The New York State Museum in Albany has acquired the Women’s Rights Pioneers Central Park Monument model. The statue features three nationally recognized leaders of the women’s rights movement, all hailing from New York State: Sojourner Truth (Ulster County), Susan B. Anthony (Rochester), and Elizabeth Cady Stanton (Johnstown, Seneca Falls, and NYC). It will be included as part of the Museum’s new exhibition, “Women Who Lead.”
The 1/3-size Women’s Rights Pioneers Monument was made possible through donations raised by Monumental Women, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing awareness and appreciation of women’s history through a national education campaign.
On August 26th, 2020, Monumental Women unveiled the first statue of real women in Central Park’s 167-year history, the Women’s Rights Pioneers Monument on the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th amendment and women winning the right to vote.
The State Museum is located at 222 Madison Avenue in Albany,NY. The Museum is open Tuesday through Sunday from 9:30 am to 5 pm. It is closed on the Fourth of July, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Day. Admission is free. Further information about Women’s History Month events and other programming can be obtained by calling (518) 474-5877 or visiting the Museum website.
FROM RIOC
2023 REHABILITATION AWARD FROM FRIENDS OF THE UPPER EAST SIDE HISTORIC DISTRICTS
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PRESIDENT & CEO SHELTON J. HAYNES ANNOUNCESROOSEVELT ISLAND LIGHTHOUSE TO RECEIVE 2023 REHABILITATION AWARD FROM FRIENDS OF THE UPPER EAST SIDE HISTORIC DISTRICTS
Award is just thelatestrecognitionof RIOC’s remarkablemultimillion-dollar restorationwork onthe Roosevelt Island Lighthouse Tower
Roosevelt Island, NY – March14, 2023 – Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation (RIOC) President & CEO Shelton J. Haynes today announced the Roosevelt Island Lighthouse has been awarded the 2023 Rehabilitation Award from the Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts, one of Manhattan’s premiere independent, not-for-profit membership organization dedicated to preserving and celebrating the architectural legacy of the Upper East Side community. The Rehabilitation Awardwas given in appreciation of RIOC’s “thoughtful and meticulously detailed preservation work” to the important Landmark structure, which was also recently recognized by the New York Landmarks Conservancy with their Lucy G. Moses 2022 Preservation Project Award.
“It is very rewarding to see all of the hard work that was put into restoring the Roosevelt Island Lighthouse Tower get the recognition it deserves from some of New York’s most storied organizations, including the Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts,” said President & CEO Shelton J. Haynes.“Preserving our rich history is paramount to me, our RIOC Board, and the entire RIOC team, as is a shared commitment to maintaining the unique beauty of our island. This restoration project manages to do both; we’ve preserved the storied lighthouse for future generations, while giving it a beautiful facelift that residents and tourists alike will enjoy.
FRIENDS of the Upper East Side Historic Districts added, “The restoration of the Roosevelt Island lighthouse reflects a true preservation undertaking in its sourcing of historic documents to guide both the conservation of the historic fabric and the design of the new octagonal lantern. The meticulous restoration and site improvements will allow New Yorkers and visitors to enjoy this landmark anew and makes it a project perfectly aligned with FRIENDS of the Upper East Side’s mission to preserve and celebrate the architectural legacy and sense of place of the Upper East Side. We applaud Thomas Fenniman and RIOC for their work.”
Mr. Haynes added, “I want to personally thank the Friends of the Upper East Side Historic Districts for this thoughtful acknowledgement of our collective effort. The completion of this project was many years in the making, and everyone who had a hand in getting it across the finish line shares today in this honor.”
The Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation, upon receiving approval from the Roosevelt Island Board of Directors, invested $3.1 million in restoring the 50-foot lighthouse, which was originally built in 1872 and had deteriorated significantly over many decades. Scope of work for the project included brick, stone, and window removal, door restoration, and modifications to the Lighthouse lantern and observation deck, including:
Removing the deteriorated concrete deck.
Installing a new concrete ring beam and fluid-applied waterproofing.
Installing a new stainless steel observation deck and railing.
Installing a new glass and structural steel lantern.
Removal of the wood stairs and installation of a new metal spiral staircase and new electrical and accent lighting.
Site improvements at the Lighthouse include resetting and installing new stone pavers and curb stones, a new concrete beam curb, and new recessed ground lighting and controls.
“I am incredibly proud of the work done to restore the lighthouse and am thrilled that this project is getting the recognition it so rightly deserves,” said Prince Shah, Director of Capital Planning & Projects for RIOC. “This project has been a top priority for our community for many years, and to see it finally come together in such a spectacular way could not be more gratifying. We will continue to do all we can to ensure future capital projects are just as successful in centering the history and natural beauty of the island.”
The Roosevelt Island community, along with the hundreds of thousands of tourists who visit the island annually, can now enjoy this beautiful beacon in the heart of the East River just as the warm spring months emerge.
About the Roosevelt Island Lighthouse Tower:
Constructed in 1872 by penitentiary inmates with stone extracted from the island, the Lighthouse was originally designed by James Renwick Jr., architect of the Smallpox Hospital and the Smithsonian Institute. The East River channel’s huge granite boulders made it very treacherous for ships to navigate, so the Lighthouse was commissioned as part of a solution for New York City’s shipping ports, along with an Army Corps of Engineers project to widen and deepen the channel. Above the waters of the East River, at the northernmost stretch of Roosevelt Island, shines the fifty-foot-high Lighthouse.
About Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation (RIOC):
The Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation (RIOC) was created in 1984 by the State of New York as a public benefit corporation with a mission to plan, design, develop, operate, and maintain Roosevelt Island. With a focus on innovative and environmentally friendly solutions, RIOC is committed to providing services that enhance the island’s residential community. RIOC manages the two-mile-long island’s roads, parks, buildings, a sports facility, and public transportation, including the iconic aerial tramway. Additionally, RIOC operates a Public Safety Department that helps maintain a safe and secure environment for residents, employees, business owners, and visitors.
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Media Contact: Akeem H. Jamal Assistant Vice President, Communications & Government Affairs riocpress@rioc.ny.gov
RIOC barely mentioned that Thomas Fenniman was the architect who worked on this project for years and his talents and use of great craftspersons made this project a success, not Mr. Haynes.
Great Hall. The historic Great Hall, located in Shepard Hall, boasts a capacity ranging from 600 to 1,000 persons depending on the occasion. Edwin H. Blashfield’s original mural titled The Graduate” anchors the Hall, depicting the passing of wisdom from The Alma Mater onto a young scholar.
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 Almanac
THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
When a shuttered lottery store’s sign was removed on Avenue A in February 2023, multiple East Villageghost signs were revealed. The hand-painted glass panes that were uncovered probably belonged to Kammerman’s, a popular Alphabet City children’s shop in the mid-20th century.
60 Avenue A
The ghost signs advertise the carriages, strollers, and toys once sold there. Many of the glass panes on the Avenue A side of the building still exist, but only a few have inscription
60 Avenue A, close-up of two signs
Throughout much of the 20th century, Avenue A was a mecca for young parents shopping for children’s clothing, carriages, furniture, cribs, and toys. In 1972 the New York Times highlighted three stores within four blocks of each other on Avenue A: Ben’s Juvenile Mart, Schachter’s Children’s World, and Schneider’s Juvenile Furniture.
The shops employed artists who would adorn cribs “with any whimsy the customer desires,” noted the Times. “One woman recently requested a reproduction of a postcard her husband had sent her during their courtship.”
New York City, 1957. Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, Anthony Angel Collection
In 2004 Schneider’s departure marked the end of an era. “In the latest sign that gentrification is overtaking Manhattan’s funkiest neighborhoods, a store that sold bargain-priced baby cribs and carriages on Avenue A for a half-century left the area when its rent quadrupled,” reported the New York Daily News. “‘We’d be working to pay the rent if we stayed,’ said Lorraine Waxman of Schneider’s Juvenile Furniture — which opened at 20 Avenue A when Harry Truman was president.”
25 Avenue A
In the 1930s, I. & J. Kramer Children’s Wear was a corner store on Second Street at 25 Avenue A. Glass signs with lettering edged in gold leaf described its merchandise: infants’ wear, children’s dresses, boys’ suits, underwear, and novelties.
25 Avenue A
Its ghost signs remained hidden for decades until they were discovered in 2016 by the owners of 2A Bar. “We were simply doing routine renovations on the facade of the building to fix our windows,” said Laura McCarthy, co-owner of 2A since 1984. “Lo and behold, we found these signs hiding out for decades upon decades underneath.”
25 Avenue A
“In this day and age when our city is increasingly losing its historical spaces, it seemed like a no-brainer to celebrate this previous incarnation of the bar and to share that story with the rest of New York City.” Time will tell if the East Village ghost signs revealed at 60 Avenue A will also be preserved, or disappear like the store they once advertised,
I remember Sunday trips to the Lower East Sie for shopping at Fine & Klein for handbags, Louis Chock for dry goods, Ezra Cohen for linens, a store on Ludlow Street for nuts and fruits. You never came home without lots of bargains.
1961 The retrieval of the bus that plunged into the Queens side of the East River. Apparently, the driver had a heart attack as the bus approached the turn behind Goldwater and before Old City. According to the news, 7 people, all hospital workers, died in the accident.
Although I was not on the island when this happened, I started as a hospital volunteer in 1966, I was told about the accident by Fr. Duino, the Goldwater Hospital Chaplain, who planted a small memorial garden at the site of the accident. THANKS, ED LITCHER
Frank Mastropolo is the author of Fillmore East: The Venue That Changed Rock Music Forever and New York Groove: An Inside Look at the Stars, Shows, and Songs That Make New York Rock, selected by Best Classic Bands as two of the Best Music Books of 2021 and 2022. Mastropolo has also written Ghost Signs: Clues to Downtown New York’s Past, winner of the 2021 Independent Publishers Book Award, and Ghost Signs 2: Clues to Uptown New York’s Past. Mastropolo is a journalist, photographer, and former ABC News 20/20 producer, winner of the Alfred I. DuPont–Columbia University silver baton and the Sigma Delta Chi award from the Society of Professional Journalists. His photography is featured in the Bill Graham Rock & Roll Revolution exhibition.
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
Yesterday I was ready to visit Nick Golebiewski’s Studio Sale in the Brookly Navy Yard. I set out on the 1:24 p.m. NYC Ferry to the Yard, Upon arriving I asked for directions and realized that the Studio Sale was next Saturday, not yesterday.
After some yummy purchases at Russ and Daughter’s in Building 92 I set off to Wegman’s about 5 blocks down Flushing Avenue. Lots of great hot and cold to dine in or take out as well as a supermarket.
