FDNY

 There's nothing I could say about New York's beloved FDNY(aka NY's Bravest) that hasn't already been said more honestly or eloquently by many other people. It is their collective badass, balls-out courage in the face of such genuine horror that I find to be almost inconceivable. The large scale and depth of their loss was felt in every corner of every borough. These photographs are from Squad 18 in the West Village...here's their website with more of their story: http://www.fdnysquad18.com/

For months after the attacks many of the city's firehouses and police stations were draped in black and purple mourning bunting. A kind of veil had dropped on the city and even as we slowly returned to the rhythm of our days, there was not any tangible feeling of normal. Not when "normal" included fighter jets making their frequent passes over New York City's airspace. And yet, there was a kind of learned comfort that came with the sound of those protective aircraft. As if you could trick yourself into feeling slightly less helpless when bolstered by their fierce speed screaming overhead.

Union Square

Washington looks out over the sea of flowers, candles, and
posters at Union Square Park

I remember emerging from the subway at Union Square and being slightly bewildered. My neighborhood on the Upper West Side had some small memorials and there were supportive signs for the FDNY and NYPD, but nothing on the scale I witnessed at Union Square Park. Candles, photographs, prayers, pleas, home made poster board "have you seen?" signs--they were everywhere. Taped to the triumphant statue of Washington, on the subway station supports. Everywhere. Unlike most occasions of ubiquity, however, these small bits of remembrance and support never failed to elicit a deep, emotional response. You couldn't NOT look, and when you looked, you would feel another wave of sadness envelop you.

Union Square Park

Union Square subway station

One of the brilliant editorial cartoons, Union Sqare Park

Another of the small "altars" left in the park

Remember them, too...

St Vincent's, and Yet Another Sad Farewell

I was working on Hudson Street on the morning of the September 11th attacks. I'd heard something odd as I walked into our office building, but nothing that really gave me pause. The timeline of that day, for me, started with my cubicle partner getting a phone call from her husband who worked farther downtown than we were. He was calling to tell her that a plane had flown into one of the towers of the World Trade Center--and said we should turn on the television. (At this point I'll admit saying something that has haunted me ever since...) As my colleague hung up from speaking with her husband (who I'm happy to say was unharmed) I quipped, "Well, at least it wasn't the Chrysler Building!"

Obviously, I felt like the colossal ass that I can be from time to time when events unfolded so horrifically later in the day. The scope of that day still is beyond my comprehension and I think I'm grateful for the memory gaps that do exist in my timeline of both that day and the following weeks.

We all stayed put for most of the day, either glued to the television in our spectacularly intimate "conference room" or trying to get thru to loved ones and let them know we were okay, at least for the moment. Once the fighter jets began making their flights over the city, a few of our staff ventured out to St Vincent's to give blood and see if there was anything they could do. St Vincent's would become the site I most identified with as I often walked past it in the months after the attacks. It was where the doctors and nurses waited in vain, mostly, for patients that never arrived. Watching the missing persons wall and all the photographs and flowers and wishes wither away as the days at "the pile" dragged on was heart wrenching and now and then, tragically, you'd see the person's obituary in the NY Times.


So when I heard months ago that St Vincent's was to close, I felt especially sad and as though a nearly decade old scab had been pulled off, exposing long buried pain. For me it was a spot by which I could ascertain small steps of progress, healing. Herewith, St Vincent's Hospital during the immediate post-September 11th days. The photo at the bottom, the ambulance with the "Last Roll Call" newspaper on the dashboard may have given me the roughest punch to the gut when I saw it among the other images.

Love is everywhere, light is everywhere

Following up on my post from yesterday, here are a two more photographs. Homemade signs like these were everywhere in the days and weeks that followed September 11. Missives and messages were attached to buildings, mailboxes, railings, light posts--practically anything that stood still. I photographed many signs but these two stood out as memorable, meaningful, and straightforward. And in the sign below, with two seemingly commonplace words that many of us use nearly every day, a deep resonance was achieved. Remember. Rebuild.

Just when you think it's safe...

I went on the hunt for a couple of pictures of a failed preservation project I'd worked on with a friend who passed away yesterday. My digital archive, (thanks mostly to iPhoto and DropBox) is far easier to sort through than my actual photographs, which are, to put it bluntly, a jumbled, bollocksed up mess. TOTAL CHAOS. And yet, occasionally chaos points us toward something important; important and safely tucked away.

In two oversized Spectra Photo envelopes (from when I took actual photographs and had them developed at the wonderful Spectra store on W 72nd street), wedged between packets filled with romantic photos of London cemeteries and my photographic "homage" to Henry Adams Mont St Michel and Chartres, there they were. Not the hoped for photographs of the old pool house at Soldier's Field where we'd waged our failed preservation campaign, but instead a treasure trove of a different nature--my photos of NYC in the early days after September 11, 2001.

I've said before that I am perpetually surprised at how quickly and powerfully that day and the maelstrom of memories attached to it flood back to the surface. The deep, dull ache is nearly as immediate and as raw as it was a decade ago. The tug in your gut never totally goes away. The emotions grasp at you, pulling in every direction from sadness, to anger, to uncertainty and back again. I cannot begin to fathom what it was or is like for those who lost loved ones and friends, the depth and breadth of their pain is on a completely different level. I was merely a bystander--a proud New Yorker--and I was and am forever altered.

