Classroom

This statue&nbsp;was designed with the unique characters of the classic Alice in Wonderland. George Delacorte wanted to make it possible for the children of New York City to explore the wonders of the adventurous, imaginative&nbsp;story.&nbsp;&nbsp;This sculpture is different than most. Normally, today's youth are told countless times to not touch works of art. Delacorte wanted the opposite effect with this masterpiece. He wanted to invite children to climb upon the statue, while touching it and examining it, with hopes of making their imaginations reach great lengths.&nbsp; The most popular characters of Lewis Carroll's classic were sculpted within the 11-foot-tall bronze statue. The characters included the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat, the Dormouse, along with the March Hare. Those four-story icons are balanced around the central element of Alice. This design of Alice was actually based off of the sculptor Jose de Creeft's daughter.&nbsp; Around the statue, there are seven different phrases. Most are quotes from the story, but one of the engraved plaques says, "Alice in Wonderland. In memory of my wife. Margarita Delacorte. Who Loved All Children. GTD. Margarita Delacorte Memorial."&nbsp; This memorial has served its purpose for many years in the Big Apple. It has even been used as settings in popular movies, such as, 'Remember Me'.&nbsp;

Alice in Wonderland was built in 1959 by sculptor José de Creeft and gifted by philanthropist George Delacorte.

Children are encouraged to touch, and even climb on the statue. 

This video shows how kids climb upon the memorable statue in Central Park. 

Video

Central Park's Alice in Wonderland statue is the creation of sculptor Jose de Creeft and located next to Conservatory Water. Philanthropist George Delacorte contributed this statue to the city and dedicated it to the memory of his Margarita. Delacorte chose this design as a gift to the children of New York City. The statue includes a variety of characters from Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland, a book that was first published in 1862 but continues to engage the curiosity and wonderment in children of all ages. 

Alice in Wonderland Statue

This all-day tour starts at the north end of the park and includes some of the greatest museums the city has to offer along with the city's most beloved landmarks. The tour was updated in 2020 to include Central Park's first monument dedicated to women's history. The tour includes only a portion of the many monuments and museums in the area and given the immense size of Central Park, this walking tour only includes around thirty stops with the majority being located in the central and southern portion of the park. The tour tries to limit steps while maximizing the number of monuments and museums along the route.

Based on the pattern of British attacks during the Revolutionary War, it was assumed that the British would attack from the South or the West, thus fortifications on Manhattan’s North and East fronts were practically nonexistent. On August 10, 1814 the British came from the east, landing at Stonington, Connecticut on the Long Island Sound. In response to this threat, several emergency fortifications were constructed along the Harlem heights, including Blockhouse Number One. There were originally three other blockhouses constructed along what is now Morningside Drive, however this is the only one that remains standing. The structures were complete by September of 1814, and the hurried construction is evident in the uneven stonework. The building was constructed by volunteers from New York, New Jersey, and Long Island. The volunteers brought construction material with them and, as such, a mix of red sandstone can be seen contrasting the Manhattan schist along the small gunports. During this building frenzy, “a chain of major batteries was installed in upper Manhattan: Fort Clinton, Fort Fish, McGown’s Pass, Nutter’s Battery, and Blockhouse Number One” (3). While the British burned Washington, they did not attack New York City in the War of 1812 so the Blockhouse never saw combat. The complex later used as a storage building for ammunition. The building had a timber floor supporting a heavy cannon from a turret on the roof, and there are still two gunports on all sides of the building. The upper two feet of the building are a noticeably lighter color and were likely added on after the close of the war as the building was converted into a storage space. Archaeologists from Columbia University excavated parts of the foundation of the Blockhouse in 1995 and found that the structure was built on top of an existing footprint, suggesting that the structure dated back even earlier than 1814. Archaeologists estimated that the building was actually constructed during the British occupation of Manhattan during the Revolutionary War. When the early plans for Central Park were drawn up in 1858, the land where the Blockhouse stands was considered unusable and was not included in the initial Park design. The Park was originally intended to run from 59th Street to 106th Street (whereas today the Park runs from 59th Street to 110th Street). The land above 106th Street contains rocky bluffs and the area that is now the Harlem Meer was formerly a swampland. In 1863, this land was added to the park after developers decided it was too difficult for residential or commercial construction. Park architects Olmsted and Vaux left the Blockhouse as a picturesque ruin, covered with crawling vines and set amidst alpine plants and evergreens. Today the building is unused and remains closed to the public. A single flagpole stands in the center of the Blockhouse. Over the years, there were two historical plaques installed at the site. The first was placed near the Blockhouse in 1905 and lost to vandals sometime after 1913. Another plaque was created in 1999 but has also gone missing.

Blockhouse Number One is a fortification located at the top of the Great Hill on the Northern edge of Central Park. The building is the oldest in the park and also predates the creation of Central Park as it was constructed to protect the city from the British in 1814. It was originally one of several emergency fortresses built following the outbreak of the War of 1812.

The Blockhouse, Central Park

During the late 1960’s, a group of Latin Americans living in New York City found themselves concerned about the stark lack, and possibly exclusion, of Latin American artists in museums. In order to remedy this, El Museo del Barrio (or simply El Museo) was formed, though it did not initially have a permanent home. From 1969 to 1976, El Museo operated out of storefronts and classrooms with the support of the community it served. In the Fall of 1977, El Museo worked with the Boys Harbor youth services agency to get El Museo moved into a proper building. After some negotiation, Boys Harbor helped move El Museo del Barrio into the Heckscher Building, where the Museo is still housed today. During that same year, El Museo joined the Cultural Institutions Group, which included institutions such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, which helped to get El Museo on its feet in regards to funding.In the early 1980’s, El Museo popularity was increasing, and plans were made for expansion and renovation. On November 19, 983, El Museo revealed a number of expansions, such as their Video Gallery and the New East Wing exhibition space. El Museo enjoyed continued popularity, but in 1985, an investigation was set to examine the museum’s fiscal management. As a result, El Museo’s funds were frozen, threatening to potentially shut the museum down. By Winter of 1986, El Museo was forced to lay off staff, and the curator of the museum volunteered to work without pay as the investigation was underway in order to keep the collection alive. By October of 1986, new management was brought in, the freeze was lifted, and El Museo rebounded from their financial troubles. Today, El Museo continues to offer educational opportunities for all of those who come through their doors. With an extensive collection of over 10,000 items, a large variety of Latin American and Latin American adjacent cultures are represented. A major focus of the museum is community involvement and investment. El Museo has a strong pedagogical commitment to improving Latin American arts access and education. Entry to the museum is on a pay-what-you-wish system, with the recommended rates currently $9 for adults, $5 for students and seniors, and free for members and children under twelve.

El Museo del Barrio is the only art museum in New York City to focus on Puerto Rican, Caribbean and Latin American art. Founded in 1969, El Museo del Barrio is home to galleries, exhibitions, and cultural celebrations. The museum also encourages public engagement and outreach in the local Latinx community. 

El Museo del Barrio

The Museum of the City
of New York was formally established in 1923 by Henry Collins Brown, a Scottish
American writer and journalist who wrote numerous books on the history of New
York City. Brown was very passionate about the story of New York and during the
1920s was perhaps the city’s most well-known historian. He was reportedly
dissatisfied with the New-York Historical Society, which he regarded as too privileged
and elitist, so he created his own private, non-profit organization to preserve
and present the New York’s history in a more populist manner. Brown first set
up the museum inside the Gracie Mansion, which would later become the official
residence of the New York City mayors. In 1926 the museum board replaced Brown
(for reasons unclear) and began looking for a new location. The city donated a
plot of land on Fifth Avenue from 103rd to 104th street,
and the museum appointed Joseph H. Freelander to design a new building. Construction
of the brick and marble, Georgian Colonial-Revival style structure began in
1929 and was completed in 1932. Sculptor Adolph Alexander Weinman also
contributed two statues of Alexander Hamilton and DeWitt Clinton, which were
displayed on the exterior. The new museum proved very popular; by 1938 it was
averaging 200,000 visitors annually. 

The museum rapidly
expanded its collection, and acquired thousands of new artifacts. It soon
became clear that the building would have to be expanded, but it would be
decades before any efforts came to fruition. In 1967 the museum was designated
a New York City landmark. In 1982 it was the recipient of The Hundred Year
Association of New York’s Gold Medal Award for its contributions to the city.
During the late 1980s and early 1990s the museum hired the Polshek Partnership Architects to
create plans to construct a new addition, but financial issues made any expansion
impossible. By the early 2000s the museum was experiencing a decline in
attendance and began contemplating a move to a more suitable location. Mayor
Rudy Giuliani proposed to have the museum move into the former Tweed
Courthouse, near City Hall. However the next mayor, Michael Bloomberg,
rescinded the offer and gave Tweed Courthouse to the Department of Education
instead. A deal to merge with the New-York Historical Society also fell
through. Left with no other options, the museum decided to remain put. In 2006
it began a multi-phase renovation project that included building a scaled-down
version of the addition designed by Polshek, a two-story contemporary glass
gallery. The renovations also included the addition of new conservation storage
for artifacts, and the creation of complete disability access. The expansions
and implementation of new programming has led to a new increase in visitors.

