Posts Tagged ‘New York City’
Tales of Calvary 9- A Pale Enthusiast
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Amateurish and lazy explorations of Calvary Cemetery and the Greater Newtown Pentacle, with associated blog postings foisted upon an unsuspecting public and amplified by a never ending barrage of self promoting debasements of all that is true, have revealed many strange things to your humble narrator, and by extension- to you my gentle lords and ladies of Newtown. Today, the Doherty monument in First Calvary gets its turn. There is nothing “odd” about the monument, in fact the reason I call attention to the thing is the supernal beauty of its working. This is one uncanny bit of carving, and unfortunately these photos do not do it justice (still adjusting to the new camera).
Art school faculty, turtlenecked and smoking french cigarettes, would probably describe it as “Sophia, goddess of wisdom- in the form of a christian angel, sitting within a Roman structure, crowned by a cross- representing an agglutination of civilized democratic-christian progress advancing since the time of the Greeks and the Roman Republic and ultimately manifested as The United States. The angel casts her eye skyward, vigilant, with a sword in her hand. A pacific and expectant expression suggests the nearness of the second coming and resurrection of the dead.”
Such imperious and hyperbolic thinking was very much in vogue in the years between 1900 and the first World War.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Eugene Doherty and his wife Mary J. Doherty are buried here. Their headstones have bas reliefs of palm fronds draped across them. The little flags are planted at the graves of military veterans in New York Cemeteries on national holidays to honor their service. I found no evidence of Doherty serving in the military, but that probably just means I didn’t know where to look.
After all- I’m just some ‘effed up lunatic who spends his spare time scuttling around trash dumps, toxic waste sites, and cemeteries who gets his kicks bad mouthing the past- Right?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Mr. Doherty, it seems, was a man of some reknown. He was a leading member of the Irish community on both sides of the Newtown Creek, and stood shoulder to shoulder in prestige alongside Battle-Ax Gleason in the eyes of his countrymen.
A manufacturer of rubber, Doherty specialized in the sort of material demanded by “turn of the 20th century” Dentists for the manufacture of dentures. His heavily advertised (see sample at bottom) Samson Rubber was a standard component for the manufacture of false teeth. The factory, incorporated as Eugene Doherty Rubber Works, Inc., was located at 110 and 112 Kent Avenue which is in Greenpoint (or Williamsburg, depending on whether or not you’re trying to hard sell a building).
rubber, from wikipedia
The major commercial source of natural rubber latex is the Para rubber tree (Hevea brasiliensis), a member of the spurge family, Euphorbiaceae. This is largely because it responds to wounding by producing more latex.
Other plants containing latex include Gutta-Percha (Palaquium gutta),[1] rubber fig (Ficus elastica), Panama rubber tree (Castilla elastica), spurges (Euphorbia spp.), lettuce, common dandelion (Taraxacum officinale), Russian dandelion (Taraxacum kok-saghyz), Scorzonera (tau-saghyz), and Guayule (Parthenium argentatum). Although these have not been major sources of rubber, Germany attempted to use some of these during World War II when it was cut off from rubber supplies. These attempts were later supplanted by the development of synthetic rubbers. To distinguish the tree-obtained version of natural rubber from the synthetic version, the term gum rubber is sometimes used.
A neat image of the the Doherty Rubber Works building late in its heyday (1920) can be found at trainweb.org, if you can believe anything I say, and they have a great description of the whole scene in context here. I warn you though, you’re going to learn about the Brooklyn Eastern District Terminal!
Also, in a completely unrelated coincidence, NAG is located at 110 Kent in modernity. Here’s the place on a google map, click “streetview” to compare to the 1920 shot above
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Eugene Doherty died in 1906, his wife Mary in 1914. Luckily for Mary, the denture business was a lucrative one, and her years of mourning were spent in material comfort. At her death, she bequeathed the staggering sum of $621,148 to her heirs.
