The Leake and Watts Orphan House was erected in 1843, and the massive Greek Revival structure is an unlikely survivor in an ever-changing city. Designed by architect Ithiel Town as a home for orphaned children with the funds from a wealthy New York lawyer, the building was the largest edifice in Morningside Heights until the construction of the neighboring St. John the Divine began in 1892. (The Cathedral is still officially unfinished more than 11 decades later.) The orphanage moved to Yonkers when the church purchased the building in 1887, and the asylum stands on land intended for the south transept of the cathedral. (See the above parenthetical for the reason this has not necessitated the demolition of the building.) The architectural writer, David Dunlap, described the scene as this: "The situation has yielded a happy architectural incongruity: two ample porticos with broad triangular pediments on giant Ionic colonnades, nestled at the base of an unfinished Romanesque-Gothic cathedral. From some vantages on the verdant grounds, it looks as if an ancient Greek temple stumbled into some medieval village." While the building was not demolished for construction, it was largely ignored by the church and might have been taken down due to safety concerns eventually. But in the early 2000s, the Cathedral reversed it hands-off plan for the asylum. With a massive restoration effort completed in 2006 and the building renamed the Town Building, for its architect, the once decaying structure has become home of the Cathedral’s Textile Conservation Lab, and the Cathedral’s social service and neighborhood outreach programming. A coop in the nearby parking lot is also the home base for the Cathedral's three peacocks, Phil, Jim, and Harry.

King's Crown Hotel, ca. 1905. Built in 1909 to the plans of the firm of Naville & Bagge, the Beaux-Arts structure was original the Hotel Westminster, and later the King's Crown Hotel, where some residents lived long term. In the 1930s the hotel was home to both physicists Leó Szilárd and Enrico Fermi. They met accidentally in the lobby of their building in 1939 and that encounter would go on to produce what one science writer described as "one of the more colorful - and contentious - partnerships in the history of science." The partnership played a major role in the Manhattan Project and the eventual creation of the atomic bomb. The building was purchased by Columbia University in the early 1980s and is now a residence for law school students.

St. Luke's Hospital, 1904. In 1896, St. Luke's Hospital (founded in 1858 on Fifth Avenue at 54th Street) moved uptown. Ernest Flagg designed the grand hospital at the start of his career. The French Renaissance style complex was to have nine five-story, mansard-roofed pavilions connected to a central building topped by an impressive dome. Construction began in 1896 and continued for more than two decades. Only seven of the nine planned pavilions were built, and four remain today. The dome was removed in the 1960s and over time architectural details have been lost, while the complex has been crowded in by the modern Stuyvesant Pavilion on its west side. In the early 1990s, the deteriorating marble cornice was removed and replaced with a concrete/fiberglass replica. The four remaining pavilions were either empty or administrative and doctors’ offices before the buildings were sold in 2016. They are currently undergoing construction as part of a luxury residential conversion with the preservation of both the exterior and some historical elements of the interior structure included. The work is planned to be completed by the end of 2019.

