Midtown Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States

 

The Longacre Theater survives today as one of the historic playhouses that symbolize American theater for both New York and the nation. Constructed in 1912-13, the Longacre was built to house the productions of Broadway producer and baseball magnate Harry H. Frazee. Designed for Frazee by Henry Herts, prominent theater architect, the Longacre is among the earliest surviving Broadway theaters, and has an exceptionally handsome facade.

 

Like most Broadway playhouses built before World War I, the Longacre was designed by a leading theater architect to house the offices and theatrical productions of its owner. Though known as a baseball magnate, and at one time the owner of the Boston Red Sox, Frazee was also an influential Broadway producer who, besides building the Longacre theater, at one time also owned two other Broadway houses (the Harris and the Lyric).

 

Henry B. Herts, the architect of the Longacre, earned a reputation as one of New York's most skilled theater architects, first in partnership with Hugh Tallant and later practicing alone. His facade for the Longacre is an exceptionally handsome neo-French Classic style design, based on classical sources and employing polychromatic effects.

 

For three-quarters of a century the Longacre Theater has served as home to countless numbers of the plays through which the Broadway theater has come to personify American theater. As such, it continues to help define the Broadway theater district, the largest and most famous concentration of legitimate stage theaters in the world.

 

Harry H. Frazee

 

When Harry Frazee opened the Longacre Theater in 1913, he was thirty-three years old. Debonair, quick-witted and extravagant, he had risen from humble beginnings in the Midwest to become one of the most influential men in American theater.

 

Frazee began his theatrical career as an usher, and then a box-office attendant in Peoria, Illinois. By the time he was sixteen he was on the road as an advance agent for a small musical troupe. Six years later he produced Uncle John Perkins, the first of Frazee's many entertainments and the foundation of his later fortune. He acquired in rapid succession a series of touring shows and soon controlled musical comedy outside the large western cities.

 

In 1909 Frazee opened his first playhouse in Chicago. He named it for theater magnate John Cort who had befriended and encouraged the once-struggling young agent. In the same year Frazee took advantage of the swelling interest in a boxing match between the undefeated champion Jim Jeffries and his black challenger Jack Johnson. Frazee cast the former in an immensely profitable athletic program, which he scheduled for a world tour. Plans were cancelled, however, when the champion unexpectedly lost his title. This was the first of Frazee's lucrative, but ill-fated, involvements in professional sports.

 

Frazee rebounded with the muscial sensation Madame Sherry which he co-sponsored with George W. Lederer in a short-lived partnerhsip. Frazee used his share of its half-million-dollar profits to build the Longacre Theatre in 1913. The theater was foreclosed, however, the following year, after which he temporarily restricted his theater involvements to production. He then turned to professional sports.

 

In 1917, while continuing to produce Broadway plays, Frazee purchased the Boston Red Sox (reputedly for $400,000). Unhappily, most of his new musicals failed, leaving him in financial straits. Frazee's expedient, if unpopular solution, was the sale of his baseball players to the rival New York team. In so doing he reduced the once powerful Red Sox to little more than a Yankee fief. In the course of his six-year ownership, Frazee sold over a dozen athletes to New York, the most notable being Babe Ruth in 1920. The latter fetched $125,000 which Frazee promptly applied to his purchase of the Harris Theater (renamed the Frazee) from the widow of Titanic victim Herny B. Harris. He is also reported to have acquired the Lyric Theater.^"

 

Frazee retired from baseball in 1923, receiving $1,500,000 for his interests. During his remaining five years, he(was divorced and remarried, and generally lived a high life in New York society. He hosted Charles Lindbergh and his mother on their triumphant visit to New York in 1927, and was the frequent companion of the flashy New York senator, and later mayor, Jimmie Walker.

 

Frazee's last big success on Broadway was No, No, Nanette in 1925 which is reported to have made him millions. He attempted a companion piece two years later with the trite play Yes, Yes, Yvette. It was an abysmal failure, and hastened Frazee's retirement from Broadway in 1928. The forty-eight-year old producer died of Brights Disease while vacationing in France in 1929. His once vast estate was valued at less than $300,000.

 

Henry Beaumont Herts

 

Many of Broadway's finest theaters owe their design in part or in whole to Henry Beaumont Herts (1871-1933). As both a technical innovator and an inventive designer, Herts earned a reputation as one of New York's (and America's) most skilled theater architects. Although his career in theater design was made in partnership with another theater specialist, Hugh Tallant (1869-1952), Herts continued to contribute to the stock of fine Broadway theaters even after the break-up of the partnership.

 

Herts, son of Henry B. Herts of the Herts Brothers firm of decorators, left college to work in the office of Bruce Price, a well-established New York architect with a national reputation. Price, impressed with his abilities, encouraged him to attend the Columbia School of Mines, forerunner of the Columbia School of Architecture. While a student, he entered and won a competition to design the Columbus Memorial Arch. From there he went on to the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where he met his future partner Hugh Tallant. Tallant had come to Paris after graduating from Harvard College, where he had studied engineering. The two worked on many student projects together in Paris, and in 1897, after returning to New York, joined in a partnership which lasted until 1911.

 

Although Herts and Tallant accepted commissions for various building types, they became best known as specialists in theater design. Their career spanned the gradual change in the American theater from the 19th- to the 20th-century pattern. Consequently their theater commissions ranged from a repertory house for a 19th-century impresario (the Lyceum for Daniel Frohman, 1903, a designated New York City Landmark), and theaters for the infamous Klaw & Erlanger Theatrical Syndicate (the New Amsterdam, 1903, a designated New York City Landmark and Interior Landmark, and the Liberty, 1904), to houses for the Shubert organization, the classic embodiment of the 20th-century theatrical entrepreneur (the Shubert and the Booth theaters, 1912-13, Herts alone).

 

Other New York theaters included the Gaiety (at Broadway and 46th Street, 1907-09, demolished), the remodeling of the old Lenox Lyceum into the German Theater (Madison Avenue at 59th Street, 1908, demolished), the Brooklyn Academy of Music (1908, in the Brooklyn Academy of Music Historic District), the Folies Bergere (later the Helen Hayes, 210 West 46th Street, 1911, demolished), and the Longacre (1912-13, Herts alone).

 

Practicing in a period of great theater expansion, Herts and Tallant were able to bring to their new theaters a propitious combination of design talent and technical expertise. Tallant became quite knowledgeable in the field of theater acoustics, and published on the subject, as well as on the history of theater design, in contemporary architectural periodicals. Herts's understanding of structural techniques led him to invent the cantilever arch method of theater balcony construction (first used at the New Amsterdam Theater, 1903), which eliminated the need for supporting pillars and thus improved auditorium sight lines.Together Herts and Tallant brought back from Paris a familiarity with modern French design which they applied to great effect in all the theaters they built on Broadway.®

 

Herts & Tallant's earlier theaters (the Lyceum, New Amsterdam, Liberty, and German), in a theatrical version of the Beaux-Arts style, brought an elaborate, elegant and ornamental look to New York's stock of playhouses. The Lyceum is probably the finest surviving Beaux-Arts theater in the country. Besides their Beaux-Arts training, Herts and Tallant brought to New York their first-hand knowledge of the Art Nouveau style current in Belgium and France, and in the New Amsterdam created an outstanding Art Nouveau interior. Herts, although trained as an architect, was also a painter, and while in Paris had several works exhibited. His interests may have been the source for the elaborate paintings and reliefs with which so many of the firm's theaters were adorned. Similarly elaborate and eminently theatrical were their designs for the German Theater, and, though on a smaller scale, also the Liberty.

 

The firm's later theaters, including the Gaiety, Folies Bergere, Longacre, and the Shubert and Booth, were equally elaborate in detail, but tended to a more restrained classicism in keeping with changing architectural tastes. Interior ornament ranged from the intimate Jacobean paneling of the smaller Booth, to the grand cycle of paintings in the larger Shubert. The double exterior of the latter two was said to be based on Venetian precedents, and relied for its effect on contrasts between brick and terra-cotta adorned with a polychromatic sgraffito ornament.

 

Non-theatrical commissions by the firm included a new facade at 232 West End Avenue for Abraham Erlanger's house (in 1903-04, the same years in which they designed Klaw & Erlanger's New Amsterdam and Liberty Theaters); the City Athletic Club (50 West 54th Street, 1909); a new grandstand for the Polo Grounds in Manhattan (1912, Herts alone, demolished); and a number of buildings for New York's Jewish community, including a remodeling of the old Harmonie Club (45 West 42nd Street, 1897-1898, demolished), the Aguilar Free Library (110th Street, 1898, and alterations 1904-05), the Guggenheim Mausoleum (1900) at Salem Fields Cemetery, Brooklyn, the cemetery of Temple Emanuel, the Isaac L. Rice Mansion (346 West 89th Street, 1901-03, a designated New York City Landmark) and the synagogue of Congregation B'nai Jeshurun (257 West 88th Street, 1917, Henry Herts and Walter S. Schneider).

 

After the partnership was dissolved in 1911, Tallant joined the firm of Lord & Hewlitt (which became Lord, Hewlitt & Tallant), while Herts continued on his own. Herts is not known to have designed any theaters after World War I, but he remained active as an architect. An expert in fireproofing (an important component of theater design), he aided New York's Fire Department in drafting the City's building code. He also served as architect for the Playground Commission of New York.

 

Herts and Tallant designed theaters together for just over a decade, and Herts did only a few more in the years immediately following, but they produced the finest surviving theaters in New York. Moreover, they influenced the architecture of the theater district well beyond their own few surviving structures by training Herbert J. Krapp, an architect in their office who went on to design numerous other Broadway theaters.

 

The Longacre Theater

 

Times Square, and the surrounding district, was originally called Long Acre Square because, as New York's horse and carriage district, it served a function parallel to London's Long Acre Street. The name came into use after 1872, when Manhattan's leading carriage manufacturer relocated from Broome Street to Broadway between 47th and 48th Streets. Brewster & Company still occupied that site in 1912 when Harry H. Frazee began construction of the nearby Longacre Theater.

 

Although Oscar Hammerstein I built the first Times Square theater as early as 1895, the district was slow to change. Its new playhouses were situated among horse exchanges, and later among automotive factories, and were flanked by "rows of drab apartment houses and dingy dwellings." Four of these three-story residences were razed to make room for the Longacre.^

 

Like David Belasco and other Broadway independent producers, Frazee built his theater in order to stage his own musical productions. Construction began on May 20, 1912, at an estimated cost of $150,000. It was completed one year later, more than $275,000 over budget.^ This miscalculation prefigured the many financial losses which Frazee was to suffer at the Longacre. Indeed, after a theatrically disappointing first season, foreclosure proceedings were initiated against him. In 1914 the Longacre passed to the L.A.T. Realty and Construction Corporation which had granted Frazee a $90,000 mortgage two years prior. He continued to produce (largely unsuccessful) shows at the Longacre until 1916, by which time the theater had been resold. The Shuberts took it over in 1925 and increased its seating. The necessary alterations to the orchestra were executed by Herbert J. Krapp, the Shuberts' preferred architect and former assistant to the Longacre's original designer.

 

Like most Broadway theaters, the Longacre barely survived the Depression. In 1942, after almost a decade of disastrously short runs, it was leased to WOR for use as a radio broadcasting studio. The Longacre returned to legitimate theater in 1953 when a renewed interest in live entertainment created an acute shortage of Broadway playhouses.

 

In marked contrast to the Longacre's checkered history is its architectural success. When the theater opened in 1913 it was applauded for its innovative auditorium, progressive stage design and completely fireproof construction of steel, terra cotta and reinforced concrete. The Longacre was considered "the most complete building for the purpose that would seem possible for the architect to design and the contractor to erect."12

 

The Longacre is Henry Herts's last known theater design. Reflecting its designer's French training and preferences, the theater's facade is an exceptionally handsome example of the neo-French Classic style. The piano nobi le, its major portion, is arranged as five bays framed by six fluted pilasters. The outer bays frame large, round-headed niches while each of the three center bays frames an enormous casement window, set within ornate terra-cotta embrasures. This formal classical facade is enlivened with a variety of unusual ornament. The pilasters are especially inventive: growing from the base of each, and extending a third of its height, is an ornately carved fountain surrounded by feathery acanthus. At the top of each fountain is a personification of drama enframed by strapwork almost Palladian in character. Each pilaster is completed by a lush capital at the center of which is an Assyrian-inspired winged genius.

 

Other ornament includes ornamental panels, a foliate cornice with projecting carved lion heads, foliate vases, strapwork escutcheons, and the inscription "THE LONGACRE THEATRE" in clear Roman letters.

 

According to early descriptions, the Longacre's facade was of "colored terra-cotta." Vintage photographs suggest that the original ground floor was faced in polychromatic tile, now hidden under a layer of concrete, painted to match the two terra-cotta-faced stories above. It is also possible that other ornamental features were likewise colored, much as they were on the Eltinge (now Empire) Theater (236-242 West 42nd Street), built to architect Thomas Lamb's design in the same year of 1913.

 

The opening of eight other Broadway theaters in the same unprecedented year as the Longacre may have helped reduce the publicity accorded to each. The Longacre's neo-French Classic style facade did not receive much notice in the press. The New York Times, however, described the Longacre as adding "a Cheerful touch of snap and cheer...to the old time structures formerly characteristic of the block."

 

The Longacre as a Playhouse^

 

During its sixty-four years as a legitimate theater, the Longacre has presented some 185 productions ranging from serious drama and farce to the musical comedies for which Harry Frazee had the playhouse constructed. To its credit are memorable performances by such actors as Hal Holbrook, Ethel Barrymore and Jean Stapleton and pre-Hollywood appearances by Clarke Gable, Thelma Ritter and New York favorite Fay Wray.

 

The Longacre opened its doors on May 1, 1913, with Frazee's production °f Are You A Crook? Intended as a parody on "crook shows" then in vogue, it closed after only twelve performances. The theater's first hit came in August with Adele, a delightful French comedy featuring William Danforth and Georgia Caine.

 

Following Adele, The theater suffered several failures before showcasing Frazee's production of A Fair of Sixes in March 1914. This hilarious farce by Edward Peple entertained 207 different audiences. In 1915, the opera world was the setting for Fred and Fanny Hutton's hit comedy The Great Lover, which ran 245 performances. The following year, William Collier "convulsed audiences" in James Montgomery's Nothing But the Truth. This enduring comedy became a favorite among stock companies and spawned several movie versions, including one starring Bob Hope. Nothing But the Truth was Frazee's last and greatest production at the Longacre.

 

Nothing But the Truth found a worthy successor in Leave It to Jane, a college musical with a witty book by P.G. Wodehouse and Guy Bolton and songs by Jerome Kern "at his winsome best." Bolton and his collaborator George Middleton provided the Longacre with another hit in 1919 with Adam and Eva starring Otto Kruger and Ruth Shepley.

 

In 1922 Ethel Barrymore leased the Longacre for a series of three plays. The first was Gerhard Hauptman's tragedy Rose Bernd for which the actress received rave reviews. Critics were less tolerant of her performance in Romeo & Jul iet, preferring instead Jane Cowl's triumphant Juliet of the same season. Miss Barrymore subsequently redeemed herself in 96 performances of The Laughing Lady in 1923.

 

The Longacre's next success and one of its greatest, running 38 5 performances in 1923-24, was the musical farce Little Jesse James, with Miriam Hopkins and Winifred Harris. In 1925, the Longacre featured the jazz musical Mercenary Mary and George S. Kaufman's show-business comedy, The Butter and Egg Man. In 1926 Morgan Farley, Katherine Wilson and Miriam Hopkins starred in a distinguished adaptation of Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy which ran 216 performances. The sophisticated German comedy The Command to Love with Basil Rathbone played 236 performances in 1927-28. Later in 1928 Richard Bennett and his daughter Joan appeared in the hard-hitting drama Jarnegan. A long period of flops followed, notwithstanding the frequently brilliant performances of Sylvia Sidney in Nice Women (1929), Clark Gable in Hawk Island (1927), Jessica Tandy and

 

Constance Collier in The Matriarch (1930) and Fay Wray in Niki (1931). Finally in February 1932, the Longacre had a hit with the aptly named Blessed Event with Roger Pryor starring as an egotistical Broadway columnist generally thought to have been modeled on Walter Winchell.

 

In March 1935, the revolutionary Group Theater took over the Longacre for two Clifford Odets one-act plays Waiting for Lefty and Til 1 the Day I ie. Starring Odets, Lee J. Cobb and Eliz Kazan, these achieved a respectable 135 performance run. In December, the Group returned with Odets' Paradise Lost played by an outstanding cast that included Stella Adler, Morris Carnovsky and Sanford Meisner.

 

A happier note was struck by Paul Osborn's On Borrowed Time with Dudley Digges as as grandfather who chases Death up a tree so he can have more time with his grandson. Selected by Burns Mantle as one of the Best Plays of the Year, it went on to play 321 performances. Unfortunately Osborn's Mornings At Seven with Dorothy Gish and Effie Shannon did not meet with equal success, closing after 44 performances in 1939, only to be revived in 1980, when it was greeted as an American classic and awarded a Tony.

 

In 1944, following the long-running production of Phoebe and Henry Ephron's wartime domestic comedy Three's a Family (497 performances) the Longacre was leased to Radio Station WOR. Among the shows originating there was Broadway Talks Back in which a panel of drama critics and theater people argued the merits of current productions.

 

The Longacre returned ~o legitimate use in October, 1953 with Armand d'Usseau and Dorothy Parker's Ladies of the Corridor. Other notable productions from the 'fifties include Lillian Hellman's adaptation of Jean Anouilh's The Lark (1955) with Julie Harris; Sam Locke's comedy Fair Game (1957) with Sam Levene and a promising young actresss, Ellen McRae, who was to become better known as Ellen Burstyn; and Sam Taylor and Cornelia Otis Skinner's The Pleasure of His Company (1958) with Cyril Richard, Walter Abel, Dolores Hart and Charles Ruggles.

 

In 1961, Zero Mostel won a Tony for his performance in lonesco's Rhinoceros. Later that year Ossie Davis' Pur1ie Victorius moved to the Longacre from the Cort for a long and successful run. Van Heflin and Sidney Blackmer appeared in A Case of Libel based on the Westbrook Pegler-Quentin Reynolds case in 1963. Gabriel Dell and Rita Morena starred in Lorraine Hansberry's The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window in 1964 and Hal Holbrook gave notable perforamnces in Mark Twain Tonight in 1966 and I Never Sang For May Father in 1968.

 

In 1975, Moreno returned to the Longacre in the hilarious comedy The Ritz, appearing for 400 performances with Jack Weston and Jerry Stiller. Julie Harris followed in 1976 with her one-woman show, The Be lie of Amherst, playing Emily Dickinson for 116 performances. Two notable productions had revivals in 1977: David Rabe's The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel with A1 Pacino, and Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice's Jesus Christ Superstar. The Fats Waller revue Ain't Misbehavin' opened in May 19 78, garnering a Tony for Best Musical, before moving to the Plymouth. In 1980 the Longacre presented Mark Medoff's Children of a Lesser God, which received Tony Awards for best play, best actress (Phyllis Frelich) and best actor (John Rubinstein). Its 887 performances established an all-time record at the theater. Subsequent productions have included a revival of Joe Efffl with Jim Dale and Stockard Channing.

 

Description^

 

The Longacre Theater has a symmetrically-organized neo-French Classic facade which is wider than it is high. The ground floor is of terra cotta, now stuccoed and painted, above a granite water table. Three central pairs of metal and glass entrance doors, each approached by a low step, are set below transoms and placed within deep reveals. Paired metal exit doors are set in reveals in the outer bays. Modern display boxes flank the door openings. At this ground floor level the wall rises from a projecting stone base. Decorative bands surmount the base. The ground floor is surmounted by a frieze adorned with foliate ornament. A modern marquee, suspended from metal tie-rods joined to original metal fasteners on the wall above, spans the three central doorways. Decorative lions-heads adorn the corners of the marquee. A mo 1 ding with faceted blocks sets off the major portion of the facade which is faced with white terra cotta.

 

This facade section is divided into five bays by fluted pilasters with stylized Corinthian capitals incorporat ing flowers and small winged figures. The base of each pilaster takes the form of a sty 1 ized p 1 ant ho 1 ding an urn from which rises a niche filled with a female figure representing Drama. She holds a scroll in her left hand and a mask in her right. The two outer bays are paneled; each contains a central niche (which is empty) carried on a corbel. The three central bays have double-height window openings, each with a tripartite window below a tripartite transom, now painted. The window si 1 are carried on brackets above reeded panels.

 

Each window surround has an eared architrave supporting a flower-adorned band and segmental-arch pediment filled with foliate ornament. The central window is now covered by projecting signs with the name of the theater. A wide frieze spans the five bays; each segment of it contains a central pane 1 flanked by round indented forms filled with stylized masks set on seallops, An entablature consisting of a frieze with fluted pane Is and the inscription, "THE LONGACRE THEATRE," a dentil course, and a modillioned cornice with sty 1 ized f o 1 iation and 1 ions -heads, sets off the uppermost story. Each of the five bays contains two window openings with three-over-three double-hung sash set in deep reveals. The reveals are enhanced by stylized foliation and medallions. Pilasters with sculpted urns from which grow plant forms flank the bays. A simple architrave and slightly stepped parapet terminate the facade. The side walls of the theater are visible from 48th Street.

 

These are of plain brick and contain randomly placed window openings and fire escapes.

 

Conclusion

 

The Longacre Theater survives today as on_ of the historic playhouses that symbolize American theater for both New York and the nation. Built for Broadway producer Harry H. Frazee, and among the earliest surviving Broadway theaters, it helped shape the character of the Broadway theater district. Designed for Frazee by Henry B. Herts, among the most prominent designers of Broadway theaters, the Longacre represents a special and important aspect of the nation's theatrical history. Its facade is an exceptional neo-French Classic style design, including a wealth of Renaissance-inspired terra-cotta ornament.

 

For three-quarters of a century the Longacre Theater has served as home to countless numbers of the plays through which the Broadway theater has come to personify American theater. As such, it continues to help define the Broadway theater district, the largest and most famous concentration of legitimate stage theaters in the world.

 

- From the 1987 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report

This image was shot at the Giants Causeway which is found on the North coast of Northern Ireland not far from the seaside town of Portrush.

 

Courtesy of the www.northantrim.com website:-

 

www.northantrim.com/causeway_stones.htm

 

Who discovered the Causeway? The discovery of the causeway has widely been attributed to the Bishop of Derry (Londonderry) who visited there in 1692 and subsequently brought word of its existence to the learned circles in Dublin and hence to the courts of London. A year later in 1694, a fellow of Trinity College, Sir Richard Bukeley, presented a paper to the Royal Society in Dublin which outlined this 'amazing' discovery and so started the debate on how it was formed Also in 1694 and contributing in depth to this debate were the Reverend Dr. Samual Foley and Dr.Thomas Molynuex. At that time theories abounded about its formation, from it being created by men with tools to a natural occurrence or by the giant 'Finn MacCool'. While the Bishop may have brought knowledge of its existence to a wider world, the first witnesses to this natural phenomenon would have been the hunter's and gatherer's who settled at Whitepark Bay after the last ice age (10,000 years ago), they would have travelled around the then densely forested north coast by boats and would have come across the causeway on their travels, perhaps from them that the enduring myth and legends of Finn MacCool arose.

 

Scientific facts - The causeway was formed during the early Tertiary period some 62 - 65 million years ago over a long period of igneous activity. Three lava outflows occurred known as the Lower, Middle and Upper Basaltic. Lulls occurred between the outflows as is evident in the deep inter-basaltic layer of reddish brown 'lithomarge' which is rich in clay, iron and aluminium oxides from weathering of the underlying basalt. The causeway area would have been situated in an equatorial region at that time, experiencing hot and humid conditions. This came about due to the fact that the earth's crust is floating on moving plates known as 'tectonic plates', these move slowly but over millions of years they can travel thousands of miles. The hexagonal columns of the causeway occur in the middle basalt layer, the same formations can be seen at Staffa in Scotland (Fingal's Cave) and they also occurs in the the surrounding landscape of North Antrim and in fact many other parts of the world.

 

The fascinating pattern that we see in the causeway stones formed as a result of rock crystallization under conditions of accelerated cooling, this usually occurs when molten lava comes into immediate contact with water, as happens today in Hawaii, the resulting fast accelerated cooling process causes cracking and results in what we see today at the causeway. For more information on volcanism please follow the link to the right where you will find references volcanic activities and their outcomes including 'column jointing' as occurs at the causeway.

 

The Causeway become widely known as the 'Eighth Wonder of the World' from the 1700s when large numbers of visitor's came to view this amazing array of basalt columns, it is estimated that there are around 40,000 in total. Today's visitor is free to wander over the stones but it was not always the case. Growing worldwide fame brought increasing numbers of visitors which inspired a syndicate to engage in a profitable charge scheme to view the stones at close hand. For over a century prior to this scheme, There had been disputes of access and ownership, the stones have been fenced off, access denied and several legal challenges made. However, in 1897 one lengthy legal battle between this syndicate and local people who objected took place, the High Court in London recognised that a road to the stones had existed for public access to the foreshore but turned down recognition of access over the stones. The Giants Causeway Company subsequently improved the site, fenced off the stones and levied a charge to view them at close hand. The Causeway came into public ownership in 1963 when it was bought by the National Trust but it is thanks to a small band of people who stood up for an ancient right of way in the late 1800's that has led to this free access today. A house once stood at the point where the mini-bus now turns round, a caretaker lived there to monitor the stones and turnstile, through the Giants Gate was a Victorian tea room - both have long since gone. There is nothing left of a two hundred year old tradition that existed amongst local people, who would set up small stalls along the pathway that leads to the causeway or the guides who would show you round or the boatmen who would row you round to Portcoon Cave or round past the Causeway to view the spectacular Amphitheatre.

Midtown Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States

 

The 21-story Look Building dates to 1948-50, when the minimalist aesthetics of European Modernism first began to transform the character of “setback” office buildings. Located on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets, this handsome mid-20th century modern structure combines tiers of ribbon-like windows with tightly-rounded corners and setbacks faced with white brick to create a unique and memorable silhouette.

 

Two second-generation, family-run, businesses were responsible for its construction: Uris Brothers, developers, and Emery Roth & Sons, architects. Though they first began to collaborate in the mid-1920s, it wasn’t until the death of each firm’s founder in the mid1940s, that the sons Percy and Harold D. Uris and Julian and Richard Roth, began to focus on commercial development. This informal partnership, which lasted until the 1970s, produced a great number of large Manhattan office buildings. Richard Roth, who attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, served as lead architect. Planned to be stylish and profitable, the building closely followed the requirements of the 1916 zoning code to maximize the square footage while using industrial materials to create sleek, streamlined elevations that suggest the influence of not only the German Expressionist architect Erich Mendelsohn, but also the 1931 Starrett-Lehigh Building and the 1947 Universal Pictures Building in Manhattan.

 

The new structure was named for Look magazine, which was part of the Cowles media empire. With a strong emphasis on photography, Look became one of the most widely-read magazines in the United States and it remained at this location until ceasing publication in 1971. Other prominent tenants included Esquire Magazine; Pocket Books; the music publisher Witmark & Sons, where singer-songwriter Bob Dylan made some of his earliest studio recordings; the industrial designer Raymond Loewy, and the building’s architects. During the late 1990s, a major and sympathetic restoration of the facade was undertaken by the architects Hardy Holzman & Pfeiffer Associates. At this time, the steel windows were replaced with similar aluminum frames and a new entrance portico was created. The Look Building was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2004 and the facade is subject to a conservation easement filed with the Trust for Architectural Easements.

 

DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS

 

Building Site

 

The Look Building, at 488 Madison Avenue, stands directly north of the St. Patrick’s Cathedral complex (1853-88, 1901-6, a designated New York City Landmark) and the Villard Houses (1882-85, a designated New York City Landmark). Prior to the First World War, this section of midtown Manhattan was primarily residential, with a mix of free-standing mansions, brownstone row houses, and a growing number of hotels.

 

Transit improvements, including the extension of the subway north along Lexington Avenue in 1918, as well as on Sixth Avenue in the 1930s, would attract commercial development to the area. While some elegant Fifth Avenue residences, including houses owned by George W. Vanderbilt (Hunt & Hunt, 1902-5), Morton & Nellie Plant (Robert W. Gibson, 1903-5), and Edward & Frances Holbrook (C. P.H. Gilbert, 1904-5), were converted to new uses around 1917, many structures were demolished and replaced by retail stores and office buildings. Rockefeller Center (begun 1931), which grew out of plans for a large performing arts center, was midtown’s most ambitious commercial ensemble, incorporating stores, offices, and entertainment venues.

 

In the vicinity of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, the Roman Catholic diocese of New York owned several structures, including the rectory and cardinal’s residence that flank the Lady Chapel on Madison Avenue, as well as the Villard Houses. It also owned the block on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets, where the Look Building would later be erected. This site was originally part of the Roman Catholic Asylum and in 1893 a three-andhalf-story Gothic Revival-style structure was erected to serve as a trade school for boys.

 

When much of the asylum’s property from Fifth Avenue to Park Avenue was sold in 1902, the structure became Cathedral College, a preparatory seminary to train men for careers in the priesthood. The New York Times called it “a midtown landmark which for two generations had offered a haven for quiet study and religious activities.” In 1942, the school moved to “modern facilities” on West End Avenue and 87th Street and the building was temporarily used by Catholic chaplains serving in the Second World War.

 

On East 51st Street, the Look Building stands beside a group of low-rise structures, including the former residence of contractor John Pierce (1904-5, a designated New York City Landmark). Designed by the prominent architect John Duncan, this five-story neo-Renaissance structure is clad with light-grey granite and was converted to commercial use after 1933. On East 52nd Street, the site adjoins 16 East 52nd Street (1926-27), a 15-story brownish brick building with limestone details, designed by Schwartz & Gross.

 

Uris Brothers

 

Uris Brothers, acting as Neprock Realty, Inc., negotiated the purchase of the L-shaped site from St. Joseph’s Seminary & College in October 1948 for $2.6 million. The demand for office space in midtown Manhattan was growing and this market became their primary focus. Percy Uris (1899-1971) and Harold D. Uris (1905-1982) were the sons of Harris H. Uris (born Urias, c. 1867-1945), a Russian immigrant from Latvia, who arrived in New York City in 1892. By the first decade of the 20th century, he and his brothers operated a large iron foundry at 525 West 26th Street (part of the West Chelsea Historic District) where a workforce of about 160 produced ornamental ironwork for the New York City subway system and other clients.

 

Percy Uris attended Columbia University, graduating with a degree in business administration in 1920. He and his father became commercial developers in the early 1920s, specializing in the construction of hotels and apartment buildings. Harold, who trained as a civil engineer at Cornell University, joined them in 1925. Together, they built numerous Manhattan structures, including the Court Square Building (Buchman & Kahn, 1925-26) at 2 Lafayette Street, 1 University Place (Emery Roth, 1929) at the corner of Waverly Place, and the Hotel St. Moritz (now the Ritz Carlton, Emery Roth, 1930-32) on Central Park South. They experienced great success but, like many of their contemporaries, struggled during the early years of the Depression and lost some of their best-known properties. In the late 1930s, they reentered the real estate field, hiring Emery Roth to design apartment buildings at 2 Sutton Place South (193738) and 930 Fifth Avenue (1939-40). Roth also designed 880 Fifth Avenue, their last residential project, in 1946-48.

 

Few of Manhattan’s leading builders of the 1920s remained active following the Second World War. The New York Times described the Urises as being, along with the Tishmans, the “only builders . . . who are descended from the leaders of the Nineteen Twenties boom.” Percy and Harold Uris would accomplish this by focusing almost entirely on office building construction. The forecast for this type of real estate was particularly optimistic and using the skills they learned with their father, they would, over the next three decades, create more than 13 million square feet of new office space. Time magazine reported in 1954 that they:

 

. . . made a fortune out of conforming to the latest taste in office buildings. Their recent constructions in Manhattan have been compared both to wedding cakes and to Assyrian ziggurats, and have more layers than the former, more bulk than the latter and about as much esthetic merit as both combined. Says Percy Uris: “We’re not building in a vacuum. We’re building in a market.”

 

The company’s productivity was a remarkable accomplishment, one that transformed the midtown skyline and streetscape. Harold Uris recalled:

 

We had a policy of creating the greatest amount of space for the lowest cost . . . We bought better and built faster than anyone else . . . Efficiency was the key to our success.

 

In terms of architectural aesthetics, however, their ambitions were modest. They produced a portfolio of buildings that were modern but hardly radical, fresh but conventional. In 1972, Uris explained:

 

I happen to believe that the interior of a building is more important that the exterior. None of the architectural people agree with me. But you build for those who occupy it, not for those who stand across the street and look at it. We have always built good buildings. I won’t say I am not a perfectionist. I can’t help it if people think every building should be the Taj Mahal.

 

In 1960, Uris Brothers issued stock to finance future projects which resulted in such colossal structures as the New York Hilton (1964), the Uris Building at 1633 Broadway (1970), and 55 Water Street (1972), which was at the time of completion the world’s largest office building. Shortly after the stock offering was made they began a series of major gifts to Columbia University which financed construction of a new building for the School of Business, called Uris Hall (Moore & Hutchins, 1961-62, altered). They also made significant contributions to Cornell University, Lenox Hill Hospital, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Following the death of Percy, Harold sold his stock in the Uris Buildings Corporation to the National Kinney Corporation in 1973.

 

Emery Roth & Sons

 

Both before and after the Second World War, the Urises turned to architect Emery Roth (and the successor firm Emery Roth & Sons) with great frequency to produce buildings that were stylish and profitable. Emery Roth, the firm’s founder, was born in Hungary in 1871 and came to the United States around 1884. His talent as a draftsman was quickly recognized and in the decade that followed he worked in Chicago with the architects Burnham & Root, and in New York City with Richard Morris Hunt and Ogden Codman, Jr.

 

In 1895 he opened his own office and later purchased the practice that would initially be known as Stein, Cohen & Roth. Many of New York City’s finest residential structures were designed by him, such as the Bellclaire Hotel (1901-3), Ritz Tower (1925-27, in association with Thomas Hastings), the Beresford (1928-29), the San Remo (1929-30), the St. George Hotel (1930) in Brooklyn Heights, and the Normandy Apartments (1938-39). Though his early works display rich and inventive exterior ornamentation, the character of his later buildings is more restrained, reflecting the growing popularity of the Art Deco and Moderne styles.

 

Roth first collaborated with the Uris family in 1924, designing the Buckingham Apartments, at the northwest corner of Sixth Avenue and 57th Street. It was during this decade that Roth’s sons, Julian and Richard, joined the firm. Julian Roth (1902-92) attended Columbia University and may have been a classmate of Percy Uris. Though not licensed as an architect, he “specialized in building materials, construction methods, cost estimates and the technology of curtain walls.” Richard Roth (1904-87) graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1928 and after briefly working with Allen & Collens in Boston, entered his father’s practice, which was renamed Emery Roth & Sons in 1938. Steven Ruttenbaum, author of Mansions in the Clouds: The Skyscraper Palazzi of Emery Roth, claimed this change had little impact on the firm’s operations and the elder Roth remained “the man who made the decisions, who maintained client contact, and set the fees. He shared the responsibilities of overseeing design development with no one.”

 

In the 1940s, however, ill health caused Emery Roth to relinquish control of the office. One of his last commissions was 300 East 57th Street, an 18-story tan brick apartment house. Built for developer Samuel Rudin in 1944-48, it featured unusual recessed terraces that were probably added by Richard who became the firm’s chief designer. This sleek project received a medal from the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects as one of the city’s best new residential structures. His next project was 505 Park Avenue (1948, altered), a 21story tan brick office building. Located at the northeast corner of 57th Street, the elevations had a strong horizontal orientation, with a “continuous glass front . . . to give a maximum amount of natural light.” This was the first of many buildings Richard designed for Uris Brothers, followed by 4 West 58th Street (1948-49), incorporating the Paris Theater, and 575 Madison Avenue (1948-50), between 56th and 57th Streets. Begun in January 1948, the latter building shares many features with the Look Building, such as a two-story base, white brick elevations, and continuous windows that “run entirely around the structure above the second floor level, providing maximum flexibility in the arrangement and subdivision of offices.”

 

These family-run businesses would remain closely aligned for several decades. Julian Roth later recalled:

 

Percy Uris would call me and say, Julian, I’ve just bought a plot of land. How soon can Richard have the plans ready?”

 

Emery Roth & Sons became one of New York City’s most prolific firms. As architect, or architect of record, they were involved in at least 150 structures after the Second World War. In 1967, reporter Thomas Ennis said that Roth has “earned most of the praise – or blame – for the way Manhattan’s business district looks today.” The firm developed a reputation for superior efficiency, employing mostly predictable formulas that maximized square footage and speed of construction. In addition, they collaborated on such high-profile projects as the Pan Am Building (1963, with Pietro Belluschi and Walter Gropius), the World Trade Center (1975, with Minoru Yamasaki), and the Citicorp Building (1978, with Hugh Stubbins & Assoc.). One writer observed: “It seems unlikely any firm in history has been responsible for so many tall buildings within such a short span of time.”

 

Designing the Look Building

 

Richard Roth began to prepare his scheme in late 1948 and the final drawings were completed in July 1949. Built on speculation, the Look Building needed to be fashionable, practical, and profitable. Throughout his career, Richard pursued a pragmatic approach to design. Not only did he try to maximize the square footage in buildings but he believed this type of plan created the kind of interior space favored by prospective tenants. When he addressed the Real Estate Board of New York in 1952, Richard urged architects entering the field to develop “a working knowledge of the various codes, laws, regulations, and ruling affecting buildings.” Though he acknowledged that slender towers could be dramatic and beautiful, he believed the market for offices on the smaller, upper floors was limited.

 

While higher rents may be obtained from tower floors, he said there are fewer good tenants for 5,000 square feet of space than there are for 15,000 square feet to 20,000 square feet.

 

The 1940s proved to be a transitional period in office building design and the Look Building combines characteristics associated with Streamlined Modernism, sometimes referred to as Art Moderne, and the International Style. In terms of massing, its shape was determined by the 1916 zoning resolution, which was conceived to protect access to light and air in Manhattan’s most crowded districts. To accomplish this, commercial buildings were required to set back at a certain height, which was determined by location and street width. Bulk was regulated and diminished in stages, creating wedding-cake-like silhouettes in which the uppermost floors could cover only 25 per cent of the lot. Slender towers, consequently, were discouraged on all-but-thelargest of properties.

 

While Roth’s setback massing was fairly conventional, stepping back at every other floor above the 12th story, the treatment of the elevations was somewhat new. Faced with industrial materials, the facade has a strong horizontal emphasis. The building’s developer, Percy Uris, defended this trend toward simplicity, saying:

 

The new facade, with its horizontal lines and absence of ornamentation is generally admired, but there are some who consider the modern exterior too severe. Actually, if a building has good lines, its simplicity will add to its beauty.