$621,148 in 1914, mind you, and federal income tax had just become a reality in 1913. That’s at least $10,000,000 in modern coine.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Life sized, if you’re a 5 foot tall woman, the statue itself is disarming and has weathered existence in the corrosive atmospheric miasmas extant about the nearby Newtown Creek for 94 years, only losing a thumb. The colour, oddly, doesn’t stain sanctified Calvary. Xanthian skill representative of true artistry went into the shaping of this stone, but I haven’t been able to find the name of the sculptor in public record.
If you see it, stand close and look into its eyes, then leave when the chills begin. Whatever you do, don’t look back over your shoulder at it afterwards, lest an adjusted hand hold on the sword, or the impression that the angle of its head has shifted might be seen. Remain an observer- in Calvary- ever the pale enthusiast- ever an Outsider.
Hey, you never know what you’re going to find at Calvary Cemetery.
Also, just as a note- today, January 13th, is Clark Ashton Smith’s birthday, and St. Knut’s Day as well.
Eugene Doherty Rubber Inc. - Late 19th/Early 20th century Advertising
The Newtown Creek Community Health Harm Narratives Project
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Andrea Muraskin of the CHHNP asked if I could post this and help get the word out about this project, all text by CHHNP-
Attention Residents of Greenpoint, East Williamsburg, and Maspeth:
Are you worried about health problems caused by the pollution in your neighborhood?
Would you like the opportunity to tell your story?
– photo by Mitch Waxman
If yes, then you may want to be interviewed for a community health project that aims to document the public health concerns of individuals residing in communities along Newtown Creek in NYC. If you live, or have ever lived in Greenpoint or East Williamsburg, Brooklyn or Maspeth, Queens, you are invited to participate in the Newtown Creek Community Health and Harm Narrative Project, as study which hopes to capture residents’ experience with illness and environmental pollution in their neighborhoods.
Participation will provide you with an opportunity to have your story documented in your own words. With your permission, the information you disclose will be displayed in written and audio format on the website http://www.habitatmap.org and in a written report that will be disseminated to community members, media outlets, elected officials, and other interested parties.
Community involvement is important. Make your voice heard!
If you have any questions or are interested in participating, please contact Yvonne Kodl at:newtowncreekstudy@gmail.com or
(718) 566-1359.
Please note: The study is in the concluding portion of its interview phase. If you are interested, please contact us as soon as possible.
The Newtown Creek Community Health and Harm Narrative Project is a collaboration between the Urban Public Health Department of Hunter College, HabitatMap, and the Newtown Creek Alliance.
Media Links
Television: Brooklyn Community Access Television ,
Radio: Leonard Lopate on WNYC
Newspaper: NY Daily News http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/brooklyn/2009/06/22/2009-06-22_newtown.html
Blog:http://www.nylcv.org/ecopoliticsdaily/20091112_newtown_creeks_neighbors_speak_out_on_health_concerns
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Tales of Calvary 8- the Abbot
– photo by Mitch Waxman
While wandering through Calvary Cemetery recently, I came upon a curious monument whose sculptural elements included a life sized portrait, and whose dedication was meant to honor a man named Florence Scannell. The stone additionally bore a curious screed- “The Abbot”. “Dedicated to the memory of Florence Scannell by his brother John J.” is displayed prominently on its face. This stirred a sleeping memory, and I tried to remember why the name Scannell is so important. I said it out loud- John J. Scannell?
Wait a minute… John J. Scannell was the first chief of the NYFD, grand sachem of Tammany Hall, and a notorious turn of the century raconteur who became “king of the hill” in the often violent political world of 19th century New York City politics.
Bare knuckled, the electoral system back then resembled modern gang wars. Bearded men were paid to vote, taken to a barber shop for a shave and a shot of whiskey, and then paid to vote again. Paid armies of volunteers rousted saloons and bars that supported their political enemies. With political bosses paying the tab, taverns became organizing points for local “get out the vote” efforts. The poor didn’t care, for a day they could drink enough to forget and even eat a real meal- with meat, and all they had to do was vote the way they were told. The bosses were the bosses, and your place in “the line” could be revoked at any time if you fell out of favor with them. There was no “safety net”, so you had to just “go along”. Sometimes the other party would send gangs of street toughs into their opponents establishments- “bar busting”.