Today the Museum of the
City of New York contains a vast collection of over 750,000 artifacts,
including artwork, photographs, prints, theatrical pieces, and other objects
connected to the history of New York. Notable items include some of Eugene O’Neill’s
handwritten manuscripts, a dollhouse belonging to Carrie Walter Stettheimer, and
a suit worn at George Washington’s Inaugural Ball. In 2016 the museum unveiled
its first permanent exhibit, “New York at Its Core,” which has become very
popular. The 8,000 square foot exhibit, taking up the entire first floor,
covers the complete history of New York City spanning over 400 years the first
ever to do so. The success of the exhibition earned the museum a $10 million
donation in 2017 from the Thompson Family Foundation, the largest contribution
ever received by the museum. The museum also presents temporary exhibits on
various aspects of the city’s history, which have included sports, women’s
suffrage, politics, fashion, theater, activism, and diversity. The museum regularly
hosts various lectures and performances as well. A digitization project is
currently underway to make the museum’s collection of paintings, prints, and
photographs available to the public online.

The Museum of the City of New York is dedicated to preserving the city’s unique and diverse history and presenting it to the public. The private non-profit museum was founded in 1923 and has been at its current location since 1932.  The museum is home to hundreds of thousands of artifacts and artwork relating to the history and culture of New York. In recent years it has gained attention for its new innovative exhibits, including the permanent “New York at Its Core,” an ambitious effort to chronicle the city’s 400-year history. The museum also hosts a number of lectures and performances, and offers venues available for special events. 

Museum of the City of New York

The New York statue of James Marion Sims was crafted about nine years after the Sims had passed in 1883. The statue was originally made in Munich, Germany by Ferdinand von Miller II. (1) The intent behind the statue was to honor Sims’s medical achievements. His most prevalent achievement was his surgical method to cure vesicovaginal fistulas, which are a labor complication that creates an opening between the vagina and the bladder. Sims operated on three enslaved women named Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy to develop this method. The statue was first commemorated in 1894 in Bryant Park, but the statue has been relocated multiple times for contradictory reasons. In 1934, the statue was first relocated to Central Park, the location where the monument stood for the longest. (1) The statue was moved to be near the New York Academy of Medicine. Due to complaints of Sims’s ethical choices during his surgical experiments, the statue was uprooted from its pedestal and repositioned near his grave in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York in April of 2018. (2) The pedestal remains in Central Park to this date.Throughout Sims’s career, the public did not question the ethics behind Sims’s medical experiments. The public’s admiration for him thrived even after his death. He was an inspiration to the medical community for his modern innovations in gynecology and founding the first Women’s Hospital in the United States. (1)Before Sims gained popularity, he never envisioned himself specializing in gynecology. He would often turn down patients that required treatment in women’s health and would instead recommend other physicians. (3) The first aspect of gynecology that sparked Sims’s interest was vesicovaginal fistulas. Sims’s surgical experiments for fistulas started after he felt inspired by one of his patients who had a retroverted uterus and injured pelvis after falling off a horse. (3) Sims and a few of his acquaintances had made a deal together that would result in Sims’s future fame and hatred by the public.Sims proposed that he would practice new surgical techniques on the acquaintance’s enslaved women as long as the owner provided the women with clothes and paid their taxes. (3) Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy were the three main women that were traded in this deal. In the agreement, Sims stated how he would not perform any experiment that jeopardized the women's lives. (3) Although, Sims openly admitted that there was a moment where he was convinced that Lucy was going to die due to her from her expression of pain. Sims experimented on these women with different techniques for approximately five years to develop a surgical technique to cure a vesicovaginal fistula. In a speech given by Paul Mundé at the unveiling of Sims’s statue in Bryant Park, Mundé described Sims’s innovation as a gift that improved medicine for the future generations. <a href="https://search.proquest.com/openview/c22cb395f3126fb16261a3f2cf34cf9d/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&amp;cbl=40146" target="_blank">(4)</a> Mundé speaks on how Sims was not solely admired by the South or New York, but instead, Sims was held on a pedestal by many European countries. <a href="https://search.proquest.com/openview/c22cb395f3126fb16261a3f2cf34cf9d/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&amp;cbl=40146" target="_blank">(4)</a> The statue of Sims in Bryant Park was a historic moment for the medical community. The Journal of the American Medical Association wrote about Sims’s accomplishments and his newly established statue on November 3, 1894. The journal also stated how the New York statue was the first statue of a medical professional created in the United States. <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=4lLlAAAAMAAJ&amp;pg=PA689&amp;lpg=PA689&amp;dq=November+3,+1894+THE+STATUE+OF+DR.+J.+MARION+SIMS+IN+BRYANT+PARK.&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=v4hAMZZl_b&amp;sig=ACfU3U3u-lJXTu_lDds58ohwVLCUqI7CTA&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ved=2ahUKEwj-ktuyg8HpAhUPRK0KHUwZBrYQ6AEwAnoECAwQAQ#v=onepage&amp;q=November%203%2C%201894%20THE%20STATUE%20OF%20DR.%20J.%20MARION%20SIMS%20IN%20BRYANT%20PARK.&amp;f=false" target="_blank">(5)</a> This journal even claimed how the statue’s plaque is an extremely accurate way to represent Sims as a surgeon. A great summary of how the public used to view Sims from the journal states, “The medical profession of the world is better and nobler for having once had a Sims and it is well to honor his memory,”. <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=4lLlAAAAMAAJ&amp;pg=PA689&amp;lpg=PA689&amp;dq=November+3,+1894+THE+STATUE+OF+DR.+J.+MARION+SIMS+IN+BRYANT+PARK.&amp;source=bl&amp;ots=v4hAMZZl_b&amp;sig=ACfU3U3u-lJXTu_lDds58ohwVLCUqI7CTA&amp;hl=en&amp;sa=X&amp;ved=2ahUKEwj-ktuyg8HpAhUPRK0KHUwZBrYQ6AEwAnoECAwQAQ#v=onepage&amp;q=November%203%2C%201894%20THE%20STATUE%20OF%20DR.%20J.%20MARION%20SIMS%20IN%20BRYANT%20PARK.&amp;f=false" target="_blank">(5) </a>During this period, the public viewed Sims's surgical innovation as one-sided. Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy were never mentioned as a key element towards Sims’s surgical advancements. They were quickly forgotten while Sims’s fame grew larger. As societal norms changed, the public’s feelings that were expressed for Sims did as well. One of the first individuals to call out Sims’s choices as a physician was Viola Plummer in 2006. (2) Plummer’s issue with Sims was founded on the lack of consent and Sims’s decision to not use anesthesia on Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy. Since anesthesia was not widely used and fairly new, Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy were not operated on with anesthesia. (1) Many physicians did not feel comfortable utilizing anesthesia if they were not informed on how to use it properly. They did not believe the pain caused by the surgical techniques was worth the risk of using a new method like anesthesia. Sims instead gave women pain killer medicine that is highly addictive. Since Anarcha, Betsey, and Lucy were enslaved, there was not an opportunity for them to give consent. The only consent that Sims needed was from their owners. In the autobiography that Sims wrote, he mentioned how he did receive consent from Betsy, but there is not another source that includes Betsy’s honest perspective. In addition to Plummer’s activism, Harriet A. Washington released Medical Apartheid in 2006 that discusses the effects that Sims experimentation had on future African-Americans as patients. (2) Both activists inspired the East Harlem Preservation to create campaigns to get this statue removed. Various in-person protests against his statue in Central Park started in 2010. 26,000 signatures were collected in hopes to have this monument partially removed from Central Park. (2)Bill de Blasio, the mayor of New York City, decided in January of 2018 that the monument should be partially relocated. In April of 2018, the statue was relocated to stand near Sims’s grave. (2) The relocation of the statue stirred up a variation of opinions from the public. Some are satisfied with the change while others had other envisions for the statue’s future. Some individuals felt that the statue should be destroyed, and a statue of a physician of color should replace his statue. While others argue that destroying the statue would be erasing a part of history society does not want to repeat.

Numerous commonly practiced medical techniques and treatments originated from the past suffering of people of color. The success and innovation that arose from the 19th-century surgeon, James Marion Sims, is not an exception. He is known as the Father of Modern Gynecology, yet his success was one-sided. The New York Statue of James Marion Sims was revealed in 1894 with the failure to mention the enslaved women Sims experimented on. Sims operated on Anarcha, Betsy, and Lucy without anesthesia and consent. The pain that these women endured was almost forgotten until 2006 when Viola Plummer addressed the ethical concerns surrounding Sims's experimentation. Plummer's advocacy created a movement that caused more individuals to call for the partial removal of the monument in Central Park. In April of 2018, the Sims statue was relocated to stand near Sims's grave in Green-Wood Cemetery. The prominent pedestal that pays homage to Sims's past legacy still stands in Central Park    