 

The Look Building has bands of ribbon-like windows that alternate with white brick spandrels. Roth was most likely influenced by two local projects: the Starrett-Lehigh Building (1930-31, a designated New York City Landmark) and the Universal Pictures Building (1945-47). Both structures feature continuous bands of fenestration that reflect contemporary interest in functional aesthetics and possibly the work of the German Expressionist architect Erich Mendelsohn, who immigrated to the United States in 1941. Many of his works had a distinctive streamlined appearance, such as the Rudolf Petersdorf Department Store (1926-28) in Breslau, which was illustrated in the New York Times in March 1931 under the headline “German Architecture Goes Modern.”

 

Of probable greater importance was the Universal Pictures Building, 445 Park Avenue, completed in 1947. Designed by Kahn & Jacobs, the project architect was Elsa Gidoni, who trained in Berlin and was later described as “highly attuned to the International Style work of Erich Mendelsohn.” Built on a comparable block-long site, this 21-story office building has similar bulk and massing, ribbon-like windows, terraces, and air conditioning. It was a great success and entirely rented prior to completion. Developer Paul Tishman asserted these amenities would increase “working efficiency” and “make it possible for tenants to obtain maximum use of space on each floor . . . there just won’t be any unusable areas.”

 

For the Look Building, Roth fine tuned many of these ideas. While the number of floors and massing is similar, the curved corners allow the windows and spandrels to flow without interruption. According to Percy Uris, this type of fenestration had various benefits. Not only did it provide better lighting and a sense of openness, but he believed it was part of:

 

. . . a real step forward in office planning. Where the space is used as a large open general office, the effect is light and cheerful. These windows also make for easy subdivision into smaller rooms with more flexibility than formerly possible when masonry and columns more or less determined individual office spaces.

 

Roth claimed that this approach would satisfy “status conscious tenants . . . because it permitted an even distribution of window space for executive offices, a matter of considerable importance to corporate tenants.”

 

The stacked, multiple curves give the elevations an organic, almost biomorphic quality. Marv Rothenstein, who worked for Uris Brothers, later wrote:

 

Everything about them was special, starting with the curved structural steel,

 

followed by curved concrete forms, curved bricks, curved window frames, and

 

curved glass.

 

The corners have a three-and-a-half foot radius and are faced with radial brick. In New York City, buildings with rounded corners are found in Lower Manhattan, where irregularly-shaped parcels provided architects with opportunities to emphasize specific vistas, facades, and entrances. Though concave and convex facades gained greater popularity in the late 1930s and were present in various pavilions at the New York World’s Fair, such features were rarely used in office buildings. It was, however, used to great advantage at the Starrett-Lehigh Building, as well as in Roth’s much simpler design for 505 Park Avenue. These streamlined buildings, however, have much wider curves and were erected with less costly “straight segments.”

 

Above the 12th story, the Look Building’s setbacks function as private terraces. These unbroken, wrap-around spaces were part of the original design, and appear in the blueprints at Avery Library, Columbia University, with glass doors and metal railings.

 

In contrast to Rockefeller Center, which had common landscaped gardens on the rooftops, these shallow outdoor spaces seem closer in spirit to residential terraces and, like the upper floors of the Cities Service Building (Clinton & Russell, Holton & George, 1930-32), 70 Pine Street in lower Manhattan, and the Universal Pictures Building, were reached from inside offices. Such amenities were also part of a broader trend after the Second World War to blur the boundaries between interior and exterior space.

 

To give the Look Building a stylish, modern appearance, Roth faced it with white brick. This material was introduced in the first decade of the 20th century but did not become popular until construction of Manhattan House (a designated New York City Landmark). Built by the architects Skidmore Owings & Merrill on East 66th Street in 1947-51, this 21-story structure is considered Manhattan’s earliest white brick apartment house, influencing the design of numerous imitators and possibly Richard Roth. Though some explained the popularity of this brick in practical terms, saying it was self-washing and would reflect light into the surrounding area, white was also strongly associated with the European avant-garde, particularly the early minimalist works of Le Corbusier and Alvar Aalto.

 

Construction

 

Plans for construction of a $6 million structure at 488 Madison Avenue were filed with the Department of Buildings in November 1948. Several months later, during February 1949, D.

 

E. H. Demolition began tearing down the former home of Cathedral College and excavation of the site began. The Harris Structural Steel Company began to deliver the steel components in June 1949 and by the end of August 1949 the framework was “topped” out. The New York Times reported that this was “considered a postwar record for steel erection.” According to Marv Rothstein, as many as seven four-men riveting teams were involved in the process. The concrete floors were finished in early September 1949, and shortly after, the white brick elevations. About four floors were enclosed each week. As this task progressed, the steel casement windows were installed. Once this job was completed, the interior plastering began. Tenants began to occupy the air-conditioned structure in early 1950.

 

Tenants

 

With Cross & Brown as the building’s rental agent, all of the office floors were leased by November 1949 – several months before construction was complete – and all of the retail space by May 1, 1950. This section of midtown Manhattan was a lively hub of media activity, especially around Rockefeller Center. Several magazines were early tenants, including Look, Esquire, and Seventeen. Look was launched by Gardner “Mike” Cowles, Jr., in Des Moines, Iowa, in January 1937. He consolidated the editorial offices at 522 Fifth Avenue, where it remained for a decade. Modeled on European picture magazines, it became a significant rival to Life magazine, which was based in Rockefeller Center, and by 1948 the magazine had a paid circulation of three million. Look would become the largest tenant, with offices on the 10th, 11th and 12th floors.

 

Uris Brothers agreed to name the building for Look in early 1950. Esquire, which claimed it was “embarrassed by the “new look,” took legal action to stop this, arguing that the change would “convey the false impression” that Esquire was “published or sponsored by the publishers of Look.” No action, however, was taken by the courts and until 1980 large capital letters spelled out “Look Building” on the mechanical tower’s south side. The 1950s would be heyday of Look’s popularity, reaching an estimated 21 per cent of all U.S. adults in 1961. It was the third most popular magazine in the nation and in 1963 it would sign a new lease, almost doubling its office space to more than 200,000 square feet. The New York Times Company purchased the Cowles Media Company in 1971, which included Family Circle and various regional newspapers.

 

Pocket Books, Inc., a division of Simon & Shuster, which published popular best sellers, was also an original tenant, as was the Music Publishers Holding Company, with such subsidiaries as Harms, Inc., Remick Music, New World Music, Advances Music, and Witmark & Sons. In Witmark’s fifth floor studio, a young Bob Dylan produced a series of important early demo recordings during 1962 and 1963.

 

Emery Roth & Sons joined the prestigious roster of tenants in April 1950. The New York Times reported that it was only the firm’s “fourth move” in fifty years and they occupied part of the 18th floor until the late 1950s. Three floors above, on the 21st floor, was Raymond Loewy, one of the 20th century’s most significant industrial designers, who appeared on the cover of Time magazine in October 1949 and would design the interiors of Lever House (a designated New York City Landmark), completed nearby at 390 Park Avenue in 1952. Later tenants have included the Institutional Investor and Abbeville Press.

 

Subsequent History

 

In April 1953, the property was sold to the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. Several months later, in August 1953, the building was leased back to Uris Brothers. Since the 1970s, it has been owned by the 488 Madison Avenue Associates (Feil Organization) and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

 

The two-story retail base was remodeled with tinted black glass and new shop entrances in the 1980s. Horowitz Immerman Architects were responsible for these alterations. The rest of the exterior was renovated with great sensitivity by Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates in 1998. Architect Malcolm Holzman (b. 1940) was the partner in charge of the project. He said that his main objective was to “keep the building as it is and not make it into something it will never be.” At the time, the original steel windows were replaced by similar aluminum frames and the glazed brick was cleaned. Additionally, about 20 per cent of the brick was replaced, as well as the original slate windowsills.

 

Interest in mid-20th century modern architecture was growing in the 1990s and the building’s careful restoration was described in a New York Times article, as well as in a small exhibition, New Life for a Modern Monument: A Salute to 488 Madison Avenue, organized by the Municipal Art Society in autumn 1998. The brochure’s text praised the owners and architects, commenting “The Look Building’s restoration shows how successfully the best postwar buildings can be updated, rewarding investors and delighting passerby.” In 2004, the Look Building was added to the National Register of Historic Places and the facade is subject to a conservation easement filed with the Trust of Architectural Easements.

 

Description

 

The Look Building stands on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets. It occupies an L-shaped lot, measuring 200 feet on Madison Avenue, 140 feet on 51st Street, and 75 feet on 52nd Street. Above the second story, the facade is mainly white brick. Continuous non-historic aluminum windows (late 1990s), three horizontal panes tall, extend continuously around the facade, starting at the west ends of the north and south facades. The center panes are operable and open out from the bottom. Above the 12-story base, every second floor sets back, climaxing with a mostly windowless tower, which incorporates horizontal louvers on the east front.

 

The two-story retail base is non-historic and dates to the late 1980s. It is divided from the third story on all facades by what appears to be charcoal-colored cast-stone panels, crowned by a curved aluminum molding. The two stories of glass panels are transparent or tinted black and the water table may be granite. The main entrance is at the center of the sloping Madison Avenue facade. There is a recessed passage that leads to a single revolving glass entrance door, flanked by conventional glass doors. The entrance passage is paved with contrasting light and dark gray granite. The exterior panels that face the street are polished black granite and the walls that flank the passage are light brown-and-black marble.

 

There is a ribbed aluminum ceiling with recessed lighting fixtures, as well as square service panel near center. Above the entrance passage is a wide non-historic aluminum marquee with curved corners and free-standing numerals (488) that identify the address. To the left (south) are three storefronts with recessed entrances. The one closest to the entrance has a horizontal aluminum sign with white lettering. At the corner of 51st Street is a revolving door with dark tinted glass. Directly to the right of this door is a conventional recessed store entrance. To the right (north) of the main entrance is a single storefront with clear glass windows. This storefront incorporates several horizontal aluminum signs with white lettering: on Madison Avenue, at the corner of 52nd Street, and on 52nd Street.

 

The Fifty-First street facade has four non-historic storefronts, at 19, 21 and 23 East 51st Street. The last address has two entrances. Most of the first-story businesses are identified above the storefronts with metal letters against black glass panels. Though most of the glass on the second story is tinted black, the windows nearest Madison Avenue are transparent. At the west end of the facade, a vertical banner is strung between two horizontal brass poles. A significant number of glass panels toward the west end of the second story have been replaced with horizontal metal louvers. Near the top of the 11th story, at center, a white horizontal box projects out from the facade. In addition, there are four vertical boxes attached at the corner above the third story. There is a fan-like security gate at the west edge of the 7th story.

 

Fifty-Second Street has a single storefront that extends around the corner from Madison Avenue. To the west of the last window is a single vertical panel of horizontal louvers. At the corner, above the aluminum sign, are two small black boxes with visible wires. The service entrance, with two metal doors that open outward, is located at the west end of the first story. At the middle of the 4th story, two of the upper windows have been replaced with horizontal louvers. Fan-like security gates have been installed at the west end of two of the uppermost floors.

 

- From the 2010 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report

As farms grew more profitable, and families grew, these old homes are frequently left on the land to simply decay on their own. Perhaps they are a testament to 'humble beginnings' or more likely they are simply left because the cost of removing them detracts from the benefits of having moved on.

celebnews.space/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/jennifer-lawre...

Jennifer Lawrence and Scarlett Johansson

  

The classification of the most profitable actors, the outputs of the week and the box office: all the news film of the week of April 1.

Hollywood, who loves the figures has just published the list of actors and the most profitable actresses of 2014 years...

 

celebnews.space/celebrity/jennifer-lawrence-and-scarlett-...

 

maggie Cohan

Grand Concourse, Bronx

 

The Andrew Freedman Home, one of the most impressive edifices built in The Bronx during the first decades of the twentieth century, was erected in 1922-24 (and enlarged in 1928-31) as a result of a generous bequest in the will of Andrew Freedman. Freedman, a capitalist who had a close relationship with the leaders of Tammany Hall, was involved with many profitable business ventures, notably the construction of the IRT, New York City's first subway line. He left most of his fortune for the establishment of a home for "aged and indigent persons of both sexes," but with the proviso that the residents of the home be poor people who had once been in good circumstances. The Board of Trustees, led by prominent lawyer Samuel Untermyer, purchased a large plot of land on the Grand Concourse, the most prestigious street in the Bronx, and commissioned a building from two notable New York architects - Joseph H. Freedlander and Harry Allan Jacobs.

 

The home is an exceptional example of a monumental building which, through its symmetrical massing, fenestration, and handsome detail, recalls the tradition of the Italian Renaissance palazzo. Its design displays many handsome architectural features, including a recessed loggia, balustraded terrace, finely cut stonework, and beautifully wrought, iron detail. The elegantly appointed building functioned as a refuge for the once affluent for fifty-nine years, from its opening in 1924 until 1983 when the Andrew Freedman Home ceased to operate and the building was purchased by the Mid-Bronx Senior Citizens Council as housing for the elderly.

 

The Grand Concourse

In 1874, when New York City annexed the West Bronx (the area west of the Bronx River officially known as the 23rd and 24th Wards, but generally referred to by nineteenth-century New Yorkers as the "North Side" or, more commonly, as the "Annexed District"), it was a sparsely settled region with few urban amenities.^ Following the annexation, residents of both Manhattan and the new wards advocated the establishment of large parks in the undeveloped region. In 1884, the New York State Legislature approved the purchase of approximately 4000 acres of parkland, primarily in the North Bronx. ^ This land was relatively inaccessible to most residents of the city since no roads or mass transit lines linked Manhattan to the new parkland. Thus, in 1890 the legislature established the Department of Street Improvements of the 23rd and 24th Wards with a mandate to lay out streets throughout the annexed district; the department's finest achievement was the Grand Concourse which made the new Bronx parks accessible from Manhattan.

 

The first commissioner of the new department was Louis J. Heintz who appointed Louis Risse as his chief engineer; it was Risse who was directly responsible for the planning of the Concourse. The inspiration for the Grand Concourse was the campaign waged by the Rider and Driver Club of New York City for the construction of a speedway on which its wealthy members could run horses and carriages. After facing opposition to the idea of a speedway along the west side of Central Park, the club began to advocate a speedway along Jerome Avenue in The Bronx. Heintz asked Risse for his opinion and, according to Risse,"... I was giving serious consideration to the necessity of supplying that missing link between the upper and lower park systems [Central Park and the Bronx parks] which the Commission had failed to provide in 1884.*"* Instead of Jerome Avenue, which is located on level ground near the Harlem River, Risse proposed that a "Speedway and Concourse" be erected on the ridge to the east.

 

The street that Risse proposed was to be more than just a speedway for pleasure driving and a convenient connection to the Bronx parks; it was also to be a luxurious residential boulevard. Risse contended that 'the great enhancement in real estate values which the construction of the Concourse must necessarily produce will repay the City many times over the original cost of the undertaking.*^

 

In fact, when Risse laid out the Concourse, he planned secondary roadways adjacent to the sidewalks that could be used by local traffic servicing the villas that were expected to appear along the roadway.

 

Plans for the new Grand Boulevard and Concourse (the name was later shortened to Grand Concourse) were drawn up in 1893. Construction began in 1897 and progressed slowly; the Concourse was not officially opened until November 25,1909. As originally constructed, the Grand Concourse consisted of a fifty-eight-foot wide central speedway with a narrow central mall and thirty-seven-foot wide service roads separated from the main roadway by six-foot wide malls (these malls were subsequently altered). It was planned to provide pedestrian sidewalks and promenades, bicycle paths, and vehicular driveways. The roadway began at Cedar Park on East 161st Street and extended north to Mosholu Parkway. In 1924, the Concourse was extended to the south as far as East 138th Street.

 

The large freestanding villas that Risse had envisioned were never built. Rather, apartment houses became virtually the exclusive type of residential construction along the Concourse when real estate development began in the second decade of the twentieth century. These buildings include modest five-story walk-ups and more impressive six-story elevator buildings. In addition to the apartment houses, a few public and institutional buildings were erected along the Concourse; the Andrew Freedman Home is the largest on the original length of the street.^

 

Andrew Freedman

The Andrew Freedman Home was founded as a result of an unusual bequest in the will of wealthy capitalist Andrew Freedman (1860-1915). Freedman was a native New Yorker who was educated in the city's public schools before beginning employment in a local dry goods store. He dabbled in law before entering the Held of real estate. Freedman was extremely successful in his real estate ventures, "by ways," according to one biographer, "that are no longer traceable

 

Freedman was allied with the Democratic party and with the leadership of Tammany Hall. He was a close friend and advisor to Tammany boss Richard Croker and was intimately involved in many financially lucrative Tammany schemes, although the exact nature of most of Freedman's financial dealings remains a mystety. An example of the financial alliance between Croker and Freedman came to light in 1900 during a New York State Assembly investigation into New York City's government. Freedman was a vice-president of the United States Fidelity & Casualty Company which bonded New York City employees. He obtained this bonding contract through Croker's influence. When questioned about this arrangement, Freedman admitted that he presented a portion of his commissions to Croker though he refused to say how much money had exchanged hands, telling the investigator 'that I wouldn't care to tell you because I don't want to let you know how much money I carry on my person.'**

 

Freedman was also a key player in the construction of the original subway line built by the Interborough Rapid Transit Company. His obituary opens by stating that he "did more perhaps than any other man to make possible the subway system in this city."*° However, Freedman's involvement was primarily behind the scenes. In a speech delivered at the opening ceremonies for the subway, August Belmont, the system's principal financial backer, commented that Freedman, although unheralded, deserved a fair share of the praise and credit since he was "among the first to appreciate the practicability of the project."**

Exactly what role Freedman played in the construction of the IRT and how this relates to Tammany Hall is not clearly understood. The story that is generally told is that it was he who brought the contractor John B. McDonald and financier August Belmont together. One version of the story recounts that Freedman urged McDonald to bid on the subway contract, promising him financial backing. He then formed a group that put up $150,000 for the bid and when additional financing was needed, persuaded August Belmont to become the project's major backer.*^ A variant has it that MacDonald went to Freedman requesting that he assist in raising the necessary deposit of $150,000. Freedman pledged $45,000 of his own money and found four friends willing to invest. On the day that the deposit was due, the group was still short $50,000 when Freedman thought of Belmont, another loyal Tammany supporter, who immediately "arranged

for the cash,. .. without reading the contract, and without any further talk."

 

There is probably little truth in these dramatic stories of three heroic individuals (McDonald, Freedman, and Belmont) selflessly advancing money for the great subway construction project. As Wallace B. Katz has noted in his detailed investigation of the subway's construction, "this is a wonderful story, one that deserves to be part of the folklore of American Capitalism, but it lacks plausibility."**

 

Freedman, Belmont, McDonald, and the other four investors were all Tammany leaders and were undoubtedly well acquainted with each other. Tammany's involvement in the bidding was well known. In January 1900, when the bids for subway construction were received, the financiers' names were not known, but it was reported in the Mm York 7vHM that McDonald was "a Tammany contractor."*^ Katz concludes that "Belmont, McDonald, and Freedman maintained their stOTy concerning the origins of their partnership during the next twenty years, through civil suits and governmental investigations.... [since] it allowed the participants to this deal to deny what was both plausible and very likely true, that Belmont, Tammany, and the RTC [Rapid Transit Commission] had prearranged the entire matter."*^ Freedman continued to be closely involved with the subway, in particular as a director of companies responsible for much of the construction work.*^

 

The construction of the IRT was not Freedman's only major financial project. He was, for example, involved with the Shuberts in the construction of Broadway theaters. The Booth (1912-13), Shubert (1912-13), 44th Street (1912-13; demolished), and Little (1912; now Helen Hayes) theaters are said to have been financed by a syndicate composed of Freedman, lawyer Samuel Untermyer (see below), and Cincinnati political boss George B. Cox.*^ To his contemporaries, Freedman was probably best known as the owner of the New York Baseball Club, commonly known as the "Giants," from 1894 until 1902. Freedman's tenure as owner of the Giants was not without conflict, as reported by Harold Seymour in his history of baseball:

Freedman's irascible personality,

quick temper, and aggressiveness

had him in constant trouble. . . . His turbulent years as Giant owner (many charged that he was only a front man for others) kept the League in constant turmoil, and made the New York observation that he had "an astonishing faculty for making enemies* seem like a gross understatement.

 

The Andrew Freedman Home

On December 8,1915, several weeks after his death, Andrew Freedman's will was made public.

 

Freedman left a sizable bequest to his brother Daniel, established a trust for his mother and sister, left small amounts of money to seven local homes and hospitals,^ and gave gifts to friends, including a bequest of a pair of large white pearl shirt buttons to Richard Croker. The bulk of Freedman's estate was to be used for the incorporation of the Andrew Freedman Home "for the free and gratuitous reception, shelter, nourishment, care and maintenance of aged and indigent persons of both sexes, and without regard to race or religious creed... [with the proviso that the selection of residents be confined to those].. . who have been in good circumstances but by reason of adverse fortune, have become poor and dependent, and that in case of husband and wife being received into the institution, provisions shall be made so that they may dwell together therein."^ The initial bequest to the new home totalled approximately $5,000,(XX) with additional funds to be added to the trust upon the death of his mother and sister.

Exactly why Freedman established this rather unusual charitable institution when he drew up his will in 1907 is not known. According to DeLancey Nicoll, a business associate of Freedman's, speaking at the opening ceremonies for the Andrew Freedman Home, "I always urged that he give his money to the unusual charities. He would say: 'No: the sick and the poor are cared for by everybody else now. Nobody has offered any refuge for people of this kind, and they need one even more than other unfortunates.'"^ His sister, Isabella Freedman, explained that "he believed that the worthy habits and traditions of affluence and refinement deserve recognition and

respect, and that people possessing them should not be allowed to live in penury.*^

 

The man most responsible for the organization of the Andrew Freedman Home and the construction of its building was Freedman's friend, business partner, and executor Samuel Untermyer (1858-1940). Untermyer, who became the first president of the Home's Board of Trustees, was one of the most prominent lawyers of his time. He was also close to the leaders of Tammany Hall and it is probably through this political connection that Untermyer and Freedman became friends.

 

Untermeyer developed Freedman's concept of a home for the once wealthy into one that sought to assist those who had not only been affluent, but were also cultured "gentlefolk." The qualifications for admission promulgated by the original trustees stated that, "the Home is intended for aged and indigent gentlefolk. This has been interpreted by the Board of Directors (sic) to mean that the applicants are to be persons of culture, education, and refinement."^ Although Freedman had ordered the novel requirement that couples be allowed to live together, it was Untermyer and the trustees who decided that admission to the home would be primarily for couples. Additional requirements were that new residents had to be between the ages of sixty and eighty, in good health, and had to have enough money for clothing and other personal expenses. With the exception of the personal allowance, all facilities, including room and board, were free.

 

In 1916, the Trustees obtained a Special Act of the Legislature that incorporated the home.^ The site, a large block bounded by the Grand Concourse, Walton Avenue, East 166th Street, and McClellan Street, was purchased by the Andrew Freedman Home in 1917.^ Construction was delayed by World War I and did not actually begin until 1922.^ The original section of the Home, the Italian Renaissance-inspired central pavilion designed by Joseph H. Freedlander and Harry Allan Jacobs, was dedicated on May 25, 1924. At the opening ceremony it was announced that "two wings would eventually be added to the present building."^ Construction of the north and south wings began in 1928. Instead of Freedlander and Jacobs, architect David Levy was commissioned to design the additions

Although an institution, the Andrew Freedman Home was planned to be as much like a private house as possible. The interiors (not subject to this designation) were decorated by the prestigious interior design firm of L. Alavoine & Co. Public facilities on the first floor included a large living room "which in its decorations and its furnishings is all that might be expected in a fine and expensively equipped private home" (it had Georgian style furniture, chandeliers, and fireplace); an oak-paneled library; card and billiard rooms; and a spacious dining room decorated with chinoiserie.^ Sleeping rooms were located on the second and third floors. Married couples could live in a double room with a private bath or in two single rooms with a shared bath; single people also had their own rooms, but two singles shared a bath. Those who lived in the home were never referred to as 'inmates* (a word often applied to people living in institutions), but were always called "members," as if they resided in a private clubhouse.

 

In exchange for free residence in the home, members had to abide by a series of rules. Among the rules were those that forbade tipping or reprimanding the employees, required all meals be taken in the dining room (only tea, coffee, and related snacks could be eaten in private rooms), and permitted members to take a vacation of up to four weeks per year.^

 

The first seventeen "members" -- five couples, five single women, and two single men - moved into the home in July, 1917. Although the contemporary press referred to the home as a retreat for former millionaires, the early residents mostly came from more modest backgrounds: jeweler, dressmaker, doctor, nurse, teacher, businessman, etc.^* Others who moved in later included engineers, politicians, actors, opera singers, and journalists. In the years before the home closed, many residents were German and Austrian Jewish refugees. At its peak, after the completion of the side wings in 1928, the home could accommodate about 130 residents.

 

The Architects^

 

The two architects who were responsible for the design of the original section of the Andrew Freedman Home, Joseph Henry Freedlander (1870-1943) and Harry Allan Jacobs (1872-1932), were, by the 1920s, well-known members of New York's architectural establishment. This is the only project on which the two collaborated, although they undoubtedly were familiar with one another. Both architects were about the same age and both had attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. They were members of many of the same professional organizations, including the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects and the Architectural League of New York.

 

Joseph Freedlander was the more prominent and more talented of the two designers. He was bom in New York City and studied at M.I.T. before entering the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. In 1895 Freedlander became one of the first three Americans to actually complete the Ecole curriculum and receive a diploma.^ He retained a deep affinity for the Ecole and for Beaux-Arts practices. Shortly after returning to New York he established an afcRfr that reproduced the French system of training.^ Later, he served as president of the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects and was a founder and president of the American Soci6t4 des Architected Dipl6mes par le Gouvemement Franca is (American Group), organized by those who had received Ecole diplomas.

 

Freedlander was proficient in designing many different types of buildings and able to utilize diverse historic architectural styles. His Ecole training allowed him to excel in competitions, and many of his commissions were won in this manner. Among Freedlander's extant buildings in New York City are those for the New Harlem Hospital (1905, with later additions, demolished in part), the George Engel House at 17 East 74th Street (1920-21; located within the Upper East Side Historic District), the French Institute of the United States at 22 East 60th Street (1924), and the Museum of the City of New York (1928-30; a designated New York City Landmark). Outside of New York, he won competitions for the St. Louis Club (1897); the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers in Johnson City, Tennessee (1904); the Perry Memorial and International Peace Memorial (1912-15) at Put-in-Bay on Lake Erie near Cleveland; the Portland Auditorium, Portland Oregon (1912); and the White Plains Municipal Building (1924-26).

 

He was also responsible for a major expansion of the spa at Saratoga Springs (1933-36). In addition, Freedlander designed three of the largest buildings erected in the Bronx in the 1920s and early 1930s -- the Freedman Home, the Bronx County Building (1931-35), and the Bronx County Jail (1931 37), the last two designed in association with Max Hausle.

 

Harry Allan Jacobs was also a native New Yorker. He studied at the Columbia School of Mines and then at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and was a winner of the American Academy's Prix de Rome. Although he designed commercial buildings, his specialty was town houses, including sixteen buildings and facade alterations in what is now the Upper East Side Historic District.

 

Freedlander and Jacobs probably became associated on the design of the Andrew Freedman Home through their personal contacts with important members of the home's Board of Trustees. Samuel Untermyer had been one of Joseph Freedlander's earliest clients. Shortly after Freedlander opened his office, he was commissioned by Untermyer to redesign Greystone, his home in Yonkers.^ One of Harry Allan Jacobs's first town houses was the Charles S. Guggenheimer House at 129 East 73rd Street of 1907 (this house is in the Upper East Side Historic District). Guggenheimer, who was a member of the Board of Trustees, was the son of Samuel Untermyer's half-brother and law partner Randolph Guggenheimer.^

 

Little is known about David Levy, the architect of the wings. He was in independent practice ior a brief period between 1928 and 1933.^ His most notable commission was the Jewish Theological Seminary (1930), where he was associated with the firm of Gehron, Ross & Alley.

 

Design of the Andrew Freedman Home

 

The Andrew Freedman Home is characteristic of the traditional design found in New York during the 1920s. Almost all of the New York architects in the forefront of their profession during that decade had studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts or in American architecture schools with Beaux-Arts curricula. Many had also traveled extensively in Europe and had a first-hand knowledge of the great monuments of that continent. Freedlander and Jacobs were both well trained and well traveled, and their design for the Andrew Freedman House reflects their Beaux-Arts education and the influence of European architectural precedents.

 

Following principles expounded at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, the Andrew Freedman Home is a building rooted in the traditions of European architecture. It is not, however, a copy of a specific building from the past. The design borrows freely from Italian Renaissance precedents, rearranging forms into a regularized and rigidly symmetrical composition. The major inspiration is the Palazzo Famese in Rome (c.1535) with its three-story massing, long thirteen-bay wide facade organization, and its ^tano ncMf articulated by rectangular windows with alternating triangular and segmentally-arched pediments.

 

While the Palazzo Famese was clearly the prototype, many other features of the home differ from the model: the somewhat elongated rustication of the first-story openings resembles that around the second-story windows of the Palazzo Gondi, Florence; the lamps flanking each entrance are modeled on that at the corner of the Palazzo Strozzi; and the tripartite arched loggia overlooking Walton Avenue resembles arcades, porches, and loggias found on many Italian Renaissance buildings. Not only does the design successfully combine features from a number of Renaissance precedents, but it also melds the rectilinear, balanced form of Italian Renaissance urban palazzi, such as the Palazzo Famese, with the setting and terraces of a rural villa. While the design relies on historical sources, the construction technology was modem; the Home is a steel-frame, fireproof structure with concrete floors and terracotta and brick partitions.

 

Description

 

The Andrew Freedman Home is located on a sloping site on the west side of the Grand Concourse; Walton Avenue is at a considerably lower elevation than the Concourse. The lot has a varied topography with a major rock outcropping near East 166th Street. Stone and concrete retaining walls run along the south and west sides of the lot and along the Grand Concourse just north of 166th Street. The building is sited near the west side of the lot, close to Walton Avenue, with a lawn and garden separating the home from the Concourse. The building is three stories facing the Concourse and four stories facing Walton Avenue. The structure consists of the original rectangular section dating from 1922-24 and the rectangular north and south wings added in 1928-31.

 

The original building is a symmetrical structure separated from the garden by a wide terrace with limestone balustrade railings. A broad flight of stone stairs, set in the center of the terrace, extends into the garden. At either end of the terrace are subsidiary stairs that connect with pedestrian walkways leading from the Concourse. Carved stone urns flank each of the stairs. The home is clad entirely in pale limestone/* The front facade of the original section is thirteen bays wide, with a rusticated ground story and smooth limestone ashlar above; quoins mark each of the comers of the building. The first story is articulated by round-arched openings, including windows with multipane wood casement sash and fixed wood transoms and a pair of entrances set into the shallow projecting fourth and tenth bays. Each entrance arch has a projecting keystone that visually supports a balustrade railing. Set within the entrances are omate iron double doors with iron transoms; pairs of iron lamps flank the entrances.

 

These wrought-iron elements and the iron canopies and window guards found elsewhere on the building were the work of FerTO Studio, Inc. The windows light the library (at the south end of the facade), the card room (at the north), and the living room (in the center).

 

Two modest beltcourses separate the first and second stories. The rectangular second-story windows, with their multipane wood sash, are alternately capped by segmentally-arched and triangular pediments, each supported on modest brackets. The rectangular, multipane, third-story windows have no enframements. The facade is crowned by a deep copper cornice with a tall parapet that hides the fourth story. Three tall chimneys rise above the slightly sloping roof.

 

The side elevations of the original section, which are now concealed by the wings, were originally three bays wide and continued the main design features of the front facade. Balconies projected in front of the central windows on the second and third stories of the north elevation.^

 

The rear facade of the original section, facing Walton Avenue, is a full four stories tall (plus the attic level set behind the parapet) and is massed with two-story projecting three-bay wide arms at either end. The ground story is the main entrance for those arriving by automobile. The driveway begins on McClellan Street, near Walton Avenue, and extends to a wide turn around in front of the central entrance. The rusticated ground story has a rectangular entrance with iron doors and a transom and an iron canopy (a wooden shelter has been constructed beneath this canopy). Flanking the entrance are pairs of rectangular windows with omate iron grilles. The focal point of this facade is a triple-arched loggia with French doors and iron railings located above the entrance. The loggia is flanked by niches and pairs of round-arched windows. The upper stories are articulated in a manner identical to that on the front.

 

The concrete retaining wall along Walton Avenue is pierced by the entrance to a passage that connects to the basement of the building, allowing goods to be delivered and garbage to be removed without disturbing the residents.

 

The north and south wings were designed in a style to match the original building. They are also clad in stone, but the stone is of a somewhat more yellow shade. The front facade of each of the two wings is six bays wide and is articulated in a manner similar to the original section. The openings of the first story of the north wing take the same form as those of the original building. In the south wing, the first story has six rectangular windows set within blind arches; three smaller rectangular openings also articulate this story. The upper stories of the wings have crisply-cut rectangular windows; there are no pediments at the second-story openings. As on the first story, each upper story of the south wing contains three smaller openings.

 

The rear facades of the wings are not symmetrical. The ground story of the north wing contains a mix of large and small windows and a single door. On the first story are round-arched windows (lighting the dining room) of the same type seen on the front facade. The two upper stories contain three groups of windows without enframements, each consisting of two large openings separated by a smaller window. The McClellan Street elevation of this wing is three bays wide and is articulated in a manner identical to that on the front elevation of this wing, except that the central window on the second story is capped by a pediment. On the rear facade of the south wing, the ground story also has openings of varying sizes, while the first story consists of rectangular windows set within the same type of blind stone arch seen on the wing's front elevation. Large and small windows alternate on the upper stories.

 

The south elevation, set on a rock outcropping high above East 166th Street, has a central door in the basement flanked by windows. The first story contains windows set in blind arches, while the central window on the second story is accented with a pediment.

 

The Andrew Freedman Home continued to serve its original function until 1983, when the increasing cost of maintaining the facility forced the home to close.^ The building was purchased by the Mid-Bronx Senior Citizens Council, a private not-for-profit organization that sponsors senior citizen housing projects in the Bronx. According to the Council's executive director at the time of the purchase: "our reopening of the home will insure the legacy of Andrew Freedman will continue to serve as a symbol of human dignity, but this time in a more universal sense because residents will come from different walks of life."** Although the building remained vacant for a period after its purchase by Mid-Bronx, it is now, once again, in use and its elegant rooms continue to serve the elderly.

 

- From the 2000 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report

Florida Keys Vacation Homes

can be a profitable investment

an invterview with Cathy Sheehan

 

Florida Keys vacation homes and investment properties are a topic many of our Readers are interested in. There’s something magical about owning a piece of property in this tropical paradise. Whether you’re looking to buy a vacation home, a permanent home, or a vacation rental property, the timing couldn’t be better.

Towards that end, I believed it was important to have a conversation with a Realtor who was well versed with the Florida Keys market as a whole. Someone who knew the region inside and out, and who could provide facts, figures, and helpful insight on Florida Keys vacation homes, investment properties, and home purchases.

 

Lela Ashkarian is a well respected Realtor with a 13 year, highly successful career. Only someone of her caliber could bring the knowledge and guidance we needed to share with our Readers. I believe you’ll find her interview to be informative and beneficial if Florida Keys vacation homes are an option for you.

 

Not only is Ms. Ashkarian a well respected Realtor, she has authored several books. Her latest, “The Crossing”, captures the essence of a young woman on the brink of disaster yet imbued with determination to more than survive, to thrive. She has taken the determination she needed to leave her war torn country, and applied that to building a successful career in real estate in the Florida Keys.

 

Her story takes her from the embattled shores of Lebanon to the palm-studded beaches of Key West, and in her autobiography she weaves a fascinating and inspiring story of courage, ambition, and transformation. The title Ms. Ashkarian chose for her latest book symbolizes many successful crossings in her life—spiritual, emotional, financial, and physical—affording the reader an opportunity for self-examination in the mirror of her amazing life.

 

I believe you find that the thoughtfulness Lela has put into her latest book is also seen in her answers to the following questions we asked her about real estate in the Florida Keys.

 

FKV: Out of all of the Florida Keys, which of the Keys is the most affordable for investment properties?

  

LA: There are certain areas or pockets of areas starting from Key Largo to Key West that have subdivisions where for example you could buy a little mobile home on a canal from $250,000 to $350,000. There are also areas like Islamorada, Marathon and the lower Keys, especially Big Pine area, where for $350,000 you can get good piece of land, and a nice two bedroom/2 bath single family home. It really depends on a buyer’s definition of affordable and where they want their Florida Keys vacation home, permanent home, or investment properties to be located.

  

FKV: That’s good information because each of our visitors will have different criteria regarding Florida Keys vacation homes and investment properties. Your answer provides them with a helpful guideline to work within. Knowing what you just said, and with real estate being what it is in this downturn of a market, is there any particular Key that would be better at holding it’s value over another?

  

LA: For Florida Keys vacation homes, investment properties and home sales, there are certain pockets of the market that have retained their value. To name a few, Key Colony Beach which is in the heart of the Florida Keys. Duck Key which has beautiful luxury homes, and Shark Key which is about 7 miles east of Key West. In the Upper Keys other such places are Islamorada, Plantation, and Key Largo. Other parts of the islands where they have kept their identity will hold value as well. These are the places are that are also going to appreciate faster than other areas in the Keys such as Big Pine or Ramrod.

 

FKV: Ramrod and Big Pine won’t hold their value as well, is that what you’re saying?

  

LA: I wouldn’t say it that way exactly. Their appreciation down the road would be about 2% - 3% on average. If they someone was buying Florida Keys vacation homes, investment properties or homes in Islamorada, Lower Matecumbe, Duck Key, Key Colony Beach, or Shark Key - those are the areas that would probably appreciate 4.5% - 5.5% in the years to come.

  

FKV: That’s good to know. So basically, if you’re in Islamorada or Lower Matecumbe you’ll have a higher appreciation rate on Florida Keys vacation homes and other properties than if you were in Ramrod?

  

LA: Yes, that’s correct.

  

FKV: Over the last few years, the real estate market in the United States has substantially dwindled. How do you feel the Florida Keys compares to the rest of the State of Florida in terms of the recovery process that’s just beginning?

  

LA: That’s a very good question. Our market dove in 2005, 2 - 3 years before the nation’s market really took it’s dive. This was because of Hurricane Katrina and Wilma. When these hurricanes passed through, consumers started to become concerned about investing in Florida Keys vacation homes and other types of properties. In 2007 when the economy took a major down turn, and the entire nation took a dive in the real estate market, our market had already dived 2 years earlier. Over the last 4 years our average list price declined -26% .

  

Now we’re leading the nation again but in a positive way. Our market is turning upward 2 years earlier than it is in the rest of the country. For example, the number of properties for sale decreased -10% to 3,359 from 3,752 in December 2010.

  

Something else that’s worth looking at is the original list price to sale price which is the price of the property when it was first listed. For the year 2011 that was 76.48%. The final list price to sale price, which is the price of the property at the time of obtaining a contract that resulted in the sale, did not change from 2011 at 90.97% compared to 2010 at 90.77%.

  

FKV: You said the Florida Keys are about 2 years ahead of the recovery process compared to the rest of the nation. So you’re already seeing some improvement. Does this mean that you don’t have as much inventory for Florida Keys vacation homes, and investment properties as you did a couple of years ago? And is the inventory starting to get picked over making it hard to find a really good buy?