For more on the milieu of political life for the working class of the 19th century, I would suggest a gander at “The Jungle” Upton Sinclair’s “progressive” propaganda piece, or taking a peek at Jacob Riis’s “How the Other Half Lives“.
The Scannell brothers are described as having been engaged in such “bar busting” activities in 1869, when brother Florence ran for Alderman from the 18th ward against a Tammany candidate. At 23rd st. and second avenue, on Dec. 3rd, a Tammany man named Thomas Donaghue ran afoul of the Scannells, who were employed to “clean out” and “bust” the saloon he owned and operated.
from pbs.org
The year 1898 ushered in a new era of firefighting. On midnight of January 1, 1898, Greater New York was formed by uniting the five boroughs, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island. The Board of Fire Commissioners was replaced by a single Commissioner, John J. Scannell, who had been head of the Board since 1894 and was appointed by Mayor R.A. Van Wyck. All of the area’s volunteer departments were to be replaced by the FDNY, and Chief Hugh Bonner assumed control of three paid departments: New York, Brooklyn, and Long Island; 121 engines, 46 trucks, one horse wagon, and a water tower; in all, 309 square miles of firefighting territory.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The Scannells and a dozen of their men produced weapons and engaged in a fierce battle with Donaghue’s own crew of toughs. Gunfire erupted and Florence Scannel was shot in the back, the bullet embedding itself in his spinal column. Rushed to the nearby Bellevue Hospital, Florence suffered a lingering death, finally passing on July 10, 1870, with his brother John at his side. John J. Scannell swore an oath to avenge his brother, and kill the man who shot him in the back– the Tammany man, Thomas Donaghue.
Donaghue’s handlers fixed things up with the courts, and he returned to his familiar Saloon on 23rd st. and second avenue.
On Sept. 19th, at the corner of 17th and third, an odd looking man wearing a slouched hat and fake beard stepped out of the shadows and blasted a hole in Donaghue’s chest with a derringer pistol. Donaghue ultimately survived this attempt on his life, and Scannell discarded his disguise as he escaped his pursuers fleeing through Irving Place and Union Square. John J. later surrendered to a Police Sgt. after taking refuge on Long Island, and was indicted by a Grand Jury for the crime, but was never charged and released on $10,000 bail.
That’s $10,000 in 1870…
In November of 1872, Donaghue was attending an auction at the Apollo Theatre on 28th street, and a man wearing a cloak and slouch hat approached him. A large caliber pistol was produced and the middle of Donaghue’s face disappeared. Four more shots, three in the face, were pumped into the now prostrate Donaghue. The killer fled and was apprehended by a Police Captain named McElwain, who immediately identified the assassin as John J. Scannell. Such quick identification of Scannell was possible only because the arresting officer had been the one who arrested him for the the earlier attempt on Donaghue, when he was a Sgt.
The event was seminal, for as John J. Scannell sat in a gaol called “The Tombs”, another sat beside him. That night, John J. Scannell met Richard Croker. Someday, they would become “The Big Two” at Tammany Hall and rule over New York City.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
John J. Scannell was born on the lower East Side of Manhattan and found early work as a horse dealer- moving on to Saloon Keeper and then Professional Gambler. Charged with the murder of Donaghue, he pled insanity, and after a 3 month stint in an asylum in Utica, returned to local politics. He owned horses and raced them on the national circuit, as did Richard Croker. Rising in Tammany with his partner Croker, Scannell ran the 25th electoral district in Manhattan for many years, and desired the post of NYFD commissioner in that newly unified pile of gold called “the City of Greater New York”. Protests were recorded citywide, but Mayor Van Wyck appointed him chief of the newly unified citywide firefighting brigades. He served in that capacity until 1901, and fought corruption charges associated with his appointment until 1906 in court. At 67, in 1907, Scannell was sued for $15,000 for kissing the daughter of his housekeeper 3 times without consent.
