Archive for the ‘Blissville’ Category
dim entity
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On the 24th of February, a Newtown Pentacle posting was offered in which description of an astounding demolition which had occurred along 30th street in Long Island City, and whose purpose was to clear the way for a gargantuan FedEx trucking depot and shipping center. Attempting to describe the sheer scale of this to friends and Our Lady of the Pentacle simply proved that words would be inadequate to convey the scale of it all.
So, a humble narrator went back, and did a little bit of climbing.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Having once been a child in Brooklyn, you humble narrator learned to climb the urban landscape like a monkey. This skill is something that still comes in handy, especially when something which needs photographing is behind a ten foot tall plywood construction fence. The shot above is a “stitched panorama” which incorporates around 16 individual exposures into a single image- encouragement is offered to click through to the largest incarnation of this shot at flickr (click here) to appreciate the massiveness of the footprint.
Click here to see it on a google map.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
From the decking of the Borden Avenue Bridge, you can see that the construction site extends all the way to the Dutch Kills tributary of the malign Newtown Creek. FedEx must need an awful lot of space.
Wonder why?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Well to begin with, the entirely coincidental condemnation and demolishing of the FedEx World Service Center building in Manhattan (528-556 West 34th Street) to make room for the Hudson Yards residential development has robbed the shipping giant of certain capabilities. My guess, and it’s a guess, is that they were offered Queens instead.
And once again, Manhattan exports its problems to Queens, I guess.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
When this site has been mentioned, those who live and work in Queens get a wild look in their eyes. They ask “Wait, where will all those trucks go when heading into Manhattan?”. Sure, they’ll be taking truck routes, but what happens when they bottleneck at Queens Plaza, the Midtown Tunnel, or the Triborough? Care to guess?
What about the tractor trailers leaving from LaGuardia and Kennedy, how will they get to Long Island City?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A bit of that climbing talent bragged about at the beginning of this posting, and a switch of POV to Hunters Point Avenue brings you this “stitched panorama” of the rubble beyond the fence. Notice the lack of water being sprayed on the shattered masonry, or any attempt at dust abatement, and remember that the factories which stood here for nearly a century adjoin the monstrous pollution of the Dutch Kills tributary.
This is no land that the site stands on either, rather it’s a construct. This area was filled in by Michael Degnon in the early 20th century with rubble from the Belmont Tunnel construction, and that the bulkheads which defined the modern shape of Dutch Kills were only installed in 1914 by the United States Army Corps of Engineers. This rubble is coated with a century worth of “the colour”.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Around thirty or forty feet down, the waters of the Newtown Creek gurgle about boulder and gravel, and around the wooden piles which the concrete mastabas of modernity stand upon. The Creek is eternal, and water always- inevitably and eternally and patiently- wins.
Like many things around the Newtown Creek, and Queens in particular, you must just accept the decisions of your betters in Manhattan- I guess. They wish to install playgrounds for the idle rich along the Hudson, erect fanciful condominiums for their comfort, and soaring office towers to administer and employ them. Why should those of us in Queens complain, when they export their waste, their trucking facilities, or their garbage to us?
The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, I guess?
ALSO:
March 6th, as in tonight
blissville update
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Just in case you were wondering, not too much new to report on the oil situation in Blissville Queens, which is found on the northern shore of the lamentable Newtown Creek. Our friends at Riverkeeper continue to investigate, as do everyone’s friends at the State DEC. Conversation with highly placed members of both organizations indicate that they have people working on it.
These photos from the beginning of February in 2012 would seem to dispute that. Compare to the same area in August 2011.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The conversations were informal, and were initiated by your humble narrator. Concurrently, I’m not going to “report” the substance of these exchanges yet, as I’m not “that kind” of blogger. “That kind” would seek to embarrass or denigrate the process and participants for puerile amusement and or self advancement. This is not the case, and I draw a line between what a source tells me privately versus publicly. Suffice to say that things are moving along and that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.
The Newtown Creek Alliance is aware of the issue as well, and we are working on it.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Some of you may have noticed that I said “we” referring to NCA, and in accordance with some standard of full disclosure which only one such as myself adheres to- the group has awarded me the title of “Historian”. I’m picking up the fallen banner of my friend and mentor, Bernie Ente, and will strive to earn the honor by continuing to reveal the occluded history of this place.
The initial assessment of the leak, as presented in the posting “oil in queens” back in December of 2011 has garnered little attention from the mainstream press. The sole venue which ran a story on it is the DNAinfo website, their posting can be accessed here. If this was Manhattan, I’d be fighting the NYTimes for access.
But seriously, who cares anything about Queens?
ALSO:
March 5th, as in tonight:
Riverkeeper and NCA ask: How’s the Water? How’s Newtown Creek?
Join Riverkeeper and the Newtown Creek Alliance for a presentation on water quality in the Hudson River Estuary and its tributaries, focusing on the waters around Manhattan Island and in Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal and Newtown Creek.