Morningside Heights is graced with the highest concentration of institutional complexes built in a relatively short period at the turn of the 20th century, both in the city and anywhere in the United States. It is home to monumental places of worship, higher learning and healing, which accentuate its backdrop of rowhouses and apartment buildings, culminating in streetscapes that are both elegant and eye-filling. Topographically, it is situated on a plateau historically known as Harlem Heights, while geographically it is bounded by West 110th Street to the south, West 125th Street to the north, and two Frederick Law Olmsted–designed parks to the east (Morningside Park) and to the west (Riverside Park). The first institution to move into the area was New York Hospital, which began purchasing land in 1816 to establish the Bloomingdale Insane Asylum (on the present-day campus of Columbia University) and the Leake and Watts Orphan Asylum (on the present-day campus of St. John the Divine) in 1821 and 1834, respectively. The stigma of an insane asylum, compounded by inadequate transit access to the area, hindered other development until the late 19th century, when the hospital auctioned off its real estate holdings and relocated to White Plains in favor of more space and fresher air. The asylum’s relocation prompted a flurry of development by other institutions intent on expansion, starting with the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in 1887 and followed by St. Luke’s Hospital, Columbia College and Teacher’s College in 1892. The introduction of the subway into Morningside Heights in 1904, coupled with the neighborhood’s magnificent parks and prestigious institutions, led to a frenzy of speculative apartment house construction, attracting middle-class residents who could now commute directly downtown to work. Even before the advent of zoning regulations for land use, developers erected rowhouses and modest apartment buildings on the side streets and grand apartment houses on the avenues, with particularly monumental examples on Riverside Drive, Claremont Avenue and Cathedral Parkway, and mixed-use commercial buildings along Broadway, giving the neighborhood a heterogeneous yet cohesive character. Morningside Heights’ unorthodox yet distinctive sense of place comes from the coexistence of residential and institutional clusters, as exemplified by elegant rowhouses and apartment buildings just steps away from renowned academic institutions and houses of worship. Today the neighborhood still enjoys this singular sense of place. Its institutions are impressive examples of Beaux-Arts planning and design, including the graceful approach to Grant’s Tomb, the entrance façades of St. John the Divine and Riverside Church aligned with the axes of 112th Street and 122nd Street, and especially Charles McKim’s plan for Columbia University, whose symmetry and axial layout emphasize the monumentality and unity of the surrounding architecture. The residential architecture, though sometimes grand, offers a human scale and balance to the whole neighborhood.

Hendrik Hudson Apartments, ca. 1910. Completed in 1907, the Hendrik Hudson Apartments occupy the entire block between Riverside Drive and Broadway and 110th and 111th Streets. The building was modeled on Italian villa with a Spanish tile roof. Of the two tall towers seen in this circa 1910 photograph, once one remains today. The units were spectacularly upscale (unsurprising in this neighborhood of early 20th century luxury apartments). Decorating the 7-9 room apartments was walnut paneling, wood-beamed ceilings, mahogany doors with glass knobs, and the newest technology in porcelain bathroom features. The building itself also boasted a billiard parlor, a cafe, a barber shop, and a ladies hairdressing salon for the exclusive use of tenants and their guests. The original costs for the apartments ranged from $1500 to $3000 a year.

Eglise De Notre Dame ARCHITECT: Daus & Otto DATE: 1909-10 STYLE: French This church on the corner of Morningside Heights and 114th Street expresses a square building, Greek Cross in plan, by the shallow eastern portico and the semicircular apse. The principal facade on the east is dominated by a handsome pedimented portico, carried on four fluted Corinthian columns. The pediment and cornice are strengthened by well-detailed modillions. The order and regularity of this style are seen in the repetition of the principal portico motif in shallow projection on the south side. Here four pilasters take the place of the columns of the east front while their height and the pediment above them are similar and reinforce the quality of symmetry. Another feature reminiscent of French antecedents is the band of swagged garlands which follows the entablature for the entire perimeter of the building, similar to that on the Church of the Madeleine in Paris and so typical of Nineteenth-Century classicism.

As the city grew and changed, Olmsted and Vaux’s design for Morning Side Park changed with it. In their first plan of 1873 the grandest of the park entrances was to be at the corner of Manhattan Ave and West 110th Street (Cathedral Parkway). This corner was closest to the northwest corner of Central Park just a short block away and one can imagine the designers envisioning park goers strolling back and forth between the two parks. Here we see a major change that most certainly made them rethink that approach. This 1879 eastward looking view of the elevated train tracks built along 110th Street just south of what would become Morningside Park, show what a changed prospect now presented itself to the designers. Olmsted and Vaux’s second 1887 plan for the park took into account this dramatically changed condition. It retained but played down the southern entrance and made more of the grand staircase leading into the middle of the park from Morningside Drive at 116th Street.