James Marion Sims Statue in New York 

The Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum grew from 1859 Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. The Cooper Union was founded by Peter Cooper as a free school for the working classes of New York City. Cooper always intended for a museum to be part of this union, though these plans did not actualize until much later in the nineteenth century. In 1895, three of Cooper’s granddaughters – the sisters Eleanor Garnier Hewitt, Sarah Cooper Hewitt, and Amy Hewitt Green – petitioned the board of trustees for the Cooper Union for a museum of decorative arts. The women proposed a space similar to the Musée des Artes Décoratifs in Paris, France. This space would allow students studying at Cooper Union to engage directly with decorative art objects. The board of trustees granted the sisters the fourth floor of the Cooper Union’s Foundation Building to use as a location for the museum. The Cooper Hewitt Museum was officially established in 1896 and opened in 1897. With access allowed three days a week, the museum welcomed members of the general public as well as Cooper Union students.The Hewitt sisters continued to manage the Cooper Hewitt Museum until 1930 when a board of directors was appointed. This system of management was short-lived, and in 1938, the museum was incorporated directly under the Cooper Union. An advisory board served to help manage the museum. By the 1960s, the Cooper Union was struggling financially. A decision was made to abolish the Cooper Hewitt Museum, though immediate outcry followed the announcement. The Committee to Save the Cooper Union Museum was headed by Henry F. du Pont, a famous horticulturist, entrepreneur, and decorative arts collector and expert. After five years of protracted legal proceedings, the Cooper Hewitt Museum’s collection was transferred to the Smithsonian Institution. Initially named the Cooper Hewitt Museum of Design during the transfer, the museum’s moniker quickly became the Cooper-Hewitt Museum of Decorative Arts and Design. The museum was the first Smithsonian branch located outside of Washington D.C.As the Cooper-Hewitt Museum was no longer affiliated with the Cooper Union, it was in need of a new home. In 1970, the museum moved to the Andrew Carnegie Mansion, where it still resides. The mansion was built by industrialist Andrew Carnegie between 1898 and 1902. The building was created as a New York residence for Carnegie and his wife, Louise, who wished to raise a child there. Carnegie purchased a piece of land in Manhattan which, at the time, was relatively far removed from other homes in the area. Carnegie hired architects Babb, Cook, &amp; Willard to design the home, which they did in a Georgian eclectic style. The completed Carnegie Mansion boasts sixty-four rooms which are spread over three floors and a basement. The building’s once-isolated location also allowed ample room for a garden, which was designed by Guy Lowell and Richard Schermerhorn Jr. The Carnegie Mansion was the first private residence in the United States to incorporate a structural steel frame. This aspect is particularly apropos as Carnegie’s fortune was built through the steel industry. The house also featured an Otis passenger elevator; one of the first in New York City. The Carnegie Mansion was occupied by the Carnegies until Louise’s death in 1946, at which point ownership passed to the Carnegie Corporation. This entity leased the mansion to the New York School of Social Work until 1963. The mansion was named a national historic landmark in 1966, just three years before the Carnegie Corporation offered the building to the Smithsonian Institution.Though the Cooper-Hewitt Museum moved into the Carnegie Mansion in 1970, it did not open to the public until 1976. Before opening, the house was renovated by Hardy Holzman &amp; Pfeiffer Associates. After nearly two decades of operation, the Cooper-Hewitt Museum of Decorative Arts and Design became the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum. This was followed by another renovation in 1998, this time by Polshek &amp; Partners. The modifications were completed in 2001 and updated several galleries as well as linked the Carnegie Mansion with nearby townhomes purchased by the museum. A similar gallery redesign was executed between 2006 and 2008 by Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners and Gluckman Mayner Architects. 2011 marked the inception of the Cooper-Hewitt Museum’s most ambitious building project to date, with over $91 million of funds allocated. Diller, Scofidio + Renfro, and Local Projects were involved in the project. The museum’s library moved to a new location, an off-site collections facility was created, a satellite education space was opened, and the Carnegie Mansion galleries were completely reimagined, which expanded floor-space from 10,000 square feet to over 17,000. In 2014, the museum once again changed names, this time to Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, which coincided with the completion of the 2011 renovation. The museum also earned LEED Silver certification from the United States Green Building Council in 2015.The Cooper Hewitt Museum is the only museum in the United States devoted exclusively to historic and contemporary design. The permanent collections consist of over 210,000 objects. These include works on paper, graphic design, textiles, wallcoverings, and digital media. Galleries are typically thematic and rotate often. In addition to being a space where visitors can appreciate the history of design, the museum also strives to encourage conversation about objects and ideas. One of the museum’s largest initiatives is the annual National Design Awards. This program honors lasting achievements in American design through a dinner, ceremony, and special exhibitions. The Cooper Hewitt Museum supports education through its Master’s Program in the History of Design and Curatorial Studies, which it offers in partnership with the Parsons School of Design. Other educational programs focus on middle and high school students interested in design. A unique feature of the museum is known simply as the Pen. A Pen device is lent to all visitors when they enter the museum. When the device is tapped against a label for an item, it is saved by the Pen. Users can then examine saved items on interactive tables in the museum, or online at a later date. This revolutionary way of experiencing a museum reflects the Cooper Hewitt Museum’s emphasis on design.

The Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum is the only museum in the nation devoted exclusively to historic and contemporary design. The museum presents compelling perspectives on the impact of design on daily life through active educational and curatorial programming. Founded in 1897 by three granddaughters of industrialist Peter Cooper, the Cooper Hewitt Museum was originally under the umbrella of the Cooper Institute. The Cooper Hewitt Museum now resides in the historic Carnegie Mansion, which was constructed for industrialist Andrew Carnegie from 1898 to 1902. This space has been extensively renovated, though it retains its historical authenticity and character. A unique feature of the Cooper Hewitt is the Pen, which allows users to save items for further examination on interactive tables in the museum, or online at a later date. Cooper Hewitt continues to encourage conversation and thought about design through a variety of exhibitions, programs, and initiatives.

Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum (Andrew Carnegie Mansion)

Now one of the most significant modern and contemporary art museums in the world, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum has relatively humble origins. Solomon R. Guggenheim was a member of a wealthy Swiss family that made its fortune investing in American mining during the Gold Rush. Guggenheim attended school in Zurich, Germany before marrying Irene Rothschild. Together, the couple began collecting art by old masters in the 1890s. In 1926, a momentous meeting altered the course of Guggenheim’s interests. Hilla von Rebay was a German abstract artist who became acquainted with Guggenheim and Rothschild when she was commissioned to paint the latter’s portrait. The three art appreciators later travelled to Europe together, where Rebay kindled a love of non-objective art in Guggenheim. Guggenheim began purchasing works by European avant-garde artists such as Vasily Kandinsky, Marc Chagall, and Fernand Léger. In 1930, Guggenheim allowed the public to view his art collection housed in his apartment in the New York Plaza Hotel. Sensing a need for a more formal approach to his goals and interests, Guggenheim established the Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation in 1937.The Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation hosted its first official exhibition in 1939 and was known as the Museum of Non-Objective Painting. Non-Objective art refers specifically to a style of European art that emerged in the 1910s and 1920s. Non-Objective art tends to use shapes as the primary art elements and Non-Objective works do not correspond to anything that actually exists. This is in contrast to abstract art which uses abstraction to correspond with things that may exist. The Guggenheim Foundation’s exhibitions were some of the first opportunities to experience Non-Objective art for many Americans. As the foundation’s collection grew, so did its popularity. By the early 1940s, there was already a pressing need for a permanent exhibition space. Many architects were considered to design a museum for the foundation, but in 1943, Rebay and Guggenheim wrote a personal appeal to architect Frank Lloyd Wright. Wright was not an obvious choice to design the Guggenheim Foundation’s new museum. Though the architect was internationally renowned, his reputation came from his residential designs which integrated seamlessly with the natural world. Furthermore, Wright had little experience with the constraints of urban planning and had never designed a museum before. Despite these challenges, Wright passionately took to the task of creating the museum building. Due to changing plans, budgetary limitations, modification of designs, and creative clashes, the structure was not completed until 1959 – sixteen years after Wright was initially contracted. The completed building resembles a coiled spring rising to a monumental glass oculus. The interior of the structure is centered around the atrium under the glass oculus, with a gently sloping walkway continuously climbing skyward around the edges. Artwork is displayed directly on the walls of this walkway, and in rooms that radiate from the central rotunda. Sadly, neither Guggenheim nor Wright lived to see the completion of the museum. Guggenheim died in 1949 and the museum was renamed to the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in his memory. Wright died in 1959, just months before the museum opened. When the Guggenheim Museum opened in 1959, it garnered extreme reactions from the art world, the media, and the general public. While some lauded the museum as a triumph of engineering, others found the structure to be tastelessly distracting from the art. No commenter, however, could deny that Wright’s building was revolutionary. Until that point, museums had predominantly been historically grand – like the Louvre or Metropolitan Museums – or neutral and unassuming. The curvilinear forms and bright white exterior of the Guggenheim Museum caused it to stand out from its neighboring blocky stone buildings. On the interior, the curving walls were intended to force the art to be tilted backwards as if it were on an easel. Wright created a statement that blurred the lines between art and vessel. The legacy established by the Guggenheim Museum reverberates even today in the designs of other modern and contemporary art museums.The Guggenheim Museum expanded in 1992, when Gwathmey Siegel &amp; Associates Architects realized an additional Wright design. Wright had intended for a ten-story tower to be erected on the property, but the plan was scrapped due to financial reasons. While remaining as true to Wright’s drawings as possible, Gwathmey Siegel &amp; Associates Architects created an eight-story rectilinear gridded tower. The simple design helps complement the main building, while avoiding distraction from the architectural centerpiece. The exterior of the Guggenheim Museum building was repaired and conserved from 2005-2008. The museum building was also recognized in several ways in the twenty-first century. In 2008, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places, and in 2015, it was nominated to the UNESCO World Heritage List. The Guggenheim Museum continues to welcome visitors to see its extensive collections of modern and contemporary art in an architecturally vibrant setting.

The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is one of the most celebrated modern and contemporary art museums in the world. The Guggenheim Foundation was founded by Solomon R. Guggenheim in 1937, though the museum itself was not completed until 1959. Internationally acclaimed architect Frank Lloyd Wright designed the revolutionary museum building. By blurring the lines between vessel and art in its own right, the architecture of the Guggenheim Museum is just as significant as its holdings. Visitors can explore over fifty thousand square feet of gallery space and one of the most ambitious permanent collections of modern and contemporary art in North America. 