On my way there I noticed a lot of young folks lining up outside one of the Yard building. No idea what the occasion was.
The parking lot for off -duty NYC ferries
We forget that the Navy Yard was the major construction site of the most famous ships that served the US Navy. No longer a military facility ships are still dry docked here for repairs and maintenance.
Barge 81 while at sail.Yesterday, it was high and dry in a dry dock.
The bow of DBL81 sitting in a dry dock showing that she is only 3 feet in the dock.
The midsection of this enormous carrier high and dry.
The stern with crane on adjoining pier.
An adjoining area awaiting ships with a great view or the WIlliamsburg Bridge
The We Work building next to the dock where NY Ferry arrives. The area next to the building has lounge chairs and even a basketball hoop for those who need a break outdoors.
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On the street I saw people who had celebrated Hali. Here is a description of this springtime Hindu celebration:
What is Holi?
Holi, sometimes referred to as the “Festival of Love,” or the “Festival of New Beginnings,” is considered one of the most revered and celebrated festivals in India. On this day, people are encouraged to unite, and forget all resentments and negative feelings towards each other. Many who celebrate also consider Holi to be a day for meeting new friends, forgetting past burdens, forgiving others, and repairing broken relationships.
Who Celebrates Holi?
Holi is predominantly celebrated by millions of Hindus across India and South Asia. Although it is now also celebrated by many non-Hindus across Asia, Africa, UK, and North America.
Where is Holi Celebrated?
Originating from the Indian subcontinent, Holi is widely celebrated in India, but is observed by others throughout areas of Asia and the Western world. The religious festival has also become popular with non-Hindus in many parts of South Asia, Jamaica, Suriname, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, South Africa, Malaysia, the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Mauritius, and Fiji.
Why is Holi Celebrated?
The Holi festival has many religious and mythological roots, as it celebrates various legends associated with the holiday. Holi celebrates the legend of Prahlad and Hiranyakshyap, the legend of Radha and Krishna, and many more.
By celebrating these various stories, Holi reassures people of the power that truth holds, since the moral of all legends is the victory of good over evil. The legend of Hiranyakshyap and Prahlad also represents the importance of extreme devotion to God. These legends help people follow a strong moral code in their everyday lives and emphasize the importance of truthfulness.
How is Holi Celebrated?
Holi celebrations begin the night before with a Holika Dahan, where people will gather, perform religious rituals by a bonfire, and pray that their internal evil be destroyed. The following morning is celebrated as Rangwali Holi, a free-for-all festival of colors, where people throw powdered dye and spray water. This celebration occurs in the open streets, parks, outdoor temples and buildings. Musical groups perform from place to place as everyone sings, dances, and enjoys the Holi traditions. People also make time to see friends and family, share gossip, and pass around Holi delicacies.
Here is the event I arrived a week early for. Join me nest Saturday at Nick Golebiewki’s Studio Sale
Dear JUDITH, I’d like to invite you to a spring-clean studio sale on Saturday, March 18 from 1-5pm in the Brooklyn Navy Yard, Building 280, Suite 610.
Come by for framed art, prints, daily drawings, sketches, postcards and more…
Please RSVP and I will send you a guest pass. The QR code you’ll receive is needed to enter the Brooklyn Navy Yard and pass security. The pass also includes a map of the Yard.
TOKEN BOOTH FROM MANHATTAN TRAM STATION BEING REMOVED IN 2010 RENOVATION ANDY SPARBERG, GLORIA HERMAN, 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
JUDITH BERDY
AKSHAYA PATRA
THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
Amelia Simmons wrote what is widely regarded as the first American cookbook, American Cookery. Through its recipes and ingredients, this work shows how a unique American diet and identity was created.The book was so popular that after its first printing in Hartford, Connecticut in 1796, and it’s second printing in Albany, NY, that same year, it remained in print for 35 years after its first publication; however, very little is known about its author.Simmons’ American Cookery used terms known to Americans, using readily available ingredients. It’s believed to be the first cookbook to include “Indian pudding,” johnnycake, and a precursor to pumpkin pie.The cookbook was the first to suggest serving cranberry with turkey, and the first to use the Dutch word “cookey.” It introduced a precursor of baking soda, starting a revolution in the making of American cakes.The book was named one of the 88 “Books That Shaped America” by the Library of Congress. Only four copies of the first printings are known to survive.Pamela Cooley has sought to solve the mystery surrounding Simmons through historical and genealogical research. Cooley shares her research and theory about the enigmatic author in a virtual program with Oneida County History Center of Utica on Wednesday, March 15th.Pamela Cooley’s interest in culinary history led her to research Amelia Simmons. Cooley has presented on Simmons in the U.S. and Canada. She is a retired archivist and also an avid historic cook who teaches open hearth, bake oven, and
Admired by George Washington, ridiculed by Thomas Jefferson, published, and read far and wide, Phillis Wheatley led an extraordinary life. Seized in West Africa and forced into slavery as a child, she was sold to a merchant family in Boston, where she became a noted poet at a young age.Mastering the Bible, Latin translations, and literary works, she celebrated political events, praised warriors, and used her verse to variously lampoon, question, and assert the injustice of her enslaved condition.By doing so, she added her voice to a vibrant, multisided conversation about race, slavery, and discontent with British rule; before and after her emancipation, her verses shook up racial etiquette and used familiar forms to create bold new meanings.In a new biography, The Odyssey of Phillis Wheatley: A Poet’s Journeys Through American Slavery & Independence (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2023), David Waldstreicher offers an account of Wheatley’s life and works, correcting myths, reconstructing intimate friendships, and deepening our understanding of her verse and the revolutionary era.The Massachusetts Historical Society a program with David Waldstreicher, in conversation with Kellie Carter Jackson of Wellesley College, on Monday, March 13th.This program will take place from 6 to 7 pm, and will be held both in person at the Massachusetts Historical Society, and virtually. Admission is $10 for in person attendance, free for virtual. For more information or to make a reservation, click here.David Waldstreicher teaches history at the City University of New York Graduate Center and is the author of Slavery’s Constitution: From Revolution to Ratification and Runaway America: Benjamin Franklin, Slavery, and the American Revolution. He has written for The New York Times Book Review, Boston Review, and The Atlantic, among other publications.
