View allAll Photos Tagged second
JSC2013-E-011432 (15 Feb. 2012) --- This on-stage shot reveals a very musical scene inside Houston’s Jones Hall, as the Irish band Chieftains joined with the Houston Symphony and other musicians during the band's Feb. 15 stop on its 50th anniversary concert tour. NASA astronaut Cady Coleman, frame center, whose 2010 stay aboard the International Space Station provided some special bonds with the Irish group, was joined by NASA astronaut Dan Burbank, seen in NASA flight jacket dancing on stage, and a pre-recorded message from Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, now serving as a flight engineer aboard the station, in performances during the evening’s celebration. Hadfield’s appearance onboard the orbital outpost was shown on an elevated screen (out of frame) in the Hall. Photo credit: NASA
1140 Franklin Avenue, Morrisania, Bronx, New York City, New York, United States
The Second Battery Armory, the first permanent armory located in The Bronx, was built in 1908-11 to the design of Charles C Haight, a former member of the New York State militia and a prominent architect known for his institutional buildings. Prominently situated on a sloping site, the armory is notable for its bold massing, expressive brick forms, picturesque asymmetry, and restrained Gothic vocabulary; the design of the structure retains references to the tradition of medieval imagery in earlier New York armory buildings, but bears a marked relationship to Collegiate Gothic institutions.
Having a large drill shed and an administrative building to the side, anchored by a corner tower, the armory was critically praised for its rational structural expression. Haight was awarded the commission, following a design competition, by the New York City Armory Board, the agency then authorized to construct new armories in the city.
The armory originally housed the Second Battery, a field artillery unit of the National Guard whose history dated to the Washington Gray Troop of 1833; units which were successors to the Second Battery remained in the building until the 1980s. Its location in the Morrisania section of The Bronx reflects the rapid growth of the borough at the turn of the century and the accompanying expansion of public services. A one-story addition to the armory (c. 1928), by architect Benjamin W. Levitan, along much of its Franklin Avenue frontage, modified Haight's original design through a skillful near-replication of its features. The Second Battery Armory remains one of the most distinctive public buildings in The Bronx.
The National Guard and Armories
The Second Battery Armory was built for a unit of the National Guard of the State of New York, long the largest and most active state militia in the country. The tradition of state militias remained strong in America from the Revolution through the nineteenth century; in 1792 Congress passed an act that established uniformity among the various state militias.
While the volunteer militia provided a large portion of the fighting forces in the nineteenth century, during the Civil War (at which time the name "National Guard" came into common usage) the readiness of the militia for warfare and its relationship to the standing army were called into question.
The New York Armory Law of 1862 attempted to address these issues by spurring the creation of regiments and armories, but met with little success in the aftermath of the war. With changes in American society in the second half of the nineteenth century - increasing industrialization, urbanization, labor union activity, and immigration - the role of the National Guard was affected, leading to its resurgence.
In the midst of a severe economic depression, the first nationwide general strike over working conditions occurred after a railroad strike in 1877; the National Guard was called to support police and federal troops against strikers and their supporters in dozens of American cities. Although units had been called previously to quell civil unrest, after 1877 the role of the National Guard was largely to control urban workers in strikes and "riots," and a wave of armory building began nationally.
The term "armory" refers to an American building type that developed in the nineteenth century to house volunteer state militias, providing space for drills, stables, storage, and administrative and social functions.
Aside from their military and police function, units of the National Guard were in large part social organizations; some, like the prestigious Seventh Regiment (first to adopt the term "national guard"), drew members from the social elite, while many others recruited primarily from local ethnic groups.
The earliest quarters for New York militia units were often inadequate rented spaces. The first regimental armory built in the city was the Tompkins Market Armory (1857-60), the result of a collaboration between the Seventh Regiment and the local butchers, in which a drill hall was above a market.
The Seventh Regiment later constructed its own armory (1877-79, Charles W. Clinton, 643 Park Avenue, a designated New York City Landmark), which had national influence in establishing the armory as a distinct building type while stimulating other New York units to build their own armories.
The Seventh Regiment Armory, modelled in plan after such nineteenth-century railroad stations as the first Grand Central Station, features a fortress-like administrative "headhouse" building with a central tower, connected to a drill shed which utilizes iron trusses to span a large space.