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

The Neue Galerie occupies the William Star Miller House, a historic mansion on Fifth Avenue. The home was constructed in 1914 for William Star Miller II, a New York industrialist and real estate developer. Carrère and Hastings – famous for designing the New York Public Library Main Branch, the Henry Clay Frick House, and many other buildings – were hired to plan the William Star Miller House. The exterior of the building suggests three primary stories, though there are actually five stories including a basement. The building was heavily inspired by King Louis XIII’s Place des Voges in Le Marais, France. This inspiration is evident in the mansard roof and stone balustrade that decorates the cornice. The general style of the structure is Neo-Classical, though the detailing and materials suggest a distinct Beaux-Arts influence. The building measures one hundred feet long by fifty feet wide, both an aesthetically pleasing proportion and an appropriate fit for a New York City lot.The interior of the William Star Miller House reflects an early twentieth century penchant for bright airy spaces. Darker hardwood floors and paneling are contrasted by crisp white marble pillars, plaster ceilings, and floor to ceiling windows. Carrère and Hastings’ Beaux-Arts touches are particularly prominent in the stairways, railings, and skylights. Miller occupied his home until his death in 1935. His wife, Edith Caroline Miller, maintained residence until her death in 1944. After Edith Miller died, the house was purchased by socialite Grace Vanderbilt, who also occupied the home until her death in 1953. The building was then utilized by the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, which stored many of their archival materials there.In 1994, art dealer Serge Sabarsky and philanthropist Ronald S. Lauder purchased the William Star Miller House. The two men had met in 1967 and bonded over their shared appreciation of Austrian and German art from the early twentieth century. Ever since their friendship began in Sabarsky’s German and Austrian Expressionist art gallery in 1967, the two had been planning to open a museum to exhibit what they felt was the pinnacle of art from this period of time. In order to make this dream a reality, Sabarsky and Lauder purchased the historic home and began renovating it into a museum space. However, Sabarsky passed away in 1996, and Lauder labored to complete the museum in his friend's honor.After extensive renovations by Annabelle Selldorf of Selldorf Architects, the Neue Galerie opened on November 16, 2001. The project’s goals were to maintain historical details while updating the museum to have necessary modern features. Fortunately for historical authenticity, the YIVO Institute boarded over the wood paneling rather than destroying it when they occupied the building. The paneling was re-revealed during the renovation. The decorative arts and fine arts intertwine throughout Neue Galerie, with furnishings and furniture complementing paintings and sculpture. The first floor serves as an entry space and hosts Café Sabarsky. The second floor is dedicated to Viennese art from the early twentieth century. Art by the Vienna Workshops, Egon Schiele, and Gustav Klimt all appear in this gallery. In 2006, the Neue Galerie purchased one of their most significant works, Klimt’s Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer I, for $135 million – at the time, the highest sum ever paid for a painting. The third floor of the Neue Galerie explores German art and also focuses on the early twentieth century. Expressionist artists Max Beckmann, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, and Emil Nolde are all well represented. Other areas of emphasis are Bauhaus artists, such as Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, and Neue Sachlichkeit artists, like Otto Dix. The Neue Galerie works to juxtapose an appreciation of the current locational culture, as well as to present to visitors a view of Germany and Austria that they may not initially associate with the countries.

The Neue Galerie in New York is a museum that is dedicated to exploring early twentieth century German and Austrian art. Formed by two friends who had a penchant for art appreciation and the decorative arts, the Neue Galerie seeks to show how these two concepts intertwine through the art that the galleries display. Additionally, the museum is located in the historic William Star Miller House, which retains much of its original character. Since its founding in 2001, the Neue Galerie has continued to enchant visitors from all across the globe. The Galerie can be found on the Museum Mile in Manhattan, where it sits alongside other museums in the area. 

Neue Galerie

The Metropolitan Museum of Art's earliest roots date back to 1866 in Paris, France, when a group of Americans agreed to create a "national institution and gallery of art" to bring art and art education to the American people. The lawyer John Jay, who proposed the idea, swiftly moved forward with the project upon his return to the United States from France. Under Jay's presidency, the Union League Club in New York rallied civic leaders, businessmen, artists, art collectors, and philanthropists to the cause. On April 13, 1870, The Metropolitan Museum of Art was incorporated, opening to the public in the Dodworth Building at 681 Fifth Avenue. The Met spent a brief period of time in the Douglas Mansion on 128 West 14th Street while architects Calvert Vaux and Jacob Wrey designed the heart of the current Met location. The building was created in a Ruskinian Gothic style, named after the seminal gothic revival architect, John Ruskin. The Met has expanded so much in the last century and a half, that the original building is now completely enclosed in newer additions.As the Met continued to grow in the final decades of the nineteenth century, more space was needed to display and store art. One of the first major additions was a Beaux-Arts Great Hall which faces Fifth Avenue. Richard Morris Hunt – already famous for designing the Statue of Liberty’s pedestal and Biltmore Estate – created the Fifth Avenue addition while he served as one of the museum’s trustees. This new space opened to the public in 1902. In 1910s, McKim, Mead &amp; White were hired to expand Hunt’s Fifth Avenue façade. The three architects added a wing on each side of the structure, increasing the total length of the Met to over a quarter mile. Though the Met consistently expanded throughout the twentieth century, the next overarching architectural project did not actualize until 1971. Kevin Roche created a masterplan for the museum which completely overhauled the space and organization. The entire project took over twenty years, and led to the creation of iconic spaces such as The Sackler Wing, which houses the Temple of Dendur, and Lila Acheson Wallace Wing, which displays modern and contemporary art. As the twentieth century wound to a close, Roche remained the primary architectural mastermind of the Met. One landmark expansion was the opening of the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Roof Garden in 1987. In addition to providing spectacular views of Central Park and the Manhattan skyline, the garden has also hosted single-artist exhibitions since 1998. Some other new spaces were created, but renovations were far more common. It was during the 1990s and early 2000s that the Met consolidated its cultural collections and gave them more distinct spaces. For example, Oceanic and Native North American galleries opened in 2007, with galleries for Turkey, Iran, Central Asia, and South Asia opening in 2011. Today, the Met boasts over 633,000 square feet of gallery space, making it the fourth largest museum in the world. With over two million works, the Metropolitan Museum of Art has extensive holdings of practically every major art movement, artist, and period. One highlight is the collection of ancient Egyptian works, the largest in the world outside of Cairo. This collection is crowned by the Temple of Dendur, a painstakingly dismantled and reconstructed place of worship from south of Aswan. Other collections of ancient art include works from Greece, Rome, Africa, Asia, and Oceania. The Met also includes extensive collections of Old Masters works, early modernist paintings, and American art from the eighteenth through twentieth centuries.Not all of the Met’s holdings are traditional visual arts. One sector of the museum includes the collection of musical instruments. There are about 5,000 instruments from all over the world displayed there. Some of the instruments displayed include the oldest surviving piano, ancient Asian instruments, and Antonio Stradivari violins. Every year, usable instruments are taken out of their displays and played by famous musicians in a concert held by the department. The Museum of Costume Art merged with the Met in 1937 and became its Costume Institute Department – another unique unit. More than 35,000 costume pieces are held within the Met, but due to the fragility of the works, they can’t be displayed year-round. Each year marks a different display theme. For example, the museum will sometimes highlight famous designer works like Coco Chanel or Versace. Other years, they will display costumes worn by famous rock stars like the Beatles or Madonna. Through a variety of object types, the Met supports their mission to educate the general public about the arts.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is the largest art museum in the United States with a permanent collection that contains more than two million works of art from all around the world. The museum opened in 1872 and is renowned for its collections, which span several millennia of art history. The Met is famous for its extensive holdings of ancient Egyptian, African, Asian, Oceanic, Byzantine, and Islamic art. In addition, the museum has works by nearly every major European Old Master, and a collection of American Art ranging from the eighteenth to twentieth century. The Met Museum showcases the importance of art throughout our history and how it reflects each era’s experiences.
 

The Metropolitan Museum of Art 

The Museum began after Judge&nbsp;Mayer Sulzberger donated a collection of art to the Jewish Theological Seminary library. With the donation, he made a suggestion that a museum be created for similar works like the ones he donated. The library served as a museum until 1944 when&nbsp;Frieda Schiff Warburg donated her mansion on 92nd street to the Jewish Theological Seminary. The mansion was to be used as a museum for Jewish art, and thus, the Warburg's mansion has served as the Jewish Museum since 1947.&nbsp; However, the Museum has expanded beyond the original mansion. In 1959, a sculpture&nbsp;court was built beside the mansion. Then, in 1963, a new building, the Albert A. List Building, was constructed to add additional space for the Museum. This would only be the beginning of the Museum's expansion. Under the leadership of Joan Rosenbaum, the&nbsp;Helen Goldsmith Menschel Director of the Museum from 1981 to 2011, the Museum doubled in size to add room for educational programs and exhibits.&nbsp; During the expansion from 1990 to 1993, a permanent exhibit was incorporated into a two-floor plan. The exhibit is called Culture and Continuity: The Jewish Journey. There are 800 works of art in this exhibit, and these works trace the Jewish experience from antiquity to present day. According to the Museum's website, this exhibit explores two important questions: "How has Judaism been able to thrive for thousands of years across the globe, often in difficult and even tragic circumstances? What constitutes the essence of Jewish identity?" The exhibit tries to answer these questions by showing how Jewish culture has adapted to changing circumstances while holding strong to Jewish values.&nbsp;

Founded in 1904 with just 26 donated objects, the Jewish Museum of New York now contains almost 30,000 items including art, ceremonial objects, and media. The museum is one of the oldest museums dedicated to Jewish history in the world and the oldest in the United States. The mission of the Museum is to show how art mixes with Jewish culture. By devoting their efforts to this mission, the Jewish Museum helps expose the public to Jewish customs and history, while also helping define the Jewish identity. 