Book Purchases made through this Amazon link support the New York Almanack’s mission to report new publications relevant to New York State.
Assassin in Utopia: The Oneida Community & The Garfield Assassination
The new book An Assassin in Utopia: The True Story of a Nineteenth-Century Sex Cult and a President’s Murder (Pegasus Crime, 2023) by Susan Wels is a true crime odyssey that explores a forgotten, astonishing chapter of American history, leading the reader from a free-love community in Upstate New York to the shocking assassination of President James Garfield.From 1848 to 1881, a small utopian colony in Upstate New York — the Oneida Community — was known for its shocking sexual practices, from open marriage and free love to the sexual training of young boys by older women. And in 1881, a one-time member of the Oneida Community — Charles Julius Guiteau — assassinated President James Garfield in a brutal crime that shook America to its core.Thousands came by trains and carriages to see this new Eden, carved from hundreds of acres of woodland. They marveled at orchards bursting with fruit, thick herds of Ayrshire cattle and Cotswold sheep, and whizzing mills. They gaped at the people who lived in this place —especially the women, with their queer cropped hair and shamelessly short skirts. The men and women of this strange outpost worked and slept together — without sin, they claimed.An Assassin in Utopia is the first book that weaves together these explosive stories in a tale of utopian experiments, political machinations, and murder. This deeply researched narrative tells the true, interlocking stories of the Oneida Community and its radical founder, John Humphrey Noyes; his idol, the eccentric newspaper publisher Horace Greeley (founder of the New Yorker and the New York Tribune); and the gloomy, indecisive President James Garfield — who was assassinated after his first six months in office.Susan Wels is a bestselling author, historian, and journalist. Her Titanic: Legacy of the World’s Greatest Ocean Liner spent fourteen weeks on the New York Times bestseller list; the book was also a Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and USA Today bestseller. Her work has received press coverage in PEOPLE, Smithsonian’s Air & Space Magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Francisco Examiner, and the San Jose Mercury-News among many other journals. Wels’s work as a historian includes her acclaimed San Francisco: Arts for the City as well as her research on the role of women at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. Wels and her husband divide their time between the San Francisco Bay Area and their farm in the south of Chile.
New Book On New York’s Women Legislators 1919-1992
The new book Ladies Day at the Capitol: New York’s Women Legislators 1919-1992 (SUNY press, 2022) by Lauren Kozakiewicz integrates for the first time the history of New York’s women lawmakers with the larger story of New York State politics.Through extensive research and interviews, Kozakiewicz documents New York women’s actions as elected officials between 1919 and 1992 and explores how gendered ideas affected their careers and ability to represent women’s voices in government. Ladies’ Day at the Capitol offers a general framework for understanding the women’s legislative careers over time while also providing a deeper look at key lawmakers’ specific histories. The study broadens out to include chapters on creating representative organizations of women legislators and women’s efforts to champion specific issues.Lauren Kozakiewicz holds a combined appointment as Lecturer in the History Department at the University at Albany, SUNY, and liaison for Albany’s University in the High School Program where she collaborates with New York State high schools to develop advanced history offerings for university credit.Her research focuses on women politicians and political culture generally in early twentieth century America, giving special attention to the world of New York State politics. She has published in the journal New York History and in New York Archives Magazine. Her teaching experience includes courses on women’s history, New York history, and political & reform movements in America.
The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American Family
Sarah and Angelina Grimke are revered figures in American history, famous for rejecting their privileged lives on a plantation in South Carolina to become firebrand activists in the North. Yet retellings of their epic story have long obscured their Black relatives.In The Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American Family (Liveright, 2022), Kerri Greenidge presents a parallel narrative, shifting the focus from the white abolitionist sisters to the Black Grimkes and deepening our understanding of the long struggle for racial and gender equality.Greenidge’s narrative centers on the Black women of the family, from the brilliant intellectual and reformer Charlotte Forten, to Angelina Weld Grimke, who channeled the family’s past into pathbreaking modernist literature during the Harlem Renaissance. In a grand saga that spans the eighteenth century to the twentieth and stretches from Boston and beyond, Greenidge reclaims the Black Grimkes as complex, often conflicted individuals shadowed by their origins.
WELFARE ISLAND BRIDGE WITH FDNY TRAINING CENTER ON THE NORTH AND CANCER HOSPITAL ON THE SOUTH. BEFORE MAIN STREET, CARS EXITED AND ENTERED THE ISLAND VIA A ROAD ON THE WEST SIDE OF ISLAND.
