New York City Day Two     08/04/22

I look for Your deliverance O LORD. ~ Genesis 49:18     Jacob pauses in his blessings to talk to God.  I believe he was looking to the coming Messiah, but it could also be his desire to go Home.  Home to Heaven to be with God forever.  Others believe he was praying for God to deliver his sons from themselves.  People have often asked “How are the people in the Old Testament saved when they didn’t have Jesus?”  They are saved through faith, just like those in the New Testament and us today.  “It is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God.  Not by works so that no one can boast.” (Ephesians 2:8-9)  Jacob believed in the promise of the coming Messiah, and that’s what saved him.  Do you believe in the One He has sent? (John 6:29)  Do You truly believe that Jesus is Who He said He Is?  Do you recognize your need for a Savior?

Here are some fast facts about the population of NYC to begin our second day:

• As of 2020, 8.38 million people live in New York City
• 1 in every 38 people living in the US, lives in NYC
• NYC has the highest population density of any US city – 27,000 per square mile.  The next closest in density is San Francisco at 18,800
• Over 3 million residents are foreign-born
• Over ¼ arrived in 2000 or later

We began our day with three breakfasts.  Seems excessive, I know, but it was necessary.  When we checked in last night, the person at the desk told us breakfast was from (6 or 6:30am depending on which of us you talk to 😊) to 10:30am.  We were up and dressed and headed downstairs a little after 6:00.  There were a few cold things sitting out, but the hot stuff wasn’t there yet.  So we grabbed some juice and a small muffin and headed to the roof.  We returned to the dining area, and while there was still no hot food, there was a large fruit salad.  We took two bowls back to our room and ate, then packed up.  While we were in the dining area, we overheard a staff member say the hot food was on schedule and would be put out at 7:00 as usual.  Ah hah!  But someone should relay that bit of information to the desk clerks.  😊  Time for our third and final breakfast before we hit the pavement.

On our way out the door, we stopped by the desk to see if they’d keep our bag all day.  The manager was there and we shared a nice conversation with him.  I’ll have to remember to give them a good review on TripAdvisor – once I have decent internet service again. (as I write this on 8/13!)

There are only 11 numbered items today, but the boat cruise we took included several mentionable things.

We began with a walk to Times Square.  By the time we arrived, it was 8:15am, but the neon signs still looked pretty remarkable!

1. Walk to Times Square – We were anxious to get a look here.  The neon advertising signs were everywhere!  Even Krispy Kreme has one!  What a place!  And it wasn’t even dark! Think you’d like to advertise something there?  Better have very deep pockets.  According to the Wall Street Journal in 2012 (which was the most recent reliable data I found) it’ll run you between $1.1 million and $4 million a year. And that’s ten years ago! We saw the New Year’s Eve ball, but it was so comparatively small, we didn’t think what we saw was it.  They make it look so huge on TV!   But when we discovered at the end of the day what we’d missed, we ventured back as we headed over to pick up our bag and go home.

Marooned on a triangular intersection at the heart of New York City’s busiest neighborhood sits One Times Square, the iconic setting for the annual New Year’s Eve ball dropping ceremony, broadcasted worldwide and attracting hundreds of thousands of revelers each December 31.

Oddly in one of the most expensive and photographed locations in the world, One Times Square is nearly completely empty. Walgreens occupies the first floor, and leases everything up through the 21st floor, but they have chosen to leave the building vacant as the advertising on the sides is worth more, and is less trouble than having tenants.

The building does have one other tenant however, and that is Jeff Straus who runs the New Year’s Eve celebration from his 22nd floor office. Above him is the New Year’s ball itself located on a metal roof deck. But it wasn’t always this way. 

Constructed in 1904 as the headquarters for the New York Times, it was the tallest building in the city when measured from basement level to roof deck. One Times Square’s completion coincided with the opening of the city’s first subway line in 1904 and was instrumental in the development of its surroundings into a thriving commercial area.  In a brilliant publicity ploy, the paper’s owner Adolph Ochs volunteered to hold the city’s New Year’s Eve celebration for the building’s opening year. The festivities had previously been held at lower Manhattan’s Trinity Church, but the raucous nature of the night was nerve-wracking for Trinity and the church was relieved to relinquish their role in the celebration. Ochs was intent on making December 31, 1904, a night to remember and spared no expense. An all-day festival in the streets culminated at midnight with fireworks raining down on over 200,000 guests and One Times Square was officially marked as the new setting for the city’s annual New Year’s Eve bash.

Within a couple of years the fireworks display was banned by the city because of the dangers of explosives showering debris down on attendees.  Ochs was determined not to let the ban detract from the spectacular quality of the city’s New Year’s festivities and turned to the newspaper’s chief electrician, Walter F. Palmer, to create an alternatively showy way to celebrate the arrival of 1908.  Inspired by the downtown Western Union Telegraph building’s clock tower, which dropped an iron ball at noon each day, Palmer hired a young Russian immigrant, Jacob Starr, to create a 700-pound ball made of iron and wood.  The Times Square Ball was made that year, illuminated with one hundred 25-watt lightbulbs and ceremoniously lowered at midnight.  The event was a massive success, and for most of the remainder of the 20th century, Starr, and later the sign-making company he founded, Artkraft Strauss, continued to be responsible for the yearly ball dropping ceremony as well as much of the design of the massive, luminous signage that has become indelibly associated with Times Square.