In 1884 the New York State Legislature created an Armory Board in New York City. The Board was charged with making the arrangements to condemn land for, to allocate funds for, and to authorize and oversee the construction, furnishing, and maintenance of, armories for National Guard units in the city; these buildings were owned by the City.
The Armory Board consisted originally of the Mayor, the senior officer of the local National Guard, and the Commissioner of Public Works, but was expanded in 1886 to include the second senior officer of the local National Guard and the President of the Board of Taxes and Assessments; its jurisdiction also included Brooklyn and Queens after consolidation of the boroughs into New York City in 1898.
Before 1900, six armories had been built in Manhattan through the Board, while two structures were built independently in Brooklyn. After 1900 the Board generally employed competitions for the design of new armories. Between 1900 and 1911 the Board authorized construction of three more armories (and one replacement) in Manhattan, three (plus an extension) in Brooklyn, and the Second Battery Armory in The Bronx, while New York State and Kings County built an additional six in Brooklyn and Queens.
By the time of the construction of the Kingsbridge Armory (1912-17, Pilcher & Tachau, 29 West Kingsbridge Road, a designated New York City Landmark), the second permanent armory in The Bronx and one of the largest in the United States, there were twenty-some actively functioning armories in New York City, and the great era of armory building in the city drew to a close.
While there were no formal standards for the plan and design of armories, and while various units had somewhat different needs, nearly all New York armories of this period shared the functional features of the Seventh Regiment Armory model.
A general consensus was reached about the appropriateness of the architectural imagery of the medieval fortress or castle for the armory's exterior appearance. Observers mentioned fortified towns in southern France and Mexico, and English, Scottish, and Norman castles, of the twelfth through the fifteenth centuries, among others, as stylistic prototypes for New York City armories.
The medieval appearance helped to signify the armory as a distinct building type, connoted its military function, as well as the concepts of power and control, and assisted functionally in the military defense of the building, if necessary (most armories had such fortress features as turrets, towers, crenellated parapets, slit windows, impenetrable doors, window grilles, etc., which could be used by troops with guns or to thwart uninvited entry).
In the design of several New York armories of the early twentieth century, however, the picturesque medieval imagery, as well as the central towered plan of the Seventh Regiment Armory was rejected or modified.
The Sixty-ninth Regiment Armory (1904-06, Hunt & Hunt, 68 Lexington Avenue, a designated New York City Landmark) has a classically-inspired design, though still military in aspect. In the Troop C Armory (1904-08, Lewis F. Pilcher, 1569 Bedford Avenue, Brooklyn), designed with classical and Art Nouveau motifs, the tower was placed near the corner, and the drill shed became an equally dominant feature. The Second Battery Armory also represented a change architecturally from the medieval model.
The Second Battery Armory
The unit which eventually became the Second Battery was established in 1833 as the Washington Gray Troop, Horse Artillery, part of the Third Regiment, New York State Artillery; in 1847 the designation was changed to Company I, Eighth Regiment. This troop, which formed part of a battalion of cavalry in 1867, was reorganized in 1879 as Battery E.
In 1881 the unit became known as the Second Battery, one of two artillery batteries in New York City. Since its founding the unit served during a number of major New York strikes and "riots,"5 as well as in the Civil and Spanish-American Wars, and either leased space or shared quarters in other units* armories. A fire in February, 1902, destroyed the 71st Regiment Armory, at Park Avenue and 33rd Street, which
then also housed the Second Battery; this provided the Battery "an opportunity to move northward, where we could secure larger and more commodious quarters for our organization."
Desiring a permanent location in The Bronx, the Second Battery moved in October, 1902, to a temporary armory (still extant; designed by architect John E. Kerby) at 1891 Bathgate Avenue, south of East Tremont Avenue.
The New York City Armory Board in 1903 selected a site for a new permanent armory for the Second Battery at the northeast corner of Franklin Avenue and East 166th Street, one block from the Third Avenue elevated station in the Morrisania section of The Bronx. The large lot, approximately 200 by 300 feet, was prominently located on a rocky slope and was the site of a small wooded estate, with a freestanding frame house known as the Allendorf Residence.