(YES, WE USED THIS PHOTO BEFORE)
(YES, WE USED THIS PHOTO BEFORE)
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
THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
10 Most Beautiful And Best Libraries In NYC To Spend A Day At
Looking for a new place to snuggle up with your book and admire some architecture? Try one of these beautiful NYC libraries
Believe it or not, NYC’s libraries are some of the most prestigious around the country (and world for that matter). Whether you’re looking for somewhere to curl up with your new book, or want somewhere lesser known to admire architecture, there’s plenty of places to do it! From the famous New York Public Library in Midtown to lesser known (but equally beautiful) spots, you’re sure to be in awe when you see the detailing and book collections these places have to offer. Without further ado, these are the best and most gorgeous libraries in NYC to visit!
The most notable library in NYC is none other than the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building of the New York Public Library in Midtown. Complete with dozens of stunning chandeliers and millions of works ready to be explored, why wouldn’t you want to spend an afternoon in the iconic Rose Reading Room (pictured above)? Stop by and see their collection of items that aim to “inspire and empower visitors to discover, learn, and create new knowledge—today and in the years ahead.”
Where: 5th Ave and 42nd St
What was once the private library of John Pierpont Morgan (yes, thee JP Morgan), this architectural beauty was gifted to the city in 1910 and then renovated once again in 2006. It’s full of a collection of jaw-dropping historical works, including Beethoven music, an early copy of Frankenstein, and more. When you’re not thumbing through historical artifacts in their naturally lit exhibition space, you can visit Gilder Lehrman Hall for occasional concerts and recitals.
Where: 225 Madison Ave
Central Library is arguably Brooklyn’s most notable library, and its beautiful architecture is meant to resemble an open book. The 1941 Art Deco building is perched in front of Grand Army Plaza and hosts many events and concerts in their outdoor space. The sweeping grand lobby is something to behold and their vast contemporary and historical collections are worth your hours of browsing.
Where: 10 Grand Army Plaza, Brooklyn
Jefferson Market Library has been a Greenwich Village staple for years now, and why wouldn’t it be when it looks like a Medieval castle? Between the stain glass windows, carved doorways, public garden, and more, it’s jaw dropping both inside and outside. It originally being a courthouse adds to the mystique, alongside its Adult Reading Room, first-floor Children’s Room, and beautiful brick-arched basement called the Reference Room.
Where: 425 Avenue of the Americas
The New York Academy of Medicine has been open to the public for over 140 years now, and it’s home to one of the most significant historical libraries in medicine and public health in the world. We’re talking about all sorts of health documents and artifacts that tell the history of health in our country: from journals on small pox to ancient medicine recipes. They also host many health-focused events you can attend!
Where: 1216 5th Ave
Located inside the Lincoln Center, this library lies more on the performing arts side than the book side, but it’s still a great visit! It’s home to the Billy Rose Theatre Collection (one of the world’s most extensive research collections in the fields of theatre, film, dance, music, and recorded sound), and they constantly host events, panels, and exhibitions about performance art.
Where: 40 Lincoln Center Plaza (entrance at 111 Amsterdam between 64th St and 65th St)
As the name suggests, Poets House is a poet’s dream, and a great place to come for inspiration. It sits right near Rockefeller Park and boasts lovely views of the Hudson River (that will surely get the creative juices flowing). Aspiring poets and writers frequent this hangout in order to browse their 70,000+ volumes of literature and write works of their own. They also offer tons of programs for children and adults alike who are interested in diving into the world of poetry.
Where: 10 River Terrace
Another Upper Easter Side library is the New York Society Library which resides in a townhouse that first opened in 1754. With over 300,000 volumes of info ready to be read, you can hangout in their cozy reading rooms free of charge, but you have to be a member of the society to check out any books. They also host free exhibits and events that are open to all!
Where: 53 E 79th St
Butler Library resides on Columbia University’s Morningside campus, and from the outside, it looks like a European facade. Once you acquire a guest pass, you can find tons of resources and books in their collection to help you cozy out in their space. With over 2 million books shelved in the maze of stacks, you’ll be in awe as you check out inscriptions from writers and philosophers like Homer and Dante on the walls. This gorgeous library just oozes Ivy League.
Where: 535 W 114th St
The all-new Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library just received a major renovation that now ranks it as one of our favorites. The library offers tons of services and resources, including unlimited browsing, seating, computer access, a free publicly accessible rooftop terrace, and more. Plus, this summer will see the return of in-person programs and classes as well! There’s also a Thomas Yoseloff Business Center, with additional research materials and services!
GUY LUDWIG, DANIELLE SHUR, ANDY SPARBERG, NINA LUBLIN, GLORIA HERMAN,ALEXIS VILLAFANE, ARON EISENPREISS, ARLENE BESSENOFF & NINA LUBLIN ALL TOOK THE EXPRES RIDE TO A CORRECT ANSWER!
THANK YOU NASRI MUNFAH FOR THE WONDERFUL PROGRAM
“THE CHALLENGES OF BUILDING THE LIRR GRAND CENTRAL MADISON TUNNEL.”
This was an excellent presentation on a project that started in the 1970’s and is just completed.
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
SECRET NYC
THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
Queens of the Air: American Women Aviation Pioneers
Within the holdings of the National Archives, you will find many resources documenting the history and early days of aviation. Among these records include the stories and flights of American women aviation pioneers, captured by newsreel footage and World War I era photographs.
Within textual material for an item titled Aviation, Historical, Since 1919 you can find Ruth Elder, the first woman to attempt a transatlantic flight.