The Times Square Ball has since been redesigned and upgraded several times across the decades.  The ball’s current incarnation weighs in at 11,875 pounds and is 12 feet in diameter. The sphere is composed of 2,688 individual Waterford Crystal triangles, impressively illuminated by tens of thousands of Philips LEDs.  It shimmers year-round from the roof deck of One Times Square, a glowing beacon overlooking the hustle and bustle of Manhattan.  Hovering high above the city streets, the Times Square Ball patiently awaits December 31, when millions of spectators around the world will gather once again to breathlessly count down the symbolic sphere’s glittery descent and the coming of a new year.

The ball is never taken down, if you can get in a skyscraper you will be able to see it any time of the year. ~ atlasobscura.com

It was time to get a different view of the city.  As we walked to our next destination, we passed the aircraft carrier USS Intrepid.  You can take a tour, probably similar to the one we did on the USS Lexington in Corpus Christi earlier this year, so we didn’t take the time nor money to check it out.

2. Circle Line Cruise – Circle Line Cruise began in 1945 and was involved in aiding the 9/11 evacuations.  I can only imagine the chaos that ensued during that time.  ☹  By the time we climbed aboard at 10am, it was already 110⁰ in the shade (if there’d been any shade) and brilliant sun.  We found seats up top, but after only about 10 minutes, we vacated the roof for a nice, cool window seat below.  There was hardly anyone down there.  Guess that makes us pretty wimpy.  Or pretty smart.  Our only issue with the seats was picking up glare in our pictures (but never our eyes) sometimes.

The line sends a narrator along and ours was excellent!   He had a nice speaking voice, and almost constantly referred to points of interest during our 2 ½ hour ride.  Highly recommended if you ever visit NYC.  I’ll mention a few of the things we can remember seeing along the way.

The NYC skyline from the water is truly something to see.  I never imagined I’d be so enthralled with a bunch of buildings, but the structure of the town defies description, as does the underbelly (aka subway system).

One of the first buildings we noticed yesterday walking through town, was this really strange one that had rooms sticking out all over it.  Our narrator gave it a name today, ”The Jenga Building”. The funniest thing is, not only is that what it looks like, but when I randomly Googled it?  It came up!

    The Jenga residential building – is an 821-foot-tall, 57-story skyscraper on Leonard Street in the neighborhood of Tribeca, the most expensive neighborhood in Manhattan.  Among its residents are the musician Frank Ocean and Keegan-Michael Key, who along with Jordan Peele, created and starred in Comedy Central’s “Key and Peele’ comedy show. The latter recently listed his apartment at the building for $5.5 million. ~ inman.com 

I don’t know how recent ‘recently’ is, but does it really matter? The building holds 145 apartments that range in price from $3.5 million for a studio, up to $50 million for the penthouse. There are a ton of interesting-looking buildings in Manhattan.  If you are interested in, or study architecture, this is without a doubt the place to be!

As we leave the view of the city behind us, we focus on our first point of interest along the Hudson River – Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty.

     Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty – We discussed visiting Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty, but due to the time (sources said 2-3 HOURS of just waiting to get in!) we decided this cruise would suffice.  We’ll keep this on our bucket list.

At the southern tip of Manhattan, thousands of ships packed with hundreds of Europeans, weary from weeks at sea, entered New York’s harbor between 1855 and 1890. New arrivals sat on damp trunks and nursed their children or smoked pipes; city residents from the immigrants’ homelands brought American clothes so their kinsmen could change in the bushes. Unscrupulous tradesmen waited hungrily to take advantage of new arrivals, offering meaningless currency exchange rates, while agents scoped the crowd from the door of the labor office. Horse-drawn carriages carted the immigrants, many from Ireland, Germany, Italy, and Scandinavian countries, to their prospective neighborhoods on the Lower East Side.

But this was decades before Ellis Island, the most famous gateway to life in America, ever opened its doors. Before Ellis Island was built, over eight million immigrants began new lives in America after walking through Castle Garden, a former beer garden and fort turned immigrant safe haven during a time of open immigration to New York City.

Originally called the Southwest Battery, the sandstone fort that is now Castle Clinton National Monument in lower Manhattan was built in preparation for the War of 1812, one of five forts meant to deter the British from the city’s southern waters. However, the British chose to attack other ports instead. Over the following decades, the Southwest Battery took on several new identities. It was briefly named Castle Clinton (after Mayor DeWitt Clinton), and in the 1820s it became Castle Garden, a raucous beer garden, opera house and theater that one New York Daily Tribune article from 1845 says had so many concert-goers that they “tested it to the utmost.”

Castle Garden, as run by the state government, was intended as part of a new effort to track disease, and give immigrants a place to convene before going onto to their new, confusing lives.

Still, people who arrived through Castle Garden found themselves in a disorienting hodgepodge of people, beckoning them in multiple directions. This was so much the norm that the Yiddish noun kesselgarten, which means “disorder and chaos”, comes directly from a pronunciation of Castle Garden.

“As much as we were trying to safeguard the immigrants’ interests, [New York residents] were taking advantage of the immigrants who did not know the language,” says Warrie Price, the founder and President of the Battery Conservancy, which maintains the park where the former Castle Garden stands. Con artists often sold new immigrant families train tickets for imaginary trains, naturally giving them terrible exchange rates for their foreign money.

Local aid programs popped up around the bustling port; a nearby church set up classes to teach young Irish women to be housemaids, and immigrant aid groups waited for new arrivals to guide them safely around opportunists who hoped to take advantage of them, and on to neighborhoods where their languages were spoken, and jobs. Thanks to the open immigration policy, there were no visas, health checks, or governmental red tape to navigate; if you made it to New York, you got to stay.

“Many people, because we were in the middle of the Civil War during this period, went right into the Union forces,” Price says. “We had a Union group of people that would sign you up—we’ll feed you, we’ll cloth you, sign here.”