March 5, 2012, 7:30PM to 9:30PM
Brooklyn Brewery, 79 North 11th Street, NY map
and March 6th, as in Tuesday
mural history
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Wandering around Calvary Cemetery is often a revelatory experience, and while perambulating through the hallows of Section 9 the other day, the shock of sudden recognition nearly laid me low. While scanning the monolith studded landscape for certain things which cannot be mentioned, the name of one of history’s most famous New Yorkers suddenly appeared before me.
Steve Brodie… The man who jumped from the Brooklyn Bridge and lived to talk about it.
Steve Brodie, photo courtesy Wikipedia
also from wikipedia
Steve Brodie (December 25, 1861 – January 31, 1901) was an American from New York City who claimed to have jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge and survived on July 23, 1886. The resulting publicity from the supposed jump, whose veracity was disputed, gave Brodie publicity, a thriving saloon and a career as an actor.
Brodie’s fame persisted long past his death, with Brodie portrayed in films and with the slang terms “taking a Brodie” and “Brodie” entering the language for “taking a chance” and “suicidal leap.”
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There weren’t just three major newspapers in 1886, there were hundreds, and the proto “media” ate up Steve Brodie’s story, turning him into a celebrity. From all accounts, Brodie found every advantage offered by fame- opening a swank saloon on the Bowery and starring in a popular play about his exploits.
He would always be known as the “bridge jumper”.
from nytimes.com
A tall, slim man, who looked very much like an overgrown street boy, stood talking to a young woman at the New-York end of the Brooklyn bridge a little after 2 o’clock yesterday afternoon. He bade her good-bye and kissed her.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The scourge of the 19th century was “consumption”, or as we call it “tuberculosis”, and Brodie took ill. Like other “lungers”, it was thought that the dry air of the southwest would aid him in fighting the affliction and he packed off for San Antonio in Texas.
That’s where he died.
from nytimes.com
The body was taken to Calvary Cemetery for burial. A crowd of 500 or 600 men, women, and children, attracted by curiosity remained in the streets during the services at the house, and many of them followed the funeral cortege to Ninety Second Street Ferry on its way to the cemetery.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
It is a real shame that someone has decided to pry the probable white bronze marker from the monument, which would have occurred in the empty oval space directly above the names and dates which remain. Such is the case though, and there are many instances of such theft not just at Calvary but at all the cemeteries which comprise the cemetery belt of western Queens.
It’s pretty low to steal from the dead, in one humble narrators opinion.
An interesting analysis of whether or not Mr. Brodie actually made his jump was published by “The Day” in 1986. Click here for the article by Larry McShane.
Steve Brodie, photo courtesy Wikipedia
ALSO, this Friday:
My own attempt at presenting a cogent narrative and historical journey “up the creek” is up coming as well-
Your humble narrator will be narrating humbly on Friday, February 24th at 7:30 P.M. for the“Ridgewood Democratic Club, 60-70 Putnam Avenue, Ridgewood, NY 11385” as the “Newtown Creek Magic Lantern Show” is presented to their esteemed group. The club hosts a public meeting, with guests and neighbors welcome, and say that refreshments will be served.
The “Magic Lantern Show” is actually a slideshow, packed with informative text and graphics, wherein we approach and explore the entire Newtown Creek. Every tributary, bridge, and significant spot are examined and illustrated with photography. This virtual tour will be augmented by personal observation and recollection by yours truly, with a question and answer period following.
For those of you who might have seen it last year, the presentation has been streamlined, augmented with new views, and updated with some of the emerging stories about Newtown Creek which have been exclusively reported on at this- your Newtown Pentacle.
For more information, please contact me here.
What: Newtown Creek Magic Lantern Show
When: Friday, February 24th at 7:30 P.M.
Where: Ridgewood Democratic Club, 60-70 Putnam Avenue, Ridgewood, NY 11385
wildly luminous
– photo by Mitch Waxman
In yesterday’s posting, a object d’art was found along Laurel Hill Blvd. At the foot of that ancient byway lies an intersection with Greenpoint Avenue, and the bridge named for it. The street lamps are often utilized by your humble narrator as “something to hide from oncoming traffic behind” and recently I’ve noticed some odd graffiti popping up on them.
Not your usual “gangsta” braggadocio or “tags” nor “ironic hipster commentary”, these involve the bible.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The scrawl I’m referring to on this pole, which is on the western corner, is not the interesting tidbit about people of Korean abstraction which is written on the masking tape holding the pen- instead it’s the “Sin is the Devil” which caught my attention.
In the American King James version, at least, this correlates to 1 John 3:8
“He that commits sin is of the devil; for the devil sins from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.”
Hmm.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Maybe I’m just stupid, but Psalms 141.6 doesn’t include the quotation above, which most likely comes from “Romans 5:13- For until the law sin was in the world: but sin is not imputed when there is no law.”
The Psalms quotation would be “Their rulers will be thrown down from the cliffs, and the wicked will learn that my words were well spoken“.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
DUGABO (or Down Under the Greenpoint Avenue Bridge Onramp), it would seem, can now boast of hosting a foe of evil.