  

LA: Investment properties, Florida Keys vacation homes, permanent homes all lost their value. It wasn't in just specific islands, it was certain areas such as Key West, Marathon, Big Pine Lower Keys have considerably lost their value by as much as 33% - 40% . They all took a serious dive. So after 2009 - 2010, and the following 2011 and 2012, the number of property sales decreased minus 10%. So between 2006 - 2009 we had 4,700 properties in Key West, now we have 3,500 properties in all of the Florida Keys.

  

If you look at the months of inventory, which is the months required to sell the existing inventory on December 31, 2011 if no other properties are placed on the market for sale, it decreased by -21% to 20 months or 1 year, 8 months and this is excellent. This absorption quotient measures the relative health of the market and provides a measure of the relationship between the number of listings and rate of sales. Simply put, if you looked at the current trend as a graph you’d see that it has turned upward in sales and downward in listings.

  

FKV: That’s good news. So there’s reasonable inventory for people looking for Florida Keys vacation homes, investment properties and permanent homes to pick through. Do you feel that it’s starting to become more of an equal buyer’s - seller’s market. That it’s not just favoring the buyer as much anymore?

  

LA: I believe it will take another 6 months if the market keeps going like it is, and then they’re will be 2,400 listings between Key Largo and Key West. This is when the market will equalize. We will then have more of a balance of harmony between buyers and sellers. It’ll probably be another 2 years before this changes and then becomes more of a sellers market. Any buyers waiting til then will have missed out on a chance to buy investment properties that had once been really high and then had the big price reductions. They’re going to miss out on that opportunity to buy Florida Keys vacation homes and other investments and they’re going to say, “I wish I..., I could have..., I should have...”

  

FKV: So what’s happening right now is that a buyer can still pick up some of those premium Florida Keys vacation homes, and other investment properties that just a few years ago were prohibitive. The kinds of property people usually only dream about, because they don’t believe they can afford them. They’re still out there right now, correct?

  

LA: Yes, and I’d like to give you an example of a property that I just closed on Friday. I call it a trophy property. That property cost the seller $4 million. It has beautiful water views, is a 4 bedroom, 4 bath home, and the property closed on Friday for $1,750,000 including furniture. My buyers were ones I had in my database, past clients, and they knew that they were going to miss it, if they didn’t buy it now. The trophy properties are selling very good, and they’re still some great choices because there are 3,500 listings throughout the Keys. Anyone interested in Florida Keys vacation homes, permanent homes, or investment properties at these great prices needs to come down now.

  

FKV: Obviously one of the things that everyone dreams about is owning Florida Keys vacation homes on the water. Open water preferably. Of course there’s also only so much land on water available so it’s always at a premium. When someone is looking to buy water property, what would be a guideline to expect to pay for a low end vs a high end?

  

LA: Let’s take a closer look at the area. I’d be very comfortable saying that the average sale price for 2011 was $404,000 between Key Largo and Key West. Now in Key Colony Beach, you could get a nice half of a duplex, 2 bedroom 2 bath, walk in from the beach. A buyer could get a place like that for between $400,000 - $425,000 - $500,000. I’m concentrating on Key Colony Beach for this example because this is the paradise people who come down here love. They love it for the beach, the canals, and because of the community, so they could pick up a very nice half of a duplex for $425,000.00.

  

FKV: What about purchasing a single family dwelling as a Florida Keys vacation home. How much more would they have to pay for a home over half a duplex?

  

LA: In let’s say Key Colony Beach, Duck Key, or Marathon, a nice 3 bedroom 2 bath single family dwelling that could be turned into a vacation rental property would rent from $1800 - $2500/week. That house is going to cost a buyer between $850,000 - $950,000 on a canal.

  

FKV: Some buyers purchasing a Florida Keys vacation home may want to do just - treat them as investment properties. They could keep it as a vacation rental property for some of the year, and then use it part of the year for themselves. I know you do not handle property management, but are people very successful with renting their Florida Keys vacation homes out in the summer months? Are they successful with renting year round as well, or is it typically just the winter months that are productive for people to rent our their Florida Keys vacation homes?

  

LA: To give you some very good news we have 3 property managers in our office at Coldwell Banker Schmitt who handle Florida Keys vacation homes and other properties. We’re considered to be the largest ‘hotel accommodation’ for people coming down to rent property. This December, 2011, has been the highest in 55 years for vacation rentals and there’s a reason for that. Due to the economy, a lot of people don’t want to leave the United States. Also, since some people have lost their homes, buyers are coming in and picking up these homes as investment properties at very nice prices. They’re then turning those properties into vacation rentals and they’re making money. Starting August, 2011, vacation rentals and long term rentals have been very, very good, and it’s going to continue like that for many years to come.

  

FKV: So do people rent these Florida Keys vacation homes for long periods at a time?

  

LA: Well Florida Keys vacation homes that are rentals require a transient license, and there are certain areas you can rent and there are certain areas where the city and county will not let you rent less than 28 days. Back to Key Colony Beach if you had a 3 bedroom 2 bath or a 4 bedroom 3 bath, a house like that could rent upward of $2700 - $3500/week. My customers that have bought these properties are making $80,000 - $100,000 from these properties a year. Now that’s a great vacation rental investment.

  

FKV: Yes, it sure is. Especially if you can use the property as your own Florida Keys vacation home . Another question regarding water property, and I’m sure there are different views on this subject, but it’s regarding the Atlantic side vs. Florida Bay or the Gulf side. Which side would have the greatest resale value?

  

LA: That really depends on what the buyer wants. If they want a sunrise or a sunset is the only real difference between the 2 sides. The Atlantic side will give a buyer beautiful sunrises and the Florida Bay and Gulf side will give them wonderful sunsets.

  

FKV: So there really isn’t any difference in value or price, it simply comes down to personal preference when looking a Florida Keys vacation home.

  

LA: Exactly.

 

FKV: Are there are restrictions for a non-US citizen or resident to purchase property in the Florida Keys or on the water? The reason I ask is that some countries, Mexico for example, they won’t allow non-citizens to purchase ocean front property.

  

LA: Foreign buyers have increased their appetite for property in the Keys, and I believe that 24% of this coming year, 2012, will be foreign buyers. The reason is the dollar is low, mortgage rates are low and inventory is high so it’s the perfect time for foreign buyers to pick up some great investment properties. However, they do have to follow Federal government requirements for such things as visas, federal taxation, recording and compliance, financing and credit, property tax and insurance. Other than that I’m inclined not to comment as I can’t give legal advise.

 

FKV: Fair enough. Can you give us some sort of an idea as to what to expect to pay for property taxes in Monroe County for a Florida Keys vacation home?

  

LA: Taxes in Monroe County - hmm, well I’m going to give you an example that I give to my prospective buyers. Let’s say on a $1 million home, expect to pay $10,000 in property taxes. That will be for school, county, and water district. For more specific information regarding a property, they can either call me 305-395-0814 or visit Monroe County Tax Appraiser’s Office.

   

Elvis Aaron Presley[a] (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977), often referred to mononymously as Elvis, was an American singer and actor. Dubbed the "King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. His energized interpretations of songs and sexually provocative performance style, combined with a singularly potent mix of influences across color lines during a transformative era in race relations, led him to both great success and initial controversy.

 

Presley was born in Tupelo, Mississippi, and relocated to Memphis, Tennessee, with his family when he was 13 years old. His music career began there in 1954, recording at Sun Records with producer Sam Phillips, who wanted to bring the sound of African-American music to a wider audience. Presley, on rhythm acoustic guitar, and accompanied by lead guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black, was a pioneer of rockabilly, an uptempo, backbeat-driven fusion of country music and rhythm and blues. In 1955, drummer D. J. Fontana joined to complete the lineup of Presley's classic quartet and RCA Victor acquired his contract in a deal arranged by Colonel Tom Parker, who would manage him for more than two decades. Presley's first RCA Victor single, "Heartbreak Hotel", was released in January 1956 and became a number-one hit in the United States. Within a year, RCA would sell ten million Presley singles. With a series of successful network television appearances and chart-topping records, Presley became the leading figure of the newly popular sound of rock and roll; though his performative style and promotion of the then-marginalized sound of African Americans[6] led to him being widely considered a threat to the moral well-being of the White American youth.

 

In November 1956, Presley made his film debut in Love Me Tender. Drafted into military service in 1958, Presley relaunched his recording career two years later with some of his most commercially successful work. He held few concerts, however, and guided by Parker, proceeded to devote much of the 1960s to making Hollywood films and soundtrack albums, most of them critically derided. Some of his most famous films included Jailhouse Rock (1957), Blue Hawaii (1961), and Viva Las Vegas (1964). In 1968, following a seven-year break from live performances, he returned to the stage in the acclaimed television comeback special Elvis, which led to an extended Las Vegas concert residency and a string of highly profitable tours. In 1973, Presley gave the first concert by a solo artist to be broadcast around the world, Aloha from Hawaii. Years of prescription drug abuse and unhealthy eating habits severely compromised his health, and he died suddenly in 1977 at his Graceland estate at the age of 42.

 

Having sold over 400 million records worldwide, Presley is recognized as the best-selling solo music artist of all time by Guinness World Records. He was commercially successful in many genres, including pop, country, rhythm & blues, adult contemporary, and gospel. Presley won three Grammy Awards, received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award at age 36, and has been inducted into multiple music halls of fame. He holds several records, including the most RIAA-certified gold and platinum albums, the most albums charted on the Billboard 200, the most number-one albums by a solo artist on the UK Albums Chart, and the most number-one singles by any act on the UK Singles Chart. In 2018, Presley was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

 

Elvis Aaron Presley was born on January 8, 1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi, to Vernon Elvis (April 10, 1916 – June 26, 1979) and Gladys Love (née Smith; April 25, 1912 – August 14, 1958) Presley in a two-room shotgun house that his father built for the occasion. Elvis's identical twin brother, Jesse Garon Presley, was delivered 35 minutes before him, stillborn. Presley became close to both parents and formed an especially close bond with his mother. The family attended an Assembly of God church, where he found his initial musical inspiration.

  

A photo of Elvis's parents at the Historic Blue Moon Museum in Verona, Mississippi

Presley's father Vernon was of German, Scottish and English origins. He was a descendant of the Harrison family of Virginia through his ancestor Tunis Hood. Presley's mother Gladys was Scots-Irish with some French Norman ancestry. His mother and the rest of the family believed that her great-great-grandmother, Morning Dove White, was Cherokee. This belief was restated by Elvis's granddaughter Riley Keough in 2017. Elaine Dundy, in her biography, supports the belief.

 

Vernon moved from one odd job to the next, showing little ambition. The family often relied on help from neighbors and government food assistance. In 1938, they lost their home after Vernon was found guilty of altering a check written by his landowner and sometime-employer. He was jailed for eight months, while Gladys and Elvis moved in with relatives.

 

In September 1941, Presley entered first grade at East Tupelo Consolidated, where his teachers regarded him as "average". He was encouraged to enter a singing contest after impressing his schoolteacher with a rendition of Red Foley's country song "Old Shep" during morning prayers. The contest, held at the Mississippi–Alabama Fair and Dairy Show on October 3, 1945, was his first public performance. The ten-year-old Presley stood on a chair to reach the microphone and sang "Old Shep". He recalled placing fifth. A few months later, Presley received his first guitar for his birthday; he had hoped for something else—by different accounts, either a bicycle or a rifle. Over the following year, he received basic guitar lessons from two of his uncles and the new pastor at the family's church. Presley recalled, "I took the guitar, and I watched people, and I learned to play a little bit. But I would never sing in public. I was very shy about it."

 

In September 1946, Presley entered a new school, Milam, for sixth grade; he was regarded as a loner. The following year, he began bringing his guitar to school on a daily basis. He played and sang during lunchtime and was often teased as a "trashy" kid who played hillbilly music. By then, the family was living in a largely black neighborhood. Presley was a devotee of Mississippi Slim's show on the Tupelo radio station WELO. He was described as "crazy about music" by Slim's younger brother, who was one of Presley's classmates and often took him into the station. Slim supplemented Presley's guitar instruction by demonstrating chord techniques. When his protégé was 12 years old, Slim scheduled him for two on-air performances. Presley was overcome by stage fright the first time, but succeeded in performing the following week.

 

In November 1948, the family moved to Memphis, Tennessee. After residing for nearly a year in rooming houses, they were granted a two-bedroom apartment in the public housing complex known as the Lauderdale Courts. Enrolled at L. C. Humes High School, Presley received only a C in music in eighth grade. When his music teacher told him that he had no aptitude for singing, he brought in his guitar the next day and sang a recent hit, "Keep Them Cold Icy Fingers Off Me", to prove otherwise. A classmate later recalled that the teacher "agreed that Elvis was right when he said that she didn't appreciate his kind of singing". He was usually too shy to perform openly and was occasionally bullied by classmates who viewed him as a "mama's boy".

 

In 1950, he began practicing guitar regularly under the tutelage of Lee Denson, a neighbor two and a half years his senior. They and three other boys—including two future rockabilly pioneers, brothers Dorsey and Johnny Burnette—formed a loose musical collective that played frequently around the Courts. That September, he began working as an usher at Loew's State Theater. Other jobs followed at Precision Tool, Loew's again, and MARL Metal Products. Presley also helped Jewish neighbors, the Fruchters, by being their shabbos goy.

 

During his junior year, Presley began to stand out more among his classmates, largely because of his appearance: he grew his sideburns and styled his hair with rose oil and Vaseline. In his free time, he would head down to Beale Street, the heart of Memphis's thriving blues scene, and gaze longingly at the wild, flashy clothes in the windows of Lansky Brothers. By his senior year, he was wearing those clothes. Overcoming his reticence about performing outside the Lauderdale Courts, he competed in Humes' Annual "Minstrel" show in April 1953. Singing and playing guitar, he opened with "Till I Waltz Again with You", a recent hit for Teresa Brewer. Presley recalled that the performance did much for his reputation: "I wasn't popular in school ... I failed music—only thing I ever failed. And then they entered me in this talent show ... when I came onstage I heard people kind of rumbling and whispering and so forth, 'cause nobody knew I even sang. It was amazing how popular I became in school after that."

 

Presley, who received no formal music training and could not read music, studied and played by ear. He also frequented record stores that provided jukeboxes and listening booths to customers. He knew all of Hank Snow's songs, and he loved records by other country singers such as Roy Acuff, Ernest Tubb, Ted Daffan, Jimmie Rodgers, Jimmie Davis, and Bob Wills. The Southern gospel singer Jake Hess, one of his favorite performers, was a significant influence on his ballad-singing style. He was a regular audience member at the monthly All-Night Singings downtown, where many of the white gospel groups that performed reflected the influence of African-American spiritual music. He adored the music of black gospel singer Sister Rosetta Tharpe.

 

Like some of his peers, he may have attended blues venues—of necessity, in the segregated South—only on nights designated for exclusively white audiences. He certainly listened to the regional radio stations, such as WDIA-AM, that played "race records": spirituals, blues, and the modern, backbeat-heavy sound of rhythm and blues. Many of his future recordings were inspired by local African-American musicians such as Arthur Crudup and Rufus Thomas. B.B. King recalled that he had known Presley before he was popular when they both used to frequent Beale Street. By the time he graduated from high school in June 1953, Presley had already singled out music as his future.

 

Graceland is a mansion on a 13.8-acre (5.6-hectare) estate in Memphis, Tennessee, United States, which was once owned by the rock and roll singer Elvis Presley. His daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, inherited Graceland after his death in 1977. Following Lisa Marie Presley's death in 2023, the mansion is to be inherited by her daughters. In addition to being the final resting place of Elvis Presley himself, the property contains the graves of his parents, paternal grandmother and grandson, and contains a memorial to Presley's stillborn twin brother. In addition, Lisa Marie Presley will be buried there.

 

Graceland is located at 3764 Elvis Presley Boulevard in the Whitehaven neighborhood, about nine miles (14 kilometers) south of central Memphis and fewer than four miles (6.4 km) north of the Mississippi border.[5] It was opened to the public as a house museum on June 7, 1982. The site was listed in the National Register of Historic Places on November 7, 1991, becoming the first site recognized for significance related to rock music. Graceland was declared a National Historic Landmark on March 27, 2006, also a first for such a site. Graceland attracts more than 650,000 visitors annually.

 

Graceland Farms was originally owned by Stephen C. Toof, founder of S.C. Toof & Co., the oldest commercial printing firm in Memphis. He worked previously as the pressroom foreman of the Memphis newspaper, the Memphis Daily Appeal. The "grounds" (before the mansion was built in 1939) were named after Toof's daughter, Grace. She inherited the farm/property from her father in 1894. After her death, the property was passed to her niece Ruth Moore, a Memphis socialite. Together with her husband, Thomas Moore, Ruth Moore commissioned construction of a 10,266-square-foot (953.7 m2) Colonial Revival style mansion in 1939. The house was designed by architects Furbringer and Ehrman.

 

After Elvis Presley began his musical career, he purchased a $40,000 home for himself and his family at 1034 Audubon Drive in Memphis. As his success and fame grew, especially after his appearances on television, the number of fans who would congregate outside the house multiplied. Presley's neighbors, although happy to have a celebrity living nearby, soon concluded that the constant gathering of fans and journalists was a nuisance.

 

In early 1957, Presley gave his parents, Vernon and Gladys Presley, a budget of $100,000 and asked them to find a "farmhouse"-like property to purchase, with buffer space around it. At the time, Graceland was located in southern Shelby County, several miles south of Memphis' main urban area. In later years, Memphis would expand with residential developments, resulting in Graceland being surrounded by other properties. Presley purchased Graceland on March 19, 1957, for the amount of $102,500.

 

Later that year, Presley invited Richard Williams and singer Buzz Cason to the house. Cason said: "We proceeded to clown around on the front porch, striking our best rock 'n' roll poses and snapping pictures with the little camera. We peeked in the not-yet-curtained windows and got a kick out of the pastel colored walls in the front rooms with shades of bright reds and purples that Elvis most certainly had picked out." Presley was fond of claiming that the US government had mooted a visit to Graceland by Nikita Khrushchev of the Soviet Union, "to see how in America a fellow can start out with nothing and, you know, make good."

 

After Gladys died in 1958 aged 46, Presley's father Vernon remarried to Dee Stanley in 1960, and the couple lived at Graceland for a time. There was some discord between Presley and his stepmother Dee at Graceland, however. Elaine Dundy, who wrote about Presley and his mother, said that

 

"Vernon had settled down with Dee where Gladys had once reigned, while Dee herself – when Elvis was away – had taken over the role of mistress of Graceland so thoroughly as to rearrange the furniture and replace the very curtains that Gladys had approved of." This was too much for the singer, who still loved his late mother deeply. One afternoon, "a van arrived ... and all Dee's household's goods, clothes, 'improvements,' and her own menagerie of pets, were loaded on ... while Vernon, Dee and her three children went by car to a nearby house on Hermitage until they finally settled into a house on Dolan Drive which ran alongside Elvis' estate."

 

According to Mark Crispin Miller, Graceland became for Presley "the home of the organization that was himself, was tended by a large vague clan of Presleys and deputy Presleys, each squandering the vast gratuities which Elvis used to keep his whole world smiling." The author adds that Presley's father Vernon "had a swimming pool in his bedroom", that there "was a jukebox next to the swimming pool, containing Elvis' favorite records", and that the singer himself "would spend hours in his bedroom, watching his property on a closed-circuit television." According to the singer's cousin, Billy Smith, Presley spent the night at Graceland with Smith and his wife Jo many times: "we were all three there talking for hours about everything in the world! Sometimes he would have a bad dream and come looking for me to talk to, and he would actually fall asleep in our bed with us."

 

Priscilla Beaulieu lived at Graceland for five years before she and Presley wed in Las Vegas, Nevada, on May 1, 1967. Their daughter Lisa Marie Presley was born on February 1, 1968, and spent the first years of her life on the estate. After her parents divorced in 1972, her mother moved with the girl to California. Every year around Christmas, Lisa Marie Presley and all her family would go to Graceland to celebrate Christmas together. Lisa Marie often returned to Graceland for visits.

 

When Elvis would tour, staying in hotels, "the rooms would be remodeled in advance of his arrival, so as to make the same configurations of space as he had at home – the Graceland mansion. His furniture would arrive, and he could unwind after his performances in surroundings which were completely familiar and comforting." 'The Jungle Room' was described as being "an example of particularly lurid kitsch."[

 

On August 16, 1977, Presley died aged 42 at Graceland. The official cause of death was cardiac arrhythmia, although later toxicology reports strongly suggested that polypharmacy was the primary cause of death; "fourteen drugs were found in Elvis' system, with several drugs such as codeine in significant quantities. Presley lay in repose in a 900-pound (410 kg), copper-lined coffin just inside the foyer; more than 3,500 of his mourning fans passed by to pay their respects. A private funeral with 200 mourners was held on August 18, 1977, in the house, with the casket placed in front of the stained glass doorway of the music room. Graceland continued to be occupied by members of the family until the death of Presley's aunt Delta in 1993, who had moved in at Elvis's invitation after her husband's death. Elvis's daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, inherited the estate in 1993 when she turned 25.

 

Presley's tombstone, along with those of his parents Gladys and Vernon Presley, and his grandmother Minnie Mae Presley, are installed in the Meditation Garden next to the mansion. They can be visited during the mansion tours or for free before the mansion tours begin. A memorial gravestone for Presley's stillborn twin brother, Jesse Garon, is also at the site.

 

In 2019, the owners of Graceland threatened to leave Memphis unless the city provided tax incentives. The Memphis City Council subsequently voted on a deal to help fund a $100 million expansion of Graceland.

 

Constructed at the top of a hill and surrounded by rolling pastures and a grove of oak trees, Graceland is designed by the Memphis architectural firm, Furbringer and Erhmanis. It's a two-story, five-bay residence in the Colonial Revival style, with a side-facing gabled roof covered in asphalt shingles, a central two-story projecting pedimented portico, and two one-story wings on the north and south sides. Attached to the wing is an additional one-story stuccoed wing, which was originally a garage that houses up to four cars. The mansion has two chimneys; one on the north side's exterior wall, the second rising through the south side's roof ridge. The central block's front and side facades are veneered with tan Tishomingo limestone from Mississippi and its rear wall is stuccoed, as are the one-story wings. The front facade fenestration on the first floor includes 9x9 double-hung windows set in arched openings with wooden panels above, and 6x6 double-hung windows on the second floor.

 

Flanked by two marble lions, four stone steps ascend from the driveway to the two-story central projecting pedimented portico. The pediment has dentils and a small, leaded oval window in the center while the portico contains four Corinthian columns with capitals modeled after architect James Stuart's conjectural porticos for the "Tower of the Winds" in Athens, Greece. The portico's cornered columns are matched by pilasters on the front facade. The doorway has a broken arched pediment, full entablature, and engaged columns while its transom and sidelights contain elaborate and colorful stained glass. And above the main entrance is another rectangular window, completed with a shallow iron balcony.

 

Graceland is 17,552 square feet (1,630.6 m2) and has a total of 23 rooms, including eight bedrooms and bathrooms. To the right of the Entrance Hall, through an elliptical-arched opening with classical details, is the Living Room. The Living Room contains a 15-foot-long (4.6 m) white couch against the wall overlooking the front yard. To the left are two white sofas, a china cabinet and a fireplace with a mirrored wall. The painting that hangs in the room was Elvis' last Christmas present from his father, Vernon, and also displayed are photographs of Elvis' parents Vernon and Gladys, Elvis and Lisa Marie. Behind an adjoined doorway is the Music Room, framed by vivid large peacocks set in stained glass and contains a black baby grand piano and a 1950s style TV. And the third adjacent room is a bedroom that was occupied by Elvis' parents. The walls, carpet, dresser, and queen size bed are bright white with the bed draped in a velvet-looking dark purple bedspread along with an en-suite full bathroom done in pink.

 

To the left of the Entrance Hall, mirroring the Living Room, is the Dining Room, headlined by a massive crystal chandelier. It features six plush chairs in golden metal frames set around a marble table, all of which are placed on black marble flooring in the center with carpet around the perimeter. Connected to the Dining Room is the Kitchen, which was used by Elvis' aunt Delta until her death in 1993 before it was opened to the public two years later.

 

The original one-story wing on the north end of the residence includes a mechanical room, bedroom, and bath. In the mid-1960s, Presley enlarged the house to create a den known as the Jungle Room which features an indoor waterfall of cut field stone on the north wall. The room also contains items both related to and imported from the state of Hawaii because, after starring in the tropical film "Blue Hawaii" (1961), the musician wanted to bring some memorabilia from The Aloha State to his mansion, which gives visitors the same feeling. In 1976, the Jungle Room was converted into a recording studio, where he recorded the bulk of his final two albums, From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee (1976) and Moody Blue (1977); these were his final known recordings in a studio setting.[27] During the mid-1960s expansion of the house, Presley constructed a large wing on the south side of the main house that was a sidewalk, between the music room in the original one-story wing and the swimming pool area, that connected to the house by a small enclosed gallery. The new wing initially housed a slot car track and to store his many items of appreciation, but was later remodeled to what is now known as the Trophy Building, which now features an exhibit about the Presley family, and includes Priscilla's wedding dress, Elvis' wedding tuxedo, Lisa Marie's toy chest and baby clothes and more.

 

The Entrance Hall contains a white staircase leading to the house's second floor with a wall of mirrors. However, the second floor is not open to visitors, out of respect for the Presley family, and partially to avoid any improper focus on the bathroom which was the site of his death. Still, it features Elvis' bedroom at the southwest corner that connects to his dressing room and bathroom in the northwest. His daughter Lisa Marie's bedroom is in the northeast corner, and in the southeast is a bedroom that served as a private personal office for the musician. The floor has been untouched since the day Elvis died and is rarely seen by non-family members.

 

Downstairs in the basement is the TV room, where Elvis often watched three television sets at once, and was within close reach of a wet bar. The three TV sets are built into the room's south wall and there's a stereo, and cabinets for Elvis' record collection. And painted on the west wall is The King's 1970s logo of a lightning bolt and cloud with the initials TCB, both of which represent 'taking care of business in a flash'. And the last room in the mansion opposite of the TV room is the billiard room; an avid billiards player, Elvis bought the pool table in 1960 and had the walls and ceiling covered with 350–400 yards of pleated cotton fabric after the two basement rooms were remodeled in 1974. The pool balls are arranged just the way they were in the musician's final days along with a strict warning sign to visitors that says "Please Do Not Touch! Thank You!" in capital letters. And in one corner of the pool table, there's a rip in the green felt, which was caused by one of Elvis' friends in a failed attempt of a trick shot.

 

Critics such as Albert Goldman write: "Though it cost a lot of money to fill up Graceland with the things that appealed to Elvis Presley, nothing in the house is worth a dime." In chapter 1 of his book, Elvis (1981), the author describes Graceland as looking like a brothel: "it appears to have been lifted from some turn-of-the-century bordello down in the French Quarter of New Orleans. Lulu White or the Countess Willie Piazza might have contrived this plushy parlor for the entertainment of Gyp the Blood. The room is a gaudy mélange of red velour and gilded tassels, Louis XV furniture and porcelain bric-a-brac..." And he dismisses the interior as "bizarre," "garish" and "phony," adding that "King Elvis's obsession with royal red reaches an intensity that makes you gag."

 

In similar terms, Greil Marcus writes that people who visited the inside of Graceland—"people who to a real degree shared Elvis Presley’s class background, and whose lives were formed by his music—have returned with one word to describe what they saw: ‘Tacky.’ Tacky, garish, tasteless—words others translated as white trash."

 

According to Karal Ann Marling, Graceland is "a Technicolor illusion. The façade is Gone With the Wind all the way. The den in the back is Mogambo with a hint of Blue Hawaii. Living in Graceland was like living on a Hollywood backlot, where patches of tropical scenery alternated with the blackened ruins of antebellum Atlanta. It was like living in a Memphis movie theater... Diehard fans are sometimes disappointed by the formal rooms along the highway side of Graceland. They’re beautiful, in a chilly blue-and-white way, but remote and overarranged." The Jungle Room's "overt bad taste" lets nonbelievers "recoil in horror and imagine themselves a notch or two higher than Elvis on the class scale."

 

After purchasing the property Presley spent in excess of $500,000 carrying out extensive modifications to suit his needs including a pink Alabama fieldstone wall surrounding the grounds that has several years' worth of graffiti (signatures and messages) from visitors, who simply refer to it as "the wall". Designed and built by Abe Sauer is the wrought-iron front gate shaped like a book of sheet music, along with green colored musical notes and two mirrored silhouettes of Elvis playing his guitar. Sauer also installed a kidney shaped swimming pool and a racquetball court, which is reminiscent of an old country club, furnished in dark leather and a functional bar. There is a sunken sitting area with the ever-present stereo system found throughout Graceland, as well as the dark brown upright piano upon which Elvis played for what were to be his last songs, Willie Nelson's "Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain" and "Unchained Melody".

 

However, reports conflict about which one was the last song. The sitting area has a floor-to-ceiling shatterproof window designed to watch the many racquetball games that took place there when Elvis was alive. In the early hours of the morning on which Elvis died, he played a game of racquetball with his girlfriend Ginger Alden, his first cousin Billy Smith and Billy's wife Jo before ending the game with the song on the piano before walking into the main house to wash his hair and go to bed. Today the two story court has been restored to the way it was when Elvis used the building.

 

Elsewhere on the estate is a small white building that served as an office for Vernon, along with an old smokehouse that housed a shooting range and a fully functional stable of horses.

 

One of Presley's better known modifications was the addition of the Meditation Garden, designed and built by architect Bernard Grenadier. It was used by the musician to reflect on any problems or situations that arose during his life. It is also where his entire family is buried: himself (1935–1977), his parents Gladys (1912–1958) and Vernon (1916–1979), and grandmother Minnie Mae Hood (1890–1980) while a small stone memorializes his twin brother Jesse Garon, who died at birth thirty minutes before Elvis was born on January 8, 1935. In late 2020, Lisa Marie's son Benjamin Keough was laid to rest on the opposite end of the Meditation Garden after his death from suicide in July of that year. Lisa Marie Presley died from sudden cardiac arrest in January 2023 and is buried next to her son.

 

After Elvis Presley's death in 1977, Vernon Presley served as executor of his estate. Upon his death in 1979, he chose Priscilla to serve as the estate executor for Elvis's only child, Lisa Marie, who was only 11. Graceland itself cost $500,000 a year in upkeep, and expenses had dwindled Elvis's and Priscilla's daughter Lisa Marie's inheritance to only $1 million. Taxes were due on the property; those and other expenses due came to over $500,000. Faced with having to sell Graceland, Priscilla examined other famous houses/museums, and hired a CEO, Jack Soden, to turn Graceland into a moneymaker. Graceland was opened to the public on June 7, 1982. Priscilla's gamble paid off; after only a month of opening Graceland's doors the estate made back all the money it had invested. Priscilla Presley became the chairwoman and president of Elvis Presley Enterprises, or EPE, stating at that time she would do so until Lisa Marie reached 21 years of age. The enterprise's fortunes soared and eventually the trust grew to be worth over $100 million.

 

An annual procession through the estate and past Elvis's grave is held on the anniversary of his death. Known as Elvis Week, it includes a full schedule of speakers and events, including the only Elvis Mass at St. Paul's Church, the highlight for many Elvis fans of all faiths. The 20th Anniversary in 1997 had several hundred media groups from around the world that were present resulting in the event gaining its greatest media publicity.

 

One of the largest gatherings assembled on the 25th anniversary in 2002 with one estimate of 40,000 people in attendance, despite the heavy rain. On the 38th anniversary of Elvis's death, an estimated 30,000 people attended the Candlelight Vigil during the night of August 15–16, 2015. On the 40th anniversary of Elvis's death, on August 15–16, 2017, at least 50,000 fans were expected to attend the Candlelight Vigil. No official figure seems to have been released, maybe because, for the first time, attendees had to pay at least the lowest tour fare, $28.75, to cover the extra security costs due to a larger than usual crowd.

 

For many of the hundreds of thousands of people who visit Graceland each year, the visit takes on a quasi-religious perspective. They may plan for years to journey to the home of the 'King' of rock and roll. On site, headphones narrate the salient events of Elvis's life and introduce the relics that adorn the rooms and corridors. The rhetorical mode is hagiographic, celebrating the life of an extraordinary man, emphasizing his generosity, his kindness and good fellowship, how he was at once a poor boy who made good, an extraordinary musical talent, a sinner and substance abuser, and a religious man devoted to the Gospel and its music. At the meditation garden, containing Elvis's grave, some visitors pray, kneel, or quietly sing one of Elvis's favorite hymns. The brick wall that encloses the mansion's grounds is covered with graffiti that express an admiration for Presley as well as petitions for help and thanks for favors granted.

 

The Graceland grounds include a new exhibit complex, Elvis Presley's Memphis, which includes a new car museum, Presley Motors, which houses Elvis's Pink Cadillac. The complex features new exhibits and museums, as well as a studio for Sirius Satellite Radio's all-Elvis Presley channel. The service's subscribers all over North America can hear Presley's music from Graceland around the clock. Not far away on display are his two aircraft including Lisa Marie (a Convair 880 jetliner) and Hound Dog II (a Lockheed JetStar business jet). The jets are owned by Graceland and are on permanent static display.

 

In early August 2005, Lisa Marie Presley sold 85% of the business side of her father's estate. She kept the Graceland property itself, as well as the bulk of the possessions found therein, and she turned over the management of Graceland to CKX, Inc., an entertainment company (on whose board of directors Priscilla Presley sat) that also owns 19 Entertainment, creator of the American Idol TV show.

 

Graceland Holdings LLC, led by managing partner Joel Weinshanker, is the majority owner of EPE. Lisa Marie Presley's estate retains a 15% ownership in the company.

 

In August 2018, Gladys Presley's headstone, which contained the Jewish star of David on one side and a cross on the other and was designed by Elvis himself, which become publicly displayed when it placed in Graceland's Mediation Garden after being stored for many years in the Graceland Archive.

 

Lisa Marie Presley's estate, which is being held in trust for her daughters Riley Keough and Harper and Finley Lockwood, retain 100% sole personal ownership of Graceland Mansion itself and its over 13-acre original grounds as well as Elvis Presley's personal effects – including costumes, wardrobe, awards, furniture, cars, etc. Prior to her death in 2023, Lisa Marie Presley had made the mansion property and her father's personal effects permanently available for tours of Graceland and for use in all of EPE's operations.

 

According to Elvis Presley's Enterprises, staff at Graceland informally kept a list of celebrities who had visited in the first years following Elvis's death. This practice was not formalized for a decade. Muhammad Ali was an early celebrity visitor in 1978, as was singer Paul Simon. He toured Graceland in the early 80s and afterward wrote a song of the same name; it was the title track of his Grammy-winning album Graceland.

 

During the Joshua Tree Tour in 1987, U2 toured Graceland. The footage was filmed for the film Rattle & Hum. During the visit, drummer, Larry Mullen Jr., sat on Elvis Presley's motorcycle -- against the rules for Graceland visitors.

 

On June 30, 2006, then US President George W. Bush hosted Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi for a tour of the mansion. It was one of the few private residences on United States soil to have been the site of an official joint-visit by a sitting US president and a serving head of a foreign government. On August 6, 2010, Prince Albert II, Head of State of the Principality of Monaco, and his fiancée (now Princess of Monaco) Charlene Wittstock, toured Graceland while vacationing in the US. On May 26, 2013, Paul McCartney of The Beatles visited Graceland. Prince William and Prince Harry, while in Memphis for a friend's wedding, visited Graceland on May 2, 2014.

 

The home has also been visited by former US President Jimmy Carter; the late Duchess of Devonshire, the sitting ambassadors of India, France, China, Korea and Israel to the United States; as well as several US governors, members of the US Congress, and at least two Nobel Prize winners, namely singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, a Literature Prize laureate, and the former President of Costa Rica, Oscar Arias, a Peace Prize honoree, who visited it on October 10, 2001.

 

In May 2016, Graceland welcomed a newlywed couple as its 20 millionth visitor.

 

In June 2022, actors Austin Butler and Tom Hanks visited the mansion and were interviewed virtually by the Good Morning America news program from the Jungle Room to talk about their biographical film Elvis.

 

In popular culture

Paul Simon named an album Graceland, as well as its title track. The song won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year in 1987.

The song "Walking in Memphis" by Marc Cohn mentions Graceland; in the second verse, he refers to the mansion and the Jungle Room. This song was later covered by Cher and Lonestar, among others.

The film 3000 Miles to Graceland is about a group of criminals who plan to rob a casino during an international Elvis week, disguised as Elvis impersonators. No scenes take place at or near the estate.

The film Finding Graceland stars Harvey Keitel with Johnathon Schaech. Keitel is an impersonator who claims to be the real Elvis after Schaech picks him up as a hitch-hiker.

In the rock music "mockumentary" This Is Spinal Tap, band members gather around Presley's grave at Graceland and attempt to sing a verse of "Heartbreak Hotel".

Pop punk group Groovie Ghoulies have a song called "Graceland" on their 1997 album Re-Animation Festival.

In the movie Zombieland: Double Tap, the protagonists venture to Graceland in hopes of shelter during a zombie apocalypse, but are distressed to find it in a ruined state.

During the credits of Lilo & Stitch, there's a photograph of Lilo, Nani, David and Stitch visiting the front gates of Graceland. Almost 20 years later, the original painting of that shot was put on display as part of the traveling Walt Disney Archives exhibition at Graceland.

In the season three episode of American Dad “The Vacation Goo”, Steve Smith asks Stan Smith if they can go to Graceland for their next vacation and Stan says “Steve, if you want to pay your respects to a fat man who died on the toilet, we can visit your Aunt Mary’s grave.”

Phoebe Bridgers has a song "Graceland Too" on her second studio album Punisher.

In the third episode of National Treasure: Edge of History, "Graceland Gambit," the main protagonist, Jess (portrayed by Lisette Olivera) is on a treasure hunt that leads her and her friends to Graceland.

Florence + The Machine reference Graceland and Elvis in their song "Morning Elvis" on their 2022 album Dance Fever.

LLWYNYPIA COLLIERY, LLWYNYPIA, RHONDDA.

Any recollection of this colliery and its workforce is inseparable from the name of Archibald Hood, a Scotsman who bestrode mid-Rhondda and elsewhere as a colossus of the mining world, and beyond that distinction too. A brief summary of this man’s career –where to do justice, a volume is needed – is that in 1860, when he arrived in Wales from Kilmarnock, Ayrshire, he was merely thirty-seven, but in a brief twenty-five of those years in Scotland, he achieved more than most men of that time would achieve in a lifetime, becoming a qualified mining engineer and coal-owner, genuinely highly-respected in both spheres by his mining peers and workforce. His interest and concern in the latter extended beyond their daily duties, with the provision of good accommodation complete with gardens for food production, and also encouraging their purchase of domestic needs from co-operative initiatives. But, as illustrious as he was in Scotland, he would, over the next forty-two years in Wales, carve a second career that would overtake his first.