Of the approximately eight million people who sailed into New York’s first immigration port between 1855 and 1890, an enormous amount settled down in New York City. Ninety-seven percent of Irish immigrants stayed in the city, forever changing its culture and heritage; Emigrant Savings Bank near Grand Central station was established by Irish immigrants who came through Castle Garden.

Others became permanent fixtures in American culture. Mary Mallon, later known as “Typhoid Mary”, first walked off of a ship from Ireland into Castle Garden in 1883 at the age of 15; Nikola Tesla’s first steps on U.S. soil took place the next year, and Harry Houdini, Emma Goldman, and Joseph Pulitzer all began their lives in America the same way. In 1885, a 16-year-old runaway barber from Germany named Friedrich Trumpf came ashore at Castle Garden, and began to build the real estate empire later inherited by his grandson, Donald Trump. (I added the bold face)

By 1890, New York City had grown to 1,515,301 inhabitants, up considerably from the 629,904 residents of 1855. A similar population swell around the United States gave the government pause, and federal agencies stepped in to regulate the burgeoning immigrant population. In 1890, Castle Garden was closed and immigrants were accepted at the Barge Office, where the New York Coast Guard is today, until Ellis Island was finally built and put to more permanent use.

Ellis Island’s service dwarfed Castle Garden in subsequent years, and completely changed the way New York dealt with immigration. Up until this point, immigrant workers were welcomed, no questions asked. While very ill immigrants who arrived at Castle Garden were taken to hospitals until they were well, immigrants on Ellis Island were pre-screened for possible health issues, and could be quarantined at the gate.

If you were a little too winded when running up and down stairs, as part the health exam, “they would put an “H” on your [armband], meaning you might have a heart condition,” says Price. You could be sent back home if you didn’t pass some medical examinations. Information on new potential citizens was recorded and stored centrally; the days of open-door immigration was over. ~ atlasobscura.com

As many of you already know, one of the greatest symbols of what our nation stands for, the Statue of Liberty, was a gift from France, arriving on June 17, 1885, but she wasn’t all put together until 1886.  Did you know that there are over 100 replicas of the Statue of Liberty around the world? More than 30 are in France, including a handful in Paris.  Isn’t that crazy?

Here are a few facts from nps.gov about her:

The Statue of Liberty is made of copper 3/32 inches thick, the same as two U.S. pennies put together.

Why is the Statue green? The Statue’s copper has naturally oxidized to form its familiar “patina” green coating. This patina is as thick, in many places, as the copper behind it and is protecting the copper from naturally wearing away.

The Statue is 305ft. 1in. from the ground to the tip of the flame. It is the equivalent height of a 22-story building. In 1886, it was the tallest structure in New York. (Currently it’s One World Trade Center at 1,776’ – and the height is no coincidence.)

Does the Statue of Liberty get struck by lightning? Yes! Although the Statue is grounded through the massive concrete and granite base she stands on; the Statue gets struck many times each year. Just how many is not known. 

The Statue’s official name is “Liberty Enlightening the World”.

The tablet of law, held in the Statue’s left hand, has the date of American Independence July 4, 1776, written on it in Roman numerals (July IV, MDCCLXXVI)

50 mph winds cause the Statue to sway up to 3 inches and the torch up to 6 inches.

For more information on how she came to be, go to:

https://www.nps.gov/stli/learn/historyculture/the-french-connection.htm#:~:text=The%20Statue%20of%20Liberty%20was,States%20during%20the%20American%20Revolution.

If you’d like to read up on her construction, check out https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/statue-of-liberty-construction

We passed under 20 bridges today.  Twenty!  We had no idea there were that many around Manhattan.  (By the way, the island is 22.82 square miles.)  One of the most notable from today’s perspective, is a low bridge at the end that the boat has to pass under to complete our 2 ½ hour cruise.  Believe it or not, whether we get through is based on the tides.  We barely fit and our narrator informed us that the next boat won’t.  Made us wonder what they do.  Do they turn around and go back the way they came?  We still had nearly an hour to go. Do they give a discount?  Do they drive back faster?  I have sooo many questions . . . You’ll see the pictures near the end of this section.

The Empire State Building – We didn’t have a close-up view on either of our walking days, but we saw it pretty well on our cruise.  Of all the buildings in NYC, why is this one the one people mention first? In part, it’s because when it was completed in 1931, it was the tallest building in the world.  In another part, it’s their observation area.  And of course, there’s the Hollywood influence.  😊  Be sure to at least read the last paragraph about it.  I’ll bet you’ll find it very interesting. . .

In the late-1920s, as New York’s economy boomed like never before, builders were in a mad dash to erect the world’s largest skyscraper. The main competition was between 40 Wall Street’s Bank of Manhattan building and the Chrysler Building, an elaborate Art Deco structure conceived by car mogul Walter Chrysler as a “monument to me.” Both towers tried to best each other by adding more floors to their design, and the race really heated up in August 1929, when General Motors executive John J. Raskob and former New York Governor Al Smith announced plans for the Empire State Building.

Upon learning that the Empire State would be 1,000 feet tall, Chrysler changed his plans a final time and fixed a stainless steel spire to the top of his skyscraper. The addition saw the Chrysler Building soar to a record 1,048 feet, but unfortunately for Chrysler, Raskob and Smith simply went back to the drawing board and returned with an even taller design for the Empire State Building. When completed in 1931, the colossus loomed 1,250 feet over the streets of Midtown Manhattan. It would remain the world’s tallest building for nearly 40 years until the completion of the first World Trade Center tower in 1970.