What may be her greatest feat however, took place on November 19, 1916, when she broke the existing cross-America flight air speed record of 452 miles set by Victor Carlstrom by flying nonstop from Chicago to New York State, a distance of 590 miles.
The next day she flew on to New York City. Flying over Manhattan, her fuel cut out, but she glided to a safe landing on Governors Island and was met by United States Army Captain Henry “Hap” Arnold (who changed her spark plugs in the Curtiss pusher), who would one day become Commanding General of the United States Army Air Forces. President Woodrow Wilson attended a dinner held in her honor on December 2, 1916.
Other American women aviation pioneers include Bessie Coleman, the first African American and Native American woman pilot, and known for her daring stunt tricks in the air.
In 1922, Coleman became the first African American woman to complete a public flight and audiences were thrilled with her loop-the-loop and Figure 8 tricks in her plane. She also became known for giving flight lessons and inspiring both Africans Americans and women to fly planes.
Willa Beatrice Brown was an aviator, flight instructor, officer, and civil rights activist, who created a path for thousands of black men and women to become pilots.
Brown’s efforts to establish a training school for African American Air Force cadets led to the creation of the Army Training facility at the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama in 1941.
Katherine Stinson became one of the first women in the United States to earn a pilot’s license on July 24, 1912, at the age of 21. After earning her license, Stinson and her family founded the Stinson Aircraft Company, and the Stinson School of Flying, in San Antonio, Texas.
In 1918, Stinson became the first woman commissioned as a mail pilot for the Post Office Department. After working for the Post Office, Stinson applied to be a volunteer pilot for the army during World War I, but was rejected twice due to her gender.
THE FORMER CITI BUILDING BEING STRIPPED OF ITS LOGO TO BECOME ALTICE
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
THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
Eighth Avenue and 56th Street today looks nothing like it did when painter Lucille Blanch captured this otherwise ordinary block south of Columbus Circle 93 years ago.
Today, modern office buildings and apartment towers obscure the view of the Argonaut Building—the castle-like white structure that still stands down the block on Broadway and 57th Street. The enormous billboards are long gone, too. The church below it, the flamboyant Broadway Tabernacle, met the wrecking ball in the 1970s. The tenement with the empty storefront next to the tire shop has also disappeared, replaced by a McDonald’s. This stretch of West Midtown in the 1920s was known as the automobile showroom district, which explains the tire store and what look like car dealerships on the left-hand corner and in the middle of the block.
Lucile Blanch made a living as a painter, departing her Minnesota hometown to study at the Art Students League on West 57th Street on scholarship. She then became involved with the Fourteenth Street School, a group of artists with a social realist bent.
In 1930, she would have been 35 years old. Why she chose this corner to paint remains a mystery. But her depiction of the bright, colorful cityscape dwarfing the small, low-key residents might be saying something about the power of the urban environment over its residents caught in the toll of the Depression.
(Hat tip to Village Preservation’s Off the Grid blog, which included this painting recently in a post about unheralded female artists living and/or working South of Union Square.)
STAINED GLASS WINDOWS IN THE NARTHRAX OF CHAPEL OF THE GOOD SHEPHERD GLORIA HERMAN GOT IT!
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
Shop girls, down and out men, lone pedestrians on the way to the elevated train—from the 1930s to the 1980s, Isabel Bishop observed these men and women from her Union Square artist’s studio, painting them in soft tones that reveal their humanity and fragility.
Born in 1902 in Cincinnati, Bishop moved to Manhattan at age 16 to attend the New York School of Applied Design for Women. She then took classes at the Art Students League, developing her talents as a printmaker and painter.
Bishop married in 1934 and moved to Riverdale. But she kept her studio first at Nine West 14th Street and then another at 857 Broadway. The Union Square area in those pre- and postwar decades was home to lower-end department stores, offices, and cheap entertainment venues.
And of course, there was the park itself, a gathering place for everyone from soap-box agitators to workers on their lunch hour to derelict men with no where else to go.
The subject matter right outside her studio suited Bishop perfectly.
“It was in New York’s pulsating environment that Bishop combined her admiration for the old masters with a contemporary taste for urban realism,” states the National Museum of Women in the Arts.
“With her discerning eye, she portrayed ordinary people in an extraordinary manner, often monumentalizing her figures within spaces that barely created context or indicated a location.”
“She chose average models from the streets of Manhattan and often rendered them in a state of physical activity—a sharp departure from the idealized, passive nudes of previous traditions.”
[“Fifteenth Street and Sixth Avenue,” 1930]
Bishop focused many of her paintings on women—the otherwise ordinary women who passed through Union Square, coming in and out of offices or catching a train. Neither mothers nor sex symbols, they “exist for themselves,” as one critic put it.
“On the street corner, in the automat, in the subway and on park benches in fine weather, Miss Bishop proved herself a perceptive observer,” wrote the New York Times in her obituary. “For young women in the big city who were as yet unmarked by life, she had a particular feeling.”
[“Fourteenth Street,” 1932]
As time went on, Bishop’s style seemed to become more muted, with figures of women in what looks like perpetual motion—perhaps a comment on the rise of women in American society.
Bishop kept her Union Square studio until 1984; she died in 1988. This self-portrait was done in 1927, when she was just 25.
She isn’t as well-known as she should be, but her amber-hued men and women caught in ordinary, fleeting moments speak to the anonymity and motion of urban life in the 20th century.
