Decaying structures on the Christopher Street Pier, ca. 1974.

Photographer Jack Dowling is standing somewhere on the pier itself, facing the headhouse structures on the shoreline. The pier structures west of the elevated Miller (West Side) Highway, itself in a state of disrepair, had become an ad hoc gathering place for the city's queer youth, with the Christopher Street pier notable for its cruising scene.

In the background at right, the uppermost story of the massive, full-block structure today known as "The Archive" is visible. Erected in the 1890s, the Appraisers' Warehouse as a holding depot for goods awaiting customs inspection downtown. It later passed into city ownership, and in the mid-1970s became a preservation cause for the nascent Landmarks Conservancy.