I'm quite certain that back then I could not even begin to project out into the future ten years ahead, and I'll wager that I haven't looked at these photographs since I took them. Maybe now is the time to share them. So over the next few days I'm going to scan a few of the images and will post them here, perhaps with some other odds and ends of remembrance from those days.

I, along with many others, I think, took a kind of comfort in being out and gathering with people--mostly complete strangers--to share stories and do whatever we could do in our own small ways. There were some incongruosly beautiful autumn days right after September the 11th, at least as I recall (and admittedly, there are large blank gaps in many of those days that I can't remember, and I'm guessing that's for the best) and I spent a lot of time wandering around the city and taking photographs.

This isn't where I expected to end up today, but here we are and here's photo 1. Taken from a Labor Day, 2001, walk across the Brooklyn Bridge. It's one of my favorite photographs ever.

Long Gone (but not forgotten)

I'm essentially a nostalgia junkie. For all my attachment to my beloved BlackBerry and MacBook Pro, one of my most prized possessions is my table-top Victrola. The 78 rpm records that spin on the green felted turntable are a little scratchy and they are easily broken. (Just ask my father who, as a teen, used them for discus practice in his back yard...that way he "always broke a record."I kid you not.) But the sound that comes out the doors of this beautiful little gem is unlike any other music you'll hear. In all honestly I'd much rather hear Benny Goodman or either of the Dorsey brothers--scratches and all--on a 78 than on some luxe Bose sound machine.

Anyway, the other evening I was spinning tunes on the Victrola (Les Paul and Mary Ford's Tiger Rag played more than once...) I got to thinking of all the things that were once taken for granted as stable and long lasting and now are no more. Whether it is a job or profession or an electronic appliance, the obsolescence rate is a little overwhelming when you really stop to think about it. And as industries and our way of life change, what we embrace of the new and what we choose to cling to of the old becomes more and more difficult to decide upon. 

I know this is not terribly groundbreaking thought here, but it really did hit me...between my Victrola--which would have been a staple in many if not most homes throughout the early years of the 20th century--and some of the photographs I've taken lately I was reminded by how cyclical our world is. 

Drive by any strip mall or, much more sadly, any Main Street in much of the country and see how many buildings and storefronts are empty. And as industry moves to other countries and leaves a community completely, there are large campuses that will be let to go to seed if someone else can't find a way to utilize them. It is the way of the world and I understand that. And not everything that we're losing needs or deserves to be saved, I fully understand that as well. But contemplating how to move forward and embrace the new without shunning the best of the old is a tricky bit of navigating.

My photographs from yesterday's post show the ruin of what was once a bustling part of port life on the Hudson River. Today they stand as a reminder to a way of life that once was...but one which would make very little sense to many of us today. 

And a the photographs that follow are of a similar nature. These places are long gone...but I think still worthy of consideration.

The two photographs above are of the Harlem Valley State Hospital (top) and Wingdale Prison power plant (The Sing-Sing Country Club.) Part of the campus was a state hospital for the insane and part of it was used as a prison facility for the "criminally" insane. A kindly State Trooper was good enough to share this info with me (as I was nearly trespassing) and then I of course researched it a little further when I got home. The campus is quite something and the buildings, which mostly seem to have been built ca1910-1920s have some wonderful details to them. Here's a great link with more details and some great vintage postcard views: http://harlemvalley.org/wingdale/

                                          

This is about all that remains of Pier 54 in NYC where the survivors of the Titanic, aboard the RMS Carpathia, disembarked. If you enlarge the photo you can see where White Star and Cunard painted signage overlap. This is also the pier where the Lusitania left from, so there is a lot of great history here. Another link to a little more detailed info: http://www.atlanticliners.com/pier_54.htm

And finally, since I'm a little obsessed with iron work (as with the remaining piece of Pier 54), this is a little piece of highway to nowhere. New Yorker's will recognize it because there are sports fields and courts underneath it on the UWS. I love the graceful sweeping arches and the play of light and shadow.

                                        

Driving past the Harlem Valley campus or past an abandoned farm or estate always makes me wonder about the people who lived and worked there, their stories. All these ruins once contributed to a community and served a population...today, they are shells and remnants. I can't help but wonder what pillars of our community, what places we depend on today will end up like this. 

On the River...

At various times during the course of the year I find myself thinking of my former days in NYC. On balmy summer days there was nothing lovelier than heading out to Riverside Park and having a long walk along the Hudson--often with the promise of a stop for ice cream or a treat at the Boat Basin Cafe. Along one section of the Hudson River Greenway bike and walking paths are some spectacular ruins, and if you've stopped by here before, you KNOW I love a good ruin.

Archival photos of the Hudson show what a hard working river it has always been and I'm just glad it's coming back as a river and a gathering place for good, healthy outdoor fun.

So in keeping with my theme of pictures being worth a thousand words...here's a few photos of that unique industrial ruin...and yes, I had a little fun with the CameraBag app filters.