Sydenham Hospital, 1925. Sydenham opened as a private hospital in a Harlem brownstone in 1892. The hospital served mostly African-American patients who lived in the neighborhood. To meet the needs of its growing community, Sydenham moved to West 125th Street and Lenox Avenue in 1924. Though Harlem was a largely African-American neighborhood, the staff of the hospital was reported to be all-white in 1944; likely due to the fact that discrimination within the medical community left little to no opportunities for African American healthcare professionals. To amend this, the hospital employed a desegregation policy, which was radical at the time. Sydenham hired twenty African Americans to its staff and brought six African Americans onto its Board, making it the first full-service hospital to hire black physicians. By 1947, the New York Times wrote that it was "praised...for its inter-racial activities...an example for the entire world," by Eleanor Roosevelt, who spoke at a fundraiser on behalf of the hospital. After the fundraiser, the director Dr. Sigmund L. Friedman made the statement that Sydenham was "the best place to prove that race, creed, and color have no importance in the hospital." The fundraiser that Mrs. Roosevelt spoke at was just one of many attempts to keep the hospital fiscally afloat. Throughout its existence, Sydenham was ridden with money problems. Finally bending to financial strain in 1949, the hospital was transferred from private ownership to New York City's municipal hospital system, though it allowed private patients to continue seeing doctors at Sydenham to "preserve the interracial practice of the hospital." In 1979, Sydenham Hospital became the center of a massive walk-out staged by the Committee for Interns and Residents. When Ed Koch took office as the Mayor in 1977, he reduced city spending on all municipal hospitals. Two hospitals in Harlem, Sydenham and Metropolitan, were slated for closure. Harlem was a "medically underserved area," and the two public hospitals were vital for the community's wellbeing. Additionally, Sydenham's sickle cell anemia clinic, led by Florence Gaynor, was of importance to the medical community at large. Unfortunately, countless public rallies and demonstrations were ignored by the city and in 1980, the city officially closed Sydenham. The hospital was subsequently occupied by "The People's Administration," for 10-days of protest, who brought national attention to the importance of the hospital. Sydenham's demise provided a cautionary lesson. In 1998, reflecting on the changing terrain of public healthcare in New York City, Sharon Lerner wrote in the Village Voice: "The Sydenham blunder paved the way for today’s more clandestine approach to hospital downsizing, in which the city reduces its contribution to the Health and Hospitals Corporation and the agency is thereby ”forced” to make cuts to the public hospitals."

Regent Theater ARCHITECT: Thomas W. Lamb DATE: 1912-13 STYLE: Theater An elegant architectural design, the Regent was built to elevate the presentation of movies and was one of the first luxurious movie theaters in New York City. The theater was controlled by the real estate interests of the Little family, prominent printers, for nearly forty years. Located in Harlem at the comer of two thoroughfares which were popular for entertainment venues, the Regent was operated as a movie and vaudeville house for some fifty years, as an innovative setting for movie presentations.

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.

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.

Low Memorial Library Interior STATUS Designated Interior Landmark 116th St & Broadway ARCHITECT: McKim, Mead & White; Charles F. McKim DATE: 1894-97 STYLE: Neo-Classical The design of the Low Library Interior is characterized by a restrained but striking combination of classical ornament and richly colored materials. It is an excellent expression of the classical spirit that so strongly influenced American architecture at the turn of the 20th century. Low Library is an excellent expression of the neo-Classical style. The monumental domed building is the focal point of the campus. Its imposing interior, dominated by a vast central hall with rich, classically-inspired ornament, ranks as one of the finest monumental spaces in New York City

This view looking west into the park from 120th Street and Morningside Avenue shows the Morningside Drive overlook at the top of the steep east-west rise. Preserving views across the park and from the park towards Harlem and Long Island was a key concept of the Olmsted and Vaux design for Morningside Park.

New York Public Library, 115th Street branch. July 18, 1928. The 115th Street branch, a Carnegie-funded library designed by McKim, Mead & White, opened in November, 1908. The small, three-story Renaissance Revival building is styled as an Italian palazzo, with a heavily rusticated limestone facade and symmetrical arched windows. In 2017, the library was renamed the Harry Belafonte 115th Street Library, after the musician, activist, and Harlem resident.

Saint Paul’s Chapel ARCHITECT: Howells & Stokes DATE: 1904-07 STYLE: Byzantine, Italian Renaissance St. Paul’s Chapel attains an altogether pleasing dignity from its beautiful proportions and handsome architectural details. This brick building with limestone trim is highlighted with terra cotta ornament and ornamental bronze carefully integrated into a harmonious ecclesiastical design. Because of its Greek cross plan, surmounted by a high drummed dome over the crossing and its four columned portico (porch) with a Florentine gable, this Byzantine Chapel displaying much Italian Renaissance detail makes an attractive contribution to American architecture.

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.”