Across Franklin Avenue is a walled ridge of parkland, where the 166th Street roadbed terminates and leads to a stairway. The Commissioners of the Sinking Fund appropriated $86,430 for the purchase of the site in September, 1905. In November, 1906, the Armory Board authorized 5450,000 for the construction of the armory, and had accepted the "plans of Charles C Haight, as modified," for which he was paid $3500.
Haight, selected through a design competition among six New York firms,9 also acted as superintendent of construction on the project10 Construction contracts were awarded in 1907, including: Charles Schneider, site excavation ($23,750); Guidone & Galardi, general contractors (5398,500); Ravitch Brothers, ornamental ironwork; and White Fireproof Construction Co., concrete floor arches. Construction began in September of 1908, after Buildings Department objections, pertaining to footings and fireproof floor arches, were settled.
The Armory Board appropriated an additional 59444 for completion of the armory in November, 1909, "in accordance with certain changes in the contract and specifications of the Guidone & Galardi Co., made by the architect,"11 and provided over 548,000 for equipment and furnishings in 1910-11. The Second Battery moved into its new armory in June of 1910, though official completion of the building did not occur until the end of January of 1911.
The Second Battery Armory was the first permanent armory built in the Borough of The Bronx, and was one of the first New York armories built following a reorganization of the National Guard, which again changed its role, to that primarily of a reserve force for the army. As the fears of domestic insurrection had waned, the Dick Act was passed in 1903 (amended in 1908), which provided that Guard personnel and equipment conform to U.S. Army standards and that Guard units could be called into federal service during wartime even while still under state jurisdiction.
In February, 1908, the First Battalion, Field Artillery, was organized from the First, Second, and Third Batteries; the First Battalion headquarters, as well as the Second Battery, were soon located in the new Second Battery Armory.
Charles C. Haight
Charles Coolidge Haight (1841-1917) [fig. D], architect of the Second Battery Armory, was born in New York City and graduated from Columbia College in 1861. He enlisted in the prestigious Seventh Regiment, and was commissioned as First Lieutenant/Adjutant, and later Captain, in the 31st and 39th New York Volunteers between 1862 and 1863; wounded at the Battle of the Wilderness in Virginia in May of 1864, he retired from the military.
Haight then studied architecture and worked with New York architect Emlen T. Littell, a friend from the Seventh Regiment. Opening his own office in New York in 1867, Haight's career was advanced through his family and its connections with the Episcopal Church - his father, the Rev. Benjamin I. Haight, was the assistant rector of Trinity Church.
In the 1870s he was appointed architect for the Trinity Church Corporation; between 1882 and 1886 he designed for the Corporation a number of buildings downtown, including a library, apartment house, and vestry offices (none of which survives). Haight also designed warehouses in the Tribeca area between 1882 and 1912 for both the Corporation and its subsidiary, the Protestant Episcopal Society of the State of New York for the Promotion of Religion and Learning.
Haight's early buildings were churches and residences in the Victorian Gothic and English Tudor styles, though he later gained recognition for his public institutional buildings, many in the English Collegiate Gothic style. Haight's designs for educational institutions include buildings for Columbia's midtown campus (1874-84, demolished), the General Theological Seminary (1883-1901, now included within the Chelsea Historic District), eleven buildings at Yale University (1894-1914), and Trinity School (1893-94, 139-147 West 91st Street, a designated New York City Landmark). Haight designed a number of hospital buildings, including the Manhattan Eye & Ear Hospital (1880), the New York Cancer Hospital (1884-90, 2 West 106th Street, a designated New York City Landmark), the Orthopoedic Hospital (1896), and the Hospital for the Ruptured & Crippled (1897).
The Second Battery Armory, designed in 1906-08 and built in 1908-11, was a late example of Haight's public institutions, employing a "restrained" and "uncomplicated"™ Gothic vocabulary, bold massing and siting, and expressive use of brick and stone.
Morrisania
The Second Battery Armory is located in the section of The Bronx known as Morrisania, after the prominent Morris family, local landowners and politicians through several generations from the seventeenth through nineteenth centuries. Morrisania became one of the twenty-one townships of Westchester County in 1788, and was annexed to the Town of Westchester in 1791.