Hood’s first Welsh mining involvement was at Tylcha Fach Level in Coed Ely, which exploited the thin bituminous Ty Du seam of less than a yard thickness. The colliery was owned by the Ely Valley Coal Company, and its office and winding-engine house are still in existence, modified into three residences, sitting above Tylcha Fach Estate, an elevated, relatively-new housing development which sits on the valley-side opposite the former Coedely Colliery. He had arrived there in 1860, commissioned by Messrs. Campbell and Mitchell-Innes to determine if a proposed investment in small mines in the area would be profitable, but in an interim period and inexplicably not seeking Hood’s advice, Campbell and Mitchell-Innes were persuaded, unwisely, to buy the level. Although Hood later joined them there, his thoughts were focussed on deep mining at Llwynypia, and when the Ely Valley Coal Company was liquidated, he, Campbell and Mitchell-Inness formed the new Glamorgan Coal Company and began shaft sinkings at Llwynypia Colliery. Eventually, under Hood’s leadership two more deep mines were established at Penrhiwfer and Gilfach Goch.

Evidence of the beginning of Llwynypia Colliery, dated February 27th,1861, is shown on page four (pages 1-3 missing) of Glamorgan Coal Company’s Cash Book, which over the following twenty-eight days showed directors’ cash injections of £3,600, including £300 by Archibald Hood. It provides early-years evidence that though Hood was undoubtedly the driving force at Llwynypia, his periodical purchase of company shares was always much less than his fellow directors! A search for this colliery through officially-recognised sources will be unsuccessful if ‘Glamorgan’ or ‘Scotch’ is used as a search-word, for the correct name is ‘Llwynypia’, which broadly translates as ‘Magpies Grove’. However, for good reason, ‘Glamorgan’ and ‘Scotch’ soon became every-day alternatives, and they are unquestioned and accepted to this day – but why did they originate? Imagine, you are a Scot, beginning work as a miner in a very sparsely populated area, where the native language is predominantly Welsh, a tongue completely foreign to you. Inevitably, at some time, you will be asked your place of residence or employment: do you invite ridicule, by attempting to pronounce ‘Llwynypia’, or do you use your wits, replying with the easily-pronounced ‘Scotch’, a reference to the colliery’s predominantly Scottish workforce imported by Archibald Hood – or the equally easy ‘Glamorgan’, the name of the company owning the colliery?

To accommodate his workforce, Hood found it necessary to build, and eventually, 271 homes were constructed in fifteen terraces adjacent to, and overlooking the colliery, of which 256 are still in occupied existence, together with several impressive managers’ residences built in the proximity of the colliery. More dwellings were built near his Penrhiwfer and Gilfach Goch mines, and to this day, in all three villages, there remain references to the Glamorgan Coal Company, Hood’s nationality, and Scottish landmarks. Sherwood (several), Gilmour, Anderson, Thistle, St. Andrew, Ayton, Campbell, Argyll, Grange, Holyrood, Rosedale, Bruce (Penrhiwfer), Scotch and Dundonnell (both at Gilfach Goch), all are overtly Scottish-influenced place-names, but there were acknowledgements to Wales, with Cambrian, Glamorgan, Llewelyn, Glandwr, Llwynypia, Glyncornel, Iscoed, etc. Missing from all these is a landmark dubbed ‘Hood’ by Hood himself, and perhaps this remarkable, extraordinary man knew there was no need for self-acclaim, for in his modest way he probably realized that his achievements in South Wales would render that self-perpetuation superfluous.

There were six vertical shafts and two levels at Llwynypia. On the Llwynypia side of the River Rhondda Fawr were shafts 1, 2, 3 and 4. Nos 1, and 2 shafts were sunk to exploit the shallow Nos. 2 and 3 Rhondda seams but were eventually deepened to exploit the steam coals in the deeper seams; No. 3 shaft worked the shallow seams too, but, whilst reportedly sunk to also exploit the lower seams, it closed in 1908. The coal in the Nos. 2 and 3 Rhondda seams was bituminous, used as a domestic fuel and also as the basic element in coke production, fuelling the 281 ovens at Llwynypia and Gilfach Goch collieries, where an impressive 1,400 tons was produced weekly. Additionally important, at the floor of these seams was fireclay, a mineral consisting of the roots of dead plants, extracted along with the coal, the decayed vegetation above the plant-roots, both having undergone change, metamorphosis, through heat and deep burial over millions of years. This clay was a valuable by-product, an essential constituent of the 10,000 or so bricks made daily by women in the colliery’s above-ground brick-making plant.

The three shafts (1, 2 and 3) were sunk in a line, parallel to and near the Taff Vale Railway, their extremes contained within an incredible 35.33 yards. No. 4 shaft did not conduct minerals, it was sunk purely to accommodate water pumped from the whole of the colliery’s workings, and its former location is today bordered by a fast-food outlet adjacent to Llwynypia Road. When the colliery ceased production in 1945, the yard remained in use as a rescue-station and central workshop, and the shaft remained open at the No. 3 Rhondda seam, 108 yards level, for water-pumping only until 1966, when total colliery closure took place. The writer recalls, during the mid-1960s, many times travelling to his ventilation duties there, in a very small, single-deck cage, the only one that could be accommodated in this extremely narrow shaft. No. 5 shaft, on the Trealaw side of the river, did not conduct minerals, it was sunk purely to conduct the whole of the colliery’s stale air to the surface, but at times through the colliery’s life this function was fulfilled by other shafts, including No. 6, when No. 5 closed. No. 6 shaft, close to the Collier’s Arms at Ynyscynon Road, was sunk to exploit the deep, steam coals.

In descending order, the seams worked at Llwynypia Colliery were: No. 1 Rhondda (only at an inconsequential, almost mountaintop level, see below); No. 2 Rhondda; No. 3 Rhondda; Pentre; Two Feet Nine Inches; Lower Six Feet; Upper Nine Feet (Red Vein): Lower Nine Feet and Bute; Bute; Five Feet; Lower Five Feet. The Lower Five Feet was the deepest-worked seam and was found at 517 yards in the 525 yards deep No. 1 shaft. The two levels were established on the Trealaw side of the river, with the highly-productive Sherwood Level, whose entrance was adjacent to No. 5 shaft, shallowly traversing under Ynyscynon Nursery as it commenced its 950 yard journey into Rhondda Fach, extracting the No. 2 Rhondda seam. It was opened in 1905, in anticipation of the closure of No. 3 shaft, thereby maintaining the essential supply of bituminous coal and fireclay for the production of coke and bricks, but it closed in 1923 when those reserves were exhausted. That year also saw the closure of Llwynypia Colliery Mountain Level, situated high on the Trealaw mountainside; it was a largely-exploratory, short-lived venture into the No. 1 Rhondda seam for its much-sought bituminous coal and fireclay, but one which was of limited presence due to glacial action and erosion by the elements. Reliable and complete manpower and production figures for Llwynypia are not available, but the colliery was certainly prolific in both, with 4,200 employees in 1902, and 700,000 tons output in 1923 being quoted, although the latter figure, is much lower than the widely-held figure of one million tons per annum.

Archibald Hood was that rarity, a truly-respected coal-owner. He was canny and conservative but also a humanitarian, and at Llwynypia, as in Scotland, he sought to beneficially influence the lives of his workmen and their families. Whereas D. A Thomas, Chairman of Cambrian Collieries Ltd, injected nothing into the Clydach Valley communities, Hood’s hand was everywhere in Llwynypia, manifested by the provision of schools, St. Andrews Church, a Miners Institute, complete with library and billiards tables — a swimming pool, tennis courts, cricket, football and rugby fields, and even the winter-time provision of a large, outdoor ice-skating area! He encouraged his workforce to grow food by providing large garden areas at the fronts of their dwellings, simultaneously seeking to divert the male occupants from alcohol, an imperative, given the volatile temperaments of the Welsh, Scots, and the Irish that later inhabited the community! He was known for his attention to detail, often involved in matters which his minions might have been expected to supervise – the writer’s grandmother lost an arm at Llwynypia when sixteen in 1893, amputated when caught in brick-making machinery, and Hood, then seventy, personally attended the matter, obtaining a job for the one-armed girl at the Tonypandy ironmongery of John Cox – Hood, probably not needing to remind Cox of Glamorgan Coal Company’s patronage!

When he died, aged 79, in 1902, a fund was established to erect a statue, the first in Rhondda, and this likeness, with an arm horizontal, pointing to his colliery, stands to this day, overlooking Llwynypia Road. Such was the respect of his workmen that the fund was heavily over-subscribed, with the surplus being used to provide a gas-lit statue and animal drinking-trough, now modified and situated near Tonypandy Library, removed from its original site at Tonypandy Square. Six years after his death, Llwynypia Colliery was taken under the control of D. A. Thomas’s Cambrian Collieries Ltd, of whom Leonard Llewelyn was General Manager. Today, it is known that Llewelyn was a liar, impostor and opportunist, but when he and Llwynypia Colliery became newspaper headlines in the Tonypandy Coal Strike and the associated rioting of 1910-11, he excelled in concealing and distorting the truth, by manipulating Establishment-based newspapers, the only information source of those times. To expose Llewelyn, one needed mining experience and a source of publication, both possessed by, and available to the writer, but not so in the latter-essential to miners in the 1910-11 period. So, critically, the untruths in those newspapers passed unchallenged, and became immediate history, creating false perceptions of events that deceived many historians and others to the present day. Llewelyn’s lies would not have sat well with Hood, and one wonders, when at the peak of his powers, would he have vetoed the Cambrian purchase of Llwynypia? Had it been possible to configure that time-span, he might have prevented the immense suffering that occurred in mid-Rhondda in 1910-11.

Midtown Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States

 

The 21-story Look Building dates to 1948-50, when the minimalist aesthetics of European Modernism first began to transform the character of “setback” office buildings. Located on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets, this handsome mid-20th century modern structure combines tiers of ribbon-like windows with tightly-rounded corners and setbacks faced with white brick to create a unique and memorable silhouette.

 

Two second-generation, family-run, businesses were responsible for its construction: Uris Brothers, developers, and Emery Roth & Sons, architects. Though they first began to collaborate in the mid-1920s, it wasn’t until the death of each firm’s founder in the mid1940s, that the sons Percy and Harold D. Uris and Julian and Richard Roth, began to focus on commercial development. This informal partnership, which lasted until the 1970s, produced a great number of large Manhattan office buildings. Richard Roth, who attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, served as lead architect. Planned to be stylish and profitable, the building closely followed the requirements of the 1916 zoning code to maximize the square footage while using industrial materials to create sleek, streamlined elevations that suggest the influence of not only the German Expressionist architect Erich Mendelsohn, but also the 1931 Starrett-Lehigh Building and the 1947 Universal Pictures Building in Manhattan.

 

The new structure was named for Look magazine, which was part of the Cowles media empire. With a strong emphasis on photography, Look became one of the most widely-read magazines in the United States and it remained at this location until ceasing publication in 1971. Other prominent tenants included Esquire Magazine; Pocket Books; the music publisher Witmark & Sons, where singer-songwriter Bob Dylan made some of his earliest studio recordings; the industrial designer Raymond Loewy, and the building’s architects. During the late 1990s, a major and sympathetic restoration of the facade was undertaken by the architects Hardy Holzman & Pfeiffer Associates. At this time, the steel windows were replaced with similar aluminum frames and a new entrance portico was created. The Look Building was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2004 and the facade is subject to a conservation easement filed with the Trust for Architectural Easements.

 

DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS

 

Building Site

 

The Look Building, at 488 Madison Avenue, stands directly north of the St. Patrick’s Cathedral complex (1853-88, 1901-6, a designated New York City Landmark) and the Villard Houses (1882-85, a designated New York City Landmark). Prior to the First World War, this section of midtown Manhattan was primarily residential, with a mix of free-standing mansions, brownstone row houses, and a growing number of hotels.

 

Transit improvements, including the extension of the subway north along Lexington Avenue in 1918, as well as on Sixth Avenue in the 1930s, would attract commercial development to the area. While some elegant Fifth Avenue residences, including houses owned by George W. Vanderbilt (Hunt & Hunt, 1902-5), Morton & Nellie Plant (Robert W. Gibson, 1903-5), and Edward & Frances Holbrook (C. P.H. Gilbert, 1904-5), were converted to new uses around 1917, many structures were demolished and replaced by retail stores and office buildings. Rockefeller Center (begun 1931), which grew out of plans for a large performing arts center, was midtown’s most ambitious commercial ensemble, incorporating stores, offices, and entertainment venues.

 

In the vicinity of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, the Roman Catholic diocese of New York owned several structures, including the rectory and cardinal’s residence that flank the Lady Chapel on Madison Avenue, as well as the Villard Houses. It also owned the block on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets, where the Look Building would later be erected. This site was originally part of the Roman Catholic Asylum and in 1893 a three-andhalf-story Gothic Revival-style structure was erected to serve as a trade school for boys.

 

When much of the asylum’s property from Fifth Avenue to Park Avenue was sold in 1902, the structure became Cathedral College, a preparatory seminary to train men for careers in the priesthood. The New York Times called it “a midtown landmark which for two generations had offered a haven for quiet study and religious activities.” In 1942, the school moved to “modern facilities” on West End Avenue and 87th Street and the building was temporarily used by Catholic chaplains serving in the Second World War.

 

On East 51st Street, the Look Building stands beside a group of low-rise structures, including the former residence of contractor John Pierce (1904-5, a designated New York City Landmark). Designed by the prominent architect John Duncan, this five-story neo-Renaissance structure is clad with light-grey granite and was converted to commercial use after 1933. On East 52nd Street, the site adjoins 16 East 52nd Street (1926-27), a 15-story brownish brick building with limestone details, designed by Schwartz & Gross.

 

Uris Brothers

 

Uris Brothers, acting as Neprock Realty, Inc., negotiated the purchase of the L-shaped site from St. Joseph’s Seminary & College in October 1948 for $2.6 million. The demand for office space in midtown Manhattan was growing and this market became their primary focus. Percy Uris (1899-1971) and Harold D. Uris (1905-1982) were the sons of Harris H. Uris (born Urias, c. 1867-1945), a Russian immigrant from Latvia, who arrived in New York City in 1892. By the first decade of the 20th century, he and his brothers operated a large iron foundry at 525 West 26th Street (part of the West Chelsea Historic District) where a workforce of about 160 produced ornamental ironwork for the New York City subway system and other clients.

 

Percy Uris attended Columbia University, graduating with a degree in business administration in 1920. He and his father became commercial developers in the early 1920s, specializing in the construction of hotels and apartment buildings. Harold, who trained as a civil engineer at Cornell University, joined them in 1925. Together, they built numerous Manhattan structures, including the Court Square Building (Buchman & Kahn, 1925-26) at 2 Lafayette Street, 1 University Place (Emery Roth, 1929) at the corner of Waverly Place, and the Hotel St. Moritz (now the Ritz Carlton, Emery Roth, 1930-32) on Central Park South. They experienced great success but, like many of their contemporaries, struggled during the early years of the Depression and lost some of their best-known properties. In the late 1930s, they reentered the real estate field, hiring Emery Roth to design apartment buildings at 2 Sutton Place South (193738) and 930 Fifth Avenue (1939-40). Roth also designed 880 Fifth Avenue, their last residential project, in 1946-48.

 

Few of Manhattan’s leading builders of the 1920s remained active following the Second World War. The New York Times described the Urises as being, along with the Tishmans, the “only builders . . . who are descended from the leaders of the Nineteen Twenties boom.” Percy and Harold Uris would accomplish this by focusing almost entirely on office building construction. The forecast for this type of real estate was particularly optimistic and using the skills they learned with their father, they would, over the next three decades, create more than 13 million square feet of new office space. Time magazine reported in 1954 that they:

 

. . . made a fortune out of conforming to the latest taste in office buildings. Their recent constructions in Manhattan have been compared both to wedding cakes and to Assyrian ziggurats, and have more layers than the former, more bulk than the latter and about as much esthetic merit as both combined. Says Percy Uris: “We’re not building in a vacuum. We’re building in a market.”

 

The company’s productivity was a remarkable accomplishment, one that transformed the midtown skyline and streetscape. Harold Uris recalled:

 

We had a policy of creating the greatest amount of space for the lowest cost . . . We bought better and built faster than anyone else . . . Efficiency was the key to our success.

 

In terms of architectural aesthetics, however, their ambitions were modest. They produced a portfolio of buildings that were modern but hardly radical, fresh but conventional. In 1972, Uris explained:

 

I happen to believe that the interior of a building is more important that the exterior. None of the architectural people agree with me. But you build for those who occupy it, not for those who stand across the street and look at it. We have always built good buildings. I won’t say I am not a perfectionist. I can’t help it if people think every building should be the Taj Mahal.

 

In 1960, Uris Brothers issued stock to finance future projects which resulted in such colossal structures as the New York Hilton (1964), the Uris Building at 1633 Broadway (1970), and 55 Water Street (1972), which was at the time of completion the world’s largest office building. Shortly after the stock offering was made they began a series of major gifts to Columbia University which financed construction of a new building for the School of Business, called Uris Hall (Moore & Hutchins, 1961-62, altered). They also made significant contributions to Cornell University, Lenox Hill Hospital, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Following the death of Percy, Harold sold his stock in the Uris Buildings Corporation to the National Kinney Corporation in 1973.

 

Emery Roth & Sons

 

Both before and after the Second World War, the Urises turned to architect Emery Roth (and the successor firm Emery Roth & Sons) with great frequency to produce buildings that were stylish and profitable. Emery Roth, the firm’s founder, was born in Hungary in 1871 and came to the United States around 1884. His talent as a draftsman was quickly recognized and in the decade that followed he worked in Chicago with the architects Burnham & Root, and in New York City with Richard Morris Hunt and Ogden Codman, Jr.

 

In 1895 he opened his own office and later purchased the practice that would initially be known as Stein, Cohen & Roth. Many of New York City’s finest residential structures were designed by him, such as the Bellclaire Hotel (1901-3), Ritz Tower (1925-27, in association with Thomas Hastings), the Beresford (1928-29), the San Remo (1929-30), the St. George Hotel (1930) in Brooklyn Heights, and the Normandy Apartments (1938-39). Though his early works display rich and inventive exterior ornamentation, the character of his later buildings is more restrained, reflecting the growing popularity of the Art Deco and Moderne styles.

 

Roth first collaborated with the Uris family in 1924, designing the Buckingham Apartments, at the northwest corner of Sixth Avenue and 57th Street. It was during this decade that Roth’s sons, Julian and Richard, joined the firm. Julian Roth (1902-92) attended Columbia University and may have been a classmate of Percy Uris. Though not licensed as an architect, he “specialized in building materials, construction methods, cost estimates and the technology of curtain walls.” Richard Roth (1904-87) graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1928 and after briefly working with Allen & Collens in Boston, entered his father’s practice, which was renamed Emery Roth & Sons in 1938. Steven Ruttenbaum, author of Mansions in the Clouds: The Skyscraper Palazzi of Emery Roth, claimed this change had little impact on the firm’s operations and the elder Roth remained “the man who made the decisions, who maintained client contact, and set the fees. He shared the responsibilities of overseeing design development with no one.”

 

In the 1940s, however, ill health caused Emery Roth to relinquish control of the office. One of his last commissions was 300 East 57th Street, an 18-story tan brick apartment house. Built for developer Samuel Rudin in 1944-48, it featured unusual recessed terraces that were probably added by Richard who became the firm’s chief designer. This sleek project received a medal from the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects as one of the city’s best new residential structures. His next project was 505 Park Avenue (1948, altered), a 21story tan brick office building. Located at the northeast corner of 57th Street, the elevations had a strong horizontal orientation, with a “continuous glass front . . . to give a maximum amount of natural light.” This was the first of many buildings Richard designed for Uris Brothers, followed by 4 West 58th Street (1948-49), incorporating the Paris Theater, and 575 Madison Avenue (1948-50), between 56th and 57th Streets. Begun in January 1948, the latter building shares many features with the Look Building, such as a two-story base, white brick elevations, and continuous windows that “run entirely around the structure above the second floor level, providing maximum flexibility in the arrangement and subdivision of offices.”

 

These family-run businesses would remain closely aligned for several decades. Julian Roth later recalled:

 

Percy Uris would call me and say, Julian, I’ve just bought a plot of land. How soon can Richard have the plans ready?”

 

Emery Roth & Sons became one of New York City’s most prolific firms. As architect, or architect of record, they were involved in at least 150 structures after the Second World War. In 1967, reporter Thomas Ennis said that Roth has “earned most of the praise – or blame – for the way Manhattan’s business district looks today.” The firm developed a reputation for superior efficiency, employing mostly predictable formulas that maximized square footage and speed of construction. In addition, they collaborated on such high-profile projects as the Pan Am Building (1963, with Pietro Belluschi and Walter Gropius), the World Trade Center (1975, with Minoru Yamasaki), and the Citicorp Building (1978, with Hugh Stubbins & Assoc.). One writer observed: “It seems unlikely any firm in history has been responsible for so many tall buildings within such a short span of time.”

 

Designing the Look Building

 

Richard Roth began to prepare his scheme in late 1948 and the final drawings were completed in July 1949. Built on speculation, the Look Building needed to be fashionable, practical, and profitable. Throughout his career, Richard pursued a pragmatic approach to design. Not only did he try to maximize the square footage in buildings but he believed this type of plan created the kind of interior space favored by prospective tenants. When he addressed the Real Estate Board of New York in 1952, Richard urged architects entering the field to develop “a working knowledge of the various codes, laws, regulations, and ruling affecting buildings.” Though he acknowledged that slender towers could be dramatic and beautiful, he believed the market for offices on the smaller, upper floors was limited.

 

While higher rents may be obtained from tower floors, he said there are fewer good tenants for 5,000 square feet of space than there are for 15,000 square feet to 20,000 square feet.

 

The 1940s proved to be a transitional period in office building design and the Look Building combines characteristics associated with Streamlined Modernism, sometimes referred to as Art Moderne, and the International Style. In terms of massing, its shape was determined by the 1916 zoning resolution, which was conceived to protect access to light and air in Manhattan’s most crowded districts. To accomplish this, commercial buildings were required to set back at a certain height, which was determined by location and street width. Bulk was regulated and diminished in stages, creating wedding-cake-like silhouettes in which the uppermost floors could cover only 25 per cent of the lot. Slender towers, consequently, were discouraged on all-but-thelargest of properties.

 

While Roth’s setback massing was fairly conventional, stepping back at every other floor above the 12th story, the treatment of the elevations was somewhat new. Faced with industrial materials, the facade has a strong horizontal emphasis. The building’s developer, Percy Uris, defended this trend toward simplicity, saying:

 

The new facade, with its horizontal lines and absence of ornamentation is generally admired, but there are some who consider the modern exterior too severe. Actually, if a building has good lines, its simplicity will add to its beauty.

 

The Look Building has bands of ribbon-like windows that alternate with white brick spandrels. Roth was most likely influenced by two local projects: the Starrett-Lehigh Building (1930-31, a designated New York City Landmark) and the Universal Pictures Building (1945-47). Both structures feature continuous bands of fenestration that reflect contemporary interest in functional aesthetics and possibly the work of the German Expressionist architect Erich Mendelsohn, who immigrated to the United States in 1941. Many of his works had a distinctive streamlined appearance, such as the Rudolf Petersdorf Department Store (1926-28) in Breslau, which was illustrated in the New York Times in March 1931 under the headline “German Architecture Goes Modern.”

 

Of probable greater importance was the Universal Pictures Building, 445 Park Avenue, completed in 1947. Designed by Kahn & Jacobs, the project architect was Elsa Gidoni, who trained in Berlin and was later described as “highly attuned to the International Style work of Erich Mendelsohn.” Built on a comparable block-long site, this 21-story office building has similar bulk and massing, ribbon-like windows, terraces, and air conditioning. It was a great success and entirely rented prior to completion. Developer Paul Tishman asserted these amenities would increase “working efficiency” and “make it possible for tenants to obtain maximum use of space on each floor . . . there just won’t be any unusable areas.”

 

For the Look Building, Roth fine tuned many of these ideas. While the number of floors and massing is similar, the curved corners allow the windows and spandrels to flow without interruption. According to Percy Uris, this type of fenestration had various benefits. Not only did it provide better lighting and a sense of openness, but he believed it was part of:

 

. . . a real step forward in office planning. Where the space is used as a large open general office, the effect is light and cheerful. These windows also make for easy subdivision into smaller rooms with more flexibility than formerly possible when masonry and columns more or less determined individual office spaces.

 

Roth claimed that this approach would satisfy “status conscious tenants . . . because it permitted an even distribution of window space for executive offices, a matter of considerable importance to corporate tenants.”

 

The stacked, multiple curves give the elevations an organic, almost biomorphic quality. Marv Rothenstein, who worked for Uris Brothers, later wrote:

 

Everything about them was special, starting with the curved structural steel,

 

followed by curved concrete forms, curved bricks, curved window frames, and

 

curved glass.

 

The corners have a three-and-a-half foot radius and are faced with radial brick. In New York City, buildings with rounded corners are found in Lower Manhattan, where irregularly-shaped parcels provided architects with opportunities to emphasize specific vistas, facades, and entrances. Though concave and convex facades gained greater popularity in the late 1930s and were present in various pavilions at the New York World’s Fair, such features were rarely used in office buildings. It was, however, used to great advantage at the Starrett-Lehigh Building, as well as in Roth’s much simpler design for 505 Park Avenue. These streamlined buildings, however, have much wider curves and were erected with less costly “straight segments.”

 

Above the 12th story, the Look Building’s setbacks function as private terraces. These unbroken, wrap-around spaces were part of the original design, and appear in the blueprints at Avery Library, Columbia University, with glass doors and metal railings.

 

In contrast to Rockefeller Center, which had common landscaped gardens on the rooftops, these shallow outdoor spaces seem closer in spirit to residential terraces and, like the upper floors of the Cities Service Building (Clinton & Russell, Holton & George, 1930-32), 70 Pine Street in lower Manhattan, and the Universal Pictures Building, were reached from inside offices. Such amenities were also part of a broader trend after the Second World War to blur the boundaries between interior and exterior space.

 

To give the Look Building a stylish, modern appearance, Roth faced it with white brick. This material was introduced in the first decade of the 20th century but did not become popular until construction of Manhattan House (a designated New York City Landmark). Built by the architects Skidmore Owings & Merrill on East 66th Street in 1947-51, this 21-story structure is considered Manhattan’s earliest white brick apartment house, influencing the design of numerous imitators and possibly Richard Roth. Though some explained the popularity of this brick in practical terms, saying it was self-washing and would reflect light into the surrounding area, white was also strongly associated with the European avant-garde, particularly the early minimalist works of Le Corbusier and Alvar Aalto.

 

Construction

 

Plans for construction of a $6 million structure at 488 Madison Avenue were filed with the Department of Buildings in November 1948. Several months later, during February 1949, D.

 

E. H. Demolition began tearing down the former home of Cathedral College and excavation of the site began. The Harris Structural Steel Company began to deliver the steel components in June 1949 and by the end of August 1949 the framework was “topped” out. The New York Times reported that this was “considered a postwar record for steel erection.” According to Marv Rothstein, as many as seven four-men riveting teams were involved in the process. The concrete floors were finished in early September 1949, and shortly after, the white brick elevations. About four floors were enclosed each week. As this task progressed, the steel casement windows were installed. Once this job was completed, the interior plastering began. Tenants began to occupy the air-conditioned structure in early 1950.

 

Tenants

 

With Cross & Brown as the building’s rental agent, all of the office floors were leased by November 1949 – several months before construction was complete – and all of the retail space by May 1, 1950. This section of midtown Manhattan was a lively hub of media activity, especially around Rockefeller Center. Several magazines were early tenants, including Look, Esquire, and Seventeen. Look was launched by Gardner “Mike” Cowles, Jr., in Des Moines, Iowa, in January 1937. He consolidated the editorial offices at 522 Fifth Avenue, where it remained for a decade. Modeled on European picture magazines, it became a significant rival to Life magazine, which was based in Rockefeller Center, and by 1948 the magazine had a paid circulation of three million. Look would become the largest tenant, with offices on the 10th, 11th and 12th floors.

 

Uris Brothers agreed to name the building for Look in early 1950. Esquire, which claimed it was “embarrassed by the “new look,” took legal action to stop this, arguing that the change would “convey the false impression” that Esquire was “published or sponsored by the publishers of Look.” No action, however, was taken by the courts and until 1980 large capital letters spelled out “Look Building” on the mechanical tower’s south side. The 1950s would be heyday of Look’s popularity, reaching an estimated 21 per cent of all U.S. adults in 1961. It was the third most popular magazine in the nation and in 1963 it would sign a new lease, almost doubling its office space to more than 200,000 square feet. The New York Times Company purchased the Cowles Media Company in 1971, which included Family Circle and various regional newspapers.

 

Pocket Books, Inc., a division of Simon & Shuster, which published popular best sellers, was also an original tenant, as was the Music Publishers Holding Company, with such subsidiaries as Harms, Inc., Remick Music, New World Music, Advances Music, and Witmark & Sons. In Witmark’s fifth floor studio, a young Bob Dylan produced a series of important early demo recordings during 1962 and 1963.

 

Emery Roth & Sons joined the prestigious roster of tenants in April 1950. The New York Times reported that it was only the firm’s “fourth move” in fifty years and they occupied part of the 18th floor until the late 1950s. Three floors above, on the 21st floor, was Raymond Loewy, one of the 20th century’s most significant industrial designers, who appeared on the cover of Time magazine in October 1949 and would design the interiors of Lever House (a designated New York City Landmark), completed nearby at 390 Park Avenue in 1952. Later tenants have included the Institutional Investor and Abbeville Press.

 

Subsequent History

 

In April 1953, the property was sold to the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. Several months later, in August 1953, the building was leased back to Uris Brothers. Since the 1970s, it has been owned by the 488 Madison Avenue Associates (Feil Organization) and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

 

The two-story retail base was remodeled with tinted black glass and new shop entrances in the 1980s. Horowitz Immerman Architects were responsible for these alterations. The rest of the exterior was renovated with great sensitivity by Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates in 1998. Architect Malcolm Holzman (b. 1940) was the partner in charge of the project. He said that his main objective was to “keep the building as it is and not make it into something it will never be.” At the time, the original steel windows were replaced by similar aluminum frames and the glazed brick was cleaned. Additionally, about 20 per cent of the brick was replaced, as well as the original slate windowsills.

 

Interest in mid-20th century modern architecture was growing in the 1990s and the building’s careful restoration was described in a New York Times article, as well as in a small exhibition, New Life for a Modern Monument: A Salute to 488 Madison Avenue, organized by the Municipal Art Society in autumn 1998. The brochure’s text praised the owners and architects, commenting “The Look Building’s restoration shows how successfully the best postwar buildings can be updated, rewarding investors and delighting passerby.” In 2004, the Look Building was added to the National Register of Historic Places and the facade is subject to a conservation easement filed with the Trust of Architectural Easements.

 

Description

 

The Look Building stands on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets. It occupies an L-shaped lot, measuring 200 feet on Madison Avenue, 140 feet on 51st Street, and 75 feet on 52nd Street. Above the second story, the facade is mainly white brick. Continuous non-historic aluminum windows (late 1990s), three horizontal panes tall, extend continuously around the facade, starting at the west ends of the north and south facades. The center panes are operable and open out from the bottom. Above the 12-story base, every second floor sets back, climaxing with a mostly windowless tower, which incorporates horizontal louvers on the east front.

 

The two-story retail base is non-historic and dates to the late 1980s. It is divided from the third story on all facades by what appears to be charcoal-colored cast-stone panels, crowned by a curved aluminum molding. The two stories of glass panels are transparent or tinted black and the water table may be granite. The main entrance is at the center of the sloping Madison Avenue facade. There is a recessed passage that leads to a single revolving glass entrance door, flanked by conventional glass doors. The entrance passage is paved with contrasting light and dark gray granite. The exterior panels that face the street are polished black granite and the walls that flank the passage are light brown-and-black marble.

 

There is a ribbed aluminum ceiling with recessed lighting fixtures, as well as square service panel near center. Above the entrance passage is a wide non-historic aluminum marquee with curved corners and free-standing numerals (488) that identify the address. To the left (south) are three storefronts with recessed entrances. The one closest to the entrance has a horizontal aluminum sign with white lettering. At the corner of 51st Street is a revolving door with dark tinted glass. Directly to the right of this door is a conventional recessed store entrance. To the right (north) of the main entrance is a single storefront with clear glass windows. This storefront incorporates several horizontal aluminum signs with white lettering: on Madison Avenue, at the corner of 52nd Street, and on 52nd Street.

 

The Fifty-First street facade has four non-historic storefronts, at 19, 21 and 23 East 51st Street. The last address has two entrances. Most of the first-story businesses are identified above the storefronts with metal letters against black glass panels. Though most of the glass on the second story is tinted black, the windows nearest Madison Avenue are transparent. At the west end of the facade, a vertical banner is strung between two horizontal brass poles. A significant number of glass panels toward the west end of the second story have been replaced with horizontal metal louvers. Near the top of the 11th story, at center, a white horizontal box projects out from the facade. In addition, there are four vertical boxes attached at the corner above the third story. There is a fan-like security gate at the west edge of the 7th story.

 

Fifty-Second Street has a single storefront that extends around the corner from Madison Avenue. To the west of the last window is a single vertical panel of horizontal louvers. At the corner, above the aluminum sign, are two small black boxes with visible wires. The service entrance, with two metal doors that open outward, is located at the west end of the first story. At the middle of the 4th story, two of the upper windows have been replaced with horizontal louvers. Fan-like security gates have been installed at the west end of two of the uppermost floors.

 

- From the 2010 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report

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Profitable Soda Fountain Operation

Midtown Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States

 

The 21-story Look Building dates to 1948-50, when the minimalist aesthetics of European Modernism first began to transform the character of “setback” office buildings. Located on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets, this handsome mid-20th century modern structure combines tiers of ribbon-like windows with tightly-rounded corners and setbacks faced with white brick to create a unique and memorable silhouette.

 

Two second-generation, family-run, businesses were responsible for its construction: Uris Brothers, developers, and Emery Roth & Sons, architects. Though they first began to collaborate in the mid-1920s, it wasn’t until the death of each firm’s founder in the mid1940s, that the sons Percy and Harold D. Uris and Julian and Richard Roth, began to focus on commercial development. This informal partnership, which lasted until the 1970s, produced a great number of large Manhattan office buildings. Richard Roth, who attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, served as lead architect. Planned to be stylish and profitable, the building closely followed the requirements of the 1916 zoning code to maximize the square footage while using industrial materials to create sleek, streamlined elevations that suggest the influence of not only the German Expressionist architect Erich Mendelsohn, but also the 1931 Starrett-Lehigh Building and the 1947 Universal Pictures Building in Manhattan.

 

The new structure was named for Look magazine, which was part of the Cowles media empire. With a strong emphasis on photography, Look became one of the most widely-read magazines in the United States and it remained at this location until ceasing publication in 1971. Other prominent tenants included Esquire Magazine; Pocket Books; the music publisher Witmark & Sons, where singer-songwriter Bob Dylan made some of his earliest studio recordings; the industrial designer Raymond Loewy, and the building’s architects. During the late 1990s, a major and sympathetic restoration of the facade was undertaken by the architects Hardy Holzman & Pfeiffer Associates. At this time, the steel windows were replaced with similar aluminum frames and a new entrance portico was created. The Look Building was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2004 and the facade is subject to a conservation easement filed with the Trust for Architectural Easements.

 

DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS

 

Building Site

 

The Look Building, at 488 Madison Avenue, stands directly north of the St. Patrick’s Cathedral complex and the Villard Houses . Prior to the First World War, this section of midtown Manhattan was primarily residential, with a mix of free-standing mansions, brownstone row houses, and a growing number of hotels.

 

Transit improvements, including the extension of the subway north along Lexington Avenue in 1918, as well as on Sixth Avenue in the 1930s, would attract commercial development to the area. While some elegant Fifth Avenue residences, including houses owned by George W. Vanderbilt , Morton & Nellie Plant , and Edward & Frances Holbrook , were converted to new uses around 1917, many structures were demolished and replaced by retail stores and office buildings. Rockefeller Center , which grew out of plans for a large performing arts center, was midtown’s most ambitious commercial ensemble, incorporating stores, offices, and entertainment venues.

 

In the vicinity of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, the Roman Catholic diocese of New York owned several structures, including the rectory and cardinal’s residence that flank the Lady Chapel on Madison Avenue, as well as the Villard Houses. It also owned the block on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets, where the Look Building would later be erected. This site was originally part of the Roman Catholic Asylum and in 1893 a three-andhalf-story Gothic Revival-style structure was erected to serve as a trade school for boys.

 

When much of the asylum’s property from Fifth Avenue to Park Avenue was sold in 1902, the structure became Cathedral College, a preparatory seminary to train men for careers in the priesthood. The New York Times called it “a midtown landmark which for two generations had offered a haven for quiet study and religious activities.” In 1942, the school moved to “modern facilities” on West End Avenue and 87th Street and the building was temporarily used by Catholic chaplains serving in the Second World War.

 

On East 51st Street, the Look Building stands beside a group of low-rise structures, including the former residence of contractor John Pierce . Designed by the prominent architect John Duncan, this five-story neo-Renaissance structure is clad with light-grey granite and was converted to commercial use after 1933. On East 52nd Street, the site adjoins 16 East 52nd Street , a 15-story brownish brick building with limestone details, designed by Schwartz & Gross.

 

Uris Brothers

 

Uris Brothers, acting as Neprock Realty, Inc., negotiated the purchase of the L-shaped site from St. Joseph’s Seminary & College in October 1948 for $2.6 million. The demand for office space in midtown Manhattan was growing and this market became their primary focus. Percy Uris and Harold D. Uris were the sons of Harris H. Uris , a Russian immigrant from Latvia, who arrived in New York City in 1892. By the first decade of the 20th century, he and his brothers operated a large iron foundry at 525 West 26th Street where a workforce of about 160 produced ornamental ironwork for the New York City subway system and other clients.

 

Percy Uris attended Columbia University, graduating with a degree in business administration in 1920. He and his father became commercial developers in the early 1920s, specializing in the construction of hotels and apartment buildings. Harold, who trained as a civil engineer at Cornell University, joined them in 1925. Together, they built numerous Manhattan structures, including the Court Square Building at 2 Lafayette Street, 1 University Place at the corner of Waverly Place, and the Hotel St. Moritz on Central Park South. They experienced great success but, like many of their contemporaries, struggled during the early years of the Depression and lost some of their best-known properties. In the late 1930s, they reentered the real estate field, hiring Emery Roth to design apartment buildings at 2 Sutton Place South and 930 Fifth Avenue . Roth also designed 880 Fifth Avenue, their last residential project, in 1946-48.

 

Few of Manhattan’s leading builders of the 1920s remained active following the Second World War. The New York Times described the Urises as being, along with the Tishmans, the “only builders . . . who are descended from the leaders of the Nineteen Twenties boom.” Percy and Harold Uris would accomplish this by focusing almost entirely on office building construction. The forecast for this type of real estate was particularly optimistic and using the skills they learned with their father, they would, over the next three decades, create more than 13 million square feet of new office space. Time magazine reported in 1954 that they:

 

. . . made a fortune out of conforming to the latest taste in office buildings. Their recent constructions in Manhattan have been compared both to wedding cakes and to Assyrian ziggurats, and have more layers than the former, more bulk than the latter and about as much esthetic merit as both combined. Says Percy Uris: “We’re not building in a vacuum. We’re building in a market.”