Despite the colossal size of the project, the design, planning and construction of the Empire State Building took just 20 months from start to finish. After demolishing the Waldorf-Astoria hotel—the plot’s previous occupant—contractors Starrett Brothers and Eken used an assembly line process to erect the new skyscraper in a brisk 410 days. Using as many as 3,400 men each day, they assembled its skeleton at a record pace of four and a half stories per week—so fast that the first 30 stories were completed before certain details of the ground floor were finalized. The Empire State Building was eventually finished ahead of schedule and under budget, but it also came with a human cost: at least five workers were killed during the construction process.

By far the most unusual aspect of the Empire State Building’s design concerned its 200-foot tower. Convinced that transatlantic airship travel was the wave of the future, the building’s owners originally constructed the mast as a docking port for lighter-than-air dirigibles. The harebrained scheme called for the airships to maneuver alongside the building and tether themselves to a winching apparatus. Passengers would then exit via an open-air gangplank, check in at a customs office and make their way to the streets of Manhattan in a mere seven minutes. Despite early enthusiasm for the project, the high winds near the building’s rooftop proved all but impossible for pilots to negotiate. The closest thing to a “landing” came in September 1931, when a small dirigible tethered itself to the spire for a few minutes. Two weeks later, a Goodyear blimp dropped a stack of newspapers on the roof a part of a publicity stunt, but the airship plan was abandoned shortly thereafter. ~ history.com

8 Spruce Street, aka Beekman Building, aka New York by Gehry – I know I talked about this in the previous post, but since then, I’ve discovered some additional information, and since we have another picture of it, I thought I’d share.  When it was completed in 2011, it was the tallest residential building in the Western Hemisphere.  As I mentioned before, the first five floors are a school for Pre-K through eighth grade.  But here’s something new – the fourth floor roof has an outdoor play area the size of a basketball court!  Can you imagine letting your kids play on a roof four floors above the ground? New Yorkers sure do things differently!

The American Copper Buildings – These two very crooked buildings are connected by a three-story 100’ long skybridge, which in part contains (of all things) a 75’ pool!  They were completed in 2017 as a residential community.  Together, they have 761 apartments.  If you think you’d like to live here, grab your bank vault.  One-bedroom units start at $6,012/month.

The Chrysler Building – Built as an office building, it was the tallest structure in the world when during its construction in November, 1929, they put a 180-foot spire on top, until 1931 when the Empire State Building was completed.

Roosevelt Island Hospital and Tram – We talked about visiting this island, and I’ll admit it was mostly just because I wanted to see the hospital ruins, but time cut into those plans.  It sure would’ve been fun to ride the tram over the Hudson River though! 😊

Few diseases have had a greater impact on the history of human civilization than smallpox.

The bubonic plague certainly wins for its baroque presentation. Malaria and HIV are concurrent with our times and thus feel more real. But smallpox takes the contamination cake. It has been around for more than 3,000 years in all parts of the world.

Before the vaccine was discovered in 1798, more than 400,000 people a year died from smallpox in Europe alone. According to the World Health Organization, smallpox killed one in ten children in Sweden and France and one in seven in Russia.

The disease killed Louis XV of France and other European monarchs. Queen Elizabeth I had the disease as a child and wore heavy make-up to conceal her pockmarks. In the French and Indian Wars, blankets containing smallpox were purposefully given to Delaware Amerindians, in an early instance of biological warfare. Through extensive worldwide vaccination efforts, the disease was eradicated in 1979 – the only disease to be completely eradicated through human intervention.

By the end of the 1800s, efforts were made in Western Europe and the United States to eradicate the disease by universal vaccination. But before that time, many cities built hospitals specifically for treating smallpox sufferers.

In New York City, the southern tip of Blackwell’s Island (now Roosevelt Island) provided ferry access but kept the infected patients far away from the population. Better known for Grace Church on Broadway and St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Madison Avenue, James Renwick Jr. designed the smallpox hospital in his Gothic Revival style. From 1856 until 1875, the hospital treated about 7,000 patients a year. In 1875, the building was converted into a nurses’ dormitory, and the city smallpox hospital was moved to North Brothers Island, in part because Blackwell’s Island had become more densely populated. By the 1950s, Renwick Hospital had become useless and was abandoned by the city, quickly falling into disrepair.

However, in 1975, the Landmarks Preservation Commission took interest in the dilapidated structure and declared it, in its ruin, a city landmark. They reinforced the walls to prevent it from completely falling apart but have not renovated it or opened it for tours. Only some of the outer walls and the foundation remain today. It is behind a fence on the southern tip of Roosevelt Island. ~atlasobscura.com

I was very doubtful about the date given for the development of the smallpox vaccine, so I looked it up.  Incredibly, it truly was 1798!  I had no idea there were vaccines back then!  And through mass dispensary over many years (nearly 200), smallpox really was eradicated by 1979.  It was the first vaccine ever created.

Despite its close proximity to both Manhattan and Queens, getting to and from Roosevelt Island has always been something of a challenge.

Before the trolley that once ran across the Queensboro Bridge starting in 1909, the only access was by boat. When that trolley stopped running in 1957, the little community was once again all but cut off from Manhattan, with only a newly-opened bridge connecting it to Queens. In the 1970s, the island began being developed for residential use (for years, it was known as “Welfare Island” for its hospitals and asylums), and the addition of a subway stop was planned. But as the population of the island continued to grow, construction of the subway station became mired in delays and it was decided that something needed to be done, and quickly.

Enter the aerial tramway: flying in from Manhattan at 250 feet above the East River, the tram began operation in 1976. Although it was really intended as a “temporary” solution until the subway connection could be completed, it still connects Manhattan to Roosevelt Island today, even after the subway station finally opened in 1989. For a decade, it was the only commuter service aerial tramway in the country (a second was built in Portland, Oregon, in 2006).