The construction of the Harlem and Hudson River Railroads, beginning in 1842, resulted in the start of development and an increase in population, particularly an influx of German and Irish immigrants. Morrisania became part of the new township of West Farms in 1846, was the most populous section of Westchester County by 1855, and was chartered as a separate town in 1864.
When Morrisania was formally annexed to New York City in 1874, along with the western section of The Bronx, it had a population of over 19,000. By the late nineteenth century Morrisania had a predominantly German population, with its own local brewing industry. Expansion of the elevated railroad lines along Third Avenue, beginning in the mid-1880s, and later, the IRT subway system, reaching the area in 1904, helped spur a vast real estate boom.
Between 1874 and the completion of the Armory in 1911, the population of the annexed section of The Bronx grew by some 1300%, the majority of which had occurred after the annexation of the rest of The Bronx in 1895. The Bronx at that time would have been the seventh largest city in the United States. Starting in the
1930s, the ethnic composition of the area's population changed as the earlier groups moved and African-American and Puerto Rican families came to the neighborhood.
The immediate neighborhood of the Armory was known in the mid-nineteenth century as Eltona after Robert H. Elton, who had purchased property from Gouverneur Morris, built his home near Boston Road and 166th Street, and began subdivision of the land in the 1850s. Thomas Rogers, a prominent Wall Street financier, built a home on part of this land around 1872; the Rogers estate was divided for sale around 1900, the largest portion going to the City for the construction of Morris High School (1901-1904, CBJ. Snyder), the borough's first.
The remaining portion of the estate was developed with rowhouses in 1900-06; today these buildings constitute the Morris High School Historic District. Morris High School is one-half block to the east of the armory. Another structure, St Augustine's R.C. Church (1894, Louis H. Giele, 1183 Franklin Avenue), is one-half block to the north of the armory. Together these three buildings form an impressive architectural grouping, prominently sited on the hill.
The decision to locate the Second Battery Armory in The Bronx represents the growth of the borough at the turn of the century and the accompanying expansion of public services.
Design of the Second Battery Armory
In plan, the vast majority of the site of the Second Battery Armory is covered by the drill shed, with the administrative building or "headhouse" (here on the side rather than at the end of the drill shed) reduced to a narrow (30-foot deep) strip along the Franklin Avenue frontage. The drill shed was constructed with iron roof trusses which span 167 feet.
The drill (riding) hall is located on the main (first) floor. Below the drill hall, in the basement, were the stables (along 166th Street), a rifle range, a gun room, and a ramp to the first floor, and there were storage spaces along Franklin Avenue. Offices and reception and meeting rooms were located on the first floor of the administrative building. In the rest of the administrative building, were quarters and more reception rooms, as well as spectators galleries for the drill hall, on the second floor; a squad room, gymnasium, and general reception room on the third floor; and officers' rooms and maintenance and communication facilities in the upper stories of the tower. The spaces on the third floor required a larger width (38 feet), so the floors were partially cantilevered over the roof of the drill shed.
The exterior design of the armory [figs. F & GJ is a picturesque, asymmetrical composition which takes the maximum benefit of its prominent location on a sloping site on a hill, through its use of a corner tower, bold massing, and expressive brick forms.
While Haight's design kept several references to the tradition of medieval imagery in armories, such as the crenellated parapet and corbelled balcony, his use here of a restrained Gothic vocabulary is related more to the Collegiate Gothic style of his educational institutions. Haight's expressive and dramatic intentions in the armory design were clearly visible in the early, brooding sketch for the building published in The Brickbuilder in 1908.
The facade along 166th Street, virtually a brick curtain wall masking the end of the drill shed, has in appearance a nearly ecclesiastical aspect; a difference in height of twelve feet at each end due to the slope allowed for direct entrances to the drill hall and basement stables. The long Franklin Avenue facade of the administrative building was architecturally organized by end towers and intermediate pairs of buttresses and pilasters, which are expressive, structurally, of their placement at the side of the drill shed, with its trusses within.