Scannell died at 78 in Jamaica, Queens- far from his retirement estate in Freeport, L.I.
The Abbot, as it turns out, is a Horse.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Scannell paid the scandalous amount of $26,500 at a Madison Square auction, the highest ever paid for a single Horse to that time, to purchase the Abbott.
That’s $26,500 in 1900…
The obituary for the Horse is actually longer than the one for the owner. The fact that Scannell engraved a Horse’s name on the monument to his dead brother, and his own eventual grave marker, shows the esteem felt by Scannell himself for the animal. Oddly enough, and this is a rare thing for Calvary Cemetery, The NYTimes once did an article on the raising of this monument which happened in 1914.
Hey, you never know what you’re going to find at Calvary Cemetery.
Tales of Calvary 7
– photo by Mitch Waxman
I just can’t sit on this one anymore. After a spree of “all cemetery” postings in November and December, I decided to take a step back from the grave, but I just can’t stop myself…
Promises would be offered to you, lords and ladies of Newtown, not to spend too much time amongst the dead in these first days of the new year, but I’d probably break them.
Paper fades, buildings fall, but Calvary is eternal and undying. Dripping in its centuried silence and nitre choked glory, the emerald desolations of Calvary Cemetery offer a pastoral transit between tumultuous neighborhoods in the Newtown Pentacle, and that weird old man in the filthy black raincoat you might glimpse as you drive by is often your humble narrator.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
On this particular day, a sunny Saturday (Thanksgiving weekend in 2009), I wasn’t transiting Calvary.
I had come here with a definite purpose, searching for the grave of a man who died in the early 30’s rumored to have been involved with the illegal smuggling of strange statuettes into the United States in the 1920’s from some impossibly remote pacific island. This man, a Massachusetts merchant named Gilman, was killed in a freak nocturnal accident, apparently by a bale of paper which had fallen out of some warehouse window along the Newtown Creek. His oddly deformed body was found by workmen the next morning, and the Coroner pronounced the death accidental. The victim was buried in Calvary’s public section as an act of charity, and under the assumption that Gilman was an Irish name. His belongings and personal valuables, made from some queer kind of gold sculpted into wild and heretical forms, were collected by a schooner captain whose three masted ship appeared unbidden at the Penny Bridge docks one night during an unnaturally thick fog. The Captain, a Massachusetts trader named Marsh, paid for a custom and eccentric grave marker to be erected for this Gilman fellow somewhere in Calvary. It remains elusive, but I shall find it- I found Al Smith!
As is often the case, my befuddled and inept investigations were swept wildly off course by a highly suggestible and credulous nature which makes me vulnerable to wild flights of shivering cowardice and shameful paranoia. Such timidity does not suit one who stands and stares into whatever abyss happens to be before him, and what I saw chilled me with its wild possibilities. It was Thanksgiving weekend, and Calvary was as quiet as… well… a tomb.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
As seen in the above shots, the overgrown monument with its vine covered cupola intrigued and drew my attention. In accordance with usual methods, the object was photographed from many angles, and my path led me widdershins around it. As mentioned in the last paragraph, thanksgiving weekend had evinced a general evacuation of the area surrounding that bulkheaded duct of urban horror called the Newtown Creek, and like their counterparts in the spires of Manhattan it would seem that the workers of Calvary got off early on the previous Wednesday. Just dropped their shovels, as it were.