The Jewish Museum of New York

The obelisk in New York holds many questions. Alongside the contents in the time capsule underneath, there was also a small box that was placed outside. The contents of this box are unknown, but we believe the man who put it there to be Henry G. Stebbins. This was the man in charge of the purchase and the obelisk’s transportation. Stated earlier, the obelisk was built around 3,500 years ago in Egypt. This was built in order to celebrate Pharaoh Thutmose III’s 30th year under reign. Thutmose III’s reign concluded about 100 years before King Tut's reign. His reign lasted for 54 years, which is considerably longer than most rule. These obelisks gained the names of Cleopatra’s Needles because they were initially placed in front of a temple that was constructed under Cleopatra, the Caesarium.  In 1879, the US purchased one of the three obelisks. Later in the year, there was ongoing preparation for the obelisk’s arrival. The logic was to place it near the middle of Central Park so it wouldn’t be enveloped by skyscrapers or larger buildings. However, moving the actual monument itself was a large task. Since it weighed over 200 tons and was about 70 feet tall, it created some problems in the start, just making it harder to transport. There were 3 main stages of this transportation: it had to be transported to Alexandria, then moved to a ship with aid beams, and finally unloaded in New York to load onto a truck into the city. Cleopatra’s needle didn’t actually reach New York City until 1880. Then another year passed until on January 21, 1881, they actually raised the needle itself. The event of raising it had about 10,000 people watching in awe.  This obelisk has become an attraction in New York City which demonstrates the vast history behind the city. Cleopatra’s needle also goes to show the lengths that were taken to just get a monument in place.  The other needles, ones in Paris and London also had interesting stories of their arrival. Unlike the United States, the English did not have to pay for their needle. It was a gift from Muhammad Ali Pasha, the Ottoman ruler. But, stepping back a bit, the obelisk was originally put up in the city of Heliopolis based on orders from Pharaoh Thutmose III, cerca 1450 BCE. It remained there until Pasha gifted it to Britain. Robert Jenkinson, the British Prime Minister at the time, didn’t take delivery of the obelisk as the shipping expenses and time were immense. It remained in Alexandria until 1877 where the expenses were funded by surgeon, William James Erasmus Wilson.  Paris had a different situation. Cleopatra’s Needle seems to cover the obelisks in New York, London, and Paris. But, what most people don’t know is that this needle was not constructed in pair with the others. This needle is actually referred to as the “Luxor Obelisk”. This obelisk was given to France in exchange of a French mechanical clock. Also, believed to be stolen sometime during the 6th century was the original cap. This was later replaced by the French in 1998 with a cap that was covered in gold leaf.

The obelisk is located in Central Park in New York City. Better known as Cleopatra’s Needle, it is man-made but weighs an astonishing 440,000lb., stands at over 69 feet, and was constructed over 3,000 years ago. Alongside the one in New York, there are two identical others in London and Paris. Carved on the side are ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. The Egyptians gifted an obelisk to London, but the United States had to buy theirs. Under the obelisk in New York, there is a time capsule buried under with a dictionary, copy of the Declaration of independence, all of Shakespeare’s works, a 1870 United States Census, and a guide to Egypt.


Cleopatra's Needle

Belvedere Castle is located in Central Park in New York City. The Caste was designed in 1867 by Calvert Vaux. Vaux was a British architect who won a competition in 1857 to design Central Park with his partner, Frederick Law Olmsted. Ten years later, Vaux was put in charge of designing Belvedere Castle, which was to serve as a Victorian Folly. A folly was meant to serve no real purpose. Instead, a folly was a decoration for the park, to be admired for its beauty. Vaux's design did just that, as he incorporated elements of both Gothic and Romanesque architecture into the Castle, which had no windows or doors when it was first built.&nbsp; The Castle continued to serve no significant function until 1919 when the United States Weather Bureau started using the Castle to record weather data for Central Park since the Castle sat elevated above the Park. The weather for Central Park was recorded on Fifth Avenue and 64th Street prior to the move. To better prepare the Castle for weather observation functions, doors and windows were added and offices were built inside the Castle. The Weather Bureau still uses the Castle to record weather data today, though most of it is automated and the offices have been moved elsewhere since the 1960s.&nbsp; After the Weather Bureau left, the Castle was neglected for a time, and it fell into disrepair by the 1980s. However, in 1983, the Central Park Conservancy stepped in to renovate the Castle and turned it into a visitor's center with a new turret and rebuilt pavilions. An observatory, known as the Henry Luce Nature Observatory, was added in 1996. The Observatory includes nature exhibits and bird-watching tools.&nbsp;

Belvedere Castle was designed in 1867 by Calvert Vaux, who was the Central Park designer and architect at the time. The Castle was designed in a Gothic style with Romanesque features to be a Victorian Folly, which means it originally had no function other than being an ornament for Central Park. Further improvements were made to the Castle in 1919 when the Central Park Observatory was moved there by the United States Weather Bureau. The Castle is still used today to record data for the Weather Bureau, but it was converted in 1983 to serve mainly as a visitor's center for guests to Central Park. 

Belvedere Castle

Albert Smith Bickmore developed the proposal for the American Museum of Natural History. After gaining support, the Museum was created in 1869, and the first President was John David Wolfe. However, exhibits did not go up until 1971 in the Museum's first building on the eastern side of central park, which would later be abandoned for a larger location in Manhattan Square.&nbsp; Throughout the late 19th and early 20th century, the Museum was involved in groundbreaking projects of exploration that included expeditions to the North Pole, Siberia, Mongolia, Gobi, and the Congo. During this time, new sections of the Museum were also opened, including the African Mammals Hall and the Hall of Ocean Life. New halls would continue to open throughout the 20th century, making the Museum one of the most important research and public learning centers in the world.&nbsp; In the 1990s and 2000s, the Museum continued to grow, as it still does today, adding new attractions for visitors and researchers. New facilities for the Museum's research library were opened in 1992, a Zeiss Star Projector was built in 1999, and the Museum started hosting overnight stays for families with its A Night at the Museum program in 2006. By adding new exhibits and activities, along with continued projects of exploration, the American Museum of Natural History continues to push deeper into the realm of knowledge, providing a service to society that will not be forgotten.&nbsp;

Founded in 1969, the American Museum of Natural History has been one of the world's preeminent science and research institutions, renowned for its collections and exhibitions. The Museum consists of 25 buildings which are all interconnected. Throughout the Museum, there are 40 exhibition halls, providing tours for visitors and learning opportunities for adults and children alike. The Museum is committed to discovering and circulating information about cultures, nature, and the universe. 

American Museum of Natural History

<div>In the Museum, some of its highly regarded exhibits include&nbsp;WWII &amp; NYC, Grant and Lee in War and Peace, and Alexander Hamilton: The Man Who Made America, to name just a few. There is also an extensive art collection within the museum that contains over 1.6 million pieces of prized artwork from paintings by Rembrandt Peale to Thomas Cole. The collection includes Hudson River School paintings, genre and historical paintings, and even sculptures by artists like Elie Nadelman.&nbsp;</div><div> </div><div>The New-York Historical Society also contains the Patricia D. Klingenstein Library. According to the NY Historical Society website, the library contains more than three million books, pamphlets, maps, atlases, newspapers, broadsides, music sheets, manuscripts, prints, and architectural drawings. The collections within the library cover many periods of US History including the colonial times and the founding of the United States, as well as containing several documents pertaining to slavery and post-Civil War Reconstruction. Also housed within the massive collection of the Library are several artifacts covering 19th-century literature and poetry as well as several resources for research on various topics, such as education and philanthropy.&nbsp;</div><div> </div><div>The New-York Historical Library houses several programs, including The Henry Luce III Center for the Study of American Culture. It's located on the 4th floor of the museum and appeals especially to the visual senses by allowing visitors to browse over 40,000 historical artifacts all in one place. These include a vast collection of Tiffany lamps to a replica of what George Washington's campsite would have looked like during the Revolutionary War. &nbsp;It also contains some quirkier items, such as a vast collection of board games from the late 19th century. &nbsp;There are interactive sections and audio guides so visitors can be at ease while browsing the center. &nbsp;Other features of the New-York Historical Society include the DiMenna Children's History Museum and the New York Historical Society Education Center, which offers a wide variety of school programs to help equip young people with research skills.&nbsp;</div><div> </div>

The New York Historical Museum and Library was founded in 1804. It is the state's oldest museum and prides itself in offering historical documents on U.S. and New York history, exhibitions, and artwork. It is seventy years older than the Museum of Metropolitan of Art. The New-York Historical Society Museum functions as a place of research and fosters discussions on issues focusing on the making of history and historiography. 

New York Historical Society Museum and Library

While strolling through Central Park many sites can be seen. One of the most memorable sites is Strawberry Fields. This 5.3 acre tear-drop shaped section of the park was dedicated to musician John Lennon, by his wife Yoko Ono, on October 9, 1985. Though this part of the park has become one of the most famous places to see, the city was reluctant to make this monument for Yoko when she requested for it to be built because the city wanted to preserve all of its 843 acres. Yoko had to obtain contributions from more than 50 different countries. All the countries that contributed are symbolically represented within the site.

Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono Lennon, worked with landscape architect, Bruce Kelly, and Central Park Conservancy to create a meditative spot for people to enjoy. The Black-and-white mosaic was created by Italian craftsmen and given as a gift by the city of Naples. Based on a Greco-Roman design, it bears the words of another one of Lennon's songs: Imagine. A designated Quiet Zone in the Park, the memorial is shaded by stately American elms and lined with benches. In the warmer months, flowers bloom all around the area. Along the path near the mosaic, you'll find a bronze plaque that lists the 121 countries that endorse Strawberry Fields as a Garden of Peace." Even today, visitors might hear inspiring musicians sitting around the memorial playing tunes made famous by The Beatles, the band that John Lennon was a part of.

From the New York City Parks' Website: "This tranquil section of Central Park was named after one of Lennon's favorite songs, "Strawberry Fields Forever." Recorded in 1966, the song's title comes from an orphanage in Liverpool, England where Lennon used to go to play with the children. &nbsp;

Strawberry Fields is a section of Central Park West that was proposed by Yoko Ono. It serves as both a tribute to musician John Lennon and as a place for quiet reflection about Lennon's message of peace. The Black-and-white central mosaic bears the word "Imagine," the title of one of Lennon's many songs about peace. Strawberry Fields was opened and officially dedicated to Lenon on October 9, 1985. 

Strawberry Fields 

Located at 72nd
Street Cross Drive, Bethesda Terrace, provides views of the woods and Central
Park Lake. It was one of the first architectural structures to be built within
Central Park. The construction of the terrace began in 1859, and it continued
to be built throughout the years of the Civil War. The final structure was
finished in 1863. Bethesda Terrace includes both an upper and a lower terrace.
They are connected by two staircases on the sides, and a smaller staircase
leading directly to the Mall, which is a long pathway that leads straight to
the terrace. 

The terrace was
constructed from New Brunswick sandstone, Roman brink, and granite for the
landings and steps. The upper terrace is on the side of 72nd street,
and is the place where many tourists see the amazing views that Central Park
has to offer. The lower terrace connects the Mall and views of the legendary
Bethesda Fountain. 

The designers of
the terrace, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, both agreed that their
plan would include nature and not only architecture when designing the
structure. The stated the terrace would be known as “the heart of the park”.
Olmsted and Vaux imagined the terrace to be a place where visitors could
experience all the nature around them while participating in social events.
Bethesda Terrace was created to be a haven from the bustling New York City
life. &nbsp;

The designer of
the Bethesda Fountain, Jacob Wrey Mould, supported Vaux and Olmsted and decided
to add nature to the designs of the fountain that lies on the terrace. The
decorative designs of the fountain incorporated Vaux’s ideas that he included
within the terrace. Mould carved many different aspects of nature in the
fountain including, the times of the day and the four seasons of the year. He
also included images of birds and plants that can be found near the terrace. 

Bethesda Terrace
has changed in many different ways throughout the decades. In the 1960’s the
terrace included a restaurant that fulfilled the wishes of the designers as a
place for social events. In the 1970’s, it was used for a place for drug-trafficking
before it was restored in the 1980’s by the Central Park Conservancy. Since the
1980’s only a few changes have been made to the Bethesda Terrace. Ornamental
poles with medieval banners were added in the vista, and many old tiles have
been replaced on the steps. Today, many people visit the Bethesda Terrace in
hopes of seeing spectacular views, and hearing the sounds of the street
performers coming from the lower terrace.

Known as the heart of Central Park, Bethesda Fountain and the terraces that surround it are one of the most popular attractions in New York City. The terrace was made to overlook the lake in the middle of Central Park. With many sculptures throughout the terrace and the landscaped gardens and fountain at the center, this has become one of the highlights of Central Park. 

Bethesda Fountain and Terrace

This statue began as an idea from a Denmark native Alma Dahlerup, who later became the president of the Danish-American Woman’s Association of New York. The Danish baroness previously worked to promote Andersen’s fairytales by having them read over the radio. Over the years, she and other supporters worked on finding a place for readings for area children, and with the help of the New York City Parks Commissioner, Robert Moses, the City Department of Parks and Recreation and the Central Park Conservancy approved this location for both a statue and a place for the reading of children's books.With the help of both Denmark and American school students, the project secured donations, and the children raised about 75,000 dollars. In 1954, Danish-American sculptor George Lober was commissioned to craft the statue which was revealed to the public the following year on the author's 150th birthday. To this day, local and well-known guest readers sit near this state to read Andersen’s fairytales to area children.As time passed, the statue not only became a place for children, it also became a symbol of good relations between both Denmark and the United States. The royal family of Demark still visits the Andersen Statue as a tradition that was started by Queen Margrethe II parents. Which Queen Margrethe II visited in 1976.Hans Christian Andersen was born in Odense, Denmark on April 2, 1805. He grew up in a poor family and dreamed of becoming rich at a young age. His father died when he was just a mere boy of 11 years old. A few years later, at age 14, he left home for good. Andersen decided to try his luck in Copenhagen, Denmark. He lived in the poor part of town and got jobs such as an actor, a singer, and a dancer, but these jobs did not have any success for him. At seventeen, Andersen was able to go back to school. It took him seven years to complete school and as his victory, he wrote his first narrative in 1828. This was a major success for him as a writer and his life was just beginning as a writer.By the time of his death in 1874, not only was Andersen a well-known writer but he had written over a hundred and fifty stories. Some of his most popular stories and fairytales include The Ugly Duckling, The Emperor’s New Clothes, The Princess and the Pea, The Nightingale, The Red Shoes, The Match Girl, Thumbelina, and The Little Mermaid.

Created in the mid-1950s, Central Park's Hans Christian Andersen Statue has been a favorite storytime location for area children featuring guest readers. Andersen is well known for his fairy tales such as "The Ugly Duckling," "Thumbelina," "The Princess and the Pea," and many other works. He is also the author of "The Little Mermaid" which became a Disney movie in 1989. The statue was dedicated on September 18, 1956, by the Danish American Women’s Association. Many children from Danish and American backgrounds helped by raising around $75,000 for the statue. 

Hans Christian Andersen Statue

Henry Clay Frick was born in 1849 to a modest family in southern Pennsylvania. Frick developed an aptitude for quality bookkeeping and amassed a small amount of money. In 1871, Frick began investing in the coke industry, a necessary product for the creation of steel. Within a decade of business expansion, Frick owned almost eighty percent of the coke used in Pittsburgh. This caused Frick to move to the city, where he married Adelaide Childs, daughter of another business magnate. The couple had four children together, with two surviving past childhood. Helen Frick, born in 1888, was particularly important to the history of the Frick Collection. For many years, Frick engaged in business in partnership with Andrew Carnegie, a Pittsburgh steel manufacturer. However, Frick’s heavy-handed approaches to labor disputes and union-busting soured the two men’s relationship, and in 1905, Frick distanced himself from Pittsburgh and moved to New York.While living in New York, Frick’s interest in collecting art increased. The businessman began collecting in his late forties, though the pace at which he acquired work rapidly accelerated later in life. By 1913, Frick wanted to build a new home, while also ensuring that his collection would be visible for future generations. He contracted Carrère and Hastings to design a grand building that would serve as a house for Frick in the present, and a museum in the future. The final project cost $5 million – over $131 million adjusted for inflation – and the result was a spectacular beaux-arts manor. Despite being located in the heart of a major city, the expansive gardens and relatively low profile of the building help enforce an impression of a serene country estate. Frick occupied the home for only a couple years before passing away in 1919. In his will, Frick bequeathed the home, the furnishing, and all the art it contained to the creation of a new gallery known as The Frick Collection.After her father’s death, Helen Frick became increasingly engaged with The Frick Collection. One of her first projects was the creation of The Frick Art Reference Library. This institution strived to continue Henry Frick’s promotion of the arts and arts knowledge. The library was initially housed in the basement of the family home before being moved to a simple Indiana limestone building at 6 East 71st street. The structure was designed by the same Hastings who designed the Frick House, and was intended to house Frick’s sculpture collection. Adelaide Frick, Henry Frick’s wife, continued to occupy the home until 1931. When she passed away that year, the trustees of the Frick Collection began preparing the home for public access. John Russel Pope – who designed many American institutions such as the National Archives, Jefferson Memorial, and National Gallery of Art – was hired to convert the Frick residence into a museum. Pope added two galleries, created a combination lecture hall and music room, and designed the Garden Court. The architect also designed a new building that was appended to the Frick House and contained the library.Following Pope’s redesign of the Frick House, The Frick Collection officially opened to the public in 1935. Many notable names were at the opening ceremony including the Lindberghs, Carnegies, Mellons, Rockefellers, Vanderbilts, and more. Though the Frick House functions as a museum, it also reflects its history as a house as well. Works of art are arranged aesthetically rather than by period, type, or style. The house was decorated by the hands of two interior designers. Sir Charles Allom decorated the first floor, which contained the Frick House’s public spaces and meeting rooms, while Elsie de Wolfe decorated the second floor, which contained the Frick family’s private spaces. All furnishings, details, and materials were chosen to complement the art. Though the interior remains virtually untouched, changes to the grounds were made in the late 1930s, most notably, the addition of three iconic magnolia trees in the Fifth Avenue Garden. The only major renovations since the 1930s occurred in 1977. Russell Page designed a new garden on Seventieth Street and created a pavilion to accommodate guest services. The museum had initially planned on expanding again in 2014, but the community was opposed to the loss of a garden this would entail. New plans for expansion are underway with guidance from several historic architects and horticulturists.The Frick Collections’ holdings are simultaneously eclectic and unified. Works are primarily European, ranging from the Renaissance through Early Modernist art. Italian, Spanish, Dutch, and French works are represented, with one of the museum’s highlights being a room devoted to Jean-Honoré Fragonard, a Rococo painter. In addition to the copious amounts of antique furniture, The Frick Collection also includes a variety of eighteenth-century decorative objects, such as Limoges enamels and Oriental rugs. A large portion of the decorative arts in the collection were purchased from J. P. Morgan. The Frick Collection continues to promote art education through exhibitions, workshops, and concert and lecture series. The unique manner in which the art is displayed help visitors experience Frick’s collection as the previous owner once did.

