New-York Historical Society

New York Historical Society building

The New-York Historical Society is an American organization based in New York and works to preserve the city's history. The association operates a museum and library at its Manhattan headquarters on 77th Street and Central Park West. The building is open to the public from Tuesday to Saturday from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. and on Sundays from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The association also runs many public educational programs. Louise Mirrer of the City University of New York has been President of the New York Historical Society since 2004 .

Overview

The New-York Historical Society, an educational and research institution, hosts exhibits, public programs, and researches history and its impact on the world today. Since it was founded in 1804, it has been researching the history of New York City, New York State, and the United States. It also serves as a national forum for discussing and examining issues related to the origins and meaning of the story. The museum houses four centuries of history, artifacts and art that tell the story of America from the point of view of New York. The building also houses an extensive library with manuscripts, newspapers and other documents from a period of 4 centuries. "Having such a large historical public library in a building ideal for the storage of beautiful exhibits is a great addition to the cultural richness of New York City," said Joyce Appleby, a history professor at UCLA .

Collections

Rural Landscape, 1861, Asher Brown Durand

The association holds a collection of historical artifacts, American art, and other materials on the history of the United States of America and New York, and is home to an independent research library and the oldest museum in New York City. The association's “Great Collection” comprises more than 4.5 million documents, images, artifacts and ephemera from American history. It includes u. a. Collections on the following topics:

the slavery
the Civil War and Reconstruction
all 435 watercolors still preserved for his book Birds of America
Hudson River School painting

Records showing the social dimensions of early United States history

the largest known collection of Tiffany lamps

extensive materials related to the country's founding and early history

In addition, the association owns paintings and handicrafts from the possession of the first New York families, e. B. the Beekmans, the Roosevelts, the Rapaljes and others. In his collection "The Children of Rapalje", painted by John Durand in 1768 and which is considered one of the most beautiful examples of colonial painting in America. In honor of the Henry Luce III Center for the Study of American Culture , Professor Steven Mintz of the University of Houston noted that the center was “an incredible source of visual resources (and) invaluable in researching the history of children and families of private life. "

history

The New-York Historical Society was founded on November 20, 1804, largely through the efforts of John Pintard. Pintard was the managing director of the American Academy of Fine Arts for a number of years , as well as the founder of the first savings bank in New York. He was also one of the first to advocate a free school system. The first session included eleven prominent citizens of the city, including Mayor DeWitt Clinton. At the meeting a committee was elected to draw up a statute, on December 10, 1804 the association was founded.

When the first catalog was printed in 1813, the association owned 4,265 books, as well as 234 volumes of United States documents, 119 almanacs , 130 newspaper titles, 134 maps, and 30 different illustrations. In addition, the beginning of a manuscript collection, various portrait oil paintings and 38 copperplate portraits had been collected.

During the first few decades the club suffered from high debts. In the year the association organized a celebration to mark the 200th anniversary of the arrival of Henry Hudson in New York Harbor. Inspired by this event, the association applied for financial support from the New York State government. This was promised and should be financed through a lottery. The failure of this lottery led the association to go into debt, which forced it to pledge some of its books, which could be redeemed again in 1823.

The association and its collections moved frequently in the 19th century. In 1809, the association and its collections moved to the Bowling Grenn government building, which had been built as a residence for the President of the United States, but which stood empty after the capital moved to Philadelphia . In 1816 the club moved back to the New York building that was formerly the poor house in City Hall Park. In 1857, the association moved into the first purpose-built collection building at the intersection of Second Avenue and 11th Street, where it stayed for the next 50 years. The association later acquired a collection of Egyptian and Assyrian art that was later relocated to the Brooklyn Museum . The central part of the current building on Central Park West was completed in 1908.

Corn Planter , F. Bratoli, 1796

In the library on the first floor there are two extraordinary lead glass windows. One depicts the arrival of Henry Hudson and was made by Mr. Calvert of Gorham Manufactory. The other, on the right-hand side of the information desk, is called the Huguenot Memorial Window, or more formally “The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes”. It is one of the most recognized works by M E. Tillinghast as it is a large beautiful window in an easily accessible location and it has the notice "Copyright July 1908. ME Tillinghast" in the lower left corner and it is in the lower right Signed corner with her signature "Mary Tillinghast Fecit 1908". The window is signed by Russell Sage, who also worked on other ME Tillnghast windows. She is probably the most important American glass painter. She worked as a partner of John La Farge for seven years , after which she started her own business. Before that, she worked in embroidery at Tiffany Studios. She lived in an elaborately decorated French-style apartment (# 3 Washington Square N.), home to a number of well-known artists, from William Glackens to Edward Hopper . Hopper used the studio above her apartment, where she died in December 1912. The studio still exists today behind the facade of the NYU School of Social Work.

