NYC Vintage

NYC Vintage Image Of The Day: The New York Of The Future... Then

2011-05-31T00:14:00.001-04:00

Over the past 100 years, engineers and urban planners have come up with some ingenious solutions to New York City's inherent challenges... Here are five that are wildly unique, if not either highly impractical or just plain stupid.
1) In 1918, the concept of technology that could dig tunnels not only beneath existing streets, but tunnels beneath tunnels—that didn't cave in on one another—was apparently next to impossible to imagine.
Using the Broadway subway line's construction as an example, city planners offered a visual to New Yorkers to demonstrate how steel wedges and wooden beams would be employed to support existing rails, while blasting rock from beneath them.

Eventually, the steel wedge would serve as permanent ceiling for the second layer of tunnels, while another beam would hold everything in place. After areas surrounding the supports were filled with cement, workers could take them away and let the structure stand on its own.

For that matter, it's still pretty astounding.

2) In 1916, Dr. T. Kennard Thomson, a consulting engineer, proposed a novel solution to New York City's growing population problem: simply add more land! His proposal entailed adding 50 square miles of land from the New York Bay, which would add about 100 miles of new waterfront, essentially turning downtown Manhattan into midtown!

The black portions at the bottom of the map display the areas Thomson planned to add land mass, including the new East River he planned to carve inside Queens. With the original East River filled in, Brooklyn and Manhattan would become the new East and West Side.

Even though the project was projected to cost more than the Panama Canal, the engineer theorized that the added populace would contribute enough financial returns to justify the investment.
3) A decade after T. Kennard Thomson offered his proposal, in 1924, John A. Harris, special deputy commissioner in charge of traffic, proposed draining the pesky East River and constructing a massive paved boulevard between Manhattan and Brooklyn.

After damming and draining the East River between the Williamsburg Bridge and the Harlem River, a new city hall atop the boulevard would house a police, health, music and art center, while new high schools, playgrounds and a theater district could serve all four boroughs.

Beneath the pabed boulevard would be parking spaces, subway lines, east and west ramps, as well as a tunnel for large vehicles... Actually, this is a pretty boffo idea... you know, except for turning New York City into a dustbowl.

4) Transferring on the S subway shuttle between Grand Central Station and Times Square is a royal pain in the ass, to this day. The Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company and Stevens-Adamson Manufacturing came up with a genius solution in 1951: installing conveyor cars that would shuttle passengers between the two stations.

According to the plan, these cars would carry twice as many people a third faster than the existing shuttle train. To ease up traffic even further, a moving sidewalk would carry commuters to and from the tunnels, the conveyor cars and the subway platforms themselves. Damn shame that never happened.5) Welcome to the all-new Times Square, via 1962! Without cross streets, traffic flow would be magically undeterred, as the center of the universe was transformed into more of a village setting, complete with multi-level connecting theaters, retail and transportation...

Funny, while nothing of the sort ever happened, NYC Mayor Bloomberg has taken today's Times Square back in time, a la George Orwell's 1984. Even though you're outdoors, somehow, smoking is hazardous, despite the steady stream of car, cab and bus exhaust.

NYC Vintage Image Of The Day: Fifth Avenue, 1913

2011-05-30T10:39:00.002-04:00

In this gratifyingly expansive, beautifully sharp image looking up Fifth Avenue in the spring of 1913, it doesn't much matter if it's in black or white, since all of the automobiles were the color of shiny coal. Note that at the time, Fifth Avenue had traffic in both directions. Photo: George Grantham Bai.

EXCLUSIVE: Lady Lib Gets Ready For Work, Just Like The Rest Of Us

2011-05-30T10:37:00.002-04:00

If there's no camera aimed at her, is the Statue of Liberty really standing on her pedestal 24/7? The Smoking Nun has discovered in these exclusive photos that Lady Liberty gets ready for work, just like everybody else, taking a ferry boat from Battery Park to her daily job on Liberty Island....Above, Lady Liberty is none too amused when I try to take her picture before she's officially on duty... She then gathers her things: sunblock, sunglasses, make-up bag, cigarettes and a small flask of booze... And to my astonishment boards the Statue Cruises boat with all of the tourists...Thirty minutes later, standing tall, as her workday begins. Who knew?!!