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
THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
The other day we featured a photo of the island’s Holy Spirit Chapel with an adjoining pergola. While examining it, I was curious about the photographer Shirley Carter Burden. That is a familiar name. Check out his famous family history below.
Plaque on side of brick building: Erected 1906 for D.P.C., Robert W. Hebberd, Commissioner; etc.
Plaque on rusticated wall: Pathological Laboratory of Metropolitan Hospital, completed in 1910. William J. Gaynor, Mayor
Side of stone 3-story building with turrets and balustrade, pointed arched windows. of Smallpox Hospital
Wall of above building with turrets and pointed arched windows, attached to brick building with coins and bays. Smallpox Hospital
Smallpox Hospital: Closer view of above photograph. 2nd story balcony over door.
Close-up of gnarled branches of large tree alongside of building fire escape.
Fire escape of unidentified stone building.
Fire escape of unidentified brick building, looking SE. Queensboro Bridge in background, street lamp foreground.
Side view of small rusticated building. (A chapel?) Looking West, huge apartment building under construction. Ramp foreground.
Large tree trunk in foreground, wooden stool at foot of tree. Blurry church door in background.
Rectangular pergola in foreground; chapel in background.
Stained glass window seen from exterior.
Smallpox Hospital: 3 1/2 story stone building. Arched windows, 2nd story balcony with columns.
Looking SW across East River. Posted on street lamp: One-Way arrow and To Bridge arrow. Manhattan skyline in background.
SHIRLEY CARTER BURDEN
THE PHOTOGRAPHER
FROM WIKIPEDIA
Shirley Carter Burden (December 9, 1908 – June 3, 1989) was an American photographer,[1][2] author of picture essays on racism, Catholicism, and history of place.[3][4] He served on advisory committees of museums, including the Santa Barbara Museum of Art in California, and was the Photography Committee chairman at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and of Aperture,[5] which named the Burden Gallery (New York) in his honor.
He was at the Browning School in New York City until 1926, but did not go on to college or university education.[8]
Career
Beginning in 1924, Burden assisted at Pathé News. In 1926, he and his cousin filmed an Ontario Indian tribe for their The Silent Enemy, and from 1927 held a minor position at Paramount Studios. A 1929 meeting with Edward Steichen inspired his interest in photography and later gained his mentorship. He sought better motion picture prospects in California and Hollywood[9] and from 1929 to 1934 used his contact Merian C. Cooper to gain associate producer work, most significantly at RKO on Academy Award nominated “She“.
Commercial career
During World War 2 Burden established Tradefilms in 1942, successfully producing training films which were then in demand from the US Navy, the Office of Education, and Lockheed Aircraft. This business was unsustainable postwar and Burden and Tradefilms partner Todd Walker opened a photography studio in Beverly Hills, California, in 1946, producing advertising and architectural photography for magazines Architectural Forum, House and Garden, Arts and Architecture.
Fine art career
Dissatisfied with commercial photography, and having embraced Roman Catholicism, Burden decided on a more fulfilling fine art career, encouraged by Minor White[10] whom he met in 1952. The friendship developed into his patronage of White’s Aperture magazine. He assisted Edward Steichen in gathering photography for, and subsequently contributing images to, MoMA‘s highly successful, international travelling Family of Man (1955), working on this also with Dorothea Lange whom he befriended.
These contacts and experience launched a successful fine art photography career.; his photo-essay on the all-but-abandoned Ellis Island,[11] was exhibited under the auspices of the City of New York, and an invitation to exhibit his essay on the Weehawken ferry at MoMA in Diogenes With a Camera IV in 1958, curated by Steichen, who encouraged Burden to photograph Trappist monks at the abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani, Kentucky (God Is My Life).[12] Travel to Lourdes in 1960 resulted in Behold Thy Mother, published by Doubleday in 1965, and notoriety continued with the well publicised I Wonder Why, which documented racism experienced by a young black girl.[13]
He continued with his photo essays (on Japan, and his ancestors, the Vanderbilts[14]) and he repaid his success by chairing or advising a range of photography organisations, and teaching (1978–81, at the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California.).
Personal life
In 1934, Burden married Flobelle Fairbanks, an actress and niece of actor Douglas Fairbanks Sr.[15] Together, they were the parents of two children, a daughter and a son:[6]
Margaret Florence (1936–2019), who married Daniel Childs.[16]
After the death of his first wife Flobelle on January 5, 1969,[16] Burden married Julietta Valverde Lyon in 1971.[8][19]
Burden died June 3, 1989 above Teterboro Airport, on a Los Angeles to New York flight.[6] His grandson, S. Carter Burden III, is the founder of the managed web hosting provider Logicworks.[20] His granddaughter, Constance Childs, married celebrity chef and Food Network host David Rosengarten.[21]
Legacy
He gifted or exchanged, in memory of his first wife Flobelle, large numbers of photographs from his generous and eclectic collection of modernist works to MoMA, The Centre for Photography and other institutions. In 1989, 5 years after Aperture moved headquarters to a five-story brownstone at 20 East 23rd Street in New York,[22] the building’s second floor was devoted to the Burden Gallery, in recognition of Burden’s longtime support.[6]The Burden Professorship in Photography at Harvard University in 1999 was established posthumously by his family.