 

The company’s productivity was a remarkable accomplishment, one that transformed the midtown skyline and streetscape. Harold Uris recalled:

 

We had a policy of creating the greatest amount of space for the lowest cost . . . We bought better and built faster than anyone else . . . Efficiency was the key to our success.

 

In terms of architectural aesthetics, however, their ambitions were modest. They produced a portfolio of buildings that were modern but hardly radical, fresh but conventional. In 1972, Uris explained:

 

I happen to believe that the interior of a building is more important that the exterior. None of the architectural people agree with me. But you build for those who occupy it, not for those who stand across the street and look at it. We have always built good buildings. I won’t say I am not a perfectionist. I can’t help it if people think every building should be the Taj Mahal.

 

In 1960, Uris Brothers issued stock to finance future projects which resulted in such colossal structures as the New York Hilton , the Uris Building at 1633 Broadway , and 55 Water Street , which was at the time of completion the world’s largest office building. Shortly after the stock offering was made they began a series of major gifts to Columbia University which financed construction of a new building for the School of Business, called Uris Hall . They also made significant contributions to Cornell University, Lenox Hill Hospital, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Following the death of Percy, Harold sold his stock in the Uris Buildings Corporation to the National Kinney Corporation in 1973.

 

Emery Roth & Sons

 

Both before and after the Second World War, the Urises turned to architect Emery Roth with great frequency to produce buildings that were stylish and profitable. Emery Roth, the firm’s founder, was born in Hungary in 1871 and came to the United States around 1884. His talent as a draftsman was quickly recognized and in the decade that followed he worked in Chicago with the architects Burnham & Root, and in New York City with Richard Morris Hunt and Ogden Codman, Jr.

 

In 1895 he opened his own office and later purchased the practice that would initially be known as Stein, Cohen & Roth. Many of New York City’s finest residential structures were designed by him, such as the Bellclaire Hotel , Ritz Tower , the Beresford , the San Remo , the St. George Hotel in Brooklyn Heights, and the Normandy Apartments . Though his early works display rich and inventive exterior ornamentation, the character of his later buildings is more restrained, reflecting the growing popularity of the Art Deco and Moderne styles.

 

Roth first collaborated with the Uris family in 1924, designing the Buckingham Apartments, at the northwest corner of Sixth Avenue and 57th Street. It was during this decade that Roth’s sons, Julian and Richard, joined the firm. Julian Roth attended Columbia University and may have been a classmate of Percy Uris. Though not licensed as an architect, he “specialized in building materials, construction methods, cost estimates and the technology of curtain walls.” Richard Roth graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1928 and after briefly working with Allen & Collens in Boston, entered his father’s practice, which was renamed Emery Roth & Sons in 1938. Steven Ruttenbaum, author of Mansions in the Clouds: The Skyscraper Palazzi of Emery Roth, claimed this change had little impact on the firm’s operations and the elder Roth remained “the man who made the decisions, who maintained client contact, and set the fees. He shared the responsibilities of overseeing design development with no one.”

 

In the 1940s, however, ill health caused Emery Roth to relinquish control of the office. One of his last commissions was 300 East 57th Street, an 18-story tan brick apartment house. Built for developer Samuel Rudin in 1944-48, it featured unusual recessed terraces that were probably added by Richard who became the firm’s chief designer. This sleek project received a medal from the New York Chapter of the American Institute of Architects as one of the city’s best new residential structures. His next project was 505 Park Avenue , a 21story tan brick office building. Located at the northeast corner of 57th Street, the elevations had a strong horizontal orientation, with a “continuous glass front . . . to give a maximum amount of natural light.” This was the first of many buildings Richard designed for Uris Brothers, followed by 4 West 58th Street , incorporating the Paris Theater, and 575 Madison Avenue , between 56th and 57th Streets. Begun in January 1948, the latter building shares many features with the Look Building, such as a two-story base, white brick elevations, and continuous windows that “run entirely around the structure above the second floor level, providing maximum flexibility in the arrangement and subdivision of offices.”

 

These family-run businesses would remain closely aligned for several decades. Julian Roth later recalled:

 

Percy Uris would call me and say, Julian, I’ve just bought a plot of land. How soon can Richard have the plans ready?”

 

Emery Roth & Sons became one of New York City’s most prolific firms. As architect, or architect of record, they were involved in at least 150 structures after the Second World War. In 1967, reporter Thomas Ennis said that Roth has “earned most of the praise – or blame – for the way Manhattan’s business district looks today.” The firm developed a reputation for superior efficiency, employing mostly predictable formulas that maximized square footage and speed of construction. In addition, they collaborated on such high-profile projects as the Pan Am Building , the World Trade Center , and the Citicorp Building . One writer observed: “It seems unlikely any firm in history has been responsible for so many tall buildings within such a short span of time.”

 

Designing the Look Building

 

Richard Roth began to prepare his scheme in late 1948 and the final drawings were completed in July 1949. Built on speculation, the Look Building needed to be fashionable, practical, and profitable. Throughout his career, Richard pursued a pragmatic approach to design. Not only did he try to maximize the square footage in buildings but he believed this type of plan created the kind of interior space favored by prospective tenants. When he addressed the Real Estate Board of New York in 1952, Richard urged architects entering the field to develop “a working knowledge of the various codes, laws, regulations, and ruling affecting buildings.” Though he acknowledged that slender towers could be dramatic and beautiful, he believed the market for offices on the smaller, upper floors was limited.

 

While higher rents may be obtained from tower floors, he said there are fewer good tenants for 5,000 square feet of space than there are for 15,000 square feet to 20,000 square feet.

 

The 1940s proved to be a transitional period in office building design and the Look Building combines characteristics associated with Streamlined Modernism, sometimes referred to as Art Moderne, and the International Style. In terms of massing, its shape was determined by the 1916 zoning resolution, which was conceived to protect access to light and air in Manhattan’s most crowded districts. To accomplish this, commercial buildings were required to set back at a certain height, which was determined by location and street width. Bulk was regulated and diminished in stages, creating wedding-cake-like silhouettes in which the uppermost floors could cover only 25 per cent of the lot. Slender towers, consequently, were discouraged on all-but-thelargest of properties.

 

While Roth’s setback massing was fairly conventional, stepping back at every other floor above the 12th story, the treatment of the elevations was somewhat new. Faced with industrial materials, the facade has a strong horizontal emphasis. The building’s developer, Percy Uris, defended this trend toward simplicity, saying:

 

The new facade, with its horizontal lines and absence of ornamentation is generally admired, but there are some who consider the modern exterior too severe. Actually, if a building has good lines, its simplicity will add to its beauty.

 

The Look Building has bands of ribbon-like windows that alternate with white brick spandrels. Roth was most likely influenced by two local projects: the Starrett-Lehigh Building and the Universal Pictures Building . Both structures feature continuous bands of fenestration that reflect contemporary interest in functional aesthetics and possibly the work of the German Expressionist architect Erich Mendelsohn, who immigrated to the United States in 1941. Many of his works had a distinctive streamlined appearance, such as the Rudolf Petersdorf Department Store in Breslau, which was illustrated in the New York Times in March 1931 under the headline “German Architecture Goes Modern.”

 

Of probable greater importance was the Universal Pictures Building, 445 Park Avenue, completed in 1947. Designed by Kahn & Jacobs, the project architect was Elsa Gidoni, who trained in Berlin and was later described as “highly attuned to the International Style work of Erich Mendelsohn.” Built on a comparable block-long site, this 21-story office building has similar bulk and massing, ribbon-like windows, terraces, and air conditioning. It was a great success and entirely rented prior to completion. Developer Paul Tishman asserted these amenities would increase “working efficiency” and “make it possible for tenants to obtain maximum use of space on each floor . . . there just won’t be any unusable areas.”

 

For the Look Building, Roth fine tuned many of these ideas. While the number of floors and massing is similar, the curved corners allow the windows and spandrels to flow without interruption. According to Percy Uris, this type of fenestration had various benefits. Not only did it provide better lighting and a sense of openness, but he believed it was part of:

 

. . . a real step forward in office planning. Where the space is used as a large open general office, the effect is light and cheerful. These windows also make for easy subdivision into smaller rooms with more flexibility than formerly possible when masonry and columns more or less determined individual office spaces.

 

Roth claimed that this approach would satisfy “status conscious tenants . . . because it permitted an even distribution of window space for executive offices, a matter of considerable importance to corporate tenants.”

 

The stacked, multiple curves give the elevations an organic, almost biomorphic quality. Marv Rothenstein, who worked for Uris Brothers, later wrote:

 

Everything about them was special, starting with the curved structural steel,

 

followed by curved concrete forms, curved bricks, curved window frames, and

 

curved glass.

 

The corners have a three-and-a-half foot radius and are faced with radial brick. In New York City, buildings with rounded corners are found in Lower Manhattan, where irregularly-shaped parcels provided architects with opportunities to emphasize specific vistas, facades, and entrances. Though concave and convex facades gained greater popularity in the late 1930s and were present in various pavilions at the New York World’s Fair, such features were rarely used in office buildings. It was, however, used to great advantage at the Starrett-Lehigh Building, as well as in Roth’s much simpler design for 505 Park Avenue. These streamlined buildings, however, have much wider curves and were erected with less costly “straight segments.”

 

Above the 12th story, the Look Building’s setbacks function as private terraces. These unbroken, wrap-around spaces were part of the original design, and appear in the blueprints at Avery Library, Columbia University, with glass doors and metal railings.

 

In contrast to Rockefeller Center, which had common landscaped gardens on the rooftops, these shallow outdoor spaces seem closer in spirit to residential terraces and, like the upper floors of the Cities Service Building , 70 Pine Street in lower Manhattan, and the Universal Pictures Building, were reached from inside offices. Such amenities were also part of a broader trend after the Second World War to blur the boundaries between interior and exterior space.

 

To give the Look Building a stylish, modern appearance, Roth faced it with white brick. This material was introduced in the first decade of the 20th century but did not become popular until construction of Manhattan House . Built by the architects Skidmore Owings & Merrill on East 66th Street in 1947-51, this 21-story structure is considered Manhattan’s earliest white brick apartment house, influencing the design of numerous imitators and possibly Richard Roth. Though some explained the popularity of this brick in practical terms, saying it was self-washing and would reflect light into the surrounding area, white was also strongly associated with the European avant-garde, particularly the early minimalist works of Le Corbusier and Alvar Aalto.

 

Construction

 

Plans for construction of a $6 million structure at 488 Madison Avenue were filed with the Department of Buildings in November 1948. Several months later, during February 1949, D.

 

E. H. Demolition began tearing down the former home of Cathedral College and excavation of the site began. The Harris Structural Steel Company began to deliver the steel components in June 1949 and by the end of August 1949 the framework was “topped” out. The New York Times reported that this was “considered a postwar record for steel erection.” According to Marv Rothstein, as many as seven four-men riveting teams were involved in the process. The concrete floors were finished in early September 1949, and shortly after, the white brick elevations. About four floors were enclosed each week. As this task progressed, the steel casement windows were installed. Once this job was completed, the interior plastering began. Tenants began to occupy the air-conditioned structure in early 1950.

 

Tenants

 

With Cross & Brown as the building’s rental agent, all of the office floors were leased by November 1949 – several months before construction was complete – and all of the retail space by May 1, 1950. This section of midtown Manhattan was a lively hub of media activity, especially around Rockefeller Center. Several magazines were early tenants, including Look, Esquire, and Seventeen. Look was launched by Gardner “Mike” Cowles, Jr., in Des Moines, Iowa, in January 1937. He consolidated the editorial offices at 522 Fifth Avenue, where it remained for a decade. Modeled on European picture magazines, it became a significant rival to Life magazine, which was based in Rockefeller Center, and by 1948 the magazine had a paid circulation of three million. Look would become the largest tenant, with offices on the 10th, 11th and 12th floors.

 

Uris Brothers agreed to name the building for Look in early 1950. Esquire, which claimed it was “embarrassed by the “new look,” took legal action to stop this, arguing that the change would “convey the false impression” that Esquire was “published or sponsored by the publishers of Look.” No action, however, was taken by the courts and until 1980 large capital letters spelled out “Look Building” on the mechanical tower’s south side. The 1950s would be heyday of Look’s popularity, reaching an estimated 21 per cent of all U.S. adults in 1961. It was the third most popular magazine in the nation and in 1963 it would sign a new lease, almost doubling its office space to more than 200,000 square feet. The New York Times Company purchased the Cowles Media Company in 1971, which included Family Circle and various regional newspapers.

 

Pocket Books, Inc., a division of Simon & Shuster, which published popular best sellers, was also an original tenant, as was the Music Publishers Holding Company, with such subsidiaries as Harms, Inc., Remick Music, New World Music, Advances Music, and Witmark & Sons. In Witmark’s fifth floor studio, a young Bob Dylan produced a series of important early demo recordings during 1962 and 1963.

 

Emery Roth & Sons joined the prestigious roster of tenants in April 1950. The New York Times reported that it was only the firm’s “fourth move” in fifty years and they occupied part of the 18th floor until the late 1950s. Three floors above, on the 21st floor, was Raymond Loewy, one of the 20th century’s most significant industrial designers, who appeared on the cover of Time magazine in October 1949 and would design the interiors of Lever House , completed nearby at 390 Park Avenue in 1952. Later tenants have included the Institutional Investor and Abbeville Press.

 

Subsequent History

 

In April 1953, the property was sold to the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. Several months later, in August 1953, the building was leased back to Uris Brothers. Since the 1970s, it has been owned by the 488 Madison Avenue Associates and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

 

The two-story retail base was remodeled with tinted black glass and new shop entrances in the 1980s. Horowitz Immerman Architects were responsible for these alterations. The rest of the exterior was renovated with great sensitivity by Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates in 1998. Architect Malcolm Holzman was the partner in charge of the project. He said that his main objective was to “keep the building as it is and not make it into something it will never be.” At the time, the original steel windows were replaced by similar aluminum frames and the glazed brick was cleaned. Additionally, about 20 per cent of the brick was replaced, as well as the original slate windowsills.

 

Interest in mid-20th century modern architecture was growing in the 1990s and the building’s careful restoration was described in a New York Times article, as well as in a small exhibition, New Life for a Modern Monument: A Salute to 488 Madison Avenue, organized by the Municipal Art Society in autumn 1998. The brochure’s text praised the owners and architects, commenting “The Look Building’s restoration shows how successfully the best postwar buildings can be updated, rewarding investors and delighting passerby.” In 2004, the Look Building was added to the National Register of Historic Places and the facade is subject to a conservation easement filed with the Trust of Architectural Easements.

 

Description

 

The Look Building stands on the west side of Madison Avenue, between 51st and 52nd Streets. It occupies an L-shaped lot, measuring 200 feet on Madison Avenue, 140 feet on 51st Street, and 75 feet on 52nd Street. Above the second story, the facade is mainly white brick. Continuous non-historic aluminum windows , three horizontal panes tall, extend continuously around the facade, starting at the west ends of the north and south facades. The center panes are operable and open out from the bottom. Above the 12-story base, every second floor sets back, climaxing with a mostly windowless tower, which incorporates horizontal louvers on the east front.

 

The two-story retail base is non-historic and dates to the late 1980s. It is divided from the third story on all facades by what appears to be charcoal-colored cast-stone panels, crowned by a curved aluminum molding. The two stories of glass panels are transparent or tinted black and the water table may be granite. The main entrance is at the center of the sloping Madison Avenue facade. There is a recessed passage that leads to a single revolving glass entrance door, flanked by conventional glass doors. The entrance passage is paved with contrasting light and dark gray granite. The exterior panels that face the street are polished black granite and the walls that flank the passage are light brown-and-black marble.

 

There is a ribbed aluminum ceiling with recessed lighting fixtures, as well as square service panel near center. Above the entrance passage is a wide non-historic aluminum marquee with curved corners and free-standing numerals that identify the address. To the left are three storefronts with recessed entrances. The one closest to the entrance has a horizontal aluminum sign with white lettering. At the corner of 51st Street is a revolving door with dark tinted glass. Directly to the right of this door is a conventional recessed store entrance. To the right of the main entrance is a single storefront with clear glass windows. This storefront incorporates several horizontal aluminum signs with white lettering: on Madison Avenue, at the corner of 52nd Street, and on 52nd Street.

 

The Fifty-First street facade has four non-historic storefronts, at 19, 21 and 23 East 51st Street. The last address has two entrances. Most of the first-story businesses are identified above the storefronts with metal letters against black glass panels. Though most of the glass on the second story is tinted black, the windows nearest Madison Avenue are transparent. At the west end of the facade, a vertical banner is strung between two horizontal brass poles. A significant number of glass panels toward the west end of the second story have been replaced with horizontal metal louvers. Near the top of the 11th story, at center, a white horizontal box projects out from the facade. In addition, there are four vertical boxes attached at the corner above the third story. There is a fan-like security gate at the west edge of the 7th story.

 

Fifty-Second Street has a single storefront that extends around the corner from Madison Avenue. To the west of the last window is a single vertical panel of horizontal louvers. At the corner, above the aluminum sign, are two small black boxes with visible wires. The service entrance, with two metal doors that open outward, is located at the west end of the first story. At the middle of the 4th story, two of the upper windows have been replaced with horizontal louvers. Fan-like security gates have been installed at the west end of two of the uppermost floors.

 

- From the 2010 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report

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The Postcard

 

A postally unused carte postale that was published by Lapina. The card, that has a divided back, was printed in Paris.

 

Rin Tin Tin

 

Nénette and Rintintin were the source of the name of the Hollywood film star dog Rin Tin Tin.

 

Rin Tin Tin (September 1918 – August 10, 1932) was a male German Shepherd dog born in Flirey, France, who became an international star in motion pictures.

 

He was rescued from a Great War battlefield by an American soldier, Lee Duncan, who nicknamed him "Rinty". Duncan trained Rin Tin Tin, and obtained silent film work for the dog.

 

Rin Tin Tin was an immediate box-office success, and went on to appear in 27 Hollywood films, gaining worldwide fame. Rin Tin Tin was responsible for greatly increasing the popularity of German Shepherd dogs as family pets.

 

The immense profitability of his films contributed to the success of Warner Bros. studios, and helped advance the career of Darryl F. Zanuck from screenwriter to producer and studio executive.

 

After Rin Tin Tin died in 1932, the name was given to several related German Shepherd dogs featured in fictional stories on film, radio, and television. Rin Tin Tin Jr. appeared in some serialized films, but was not as talented as his father.

 

Rin Tin Tin III, said to be Rin Tin Tin's grandson, but probably only distantly related, helped promote the military use of dogs during World War II. Rin Tin Tin III also appeared in a film with child actor Robert Blake in 1947.

 

Duncan groomed Rin Tin Tin IV for the 1950's television series The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin, but the dog performed poorly in a screen test, and was replaced in the TV show by trainer Frank Barnes's dogs, primarily one named Flame Jr., called JR, with the public being led to believe otherwise.

 

Instead of shooting episodes, Rin Tin Tin IV stayed at home in Riverside, California. The TV show Rin Tin Tin was nominated for a PATSY Award in both 1958 and 1959, but did not win.

 

After Duncan died in 1960, the screen property of Rin Tin Tin passed to TV producer Herbert B. Leonard, who worked on further adaptations such as the 1988–1993 Canadian-made TV show Katts and Dog, which was called Rin Tin Tin: K-9 Cop in the US, and Rintintin Junior in France.

 

Following Leonard's death in 2006, his lawyer James Tierney made the 2007 children's film Finding Rin Tin Tin, an American–Bulgarian production based on Duncan's discovery of the dog in France.

 

Meanwhile, a Rin Tin Tin memorabilia collection was being amassed by Texas resident Jannettia Propps Brodsgaard, who had purchased several direct descendant dogs from Duncan, beginning with Rinty Tin Tin Brodsgaard in 1957.

 

Brodsgaard bred the dogs to keep the bloodline. Brodsgaard's granddaughter, Daphne Hereford, continued to build on the tradition and bloodline of Rin Tin Tin from 1988 to 2011; she was the first to trademark the name Rin Tin Tin.

 

Hereford also opened a short-lived Rin Tin Tin museum in Latexo, Texas. Hereford passed the tradition to her daughter, Dorothy Yanchak, in 2011. The current dog, Rin Tin Tin XII, owned by Yanchak, takes part in public events to represent the Rin Tin Tin legacy.

 

The Origins of Rin Tin Tin

 

Following advances made by American forces during the Battle of Saint-Mihiel, Corporal Lee Duncan, an armourer of the U.S. Army Air Service, was sent forward on the 15th. September 1918, to the small French village of Flirey to see if it would make a suitable flying field for his unit, the 135th. Aero Squadron.

 

The area had been subjected to aerial bombing and artillery fire, and Duncan found a severely damaged kennel which had once supplied the Imperial German Army with German Shepherd dogs. The only dogs left alive in the kennel were a starving mother with a litter of five nursing puppies, their eyes still shut because they were less than a week old. Duncan rescued the dogs, and brought them back to his unit.

 

When the puppies were weaned, he gave the mother to an officer and three of the litter to other soldiers, but he kept one puppy of each sex. He felt that these two dogs were symbols of his good luck.

 

He dubbed them Rin Tin Tin and Nanette after a pair of good luck charms called Rintintin and Nénette that French children often gave to the American soldiers. The soldiers were told that Rintintin and Nénette were lucky lovers who had survived a bombing attack, but the original dolls had been designed by Francisque Poulbot before the war in late 1913 to look like Paris street urchins. Contrary to linguistic clues and popular usage, Poulbot said that Rintintin was the girl doll.

 

Duncan sensed that Nanette was the more intelligent of the two puppies.

 

In July 1919, Duncan sneaked the dogs aboard a ship taking him back to the US at the end of the war. When he got to Long Island, New York, for re-entry processing, he put his dogs in the care of a Hempstead breeder named Mrs. Leo Wanner, who trained police dogs.

 

Nanette was diagnosed with pneumonia; as a replacement, the breeder gave Duncan another female German Shepherd puppy. Duncan travelled to California by rail with his dogs. While Duncan was travelling by train, Nanette died in Hempstead. As a memorial, Duncan named his new puppy Nanette II, but he called her Nanette.

 

Duncan, Rin Tin Tin, and Nanette II settled at his home in Los Angeles. Rin Tin Tin was a dark sable colour, and had very dark eyes. Nanette II was much lighter in colour.

 

An athletic silent film actor named Eugene Pallette was one of Duncan's friends. The two men enjoyed the outdoors; they took the dogs to the Sierras, where Pallette liked to hunt, while Duncan taught Rin Tin Tin various tricks. Duncan thought that his dog might win a few awards at dog shows and thus be a valuable source of puppies bred with Nanette for sale.

 

In 1922, Duncan was a founding member of the Shepherd Dog Club of California, based in Los Angeles. At the club's first show, Rin Tin Tin showed his agility, but also demonstrated an aggressive temper, growling, barking, and snapping.

 

It was a very poor performance, but the worst moment came afterward when Duncan was walking home. A heavy bundle of newspapers was thrown from a delivery truck and landed on the dog, breaking his left front leg. Duncan had the injured limb set in plaster, and he nursed the dog back to health for nine months.

 

Ten months after the break, the leg was healed and Rin Tin Tin was entered in a show for German Shepherd dogs in Los Angeles. Rin Tin Tin had learned to leap great heights.

 

At the dog show while making a winning leap, he was filmed by Duncan's acquaintance Charley Jones, who had just developed a slow-motion camera. Seeing his dog being filmed, Duncan became convinced Rin Tin Tin could become the next Strongheart, a successful film dog that lived in his own full-sized stucco bungalow with its own street address in the Hollywood Hills, separate from the mansion of his owners, who lived a street away next to Roy Rogers.

 

Duncan later wrote:

 

"I was so excited over the film idea

that I found myself thinking of it night

and day."

 

The Film Career of Rin Tin Tin

 

Duncan walked his dog up and down Poverty Row, talking to anyone in a position to put Rin Tin Tin in film, however modest the role.

 

The dog's first break came when he was asked to replace a camera-shy wolf in The Man from Hell's River (1922) featuring Wallace Beery. The wolf was not performing properly for the director, but under the guidance of Duncan's voice commands, Rin Tin Tin was very easy to work with. When the film was completed, the dog was billed as "Rin Tan".

 

Rin Tin Tin would be cast as a wolf or wolf-hybrid many times in his career, because it was much more convenient for filmmakers to work with a trained dog.

 

In another 1922 film titled My Dad, Rin Tin Tin picked up a small part as a household dog. The credits read:

 

"Rin Tin Tin – Played by himself".

 

Rin Tin Tin's first starring role was in Where the North Begins (1923), in which he played alongside silent screen actress Claire Adams. This film was a huge success, and has often been credited with saving Warner Bros. from bankruptcy.

 

It was followed by 24 more screen appearances. Each of these films was very popular, making such a profit for Warner Bros. that Rin Tin Tin was called "the mortgage lifter" by studio insiders.

 

A young screenwriter named Darryl F. Zanuck was involved in creating stories for Rin Tin Tin; the success of the films raised him to the position of film producer. In New York City, Mayor Jimmy Walker gave Rin Tin Tin a key to the city.

 

Rin Tin Tin was much sought after, and was signed for endorsement deals. Ken-L Ration, Ken-L-Biskit, and Pup-E-Crumbles all featured him in their advertisements. Warner Bros. fielded fan letters by the thousands, sending back a glossy portrait signed with a paw print and a message written by Duncan:

 

"Most faithfully, Rin Tin Tin."

 

In the 1920's, Rin Tin Tin's success for Warner Bros. inspired several imitations from other studios looking to cash in on his popularity, notably RKO's Ace the Wonder Dog, also a German Shepherd dog.

 

Around the world, Rin Tin Tin was extremely popular because as a dog he was equally well understood by all viewers. At the time, silent films were easily adapted for various countries by simply changing the language of the intertitles. Rin Tin Tin's films were widely distributed.

 

Film historian Jan-Christopher Horak wrote that by 1927, Rin Tin Tin was the most popular actor with the very sophisticated film audience in Berlin. One fan wrote:

 

"He is a human dog, "human in

the real big sense of the word."

 

A Hollywood legend holds that at the first-ever Academy Awards competition in 1929, Rin Tin Tin was voted Best Actor, but that the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, wishing to appear more serious and thus determined to have a human actor win the award, removed Rin Tin Tin as a choice and re-ran the vote, leading to German actor Emil Jannings winning the award.

 

Author Susan Orlean stated this story as fact in her 2011 book Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend. However, former Academy head Bruce Davis has written that the 1928 ballots, kept in storage at the Academy's Margaret Herrick Library, show a complete absence of votes for Rin Tin Tin.

 

Davis called the story an urban legend that probably originated in a joke ballot circulated that year by Zanuck, who wanted to mock the concept of the Academy Awards.

 

Although primarily a star of silent films, Rin Tin Tin did appear in four sound features, including the 12-part Mascot Studios chapter-play The Lightning Warrior (1931), co-starring with Frankie Darro. In these films, vocal commands would have been picked up by the microphones, so Duncan likely guided Rin Tin Tin by hand signals.

 

Rin Tin Tin and the rest of the crew filmed much of the outdoor action footage for The Lightning Warrior on the Iverson Movie Ranch in Chatsworth, Los Angeles, known for its huge sandstone boulders and widely recognized as the most heavily filmed outdoor shooting location in the history of the movies.

 

Rin Tin Tin and Nanette II produced at least 48 puppies; Duncan kept two of them, selling the rest or giving them as gifts. Greta Garbo, W. K. Kellogg, and Jean Harlow each owned one of Rin Tin Tin's descendants.

 

The Death of Rin Tin Tin

 

On the 10th. August 1932, Rin Tin Tin died at Duncan's home on Club View Drive in Los Angeles. Duncan wrote about the death in his unpublished memoir: He heard Rin Tin Tin bark in a peculiar fashion, so he went to see what was wrong. He found the dog lying on the ground, moments away from death.

 

In the United States, Rin Tin Tin's death set off a national response. Regular programming was interrupted by a news bulletin. An hour-long program about Rin Tin Tin played the next day.

 

Newspapers across the nation carried obituaries. Magazine articles were written about his life, and a special Movietone News feature was shown to movie audiences.

 

In the press, aspects of the death were fabricated in various ways, such as Rin Tin Tin dying on the set of the film Pride of the Legion (where Rin Tin Tin Jr. was working), dying at night, or dying at home on the front lawn in the arms of actress Jean Harlow, who lived on the same street.

 

In a private ceremony, Duncan buried Rin Tin Tin in a bronze casket in his own backyard with a plain wooden cross to mark the location. Duncan was suffering the financial effects of the Great Depression and could not afford a finer burial, nor even his own expensive house.

 

He sold his house, and quietly arranged to have the dog's body returned to his country of birth for reburial in the Cimetière des Chiens et Autres Animaux Domestiques, the pet cemetery in the Parisian suburb of Asnières-sur-Seine.

 

In a ceremony on the 8th. February 1960, Rin Tin Tin was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1627 Vine Street.

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"Доходното здание" днес е своеобразна емблема на Русе - сградата е построена на границата на ХІХ и ХХ век като доходоносно за общината съоръжение, разполагащо с театрален салон, библиотека, магазини. Дело е на виенския архитект Паул Бранк. Богатата орнаментика на фасадата превръща сградата като едно от многото архитектурни паментици, изтъквани като доказателство за силното културно влияние на Австро-Унгария върху Русе... Сградата подслонява постановките на градския драматичен театър. През 80-те и 90-те години зданието е затворено и оградено във връзка с основна реконструкция, предвиждаща изграждането на по-голяма зала и нови фоайета. На практика от старата сграда се запазва само фасадата, а вътрешността е изцяло новопостроена. След няколко десетилетия ремонтни дейности, сградата се връща към живот едва през 2006 г.

 

"The profitable house" as known in Ruse is a kind of emblem of the city. It was built between 1898 and 1902 as an enterprise to accomodate theatre spectacles, a library, shops and cafes and gain money for the municipality. It was designed by the architect from Austrian architect Paul Brank. The rich ornamentated facade makes the building one of the many architectural landmarks in the city, used as a proof for the Austrian cultural influence on Ruse... The building was being and is still used by the drama theatre. In 1980 it was closed for a great reconstruction - a new bigger hall and new foyers were planed to be built. In fact the facade is the single element to survive from the original building. Due to financial problems the reconstruction lasted more than 20 years and the finished building was opened in 2006.

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Grand Concourse, Bronx

 

The Andrew Freedman Home, one of the most impressive edifices built in The Bronx during the first decades of the twentieth century, was erected in 1922-24 (and enlarged in 1928-31) as a result of a generous bequest in the will of Andrew Freedman. Freedman, a capitalist who had a close relationship with the leaders of Tammany Hall, was involved with many profitable business ventures, notably the construction of the IRT, New York City's first subway line. He left most of his fortune for the establishment of a home for "aged and indigent persons of both sexes," but with the proviso that the residents of the home be poor people who had once been in good circumstances. The Board of Trustees, led by prominent lawyer Samuel Untermyer, purchased a large plot of land on the Grand Concourse, the most prestigious street in the Bronx, and commissioned a building from two notable New York architects - Joseph H. Freedlander and Harry Allan Jacobs.

 

The home is an exceptional example of a monumental building which, through its symmetrical massing, fenestration, and handsome detail, recalls the tradition of the Italian Renaissance palazzo. Its design displays many handsome architectural features, including a recessed loggia, balustraded terrace, finely cut stonework, and beautifully wrought, iron detail. The elegantly appointed building functioned as a refuge for the once affluent for fifty-nine years, from its opening in 1924 until 1983 when the Andrew Freedman Home ceased to operate and the building was purchased by the Mid-Bronx Senior Citizens Council as housing for the elderly.

 

The Grand Concourse

In 1874, when New York City annexed the West Bronx (the area west of the Bronx River officially known as the 23rd and 24th Wards, but generally referred to by nineteenth-century New Yorkers as the "North Side" or, more commonly, as the "Annexed District"), it was a sparsely settled region with few urban amenities.^ Following the annexation, residents of both Manhattan and the new wards advocated the establishment of large parks in the undeveloped region. In 1884, the New York State Legislature approved the purchase of approximately 4000 acres of parkland, primarily in the North Bronx. ^ This land was relatively inaccessible to most residents of the city since no roads or mass transit lines linked Manhattan to the new parkland. Thus, in 1890 the legislature established the Department of Street Improvements of the 23rd and 24th Wards with a mandate to lay out streets throughout the annexed district; the department's finest achievement was the Grand Concourse which made the new Bronx parks accessible from Manhattan.

 

The first commissioner of the new department was Louis J. Heintz who appointed Louis Risse as his chief engineer; it was Risse who was directly responsible for the planning of the Concourse. The inspiration for the Grand Concourse was the campaign waged by the Rider and Driver Club of New York City for the construction of a speedway on which its wealthy members could run horses and carriages. After facing opposition to the idea of a speedway along the west side of Central Park, the club began to advocate a speedway along Jerome Avenue in The Bronx. Heintz asked Risse for his opinion and, according to Risse,"... I was giving serious consideration to the necessity of supplying that missing link between the upper and lower park systems [Central Park and the Bronx parks] which the Commission had failed to provide in 1884.*"* Instead of Jerome Avenue, which is located on level ground near the Harlem River, Risse proposed that a "Speedway and Concourse" be erected on the ridge to the east.

 

The street that Risse proposed was to be more than just a speedway for pleasure driving and a convenient connection to the Bronx parks; it was also to be a luxurious residential boulevard. Risse contended that 'the great enhancement in real estate values which the construction of the Concourse must necessarily produce will repay the City many times over the original cost of the undertaking.*^

 

In fact, when Risse laid out the Concourse, he planned secondary roadways adjacent to the sidewalks that could be used by local traffic servicing the villas that were expected to appear along the roadway.

 

Plans for the new Grand Boulevard and Concourse (the name was later shortened to Grand Concourse) were drawn up in 1893. Construction began in 1897 and progressed slowly; the Concourse was not officially opened until November 25,1909. As originally constructed, the Grand Concourse consisted of a fifty-eight-foot wide central speedway with a narrow central mall and thirty-seven-foot wide service roads separated from the main roadway by six-foot wide malls (these malls were subsequently altered). It was planned to provide pedestrian sidewalks and promenades, bicycle paths, and vehicular driveways. The roadway began at Cedar Park on East 161st Street and extended north to Mosholu Parkway. In 1924, the Concourse was extended to the south as far as East 138th Street.

 

The large freestanding villas that Risse had envisioned were never built. Rather, apartment houses became virtually the exclusive type of residential construction along the Concourse when real estate development began in the second decade of the twentieth century. These buildings include modest five-story walk-ups and more impressive six-story elevator buildings. In addition to the apartment houses, a few public and institutional buildings were erected along the Concourse; the Andrew Freedman Home is the largest on the original length of the street.^

 

Andrew Freedman

The Andrew Freedman Home was founded as a result of an unusual bequest in the will of wealthy capitalist Andrew Freedman (1860-1915). Freedman was a native New Yorker who was educated in the city's public schools before beginning employment in a local dry goods store. He dabbled in law before entering the Held of real estate. Freedman was extremely successful in his real estate ventures, "by ways," according to one biographer, "that are no longer traceable

 

Freedman was allied with the Democratic party and with the leadership of Tammany Hall. He was a close friend and advisor to Tammany boss Richard Croker and was intimately involved in many financially lucrative Tammany schemes, although the exact nature of most of Freedman's financial dealings remains a mystety. An example of the financial alliance between Croker and Freedman came to light in 1900 during a New York State Assembly investigation into New York City's government. Freedman was a vice-president of the United States Fidelity & Casualty Company which bonded New York City employees. He obtained this bonding contract through Croker's influence. When questioned about this arrangement, Freedman admitted that he presented a portion of his commissions to Croker though he refused to say how much money had exchanged hands, telling the investigator 'that I wouldn't care to tell you because I don't want to let you know how much money I carry on my person.'**

 

Freedman was also a key player in the construction of the original subway line built by the Interborough Rapid Transit Company. His obituary opens by stating that he "did more perhaps than any other man to make possible the subway system in this city."*° However, Freedman's involvement was primarily behind the scenes. In a speech delivered at the opening ceremonies for the subway, August Belmont, the system's principal financial backer, commented that Freedman, although unheralded, deserved a fair share of the praise and credit since he was "among the first to appreciate the practicability of the project."**

Exactly what role Freedman played in the construction of the IRT and how this relates to Tammany Hall is not clearly understood. The story that is generally told is that it was he who brought the contractor John B. McDonald and financier August Belmont together. One version of the story recounts that Freedman urged McDonald to bid on the subway contract, promising him financial backing. He then formed a group that put up $150,000 for the bid and when additional financing was needed, persuaded August Belmont to become the project's major backer.*^ A variant has it that MacDonald went to Freedman requesting that he assist in raising the necessary deposit of $150,000. Freedman pledged $45,000 of his own money and found four friends willing to invest. On the day that the deposit was due, the group was still short $50,000 when Freedman thought of Belmont, another loyal Tammany supporter, who immediately "arranged

for the cash,. .. without reading the contract, and without any further talk."

 

There is probably little truth in these dramatic stories of three heroic individuals (McDonald, Freedman, and Belmont) selflessly advancing money for the great subway construction project. As Wallace B. Katz has noted in his detailed investigation of the subway's construction, "this is a wonderful story, one that deserves to be part of the folklore of American Capitalism, but it lacks plausibility."**

 

Freedman, Belmont, McDonald, and the other four investors were all Tammany leaders and were undoubtedly well acquainted with each other. Tammany's involvement in the bidding was well known. In January 1900, when the bids for subway construction were received, the financiers' names were not known, but it was reported in the Mm York 7vHM that McDonald was "a Tammany contractor."*^ Katz concludes that "Belmont, McDonald, and Freedman maintained their stOTy concerning the origins of their partnership during the next twenty years, through civil suits and governmental investigations.... [since] it allowed the participants to this deal to deny what was both plausible and very likely true, that Belmont, Tammany, and the RTC [Rapid Transit Commission] had prearranged the entire matter."*^ Freedman continued to be closely involved with the subway, in particular as a director of companies responsible for much of the construction work.*^

 

The construction of the IRT was not Freedman's only major financial project. He was, for example, involved with the Shuberts in the construction of Broadway theaters. The Booth (1912-13), Shubert (1912-13), 44th Street (1912-13; demolished), and Little (1912; now Helen Hayes) theaters are said to have been financed by a syndicate composed of Freedman, lawyer Samuel Untermyer (see below), and Cincinnati political boss George B. Cox.*^ To his contemporaries, Freedman was probably best known as the owner of the New York Baseball Club, commonly known as the "Giants," from 1894 until 1902. Freedman's tenure as owner of the Giants was not without conflict, as reported by Harold Seymour in his history of baseball:

Freedman's irascible personality,

quick temper, and aggressiveness

had him in constant trouble. . . . His turbulent years as Giant owner (many charged that he was only a front man for others) kept the League in constant turmoil, and made the New York observation that he had "an astonishing faculty for making enemies* seem like a gross understatement.

 

The Andrew Freedman Home

On December 8,1915, several weeks after his death, Andrew Freedman's will was made public.