The Winfield Scott Hancock Statue commemorates the United States Army Officer and presidential nominee who fought in numerous wars including the Mexican War, Seminole War, and Civil War. The Board of Aldermen dedicated this recently acquired plot of land to the war hero in 1886. Sculptor James Wilson Alexander MacDonald likely based this piece on a plaster mask taken of Hancock the year he ran for president. A smaller casting is part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection.

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.

We are looking east along West 123rd Street in this view from Amsterdam Avenue. This is the northern boundary of the park. We see the Block House No. 4, a remnant fortification built but never used to defend the city in the war of 1812. PS 36 now sits on this same outcropping. One of the other block houses built at this time still survives in the north woods of Central Park.

Hancock Park was dedicated to war hero Winfield Scott Hancock in 1886 by the New York City Board of Aldermen. The board gained possession of this property the year of Hancock's death and saw fit to celebrate the decorated general. The Coalition of 100 Black Women has maintained this small park since 1981. Recent plantings have included the introduction of evergreens, tulips, and a perennial garden.

Block House #4, ca. 1905. Block House #4 sat on the massive glacial rock outcropping at 123rd Street and Amsterdam Avenue. It was one of a series of stone defense fortifications constructed around the War of 1812. Despite the preparation for the perceived threat of British invasion, the British never made it to Manhattan during the war. The ruins of Block House #4 remained on the outcropping until the 1960s when Public School 36 was constructed on the site. The sections of the school where built directly on the large rock, which can still be seen on the 123rd Street side. A single block house survives in the northern section of Central Park; it is also situated on a large rock outcropping.

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

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).

Turks Lounge and Bar, March 11, 1954.

Bancroft Hall Designed and built in 1910 by esteemed architect Emery Roth, Bancroft Hall differed from the general Beaux Arts flavored Morningside Heights. The Vienna Secessionist style building features copper-clad bay windows and a timber Tuscan-style roof. Though designed for apartments, it was purchased to serve as a dormitory by the Teachers College/

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.

This rare early view of the north end of the park looks east-northeast from Amsterdam Avenue near West 122nd Street. We see what we now know as Morningside Drive (it was earlier called both Morningside Avenue and Morningside Avenue West) curving off to the right. We see how the park connected to Amsterdam Avenue. This connection was lost when a public school (PS36) was built in this section of the park in the mid 1960’s.

Charles McKim, 1895–97: New York City Individual and Interior Landmark, State and National Registers of Historic Places Charles McKim designed the campus in the Beaux-Arts style popularized at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. Its focal point is Low Library, designed in the Roman Classical style, with Italian Renaissance–inspired classroom buildings flanking it in the forecourt and rear. Fashioned after the Baths of Caracalla and the Pantheon, the library’s granite dome is the country’s largest. The university outgrew Low Library in the 1920s, and a new library named for then president Nicholas Murray Butler was built on the campus’ southern end.

O'Reilly Storage, April 13, 1925. One of the tallest structures in this area of Harlem, the O'Reilly Storage was constructed in 1892 as a storage facility to serve the new residents of the booming middle class neighborhood. The orange and red brick building stood for more than a century, becoming the Dwyer Warehouse in the 1960s. By the start of the 21st century, the building was in poor condition and was largely razed in 2005. The condominium that rose in its place includes some small portion of the original building's base and calls to mind the former structure with orange bricks and a similar silhouette, complete with hexagonal corner tower.

Another view of the Block House No. 4 and the exposed manhattan schist face where West 123rd Street was cut through at the northern termination of the park. As we’ve seen in this story, the geology and resulting dramatic topography of a ridge of Manhattan Schist is a defining feature of Morningside Park. In fact, it’s only due to the daunting nature of this rock that Andrew Haswell Green decided to not extend the east-west street grid through this part of Manhattan and instead called for a park to be designed and constructed on this land.

Janus Court, 1913. Built by private developers in 1910, Janus Court would only function as a private residence for less than a decade. In 1919, Teachers College at Columbia University purchased the building to meet the demand for student housing. It was renamed Seth Low Hall, and is the only Columbia building named for the once university president (the well-known Low Law Library is named for Seth's father, Abiel Abbot Low.