Open-Air Pulpit: Howells & Stokes, 1913

Manhasset Apartments ARCHITECT: Joseph Wolf DATE: 1899-1901 STYLE: Beaux-Arts Erected at the turn of the century, when the Upper West Side of Manhattan became the center of apartment house construction in the city, the Manhasset is one of the city’s most imposing apartment houses. The building was designed and constructed in two phases. The lower eight stories of 1899- 1901 were designed by Joseph Wolf. The second phase, consisting of grand entrance pavilions and three additional stories incorporating a two-story slate-covered mansard, was added in 1901-05 by a new owner to the designs of Janes & Leo, a firm responsible for several of the Upper West Side’s most prominent apartment buildings. The handsome limestone, brick, and terra-cotta Beaux-Arts style facades of the Manhasset continue to attract attention, creating an important anchor at the northern edge of the Upper West Side.

110th Street Curve, also known as “suicide curve,” 1913. In 1879, the elevated tracks of the IRT Ninth Avenue Line were extended northward from the 104th Street station. At 110th Street, the trestle turned 90 degrees to the right on 110th Street, before turning uptown again at Eighth Avenue. The 110th Street station and adjacent tracks earned the nickname “suicide curve,” as the high elevated railway had become a destination for jumpers. In 1927, the New York Times reported that local business owners were concerned that the curve’s reputation was a deterrent to customers. The Ninth Avenue El ceased operations in June, 1940, and the railway was dismantled shortly thereafter. While many sources claim the tracks stood a dizzy 100 feet above street level, a 1940 dispatch in the New York Times quoted the project superintendent overseeing the trestle's demolition, who claimed a maximum height of 56 feet. Today, the elevated tracks former right of way is still visible at the southeast corner of 110th Street and Columbus Avenue: older buildings are set back from the corner, while more recent single-story construction occupies the land once underneath the tracks.

P.S. 165, ca. 1897. This C.B.J. Snyder-designed public school was the first to make use of the H-plan, a floorplan designed to maximize light and airflow by incorporating recessed courtyards partially surrounded by “wings.” Since 1936, the school has been named for Robert E. Simon, the philanthropist and real estate developer who was president of Carnegie Hall from 1925-35.

In the closing decades of the 19th century, New York underwent a profound physical and cultural transformation. Fueled by the wealth of the exploding financial and manufacturing sectors, the city rapidly evolved into a world-class metropolis. The bold ambitions of civic and business leaders, architects, and engineers of the era manifested in landmarks such as the vast Cathedral of St. John the Divine, the stately U.S. Custom House, the towering Municipal Building, and the original terminus of New York City’s first official subway line—the ornate City Hall stop. The sweeping interior spaces common to all of these structures, and hundreds of others, depended upon a venerable Mediterranean building technology adapted to contemporary American construction: arched tile ceilings—or vaults—that were not only self-supporting but could also bear the weight of floors or roofs above them. These vaults were designed and built by a single New York firm, founded by Spanish immigrant Rafael Guastavino (1842-1908) and later headed by his son Rafael Jr. (1872-1950). The Guastavinos’ patented system for building domes and vaults involved multiple layers of thin ceramic tiles bonded with quick-drying mortar. The resulting structures were not only exceptionally strong, but also lightweight, easy to build, and inherently beautiful, thanks to intricate patterns of exposed tile that formed finished, decorative surfaces. Guastavino vaults figured prominently in more than 1,000 projects across the nation, including 200 in Manhattan alone. During its 73-year history, the Guastavino Company helped build some of the most impressive interior spaces in America—veritable palaces for the people. This list based on MCNY's exhibition Palaces for the People, contains many of Guastavino's masterpieces in the five boroughs, both those that remain and those that have been lost to the wrecking ball.

When you’re planning to build some of the world’s most spectacular and challenging tunnels, you need to know ahead of time what you’ll be digging through. Is it soil, sand, or stone? Is the stone strong and secure or friable and likely to collapse? To know what the bedrock is like, you need a drill rig to dig it out from hundreds of feet below the surface. The drill extracts geological core borings, cylindrical samples that provide a cross-section of subsurface conditions and let engineers know whether the area is good for tunneling and what construction methods should be used. The drill bits are tubular and loaded with shot or embedded with diamonds to cut around the core, like a drinking straw plunging into a milkshake (except really, really hard!).