The association's collection grew during the 20th century, but renewed financial problems in the 1970s and 1980s forced the association to restrict access to the collections to professional researchers in the early 1990s. In 1988, hundreds of paintings, objets d'art and artifacts were found moldy and damaged in a warehouse in Manhattan. Many of the items were on long-term loan to the museum. In 1995, grants from the city and the state allow public access to the museum, which was headed by Betsy Gotbaum. Recent private donations enabled the association to set up an online catalog of its collection. In 2005, the association was one of 406 arts and social institutions that shared a $ 20 million donation from Carnegie Corporation . This donation was made possible by an anonymous donation from Michael Bloomberg , the Mayor of New York.

Education and public programs

Every year the museum supports students and teachers in adapting learning programs and study plans to the special needs of students and teachers, not only during their stay in the museum but also in their schools. Every year the museum hosts tens of thousands of students. The New-York Historic Society offers programs such as: B. An object-based learning technique that helps students develop their own perspective on history by dealing with primary sources and material cultural assets. New projects include the American Musicals Project , which provides teachers with a variety of timetables, each using a variety of musicals to introduce students to different periods in American history. The New-York Historical Society offers programs and lectures open to the public. The New-York Historical Society also offers a series of “hands-on history” weekends where children and families learn about important historical events through play through historical story re-enactment and other activities.

literature

Shapiro, Gary. "Celebrations of Learning Knickerbocker". The New York Sun , May 4, 2006
Regis, Necee. "Don't Expect to Relax on your visit to NYC". The Boston Globe , November 21, 2005
Fine Art Connoisseur, www.fineartconnoisseur.com, November / December 2006
The New-York Historical Society, Education Department: https://www.nyhistory.org/web/default.php?section=education
The American Musicals Project: http://www.americanmusicalsproject.org/
Dr. Miller, Dan. “Focus on Education: Fifth Graders Visit Slavery Exhibit”. The Queens Times , November 24, 2005
The New-York Historical Society, Testimonials: https://www.nyhistory.org/future/Testimonials/#
New York Times ; July 10, 1988 ; Hundreds of paintings, decorative art objects and artifacts that the New-York Historical Society is storing in a Manhattan warehouse are in such acute stages of deterioration that some may be permanently lost. Hundreds of paintings, decorative art objects and artifacts that the New-York Historical Society is storing in a Manhattan warehouse are in such acute stages of deterioration that some may be permanently lost. … "It's tragic that the situation was allowed to deteriorate to the point that it was," said Christopher Forbes, the associate publisher of Forbes magazine and a trustee. "The nadir has been reached." The museum's director, James B. Bell , said it would take "several conservators several lifetimes" to restore the damaged works. In particularly poor condition are as many as 100 of the approximately 300 European and American paintings in the possession of the historical society and an undetermined number of roughly 3,200 works of early American decorative art and artifacts that had previously been stored in a warehouse in Paterson ( New Jersey) , and in a townhouse on West 76th Street. In late 1986 and 1987, after the society's board of trustees received a report on the collection's condition from a consultant, these works were transferred to an art warehouse in the Chelsea section of Manhattan. In a tour of the Chelsea warehouse last week, the paintings were found to be covered with white mold and mildew and splattered with what appeared to be house paint or acid. Some canvases were torn, some had flaking paint and others had separated from their frames. Museum conservators said that the seriousness of the mold could be determined only after close examination of each painting, but that its possible effects ranged from slight to ruinous. ...
New York Times ; August 14, 1988 ; Last year, with yearly expenses of $ 5.8 million, the society showed a deficit of $ 3.5 million. The market value of the society's endowment dropped from $ 12.4 million last year to around $ 7.6 million now, in part because of covering the deficit and in part because of the stock market collapse last October.
New York Times ; August 28, 1988 ; In recent weeks, the New York Historical Society, which for years had used money from its endowment and from a few wealthy trustees and patrons to compensate for growing annual deficits, finally reached the end of the line. Facing possible bankruptcy, the board dismissed nearly a quarter of its museum staff, closed half of the gallery space and curtailed visiting hours. James B. Bell, the society's director since 1982, resigned last month, and the trustees enlisted an 11-member committee of businessmen and arts administrators, headed by John D. Macomber , former chief executive of the Celanese Corporation, to rescue the 184- year-old institution.