The aging system was overhauled in 2010, and now runs new cars on a regular daily schedule. ~ atlasobscura.com

Yankee Stadium – It resides in the Bronx and was originally built in 1923. They broke ground on this new stadium in 2006 and opening day was 2009.  It cost $1.6 billion and holds 52,325.  They kept as many aspects of the old stadium as they could, including the color of the seats, the size of the infield, and the outside walls.

We had to sit and idle for a few minutes for two practicing rowing teams to clear out from under one of the bridges.  The same area also held a swimmer alongside a protective kayak/coach.  We slowed to a crawl for the swimmer, so as not to swamp them, but another pleasure boater had no intensions of doing that, in spite of our captain blowing his horn repeatedly as a warning.  They just flew by us waving!  As the narrator said, “not too many brains” or something to that effect.

Miracle on the Hudson – According to our narrator, on January 15, 2009, US Airways flight 1549, Captained by Chesley Sullenberger cleared the George Washington bridge by only 100’, then continued its gliding descent to land not too far from the Circle Line port.  Their boats contributed to the rescue of the passengers. Many were treated for hypothermia, and five people were seriously injured but there were no fatalities.

Here’s a bit of information I found on britannica.com to refresh your memory of what happened that day:

On board were 5 crew members, including Capt. Chesley (“Sully”) Sullenberger III, and 150 passengers. About two minutes into the flight, the airplane flew into a flock of Canada geese. Both engines were severely damaged, causing an almost complete loss of thrust. Repeated attempts to restart the engines were unsuccessful.

Sullenberger notified LaGuardia’s air control that he was returning to the airport. However, as the plane continued to descend in a glide, Sullenberger believed that it would be unable to reach LaGuardia. An airport in New Jersey was also quickly ruled out. Shortly thereafter he notified air control that he was going to attempt a very risky and rare water landing – – in the Hudson River. At approximately 3:29 PM, Sullenberger announced over the intercom “This is the captain. Brace for impact.”

Some 3 ¹/₂ minutes after colliding with the birds, the plane landed in the river. 

I don’t know about you, but I never knew the entire thing took only 3 ½ minutes!  Did anyone even have time to brace for impact?!?  Captain Sully retired in 2010 after 30 years of service with US Airways.

 The Bridge and the Little Red Lighthouse – apparently a children’s book was written about this itty-bitty lighthouse, so when it was discovered that someone was going to tear it down, some people got up in arms and saved it. It sits underneath the George Washington Bridge.

Grant’s Tomb – We soooo wanted to go see this!  But it’s on the very far end of town.  ☹  And, yes, I suppose there’s probably a subway stop nearby, but time and energy kept that thought at bay. Another thing to put on our bucket list.  At least we were able to see it on our cruise, though with terrible lighting.  So I borrowed a picture. 

In New York City, walking up the steps of Grant’s Tomb fills visitors with a sense of national pride and awe.

Finished in 1897, 12 years after Grant’s death, the tomb rises 150 feet to a domed top that overlooks the Hudson River, honoring and holding the remains of the 18th American president and victorious Civil War general. On the facade of the tomb is inscribed a quote attributed to Grant: “Let us have peace.” Inside, Grant and his wife Julia are interred in a pair of massive red granite sarcophagi housed in a subterranean chamber. It’s the second largest mausoleum in the Western Hemisphere.

The tomb was devastated by a long period of neglect starting when the National Park Service gained control of the site in 1958. Lacking a formal plan for the tomb, and in the midst of New York’s economic downturn of the 1960s and 1970s, the tomb was marred and scarred with graffiti and vandalism and its exterior nooks and crannies were a popular haven for drug dealers and the homeless. A grassroots rehabilitation effort gradually took hold starting in the early 1990s and today the tomb has been restored to its former glory.

Grant’s Tomb is perhaps best known as part of a riddle: “Who’s buried in Grant’s Tomb?” The correct answer to the trick question is “nobody.” The remains of both Grant and his wife are entombed in their sarcophagi aboveground. Nobody is buried in Grant’s Tomb. ~ atlasobscura.com

57 West – This too, is a residential building, located in the Hell’s Kitchen area of Manhattan.  It was completed in 2016, and although it’s not as fancy as the Copper Building apartments, their 709 units are still just as pricy.  Monthly rent on a 1-2 bedroom will set you back $4,995 – $8,708 (utilities and permission for 1 dog and/or cat and other amenities included).

3. Sacco’s pizza – the Best little ‘accidental’ find ever!  We were hungry.  We still hadn’t tried a real New York pizza, which was on our ‘must do’ list.  Blaine had an idea of a spot (have I ever mentioned he’s great at research?), but when we got there, there was something just ‘off’ about it.  So he whipped out his phone and found a place just a couple of doors up the street, but it was more like a street vendor with only take out slices and I was insisting on sitting down.  Plus when we looked at it, all the pizzas were just sitting in a deli case.  Nah!  So he looked once more and found a place a few doors the opposite direction.  There are tons of pizza shops in Manhattan!!  According to one site who quoted figures from NYC food industry, as of 2017, there were 26,697 places in NYC that sell pizza.  You think that’s a lot?  In the same year, Paris had 44,896!  Anyway, when you look at our pictures, it doesn’t look all that remarkable, but it was!  And not just because we were hot and hungry.  There was no a/c in the place, just a couple of fans, but it wasn’t too bad.  $3.00/slice with cheese only + $1.00/topping.  Cold cans of Coke were $1.00 as well.  They were huge slices, and filled us up and like I said, absolutely delicious!  And we had to eat them NY style – folded in half longways.  😊 On the way out, I told the guys their pizza was delicious, and a customer very eagerly told me we’d come to the right place for authentic New York pizza. God is so good!

