of the crew were lost, but most agree that around 60 American prisoners of war who were shackled below deck went down with the ship. Crucially, whether Hussar still had gold on board when it sank has also been the subject of much debate over the past two centuries. Modern historians tend to think not. Contemporaneous news articles about the accident made no mention of treasure, nor do the minutes from the Royal Navy court martial into the loss of the frigate.
“It’s a pie-in-the-sky romantic notion that you could find gold in the waters of the Bronx,” says Ultan. But this did not stop generations of people from trying, beginning in the early 19th century. It was known that the ship was carrying gold when it arrived in New York, and in the decades after Hussar sank, “the legend began to grow that the gold was still on the ship,” says Ultan. “The East River at the southeastern end of the Bronx suddenly becomes the Spanish Main.”
Captain Charles Morice Pole (left) was in command of HMS Hussar when it wrecked, but was acquitted of wrongdoing at a court martial. This British gold George III guinea (right) from 1777 represents the coins that were rumored to have been carried in the ship. PUBLIC DOMAIN; THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART/PUBLIC DOMAIN
By the 1810s, the notion that a fortune in gold was lying near the bottom of Hell Gate had become an almost-uncontested truth in the New York press, and would remain so well into the 20th century. “You have to remember it’s a good story,” says Ultan. “It sells copy.” This frenzy may have been initially fed by the British themselves, who, despite denying that there was gold in Hussar when it sank, sent over a team of experts to salvage the ship in the 1790s, “with results wholly ineffectual,” according to a New York Times article from several decades later.
Press speculation on the value of the gold varied wildly. The “large amount” vaguely referred to in early articles suddenly became the oddly specific sum of £600,000, and then $1,000,000, then $5,000,000. In the 1980s, an international coin dealer told The New York Times that the bullion said to be in the Hussar wreck could fetch a whopping half a billion dollars in the rare coins market. “Everything gets distorted,” says Ultan. “It’s like a game of telephone.”
Early attempts to salvage the ship, including by the British, involved diving bells, a technology that dates back to antiquity and is still used today. Divers descended in a small metal chamber with an open bottom, with the air pocket that allowed them to breathe at depth as they more or less felt around the bottom. At and around Hell Gate, this yielded few results. Diving was only possible for short windows, and even then the currents would toss the bell around, making any kind of concerted search impossible.
A Charles Pratt diving helmet which is on display at the Worcester Historical Museum in Massachusetts. JOAQUIM SALLES
But even for him the waters around Hell Gate were a worthy opponent. The bottom lived up to the tempestuous reputation of its surface waters. Currents remained fierce, visibility was near-nonexistent, and the submarine armor was cumbersome. It was made of a combination of rubber and metal and weighed around 70 pounds. Its copper helmet had to be bolted to the diver’s neck piece. A rubber hose connected the helmet to a hand-cranked air pump at the surface.
Over the course of 13 years, Pratt salvaged numerous artifacts from Hussar. He raised cannons and cannonballs, bottles of wine and swords. He found human bones still in shackles—likely the remains of the American prisoners. Tantalizingly, he also found several 18th-century gold guineas, but far from the promised windfall. The coins probably belonged to the crew and were not a part of a larger haul, but were more than enough to keep the legend alive. Like others before him, Pratt had difficulty breaching the wreck’s lower deck, where cargo was traditionally stored. He dove on Hussar for the last time in 1866. (Fast forward to 2013, when Central Park Conservancy employees were cleaning a cannon from Hussar that had likely been donated by Pratt and kept in storage for many years. They were surprised to discover it was still loaded with gunpowder and a cannonball. The NYPD bomb squad was called on to diffuse it.)
McGowan’s Pass, now in Central Park, was a British position during the Revolutionary War. Today, a cannon from HMS Hussar marks the site. In 2013, the Central Park Conservancy discovered that it was still loaded, and called on the NYPD bomb squad to defuse it. STATION1/CC BY-SA 4.0
Several salvage companies worked on Hussar over the ensuing decades, without Pratt’s success. One notable attempt was led by a less-than-reputable street preacher named George W. Thomas, who, like Davis before him, convinced investors to back his effort. They gave him $70,000, roughly equivalent to $2 million today, though he was later accused of using the money to buy a lavish house in New Jersey. In 1900, divers trying to salvage a yacht in the East River found an anchor with “H.M.S. Hussar” inscribed on it and sold it to a junk shop. After a century of regular media coverage, it would be almost 40 years until Hussar made headlines again.