The Second Battery Armory received favorable comment even before its completion. J. Hollis Wells, a lieutenant-colonel and member of the architectural firm of Clinton & Russell who was an authority on armories, wrote in 1908:
The site suggested the effectiveness of vertical masses, and these with a carefully studied sky-line gave the expression desired. Wide piers where strength was needed and a multiplicity of windows in the curtain walls between, the armory became an idealized type of 'mill construction'.... The silhouette against the sky, prominent through the building's high situation, has been perhaps the most carefully studied element of the facade, and on it the success of the exterior in a great measure depends. In short, its merit is in the composition of its masses of dark red brick with little or no ornament and a sparing use of sandstone.
Architecture in 1910 praised the armory as "probably the best in the City of New York.
The architecture is of a curious and fascinating style; powerful without being brutal, original without being bizarre. The military thought is at once apparent., but the windows are of ample size and as many as are needed to properly light the rooms within, not cut down to mere arrow slits as has been so often done.
The composition is exceedingly picturesque and has not been carried to a point which entails a sacrifice of the dignity so essential in a public building. . . . The complete disregard for symmetry displayed throughout the building is of much interest... . The mass of the tower looms up splendidly as seen from nearby points... . The interesting features are so many and the spirit of the design so complex that a cursory examination fails to impress one as does a more careful and thorough study. It is a building of the very highest interest and originality; quite the best as was before said, of our New York armories, and well worthy of its position as one of the city's monuments.
And noted critic Montgomery Schuyler, in Architectural Record in 1917, considered the armory virtually the best building in the entire borough of The Bronx. After scathing comments on the quality of buildings there, he went on to extoll the virtues of the armory:
The dimensions of the building would alone suffice to make it conspicuous. ... A flanking wall of 300 feet in extent cannot fail of making an impression, whatever its treatment... [Here] the walls have visibly sufficient depth, a depth which becomes most impressive and powerful where, as in the arched entrances, the whole thickness of the wall can be... 'revealed.' Moreover, there are three pairs of massive buttresses at intervals... the abutments of the huge roof trusses necessary for such a span.
Not only is the stability of the long wall put far beyond doubt by these devices, but the brute expanse becomes an ordered mass, an architectural design. ... In material... being common brick, though apparently chosen for color, and at any rate very lucky in its color - ... laid with wide red joints, and relieved in the right places... by a sparing introduction of brownstone the whole arrangement is expressive, rational, significant... The wall is most effectively framed between the terminal masses... . [At] the front., a series of crenellated serrations of the skyline, rising towards the centre... [indicates] the large and low curve of the actual roof. ... The suggestions of 'military Gothic' are not overdone, as they are so apt to be in similar erections.
They are confined to the crenellations of the parapets... and the corbelling of the balcony over the archway of the side... . These touches of tradition, denoting the purpose of the building are perfectly compatible with the fact that the detail throughout is simply straightforward structural modeling which might have taken the same forms if the designer had never heard of a Gothic castle, and is the logical expression of the materials and the construction employed. The photographs show how admirably consistent, restrained, and effective the architecture of the armory is, and what an effect it produces with utmost simplicity and unpretendingness of material.
Haight's expressive design was successful not only in providing a different architectural direction for armories while making references to armory tradition, but also in reflecting the building's function and structural composition.
The Armory Addition
At the request of the New York City Armory Board, architect Benjamin W. Levitan was hired in 1926 to draw plans "for the erection of an additional story providing adequate storage space" at the Second Battery Armory. Levitan's additional story, along the entire Franklin Avenue frontage of the armory north of the corner tower, was skillfully integrated with Haight's original design. Levi tan virtually replicated the features of Haight's top story, with the addition of a taller parapet and some brick patterning on the parapet and spandrels.
Benjamin W. Levitan (1878-1941), born in New York City and educated at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, was a prolific architect, active in New York City from 1900 to 1940. Upon his return to New York from Europe, he worked in the prominent firm of Warren & Wetmore, before establishing an independent practice in 1907. He developed a diverse expertise and was credited with the design of "hundreds of apartment houses, banks, factories, theatres, stadiums, schools, [and] gymnasiums."
He also obtained patents for "cell-block construction," a type of comfort station, and long-span construction for hangar sheds. His known commissions include the Central Jewish Institute (1922) on East 85th Street, the Women's House of Detention (1929, in association with Sloan & Robertson, 2-16 Greenwich Street, demolished), and a portion of Bloomingdale's Department Store. Levi tan was a member of the 22nd Regiment Engineers, New York National Guard, and his obituary mentioned his work at the Second Battery (then the "105th Field Artillery") Armory.