Wonder what might happen should they spy the Blissville Banshee as she floats down the Newtown Creek, spy the occultists who make altars in area cemeteries, or wonder at the tales of an antique and quite spectral locomotive passing the Bliss Tower on its way to Deadman’s Curve at Berlin Hill?
Would we see an exorcism in DUGABO?
ALSO, this Friday:
My own attempt at presenting a cogent narrative and historical journey “up the creek” is up coming as well-
Your humble narrator will be narrating humbly on Friday, February 24th at 7:30 P.M. for the“Ridgewood Democratic Club, 60-70 Putnam Avenue, Ridgewood, NY 11385” as the “Newtown Creek Magic Lantern Show” is presented to their esteemed group. The club hosts a public meeting, with guests and neighbors welcome, and say that refreshments will be served.
The “Magic Lantern Show” is actually a slideshow, packed with informative text and graphics, wherein we approach and explore the entire Newtown Creek. Every tributary, bridge, and significant spot are examined and illustrated with photography. This virtual tour will be augmented by personal observation and recollection by yours truly, with a question and answer period following.
For those of you who might have seen it last year, the presentation has been streamlined, augmented with new views, and updated with some of the emerging stories about Newtown Creek which have been exclusively reported on at this- your Newtown Pentacle.
For more information, please contact me here.
What: Newtown Creek Magic Lantern Show
When: Friday, February 24th at 7:30 P.M.
Where: Ridgewood Democratic Club, 60-70 Putnam Avenue, Ridgewood, NY 11385
sober and solitary
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The other day, your humble narrator was seeking adventure and illumination amongst the mouldering tombstones and oil soaked sands of Blissville. This is an industrial stretch, closer to DUGABO than it is to DUKBO, with the cyclopean walls of Calvary Cemetery defining the northern side of the street and an unbroken facade of industrial buildings and warehouses on the the south, which is also the direction in which the fabled Newtown Creek might be found by those that seek it out.
This is formerly one of the most loathsome stretches of the Creeklands- home to oil works, distilleries, and fat rendering plants.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On the gates of what was once the vast rendering plant of Van Iderstines, a noxious industrial combine which was reviled by its neighbors during the century it squatted squamously upon this spot, this artwork was observed. This was no mere graffiti scrawl, instead this was an affixed installation, one which was obviously prepared elsewhere.
Content and subject matter are curious… and more than curious…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Your humble narrator grew interested upon noticing the presence of the double helix in the design, and the labeling which is meant to indicate the various amino acids which DNA is composed of. The “genetic code” as it is called, is actually represented by just four letters representing the chemical nucleotides which form the “double helix”- G,A,T, and C.
The four bases found in DNA are adenine (abbreviated A), cytosine (C), guanine (G) and thymine (T)
– photo by Mitch Waxman
A secondary piece was hung nearby, this one showed greater restraint than the first, but absent the chaotic charisma of the first.
Wouldn’t it be a wonderful thing if the fences and gated properties of the Newtown Creek waterfront became a sort of guerrilla gallery for local artists. Imagine mile after mile of bizarre conceptions and twee fever dreams installed in the dead of night by a virtual and quite fey army of artists. Not “tagging”, of course, just tacking up something on paper whose impermanence was part of its very composition. Do the art on rice paper or something that will just turn to pulp when it rains.
A friend of mine once did an ad agency mailing for some “green” client, and her gimmick was to use paper into which flower seeds were embedded at the paper mill (and it was printed using soy inks, of course), and you were meant to just plant the advertisement in a pot after reading it.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Being the sort of damaged individual that you’ve come to expect me to be, Lords and Ladies, an attempt was made to decode this particular painting. It soon became apparent that expertise in organic chemistry would be required to profoundly critique it, something which it would be foolhardy to attempt. A cursory scan of the various formulae revealed that some of these are indeed actual chemical descriptors for amongst other things- restriction enzymes.
The usage of the infinity symbol and the other text is a mystery to me, but overall I liked the art.
ALSO, this Friday:
My own attempt at presenting a cogent narrative and historical journey “up the creek” is up coming as well-
Your humble narrator will be narrating humbly on Friday, February 24th at 7:30 P.M. for the“Ridgewood Democratic Club, 60-70 Putnam Avenue, Ridgewood, NY 11385” as the “Newtown Creek Magic Lantern Show” is presented to their esteemed group. The club hosts a public meeting, with guests and neighbors welcome, and say that refreshments will be served.
The “Magic Lantern Show” is actually a slideshow, packed with informative text and graphics, wherein we approach and explore the entire Newtown Creek. Every tributary, bridge, and significant spot are examined and illustrated with photography. This virtual tour will be augmented by personal observation and recollection by yours truly, with a question and answer period following.
For those of you who might have seen it last year, the presentation has been streamlined, augmented with new views, and updated with some of the emerging stories about Newtown Creek which have been exclusively reported on at this- your Newtown Pentacle.
For more information, please contact me here.
What: Newtown Creek Magic Lantern Show
When: Friday, February 24th at 7:30 P.M.
Where: Ridgewood Democratic Club, 60-70 Putnam Avenue, Ridgewood, NY 11385
The Newtown Pentacle 