That’s when I saw it, said “oh. oh… no… just keep walking… don’t take any pictures of…”. Unfortunately, my finger was already depressing the button on my camera. I had lost all control, and still can’t stop myself from posting about it weeks later… I’m all ‘effed up.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
In the interest of full disclosure, the names on the two grave markers are obscured as they were modern burials. If a grave is at least older than me, I feel fine about publishing a photo or talking about who it holds. If it’s an early 1900’s burial- fair game. (note: a cool thing happened recently- a sepulchral portrait, randomly chosen and published in the Mt. Zion series of postings, resulted in a certain Pentacle reader seeing his grandmother’s face for the first time) These interments, however, date from the early 1990’s and later. The context of this post demands some discretion, and censoring the names of the deceased whose graves are seen is definitely the right thing to do.
Now on to something you don’t normally see… and I am cognizant that the presentation of the following is vulgar and in very bad taste. I just can’t stop myself… Its like some alien thing is controlling me…
– photo by Mitch Waxman
There is a limited amount of time that one can tolerate solitary exposure to Calvary Cemetery, as the marble crown of Laurel Hill is a sort of psychic Chernobyl. It preys upon you- this place- in subtle ways, and comes at you in a manner not unlike the gradual stupefaction brought on by liquor. On New Year’s Eve, someone offered me three plots here for free, and withdrew the offer when I explained what a gravesite in Old Calvary is actually worth. Coincidence? hmmm… The place has noticed me, and it is trying to draw me further in…
Like ionizing radiation, whose damage to healthy living flesh is calculated by a multiplex of intensity and duration, whatever it is that lurks in the aether of Calvary is invisible, insidious, and real. Looking into an open grave like this, in this place, carries the comparable psychic risks of unshielded exposure to the thermonuclear eye of god itself.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
What I can’t do, is use my favorite catch phrase. The “who can guess…” one. Horrors too horrible for the graves holding lurk into the abyss, and loathsomeness waits below, but…
That’s what I was thinking as I passed out, again, in a dead faint. Luckily I fell backwards.
In the cold waste 3
This is the 163rd posting of the Newtown Pentacle, last one of 2009, and just about 6 months into this little project. Halfway through writing this, I had to evacuate the building due to a fire in another apartment. NYFD was prompt and performed their work in the normal fashion. Thanks Guys, and Happy New Year… now on with the dirge, apostasy, and dire prophecies…
Gondor, or Manhattan- from recently completed sections of Gantry Plaza State Park – photo by Mitch Waxman
The new East River Parks are magnificent and welcome additions to the waterfront, a tony garland showcasing the shining shield wall of Manhattan, and a value adding loss leader for landlords to dazzle the prospective Tower People with. Queensbridge Park was similarly awe inspiring upon its completion in the 3rd incarnation of Ravenswood, until things went horribly wrong in the Housing Complex it was designed to serve and the vain optimists in City government lost interest in funding it.
Today, its bulkheads are collapsing into the river and the muddy ball fields and patchy lawns are shoddy at best. Perhaps the experiences of the Tower People will be different as the calendar pages roll by, here in the Newtown Pentacle.
From the Wheelspur Yard road crossing beneath the Pulaski Bridge – photo by Mitch Waxman
The story of Long Island City, as one proceeds south, is told in steel and concrete. Leave the modern world, which is possible in Long Island CIty, and see the apotheosis of victorian aspirations. The industrial past of the 19th century, whose cracked pavement and toxic inheritances define the modern era, can be accessed merely by crossing the street. By 2020, the Manhattan Skyline will be hidden behind even more Tower Condos, and Hunters Point will accommodate some 5,000 new housing units. Hotels and Parks are also planned.
All the while, the City is closing Queens Fire Houses and Hospitals.
LIE from the Pulaski Bridge – photo by Mitch Waxman
Surmount the Pulaski Bridge, but do not touch it with your bare skin. From here, the early and mid 20th century is visible. Witness a steel highway- Robert Moses’s LIE soaring over “the empty corridor“. It once carried the terrified middle class away from a troubled mid and late 20th century New York, in the manner of some open artery, creating the vast populations of suburban Long Island. It also blighted and depopulated western Queens, turning the valuable industrial land it shadowed into empty warehouses and abandoned brick lots. For the last half of the 20th century, Long Island City and the surrounding communities became ethnic ghettos and crime infested wards of municipal indifference. In this mid century midden, the rats ruled, and rat kings ruled over all.