The Great God Pan, ca. 1907. Originally located (as seen here) at the center of a fountain on the north side of the Columbia campus, the bronze sculpture was actually intended for a very different location. Commission by the Clark family in the 1890s for a location at their Dakota apartment building, the resulting statue was deemed too risque for the apartment house. For a time it was considered for a spot in Central Park, but finally Edward Severin Clark donated the piece to Columbia for its uptown campus. It was installed in 1907 as a working fountain in a grotto on the northeast corner of campus. It was moved, at an unknown point in the 20th century to its current location outside of Lewisohn Hall. Pan, (deemed to risque for the Dakota) by the American artist George Grey Barnard, is depicted in his usual form as half-man (nude), half-goat, playing his traditional pipes. Cast from bronze by the Henry-Bonnard Bronze Co., a local foundry, it was one of Branard's first commissions. His later medieval architectural fragments and sculptures would go to become the foundation for the The Cloisters Museum & Gardens at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Low Memorial Library, c. 1975. President Seth Low founded the Low Memorial Library in honor of his father, Abiel Abbot Low. It was designed in the Neoclassical style by Charles Follen McKim of the renowned architecture firm McKim, Mead, and White, who designed the Beaux-Arts plan that governs Columbia University's campus. The Low Memorial Library was constructed from 1895 until 1897 as the first major building on the new campus. It was meant to be both the visual and the academic focus of the grounds. The building, a Greek cross in plan, was modeled after the Pantheon, with windows inspired by the Baths of Diocletian, and various Classical influences on the outside, including busts of Apollo, Zeus, and Athena. The great hall of the building, octagonal in plan, was designed as the main reading room. The reading room took influence from the Reading Room at the British Museum, which was circular in plan and also covered by a domed ceiling. A circular arrangement of tiered desks surrounded a central reception desk, both of which occupy the space under the rounded ceiling. The ceiling is painted dark blue and adorned with a suspended white sphere meant to represent the moon and night sky. The reading room held 12,000 of the library's books, and at maximum capacity, the library was to hold 1,900,000 volumes in total. Since 1934, the reading room has been repurposed for more ceremonious occasions such as exhibitions, convocations, and as a reception area. The iconic facade of the building is used as the backdrop for Columbia's graduation ceremonies. During the protests at Columbia in 1968, the library, which also housed the president's office, was occupied by a group of students. The students were protesting the university's involvement in the Vietnam War and, among other things, a segregated gymnasium proposed near campus. Of the drama that ensued, one account by a former student describes food being hurled at the building to feed the occupants. Peculiarly, the 1897 Real Estate Record and Guide wrote that the Library's design was a direct copy of a French Church designed by an architect called Rumpf. There is no record of such a building, though the Guide wrote of the building, "Successful architects have too much to do to be pre-eminently artists -- they much be first-rate men of business." The library is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

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.

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 the spring semester of 1968, over 1,000 protesters occupied five of the campuses' buildings, leading to one of the largest mass arrests in New York. The story of the Columbia Protests offers a glimpse of the country's political climate during that fateful year. A former protestor recalled that students felt "two strands of anger and disgust converge: what the university was doing to aid the war effort, and what the university was doing that was racist to our neighborhood."

The Wadleigh High School for Girls 215-25 W. 114th Street, Harlem 1902 Hailed as “a triumph of architectural skill,” The Wadleigh High School for Girls was among the first public high schools built in New York City and the first high school for girls. Designed in the Colligate Gothic style by school architect C.B.J. Snyder, the impressive red brick and buff limestone structure boasts a 125-foot tower. Constructed at a total cost of $900,000 inclusive of furnishings and equipment, The Wadleigh’s 3,000 student capacity had 80 classrooms, 3 gymnasia and a 1,500-seat auditorium and was the first school building to have electric elevators. In February 1903, the New York Times described The Wadleigh as “the finest high school building in the world.” Notable alumnae include actresses Jean Stapleton and Isabel Sanford.

“During the \[famous 1968] occupation, faculty presence at the occupied buildings was assured. How did it all work? Why did individual faculty congregate in Philosophy Hall, sign up for tours of duty in front of occupied buildings to prevent a police cleanup of the occupied buildings, and regularly show up? The faculty understood its students because it identified with them and their humanistic and political values, as the students identified with the populations they undertook to serve and — to the extent possible — represented, as well as the unknown victims of their government’s Vietnam aggression. That potential for identification, which is prior to ideology, has disintegrated....“ Excerpted from a series presented by The Gotham Center for New York City History on the fiftieth anniversary of the protests in 1968.

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.

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

St. Paul's Chapel, Columbia University Interior ca. 1917 This chapel on the campus of Columbia University illustrates the full potential of Guastavino vaulting as both a structural and a decorative system. The chapel is capped by a double dome, consisting of two thin tile layers separated by an air space. The most dramatic architectural elements of the building, however, are the spiral staircases whose three-dimensional curvatures convey the remarkable flexibility of the Guastavino system.

Low Memorial Library, Columbia University, ca. 1975. Seth Low, the president of Columbia College, which in the 1890s was located at Madison Avenue at 50th Street, established a great urban university that would eventually be called Columbia University in the City of New York. He built a new campus for this university in the open spaces of 114th to 120th Streets between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue. The first building erected on this new campus was the library and President Low was its benefactor. The University moved to its new campus in 1897

Casa Italiana ARCHITECT: McKim, Mead & White; William M. Kendall DATE: 1926-27 STYLE: Neo-Italian Renaissance Casa ltaliana, a neo-Italian Renaissance style institutional building, was designed as a center for Italian studies by the prestigious architectural firm of McKim, Mead & White. Built in 1926-27, it is located on the Morningside Heights campus of Columbia University at Amsterdam Avenue and 117th Street. Casa ItaIiana had its beginnings in 1914 when a group of students of Italian descent organized an ItaIian club at Columbia College in an effort to promulgate knowledge of modern Italy. In 1920 a group of 25 students formalized themselves into the Circolo Italiano.