THREE VISITORS AT THE LGHTHOUSE IN THE 1950’S PLEASE NOTE: NO SEAWALL PEDESTRIANS BEWARE! GLORIA HERMAN AND ALEXIS VILLAFANE 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
NEW YORK CITY MUNICIPAL ARCHIVES WIKIPEDIA
THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.
SAVE THE DATE-TUESDAY, MARCH 7TH, IN PERSON PRESENTATION NO RESERVATIONS REQUIRED ALL ARE WELCOME
FROM THE ARCHIVES
WEEKEND,MARCH 4-5, 2023
ISSUE 930
REFORMING WOMAN OF
BLACKWELL’S ISLAND #7
MARY BELLE HARRIS
Superintendent of Women
and
Deputy Warden of the Workhouse
on
Blackwell’s Island
NYC CORRECTIONS DEPARTMENT
JUDITH C. REVEAL
Harris, Mary Belle (1874–1957)
American prison administrator. Born on August 19, 1874, in Factoryville, Pennsylvania; died on February 22, 1957, in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania; the only daughter of John Howard and Mary Elizabeth (Mace) Harris; graduated from Bucknell University, A.B. in music, 1893, A.M. in Latin, 1894; earned Ph.D. in Sanskrit and Indo-European comparative philology from the University of Chicago, 1900.
Mary Belle Harris was born in Factoryville, Pennsylvania, the oldest of three children. Her father John Howard was a Baptist minister and president of Bucknell University from 1889 to 1919. Her mother Mary Mace Harris died when Mary Belle was only six. John Howard married Lucy Adelaide Bailey —a close family friend—a year later. Their family grew by six sons as a result of this second marriage, and Bailey was a much-loved stepmother to Mary Belle. Harris and her brothers received an education at the Keystone Academy, a Baptist secondary school founded by her father.
Harris did not actually start in the career for which she became famous until she was nearly 40. She worked as a scholar and teacher after earning an A.B. in music, an A.M. in Latin at Bucknell University, and a Ph.D. in Sanskrit and Indo-European comparative philology from the University of Chicago. Harris taught Latin in Chicago and Baltimore between 1900 and 1910. In Baltimore, she studied archaeology and numismatics at Johns Hopkins University. In 1912, she traveled to Europe to teach at the American Classical School in Rome.
When Harris returned to America in 1914, a close friend from her years at the University of Chicago, Katharine Bement Davis— now commissioner of corrections in New York City—offered Harris the post of superintendent of women and deputy warden of the Workhouse on Blackwell’s Island (now Roosevelt Island), a strip of land in the East River, between Manhattan and Queens. Harris, who had no job prospects, accepted the post, even though she lacked experience in corrections administration. The Workhouse, severely overcrowded with a daily population of 700 women, was known for its grim atmosphere. Harris, who believed that prisons should teach employable skills and rehabilitate, dedicated herself to prison reform. She created a library and permitted card playing and knitting in the women’s cells in order to alleviate boredom; she also facilitated daily outdoor exercise by fencing off a section of the prison yard. She quickly earned a reputation for success based on common sense.
Harris remained at the Workhouse for three years. In 1917, the defeat of reform mayor John Mitchel forced her resignation, and, in February of 1918, she assumed the superintendent’s position at the State Reformatory for Women in Clinton, New Jersey. She continued her reforms, which included a system of self-government in the cottages and an Exit Club for women preparing for parole.
In September of 1918, Harris was granted a leave of absence to join the War Department’s Commission on Training Camp Activities. She became assistant director of the Section on Reformatories and Detention Houses, where she was responsible for dealing with women arrested in camp areas. She set up detention homes and health facilities in various cities in the South, including Florida, South Carolina, Virginia and Georgia.
In May of 1919, Harris became superintendent of the State Home for Girls in Trenton, New Jersey, a juvenile institution notorious for its dangerous inmates. Although plagued with continual problems, Harris was successful in establishing a system of self-government, then resigned from the State Home in 1924. The following year, on March 12, 1925, Harris was sworn in as the first superintendent of the Federal Industrial Institution for Women, a new establishment to be built at Alderson, West Virginia. She worked with the architects, overseeing all aspects of construction to ensure that Alderson would be a place of education for the inmates. It opened November 24, 1928, and, under Harris’ direction, became a model institution. The innovative features of the prison included the absence of a large surrounding wall or heavily armed guards, the establishment of farming and other physical activities, a system of self-government, and the promotion of education and vocational training. Despite the relative freedom of the institution, there were few disciplinary problems or escapes.
Following Harris’ retirement from Alderson in March 1941, she returned to Pennsylvania and served on the state Board of Parole until it was abolished in 1943. She then settled in Lewis-burg, Pennsylvania, served as a trustee for Bucknell University, and lectured and wrote about her activities in the world of female incarceration. In 1953, she began an extended tour of Europe and North Africa, visited her nephew in Cyprus, and inspected two Libyan prisons. She returned to Lewisburg in July of 1954 and died there on February 22, 1957, of a heart attack.
Harris was outspoken in her quest for re-form in women’s penal institutions, emphasizing the need for women to “build within them a wall of self-respect,” to learn employable skills which they could use upon their release, and to free themselves from dependency upon the community and/or men. She was considered a tough and powerful administrator and was recognized for her positive contributions to penal reform.
sources:
Sicherman, Barbara, and Carol Hurd Green, eds. Notable American Women: The Modern Period. Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1980.
PERGOLA SOUTH OF HOLY SPIRIT CHAPEL, NOW THE SANCTUARY .
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