"Riverside Drive at the S.E. corner of West 113th Street. Apartment house, ca. 1910." The Strathmore is an apartment house built in 1909 for the Akron Building Company, and designed by Schwartz & Gross. The facade of the 12-story building is broken up into three bands. The four-story base is rusticated limestone, while floors five through ten are a dark red brick, and the top of the building is a three-story limestone and terra cotta capital and cornice. The building was designed to house two 10-room apartments on each floor and the apartments were to be of the highest luxury with high ceilings, elaborately parquet floors, and huge bathtubs.

Morningside Heights holds a very different ground than the Upper West Side - probably because it is home to Columbia University, Barnard College, the Manhattan School of Music, and other smaller schools. 🏫📚✍️ Explore the area between the Hudson and the Manhattan Schist…

From April 23 to April 30, 1968, Hundreds of Columbia University students occupied and barricaded five buildings on the Morningside Heights campus. They were protesting Columbia’s plan to build a private gym in Morningside Park—an “apartheid gym,” as they saw it, which would exclude the local black community, as well as disciplinary measures taken against student anti-war demonstrators. Afraid a confrontation might spark riots in nearby Harlem, Columbia President Grayson Kirk held back from calling in the police. On April 30, Columbia called in the NYPD to clear the buildings. Police arrested 705 students, at least 150 of whom they beat; more violence erupted on May 1 in skirmishes between police and demonstrators. policemen were also injured, one seriously. Lindsay publicly praised the “restraint” of most police, while admitting that some “used excessive force.”

How did New York build one of the largest Cathedrals in the world? Not quickly, using traditional craftsmen, the Cathedral of St. John the Divine took a century to reach its current state. As the seat of the Episcopal Diocese of New York St. John The Divine remains in active use to this day. This blog is adapted from Historic District Council's Six to Celebrate, which can be viewed here.

Bronze statue by Augustus Lukeman, in memory of Isidor and Ida Straus, ca. 1975. Lukeman’s statue depicts a nymph gazing into water, representing “memory.” The statue is situated in Straus Park, where it was dedicated in April, 1915.

Carl Schurz Memorial, 1913. The Carl Schurz Memorial was designed by Austrian-born American sculptor Karl Bitter in conjunction with renowned architect Henry Bacon. Carl Schurz was a Union general in the Civil War, Secretary of the Interior, a U.S. Senator (as well as a lawyer and journalist) who immigrated from Germany after the revolutions of 1848-49. After settling in America, he established a reputation as a skilled orator and anti-imperialist. Following his military and political careers, Schurz lived in New York City from 1881 until his death in 1906. While this statue is situated on the west side just outside Morningside Park, he is also honored on the east side. Carl Schurz Park in Yorkville is the location of Gracie Mansion, the official residence of the New York City mayor.

Morningside Park ARCHITECT: Frederick Law Olmsted; Calvert Vaux DATE: 1873-95 STYLE: Park Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, renowned landscape designers at the time, also designed included Central Park, Prospect Park, and Riverside Park and Drive. They transformed the long, narrow, and unusual site into a picturesque park by respecting and enhancing its inherent beauties and possibilities, including the views both eastward and westward. The most important features of Morningside Park include the massive buttressed masonry retaining wall with parapet, overlook bays, and entrance stairways, natural rock outcroppings, carefully worked-out “designed” rockwork and plantings, curvilinear walk system, and small open meadows along the southern and eastern sides

View west from 2760 Broadway, at 106th Street, 1928. In the foreground is Straus Park, named for Isidor and Ida Straus, Upper West Side residents who perished aboard the Titanic. Isidor Straus and his brother Nathan were partners in Abraham & Straus department store, and later Macy’s, where the brothers became co-owners and opened the flagship Herald Square store. Isidor Straus also held office as a United States Representative for New York. The park, previously known as Schulyer Square and Bloomingdale Square, features a bronze statue in memory of the Strauses by the sculptor Augustus Lukeman. In the background, Riverside Park and the Hudson River are visible. At the foot of 106th Street is a bronze equestrian sculpture by Karl Bitter, depicted General Franz Sigel, a German-born Civil War veteran.