The Frick Collection was formed from industrialist Henry Clay Frick’s personal art collection in 1935. The collection consists of works associated with Old Master paintings along with European sculptures and decorative arts. The Frick resides in Frick’s New York City residence, which he built with the understanding that it would one day become a museum. For this reason, the galleries are arranged aesthetically, rather than by particular themes. Frick’s home has changed extremely little and allows visitors to view works of art, architecture, and furnishings in the same way Frick would have. Aside from the collection, the Museum hosts special exhibitions, concert series, lectures and other educational programs. The goal of the collection is to preserve and deepen the appreciation of art.

The Frick Collection

As the United States mobilized for the Great War (now referred to as World War I), the Seventh New York Infantry, a unit which traced its origins back hundreds of years to the American Revolution, officially became the 107th Infantry Regiment and was placed in the Fifty-Fourth Brigade, Twenty-Seventh Division. The regiment drilled in the Sheep Meadow, not far from where its monument stands today, before shipping out to Europe and the Western Front with 2,995 officers and men in May 1918. Between September 24 and October 21 of that same year, the 107th Infantry, with the rest of the Twenty-Seventh Division, took part in the Allied Somme Offensive, which successfully broke Germany’s defensive Hindenburg Line and helped bring an end to the war. The 107th Infantry saw heavy fighting during the assault, including brutal hand-to-hand combat. By late March 1919, the entire regiment had returned home from Europe. During its service on the Western Front, the 107th Infantry suffered 1,918 casualties. Of the casualties, 437 were killed in action, 1,383 were wounded, and another ninety-eight later succumbed to their wounds.  One of the men of the 107th Infantry was Karl Illava (1896-1954). The son of a successful New York City starch manufacturer, Illava served as a dispatch rider during the war and rose to the rank of sergeant major. Before the war, he was a sculptor and spent three years studying under Gutzon Borglum, the man who would later create the Mount Rushmore National Memorial. After the war, Illava returned to New York City and resumed his artistic career. At some point, the Seventh Regiment New York 107th United Infantry Memorial Committee commissioned Illava to sculpt a memorial to commemorate the regiment’s service in the Great War. Taking inspiration from his own experience in the conflict, he went to work at his studio in Elmsford in Westchester County. Unbeknownst to Illava at the time, the memorial to the 107th Infantry would become his most famous work. On September 27, 1927, the ninth anniversary of the regiment’s breaking through the Hindenburg Line at St. Quentin Canal, the monument was revealed to a crowd of a few thousand people and honored guests. Perched on a stepped granite pedestal designed by New York architects Rogers and Haneman, the bronze sculpture, cast in Italy, depicts seven anonymous larger-than-life-sized soldiers of the 107th Infantry in action. Three of the men, with courageous and determined expressions on their faces, appear to advance forward with rifles in hand and bayonets fixed. Two others help two wounded comrades, one with a dressing wrapped around his head and the other completely limp and barely alive. Rather than glorify or romanticize war, Illava’s work portrays it as brutal, chaotic, and deadly, while still commemorating the bravery and sacrifices of the men of the 107th Infantry during the Great War. The monument to the 107th Infantry remained in the location at which it was dedicated until the 1950s. In 1954, the City of New York moved the monument to its current location, where East Sixty-Seventh Street meets Fifth Avenue. Originally, the monument was closer to where Sixty-Fifth Street meets Fifth Avenue, but it was relocated about a block north to make way for a new east-west road into Central Park.

Designed by sculptor Karl Illava, the 107th Infantry Memorial honors the men who served in the regiment during the First World War. Between September 24 and October 21, 1918, the New York regiment took part in the Allied Somme Offensive, which successfully broke Germany’s defensive Hindenburg Line and helped to bring an end to the war. The unit saw heavy fighting during the assault, including brutal hand-to-hand combat. On September 27, 1927, the ninth anniversary of the regiment’s breaking through the Hindenburg Line at St. Quentin Canal, the monument to the 107th Infantry was revealed to a crowd of a few thousand people and honored guests. It remained in the location at which it was dedicated until 1954, when the City of New York moved it about a block north to its current location, where East Sixty-Seventh Street meets Fifth Avenue, to make way for a new east-west road into Central Park. 

107th Infantry Memorial

In January 1925, a deadly diphtheria outbreak struck the small, remote Alaskan town of Nome. The nearest supply of life-saving anti-toxin serum was located in Anchorage, several hundred miles to the southeast. The harsh Alaskan winter made air and sea travel impossible. The only hope of getting the medicine to Nome in a timely fashion was to ship it by rail to Nenana, the closest train station to Nome, and from there use dogsled teams to complete the long overland journey. Once the precious, twenty-pound, fur-cloaked package of anti-toxin serum arrived at the train station in Nenana, twenty sled teams composed of over 200 dogs relayed the medicine round-the-clock through feet of snow, gale-force winds, and subzero temperatures for 674 miles. Completing the final fifty-three-mile leg of the journey to Nome was a sled team led by musher Gunnar Kaasen and a Black and white Siberian Huskey named Balto. The team arrived in Nome on the morning of February 2. In all, the dogsled teams completed the nearly 700-mile journey in just over five days. In the process, not one vial of anti-toxin serum was damaged.  While it was unfolding, the race to get the life-saving anti-toxin serum to Nome garnered both national and international attention. After successfully completing his leg of the journey, Balto became an overnight celebrity and, along with Kaasen, embarked on a tour of the United States. Not long after, a group of New York City artists led by renowned portraitist Cecilia Beaux began calling for the creation of a statue in honor of Balto and the other sled dogs that helped save so many lives in Nome. Under the auspices of the Municipal Arts Society, they began raising money, mostly through private donations. The group commissioned Brooklyn-born sculptor Frederick George Richard Roth, best known for his bronze portrayals of living animals, to design it. On December 17, 1925, only ten months after the famous journey, the statue was unveiled in Central Park. Made of bronze, the statue—a likeness of Balto standing proudly and sporting a sleigh harness— is anchored into a natural rock outcropping. On the face of the outcropping is mounted a bronze dedicatory plaque with a sled dog team motif. In attendance at the unveiling ceremony was Kaasen and Balto. To this day, Balto’s statue is the only one in Central Park to have had its honoree present at the dedication ceremony. After the statue’s unveiling, the National Academy of Design awarded Roth the 1925 Speyer Prize for the work.  Balto lived out his later years at the Brookside Zoo (now the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo), where countless visitors came to catch a glimpse of the famous canine. In 1933, at the age of fourteen, he died of natural causes. Balto’s body was taxidermically preserved and put on display at the Cleveland Natural History Museum, where it and an exhibit on him can still be viewed today. Several decades later, director Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment introduced a new generation to the story of famous pooch and the race to get the life-saving medicine to Nome with his 1995 animated film, Balto.

Designed by sculptor Frederick George Richard Roth, the bronze canine statue honors the more than 200 sled dogs that helped to transport vital medicine to the people of Nome, Alaska during a diphtheria outbreak in the winter of 1925. Completing the final fifty-three-mile leg of the nearly 700-mile journey from Nenana to Nome was a sled team led by musher Gunnar Kaasen and a Black and white Siberian Huskey named Balto. While it was unfolding, the race to get the life-saving anti-toxin serum to Nome garnered both national and international attention. After successfully completing his leg of the journey, Balto became an overnight celebrity and, along with Kaasen, embarked on a tour of the United States. Soon after, a group of New York City artists began calling for the creation of a statue in honor of Balto and the other sled dogs that helped save so many lives in Nome. Under the auspices of the Municipal Arts Society, they began raising money, mostly through private donations. On December 17, 1925, only ten months after the famous journey, the bronze statue of Balto was unveiled in Central Park. In 1933, at the age of fourteen, Balto died of natural causes. His body was taxidermically preserved and put on display at the Cleveland Natural History Museum, where it can still be viewed today. 