Window To The World

2011-05-30T10:36:00.001-04:00

Urban Oasis: Fulton Landing, River Cafe, Brooklyn Bridge Park

2011-05-30T10:35:00.002-04:00

An utterly poifect weekend day. Sunny and warm, with blue skies abounding... and a walk in the park with Leo. Destination: Fulton Landing, the grounds of the five-star River Cafe and Brooklyn Bridge Park's Pier 1. Ain't it great to be alive?Kayaking on the East River... scary!

NYC Vintage Image Of The Day: The 1890s Version Of Google?

2011-05-27T06:39:00.002-04:00

Today, we call them pop-up ads. Were the billboards plastered all over this abandoned building in the 1890s any less invasive?

NYC Vintage Image Of The Day: Second & 2nd, Then & Now

2011-05-26T19:03:00.001-04:00

Dino's Then & Now shows us a view of Second Avenue and 2nd Street from Oct. 4, 1942. Below is the same set of buildings as of October 2010. Boo!!

NYC Vintage Image Of The Day: The Astor Theatre, 1936

2011-05-25T06:37:00.004-04:00

The Astor Theatre, located at Broadway and 45th Street, was among New York City's most prominent Broadway theaters from 1906 to 1925. It was eventually managed by the Shubert Organization, which today maintains control of 17 Broadway houses. From 1925 to 1972, Astor was a movie theater, but was shuttered because of faulty air conditioning.

The above image from 1936 shows the premiere of The Great Ziegfeld, a 1936 musical biopic of Florenz Ziegfeld, including music by Irving Berlin. It stars Luise Rainer, William Powell, Myrna Loy & Frank Morgan, as well as real-life Ziegfeld performers Fanny Brice & Ray Bolger, who played themselves.

In 1982, the Astor Theatre was demolished—along with the Victoria, Helen Hayes, Morosco and Bijou theaters—to make way for the Marriott Hotel. All is not totally lost, however: The Marriott houses Broadway's Marquis Theatre, which opened in 1986. Among shows there: Me and My Girl, Gypsy, Man of La Mancha, The Goodbye Girl, Damn Yankees, Victor/Victoria, Peter Pan, Annie Get Your Gun and Thoroughly Modern Millie.Below, today's Marriott Marquis Hotel.

NYC Vintage Image Of The Day: Gray's Papaya, Since 1973

2011-05-24T00:47:00.002-04:00

Gray's Papaya, established in New York in 1973, is a hot dog restaurant renowned for inexpensive, tasty wieners. A single dog costs $1.50, while the Recession Special—two dogs & a 14-ounce drink—is $4.45 (up from 2008's $2.75). Its namesake papaya fruit drink is joined by orange, grape, pina colada, coconut champagne & banana daiquiri. Thankfully, Gray's also serves sodas, coffee & hot chocolate. And that's it: other than bagels for breakfast, no fries... nuttin' else.
Gray's was founded by a former partner of its predecessor, Papaya King, established in 1932. In 2006, Time Out ranked Gray's hotdog No. 1 over Papaya King.
Two locations of the iconic joint remain, which are open 24/7/365: Broadway & 72nd Street and Sixth Avenue at 8th Street.The 72nd Street locale has been featured in a bunch of films, including The Warriors, Die Hard with a Vengeance, You've Got Mail, Fools Rush In, Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and in 2010, The Backup Plan, starring Jennifer Lopez—which I watched last night, prompting me to find out more about this NYC fave. Gray's has also appeared in TV shows Sex and the City and How I Met Your Mother.
Above, The Smoking Nun's take on the Sixth Avenue location... and below, a telling image I took in November 2008 during the Bush administration, weeks before Obama was elected.

NYC Vintage Image: New York Public Library, 1911

2011-05-23T07:24:00.001-04:00

The New York Public Library, on Fifth Avenue covers two city blocks from 40th to 42nd Streets. The handsome Beaux Arts building, constructed entirely of marble, cost $9 million. The cornerstone was laid in November 1902 and the library opened May 23, 1911.

Views of the main reading room: left is from the 1930s, right from the 1920s. Below: Today, gloriously, it looks the same.