4. Carnegie Hall was a bust!  Once we found the ginormous building, the entrance was guarded by a security officer. We had to don masks to go in, so we did, and then he told us we could only go into the lobby.  We were expecting a grand lobby at least, but no.  It was very small.  And the outside was all dressed up with construction garb.  So I’m not even going to talk about it.  But I’ll show you the two  pictures we took.  😊

5. Central Park – It was mid-afternoon before we made it over to the most popular and well-known Park in New York and maybe in the US, and maybe in the world.  And we were shocked to learn that it’s only the fifth largest in NYC!  We just walked around a very small section and happened upon their zoo, which we walked into, but not really.  Still, it felt like we were walking in, and we could watch the seals cavorting around in their small circle enclosure.  I found loads of information on this Park.  Check it out!

The park was designed in 1853 and sits on the site of a former village called Seneca Village. The fact that residents of Seneca Village were ruthlessly displaced to build a grand park is a stain NYC can’t wipe away to this day. The area we now call Central Park used to be home to a village founded in 1825 by freed American slaves. It was home not only to property-owning African Americans but also to a healthy population of German and Irish residents.

Seneca Village served as a safe haven from the racial discrimination in the city and allowed residents a chance to escape the fast pace in favor of a calm setting. However, when the decision for a large city park was finalized, the village was razed after being seized through eminent domain.

Construction on Central Park began in 1857 and the completed portions were opened to the public starting in 1858. The park was completed in 1876 and has gone through quite the transformation since then. Today the park is run by the Central Park Conservancy, which was created in 1980 with the goal of keeping Central Park in tip-top shape and to prevent it from falling into decline.

More movies are filmed in Central Park way more than any other place on earth. For example, the second most filmed location in the world is Trafalgar Square in London, with 131 movie credits, compared to Central Park’s 532 – and counting.

Here’s a fun fact about Central Park that most folks don’t know. The 843-acres of land for Central Park cost New York State legislature approximately 7.4 million dollars. For reference, the U.S. paid Russia 7.2 million for Alaska around the same time.

While we’re on the topic of comparing Central Park to impressive states, let’s add this fascinating fact about Central Park: It’s bigger than the country of Monaco.  Monaco encompasses 500 acres, compared to Central Park’s 843.  To understand it’s impressive size, you need to see it from the air.

It holds more than 10,000 benches and 7,000 of them don personalized plaques. The Adopt-A-Bench program was started in 1986 as a way to increase maintenance funding for the park. The program was a huge success and folks from all over the world seek to leave their mark. The challenge? The steep $10,000 price tag.

Here’s a cool Central Park fact for history buffs — Central Park was the first landscaped park in the country. Modeled after the handsome parks in European cities like Paris and London, New Yorkers wanted to keep up.

It’s said that the land was purchased to create a beautiful city park that rivals those in Paris and London. But some argue that the land was set aside to increase property value for wealthy New Yorkers that didn’t want their views obstructed.

There’s only one straight line in the entire park. The park is defined by meandering paths that curve from one point to the next and they’re intentionally built that way. The vision for the park was that it would represent the natural flow of nature. Some argue that the park was intentional designed without straight lines to deter horse carriage races, but that hasn’t been confirmed. What has been confirmed is that the only straight in the park can be found at The Mall. The Mall was referred to as the “open air hall of reception” by the park’s architects and served as a place for the wealthy to parade and show off in front of the “less fortunate.” The width of the promenade accommodated horse-drawn carriages that would drop off the wealthy at the start of the Mall so that they could mingle with those of lesser status while casually strolling through. When they reached Bethesda Terrace they would simple jump back aboard their waiting carriage and head out to the next spot.

Remember how I mentioned that Central Park was larger than the country of Monaco? Well, allow me to share a surprising Central Park fact with you, it’s not even the biggest park in New York City!

The title for the largest park in NYC goes to Pelham Bay Park in the Bronx. Spanning an impressive 2,765 acres, Pelham Bay Park dwarfs Central Park. But let’s take this a step further, yet another interesting fact about Central Park is that it’s not even the second largest park in the city, nor the third or fourth.  It comes in at fifth based on size.

Wrapping up this list of the coolest facts about Central Park, the 20,000 trees in Central Park absorb and estimated one million pounds of carbon dioxide every year. In other words, New York needs Central Park more than they know. ~ newyorksimply.com

6. Sherman’s Monument – This was another accidental discovery!  We just happened to walk by it.  We were so surprised to find General William Tecumseh Sherman here in NYC, and even more surprised to discover him completely gilded in 24K gold leaf!  A little Googling and I discovered how he got here. Although he was born in Lancaster, Ohio, he died in New York, New York, plus he was a Union hero, so I guess that’s why he has a monument here.

In 1891, friends of William Tecumseh Sherman and members of New York City’s Chamber of Commerce formed a committee to advocate for a public monument and approached the renowned sculptor Saint-Gaudens about creating it. Originally slated for completion by 1894, the monument was not realized until 1903, due in part to debate over its location. Some of the sites under consideration were the southern end of the Mall in Central Park and Riverside Park near General Grant’s Tomb. The southeast corner of the Park was ultimately chosen as the open plaza best accommodated views of the 24-foot-high monument. William Tecumseh Sherman was unveiled in Grand Army Plaza in 1903.