 

Freedman left a sizable bequest to his brother Daniel, established a trust for his mother and sister, left small amounts of money to seven local homes and hospitals,^ and gave gifts to friends, including a bequest of a pair of large white pearl shirt buttons to Richard Croker. The bulk of Freedman's estate was to be used for the incorporation of the Andrew Freedman Home "for the free and gratuitous reception, shelter, nourishment, care and maintenance of aged and indigent persons of both sexes, and without regard to race or religious creed... [with the proviso that the selection of residents be confined to those].. . who have been in good circumstances but by reason of adverse fortune, have become poor and dependent, and that in case of husband and wife being received into the institution, provisions shall be made so that they may dwell together therein."^ The initial bequest to the new home totalled approximately $5,000,(XX) with additional funds to be added to the trust upon the death of his mother and sister.

Exactly why Freedman established this rather unusual charitable institution when he drew up his will in 1907 is not known. According to DeLancey Nicoll, a business associate of Freedman's, speaking at the opening ceremonies for the Andrew Freedman Home, "I always urged that he give his money to the unusual charities. He would say: 'No: the sick and the poor are cared for by everybody else now. Nobody has offered any refuge for people of this kind, and they need one even more than other unfortunates.'"^ His sister, Isabella Freedman, explained that "he believed that the worthy habits and traditions of affluence and refinement deserve recognition and

respect, and that people possessing them should not be allowed to live in penury.*^

 

The man most responsible for the organization of the Andrew Freedman Home and the construction of its building was Freedman's friend, business partner, and executor Samuel Untermyer (1858-1940). Untermyer, who became the first president of the Home's Board of Trustees, was one of the most prominent lawyers of his time. He was also close to the leaders of Tammany Hall and it is probably through this political connection that Untermyer and Freedman became friends.

 

Untermeyer developed Freedman's concept of a home for the once wealthy into one that sought to assist those who had not only been affluent, but were also cultured "gentlefolk." The qualifications for admission promulgated by the original trustees stated that, "the Home is intended for aged and indigent gentlefolk. This has been interpreted by the Board of Directors (sic) to mean that the applicants are to be persons of culture, education, and refinement."^ Although Freedman had ordered the novel requirement that couples be allowed to live together, it was Untermyer and the trustees who decided that admission to the home would be primarily for couples. Additional requirements were that new residents had to be between the ages of sixty and eighty, in good health, and had to have enough money for clothing and other personal expenses. With the exception of the personal allowance, all facilities, including room and board, were free.

 

In 1916, the Trustees obtained a Special Act of the Legislature that incorporated the home.^ The site, a large block bounded by the Grand Concourse, Walton Avenue, East 166th Street, and McClellan Street, was purchased by the Andrew Freedman Home in 1917.^ Construction was delayed by World War I and did not actually begin until 1922.^ The original section of the Home, the Italian Renaissance-inspired central pavilion designed by Joseph H. Freedlander and Harry Allan Jacobs, was dedicated on May 25, 1924. At the opening ceremony it was announced that "two wings would eventually be added to the present building."^ Construction of the north and south wings began in 1928. Instead of Freedlander and Jacobs, architect David Levy was commissioned to design the additions

Although an institution, the Andrew Freedman Home was planned to be as much like a private house as possible. The interiors (not subject to this designation) were decorated by the prestigious interior design firm of L. Alavoine & Co. Public facilities on the first floor included a large living room "which in its decorations and its furnishings is all that might be expected in a fine and expensively equipped private home" (it had Georgian style furniture, chandeliers, and fireplace); an oak-paneled library; card and billiard rooms; and a spacious dining room decorated with chinoiserie.^ Sleeping rooms were located on the second and third floors. Married couples could live in a double room with a private bath or in two single rooms with a shared bath; single people also had their own rooms, but two singles shared a bath. Those who lived in the home were never referred to as 'inmates* (a word often applied to people living in institutions), but were always called "members," as if they resided in a private clubhouse.

 

In exchange for free residence in the home, members had to abide by a series of rules. Among the rules were those that forbade tipping or reprimanding the employees, required all meals be taken in the dining room (only tea, coffee, and related snacks could be eaten in private rooms), and permitted members to take a vacation of up to four weeks per year.^

 

The first seventeen "members" -- five couples, five single women, and two single men - moved into the home in July, 1917. Although the contemporary press referred to the home as a retreat for former millionaires, the early residents mostly came from more modest backgrounds: jeweler, dressmaker, doctor, nurse, teacher, businessman, etc.^* Others who moved in later included engineers, politicians, actors, opera singers, and journalists. In the years before the home closed, many residents were German and Austrian Jewish refugees. At its peak, after the completion of the side wings in 1928, the home could accommodate about 130 residents.

 

The Architects^

 

The two architects who were responsible for the design of the original section of the Andrew Freedman Home, Joseph Henry Freedlander (1870-1943) and Harry Allan Jacobs (1872-1932), were, by the 1920s, well-known members of New York's architectural establishment. This is the only project on which the two collaborated, although they undoubtedly were familiar with one another. Both architects were about the same age and both had attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. They were members of many of the same professional organizations, including the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects and the Architectural League of New York.

 

Joseph Freedlander was the more prominent and more talented of the two designers. He was bom in New York City and studied at M.I.T. before entering the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. In 1895 Freedlander became one of the first three Americans to actually complete the Ecole curriculum and receive a diploma.^ He retained a deep affinity for the Ecole and for Beaux-Arts practices. Shortly after returning to New York he established an afcRfr that reproduced the French system of training.^ Later, he served as president of the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects and was a founder and president of the American Soci6t4 des Architected Dipl6mes par le Gouvemement Franca is (American Group), organized by those who had received Ecole diplomas.

 

Freedlander was proficient in designing many different types of buildings and able to utilize diverse historic architectural styles. His Ecole training allowed him to excel in competitions, and many of his commissions were won in this manner. Among Freedlander's extant buildings in New York City are those for the New Harlem Hospital (1905, with later additions, demolished in part), the George Engel House at 17 East 74th Street (1920-21; located within the Upper East Side Historic District), the French Institute of the United States at 22 East 60th Street (1924), and the Museum of the City of New York (1928-30; a designated New York City Landmark). Outside of New York, he won competitions for the St. Louis Club (1897); the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers in Johnson City, Tennessee (1904); the Perry Memorial and International Peace Memorial (1912-15) at Put-in-Bay on Lake Erie near Cleveland; the Portland Auditorium, Portland Oregon (1912); and the White Plains Municipal Building (1924-26).

 

He was also responsible for a major expansion of the spa at Saratoga Springs (1933-36). In addition, Freedlander designed three of the largest buildings erected in the Bronx in the 1920s and early 1930s -- the Freedman Home, the Bronx County Building (1931-35), and the Bronx County Jail (1931 37), the last two designed in association with Max Hausle.

 

Harry Allan Jacobs was also a native New Yorker. He studied at the Columbia School of Mines and then at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and was a winner of the American Academy's Prix de Rome. Although he designed commercial buildings, his specialty was town houses, including sixteen buildings and facade alterations in what is now the Upper East Side Historic District.

 

Freedlander and Jacobs probably became associated on the design of the Andrew Freedman Home through their personal contacts with important members of the home's Board of Trustees. Samuel Untermyer had been one of Joseph Freedlander's earliest clients. Shortly after Freedlander opened his office, he was commissioned by Untermyer to redesign Greystone, his home in Yonkers.^ One of Harry Allan Jacobs's first town houses was the Charles S. Guggenheimer House at 129 East 73rd Street of 1907 (this house is in the Upper East Side Historic District). Guggenheimer, who was a member of the Board of Trustees, was the son of Samuel Untermyer's half-brother and law partner Randolph Guggenheimer.^

 

Little is known about David Levy, the architect of the wings. He was in independent practice ior a brief period between 1928 and 1933.^ His most notable commission was the Jewish Theological Seminary (1930), where he was associated with the firm of Gehron, Ross & Alley.

 

Design of the Andrew Freedman Home

 

The Andrew Freedman Home is characteristic of the traditional design found in New York during the 1920s. Almost all of the New York architects in the forefront of their profession during that decade had studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts or in American architecture schools with Beaux-Arts curricula. Many had also traveled extensively in Europe and had a first-hand knowledge of the great monuments of that continent. Freedlander and Jacobs were both well trained and well traveled, and their design for the Andrew Freedman House reflects their Beaux-Arts education and the influence of European architectural precedents.

 

Following principles expounded at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, the Andrew Freedman Home is a building rooted in the traditions of European architecture. It is not, however, a copy of a specific building from the past. The design borrows freely from Italian Renaissance precedents, rearranging forms into a regularized and rigidly symmetrical composition. The major inspiration is the Palazzo Famese in Rome (c.1535) with its three-story massing, long thirteen-bay wide facade organization, and its ^tano ncMf articulated by rectangular windows with alternating triangular and segmentally-arched pediments.

 

While the Palazzo Famese was clearly the prototype, many other features of the home differ from the model: the somewhat elongated rustication of the first-story openings resembles that around the second-story windows of the Palazzo Gondi, Florence; the lamps flanking each entrance are modeled on that at the corner of the Palazzo Strozzi; and the tripartite arched loggia overlooking Walton Avenue resembles arcades, porches, and loggias found on many Italian Renaissance buildings. Not only does the design successfully combine features from a number of Renaissance precedents, but it also melds the rectilinear, balanced form of Italian Renaissance urban palazzi, such as the Palazzo Famese, with the setting and terraces of a rural villa. While the design relies on historical sources, the construction technology was modem; the Home is a steel-frame, fireproof structure with concrete floors and terracotta and brick partitions.

 

Description

 

The Andrew Freedman Home is located on a sloping site on the west side of the Grand Concourse; Walton Avenue is at a considerably lower elevation than the Concourse. The lot has a varied topography with a major rock outcropping near East 166th Street. Stone and concrete retaining walls run along the south and west sides of the lot and along the Grand Concourse just north of 166th Street. The building is sited near the west side of the lot, close to Walton Avenue, with a lawn and garden separating the home from the Concourse. The building is three stories facing the Concourse and four stories facing Walton Avenue. The structure consists of the original rectangular section dating from 1922-24 and the rectangular north and south wings added in 1928-31.

 

The original building is a symmetrical structure separated from the garden by a wide terrace with limestone balustrade railings. A broad flight of stone stairs, set in the center of the terrace, extends into the garden. At either end of the terrace are subsidiary stairs that connect with pedestrian walkways leading from the Concourse. Carved stone urns flank each of the stairs. The home is clad entirely in pale limestone/* The front facade of the original section is thirteen bays wide, with a rusticated ground story and smooth limestone ashlar above; quoins mark each of the comers of the building. The first story is articulated by round-arched openings, including windows with multipane wood casement sash and fixed wood transoms and a pair of entrances set into the shallow projecting fourth and tenth bays. Each entrance arch has a projecting keystone that visually supports a balustrade railing. Set within the entrances are omate iron double doors with iron transoms; pairs of iron lamps flank the entrances.

 

These wrought-iron elements and the iron canopies and window guards found elsewhere on the building were the work of FerTO Studio, Inc. The windows light the library (at the south end of the facade), the card room (at the north), and the living room (in the center).

 

Two modest beltcourses separate the first and second stories. The rectangular second-story windows, with their multipane wood sash, are alternately capped by segmentally-arched and triangular pediments, each supported on modest brackets. The rectangular, multipane, third-story windows have no enframements. The facade is crowned by a deep copper cornice with a tall parapet that hides the fourth story. Three tall chimneys rise above the slightly sloping roof.

 

The side elevations of the original section, which are now concealed by the wings, were originally three bays wide and continued the main design features of the front facade. Balconies projected in front of the central windows on the second and third stories of the north elevation.^

 

The rear facade of the original section, facing Walton Avenue, is a full four stories tall (plus the attic level set behind the parapet) and is massed with two-story projecting three-bay wide arms at either end. The ground story is the main entrance for those arriving by automobile. The driveway begins on McClellan Street, near Walton Avenue, and extends to a wide turn around in front of the central entrance. The rusticated ground story has a rectangular entrance with iron doors and a transom and an iron canopy (a wooden shelter has been constructed beneath this canopy). Flanking the entrance are pairs of rectangular windows with omate iron grilles. The focal point of this facade is a triple-arched loggia with French doors and iron railings located above the entrance. The loggia is flanked by niches and pairs of round-arched windows. The upper stories are articulated in a manner identical to that on the front.

 

The concrete retaining wall along Walton Avenue is pierced by the entrance to a passage that connects to the basement of the building, allowing goods to be delivered and garbage to be removed without disturbing the residents.

 

The north and south wings were designed in a style to match the original building. They are also clad in stone, but the stone is of a somewhat more yellow shade. The front facade of each of the two wings is six bays wide and is articulated in a manner similar to the original section. The openings of the first story of the north wing take the same form as those of the original building. In the south wing, the first story has six rectangular windows set within blind arches; three smaller rectangular openings also articulate this story. The upper stories of the wings have crisply-cut rectangular windows; there are no pediments at the second-story openings. As on the first story, each upper story of the south wing contains three smaller openings.

 

The rear facades of the wings are not symmetrical. The ground story of the north wing contains a mix of large and small windows and a single door. On the first story are round-arched windows (lighting the dining room) of the same type seen on the front facade. The two upper stories contain three groups of windows without enframements, each consisting of two large openings separated by a smaller window. The McClellan Street elevation of this wing is three bays wide and is articulated in a manner identical to that on the front elevation of this wing, except that the central window on the second story is capped by a pediment. On the rear facade of the south wing, the ground story also has openings of varying sizes, while the first story consists of rectangular windows set within the same type of blind stone arch seen on the wing's front elevation. Large and small windows alternate on the upper stories.

 

The south elevation, set on a rock outcropping high above East 166th Street, has a central door in the basement flanked by windows. The first story contains windows set in blind arches, while the central window on the second story is accented with a pediment.

 

The Andrew Freedman Home continued to serve its original function until 1983, when the increasing cost of maintaining the facility forced the home to close.^ The building was purchased by the Mid-Bronx Senior Citizens Council, a private not-for-profit organization that sponsors senior citizen housing projects in the Bronx. According to the Council's executive director at the time of the purchase: "our reopening of the home will insure the legacy of Andrew Freedman will continue to serve as a symbol of human dignity, but this time in a more universal sense because residents will come from different walks of life."** Although the building remained vacant for a period after its purchase by Mid-Bronx, it is now, once again, in use and its elegant rooms continue to serve the elderly.

 

- From the 2000 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report

One of the most amazing attractions is this small Mayo town of Ballina is the Jackie Clarke Collection, the most important collection of Irish historical material in public hands. With over 100,000 items spanning 400 years, it includes items associated with some of the most influential figures of Ireland’s history including Wolfe Tone, Michael Collins, Dr. Douglas Hyde, Michael Davitt and O’Donovan Rossa.

 

It's like a bridge backwards in time that you can never imagine without seeing it as the material holds the key to Ireland’s past. Not exhibited in a fortress in Dublin, but tucked away in a former bank (with a useful vault) in this small town. Truly, a treasure in the West.

 

How did an ordinary private individual manage to buy so many rare items, from a cockade from Wolfe Tone's bonnet, to one of the original issues of the 1916 Proclamation? Through the income from this profitable business in Ballina: Clarke's Salmon Smokery, which shipped the local delicacy world wide. One man, one money-making business, one historical collection that grew from a hobby into one of the largest private collections in the world.

 

Never scorn the value of business.

 

www.clarkecollection.ie/home/

  

Here's another old bank building, belonging to the Midland Bank. I couldn't find a date stone or plaque anywhere but it does appear on the 1915 edition OS map, annotated as a 'Bank'. The map is based on a survey conducted in 1880 and revised in 1913, so you can pick a date, any-date, from that range. It must have dealt with a lot of business in its heyday, based on its size, but then at one time Hyson Green was one of the most profitable and sought after shopping areas in the Midlands.

Disabled Army veteran, new farmer and owner-operator of Prado Recreation Inc. Ruben Llamas, leases more than 585 acres from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, where his family and employees farm more than half of that and maintain the rest as a dog training facility, where the U.S. Department of Agriculture USDA Natural Resources and Conservation Service NRCS has helped him improve the health of the land and the profitability of the farm with the replacement of six new tractors, a loader, and technical assistance in the basin of the Prado Dam area, in Chino, CA, on Oct. 21, 2022. The facility is 36 miles east of Los Angeles, 11 miles south of Ontario, in what is known as the Inland Empire.

 

Sergeant Llamas served in the U.S. Army for 13 years as a Combat Engineer and a Scout. He was assigned to the U.S. Army 578th Brigade Engineer Battalion and the California Army National Guard 18th Calvery Regiment. He and his wife have six children; two are serving in the U.S. Army, one in the U.S. Coast Guard, and one is considering enlisting herself.

 

The basin’s range of environments and topography supports a wide variety of training grounds for sporting dogs, rescue tracking dogs, obedience training, and the ability to provide kennel facilities and the maintenance of waterfowl habitats and outdoor recreation areas. The farm fields of grasses and natural meadows provide nesting. Their seeds feed migrating birds near a hunting club and the broader wetlands. Hunting dog trainers use the forests, fields, meadows, ponds, and islands to train dogs to find game birds for hunters.

 

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers controls the approximately 4,500-acres Prado Dam area. Their lease is for more than 500 acres near the dam and Highway 71.

 

They purchased the business 16 years ago. The land ranges from farm fields to wetlands and woodlands. Three counties with about 15 million people surround the area.

 

The farm produces alfalfa, corn, and other forage crops for silage sold to local dairies. Winter crops are wheat, winter wheat, oats, and ryegrass. In the summer, they grow sorghum, corn, milo, and various types of grass. All the fields at different stages of growth are used for hunting dog training, as it provides cover for waterfowl and challenges to rescue dogs in training.

 

Ruben Llamas is a new farmer who wants to be as profitable as possible and develop his best practices. To help him, Llamas discovered the USDA Natural Resources and Conservation Service online at usda.gov. He called the nearest NRCS Field Office in Redlands, CA. District Conservationist Tomas Aguilar-Campos answered the phone and immediately helped him with the information and ways to begin networking. To better understand Llamas’s farm and conservation needs Campos went to see him at the farm in the Prado Dam basin. Llamas was hesitant to provide information to the government and work with them but decided to try it. He now compares his experience with USDA to be similar to a bank customer and their banker.

 

The business came with 40-year-old tractors that were unreliable, produced higher emissions, and were expensive to maintain. Thanks to the USDA Environmental Quality Incentives Program EQIP and the USDA assistance with the application process, he qualified for the replacement of six tractors and a loader. Now, there is no problem operating any of them at any time. The robust and reliable equipment accomplishes twice the work in half the time and does it with 30 percent less fuel, says Llamas.

 

NRCS EQIP provides technical and financial assistance to producers to address natural resource concerns and deliver environmental benefits such as improved water and air quality, conserved ground and surface water, increased soil health and reduced soil erosion and sedimentation, improved or created wildlife habitat, and mitigation against drought and increasing weather volatility.

 

Equally as old were the irrigation systems. So, next, the pump and mainline, and distribution pipe needed improvement. To test the system Tomas and another specialist came to test the irrigation system. He recommended larger lines and a smaller pump for lower energy costs and better efficiency.

 

“The field representative, they’re always there, ready to help, says Llamas. With whatever question I have, they will help me.”

During the winter, the lower wetlands and farm fields become flooded with rainwater. The water attracts local and migratory birds. They come to eat, rest and leave the soil richer from their time there.

In the lowest field, seasonal flooding made it difficult to farm. Aguilar-Campos responded by asking a USDA soil specialist to examine the land. Compost was the recommendation, resulting in consistent farming and increased yields.

 

Because of the varying soils, Aguilar-Campos had a soil analysis performed. It showed that composting would help. The compost revitalized the soil to the point that certain crops needed 30 percent less water, and corn required 18 percent less water. Another result is that weed suppression has improved, so chemical use is down from an already sparing use.

 

Ruben Llamas says, “It’s been a really great relationship. I mean, I got seven pieces of equipment, so it’s been really, really good.”

 

For more information about EQIP, go to nrcs.usda.gov/programs-initiatives/eqip-environmental-quality-incentives

 

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 533 Pumping Plant please see efotg.sc.egov.usda.gov/api/CPSFile/14941/533_NC_CPS_Pumping_Plant_2011

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 430, Irrigation Pipe, please see nrcs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/Irrigation_Pipeline_430_Overview_9_2020.pdf

 

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 443 Irrigation System please see nrcs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/Irrigation_System_Surface_And_Subsurface_443_Overview.pdf

 

USDA Media by Lance Cheung.

MetaTrader expert advisors, indicators and scripts that can assist traders take the right decision when trading forex, futures or stocks

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Shaniko History

 

As the five transcontinental railroad systems opened the United States to enormous economic growth from 1862 - 1893, the spur called “The Columbia Southern Railway” would open the eastern interior of Oregon for easier more profitable business. Papers were filed by the railroad company in 1897 to run track from the Columbia River at Biggs to a high grassland spot above the old stage stop of Cross Hollows. This was only to be a temporary terminus location and was decidedly named Shaniko.

 

Cross Hollows was operated by second owner, August Scherneckau from 1874-1887. He was well liked by the Indians, who could not pronounce his German name correctly. They called him 'Shaniko', thus the name chosen for the new and promising city. The Townsite Company bought the land from the third owner for $3,500 in 1899 as the railroad continued to lay track down through Sherman County. The Townsite Co. platted the town into thirty blocks. On May 13, 1900, the first train arrived to a few buildings and the tents that were pitched all over for the 170 or so people living in the infant town. The first wooden building built, a saloon, was operational.

 

Unfortunately, the railroad tracks could not to go any further than Shaniko due to terrain issues and the great railroad race of Harriman and Hill built tracks from the Columbia River along the Deschutes River, headed to Bend from 1908 to 1911. This put an end to the trek many grain farmers and livestock ranchers from the south previously made to Shaniko. The city, however, continued to meet many needs while approaching the slow decline. Most of the business district perished in a major fire in 1911; some never to be rebuilt. The people moved away, a few taking their homes with them. Though the railroad stopped service to Shaniko in 1942, people continued to live in the town.

 

Shaniko, Oregon is still classified as a Ghost Town even though people still live there. Once a place of legitimate community and commerce, it now survives as a shadow of its former existence. Ghost towns are categorized into three types: one still inhabited, one deserted, and one known only by the ground it once occupied.

 

With new interest in historic places in the 1960's, economic life began a slow revival. Today, the West lives on in Shaniko, as the community sees restorative changes and hosts events put on by the the City of Shaniko, Shaniko Chamber of Commerce and the Shaniko Preservation Guild. It’s a nice place to stay or just stretch your legs. The sunsets are beautiful and the sky can take you back a hundred years.

 

Source: www.shanikooregon.com/shaniko/history

The Last Run of Phase 2 LRV is scheduled on Feb 26th 2023.

 

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Kerikeri stone store and Kemp House (and surroundings) - 08 October 2013

 

The Stone Store at Kerikeri in the Bay of Islands is New Zealand’s oldest surviving stone building.

Part of the first Church Missionary Society station in New Zealand, the store was designed by John Hobbs to replace an earlier wooden store house. The Stone Store was erected between 1832 and 1836 by mason William Parrott, carpenter Ben Nesbitt and a team of Māori. Construction was of sandstone from Australia, local volcanic rocks and burnt shell mortar. Iron ties and window bars were forged by James Kemp, (though these unfortunately corroded the sandstone). Initially it had a wooden belfry on one side.

The Stone Store was intended to be the base of the Church Missionary Society’s trading post, selling produce from the farms at Te Waimate mission to ships, and European goods to Māori. Marsden planned to build a flour mill on the adjacent Kerikeri River, but this was eventually built at te Waimate instead. Stone was used to protect wheat from rats, for defence against Māori and to reduce the risk of fire.

  

Stone Store

By the mid-1830s the mission stations could not compete with the private enterprise of other European settlers, either as traders or farmers, and the store was not profitable.

The building was converted into the mission library by Bishop Selwyn in the early 1840s. Following the sacking of Kororareka in the Flagstaff War, it was briefly taken over by Governor George Grey for use as a magazine and barracks. After the cessation of hostilities in 1845, the stone store was leased to become the centre of Kauri gum trading operation, and then in 1863 it was used to house a boys' school. The building was sold to the Kemp family in 1874, and was used as a general store, although it increasingly became a tourist attraction. The Stone Store was purchased from the Kemps by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust in 1975. Conservation work was done in the 1990s. The store, together with the neighbouring Mission House now form a small museum.

  

The Mission House at Kerikeri in New Zealand was completed in 1822[1] as part of the Kerikeri Mission Station by the Church Missionary Society, and is New Zealand’s oldest surviving building. It is sometimes known as Kemp House.

Samuel Marsden established the Anglican mission to New Zealand with lay preachers, who lived in the Bay of Islands under the protection of Hongi Hika, the chief of the local tribe, the Ngapuhi. In November 1819, Marsden purchased 13,000 acres (53 km²) from the Ngapuhi.

Marsden instructed the Reverend John Butler to erect buildings for the mission station under the shelter of the Ngapuhi Pa or fortress of Kororipo at Kerikeri, (Marsden, himself, Thomas Kendall and Hongi Hika left for Britain). Using Māori and skilled European labour, Butler had completed the centre piece Mission House by 1822, (despite being interrupted by the return of Kendall and Hongi Hika with a thousand muskets, and Kororipo being used as a base for the subsequent Ngapuhi military campaign in the Musket Wars).

  

Mission House

Butler’s house was a weatherboard clad, two-storey Georgian design with a verandah and two chimneys. It was built primarily from Kauri. At some point in the 1830s, a skilling was added, and the verandah was replaced with an enlarged design in 1843. In the 1920s a bathroom was added behind the kitchen.

Butler was sacked in 1823, and George Clarke occupied the building until the early 1830s, by which time the Ngapuhi had abandoned Kororipo, but the mission station was strong enough to feel no need for protection.

The house was occupied by James and Charlotte Kemp in 1832 and although initially part of an expanded mission presence, (including the Stone Store), it was later purchased by the Kemps, and stayed in that family for 142 years, until Ernest Kemp donated it to the New Zealand Historic Places Trust in 1976.

The Trust has restored the building to an approximation of its 1843 appearance, (although the verandah was higher, and the roof was not shingled). Together with the Stone Store, the Mission house is now a museum open to the public.

  

source:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Store

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission_House

 

Bennett Rice Mill Charleston South Carolina. After the Civil War, rice planting became less profitable. By the turn of the century, the Lowcountry rice industry had all but died out. By 1911 the mill left the ownership of the Bennett family. Around 1924, the mill was converted into a peanut plant as a branch of the Planters Peanut and Chocolate Co. Ownership again changed hands to Seaboard Air Line Railroad Co. and finally to the South Carolina Ports Authority in 1958.

Damage from Hurricane Donna in September of 1960 all but demolished the mill. The Ports Authority built a steel frame to support the remaining western façade. After Hurricane Hugo in 1989, 90% of the braced façade survived.

 

In the 1990s, a series of restoration projects teamed local master masons with high school students to repoint the façade and repair the cracked brick arch. The Foundation continues to monitor the site, which remains one of Charleston 's architectural gems.

This ruin is located in the Charleston Port Authority. The sign on the fence said No Photographs.

WOMEN OF HISTORY:

SELECTED FROM THE WRITINGS OF STANDARD AUTHORS.

BY THE EDITOR OF "MEN OF HISTORY."

“Biography is the most universally pleasant and universally profitable of all reading."

EDINBURGH: W. P. NIMMO, HAY, & MITCHELL. 1890.

MORRISON AND GIBB, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH.

 

PREFACE.

________________________________________

Women of History is a further development of the idea which suggested the companion volume, Men of History, viz.: "To exhibit views of the world's great men and women, as set forth in the best words of the best authors—to convey, as it were, at once impressions of History and Literature, and lessons in Biography and Style."

 

In the present case, it has not been considered necessary to attempt a classification of the subjects in the manner followed in the preceding volume, from the fact that the feelings and motives which generally influence the lives of celebrated women are of a nature different from those of the opposite sex, and from the consequent want of a standard sufficiently distinct to adhere to. A chronological arrangement, however, has been adopted, which, it is hoped, will to a considerable extent supply the want of classification.

 

CONTENTS.

PAGE

Lucretia,Bayle,9

Sappho,Mure,12

Aspasia of Pericles,Grote,16

Xantippe,Brucker,20

Aspasia of Cyrus,Bayle,22

Cornelia, The Mother of the Gracchi,Plutarch,25

Portia,Plutarch,28

Octavia,Bayle,31

Cleopatra,Merivale,34

Mariamne,Merivale,39

Julia Domna,Gibbon,41

Zenobia,Gibbon,43

Valeria,Gibbon,47

Eudocia,Gibbon,50

Hypatia,Brucker,54

The Wife of Maximus,Gibbon,57

The Lady Rowena,Verstegan,60

Olga,Gibbon,62

The Lady Elfrida,Hume,65

The Countess of Tripoli,Sismondi,686

Jane, Countess of Mountfort,Hume,70

Laura de Sade,Sismondi,74

The Countess of Richmond,Tytler,77

Elizabeth Woodville,Hume,79

Joan of Arc,De Quincey,81

Jane Shore,Hume,85

Catharine of Arragon,Tytler,88

Anne Boleyn,Tytler,91

Margaret Roper,Ballard,94

Elizabeth Lucas,Ballard,97

Gaspara Stampa,Hallam,99

Anne Askew,Hume,102

Queen Elizabeth,Hume—Macaulay,105

Lady Jane Grey,Hume,110

Tarquinia Molza,Hilarion de Coste,114

Mary, Queen of Scots,Robertson,117

Gabrielle D'Estrees,Davenport Adams,120

Anne, Duchess of Pembroke,Bishop Rainbow,125

Esther Inglis,Ballard,128

Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle,Ballard,131

Lady Pakington,Ballard,133

Noor Mahal,James Mill,136

Pocahontas,Dr Hugh Murray,139

Lucy Hutchinson,Jeffrey,143

Lady Fanshawe,Jeffrey,146

Dorothy Osborne,Macaulay,148

Catherine Philips,Ballard,151

Madame de Maintenon,St Simon,154

Countess de Grammont,Count A. Hamilton,157

Mademoiselle de la Valliere,Davenport Adams,161

Madame Dacier,Hallam,1647

Lady Masham,Ballard,166

Anne Killigrew,Ballard,169

Queen Anne,Miss Strickland,172

Esther Johnson,Jeffrey,177

Esther Vanhomrigh,Sir Walter Scott,181

Mary Astell,Ballard,185

Madame des Ursins,St Simon,188

Lady Grizel Jerviswoode,Anderson,192

Madame de Pontchartrain,St Simon,196

Elizabeth Halkett,Conolly,198

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu,Jeffrey,200

Madame du Deffand,Jeffrey,204

Phœbe Bentley,Cumberland,207

Marquise du Chatelet,Professor Craik,208

Lady Huntingdon,Isaac Taylor,211

Maria Theresa,Carlyle,214

Meta Moller,Letters,217

Elizabeth Blackwell,James Bruce,221

Lætitia Barbauld,Johnstone,224

Hannah More,Professor Craik,226

Anna Seward,Sir Walter Scott,229

Catherine Cockburn,Professor Craik,232

Elizabeth Berkeleigh,Temple Bar,236

Caroline Herschel,Professor Craik,240

Madame D'Arblay,Macaulay,242

Madame Roland,Carlyle,245

Marie Antoinette,Carlyle,248

Sarah Siddons,Cunningham,252

Mrs Grant,Professor Craik,256

Elizabeth Inchbald,Cunningham,260

Elizabeth Hamilton,Professor Craik,2638

Countess de Vemieiro,Sismondi,267

Joanna Baillie,Professor Spalding269

Josephine,Alison,271

Anne Radcliffe,Edinburgh Review,273

Miss Edgeworth,Jeffrey,276

Charlotte Corday,Carlyle,279

Madame de Stael,Jeffrey,283

Madame de la Rochejaquelein,Jeffrey,286

Madame Recamier,Davenport Adams,290

Mary Brunton,Dr Brunton,293

Felicia Hemans,Jeffrey,297

Augustina Saragoza,Alison,299

Charlotte Bronte,Mrs Gaskell,301

 

Profitable Soda Fountain Operation

Profitable Soda Fountain Operation

Disabled Army veteran, new farmer and owner-operator of Prado Recreation Inc. Ruben Llamas, drives by his dog kennel facility on land leased from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, where his family and employees farm more than half of that and maintain the rest as a dog training facility, and where the U.S. Department of Agriculture USDA Natural Resources and Conservation Service NRCS has helped him improve the health of the land and the profitability of the farm with the replacement of six new tractors, a loader, and technical assistance in the basin of the Prado Dam area, in Chino, CA, on Oct. 21, 2022. The facility is 36 miles east of Los Angeles, 11 miles south of Ontario, in what is known as the Inland Empire.

 

Sergeant Llamas served in the U.S. Army for 13 years as a Combat Engineer and a Scout. He was assigned to the U.S. Army 578th Brigade Engineer Battalion and the California Army National Guard 18th Calvery Regiment. He and his wife have six children; two are serving in the U.S. Army, one in the U.S. Coast Guard, and one is considering enlisting herself.

 

The basin’s range of environments and topography supports a wide variety of training grounds for sporting dogs, rescue tracking dogs, obedience training, and the ability to provide kennel facilities and the maintenance of waterfowl habitats and outdoor recreation areas. The farm fields of grasses and natural meadows provide nesting. Their seeds feed migrating birds near a hunting club and the broader wetlands. Hunting dog trainers use the forests, fields, meadows, ponds, and islands to train dogs to find game birds for hunters.

 

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers controls the approximately 4,500-acres Prado Dam area. Their lease is for more than 500 acres near the dam and Highway 71.

 

They purchased the business 16 years ago. The land ranges from farm fields to wetlands and woodlands. Three counties with about 15 million people surround the area.

 

The farm produces alfalfa, corn, and other forage crops for silage sold to local dairies. Winter crops are wheat, winter wheat, oats, and ryegrass. In the summer, they grow sorghum, corn, milo, and various types of grass. All the fields at different stages of growth are used for hunting dog training, as it provides cover for waterfowl and challenges to rescue dogs in training.

 

Ruben Llamas is a new farmer who wants to be as profitable as possible and develop his best practices. To help him, Llamas discovered the USDA Natural Resources and Conservation Service online at usda.gov. He called the nearest NRCS Field Office in Redlands, CA. District Conservationist Tomas Aguilar-Campos answered the phone and immediately helped him with the information and ways to begin networking. To better understand Llamas’s farm and conservation needs Campos went to see him at the farm in the Prado Dam basin. Llamas was hesitant to provide information to the government and work with them but decided to try it. He now compares his experience with USDA to be similar to a bank customer and their banker.

 

The business came with 40-year-old tractors that were unreliable, produced higher emissions, and were expensive to maintain. Thanks to the USDA Environmental Quality Incentives Program EQIP and the USDA assistance with the application process, he qualified for the replacement of six tractors and a loader. Now, there is no problem operating any of them at any time. The robust and reliable equipment accomplishes twice the work in half the time and does it with 30 percent less fuel, says Llamas.

 

NRCS EQIP provides technical and financial assistance to producers to address natural resource concerns and deliver environmental benefits such as improved water and air quality, conserved ground and surface water, increased soil health and reduced soil erosion and sedimentation, improved or created wildlife habitat, and mitigation against drought and increasing weather volatility.

 

Equally as old were the irrigation systems. So, next, the pump and mainline, and distribution pipe needed improvement. To test the system Tomas and another specialist came to test the irrigation system. He recommended larger lines and a smaller pump for lower energy costs and better efficiency.

 

“The field representative, they’re always there, ready to help, says Llamas. With whatever question I have, they will help me.”

During the winter, the lower wetlands and farm fields become flooded with rainwater. The water attracts local and migratory birds. They come to eat, rest and leave the soil richer from their time there.

In the lowest field, seasonal flooding made it difficult to farm. Aguilar-Campos responded by asking a USDA soil specialist to examine the land. Compost was the recommendation, resulting in consistent farming and increased yields.

 

Because of the varying soils, Aguilar-Campos had a soil analysis performed. It showed that composting would help. The compost revitalized the soil to the point that certain crops needed 30 percent less water, and corn required 18 percent less water. Another result is that weed suppression has improved, so chemical use is down from an already sparing use.

 

Ruben Llamas says, “It’s been a really great relationship. I mean, I got seven pieces of equipment, so it’s been really, really good.”

 

For more information about EQIP, go to nrcs.usda.gov/programs-initiatives/eqip-environmental-quality-incentives

 

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 533 Pumping Plant please see efotg.sc.egov.usda.gov/api/CPSFile/14941/533_NC_CPS_Pumping_Plant_2011

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 430, Irrigation Pipe, please see nrcs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/Irrigation_Pipeline_430_Overview_9_2020.pdf

 

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 443 Irrigation System please see nrcs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/Irrigation_System_Surface_And_Subsurface_443_Overview.pdf

 

USDA Media by Lance Cheung.

Kerikeri stone store and Kemp House (and surroundings) - 08 October 2013

 

The Stone Store at Kerikeri in the Bay of Islands is New Zealand’s oldest surviving stone building.

Part of the first Church Missionary Society station in New Zealand, the store was designed by John Hobbs to replace an earlier wooden store house. The Stone Store was erected between 1832 and 1836 by mason William Parrott, carpenter Ben Nesbitt and a team of Māori. Construction was of sandstone from Australia, local volcanic rocks and burnt shell mortar. Iron ties and window bars were forged by James Kemp, (though these unfortunately corroded the sandstone). Initially it had a wooden belfry on one side.

The Stone Store was intended to be the base of the Church Missionary Society’s trading post, selling produce from the farms at Te Waimate mission to ships, and European goods to Māori. Marsden planned to build a flour mill on the adjacent Kerikeri River, but this was eventually built at te Waimate instead. Stone was used to protect wheat from rats, for defence against Māori and to reduce the risk of fire.

  

Stone Store

By the mid-1830s the mission stations could not compete with the private enterprise of other European settlers, either as traders or farmers, and the store was not profitable.

The building was converted into the mission library by Bishop Selwyn in the early 1840s. Following the sacking of Kororareka in the Flagstaff War, it was briefly taken over by Governor George Grey for use as a magazine and barracks. After the cessation of hostilities in 1845, the stone store was leased to become the centre of Kauri gum trading operation, and then in 1863 it was used to house a boys' school. The building was sold to the Kemp family in 1874, and was used as a general store, although it increasingly became a tourist attraction. The Stone Store was purchased from the Kemps by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust in 1975. Conservation work was done in the 1990s. The store, together with the neighbouring Mission House now form a small museum.

  

The Mission House at Kerikeri in New Zealand was completed in 1822[1] as part of the Kerikeri Mission Station by the Church Missionary Society, and is New Zealand’s oldest surviving building. It is sometimes known as Kemp House.

Samuel Marsden established the Anglican mission to New Zealand with lay preachers, who lived in the Bay of Islands under the protection of Hongi Hika, the chief of the local tribe, the Ngapuhi. In November 1819, Marsden purchased 13,000 acres (53 km²) from the Ngapuhi.