The Vietnam War was a bloody conflict which lasted nearly 20 years. The United States entered the conflict because of the policy of Containment. Americans believed they needed to contain the spread of Communism in order to prevent the Domino Theory from playing out. This theory held that if one nation fell to Communism then surrounding nations would follow, much like if a person was to knock one domino tile down the others would fall in a chain reaction. As a result, the policy of Containment pursued a goal of containing or limiting Communism's spread by becoming involved in the affairs of nations at risk of turning "Red." With this in mind, US troops first arrived in Vietnam in 1955, and did not leave until 1973. Throughout those 18 years, American soldiers fought and died in the jungles of Vietnam. As time went on, many Americans grew frustrated with their nation's involvement in the conflict and began protesting to demand peace. This protest movement grew quickly and, at times, was marred by violence. However, the pressure put on the US government eventually helped to bring the troops home. Unfortunately, the 18 years, thousands of lives lost, and the millions of dollars spent ultimately proved ineffective at stopping Ho Chi Minh's communist regime from taking over Vietnam in 1975. To this day, the Vietnam War is considered one of America's darkest chapters. Its legacy continues to effect our nation and its veterans of the conflict in particular. As you read, consider how the Vietnam War shaped domestic feelings and movements and how people have come to remember the conflict today. NYS Social Studies Scope and Sequence Standards: 8.7, 8.9 & 11.9 For Teachers: Vietnam War @ Home Lesson Plan

Morningside Park (undated postcard).

Cathedral of St. John the Divine interior ca. 1959 The Guastavino Company pushed the limits of traditional tile vaulting further than any previous builders. Guastavino Jr.’s building method for the dome of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine required no support during construction, yet created a highly stable shell only 4.5 inches thick at its crown. The 135-foot span was erected in a mere 15 weeks. Originally intended as a temporary, inexpensive cover for the crossing of the cathedral’s two main axes, the dome remains in place today—a testament to its solid construction.

Seventh Church of Christ Scientist, August 22, 1929. Designed by Griffin & Wynkoop, this Greek Revival church was completed in 1919. Clad in white limestone, the facade boasted no windows. The building survived until the late 1980s when the church sold the deteriorating church and its brownstone neighbor (which housed administrative offices and the Sunday school). The purchasing developers constructed a modest, modern church facade with a large circular window (that the church owns outright) next to a 22-story condo building, both clad in red brick.

Cathedral of St. John The Divine. Heins & LaFarge won the design competition for their Byzantine/Romanesque/Gothic cathedral conception. One of its most prominent features is the Guastavino tiled dome, constructed as a temporary roof during fundraising for the massive central crossing tower, which was never completed. The cathedral famously suffered many setbacks, including waning public interest to provide funds, significant design alterations, the replacement of Heins & LaFarge with Ralph Adams Cram, and building hiatuses during two world wars. Despite its uneven developmental history, the cathedral remains a fascinating juxtaposition of styles and construction technologies. Its subsidiary structures were built around the Close in Gothic variations. In spite of being an international icon, the complex remains unprotected by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission. In 2007, the cathedral leased the Close’s southeast parcel for the construction of a residential high-rise, and there is currently a proposal to build two residential high-rises next to the Cathedral’s north wall. The Greek Revival Leake and Watts Orphan Asylum, restored in 2006 and currently the home of the cathedral’s tapestry conservation studio, is Morningside Heights’ oldest extant structure.

Often thought of as a "concrete jungle," New York City also has a rich history of environmental activism--from the creation of green spaces to confronting climate change. In the decades following the first Earth Day in 1970 and the birth of the environmental movement, New Yorkers sought to make their city greener with recycling centers, community gardens, and bike lanes. Activist groups also called for improved environmental conditions and air quality that disproportionately affected people of color. Though the city is less polluted today, climate change has posed large challenges that have ignited a new generation of environmental activists. Explore key sites of eco-advocacy in the city from the 1960s to today.

Within twenty years of the park’s completion this grand overlook at West 116th Street and Morningside Drive was completely redesigned to incorporate the Carl Schurz Memorial. While an impressive work in its own right, the monument completed negates the Olmsted and Vaux design intent for this space. The monument faces inward and robs visitors of much of the grand view out over the city and towards Long Island. We’ve watched untold numbers of visitors to this spot immediately proceed to the edge of the monument and peer over trying to recapture that view. The monument also served as a backdrop for this famous photo of The Who from 1968.