The monument depicts Sherman on his horse, Ontario, led by the allegorical figure of Victory. The model for “Victory” was an African-American woman named Hettie Anderson who worked as a model for many of the era’s most prominent painters and sculptors. The figure of Victory is depicted holding a palm frond as she leads Sherman to Union victory. Sherman’s horse is trampling a Georgia Pine branch, a symbol of the south.

In September 2015 the Central Park Conservancy completed a major restoration of the northern half of Grand Army Plaza, including a conservation and re-gilding of the Sherman monument. The project involved cleaning the bronze and applying new gold leaf (23.75 karat) to the surface of the statue. A protective coating of wax — tinted to emphasize the sculptural detail of the monument—was layered on top. ~ centralparknyc.org

7. St Patrick’s Cathedral – This Catholic Cathedral was gorgeous (Of course!  No one builds places of worship like the Catholics! 😊), but it was very difficult to take pictures of the exterior.  Just like many places in NYC, there’s simply not much room to move around because all the land is covered with buildings.  Here’s what we have, plus a smidgen of what I found out about it.

Over 150 years ago (around 1864), Archbishop John Hughes announced his plans to build the “new” St. Patrick’s Cathedral. 

In a ceremony at Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Archbishop Hughes proposed “for the glory of Almighty God, for the honor of the Blessed and Immaculate Virgin, for the exaltation of Holy Mother Church, for the dignity of our ancient and glorious Catholic name, to erect a Cathedral in the City of New York that may be worthy of our increasing numbers, intelligence, and wealth as a religious community, and at all events, worthy as a public architectural monument, of the present and prospective crowns of this metropolis of the American continent.”

It took 21 years to build and was finally opened to the people in the spring of 1879.

St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue in New York is the largest Gothic Roman Catholic Cathedral in the United States.

The cornerstone of the Cathedral was laid in 1858.

The Cathedral was named after St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, in response to the increasing numbers of Irish immigrants in the city.

The church takes up one whole city block. The spires rise 330 feet above street level. It seats 2,400 people.

The new gallery organ, which was replaced in 1930, has 7,855 pipes.

The Cathedral has 21 altars and 19 bells, each named after a different saint.

It has more than 2,800 stained glass panels.

Eight Archbishops of New York are buried in a crypt under the high altar.

In normal times, there are between 15 and 18 masses said every day, and 150 weddings every year. ~ irishcentral.com

8. Rockefeller – Center, Top of the Rock, and the Rockettes – We thought Rockefeller Center was just that ice skating rink area, a Christmas tree, and a building.  Boy were we wrong!  Read about it below, then continue to the rest of our ‘Rockefeller’ stuff.

Rockefeller Center is a large complex consisting of 19 high-rise commercial buildings located in Midtown Manhattan, NYC.

Rockefeller Center is spread over a whopping 89,000 square meters (22 acres) bounded by Fifth and Sixth avenues and from 48th Street to 51st Street.

It was commissioned by the Rockefeller family.

Rockefeller Center was named after John D. Rockefeller, Jr., who leased the space from Columbia University in 1928 and developed it beginning in 1930.

For the project, 228 buildings on the site were razed and some 4,000 tenants relocated. The construction of the project employed between 40,000 and 60,000 people. The complex was the largest private building project ever undertaken in contemporary times. By fall 1939, the complex had 26,000 tenants and 125,000 daily visitors. That year, 1.3 million people went on a guided tour of Rockefeller Center or visited the RCA Building’s observation deck, while 6 million people visited the underground shopping mall, and 7 million saw a performance at Rockefeller Center.

The land was originally bought for less than $5,000

The first private owner of the site was physician David Hosack, who purchased twenty acres of rural land from New York City in 1801 for $5,000 and opened the country’s first botanical garden, the Elgin Botanic Garden, on the site. The gardens operated until 1811, and by 1823, ended up in the ownership of Columbia University.

Although John D. Rockefeller Jr. spent most of his life engaged in philanthropy, his single, defining business venture was the creation of the “city within a city”. Constructed during the Great
Depression’s worst years, the project gainfully employed over 40,000 people.

It was the largest private building project ever undertaken in modern times. Construction of the 14 buildings in the Art Deco style began on May 17, 1930, and the buildings were completed and opened in 1939.

Unlike most other Art Deco towers built during the 1930s, the Comcast Building was constructed as a slab with a flat roof and since 1933 has been home of the Center’s observation deck, the Top of the Rock. It is one of the most popular Manhattan landmarks. The Top of Rock offers breathtaking views of the Empire State Building, Central Park, and many other sights in the Big Apple.

We could see Radio City Music Hall from inside the Comcast building, so I thought I’d take a quick look for some information.  Plus – – call me naïve or whatever you want, but I had no idea the ROCK-ettes were named for JD and his little complex!

Radio City Music Hall was completed in December 1932. At the time, it was promoted as the largest and most opulent theater in the world. The Music Hall seats 6,000 people and after an initial slow start became the single biggest tourist destination in the city. Its interior was declared a New York City landmark in 1978. Painstakingly restored in 1999, the Music Hall interiors are one of the world’s greatest examples of Art Deco design.

More than 100 murals, sculptures, and mosaics by 39 different artists adorn Rockefeller Center.

Some 200 flagpoles line the plaza at street level. Flagpoles around the plaza display flags of United Nations member countries, the U.S. states and territories, or decorative and seasonal motifs. During national and state holidays, every pole carries the flag of the United States. ~ justfunfacts.com and hellobigapple.net

The origins of the Rockettes, the world’s most famous precision dance team, can be traced to 1925, when impresario Russell Markert of St. Louis, Missouri, billed a group of women dancers as the Missouri Rockets. Following a positive reception locally, the dance team began a nationwide tour. Among their admiring audiences in New York City was Samuel (“Roxy”) Rothafel, owner of the new Roxy Theater. He acquired the troupe, doubled its size, and dubbed the dancers the Roxyettes. After opening the Radio City Music Hall—the world’s largest indoor theatre—he enlarged the troupe again in order to fill the hall’s Great Stage. The dance team became known as the Rockettes in 1934.

