Saving the Titanic Memorial Lighthouse
April 16, 1912 was supposed to have been a joyous day for Seamen’s Church Institute. That evening, they were scheduled to celebrate laying the cornerstone of their new building at … Continue reading
The Abolitionist Riots of 1834
Not too long ago, I was looking through our map collection with Andrea Renner, one of the Museum’s Andrew W. Mellon Post-Doctoral Curatorial Fellows, who assisted curator Hilary Ballon on … Continue reading
Love in the Time of Weegee
As we continue to inventory and image the Museum’s holdings from the LOOK Magazine archives , we’ve discovered troves of images taken by famous photographers on assignment for the magazine. … Continue reading
It’s Toasted: Mad Men and New York City
The digital team is eagerly awaiting the return of Mad Men to television on Sunday, March 25, after a 17-month hiatus. In anticipation of this, we have pulled together an … Continue reading
South Street Seaport’s Library and Archive
Greetings from the South Street Seaport Museum’s library and archive! In October of last year the Museum of the City of New York assumed the operation of the South Street … Continue reading
A Practical Joke of Great Proportions
I recently finished reading The Rector and the Rogue, W. A. Swanberg’s riveting true account of a peculiar situation targeting the Reverend Morgan Dix of Trinity Church over 130 years … Continue reading
How Harlem River Speedway Became Harlem River Drive
Before it was called the Harlem River Drive, the parkway running north and south along the west bank of the Harlem River was called the Harlem River Speedway. Construction began … Continue reading
The digital team reflects on Valentine’s Day
We here in the digital lab have conflicted feelings about today’s holiday. So we’ve pulled images from our collection that express a variety of viewpoints about romance and Valentine’s Day. … Continue reading
Treasures and “Shandas” from the Collection on Yiddish theater
In the early decades of the twentieth century, the streets of the Lower East Side were plastered with theatrical advertisements for Der yidisher kenig lir and Mentsh un Tayvl. Second … Continue reading
French Casino
In December 1934, the refurbished Earl Carroll Theatre on 7th Avenue and 50th Street opened as the French Casino. It was an art deco showpiece, with walls draped in black … Continue reading
Metamorphoses: A mysterious poem
The images below come from one of two hand drawn flip-books I came across in the “Verses” collection. After each verse, you flip back one of the leaves to reveal … Continue reading
Opening Night! Top Banana
The digital team has begun digitizing thousands of images from the rarely-seen archives of the Lucas-Pritchard / Lucas-Monroe Studios, preeminent Broadway production photographers in New York City from about 1936 … Continue reading
100 Years Ago – The Equitable Building Fire
January 9th, 1912, just after 5 A.M. The wind is howling at nearly 40 miles per hour–with gusts of up to 68 miles per hour–making the already below freezing temperatures … Continue reading
MCNY Blog: New York Stories 