At the same time as architect Henry F Kilburn was completing work on West-Park Presbyterian Church on West 86th Street, he was building another masterpiece 20 blocks north. Both churches were built to accommodate the Upper West Side’s rapidly growing population. This church, with its light-yellow, speckled brick and detailed terra-cotta banding, once housed the largest Presbyterian congregation in New York City.

Sunnycrest Apartments, ca. 1905. The early advertising for the Sunnycrest Apartments noted its proximity to the Hudson River, St. John the Divine, and subway, street car, and elevated train stations. The 1907-completed Colonial style building in red brick and limestone decoration was designed by the neighborhood favorite firm of Schwartz and Gross. Though laid out originally as substantially sized apartments with servants space, the building became single occupancy residences by the mid century. At some point prior to 1965 Columbia University became the owner of this building, known then as York Studios. That year the evicted the tenants of the building for then unknown reasons. The structure was demolished at some point in the mid to late 20th century and today the site is used as a parking lot.

Cathedral of St. John the Devine, ca. 1913. The massive Cathedral of St. John, the principal church of the Episcopal diocese of New York, is the largest church in the United States and one of the largest in the world. Designed by the Heins & LaFarge firm in 1891, the Cathedral's construction began its long journey in 1892 when the first stone was laid. The design was transferred to the firm of Cram and Ferguson in 1911, when the crossing and eastern end of church was completed. The resulting change in architects caused the Cathedral's Nave to have a French Gothic influence while the sanctuary and choir taking a Romanesque Style. The initial length of the cathedral was completed in 1941 (in part due to a colossal fundraising campaign amongst New Yorkers) and the cathedral was opened, marking a pause its construction that would last until 1979. The Very Reverend James Parks then spurred another round of construction and renovation, employing masons to continue the work. However, the great Cathedral remains unfinished, the last additions having been made in 2007, as its stone on stone construction is both expensive and painstaking. Even in its unfinished state, it remains one of the most important Anglican churches in the world.

Pulitzer Hall (formerly Journalism Hall), home to the Columbia University Graduate school of Journalism, undated photo. The Columbia Journalism School is the only journalism school in the Ivy League and one of the oldest in the world. Established by newspaper publisher Joseph Pulitzer, the school and the related Pulitzer Prizes were funded via a gift of $2 million in 1903. It took nearly a decade to iron out the details from the time of the gift until the official founding and matriculation of the first class in 1912. The classical building that has housed the school since its inception (and was funded through the original gift) was known for its first century as Journalism Hall. Alas a closer reading (in 2003) of the 1903 gift agreement uncovered the specification that "the building shall bear the name of the donor." In 2012 during the celebration of the school's centennial, the building was renamed Pulitzer Hall.

In this view from 1911 we see the rugged topography of the site which is just one block wide but 13 blocks long. The Olmsted and Vaux design highlights the natural setting by creating two linear path systems, one broad and meandering and the other cutting through the Manhattan schist and hugging a massive buttressed retaining wall along the park’s western edge.

Cathedral of St. John the Divine ca. 1904 In competition among most of the leading architects of the day, the magnificent Romanesque Revival scheme of Heins and La Farge was selected for construction of an American cathedral. Only the choir and apse and a rough masonry shell at the crossing were completed when Ralph Adams Cram gained control of the design for the rest of the building, which then was carried out in French Gothic Style.