Four decades is a long time in a place like Hell Gate. Somewhere along the way, the location of the wreck was lost. Hell Gate itself had changed significantly over the course of the 19th century. Its rocks had been blown to bits to facilitate boat traffic, first by a French civil engineer in the 1850s and later by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Pot Rock, the hazard that sank Hussar, was the first to go. The greatest of these blasts happened in 1885, when 300,000 pounds of explosives were simultaneously set off in the waters of Hell Gate, lifting a geyser of foam and rock high in the air. Journalists at the time hyped it as the single largest explosion in history. The blast was felt as far as Princeton, New Jersey, 50 miles away, according to the New York City Parks Department website entry for Mill Rock Island, where the explosives were prepped. One can only imagine the effect that this blast and the ones that came before it, all over Hell Gate, had on the remains of the wrecks below.
But even after dozens of failed attempts and the bombardment, there were still those who believed there was a fortune waiting to be discovered. Simon Lake, one of the inventors of the modern submarine, began looking for Hussar in 1935 in a “baby-submarine” of his own creation, adapted to the conditions of the East River. A year later he gathered journalists in his hotel room and announced that he had found the ship. “Within six weeks I expect to step within her hold,” he told The New York Times. This never came to pass. Whatever Lake had found, it was not Hussar. He ended the 1930s in dire financial straits.
Fifty years later, another underwater explorer would continue the search. Salvage expert Barry Clifford came to the project with a pedigree. He had just discovered Samuel Bellamy’s treasure-filled pirate ship, Wydah, off the coast of Cape Cod. Hussar seemed like the next logical step. Clifford and his team began taking sonar images of the bottom of Hell Gate in 1985. The same technology had just been used to locate the wreck of Titanic that same year. Within months, in an echo of Simon Lake’s hotel room press conference, Clifford announced to the world that he had found the wreck. “My opinion is there is a very strong possibility that there is treasure on board the Hussar,” he told The New York Times. But when divers got in the water it was a different story. In the end, Clifford and his team encountered abandoned cars, washing machines and seven other shipwrecks, but none from the Revolutionary War era.
And with that, the era of serious salvagers and underwater explorers was deep-sixed. The latest to take up the mantle left by others before is an actor and demolition worker from the Bronx named Joe Governali, who goes by “Joey Treasures.” Governali has been trying to secure exclusive salvage rights over the wreck since the early 2000s. In a deposition, Governali claimed to have found an old map in the Rare Books Room of the New York Public Library that revealed the location of the ship. His salvage company conducted several exploratory dives, but have little to show for it other than some grainy video of what Governali claims is the wreck of Hussar and an 18th-century beer pitcher of British origin. Governali produced a reality TV pilot of his escapades. Alas, he is also being accused of fraud by one of his investors, James Kays, who was convinced to pitch in $100,000 after being shown gold coins purported to be from Hussar. According to court records, they were allegedly “junk bought on eBay.”
It’s difficult to predict what the next phase of this centuries-long treasure hunt will be, but it’s likely to continue in some form. James Kays’s lawyer wrote in a letter to the judge presiding over the case that his client intends to continue the search, just as soon as he gets his money back.
The next big development might be with Hell Gate itself. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has proposed major civil works in the area to protect New York City from storm surges. Some versions of the proposal include large storm barriers that could permanently alter the tidal exchange between the East River, Long Island Sound, and New York Harbor, potentially weakening Hell Gate’s infamous currents. Although such barriers would only close during rare storms, they “threaten to choke off the tidal flow” even when open, according to Riverkeeper. The Army Corps of Engineers indicated recently that they are leaning towards a less invasive alternative but the storm barriers have not yet been ruled out. “It remains possible that other alternatives or components of those alternatives may also be advanced,” according to New York/New Jersey Harbor and Tributaries Project Manager Bryce Wisemiller.
“It’s a little bit here, a little bit there, a little bit everywhere.” For now at least, the currents of Hell Gate will keep on flowing unobstructed. As for Hussar, the promise of its gold remains alive and well, even if the same may not be true for the ship itself. After two centuries of salt corrosion, violent tides, salvage attempts and maybe explosives, it’s a safe bet that whatever remains of it is probably beyond recognition. “I think the Hussar is hither and yon,” says Lloyd Ultan. “It’s a little bit here, a little bit there, a little bit everywhere.”
In his essay about Hell Gate, Washington Irving mentions how he had grown up hearing fantastic stories about the remains of a ship that lay scattered among the channel’s rocks, one of the many that fell victim to its currents. As an adult, he tried to find the truth about those stories. “I found infinite difficulty, however, in arriving at any precise information,” he wrote. “In seeking to dig up one fact it is incredible the number of fables which I unearthed.”