Fifth Avenue & 42nd, Easter, 1913

The two twin male lions guarding the entrance of the New York Public Library’s main branch were called Leo Astor and Leo Lenox, after two NYPL benefactors, John Jacob Astor and James Lenox. But in the 1930s, with the first Great Depression taking its toll on the city, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia renamed them Patience and Fortitude, believing that these were the qualities city residents needed most to survive the horrible economic times... I'm thinking we're due for another name change with the second Depression today. How about Job and Cash?Below, opening day, May 23, 1911.

Rainy Days & Wednesdays

2011-05-20T02:26:00.002-04:00

Wednesday evening I ventured to the nabe surrounding Grand Central Station for a freelance bio interview. Digital recorder, check... digital SLR camera, fun HDR editing software, you know it... If you're gonna get drenched, you might as well have a couple shits and giggles along the way.

NYC Vintage Image: Kaleidoscope Cabbies, 1960s

2011-05-20T02:25:00.002-04:00

In 1967, New York City ordered all "medallion taxis" be painted yellow to help cut down on unofficial drivers and make official taxicabs more readily recognizable. Imagine a day when you might see this kitschy psychedelic number on the right. Photo: early 1960s...

Taxis from beyond "vintage": 1890, 1900 and 1973...And, of course, below, the taxis of today, though Bloomberg's approved "green" cabs of the future, which look like hunchback bugs, will soon make NYC even more of a laughing stock than he's already accomplished (i.e.: "Don't you dare smoke out of doors. It's dangerous!").

NYC Vintage Image: The First Great Depression, 1935

2011-05-19T01:18:00.002-04:00

During the first Great Depression, out-of-work New Yorkers line up in front of employment agencies desperately in search of jobs, along 49th Street in 1935.
Sadly, this is one vintage image we are reliving again. Despite news reports that have termed the economic collapse of 2007 as a "recession," statisticians recognize that is pure bunk. Indeed, we are now enduring the Second Great Depression.

In this close-up of the images above, note that beside the Geneva Employment Agency, there is a liquor store. Wise placement, if you ask meese!

Wowsah! 'Reach The Sky' by A.G. Photographe

2011-05-18T17:42:00.003-04:00

Photos by

NYC Image: Future New York, 'The City of Skyscrapers,' 1910s

2011-05-18T10:08:00.003-04:00

Well, it didn't quite turn out this way... This 1910s postcard from Walker Evans imagines the future of New York, "The City of Skyscrapers," offering a system of elevated trams that cut through buildings, massive skywalks, rickety but plentiful air travel, few cars on ground level and—the reality—a landscape of proud towering skyscrapers as far as the eye can see.

The back reads: "Future New York will be pre-eminently the city of skyscrapers. The first steel frame structure regarded as a skyscraper was the Tower Building at 50 Broadway, a 10-story structure 129 feet high. There are now over 1,000 buildings of that height in Manhattan. The best known skyscrapers are the Singer Building, the Metropolitan Building and the Woolworth Tower, which towers above them all and rises to a height of 790 feet. The proposed Pan American Building is to be 801 feet high."

This reminds me of another fantasy of "future New York": rebuilding the World Trade Center. The once-deemed Freedom Tower was supposed to reach rooftop level by the end of 2010 with topping out in 2011. Estimated completion of the tower was then pushed back to 2013. Today, 10 years after toppling, it stands all of 12 stories. Seems to me we were much more accomplished in the 1910s than the 2010s.

NYC Vintage: Walker Evans' 'Subway Portrait 16 Women," 1938-1941

2011-05-17T14:39:00.002-04:00

American photographer Walker Evans, best known for his iconic images documenting the Great Depression, surreptitiously shot portraits of passengers in the New York subway between 1938 and 1941, riding with a camera concealed under his coat, fitted with a shutter release running inside his sleeve. In 1959, Evans assembled 16 of the images into "Subway Portrait," which in 1966, were exhibited at New York’s Museum of Modern Art.

NYC Image: Toffenetti Restaurant, 'Famous For Ham & Sweets'

2011-05-16T00:39:00.002-04:00

Toffenetti’s, the "Cathedral of All Restaurants," at the corner of Broadway and 43rd, "where glamour sparkles forever," opened in 1940, serving an astounding 8,500 meals in its first day. Established by Austrian immigrant Dario Louis Toffenetti, the restaurant became a staple in Times Square for nearly 30 years.

Born in 1889, Toffenetti came to the U.S. in 1910, selling baked potatoes at a Wisconsin mining camp, before becoming a bus boy at Chicago’s Sherman House. In 1914, he opened his first restaurant there, followed by a second in 1921 and six by 1937.