Description
The Second Battery Armory is a large (over 200 by 300 feet) red brick building consisting mostly of a drill shed, but also having a narrow administrative "headhouse" portion on the side of the drill shed. The brick is laid in Flemish double-stretcher bond while the watertable, coping, and trim are brownstone.
The two designed facades, three to five stories, are asymmetrically composed overall, although some sections are symmetrical; a massive, taller tower, rising up to six stories, is at the southwest corner of the building. The armory was originally constructed in 1908-11; an addition at the fifth story level was built along much of the Franklin Avenue facade c. 1928.
The long Franklin Avenue facade of the administrative building is anchored on the south by the corner tower (a smaller tower at the north end was incorporated into the addition). The design of the addition modified the facade by nearly replicating the original fourth-story features on the new fifth story. The overall facade is articulated by pairs of vertical buttresses which rise above the crenellated parapet, as well as intermediate pilasters on the third and fourth stories.
The corner tower features groupings of round-, segmental-, and pointed-arched windows of varying sizes, the latter expressed as a two-story arcade and having molded surrounds and decorative stone spandrels. Some of the windows in the bay just north of the tower are now blind; this section also has intermediate level spandrels.
The rest of the facade employs rectangular, and segmental- and round-arched window groupings of varying sizes. On the fifth story, and at the entrances at both ends, large pointed arches which are terminated by buttresses on the sides, before the imposts, are employed; those at the fifth story have recessed window arcades set within.
The northern end entrance has its original wood panelled doors and transoms. Surmounting the main corner entrance, with non-historic doors below the original panelled transoms, is a corbelled balcony with a flagpole. Doors lead onto the balcony, and the areas above are partially filled with brick.
A small window to the right of the entrance has an original decorative wrought-iron grille. The parapet and many of the spandrels of the upper two stories have decorative brickwork (dating from c. 1928). Ground-story windows have vertical-bar iron grilles.
The shorter 166th Street facade is arranged with the corner tower of the administrative building abutted by three three-story pavilions at the end of the drill shed, which are symmetrically composed and more planar; the sloping site creates a difference in height of twelve feet from end to end.
The tower has windows generally similar to those on its other facade, a small pedestrian entrance, with a non-historic door and stone stoop, surmounted by a double arched window with original cusped sash, and a small window to the left of the entrance with an original decorative wrought-iron grille.
The central drill shed pavilion has a two-story arcade of tall, narrow, molded pointed-arched openings which are now blind, above a plain stone panel; a double pointed-arched pedestrian entrance with original panelled doors and transoms and stone stoop and area way, and a stepped and crenellated parapet The central pavilion is flanked by two recessed sections, with four arched windows each on the second story, now half-filled with brick, and one louver each inserted on the ground story, and by two small tower-like pavilions which also employ the device at the large entrances and upper stoiy of pointed arches which are terminated by buttresses on the sides, before the imposts; those at the upper stoiy also have recessed window arcades set within.
The eastern (troop) entrance, with a non-historic rolldown gate, leads to the drill hall, while the western (troop) entrance, with non-historic doors and transoms, leads to the basement Ground-story windows have vertical-bar iron grilles.
The eastern side of the armory, which is now visible, including a three-story wing beside the drill shed, is unarticulated, with a combination of exposed brick and parging. The large roof monitors (probably added c. 1928) of the drill shed are also now visible along the east side. The windows of the building, mostly one-over-one double-hung wood sash with transoms are replacements of 1953-54. Exterior masonry repointing occurred in 1964.
Subsequent History
Following the completion of the armory in 1911, the Second Battery received a variety of different designations due to reorganizations within the National Guard.
In August of 1911 the First Battalion was reorganized, now with the Second, Third, and Sixth Batteries, which became known as Batteries A, B, and C In May of 1912, the First Battalion was reorganized within the Second Regiment, Field Artillery, but the regiment was reduced to the First Battalion again in October, and was transferred to the First Regiment, F.A.; in December Battery A was detached from that regiment, redesignated Battery B, and was assigned to the Second Battalion, F.A. The following month the Second Regiment was reconstituted, with the Second Battalion, Batteries D, E, and F, listed as located in the armory (Battery D was the successor to the Second Battery).
