Castleton Avenue at Oxford Place, unknown date. The Smith Infirmary was designed by Alfred E. Barlow and opened in 1890. The Ruskinian Gothic building was named after local physician, Samuel R. Smith, but later known as the Staten Island Hospital. The hospital moved in 1979 to Dongan Hills and abandoned this structure. The castle was deemed a hazard and demolished in March, 2012.

While New York City is certainly best known for its towering skyscrapers and classy historic districts, its earliest monuments of stone are just that: stone. The geologic landscape of the city was formed between 20,000 and 18,000 years ago with the movement of the Wisconsin Ice Sheet down from Canada. The rock and debris deposited from the ice sheet, as well as the valleys it deepened, bedrock it smoothed and glacial grooves it left, formed the landscape of the city that began to grow in the colonial era. In some cases the rocks have been moved or crumbled in the name of urban development. But some of this geologic history can still be seen within the urban environment. This collection highlights some of the more well-known geologic features.

"Hero Park was dedicated in 1920 to the martyrs of the World War and a bronze tablet on Sugar Loaf Rock bears the names of Staten Islanders who died in the war, June 23, 1937."

Hero Park, Staten Island.