As advertising, marketing and public relations advanced, the entrepreneur offered elaborate descriptors for his menu items. Ham was “Roast Sugar Cured Ham” with accompanying copy, a la “These hams are cut from healthy young hogs grown in the sunshine on beautifully rolling Wisconsin farms, where corn, barley, milk and acorns are unstintingly fed to them, producing that silken meat so rich in wonderful flavor.”

His potatoes were “bulging beauties, grown in the ashes of extinct volcanoes, scrubbed and washed, then baked in a whirlwind of tempestuous fire until the shell crackles with brittleness.”

Following the New York World's Fair in 1939-1940, he outbid Louis B. Mayer for a premiere spot in Times Square, and designed a a two-story, glass-fronted modern building, with an escalator and open stainless steel kitchen. There, Toffenetti became famous for his Old Fashioned Louisiana Strawberry Shortcake, "topped with pure, velvety whipped cream like puffs of snow."

To build trust, he featured himself in his ads. When Prohibition ended, he announced he would serve beer, but not "in any fashion that might offend our most fastidious women patrons." Toffenetti died in 1962 and his sons, lacking the charm and drive of their papa, closed the iconic locale in 1968.
Toffenetti’s in New York, The Heart of the Great White Way. The Finest of Food and Liquor at Popular Prices.

NYC's Historic Trinity Church, Part Deux

2011-05-14T15:29:00.002-04:00

I've had the best possible reason to return to the southern tip of Manhattan in the last couple days, following previous posts covering Trinity Church and Bowling Green: It's work, cool cats! I'm delivering written content for a soon-to-launch webbie that not only has great potential, but focuses on one of the great loves of my life: New York City. Nothing more to say for now... so let's return to the Trinity memorial park. Last post was on the south side of the historic church; now we shift to the north.

NYC Vintage Image: Penn Station Hustle & Bustle, 1941

2011-05-14T15:28:00.002-04:00

A glorious 1941 interior shot showing hustle and bustle at 1:35 p.m. in the original Penn Station at West 33rd Street and Broadway, from The Herald Tribune. Note the soldiers in uniform, women in festive traveling hats and men in suits and hats.

Here's the original Penn Station's exterior, shown in 1920.

Bowling Green: Iconic Images Of The Southern Tip Of NYC

2011-05-13T15:25:00.000-04:00

Bowling Green, at the foot of Broadway in Lower Manhattan, is the oldest public park in New York City, built in 1733. At its northern end is the Charging Bull sculpture, at the south is the Alexander Graham Custom House, which now hosts the happy New York branch of the Smithsonian Institute and NYC's less jolly Bankruptcy Court.

Wednesday I took a stroll down to the tip of the island, and captured a few of the iconic images in and around Bowling Green, which is listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places.
Alexander Graham U.S. Custom House, completed 1907.
1 Broadway, former office building formerly known as United States Lines-Panama Pacific Lines Building, completed 1884. (Today, Citibank and an attorney practice.)
26 Broadway, the majestic, novel Standard Oil Company Building, completed 1928.
Charging Bull, 7,100 pounds of bronze muscle, installed 1989.
And of course, how could we forget Wall Street icon SpongeBob Squarepants, who first aired on Nickelodeon in 1999.

NYC Vintage Image: Women's Working Hotel, 1878

2011-05-12T08:22:00.000-04:00

In 1877, wealthy merchant A.T. Stewart commissioned the handsome Stewart's Hotel for Working Women at Fourth Avenue (now Park Avenue) between 32nd and 33rd Streets, to provide safe housing for the influx of single working women into New York City. That certainly didn't last long: It was opened in April 1878, closed in May and reopened in June as the Park Avenue Hotel.How about that boffo bedroom?!
Below is an image of the post Working Women's Hotel, as the Park Avenue Hotel, with patriotic bunting and a horse-drawn carriage parked at the entrance. Poor Mr. Stewart; this venture didn't pan out, either. The building was demolished in 1927.
Below is a view from the Park Avenue Hotel rooftop, looking up Park Avenue, with horses and carts ambling the avenue. At the north end is Grand Central Depot, which was torn down for the current Grand Central Terminal in order to handle the onset of electric locomotives.