Marsden instructed the Reverend John Butler to erect buildings for the mission station under the shelter of the Ngapuhi Pa or fortress of Kororipo at Kerikeri, (Marsden, himself, Thomas Kendall and Hongi Hika left for Britain). Using Māori and skilled European labour, Butler had completed the centre piece Mission House by 1822, (despite being interrupted by the return of Kendall and Hongi Hika with a thousand muskets, and Kororipo being used as a base for the subsequent Ngapuhi military campaign in the Musket Wars).

  

Mission House

Butler’s house was a weatherboard clad, two-storey Georgian design with a verandah and two chimneys. It was built primarily from Kauri. At some point in the 1830s, a skilling was added, and the verandah was replaced with an enlarged design in 1843. In the 1920s a bathroom was added behind the kitchen.

Butler was sacked in 1823, and George Clarke occupied the building until the early 1830s, by which time the Ngapuhi had abandoned Kororipo, but the mission station was strong enough to feel no need for protection.

The house was occupied by James and Charlotte Kemp in 1832 and although initially part of an expanded mission presence, (including the Stone Store), it was later purchased by the Kemps, and stayed in that family for 142 years, until Ernest Kemp donated it to the New Zealand Historic Places Trust in 1976.

The Trust has restored the building to an approximation of its 1843 appearance, (although the verandah was higher, and the roof was not shingled). Together with the Stone Store, the Mission house is now a museum open to the public.

  

source:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Store

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission_House

 

Bodie is a ghost town in the Bodie Hills east of the Sierra Nevada mountain range in Mono County, California, United States. It is about 75 miles (121 km) southeast of Lake Tahoe, and 12 mi (19 km) east-southeast of Bridgeport, at an elevation of 8,379 feet (2554 m). Bodie became a boom town in 1876 (146 years ago) after the discovery of a profitable line of gold; by 1879 it had a population of 7,000–10,000.

 

The town went into decline in the subsequent decades and came to be described as a ghost town by 1915 (107 years ago). The U.S. Department of the Interior recognizes the designated Bodie Historic District as a National Historic Landmark.

 

Also registered as a California Historical Landmark, the ghost town officially was established as Bodie State Historic Park in 1962. It receives about 200,000 visitors yearly. Bodie State Historic Park is partly supported by the Bodie Foundation.

 

Bodie began as a mining camp of little note following the discovery of gold in 1859 by a group of prospectors, including W. S. Bodey. Bodey died in a blizzard the following November while making a supply trip to Monoville (near present-day Mono City), never getting to see the rise of the town that was named after him. According to area pioneer Judge J. G. McClinton, the district's name was changed from "Bodey," "Body," and a few other phonetic variations, to "Bodie," after a painter in the nearby boomtown of Aurora, lettered a sign "Bodie Stables".

 

Gold discovered at Bodie coincided with the discovery of silver at nearby Aurora (thought to be in California, later found to be Nevada), and the distant Comstock Lode beneath Virginia City, Nevada. But while these two towns boomed, interest in Bodie remained lackluster. By 1868 only two companies had built stamp mills at Bodie, and both had failed.

 

In 1876, the Standard Company discovered a profitable deposit of gold-bearing ore, which transformed Bodie from an isolated mining camp comprising a few prospectors and company employees to a Wild West boomtown. Rich discoveries in the adjacent Bodie Mine during 1878 attracted even more hopeful people. By 1879, Bodie had a population of approximately 7,000–10,000 people and around 2,000 buildings. One legend says that in 1880, Bodie was California's second or third largest city. but the U.S. Census of that year disproves this. Over the years 1860-1941 Bodie's mines produced gold and silver valued at an estimated US$34 million (in 1986 dollars, or $85 million in 2021).

 

Bodie boomed from late 1877 through mid– to late 1880. The first newspaper, The Standard Pioneer Journal of Mono County, published its first edition on October 10, 1877. Starting as a weekly, it soon expanded publication to three times a week. It was also during this time that a telegraph line was built which connected Bodie with Bridgeport and Genoa, Nevada. California and Nevada newspapers predicted Bodie would become the next Comstock Lode. Men from both states were lured to Bodie by the prospect of another bonanza.

 

Gold bullion from the town's nine stamp mills was shipped to Carson City, Nevada, by way of Aurora, Wellington and Gardnerville. Most shipments were accompanied by armed guards. After the bullion reached Carson City, it was delivered to the mint there, or sent by rail to the mint in San Francisco.

 

As a bustling gold mining center, Bodie had the amenities of larger towns, including a Wells Fargo Bank, four volunteer fire companies, a brass band, railroad, miners' and mechanics' union, several daily newspapers, and a jail. At its peak, 65 saloons lined Main Street, which was a mile long. Murders, shootouts, barroom brawls, and stagecoach holdups were regular occurrences.

 

As with other remote mining towns, Bodie had a popular, though clandestine, red light district on the north end of town. There is an unsubstantiated story of Rosa May, a prostitute who, in the style of Florence Nightingale, came to the aid of the town menfolk when a serious epidemic struck the town at the height of its boom. She is credited with giving life-saving care to many, but after she died, was buried outside the cemetery fence.

 

Bodie had a Chinatown, the main street of which ran at a right angle to Bodie's Main Street. At one point it had several hundred Chinese residents and a Taoist temple. Opium dens were plentiful in this area.

 

Bodie also had a cemetery on the outskirts of town and a nearby mortuary. It is the only building in the town built of red brick three courses thick, most likely for insulation to keep the air temperature steady during the cold winters and hot summers. The cemetery includes a Miners Union section, and a cenotaph erected to honor President James A. Garfield. The Bodie Boot Hill was located outside of the official city cemetery.

 

On Main Street stands the Miners Union Hall, which was the meeting place for labor unions. It also served as an entertainment center that hosted dances, concerts, plays, and school recitals. It now serves as a museum.

 

The first signs of decline appeared in 1880 and became obvious toward the end of the year. Promising mining booms in Butte, Montana; Tombstone, Arizona; and Utah lured men away from Bodie. The get-rich-quick, single miners who came to the town in the 1870s moved on to these other booms, and Bodie developed into a family-oriented community. In 1882 residents built the Methodist Church (which still stands) and the Roman Catholic Church (burned 1928). Despite the population decline, the mines were flourishing, and in 1881 Bodie's ore production was recorded at a high of $3.1 million. Also in 1881, a narrow-gauge railroad was built called the Bodie Railway & Lumber Company, bringing lumber, cordwood, and mine timbers to the mining district from Mono Mills south of Mono Lake.

 

During the early 1890s, Bodie enjoyed a short revival from technological advancements in the mines that continued to support the town. In 1890, the recently invented cyanide process promised to recover gold and silver from discarded mill tailings and from low-grade ore bodies that had been passed over. In 1892, the Standard Company built its own hydroelectric plant approximately 13 miles (20.9 km) away at Dynamo Pond. The plant developed a maximum of 130 horsepower (97 kW) and 3,530 volts alternating current (AC) to power the company's 20-stamp mill. This pioneering installation marked the country's first transmissions of electricity over a long distance.

 

In 1910, the population was recorded at 698 people, which were predominantly families who decided to stay in Bodie instead of moving on to other prosperous strikes.

 

The first signs of an official decline occurred in 1912 with the printing of the last Bodie newspaper, The Bodie Miner. In a 1913 book titled California Tourist Guide and Handbook: Authentic Description of Routes of Travel and Points of Interest in California, the authors, Wells and Aubrey Drury, described Bodie as a "mining town, which is the center of a large mineral region". They referred to two hotels and a railroad operating there. In 1913, the Standard Consolidated Mine closed.

 

Mining profits in 1914 were at a low of $6,821. James S. Cain bought everything from the town lots to the mining claims, and reopened the Standard mill to former employees, which resulted in an over $100,000 profit in 1915. However, this financial growth was not in time to stop the town's decline. In 1917, the Bodie Railway was abandoned and its iron tracks were scrapped.

 

The last mine closed in 1942, due to War Production Board order L-208, shutting down all non-essential gold mines in the United States during World War II. Mining never resumed after the war.

 

Bodie was first described as a "ghost town" in 1915. In a time when auto travel was on the rise, many travelers reached Bodie via automobiles. The San Francisco Chronicle published an article in 1919 to dispute the "ghost town" label.

 

By 1920, Bodie's population was recorded by the US Federal Census at a total of 120 people. Despite the decline and a severe fire in the business district in 1932, Bodie had permanent residents through nearly half of the 20th century. A post office operated at Bodie from 1877 to 1942

 

In the 1940s, the threat of vandalism faced the ghost town. The Cain family, who owned much of the land, hired caretakers to protect and to maintain the town's structures. Martin Gianettoni, one of the last three people living in Bodie in 1943, was a caretaker.

 

Bodie is now an authentic Wild West ghost town.

 

The town was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1961, and in 1962 the state legislature authorized creation of Bodie State Historic Park. A total of 170 buildings remained. Bodie has been named as California's official state gold rush ghost town.

 

Visitors arrive mainly via SR 270, which runs from US 395 near Bridgeport to the west; the last three miles of it is a dirt road. There is also a road to SR 167 near Mono Lake in the south, but this road is extremely rough, with more than 10 miles of dirt track in a bad state of repair. Due to heavy snowfall, the roads to Bodie are usually closed in winter .

 

Today, Bodie is preserved in a state of arrested decay. Only a small part of the town survived, with about 110 structures still standing, including one of many once operational gold mills. Visitors can walk the deserted streets of a town that once was a bustling area of activity. Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Littered throughout the park, one can find small shards of china dishes, square nails and an occasional bottle, but removing these items is against the rules of the park.

 

The California State Parks' ranger station is located in one of the original homes on Green Street.

 

In 2009 and again in 2010, Bodie was scheduled to be closed. The California state legislature worked out a budget compromise that enabled the state's Parks Closure Commission to keep it open. As of 2022, the park is still operating, now administered by the Bodie Foundation.

 

California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2 million residents across a total area of approximately 163,696 square miles (423,970 km2), it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the most populated subnational entity in North America and the 34th most populous in the world. The Greater Los Angeles area and the San Francisco Bay Area are the nation's second and fifth most populous urban regions respectively, with the former having more than 18.7 million residents and the latter having over 9.6 million. Sacramento is the state's capital, while Los Angeles is the most populous city in the state and the second most populous city in the country. San Francisco is the second most densely populated major city in the country. Los Angeles County is the country's most populous, while San Bernardino County is the largest county by area in the country. California borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, the Mexican state of Baja California to the south; and has a coastline along the Pacific Ocean to the west.

 

The economy of the state of California is the largest in the United States, with a $3.4 trillion gross state product (GSP) as of 2022. It is the largest sub-national economy in the world. If California were a sovereign nation, it would rank as the world's fifth-largest economy as of 2022, behind Germany and ahead of India, as well as the 37th most populous. The Greater Los Angeles area and the San Francisco Bay Area are the nation's second- and third-largest urban economies ($1.0 trillion and $0.5 trillion respectively as of 2020). The San Francisco Bay Area Combined Statistical Area had the nation's highest gross domestic product per capita ($106,757) among large primary statistical areas in 2018, and is home to five of the world's ten largest companies by market capitalization and four of the world's ten richest people.

 

Prior to European colonization, California was one of the most culturally and linguistically diverse areas in pre-Columbian North America and contained the highest Native American population density north of what is now Mexico. European exploration in the 16th and 17th centuries led to the colonization of California by the Spanish Empire. In 1804, it was included in Alta California province within the Viceroyalty of New Spain. The area became a part of Mexico in 1821, following its successful war for independence, but was ceded to the United States in 1848 after the Mexican–American War. The California Gold Rush started in 1848 and led to dramatic social and demographic changes, including large-scale immigration into California, a worldwide economic boom, and the California genocide of indigenous people. The western portion of Alta California was then organized and admitted as the 31st state on September 9, 1850, following the Compromise of 1850.

 

Notable contributions to popular culture, for example in entertainment and sports, have their origins in California. The state also has made noteworthy contributions in the fields of communication, information, innovation, environmentalism, economics, and politics. It is the home of Hollywood, the oldest and one of the largest film industries in the world, which has had a profound influence upon global entertainment. It is considered the origin of the hippie counterculture, beach and car culture, and the personal computer, among other innovations. The San Francisco Bay Area and the Greater Los Angeles Area are widely seen as the centers of the global technology and film industries, respectively. California's economy is very diverse: 58% of it is based on finance, government, real estate services, technology, and professional, scientific, and technical business services. Although it accounts for only 1.5% of the state's economy, California's agriculture industry has the highest output of any U.S. state. California's ports and harbors handle about a third of all U.S. imports, most originating in Pacific Rim international trade.

 

The state's extremely diverse geography ranges from the Pacific Coast and metropolitan areas in the west to the Sierra Nevada mountains in the east, and from the redwood and Douglas fir forests in the northwest to the Mojave Desert in the southeast. The Central Valley, a major agricultural area, dominates the state's center. California is well known for its warm Mediterranean climate and monsoon seasonal weather. The large size of the state results in climates that vary from moist temperate rainforest in the north to arid desert in the interior, as well as snowy alpine in the mountains.

 

Settled by successive waves of arrivals during at least the last 13,000 years, California was one of the most culturally and linguistically diverse areas in pre-Columbian North America. Various estimates of the native population have ranged from 100,000 to 300,000. The indigenous peoples of California included more than 70 distinct ethnic groups, inhabiting environments from mountains and deserts to islands and redwood forests. These groups were also diverse in their political organization, with bands, tribes, villages, and on the resource-rich coasts, large chiefdoms, such as the Chumash, Pomo and Salinan. Trade, intermarriage and military alliances fostered social and economic relationships between many groups.

 

The first Europeans to explore the coast of California were the members of a Spanish maritime expedition led by Portuguese captain Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo in 1542. Cabrillo was commissioned by Antonio de Mendoza, the Viceroy of New Spain, to lead an expedition up the Pacific coast in search of trade opportunities; they entered San Diego Bay on September 28, 1542, and reached at least as far north as San Miguel Island. Privateer and explorer Francis Drake explored and claimed an undefined portion of the California coast in 1579, landing north of the future city of San Francisco. Sebastián Vizcaíno explored and mapped the coast of California in 1602 for New Spain, putting ashore in Monterey. Despite the on-the-ground explorations of California in the 16th century, Rodríguez's idea of California as an island persisted. Such depictions appeared on many European maps well into the 18th century.

 

The Portolá expedition of 1769-70 was a pivotal event in the Spanish colonization of California, resulting in the establishment of numerous missions, presidios, and pueblos. The military and civil contingent of the expedition was led by Gaspar de Portolá, who traveled over land from Sonora into California, while the religious component was headed by Junípero Serra, who came by sea from Baja California. In 1769, Portolá and Serra established Mission San Diego de Alcalá and the Presidio of San Diego, the first religious and military settlements founded by the Spanish in California. By the end of the expedition in 1770, they would establish the Presidio of Monterey and Mission San Carlos Borromeo de Carmelo on Monterey Bay.

 

After the Portolà expedition, Spanish missionaries led by Father-President Serra set out to establish 21 Spanish missions of California along El Camino Real ("The Royal Road") and along the Californian coast, 16 sites of which having been chosen during the Portolá expedition. Numerous major cities in California grew out of missions, including San Francisco (Mission San Francisco de Asís), San Diego (Mission San Diego de Alcalá), Ventura (Mission San Buenaventura), or Santa Barbara (Mission Santa Barbara), among others.

 

Juan Bautista de Anza led a similarly important expedition throughout California in 1775–76, which would extend deeper into the interior and north of California. The Anza expedition selected numerous sites for missions, presidios, and pueblos, which subsequently would be established by settlers. Gabriel Moraga, a member of the expedition, would also christen many of California's prominent rivers with their names in 1775–1776, such as the Sacramento River and the San Joaquin River. After the expedition, Gabriel's son, José Joaquín Moraga, would found the pueblo of San Jose in 1777, making it the first civilian-established city in California.

  

The Spanish founded Mission San Juan Capistrano in 1776, the third to be established of the Californian missions.

During this same period, sailors from the Russian Empire explored along the northern coast of California. In 1812, the Russian-American Company established a trading post and small fortification at Fort Ross on the North Coast. Fort Ross was primarily used to supply Russia's Alaskan colonies with food supplies. The settlement did not meet much success, failing to attract settlers or establish long term trade viability, and was abandoned by 1841.

 

During the War of Mexican Independence, Alta California was largely unaffected and uninvolved in the revolution, though many Californios supported independence from Spain, which many believed had neglected California and limited its development. Spain's trade monopoly on California had limited the trade prospects of Californians. Following Mexican independence, Californian ports were freely able to trade with foreign merchants. Governor Pablo Vicente de Solá presided over the transition from Spanish colonial rule to independent.

 

In 1821, the Mexican War of Independence gave the Mexican Empire (which included California) independence from Spain. For the next 25 years, Alta California remained a remote, sparsely populated, northwestern administrative district of the newly independent country of Mexico, which shortly after independence became a republic. The missions, which controlled most of the best land in the state, were secularized by 1834 and became the property of the Mexican government. The governor granted many square leagues of land to others with political influence. These huge ranchos or cattle ranches emerged as the dominant institutions of Mexican California. The ranchos developed under ownership by Californios (Hispanics native of California) who traded cowhides and tallow with Boston merchants. Beef did not become a commodity until the 1849 California Gold Rush.

 

From the 1820s, trappers and settlers from the United States and Canada began to arrive in Northern California. These new arrivals used the Siskiyou Trail, California Trail, Oregon Trail and Old Spanish Trail to cross the rugged mountains and harsh deserts in and surrounding California. The early government of the newly independent Mexico was highly unstable, and in a reflection of this, from 1831 onwards, California also experienced a series of armed disputes, both internal and with the central Mexican government. During this tumultuous political period Juan Bautista Alvarado was able to secure the governorship during 1836–1842. The military action which first brought Alvarado to power had momentarily declared California to be an independent state, and had been aided by Anglo-American residents of California, including Isaac Graham. In 1840, one hundred of those residents who did not have passports were arrested, leading to the Graham Affair, which was resolved in part with the intercession of Royal Navy officials.

 

One of the largest ranchers in California was John Marsh. After failing to obtain justice against squatters on his land from the Mexican courts, he determined that California should become part of the United States. Marsh conducted a letter-writing campaign espousing the California climate, the soil, and other reasons to settle there, as well as the best route to follow, which became known as "Marsh's route". His letters were read, reread, passed around, and printed in newspapers throughout the country, and started the first wagon trains rolling to California. He invited immigrants to stay on his ranch until they could get settled, and assisted in their obtaining passports.

 

After ushering in the period of organized emigration to California, Marsh became involved in a military battle between the much-hated Mexican general, Manuel Micheltorena and the California governor he had replaced, Juan Bautista Alvarado. The armies of each met at the Battle of Providencia near Los Angeles. Marsh had been forced against his will to join Micheltorena's army. Ignoring his superiors, during the battle, he signaled the other side for a parley. There were many settlers from the United States fighting on both sides. He convinced these men that they had no reason to be fighting each other. As a result of Marsh's actions, they abandoned the fight, Micheltorena was defeated, and California-born Pio Pico was returned to the governorship. This paved the way to California's ultimate acquisition by the United States.

 

In 1846, a group of American settlers in and around Sonoma rebelled against Mexican rule during the Bear Flag Revolt. Afterward, rebels raised the Bear Flag (featuring a bear, a star, a red stripe and the words "California Republic") at Sonoma. The Republic's only president was William B. Ide,[65] who played a pivotal role during the Bear Flag Revolt. This revolt by American settlers served as a prelude to the later American military invasion of California and was closely coordinated with nearby American military commanders.

 

The California Republic was short-lived; the same year marked the outbreak of the Mexican–American War (1846–48).

 

Commodore John D. Sloat of the United States Navy sailed into Monterey Bay in 1846 and began the U.S. military invasion of California, with Northern California capitulating in less than a month to the United States forces. In Southern California, Californios continued to resist American forces. Notable military engagements of the conquest include the Battle of San Pasqual and the Battle of Dominguez Rancho in Southern California, as well as the Battle of Olómpali and the Battle of Santa Clara in Northern California. After a series of defensive battles in the south, the Treaty of Cahuenga was signed by the Californios on January 13, 1847, securing a censure and establishing de facto American control in California.

 

Following the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (February 2, 1848) that ended the war, the westernmost portion of the annexed Mexican territory of Alta California soon became the American state of California, and the remainder of the old territory was then subdivided into the new American Territories of Arizona, Nevada, Colorado and Utah. The even more lightly populated and arid lower region of old Baja California remained as a part of Mexico. In 1846, the total settler population of the western part of the old Alta California had been estimated to be no more than 8,000, plus about 100,000 Native Americans, down from about 300,000 before Hispanic settlement in 1769.

 

In 1848, only one week before the official American annexation of the area, gold was discovered in California, this being an event which was to forever alter both the state's demographics and its finances. Soon afterward, a massive influx of immigration into the area resulted, as prospectors and miners arrived by the thousands. The population burgeoned with United States citizens, Europeans, Chinese and other immigrants during the great California Gold Rush. By the time of California's application for statehood in 1850, the settler population of California had multiplied to 100,000. By 1854, more than 300,000 settlers had come. Between 1847 and 1870, the population of San Francisco increased from 500 to 150,000.

 

The seat of government for California under Spanish and later Mexican rule had been located in Monterey from 1777 until 1845. Pio Pico, the last Mexican governor of Alta California, had briefly moved the capital to Los Angeles in 1845. The United States consulate had also been located in Monterey, under consul Thomas O. Larkin.

 

In 1849, a state Constitutional Convention was first held in Monterey. Among the first tasks of the convention was a decision on a location for the new state capital. The first full legislative sessions were held in San Jose (1850–1851). Subsequent locations included Vallejo (1852–1853), and nearby Benicia (1853–1854); these locations eventually proved to be inadequate as well. The capital has been located in Sacramento since 1854 with only a short break in 1862 when legislative sessions were held in San Francisco due to flooding in Sacramento. Once the state's Constitutional Convention had finalized its state constitution, it applied to the U.S. Congress for admission to statehood. On September 9, 1850, as part of the Compromise of 1850, California became a free state and September 9 a state holiday.

 

During the American Civil War (1861–1865), California sent gold shipments eastward to Washington in support of the Union. However, due to the existence of a large contingent of pro-South sympathizers within the state, the state was not able to muster any full military regiments to send eastwards to officially serve in the Union war effort. Still, several smaller military units within the Union army were unofficially associated with the state of California, such as the "California 100 Company", due to a majority of their members being from California.

 

At the time of California's admission into the Union, travel between California and the rest of the continental United States had been a time-consuming and dangerous feat. Nineteen years later, and seven years after it was greenlighted by President Lincoln, the First transcontinental railroad was completed in 1869. California was then reachable from the eastern States in a week's time.

 

Much of the state was extremely well suited to fruit cultivation and agriculture in general. Vast expanses of wheat, other cereal crops, vegetable crops, cotton, and nut and fruit trees were grown (including oranges in Southern California), and the foundation was laid for the state's prodigious agricultural production in the Central Valley and elsewhere.

 

In the nineteenth century, a large number of migrants from China traveled to the state as part of the Gold Rush or to seek work. Even though the Chinese proved indispensable in building the transcontinental railroad from California to Utah, perceived job competition with the Chinese led to anti-Chinese riots in the state, and eventually the US ended migration from China partially as a response to pressure from California with the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act.

 

Under earlier Spanish and Mexican rule, California's original native population had precipitously declined, above all, from Eurasian diseases to which the indigenous people of California had not yet developed a natural immunity. Under its new American administration, California's harsh governmental policies towards its own indigenous people did not improve. As in other American states, many of the native inhabitants were soon forcibly removed from their lands by incoming American settlers such as miners, ranchers, and farmers. Although California had entered the American union as a free state, the "loitering or orphaned Indians" were de facto enslaved by their new Anglo-American masters under the 1853 Act for the Government and Protection of Indians. There were also massacres in which hundreds of indigenous people were killed.

 

Between 1850 and 1860, the California state government paid around 1.5 million dollars (some 250,000 of which was reimbursed by the federal government) to hire militias whose purpose was to protect settlers from the indigenous populations. In later decades, the native population was placed in reservations and rancherias, which were often small and isolated and without enough natural resources or funding from the government to sustain the populations living on them. As a result, the rise of California was a calamity for the native inhabitants. Several scholars and Native American activists, including Benjamin Madley and Ed Castillo, have described the actions of the California government as a genocide.

 

In the twentieth century, thousands of Japanese people migrated to the US and California specifically to attempt to purchase and own land in the state. However, the state in 1913 passed the Alien Land Act, excluding Asian immigrants from owning land. During World War II, Japanese Americans in California were interned in concentration camps such as at Tule Lake and Manzanar. In 2020, California officially apologized for this internment.

 

Migration to California accelerated during the early 20th century with the completion of major transcontinental highways like the Lincoln Highway and Route 66. In the period from 1900 to 1965, the population grew from fewer than one million to the greatest in the Union. In 1940, the Census Bureau reported California's population as 6.0% Hispanic, 2.4% Asian, and 89.5% non-Hispanic white.

 

To meet the population's needs, major engineering feats like the California and Los Angeles Aqueducts; the Oroville and Shasta Dams; and the Bay and Golden Gate Bridges were built across the state. The state government also adopted the California Master Plan for Higher Education in 1960 to develop a highly efficient system of public education.

 

Meanwhile, attracted to the mild Mediterranean climate, cheap land, and the state's wide variety of geography, filmmakers established the studio system in Hollywood in the 1920s. California manufactured 8.7 percent of total United States military armaments produced during World War II, ranking third (behind New York and Michigan) among the 48 states. California however easily ranked first in production of military ships during the war (transport, cargo, [merchant ships] such as Liberty ships, Victory ships, and warships) at drydock facilities in San Diego, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay Area. After World War II, California's economy greatly expanded due to strong aerospace and defense industries, whose size decreased following the end of the Cold War. Stanford University and its Dean of Engineering Frederick Terman began encouraging faculty and graduates to stay in California instead of leaving the state, and develop a high-tech region in the area now known as Silicon Valley. As a result of these efforts, California is regarded as a world center of the entertainment and music industries, of technology, engineering, and the aerospace industry, and as the United States center of agricultural production. Just before the Dot Com Bust, California had the fifth-largest economy in the world among nations.

 

In the mid and late twentieth century, a number of race-related incidents occurred in the state. Tensions between police and African Americans, combined with unemployment and poverty in inner cities, led to violent riots, such as the 1965 Watts riots and 1992 Rodney King riots. California was also the hub of the Black Panther Party, a group known for arming African Americans to defend against racial injustice and for organizing free breakfast programs for schoolchildren. Additionally, Mexican, Filipino, and other migrant farm workers rallied in the state around Cesar Chavez for better pay in the 1960s and 1970s.

 

During the 20th century, two great disasters happened in California. The 1906 San Francisco earthquake and 1928 St. Francis Dam flood remain the deadliest in U.S. history.

 

Although air pollution problems have been reduced, health problems associated with pollution have continued. The brown haze known as "smog" has been substantially abated after the passage of federal and state restrictions on automobile exhaust.

 

An energy crisis in 2001 led to rolling blackouts, soaring power rates, and the importation of electricity from neighboring states. Southern California Edison and Pacific Gas and Electric Company came under heavy criticism.

 

Housing prices in urban areas continued to increase; a modest home which in the 1960s cost $25,000 would cost half a million dollars or more in urban areas by 2005. More people commuted longer hours to afford a home in more rural areas while earning larger salaries in the urban areas. Speculators bought houses they never intended to live in, expecting to make a huge profit in a matter of months, then rolling it over by buying more properties. Mortgage companies were compliant, as everyone assumed the prices would keep rising. The bubble burst in 2007–8 as housing prices began to crash and the boom years ended. Hundreds of billions in property values vanished and foreclosures soared as many financial institutions and investors were badly hurt.

 

In the twenty-first century, droughts and frequent wildfires attributed to climate change have occurred in the state. From 2011 to 2017, a persistent drought was the worst in its recorded history. The 2018 wildfire season was the state's deadliest and most destructive, most notably Camp Fire.

 

Although air pollution problems have been reduced, health problems associated with pollution have continued. The brown haze that is known as "smog" has been substantially abated thanks to federal and state restrictions on automobile exhaust.

 

One of the first confirmed COVID-19 cases in the United States that occurred in California was first of which was confirmed on January 26, 2020. Meaning, all of the early confirmed cases were persons who had recently travelled to China in Asia, as testing was restricted to this group. On this January 29, 2020, as disease containment protocols were still being developed, the U.S. Department of State evacuated 195 persons from Wuhan, China aboard a chartered flight to March Air Reserve Base in Riverside County, and in this process, it may have granted and conferred to escalated within the land and the US at cosmic. On February 5, 2020, the U.S. evacuated 345 more citizens from Hubei Province to two military bases in California, Travis Air Force Base in Solano County and Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, San Diego, where they were quarantined for 14 days. A state of emergency was largely declared in this state of the nation on March 4, 2020, and as of February 24, 2021, remains in effect. A mandatory statewide stay-at-home order was issued on March 19, 2020, due to increase, which was ended on January 25, 2021, allowing citizens to return to normal life. On April 6, 2021, the state announced plans to fully reopen the economy by June 15, 2021.

 

Profitable Soda Fountain Operation

Profitable Soda Fountain Operation

Grand Concourse, The Bronx, New York City, New York, United States

 

The Andrew Freedman Home, one of the most impressive edifices built in The Bronx during the first decades of the twentieth century, was erected in 1922-24 (and enlarged in 1928-31) as a result of a generous bequest in the will of Andrew Freedman. Freedman, a capitalist who had a close relationship with the leaders of Tammany Hall, was involved with many profitable business ventures, notably the construction of the IRT, New York City's first subway line. He left most of his fortune for the establishment of a home for "aged and indigent persons of both sexes," but with the proviso that the residents of the home be poor people who had once been in good circumstances. The Board of Trustees, led by prominent lawyer Samuel Untermyer, purchased a large plot of land on the Grand Concourse, the most prestigious street in the Bronx, and commissioned a building from two notable New York architects - Joseph H. Freedlander and Harry Allan Jacobs.

 

The home is an exceptional example of a monumental building which, through its symmetrical massing, fenestration, and handsome detail, recalls the tradition of the Italian Renaissance palazzo. Its design displays many handsome architectural features, including a recessed loggia, balustraded terrace, finely cut stonework, and beautifully wrought, iron detail. The elegantly appointed building functioned as a refuge for the once affluent for fifty-nine years, from its opening in 1924 until 1983 when the Andrew Freedman Home ceased to operate and the building was purchased by the Mid-Bronx Senior Citizens Council as housing for the elderly.

 

The Grand Concourse

In 1874, when New York City annexed the West Bronx (the area west of the Bronx River officially known as the 23rd and 24th Wards, but generally referred to by nineteenth-century New Yorkers as the "North Side" or, more commonly, as the "Annexed District"), it was a sparsely settled region with few urban amenities.^ Following the annexation, residents of both Manhattan and the new wards advocated the establishment of large parks in the undeveloped region. In 1884, the New York State Legislature approved the purchase of approximately 4000 acres of parkland, primarily in the North Bronx. ^ This land was relatively inaccessible to most residents of the city since no roads or mass transit lines linked Manhattan to the new parkland. Thus, in 1890 the legislature established the Department of Street Improvements of the 23rd and 24th Wards with a mandate to lay out streets throughout the annexed district; the department's finest achievement was the Grand Concourse which made the new Bronx parks accessible from Manhattan.

 

The first commissioner of the new department was Louis J. Heintz who appointed Louis Risse as his chief engineer; it was Risse who was directly responsible for the planning of the Concourse. The inspiration for the Grand Concourse was the campaign waged by the Rider and Driver Club of New York City for the construction of a speedway on which its wealthy members could run horses and carriages. After facing opposition to the idea of a speedway along the west side of Central Park, the club began to advocate a speedway along Jerome Avenue in The Bronx. Heintz asked Risse for his opinion and, according to Risse,"... I was giving serious consideration to the necessity of supplying that missing link between the upper and lower park systems [Central Park and the Bronx parks] which the Commission had failed to provide in 1884.*"* Instead of Jerome Avenue, which is located on level ground near the Harlem River, Risse proposed that a "Speedway and Concourse" be erected on the ridge to the east.

 

The street that Risse proposed was to be more than just a speedway for pleasure driving and a convenient connection to the Bronx parks; it was also to be a luxurious residential boulevard. Risse contended that 'the great enhancement in real estate values which the construction of the Concourse must necessarily produce will repay the City many times over the original cost of the undertaking.*^

 

In fact, when Risse laid out the Concourse, he planned secondary roadways adjacent to the sidewalks that could be used by local traffic servicing the villas that were expected to appear along the roadway.

 

Plans for the new Grand Boulevard and Concourse (the name was later shortened to Grand Concourse) were drawn up in 1893. Construction began in 1897 and progressed slowly; the Concourse was not officially opened until November 25,1909. As originally constructed, the Grand Concourse consisted of a fifty-eight-foot wide central speedway with a narrow central mall and thirty-seven-foot wide service roads separated from the main roadway by six-foot wide malls (these malls were subsequently altered). It was planned to provide pedestrian sidewalks and promenades, bicycle paths, and vehicular driveways. The roadway began at Cedar Park on East 161st Street and extended north to Mosholu Parkway. In 1924, the Concourse was extended to the south as far as East 138th Street.

 

The large freestanding villas that Risse had envisioned were never built. Rather, apartment houses became virtually the exclusive type of residential construction along the Concourse when real estate development began in the second decade of the twentieth century. These buildings include modest five-story walk-ups and more impressive six-story elevator buildings. In addition to the apartment houses, a few public and institutional buildings were erected along the Concourse; the Andrew Freedman Home is the largest on the original length of the street.^

 

Andrew Freedman

The Andrew Freedman Home was founded as a result of an unusual bequest in the will of wealthy capitalist Andrew Freedman (1860-1915). Freedman was a native New Yorker who was educated in the city's public schools before beginning employment in a local dry goods store. He dabbled in law before entering the Held of real estate. Freedman was extremely successful in his real estate ventures, "by ways," according to one biographer, "that are no longer traceable

 

Freedman was allied with the Democratic party and with the leadership of Tammany Hall. He was a close friend and advisor to Tammany boss Richard Croker and was intimately involved in many financially lucrative Tammany schemes, although the exact nature of most of Freedman's financial dealings remains a mystety. An example of the financial alliance between Croker and Freedman came to light in 1900 during a New York State Assembly investigation into New York City's government. Freedman was a vice-president of the United States Fidelity & Casualty Company which bonded New York City employees. He obtained this bonding contract through Croker's influence. When questioned about this arrangement, Freedman admitted that he presented a portion of his commissions to Croker though he refused to say how much money had exchanged hands, telling the investigator 'that I wouldn't care to tell you because I don't want to let you know how much money I carry on my person.'**

 

Freedman was also a key player in the construction of the original subway line built by the Interborough Rapid Transit Company. His obituary opens by stating that he "did more perhaps than any other man to make possible the subway system in this city."*° However, Freedman's involvement was primarily behind the scenes. In a speech delivered at the opening ceremonies for the subway, August Belmont, the system's principal financial backer, commented that Freedman, although unheralded, deserved a fair share of the praise and credit since he was "among the first to appreciate the practicability of the project."**

Exactly what role Freedman played in the construction of the IRT and how this relates to Tammany Hall is not clearly understood. The story that is generally told is that it was he who brought the contractor John B. McDonald and financier August Belmont together. One version of the story recounts that Freedman urged McDonald to bid on the subway contract, promising him financial backing. He then formed a group that put up $150,000 for the bid and when additional financing was needed, persuaded August Belmont to become the project's major backer.*^ A variant has it that MacDonald went to Freedman requesting that he assist in raising the necessary deposit of $150,000. Freedman pledged $45,000 of his own money and found four friends willing to invest. On the day that the deposit was due, the group was still short $50,000 when Freedman thought of Belmont, another loyal Tammany supporter, who immediately "arranged

for the cash,. .. without reading the contract, and without any further talk."

 

There is probably little truth in these dramatic stories of three heroic individuals (McDonald, Freedman, and Belmont) selflessly advancing money for the great subway construction project. As Wallace B. Katz has noted in his detailed investigation of the subway's construction, "this is a wonderful story, one that deserves to be part of the folklore of American Capitalism, but it lacks plausibility."**

 

Freedman, Belmont, McDonald, and the other four investors were all Tammany leaders and were undoubtedly well acquainted with each other. Tammany's involvement in the bidding was well known. In January 1900, when the bids for subway construction were received, the financiers' names were not known, but it was reported in the Mm York 7vHM that McDonald was "a Tammany contractor."*^ Katz concludes that "Belmont, McDonald, and Freedman maintained their stOTy concerning the origins of their partnership during the next twenty years, through civil suits and governmental investigations.... [since] it allowed the participants to this deal to deny what was both plausible and very likely true, that Belmont, Tammany, and the RTC [Rapid Transit Commission] had prearranged the entire matter."*^ Freedman continued to be closely involved with the subway, in particular as a director of companies responsible for much of the construction work.*^

 

The construction of the IRT was not Freedman's only major financial project. He was, for example, involved with the Shuberts in the construction of Broadway theaters. The Booth (1912-13), Shubert (1912-13), 44th Street (1912-13; demolished), and Little (1912; now Helen Hayes) theaters are said to have been financed by a syndicate composed of Freedman, lawyer Samuel Untermyer (see below), and Cincinnati political boss George B. Cox.*^ To his contemporaries, Freedman was probably best known as the owner of the New York Baseball Club, commonly known as the "Giants," from 1894 until 1902. Freedman's tenure as owner of the Giants was not without conflict, as reported by Harold Seymour in his history of baseball:

Freedman's irascible personality,

quick temper, and aggressiveness

had him in constant trouble. . . . His turbulent years as Giant owner (many charged that he was only a front man for others) kept the League in constant turmoil, and made the New York observation that he had "an astonishing faculty for making enemies* seem like a gross understatement.

 

The Andrew Freedman Home

On December 8,1915, several weeks after his death, Andrew Freedman's will was made public.

 

Freedman left a sizable bequest to his brother Daniel, established a trust for his mother and sister, left small amounts of money to seven local homes and hospitals,^ and gave gifts to friends, including a bequest of a pair of large white pearl shirt buttons to Richard Croker. The bulk of Freedman's estate was to be used for the incorporation of the Andrew Freedman Home "for the free and gratuitous reception, shelter, nourishment, care and maintenance of aged and indigent persons of both sexes, and without regard to race or religious creed... [with the proviso that the selection of residents be confined to those].. . who have been in good circumstances but by reason of adverse fortune, have become poor and dependent, and that in case of husband and wife being received into the institution, provisions shall be made so that they may dwell together therein."^ The initial bequest to the new home totalled approximately $5,000,(XX) with additional funds to be added to the trust upon the death of his mother and sister.