My Archive Spring 2019 "September 1989: Playing at the Peace Fountain sculpted by Greg Wyatt, and installed in 1985. The park was a great place to play in the 1980s and I’m very lucky that my grandmother marched me out nearly every day of her visits to watch ongoing construction at the cathedral, including getting to speak with sculptor Simon Verity and his assistants who were working at the Portal of Paradise at the west facade. This photo was taken during one of my Brooklyn-born grandmother’s visits during which she’d encourage me to be more interested in my city. She would have me stand and watch the construction of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine because as she’d say, it’s not every day that you witness the construction of a cathedral. Someone living in our building was from an area near Barcelona and had brought me a 1992 Summer Olympics T-shirt, which is what I’m wearing. Barcelona had been selected as the host city on October 17, 1986." —James Russiello

The park was designated a Scenic Landmark of New York City in 2008. Today there are only ten other designated Scenic landmarks in the city. This photo shows the Washington and Lafayette monument in the small triangle formed at the intersection of Morningside Avenue and Manhattan Avenue on the eastern edge of the park at 114th Street. The triangle is included in the Scenic Landmark designation. The statue was added to the triangle just a few years after the park’s completion and is by Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi the sculptor of the Statue of Liberty. In the right hand corner of this photo in the far distance we can make out the park overlook at 116th Street on the western edge of the park. As we said, it’s a narrow park!

405 West 114th Street Daus & Otto, 1910; Cross & Cross, 1914 New York City Individual Landmark State and National Registers of Historic Places This French Neo-Classical church was donated by Geraldine Redmond after her son was cured at the famous pilgrimage site and sanctuary at Notre Dame de Lourdes in France. Its interior grotto recalls the grotto of its namesake.

My Archive Spring 2019 "Back when my Brooklyn-born grandmother would revisit the city once a year in the ‘80s and early ‘90s, she’d berate for not being more interested in my city. She’d march me out to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine because as she’d say, it’s not every day that you witness the construction of a cathedral. I was there in a stroller, playing at the newly installed Peace Fountain sculpted by Greg Wyatt. The park was a great place to play in the 1980s and I’m very lucky for my grandmother for marching me out nearly every day to watch sculptor Simon Verity and his assistants first chalk out and then sculpt the jamb figures at the Portal of Paradise. There are a lot of photos of me looking very bored, but we stood there for long periods each day watching, during which time the sculptor spoke to us, and my grandmother inquired if there was a training program I could join. He politely explained that it was nice that I was local but I was too young to be part of the cathedral works (my first in a long line of rejections). I was fortunate to see his amazing Yorkminster west portal figures while living in the UK and his work at NYC’s Hanover Square. I remember we posed my dad under the New York Apocalypse featuring the World Trade Center carving because he was handling maintenance plans for one of the buildings depicted in that carving nearby the World Trade Center. Coincidentally, the photograph is dated September 11, 1991 only because the outing correlated to a family birthday. We had no idea at the time that that would be the exact date featured at the start of The Big Lebowski (1998)." —James Russiello

Atlas Motor Company Garage, ca. 1907.

The Manhasset is an 11-story apartment house located on Broadway between West 108th and 109th Streets on the Upper West Side. Apartment houses were a brand new building type imported from France. When they began appearing on the Upper West Side in the 1880s, families had to adjust to the idea of living in the same building as other families. Advantages of apartment living included not needing so many servants and having elevators, which were new technology then. Built in 1899, the Manhasset is colorful and grand. The top floor roofs have a special form called mansard. The building covers the entire block-front, and, because it is located where Broadway makes a curve, it can be seen from many blocks away. Originally, the Manhasset was an eight-story apartment house. A few years later it was redesigned by two famous architects, Janes and Leo. In addition to making it taller, they added many shops on the first floor after the opening of the subway in 1904. The original 77 apartments, planned for upper middle class families, contained six, seven, or nine rooms with one to three baths. In 1905, the New York Census records the presence of many professional and business people. Most of the renters were born in the United States, but there were also a number of adults who were immigrants from Germany as well as others from Ireland, France, and Canada. As would be expected on the diverse Upper West Side, the residents appear to have been from various ethnic groups and religions and included Catholics, Protestants, and Jews. Each apartment included a single servant’s room, and most residents had one or two live-in servants.

To learn more about the Columbia University Protests of '68, visit: https://www.gothamcenter.org/blog/remembering-the-columbia-protest-of-68-students AND https://www.gothamcenter.org/blog/remembering-the-columbia-protest-of-68-faculty

Elevated railroad at 110th Street and 8th Avenue, ca. 1895.