Brooklyn Heights' Beauty Supplanted By Scourge Of Scaffolding

2011-05-12T08:20:00.000-04:00

Brooklyn Heights has been known since the 1840s as the "City of Churches." You can forget that. The historic neighborhood's main drag, Montague Street, now has a new image: the center of scaffolding. No fewer than 10 buildings along its .29-mile, five-block stretch have been bombarded with the unsightly scourge. It's enough to make you long for the suburbs.

Office building & Cohen's Optical, 189 Montague Street (illegal license that expired 4/1/11).Rite Aid and new facade on apartment building, 168 Montague Street.St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church R train entrance, 157 Montague Street.St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church main entrance, 157 Montague Street.Restaurant or retail... 149 Montague Street.Heights Cleaners, UPS, 137 Montague Street.Sleepy's, new apartment building, 116 Montague Street.Ricky's, 107 Montague Street.62 Montague Street, coop, bleeding to 58 Montague Street...
57 Montague Street, coop... new scaffolding, as of Wednesday. Oh, happy day...

NYC Vintage Image: Dear Miss Taylor... 1937

2011-05-11T08:59:00.003-04:00

This postcard addressed to Miss F.E.L. Taylor in Franklin, Mass., was processed at Grand Central Station in NYC on April 22, 1937. "Mama" writes, "Dear E, Is everything okay? I hope so. Have been thinking about you all and trust everything is O.K. now. Hope that stove and everything is working fine. Love, Mama." In a P.S., she instructs E to "meet the 10:30 train."Front of the postcard shows the Northeast side of Fifth Avenue and 34th Street. Amid the crowd on sidewalks are cars and a double-decker bus. The car parked facing north indicates that Fifth Avenue, at the time, was a two-way street.

NYC Vintage Image: Long Island City For Sale, 1915

2011-05-10T01:01:00.000-04:00

Going now! The Long Island City Absolute Auction Sale. Build a home just across from Manhattan! This Sept. 25, 1915 advert targets city dwellers who wanna escape the chaos, yet desire alleged easy access in & out of the city. Then, it cost 5 cents to take public transportation into NYC.

NYC Vintage Image Of The Day: Gimbels Department Store

2011-05-09T12:20:00.003-04:00

Gimbels Department Store, 1963, with rival Macy's next door. To the far right is the Hotel McAlpin, the largest hotel in the world when it opened in 1912. Close right is Hotel Martinique, a stately destination when Herald Square was the city's theater district, before it devolved into a dilapidated welfare hotel in the 1970s.

Who doesn't remember the mighty Gimbels Department Store as a child, and its world-famous rivalry with next-door-neighbor Macy's? Um, actually, I for one, since I grew up in the south...

But I do recall the fact that Kris Kringle, in Miracle on 34th Street, tells a mamer at Macy's that she can find sold-out skates at Gimbels, and that after Auntie Mame is fired from Macy's, she shouts out to buy "the little nippers" their Christmas skates at Gimbels... So when I moved to New York in 1995, I was eager to find the landmark.

Of course, unfortunately, by then it had closed. Gimbels began as a general store in Indiana in the 1880s, and expanded into Philadelphia in 1894, before opening its flagship in New York's Herald Square at Sixth Avenue and 32nd Street, just across from Macy's in 1910, beginning a 50+-year rivavlry. In 1923, owner Adam Gimbel also acquired what would become Saks Fifth Avenue.

Gimbels marketed to the middle class, offering NYC's first department store bargain basement, but had a tough time distinguishing itself from the larger Macy's—which did, after all, have a parade—and the legendary store shuttered in 1986. In its location now is what locals detest—Manhattan Mall—where Abraham & Strauss, then Stern's operated. In 2010, J.C. Penney opened its first New York retailer in the space.

Gimbels in the 1940s...

1951 on left, 1923 top right, 1911.

Gimbels' merch and advertising from 1934 through the 1980s.

See the site today and before Gimbels and Macy's, after the jump!

Here's the site today, with J.C. Penney's first New York retailer, opened in 2010.
And this amazing photograph shows pre-Herald Square, before Gimbels and Macy's, with a four-story residential building and dry goods retailer McDonalds on the ground floor. The billboard along the roof is an ad for Benedictine, a French liqueur.Gimbels in the 'burbs. Yonkers, NY, in the 1950s.