Open air warehouse at Newtown Creek – photo by Mitch Waxman
And then there is the Creek. The Newtown Creek. I have a lot of purple prose fun with the Newtown Creek- these quotes are culled from various postings-
“I’d rather drink a glass of that queerly coloured effluviam which flows lugubriously through a crucible of dictatorial capitalism called the Newtown Creek.”
“just a little bit of the chemical recipe that produces an anaerobic broth like that found in the Newtown Creek”
“VOC’s are amongst the primary pollutants fouling the waters of a nearby cautionary tale called the Newtown Creek.”
“and indeed- swirling within a nearby cataract of tears called the Newtown Creek”
“which I attribute to the possibly mutagenic qualities of the chemical pollution of that nearby extinction of hope called the Newtown Creek.”
“languidly across that gelatinous slick of black water- called the Newtown Creek- triggered its horns”
“The secular spectacular merely whets the appetite of your humble narrator for the open skies and sacred vantages found along those unhallowed backwaters of an urban catastrophe called the Newtown Creek.”
“The motive engines of the Pulaski began grinding in those deep pilings sunken on both sides of that vexing mystery called the Newtown Creek”
” is powered, fed, and flushed by that which may be found around a shimmering ribbon of abnormality called the Newtown Creek.”
“flabby jowled, staring eyed, scaly group which had been tormenting me- and whose apparent leader was a young girl carrying a curiously polydactyl cat whose aspect “I did not like”- were running off in the direction of that stygian cataract called the Newtown Creek”
There is actually nothing funny about the Creek, its a sobering subject, but I do my best to keep things light. One of the maddening facts though, is that the open air warehouse observed above, is designated to become a City Park as the Hunters Point South phase of the Queenswest development gets rolling in 2010.
Still Waters Run Deep – photo by Mitch Waxman
The EPA comment period on the issue of “superfunding the creek” has just ended, and as expected, the Oligarchs of Manhattan have rendered their opinion that the Creek should remain under their jurisdiction.
Did you think, honestly, that City Hall is going to cede control over a 4 x1 mile strip of Brooklyn and Queens to Washington without a fight?
That’s what Superfund means, the feds TAKE OVER, for as long as it will take to clean up the mess. They will fine whoever they want to for whatever they want to, issue orders that MUST be followed by commoner and king alike, and will not take “NO” or “That isn’t possible in this climate” as an answer. In the case of the Newtown Creek, the estimates for completion of project (at the medium estimate) are 30-45 years (45 years ago in 1963, John Kennedy had just been assassinated in November and LBJ was president). A river of federal money will flush out the Newtown Creek, but the tide is going to hit the masters across the river in Manhattan.
Our fellow citizens in the Western States have been chaffing under the authority of the EPA for a long time, which has created an electoral preference for smaller and less intrusive government policy amongst the citizenry. A lack of “institutional memory”, a disturbing modern trend easily blamed on a 4th estate owned and operated by real estate interests, is a smoking volcano.
Your Humble Narrator – photo by Mitch Waxman
It is the end of a year of change- but all years are “years of change”. New York, and the United States on the whole, continue their trend toward apathy and quasi-fascism.
- The rich are always right- for by virtue of their fortunes they are proven so
- Our enemies are all around us- and we must consider which rights to trade away in the name of security
- Endless is war, with new fronts opening in Northern Africa and the Far East as we speak (did you notice how fast the story of “the underwear bomber” came together?)
- The burdens of the social contract suddenly seem to be too much to bear as the Baby Boomer population begins to retire.
Ceasar is just a few years away now, and will choose to reveal him or her self shortly- and offer clarity and purpose to the masses- who will love their Ceasar, along with the bread and circuses.
And all the poisons in the mud will leach out.