Over the years the Rockettes attained international renown for their intricate dance routines and, in particular, for their extremely high kicks. In the early 21st century more than 150 precision dancers performed as Rockettes, some at the Radio City Music Hall and others on tour or at special events. To become a Rockette, a dancer must be at least 18 years old, between 5 feet 6 inches and 5 feet 10.5 inches tall, and proficient in tap, jazz, ballet, and modern dance.

Once hired, the Rockettes move right into training with months of rehearsals and training on how to do their own hair and makeup. Rockettes must also learn to change costumes in under 78 seconds, kick up to 1,200 times each day, and line up in a way that gives the illusion the dancers are all the same height.

How many Rockettes are there currently?  80 dancers make up the Rockettes corps, a spokeswoman for the company told me; you are only seeing half the cast during any given show because there are so many performances to fill — on weekends, up to six a day.

The April 18 Radio City Rockettes open audition saw roughly 800 dancers competing for a spot in the annual 2022 Christmas Spectacular and to attend the dance company’s conservatory program. The no-cost program is considered a pipeline for future Rockettes dancers and allows the company to continue to discover new talent.

What does a Rockette get paid?  Typically, each Rockette receives a paycheck of between $1,400 and $1,500 each week. Because these famous dancers only perform seasonally, this only amounts to between $36,400 to $39,000 per year. The Rockettes do receive their benefits year-round, though. ~ various on-line sources

It was a spur of the moment decision to head to the very top of the Comcast Building, called Top of the Rock.  If you read the above information, you know that it’s been a popular observation deck since the 1930’s.  I wanted to see a comparison picture and found these from their opening day in 1933:

They’re extremely organized in here, There’s a bit of information to be had as you walk to the ticket booth. 

Once you purchase your ticket, and watch a couple short movies, staff quickly and cheerily send you along the route to the elevator that takes you to the top, and then more staff direct you to the three floors of the observation area.  Three floors!  The elevator has a glass ceiling and they also play various hologram-ish pictures from the 1930s to the present on it as you’re flying up at a rate of 1,200’ per second.  It takes 42 seconds. Fun fact – The Observation deck was originally designed to evoke the upper decks of a 1930s grand ocean liner, outfitted with deck chairs, gooseneck fixtures and large air-conditioning vents intended to look like the stacks on a ship’s deck. ~ great-towers.com

Because it was a gorgeous (albeit stifling hot) day, we felt it was money well-spent.  What you think?  Of course, you agree!  It’s not your money.  😊

9. NY Public Library – I think – – no I’m certain – – this is the first time I’ve ever walked into a library and saw no books!  They must keep them on a different floor(s).  The reason we’re here is not to check out a classic, but to see what inspired a classic.  Thanks again, atlasobscura! 

For nearly a century, a motley group of animals has enchanted readers around the globe. The lovable Winnie the Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, and the rest of the gang were created by A.A. Milne, who was inspired by his son’s toys. Those original toys can be found today far from the Hundred Acre Wood, in the heart of the concrete jungle, in the New York Public Library’s permanent collection.

The model for the rotund, cheerful Pooh was a teddy bear that Milne purchased from the Harrods store in London and gifted to his son Christopher Robin for his first birthday, in 1921. The boy’s toy collection grew to encompass a donkey, a piglet, a kangaroo, and a tiger.

Milne and his friend, Illustrator E.H. Shepard began creating a series based on these animals, and the character of Pooh first made his appearance in a newspaper story published in 1925. A book followed a year later, and since then the series has been been read by millions of children around the world and adapted countless times for film and television. 

The toys with whom it all began became celebrities in their own right and toured the United States in 1947 before being donated to the New York Public Library in 1987. They became the subject of some controversy in 1998 when a British MP called for their return to England, but the attempt failed.

The five dolls—Pooh, Tigger, Kanga, Eeyore and Piglet—live in a climate controlled glass case in the library’s Children’s Center. Age and affection have contributed to their endearingly threadbare condition. 

It’s worth noting that the bear on display doesn’t bare the appearance of the Pooh we’re familiar with. After an initial sketch, Shepard decided that Winnie was a little “too gruff-looking” and substituted his son’s bear Growler, an altogether more portly and friendly-looking bear.

Winnie and pals were part of an exhibit of ‘Treasures’ in a very large room.  We looked at a few items, but being as how it was after 4:30pm and we still had a long walk to the hotel, a subway ride to Grand Central Terminal, and a nearly hour-long train ride to home, we didn’t linger.

After the library, it was time to walk to the hotel and retrieve our bag before taking the subway to Grand Central and then the train back to our Jeep.

10.  We returned to our Jeep at 7:00pm, but we hadn’t eaten since that slice of pizza.  As we rode the train, we decided to drive to the local grocery store and see what they might have in the way of pre-made stuff.  We bought sushi and pre-cut pineapple for our late dinner.

We put another 11-12 miles on our shoes today.  I just LOVE my Sketchers!

As you can tell, we covered a lot in two days!  The places we visited, and our time walking the streets was time well spent.  But it brought to mind the Old Testament’s Tower of Babel.  There were so many languages we didn’t understand, and so much oohing and ahhhing over tall buildings.  God made us different to keep us from thinking too highly of ourselves.  God did not make these structures, but the ability to construct them comes from Him. 

Lest we forget. . . .