In 1916-17 this unit served in the New York State Artillery Brigade of the Sixth Division of the National Guard in U.S. service in Mexico, and during World War I served overseas in the 52nd F.A. Brigade, 27th Division. Around 1920, the unit was designated the 105th Field Artillery, Second Battalion, 52nd Brigade, 27th Division of the National Guard of the State of New York.
The U.S. War Department converted it to a "motorized unit" in 1934, and the basement stables of the armory were subsequently changed into garages. By the mid-1980s many of the Guard units were consolidated, and in 1988 the New York State Division of Military & Naval Affairs ended its jurisdiction over the building.
It is in City use today, administered by the Human Resources Administration, as a shelter for homeless New Yorkers. The building survives as a powerful architectural presence in the Bronx, and as one of eighteen historic armory buildings still remaining in the city.
- From the 1992 NYCLPC Landmark Designation Report
Everybody deserves a second chance. Even left-overs!
100% recycled lunch :) Vietnamese egg fried rice and fried cinnamon pork loaf.
PS: I just bought a used Sigma 24mm/2.8 Super Wide I MF from eBay for $60 shipped. Can't wait to test it out :)
It's not often I enter a photography competition for obvious reasons. But the Art in Hats exhibit curated by Quan Lavender, which is quite stunning by the way, currently has a competition. Each person starts with the same plain grey cloche hat and decorates it for a photograph.
I'm sure most people will photoshop their hat decoration but mine really is inworld like that, temporarily at least. Laughs. I will never be an SL milliner like the talented Reghan Straaf! But it gave me an excuse to dress up in some 20s flapper clothes, a favourite period for me.
I'm not asking you to vote for me (the competition is 50% popular vote but also 50% juried) but to vote for your favourite so the competition is a genuine success. Take in the wonderful exhibit while you are there. It highlights the the work of some very talented SL milliners and SL photographers.
Your taxi: maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Shekhawati/213/15/35
When Ken & I went down for the second space shuttle Endeavour launch attempt, we had to drive rather than fly. It's a LONG trip from here- about 12 hrs.- so we decided to break up the trip into two days- driving until wewere so exhausted we had to stop. We stayed a a motel in Tallahassee FL and I was SOME surprized when I saw the room number we were given! The Endeavour's mission designation was STS-134!! Seems like an omen to ME! And of COURSE it was successful this trip! :)
Me- tired grubby- doing my best Vanna White impression! :) (Photo by Ken)
In the game Second Life, I play the avatar Juushika Redgrave.
I went for something of a more relaxed look this time: just a sweater and jeans. The sweater is the Jam hoody from Maitreya, worn of course without the hood; I layered a Savvy? bandeau for a bit more coverage. The jeans are from Last Call and so no longer avaliable—but they're probably my favorite pair on the grid, and so I wear them often. Another reappearing wardrobe staple is Shiny Thing's Flared Oxfords. My hair, however, is new (or at least new to me): a high and messy bun from ETD, which was surprisingly easy to fit over my system ears and around my cat ears. New also (to me) is another Gala skin. It took a bit to adjust to these skins, and they still don't always suit me, but I'm fond of how fresh and simple it looks here. This isn't a particualrly complex outfit (save for the hair), but all told I'm rather fond of it.
Clothes
Shirt: Jam Hoody Black by Maitreya
Undershirt: Haver Bandeau by Savvy?
Jeans: Alizee Jeans by Last Call (retired)
Shoes: Flare Oxford - Black by Shiny Things
Body
Eyes: Gaze - Cat Gold by Nora
Skin: Glow - Dew - Frex by Gala
Manicure: Glitter Manicure Black by Sin Skins
Hair: Aiiyanna - Auburn by ETD (modded)
Lashes: Ferra Lashes by Sin Skins (top only)
Accessories
Glasses: Shea by Persenickety (modded)
Whiskers: Plenty Black Whiskers by Gritty Kitty
Neko Ears: Anisa's Neko Ears by Anisa @ OTCR ( modded to include Industrial piercing by DEEKS)
Neko Tail: Kitty Black Tail Long by Hybrid (modded) (retired)