Exactly why Freedman established this rather unusual charitable institution when he drew up his will in 1907 is not known. According to DeLancey Nicoll, a business associate of Freedman's, speaking at the opening ceremonies for the Andrew Freedman Home, "I always urged that he give his money to the unusual charities. He would say: 'No: the sick and the poor are cared for by everybody else now. Nobody has offered any refuge for people of this kind, and they need one even more than other unfortunates.'"^ His sister, Isabella Freedman, explained that "he believed that the worthy habits and traditions of affluence and refinement deserve recognition and

respect, and that people possessing them should not be allowed to live in penury.*^

 

The man most responsible for the organization of the Andrew Freedman Home and the construction of its building was Freedman's friend, business partner, and executor Samuel Untermyer (1858-1940). Untermyer, who became the first president of the Home's Board of Trustees, was one of the most prominent lawyers of his time. He was also close to the leaders of Tammany Hall and it is probably through this political connection that Untermyer and Freedman became friends.

 

Untermeyer developed Freedman's concept of a home for the once wealthy into one that sought to assist those who had not only been affluent, but were also cultured "gentlefolk." The qualifications for admission promulgated by the original trustees stated that, "the Home is intended for aged and indigent gentlefolk. This has been interpreted by the Board of Directors (sic) to mean that the applicants are to be persons of culture, education, and refinement."^ Although Freedman had ordered the novel requirement that couples be allowed to live together, it was Untermyer and the trustees who decided that admission to the home would be primarily for couples. Additional requirements were that new residents had to be between the ages of sixty and eighty, in good health, and had to have enough money for clothing and other personal expenses. With the exception of the personal allowance, all facilities, including room and board, were free.

 

In 1916, the Trustees obtained a Special Act of the Legislature that incorporated the home.^ The site, a large block bounded by the Grand Concourse, Walton Avenue, East 166th Street, and McClellan Street, was purchased by the Andrew Freedman Home in 1917.^ Construction was delayed by World War I and did not actually begin until 1922.^ The original section of the Home, the Italian Renaissance-inspired central pavilion designed by Joseph H. Freedlander and Harry Allan Jacobs, was dedicated on May 25, 1924. At the opening ceremony it was announced that "two wings would eventually be added to the present building."^ Construction of the north and south wings began in 1928. Instead of Freedlander and Jacobs, architect David Levy was commissioned to design the additions

Although an institution, the Andrew Freedman Home was planned to be as much like a private house as possible. The interiors (not subject to this designation) were decorated by the prestigious interior design firm of L. Alavoine & Co. Public facilities on the first floor included a large living room "which in its decorations and its furnishings is all that might be expected in a fine and expensively equipped private home" (it had Georgian style furniture, chandeliers, and fireplace); an oak-paneled library; card and billiard rooms; and a spacious dining room decorated with chinoiserie.^ Sleeping rooms were located on the second and third floors. Married couples could live in a double room with a private bath or in two single rooms with a shared bath; single people also had their own rooms, but two singles shared a bath. Those who lived in the home were never referred to as 'inmates* (a word often applied to people living in institutions), but were always called "members," as if they resided in a private clubhouse.

 

In exchange for free residence in the home, members had to abide by a series of rules. Among the rules were those that forbade tipping or reprimanding the employees, required all meals be taken in the dining room (only tea, coffee, and related snacks could be eaten in private rooms), and permitted members to take a vacation of up to four weeks per year.^

 

The first seventeen "members" -- five couples, five single women, and two single men - moved into the home in July, 1917. Although the contemporary press referred to the home as a retreat for former millionaires, the early residents mostly came from more modest backgrounds: jeweler, dressmaker, doctor, nurse, teacher, businessman, etc.^* Others who moved in later included engineers, politicians, actors, opera singers, and journalists. In the years before the home closed, many residents were German and Austrian Jewish refugees. At its peak, after the completion of the side wings in 1928, the home could accommodate about 130 residents.

 

The Architects^

 

The two architects who were responsible for the design of the original section of the Andrew Freedman Home, Joseph Henry Freedlander (1870-1943) and Harry Allan Jacobs (1872-1932), were, by the 1920s, well-known members of New York's architectural establishment. This is the only project on which the two collaborated, although they undoubtedly were familiar with one another. Both architects were about the same age and both had attended the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris. They were members of many of the same professional organizations, including the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects and the Architectural League of New York.

 

Joseph Freedlander was the more prominent and more talented of the two designers. He was bom in New York City and studied at M.I.T. before entering the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. In 1895 Freedlander became one of the first three Americans to actually complete the Ecole curriculum and receive a diploma.^ He retained a deep affinity for the Ecole and for Beaux-Arts practices. Shortly after returning to New York he established an afcRfr that reproduced the French system of training.^ Later, he served as president of the Society of Beaux-Arts Architects and was a founder and president of the American Soci6t4 des Architected Dipl6mes par le Gouvemement Franca is (American Group), organized by those who had received Ecole diplomas.

 

Freedlander was proficient in designing many different types of buildings and able to utilize diverse historic architectural styles. His Ecole training allowed him to excel in competitions, and many of his commissions were won in this manner. Among Freedlander's extant buildings in New York City are those for the New Harlem Hospital (1905, with later additions, demolished in part), the George Engel House at 17 East 74th Street (1920-21; located within the Upper East Side Historic District), the French Institute of the United States at 22 East 60th Street (1924), and the Museum of the City of New York (1928-30; a designated New York City Landmark). Outside of New York, he won competitions for the St. Louis Club (1897); the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers in Johnson City, Tennessee (1904); the Perry Memorial and International Peace Memorial (1912-15) at Put-in-Bay on Lake Erie near Cleveland; the Portland Auditorium, Portland Oregon (1912); and the White Plains Municipal Building (1924-26).

 

He was also responsible for a major expansion of the spa at Saratoga Springs (1933-36). In addition, Freedlander designed three of the largest buildings erected in the Bronx in the 1920s and early 1930s -- the Freedman Home, the Bronx County Building (1931-35), and the Bronx County Jail (1931 37), the last two designed in association with Max Hausle.

 

Harry Allan Jacobs was also a native New Yorker. He studied at the Columbia School of Mines and then at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and was a winner of the American Academy's Prix de Rome. Although he designed commercial buildings, his specialty was town houses, including sixteen buildings and facade alterations in what is now the Upper East Side Historic District.

 

Freedlander and Jacobs probably became associated on the design of the Andrew Freedman Home through their personal contacts with important members of the home's Board of Trustees. Samuel Untermyer had been one of Joseph Freedlander's earliest clients. Shortly after Freedlander opened his office, he was commissioned by Untermyer to redesign Greystone, his home in Yonkers.^ One of Harry Allan Jacobs's first town houses was the Charles S. Guggenheimer House at 129 East 73rd Street of 1907 (this house is in the Upper East Side Historic District). Guggenheimer, who was a member of the Board of Trustees, was the son of Samuel Untermyer's half-brother and law partner Randolph Guggenheimer.^

 

Little is known about David Levy, the architect of the wings. He was in independent practice ior a brief period between 1928 and 1933.^ His most notable commission was the Jewish Theological Seminary (1930), where he was associated with the firm of Gehron, Ross & Alley.

 

Design of the Andrew Freedman Home

 

The Andrew Freedman Home is characteristic of the traditional design found in New York during the 1920s. Almost all of the New York architects in the forefront of their profession during that decade had studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts or in American architecture schools with Beaux-Arts curricula. Many had also traveled extensively in Europe and had a first-hand knowledge of the great monuments of that continent. Freedlander and Jacobs were both well trained and well traveled, and their design for the Andrew Freedman House reflects their Beaux-Arts education and the influence of European architectural precedents.

 

Following principles expounded at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, the Andrew Freedman Home is a building rooted in the traditions of European architecture. It is not, however, a copy of a specific building from the past. The design borrows freely from Italian Renaissance precedents, rearranging forms into a regularized and rigidly symmetrical composition. The major inspiration is the Palazzo Famese in Rome (c.1535) with its three-story massing, long thirteen-bay wide facade organization, and its ^tano ncMf articulated by rectangular windows with alternating triangular and segmentally-arched pediments.

 

While the Palazzo Famese was clearly the prototype, many other features of the home differ from the model: the somewhat elongated rustication of the first-story openings resembles that around the second-story windows of the Palazzo Gondi, Florence; the lamps flanking each entrance are modeled on that at the corner of the Palazzo Strozzi; and the tripartite arched loggia overlooking Walton Avenue resembles arcades, porches, and loggias found on many Italian Renaissance buildings. Not only does the design successfully combine features from a number of Renaissance precedents, but it also melds the rectilinear, balanced form of Italian Renaissance urban palazzi, such as the Palazzo Famese, with the setting and terraces of a rural villa. While the design relies on historical sources, the construction technology was modem; the Home is a steel-frame, fireproof structure with concrete floors and terracotta and brick partitions.

 

Description

 

The Andrew Freedman Home is located on a sloping site on the west side of the Grand Concourse; Walton Avenue is at a considerably lower elevation than the Concourse. The lot has a varied topography with a major rock outcropping near East 166th Street. Stone and concrete retaining walls run along the south and west sides of the lot and along the Grand Concourse just north of 166th Street. The building is sited near the west side of the lot, close to Walton Avenue, with a lawn and garden separating the home from the Concourse. The building is three stories facing the Concourse and four stories facing Walton Avenue. The structure consists of the original rectangular section dating from 1922-24 and the rectangular north and south wings added in 1928-31.

 

The original building is a symmetrical structure separated from the garden by a wide terrace with limestone balustrade railings. A broad flight of stone stairs, set in the center of the terrace, extends into the garden. At either end of the terrace are subsidiary stairs that connect with pedestrian walkways leading from the Concourse. Carved stone urns flank each of the stairs. The home is clad entirely in pale limestone/* The front facade of the original section is thirteen bays wide, with a rusticated ground story and smooth limestone ashlar above; quoins mark each of the comers of the building. The first story is articulated by round-arched openings, including windows with multipane wood casement sash and fixed wood transoms and a pair of entrances set into the shallow projecting fourth and tenth bays. Each entrance arch has a projecting keystone that visually supports a balustrade railing. Set within the entrances are omate iron double doors with iron transoms; pairs of iron lamps flank the entrances.

 

These wrought-iron elements and the iron canopies and window guards found elsewhere on the building were the work of FerTO Studio, Inc. The windows light the library (at the south end of the facade), the card room (at the north), and the living room (in the center).

 

Two modest beltcourses separate the first and second stories. The rectangular second-story windows, with their multipane wood sash, are alternately capped by segmentally-arched and triangular pediments, each supported on modest brackets. The rectangular, multipane, third-story windows have no enframements. The facade is crowned by a deep copper cornice with a tall parapet that hides the fourth story. Three tall chimneys rise above the slightly sloping roof.

 

The side elevations of the original section, which are now concealed by the wings, were originally three bays wide and continued the main design features of the front facade. Balconies projected in front of the central windows on the second and third stories of the north elevation.^

 

The rear facade of the original section, facing Walton Avenue, is a full four stories tall (plus the attic level set behind the parapet) and is massed with two-story projecting three-bay wide arms at either end. The ground story is the main entrance for those arriving by automobile. The driveway begins on McClellan Street, near Walton Avenue, and extends to a wide turn around in front of the central entrance. The rusticated ground story has a rectangular entrance with iron doors and a transom and an iron canopy (a wooden shelter has been constructed beneath this canopy). Flanking the entrance are pairs of rectangular windows with omate iron grilles. The focal point of this facade is a triple-arched loggia with French doors and iron railings located above the entrance. The loggia is flanked by niches and pairs of round-arched windows. The upper stories are articulated in a manner identical to that on the front.

 

The concrete retaining wall along Walton Avenue is pierced by the entrance to a passage that connects to the basement of the building, allowing goods to be delivered and garbage to be removed without disturbing the residents.

 

The north and south wings were designed in a style to match the original building. They are also clad in stone, but the stone is of a somewhat more yellow shade. The front facade of each of the two wings is six bays wide and is articulated in a manner similar to the original section. The openings of the first story of the north wing take the same form as those of the original building. In the south wing, the first story has six rectangular windows set within blind arches; three smaller rectangular openings also articulate this story. The upper stories of the wings have crisply-cut rectangular windows; there are no pediments at the second-story openings. As on the first story, each upper story of the south wing contains three smaller openings.

 

The rear facades of the wings are not symmetrical. The ground story of the north wing contains a mix of large and small windows and a single door. On the first story are round-arched windows (lighting the dining room) of the same type seen on the front facade. The two upper stories contain three groups of windows without enframements, each consisting of two large openings separated by a smaller window. The McClellan Street elevation of this wing is three bays wide and is articulated in a manner identical to that on the front elevation of this wing, except that the central window on the second story is capped by a pediment. On the rear facade of the south wing, the ground story also has openings of varying sizes, while the first story consists of rectangular windows set within the same type of blind stone arch seen on the wing's front elevation. Large and small windows alternate on the upper stories.

 

The south elevation, set on a rock outcropping high above East 166th Street, has a central door in the basement flanked by windows. The first story contains windows set in blind arches, while the central window on the second story is accented with a pediment.

 

The Andrew Freedman Home continued to serve its original function until 1983, when the increasing cost of maintaining the facility forced the home to close.^ The building was purchased by the Mid-Bronx Senior Citizens Council, a private not-for-profit organization that sponsors senior citizen housing projects in the Bronx. According to the Council's executive director at the time of the purchase: "our reopening of the home will insure the legacy of Andrew Freedman will continue to serve as a symbol of human dignity, but this time in a more universal sense because residents will come from different walks of life."** Although the building remained vacant for a period after its purchase by Mid-Bronx, it is now, once again, in use and its elegant rooms continue to serve the elderly.

 

- From the 2000 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report

Profitable Soda Fountain Operation

Profitable Soda Fountain Operation

Common Hill Myna (Gracula religiosa)

 

The common hill myna (Gracula religiosa), sometimes spelled "mynah" and formerly simply known as hill myna, is the myna most commonly seen in aviculture, where it is often simply referred to by the latter two names. It is a member of the starling family (Sturnidae), resident in hill regions of South Asia and Southeast Asia. The Sri Lanka hill myna, a former subspecies of G. religiosa, is now generally accepted as a separate species G. ptilogenys. The Enggano hill myna (G. enganensis) and Nias hill myna (G. robusta) are also widely accepted as specifically distinct, and many authors favor treating the Southern hill myna (G. indica) from the Nilgiris and elsewhere in the Western Ghats of India as a separate species.

  

Description

 

This is a stocky jet-black myna, with bright orange-yellow patches of naked skin and fleshy wattles on the side of its head and nape. At about 29 cm length, it is somewhat larger than the common myna (Acridotheres tristis).

 

It is overall green-glossed black plumage, purple-tinged on the head and neck. Its large, white wing patches are obvious in flight, but mostly covered when the bird is sitting. The bill and strong legs are bright yellow, and there are yellow wattles on the nape and under the eye. These differ conspicuously in shape from the naked eye-patch of the common myna and bank myna (A. ginginianus), and more subtly vary between the different hill mynas from South Asia: in the common hill myna, they extend from the eye to the nape, where they join, while the Sri Lanka hill myna has a single wattle across the nape and extending a bit towards the eyes. In the Southern hill myna, the wattles are separate and curve towards the top of the head. The Nias and Enggano hill mynas differ in details of the facial wattles, and size, particularly that of the bill.

 

Sexes are similar; juveniles have a duller bill.

 

With the Southern, Nias and Enggano hill mynas as separate species, the common hill myna, Gracula religiosa, has seven or eight subspecies which differ only slightly. They are:

 

- G. r. andamanensis Beavan 1867 – Andaman hill myna, Andaman Islands, central (Nancowry) group of the Nicobar Islands

 

- G. r. batuensis – Batu and Mentawai Islands

 

- G. r. halibrecta Oberholser 1926 – Great Nicobar hill myna, Great Nicobar Little Nicobar and adjacent islets in the Nicobar Islands, Doubtfully distinct from G. r. andamanensis.

 

- G. r. intermedia – northwestern Indochina and adjacent northeastern India and southern China

 

- G. r. palawanensis – Palawan in the Philippines

 

- G. r. peninsularis – Bastar hill mynah, central India, (State Bird of Chhattisgarh, India)

 

- G. r. religiosa – Greater Sundas (except Sulawesi) and Peninsular Malaysia

 

- G. r. venerata – western Lesser Sundas

  

Vocalisations

 

The common hill myna is often detected by its loud, shrill, descending whistles followed by other calls. It is most vocal at dawn and dusk, when it is found in small groups in forest clearings high in the canopy.

 

Both sexes can produce an extraordinarily wide range of loud calls – whistles, wails, screeches, and gurgles, sometimes melodious and often very human-like in quality. Each individual has a repertoire of three to 13 such call types, which may be shared with some near neighbours of the same sex, being learned when young. Dialects change rapidly with distance, such that birds living more than 15 km apart have no call-types in common with one another.

 

Unlike some other birds, such as the greater racket-tailed drongo (Dicrurus paradiseus), the common hill myna does not imitate other birds in the wild, although it is a widely held misconception that they do. On the other hand, in captivity, they are among the most renowned mimics, perhaps on par only with the African grey parrot (Psittacus erithacus). They can learn to reproduce many everyday sounds, particularly the human voice, and even whistled tunes, with astonishing accuracy and clarity.

  

Distribution and ecology

 

This myna is a resident breeder from Kumaon division in India (80° E longitude) east through Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh, the lower Himalayas, terai and foothills up to 2000 m ASL. Its range continues east through Southeast Asia northeastwards to southern China, and via Thailand southeastwards across northern Indonesia to Palawan in the Philippines. It is virtually extinct in Bangladesh due to habitat destruction and overexploitation for the pet trade. A feral population on Christmas Island has likewise disappeared. Introduced populations exist in Saint Helena, Puerto Rico, Hawaii and perhaps in the mainland USA and possibly elsewhere; feral birds require at least a warm subtropical climate to persist.

 

This myna is almost entirely arboreal, moving in large, noisy groups of half a dozen or so, in tree-tops at the edge of the forest. It hops sideways along the branch, unlike the characteristic jaunty walk of other mynas. Like most starlings, the hill myna is fairly omnivorous, eating fruit, nectar and insects.

 

They build a nest in a hole in a tree. The usual clutch is two or three eggs.

  

Pet trade and conservation

 

The hill mynas are popular cage birds, renowned for their ability to imitate speech. The widely distributed common hill myna is the one most frequently seen in aviculture. Demand outstrips captive breeding capacity, so they are rarely found in pet stores and usually purchased directly from breeders or importers who can certify the birds are traded legally.

 

This species is widely distributed and locally common, and if adult stocks are safeguarded, it is able to multiply quickly. On a worldwide scale, the IUCN thus considers the common hill myna a Species of Least Concern. But in the 1990s, nearly 20,000 wild-caught birds, mostly adults and juveniles, were brought into trade each year. In the central part of its range, G. r. intermedia populations have declined markedly, especially in Thailand, which supplied much of the thriving Western market. Its neighbor countries, from where exports were often limited due to political or military reasons, nevertheless supplied a burgeoning domestic demand, and demand in the entire region continues to be very high. In 1992, Thailand had the common hill myna put on CITES Appendix III, to safeguard its stocks against collapsing. In 1997, at the request of the Netherlands and the Philippines, the species was uplisted to CITES Appendix II. The Andaman and Nicobar Islands subspecies G. r. andamanensis and (if valid) G. r. halibrecta, described as "exceedingly common" in 1874, qualified as Near Threatened in 1991. The former is not at all common anymore in the Nicobar Islands and the latter—if distinct—has a very limited range.

 

Elsewhere, such as on the Philippines and in Laos, the decline has been more localized. It is also becoming increasingly rare in regions of northeastern India due to capture of fledged birds for the illegal pet trade. In the Garo Hills region, however, the locals make artificial nests of a split-bamboo framework covered with grass, and put them up in accessible positions in tall trees in a forest clearing or at the edge of a small village to entice the mynas to breed there. The villagers are thus able to extract the young at the proper time for easy hand-rearing, making common hill myna farming a profitable, small-scale cottage industry. It helps to preserve the environment, because the breeding birds are not removed from the population, while habitat destruction is curtailed because the mynas will desert areas of extensive logging and prefer more natural forest to plantations. As the mynas can be something of a pest of fruit trees when too numerous, an additional benefit to the locals is the inexpensive means of controlling the myna population: failing stocks can be bolstered by putting out more nests than can be harvested, while the maximum proportion of nestlings are taken when the population becomes too large.

  

[Credit: en.wikipedia.org]

Disabled Army veteran, new farmer and owner-operator of Prado Recreation Inc. Ruben Llamas, leases more than 585 acres from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, where his family and employees farm more than half of that and maintain the rest as a dog training facility, where the U.S. Department of Agriculture USDA Natural Resources and Conservation Service NRCS has helped him improve the health of the land and the profitability of the farm with the replacement of six new tractors, a loader, and technical assistance in the basin of the Prado Dam area, in Chino, CA, on Oct. 21, 2022. The facility is 36 miles east of Los Angeles, 11 miles south of Ontario, in what is known as the Inland Empire.

 

Sergeant Llamas served in the U.S. Army for 13 years as a Combat Engineer and a Scout. He was assigned to the U.S. Army 578th Brigade Engineer Battalion and the California Army National Guard 18th Calvery Regiment. He and his wife have six children; two are serving in the U.S. Army, one in the U.S. Coast Guard, and one is considering enlisting herself.

 

The basin’s range of environments and topography supports a wide variety of training grounds for sporting dogs, rescue tracking dogs, obedience training, and the ability to provide kennel facilities and the maintenance of waterfowl habitats and outdoor recreation areas. The farm fields of grasses and natural meadows provide nesting. Their seeds feed migrating birds near a hunting club and the broader wetlands. Hunting dog trainers use the forests, fields, meadows, ponds, and islands to train dogs to find game birds for hunters.

 

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers controls the approximately 4,500-acres Prado Dam area. Their lease is for more than 500 acres near the dam and Highway 71.

 

They purchased the business 16 years ago. The land ranges from farm fields to wetlands and woodlands. Three counties with about 15 million people surround the area.

 

The farm produces alfalfa, corn, and other forage crops for silage sold to local dairies. Winter crops are wheat, winter wheat, oats, and ryegrass. In the summer, they grow sorghum, corn, milo, and various types of grass. All the fields at different stages of growth are used for hunting dog training, as it provides cover for waterfowl and challenges to rescue dogs in training.

 

Ruben Llamas is a new farmer who wants to be as profitable as possible and develop his best practices. To help him, Llamas discovered the USDA Natural Resources and Conservation Service online at usda.gov. He called the nearest NRCS Field Office in Redlands, CA. District Conservationist Tomas Aguilar-Campos answered the phone and immediately helped him with the information and ways to begin networking. To better understand Llamas’s farm and conservation needs Campos went to see him at the farm in the Prado Dam basin. Llamas was hesitant to provide information to the government and work with them but decided to try it. He now compares his experience with USDA to be similar to a bank customer and their banker.

 

The business came with 40-year-old tractors that were unreliable, produced higher emissions, and were expensive to maintain. Thanks to the USDA Environmental Quality Incentives Program EQIP and the USDA assistance with the application process, he qualified for the replacement of six tractors and a loader. Now, there is no problem operating any of them at any time. The robust and reliable equipment accomplishes twice the work in half the time and does it with 30 percent less fuel, says Llamas.

 

NRCS EQIP provides technical and financial assistance to producers to address natural resource concerns and deliver environmental benefits such as improved water and air quality, conserved ground and surface water, increased soil health and reduced soil erosion and sedimentation, improved or created wildlife habitat, and mitigation against drought and increasing weather volatility.

 

Equally as old were the irrigation systems. So, next, the pump and mainline, and distribution pipe needed improvement. To test the system Tomas and another specialist came to test the irrigation system. He recommended larger lines and a smaller pump for lower energy costs and better efficiency.

 

“The field representative, they’re always there, ready to help, says Llamas. With whatever question I have, they will help me.”

During the winter, the lower wetlands and farm fields become flooded with rainwater. The water attracts local and migratory birds. They come to eat, rest and leave the soil richer from their time there.

In the lowest field, seasonal flooding made it difficult to farm. Aguilar-Campos responded by asking a USDA soil specialist to examine the land. Compost was the recommendation, resulting in consistent farming and increased yields.

 

Because of the varying soils, Aguilar-Campos had a soil analysis performed. It showed that composting would help. The compost revitalized the soil to the point that certain crops needed 30 percent less water, and corn required 18 percent less water. Another result is that weed suppression has improved, so chemical use is down from an already sparing use.

 

Ruben Llamas says, “It’s been a really great relationship. I mean, I got seven pieces of equipment, so it’s been really, really good.”

 

For more information about EQIP, go to nrcs.usda.gov/programs-initiatives/eqip-environmental-quality-incentives

 

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 533 Pumping Plant please see efotg.sc.egov.usda.gov/api/CPSFile/14941/533_NC_CPS_Pumping_Plant_2011

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 430, Irrigation Pipe, please see nrcs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/Irrigation_Pipeline_430_Overview_9_2020.pdf

 

For more information about NRCS Conservation Practice 443 Irrigation System please see nrcs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/2022-09/Irrigation_System_Surface_And_Subsurface_443_Overview.pdf

 

USDA Media by Lance Cheung.

Profitable Soda Fountain Operation

Here’s Why the ‘99 Percent’ Are Pissed

BY KEVIN OSBORNE · NOVEMBER 9TH, 2011

A disturbing study found 30 of the most profitable U.S. corporations had a “negative tax rate” during the recent three-year period it covered. Those same firms had combined pre-tax profits of $160 billion during that time.

 

The study also found that 78 of the corporations paid no taxes in at least one of the three years, and that 280 companies shelter at least half of their profits from taxes.

 

The comprehensive study was conducted by Citizens for Tax Justice and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. It covers the years 2008-2010, and examines data from the companies’ financial reports about their pre-tax U.S. profits and their U.S. federal income taxes.

 

In all, 280 companies are included in the report, all of which are from the Fortune 500 list.

 

Those factoids would be surprising enough by themselves, but the study contains more revelations. Chief among them is that the average effective tax rate for all 280 companies in the study over the three-year period was 18.5 percent; for the period 2009-2010 it was just 17.3 percent, far below the statutory corporate rate of 35 percent.

 

That finding pretty much demolishes the primary argument of the national Republican Party, in its never-ending quest for lower taxes and other perks for Big Business, regardless of the disastrous effect the policy has on local, state and federal governments.

 

But wait, it gets even more maddening.

 

The study also found that U.S. corporations with significant foreign profits — totaling 10 percent or more of their total worldwide profits — paid tax rates to foreign nations that were almost one-third higher than they paid to the IRS on their domestic profits. Those nations are mostly free of demagogues like Grover Norquist, Rush Limbaugh and Sarah Palin, or at least their counterparts wield much less clout than here, and politicians realize that companies are expected to contribute their fair share for the common good.

 

What a crazy notion.

 

And you remember President Eisenhower’s warning about the rise of the Military-Industrial Complex during his farewell address in 1961? Well, it’s here, it’s entrenched and it’s powerful.

 

The study found that the top 10 defense contractors saw their combined tax rate decline from 19.3 percent in 2008 to a mere 10.6 percent rate in 2010. Outrageous.

 

During the same three-year period, those 280 companies were given tax subsidies of one form or another totaling $222.7 billion. Incredibly, despite the mess they caused during the financial crisis of 2008, the financial services sector received the largest share of all federal tax subsidies at 16.8 percent.

 

Keep those figures in mind the next time that some politician wants you to accept cuts to your Social Security or Medicare benefits, instead of raising taxes on the wealthy.

 

“These 280 corporations received a total of nearly $223 billion in tax subsidies,” said Robert McIntyre, director at Citizens for Tax Justice. “This is wasted money that could have gone to protect Medicare, create jobs and cut the deficit.”

 

Noting that corporations continue to lobby for lower tax rates and an exemption for profits they shift offshore, McIntyre added, “Our study provides proof that too many corporations are already being coddled by our tax system.”

 

This is the 10th comprehensive review of corporate taxation policies released by the two groups. Their first report, released in 1984, helped lead to the landmark Tax Reform Act of 1986, signed into law in October of that year by President Reagan. It curbed tax shelters for corporations and lowered taxes on lower- and middle-income families.

 

The 1986 law was created to be tax revenue neutral, as individual taxes were decreased while corporate taxes were increased. Also, it simplified the tax code by reducing the number of tax brackets from 15 levels of income to four levels.

 

. . . The United States has seen the widest income disparity develop between wealthy Americans and the rest of us in three decades; while the the top 1 percent of Americans had its largest share of income since 1928, incomes for the other 99 percent stagnated or declined.

 

As a result, I tend to trust what Citizens for Tax Justice has to say on fiscal matters.

 

In its current report, the group recommends that Congress consider fixes like reinstating a strong corporate Alternative Minimum Tax; reforming the way multinational corporations allocate their profits between the United States and foreign nations, so that U.S. taxable profits aren’t artificially shifted offshore; and repealing the rule that allows U.S. corporations to “defer” their U.S. taxes on their offshore profits, so there wouldn’t be a tax incentive to shift profits overseas.

 

Congress and the president, however, seem to have little stomach for these ideas, even though polls show most Americans like them.

 

“Unfortunately, corporate tax legislation now being promoted by many in Congress seems stuck on the idea that as a group, corporations are now either paying the perfect amount in federal income taxes or are paying too much,” the study concludes.

 

“Real, revenue-raising corporate tax reform, however, is what most Americans want and what our country needs,” it adds. “Our elected officials should stop kowtowing to the loophole lobbyists and stand up for the vast majority of Americans.”

 

Left unchecked, such festering inequity eventually is a recipe for disaster. Or violent social change. Let’s begin working to force politicians to deal with the problem now.

  

Ayr and Maybole Junction Railway (Information from Wikipedia under creative commons licence)

 

One of the most profitable railways in Scotland this line was a short 5.5 mile route with an interesting history. The Glasgow, Paisley, Kilmarnock and Ayr Railway (GPK&AR) was opened as far as Ayr in 1840, but its Ayr station was on the north bank of the River Ayr. (The GPK&AR was a predecessor company of the Glasgow and South Western Railway.) At this early date, thought was given to reaching Portpatrick, which was the port for a short sea route ferry service to Donaghadee in the north of Ireland.

For a time the GPK&AR had other priorities, but during the frenzy of railway schemes that arose in 1845, a Glasgow and Belfast Union Railway (G&BUR) was promoted; it was supported by the GPK&AR, and its parliamentary costs were partly funded by that company.

Portpatrick seemed to be an important destination for a line, although there was much wild and difficult territory to be crossed to get there: in the same year the British and Irish Union Railway (B&IUR), an independent concern, was proposed to run from Dumfries via Castle Douglas to Portpatrick.

The G&BUR was to run by way of Patna, and a third line was proposed to cross the wild country of Galloway, the Ayrshire and Galloway Railway (A&GR); it would form a junction with the G&BUR at Smithston, near Patna, and run through Dalmellington to Castle Douglas, there linking with the British and Irish Union Railway.

The frenzy of railway schemes lasted for a while but then the bubble burst in 1846, and ambitious and expensive proposals found that they could not get the financial support they needed. The B&IUR announced that it was not proceeding on 21 April 1846, and the A&GR scheme was cut back drastically, to run from Smithston to Dalmellington only, a tiny fraction of its intended extent. It was to have running powers over the G&BUR to reach Ayr.

The G&BUR was authorised in the face of grave financial difficulty, and when the shareholders considered the reality of the situation, the decision was taken not to proceed with construction, and the expensively-won powers were allowed to lapse.[1]

The A&GR scheme had been heavily cut back in Parliament, and with the G&BUR now dormant, it was unable to connect to Ayr, so the promoters put forward a revised scheme in the next Parliamentary session. It won approval and the Ayrshire and Galloway (Smithstown & Dalmellington) Railway received the Royal Assent on 8 June 1847. It would connect with the GPK&AR at Falkland Junction, a short distance north of their terminal station on the north shore of the River Ayr.

The Glasgow and South Western Railway

In October 1850 the GPK&AR merged with another company and the Glasgow and South Western Railway (G&SWR) was created. The new concern had pressing problems elsewhere, but was happy to encourage local initiatives to promote new lines. The lure of reaching Portpatrick remained, and at the end of 1852 the prospectus for an Ayr, Maybole and Girvan Railway was published. Although it was supported by the G&SWR, this scheme too failed to attract sufficient support, and it came to nothing.

Yet another truncated scheme was presented to Parliament in the 1854 session, and this time it was authorised: the Ayr and Maybole Junction Railway was incorporated on 10 July 1854. Capital was to be £33,000 for the line of 5¾ miles (9.3 km). The line was to diverge from the (as yet unbuilt) Ayr and Dalmellington line at Dalrymple Junction. The G&SWR was authorised to work the line for 35% of gross receipts for a period of five years, thereafter at a rate to be determined by arbitration.[3] The charge for working the line was considered low by some GS&WR shareholders.

Actual subscription for shares was disappointing, and the G&SWR was obliged to subscribe £10,000 to the scheme.[1]

Opening at last

The line opened to goods trains on 15 September 1856, but the Inspecting Officer was not satisfied with the ballasting, and opening to passengers was accordingly delayed until 13 October 1856.

In 1863 the working arrangement between the owning company and the GS&WR was due to expire. Much work remained to be done in completing the stations, and the A&MJR had been paying its shareholders handsome dividends but had failed to generate capital to complete the works. An impasse arose over the renewal of the working arrangement, and negotiations to absorb the A&MJR into the G&SWR also failed. The negotiations dragged on and the G&SWR agreed a "perpetual working agreement" with a sliding scale of charges between 39% and 45% of gross receipts. The G&SWR may have been motivated to concede better terms by the fear that the Caledonian Railway might step in. The new terms were ratified by Act of Parliament of 13 July 1863. The A&MJR chairman was Rigby Wason, and his tenacity is credited with getting good terms for his company.

Reaching Stranraer. When the company was originally promoted, a direct rail connection between Glasgow and Portpatrick was contemplated; the A&MJR saw itself as a link in that chain. In the event the harbour at Portpatrick was not developed as had been thought, although Stranraer took over as the dominant ferry port. The Portpatrick Railway had expended its meagre resources in reaching Portpatrick from Dumfries, but Rigby Wason launched an attack on the PR for failing to build a line northwards from Stranraer, as he considered had been promised. The word "fraud" was used.

The Portpatrick Railway had no funds to build such a line, but the idea remained as an objective. The gap was closed by two nominally independent companies.

The Maybole and Girvan Railway opened its line on 24 May 1860. The A&MJR terminus at Maybole was at Redbrae, and it was unsuitable for conversion to a through station, so the M&GR by-passed it, building a new through station further west. The old terminus served as a goods yard. The M&GR company succumbed to absorption into the G&SWR in 1865.

The wild territory between Girvan and Stranraer took longer to traverse; the Girvan and Portpatrick Junction Railway opened its line across challenging terrain in 1877. It joined the Portpatrick Railway at Challoch Junction, entering Stranraer over that company's line. It was always in financial difficulties, and however desirable it was to have a direct line between Glasgow and Stranraer, the income generated hardly paid for the outgoings. After an unsuccessful capital reconstruction the line was sold to the G&SWR in 1892

Absorbed by the G&SWR

The A&MJR had long held out for better terms if absorption by the G&SWR was to take place. A guaranteed 5% on capital had been rejected, and in 1871 terms were finally agreed. An Act of 29 June 1871 confirmed the absorption of the A&MJR, which had effectively taken place on 1 February 1871. The terms were a remarkable guaranteed 7%. The G&SWR Vice Chairman was asked to explain the generous terms at the Extraordinary General Meeting called to ratify the deal, and he replied that "we could not get it for less”

In 1911 the company was finally dissolved and vested in the G&SWR, the 7% dividend guarantee being sustained.

The present day

The Ayr and Maybole Junction line continues in use at the present (2014) as part of the line between Ayr and Stranraer. Passenger services are operated under the brand Glasgow South Western Line. The original Maybole terminus has long been closed.

 

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Kerikeri stone store and Kemp House (and surroundings) - 08 October 2013

 

The Stone Store at Kerikeri in the Bay of Islands is New Zealand’s oldest surviving stone building.

Part of the first Church Missionary Society station in New Zealand, the store was designed by John Hobbs to replace an earlier wooden store house. The Stone Store was erected between 1832 and 1836 by mason William Parrott, carpenter Ben Nesbitt and a team of Māori. Construction was of sandstone from Australia, local volcanic rocks and burnt shell mortar. Iron ties and window bars were forged by James Kemp, (though these unfortunately corroded the sandstone). Initially it had a wooden belfry on one side.

The Stone Store was intended to be the base of the Church Missionary Society’s trading post, selling produce from the farms at Te Waimate mission to ships, and European goods to Māori. Marsden planned to build a flour mill on the adjacent Kerikeri River, but this was eventually built at te Waimate instead. Stone was used to protect wheat from rats, for defence against Māori and to reduce the risk of fire.

  

Stone Store

By the mid-1830s the mission stations could not compete with the private enterprise of other European settlers, either as traders or farmers, and the store was not profitable.

The building was converted into the mission library by Bishop Selwyn in the early 1840s. Following the sacking of Kororareka in the Flagstaff War, it was briefly taken over by Governor George Grey for use as a magazine and barracks. After the cessation of hostilities in 1845, the stone store was leased to become the centre of Kauri gum trading operation, and then in 1863 it was used to house a boys' school. The building was sold to the Kemp family in 1874, and was used as a general store, although it increasingly became a tourist attraction. The Stone Store was purchased from the Kemps by the New Zealand Historic Places Trust in 1975. Conservation work was done in the 1990s. The store, together with the neighbouring Mission House now form a small museum.

  

The Mission House at Kerikeri in New Zealand was completed in 1822[1] as part of the Kerikeri Mission Station by the Church Missionary Society, and is New Zealand’s oldest surviving building. It is sometimes known as Kemp House.

Samuel Marsden established the Anglican mission to New Zealand with lay preachers, who lived in the Bay of Islands under the protection of Hongi Hika, the chief of the local tribe, the Ngapuhi. In November 1819, Marsden purchased 13,000 acres (53 km²) from the Ngapuhi.

Marsden instructed the Reverend John Butler to erect buildings for the mission station under the shelter of the Ngapuhi Pa or fortress of Kororipo at Kerikeri, (Marsden, himself, Thomas Kendall and Hongi Hika left for Britain). Using Māori and skilled European labour, Butler had completed the centre piece Mission House by 1822, (despite being interrupted by the return of Kendall and Hongi Hika with a thousand muskets, and Kororipo being used as a base for the subsequent Ngapuhi military campaign in the Musket Wars).

  

Mission House

Butler’s house was a weatherboard clad, two-storey Georgian design with a verandah and two chimneys. It was built primarily from Kauri. At some point in the 1830s, a skilling was added, and the verandah was replaced with an enlarged design in 1843. In the 1920s a bathroom was added behind the kitchen.

Butler was sacked in 1823, and George Clarke occupied the building until the early 1830s, by which time the Ngapuhi had abandoned Kororipo, but the mission station was strong enough to feel no need for protection.

The house was occupied by James and Charlotte Kemp in 1832 and although initially part of an expanded mission presence, (including the Stone Store), it was later purchased by the Kemps, and stayed in that family for 142 years, until Ernest Kemp donated it to the New Zealand Historic Places Trust in 1976.

The Trust has restored the building to an approximation of its 1843 appearance, (although the verandah was higher, and the roof was not shingled). Together with the Stone Store, the Mission house is now a museum open to the public.

  

source:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Store

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission_House

 

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