Balto Statue

Born enslaved as Isabella Baumfree in Ulster County, New York in 1797, Sojourner Truth escaped from her owner in 1827 and fled to a nearby abolitionist family, which bought her freedom. The following year, she moved to New York City, where she worked for a minister, converted to Christianity, and participated in the religious revivals of the Second Great Awakening. In 1843, believing that God had called her to travel and preach the truth to the people, she changed her name to Sojourner Truth and became an itinerant preacher. During her travels, Truth met prominent abolitionists William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass. The former’s organization encouraged her to begin delivering anti-slavery speeches across the country. Truth also met Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, which inspired her to fight for women’s rights, including the right to vote. In 1851, at a women’s rights convention in Akron, Ohio, she delivered her famous “Ain’t I a Woman?” speech, in which she spoke out against gender and racial inequality. During the Civil War, Truth encouraged enlistments in the Union Army and gathered supplies to send to Black troops. During Reconstruction, she received an invitation to the White House, worked with the Freedmen’s Bureau, and spoke out against racial segregation in the South. Truth died in Michigan in 1883.  Born into a family of privilege in Johnstown, New York in 1815, Elizabeth Cady Stanton received a top-notch formal education during her early years. In 1840, she married abolitionist lecturer, Henry Stanton. Like her husband, she became active in the antislavery movement and, in the process, met many prominent abolitionists, such as William Lloyd Garrison and the Grimke sisters. Infuriated by the exclusion of women at the World Anti-Slavery Convention in London in 1840, Stanton along with fellow abolitionist Lucretia Mott decided to organize a women’s rights convention in the United States, which later became the Seneca Falls Convention in 1848. At the meeting, some of those in attendance signed the “Declaration of Sentiments,” of which Stanton was the principal author. Taking inspiration from the Declaration of Independence, the document asserted that all men and women are created equal and ought to have equal rights, including the right to vote. In 1851, Stanton met Susan B. Anthony and the two commenced a friendship and professional partnership that would span decades. During the Civil War, Stanton supported the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery. Along with Anthony, she founded the National Woman Suffrage Association in 1869, which advocated for a constitutional amendment giving women the right to vote. She also wrote for the organization’s newspaper, The Revolution. In October 1902, Stanton died in New York City.  Born into a Quaker family in Adams, Massachusetts in 1820, Susan B. Anthony learned at a young age the values of her faith. Among those was equality, an idea which would inform her later activism. While living with her family in upstate New York, Anthony met prominent abolitionists William Lloyd Garrison and Frederick Douglass. Both men, in fact, were friends of her father and were often guests in the family’s home. Inspired by their work, Anthony became an abolitionist and began traveling the country delivering antislavery speeches. In 1851, she met Elizabeth Cady Stanton and began a friendship and professional partnership that would influence the women’s rights movement in the United States for the remainder of the nineteenth century. With Stanton, she founded the National Woman Suffrage Association in 1869. Three years later, in 1872, Anthony was arrested for voting, an incident which brought the women’s suffrage movement national attention. Throughout the remainder of her life, she tirelessly advocated for women’s suffrage, traveling the country giving speeches, collecting signatures for petitions, and lobbying Congress for a women’s suffrage amendment to the Constitution. Anthony died in New York in 1906.  In 2014, the all-volunteer non-profit group Monumental Women was founded with the goal of creating the first monument in Central Park to honor actual women, as opposed to fictional female characters. Over the course of several years, the organization raised over $1.5 million in private donations. It commissioned renowned sculptor Meredith Bergmann to create the monument. Unveiled in August 2020, the centennial of the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the monument consists of three over-life-sized bronze likenesses of Sojourner Truth, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony on an elongated oval granite pedestal. The Women’s Rights Pioneers Monument was the first to be added to the park since 1965.

Located at the southern end of the Mall in New York City’s Central Park, the Women’s Rights Pioneers Monument honors the lives and work of Sojourner Truth, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Susan B. Anthony. Sponsored by the all-volunteer non-profit group Monumental Women and designed by renowned sculptor Meredith Bergmann, the monument consists of three over-life-sized bronze likenesses of the early women’s rights advocates on an elongated oval granite pedestal. Unveiled in August 2020, it commemorates the centennial of the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees women the right to vote. The first to be added to Central Park since 1965, the Women’s Rights Pioneers Monument is also the first in the park’s history to depict actual women, as opposed to fictional female characters. 

Women's Rights Pioneers Monument

For Sir Walter Scott’s 100th birthday, immigrants
living in New York but from Scotland came together and decided to place a
monument of Sir Walter Scott in Central Park. John Steell was asked to sculpt
the monument and would later sculpt the Robert Burns Statue that sits across from
the Scott Monument. When Steell sculpted the Scott Monument, he sculpted it to
where Scott is sitting on a rock, he is wearing a loose clock and shoes for the
workingman. He is also holding a book and pen. Scott’s dog, Maida, is also
sculpted into the monument. 

In 1872 on November 2nd, a little after the
unveiling of William Shakespeare Monument, the Sir Walter Scott Monument was
unveiled. There was a celebration at the unveiling and many people came and
spoke about Scott and the future he will impact or has impacted already. 

As of 1936, the Scott Monument was repaired from the
years before from weather and the public. And then in 1993, the monument became
part of the Adopt-A-Monument Program. The monument is now funded by the Saint
Andrew’s Society, that now cares for and repairs any damages.

Sir Walter Scott was born in 1771 on August 15th.
He was born to a father who was lawyer and a mother whose father was a
physician. Scott had the best education, where he attended high school in Edinburgh
and went to grammar school as well. He was to become a lawyer like his father,
who he apprenticed under. Which he did not attend to for long because he wanted
concentrate on reading in different languages. He became a translator for
books. He translated works by John Dryden, who wrote the popular poem “Lady of
the Lake” and Jonathan Swift in his eighteenth and nineteenth volume books that
were published from 1808 to 1815. 

By 1814, he became to tire from other people’s works
and decided to finish a book he started in 1805, which was his book “Waverley”.
It became a sensation of a novel and of of his most popular. Then over the next
couple of years, he wrote “Ivanhoe”, “Rob Roy”, “The Heart of Midlothian” and “The
Bride of Lammermoor”.

In 1832, he died due to heart complications. He never
really became rich for his writings but he would become world famous for his contribution
to Scotland history, where he was able to find the crown jewels that were
hidden for 100 years in Edinburgh Castle and that of his own writings, that are
still read today.&nbsp;

The Sir Walter Scott Monument sits across from the Robert Burns Statue that sit in the Literacy Mall of Central Park. The monument was dedicated in 1872 by the sculptor John Steell, who also did the Burns Statue. Sir Walter Scott was known for his contribution to Scotland history and for his novels as well. He was also able to translate many books for society at that time. Scott sits with his dog on the monument while holding a book and pen. 

Sir Walter Scott Monument 

The statue that sits in Central Park, New York City of Robert Burns was dedicated in 1880, a few years after the Sir Walter Scott Statue was erected in 1872. After the unveiling of the Scott Statue, a committee formed shortly after to get a monument of Burns. They were both created by the same sculptor by the name of Sir John Steell. Steell was “appointed Sculptor of the Queen of Scotland” which he went on and created four statues of Burns around the world. When Steell created the Robert Burns Statue in New York, he had Burns sitting on a tree stump, with a pen, and his eyes were looking up into the sky. Steell thought this gave Burns “a pose of inspiration”. Then at the bottom of the statue there is a poem for his lost love, Mary Campbell, who died unexpectedly. On October 3rd, 1880, more than 5,000 people attended the unveiling. People from clubs dressed in Highland costume and there was also a band called Grafulla’s Band.Throughout the years, the statue has been reconstructed. Once in 1940, due to an unstable pedestal. It was again reconstructed in 1993, the pen was stolen, so they had it replicated. The statue than become part of the Adopt-A-Monument Program, that helped restore a lot of monuments out there today. Since then, the Saint Andrew’s Society now funds the caring of the Robert Burn Statue. And then in 1996, hundreds of people gathered for the bicentennial of his death, where a lot of programs and foundations supported the event.Robert Burns was born January 25th, 1759
and was William Burnes and Agnes Broun first born child. His parents were
tenant farms who really did not have a lot of money. Growing up Burns would
find time from working on the farm to write poetry. After his father died in
1784, Burns fathered a child out of wedlock and then had another child with
someone else as well. When he could not marry the second women, Jean Amour, due
to her father, he began seeing Mary Campbell who would become his long-lost
love when she died unexpectedly. 

As of 1786, Burns published his first book of poems in
Kilmarnock, where they became popular. He took this as a good sign and left the
farm for Edinburgh. Over the years, Burns wrote a second book of poetry but it
still did not help with money and by 1788, he was tenant farming again and
married to Jean Amour and would have nine children all together.

However, by 1791, Burns gave up farming for good.
Burns and his family then moved to Bumfries that was not too far away and he
got a job as a tax collector. While doing this, he was able to continue writing
until his death in 1796 at the age of 37. Burns’ most popular writings include “Auld
Lang Syne”, the unofficial New Years’ Song, “A Red, Red Rose” and “The Battle
of Sherramuir”.

The Robert Burns Statue was an idea after the Sir Walter Scott Statue was erected in 1872. These two statues sit across from one another. The statue was sculpted by Sir John Steell, who also did the Sir Walter Scott Statue. The Robert Burns Statue was unveiled on October 3rd, 1880 and there was a big celebration of more than 5,000 people. Over the years, the statue has been reconstructed and been taken care of by the Saint Andrew's Society. 

Robert Burns Statue 

<div>&nbsp;William Shakespeare was born in April, in the year of 1564. Not much can be said about Shakespeare’s childhood. His father was a local trader before rising in local government in Stratford then failing at that due to misfortunes. Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway in 1582 and had three children. Susanna the oldest and she had two younger siblings, Judith and Hamnet. The boy died at a young age.&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;</div><div>Shakespeare’s first time out in the spotlight is when he plays as an actor and uses the playwright of Robert Greene’s "A Groatsworth of Wilt", from here he would go to London. By 1594, Shakespeare had joined the Chamberlain’s Men, a theater company. It would later be known as the King’s Men. They would perform at the Globe Theater in London, where a lot of Shakespeare’s plays would be performed as well. By the time of Shakespeare’s death in 1616, he had written thirteen comedies, thirteen historical dramas, six tragedies, four tragic comedies and 154 sonnets. He also created words by combining different languages. Shakespeare took the world by a literature storm and his writings and words are still used all over the world today.&nbsp;</div><div>&nbsp; In 1864, actors and managers within a Shakespearean theater got permission from the Central Park’s Board of Commissioners start the construction of a Shakespeare Monument at the end of the Mall between two elm trees. It was not until the end of the Civil War before this project was moved forward. In 1866, John Quincy Adams Ward joined a competition that was held to find someone to sculpt the statue. Ward won the competition. Ward would later be known as “Dean of American Sculptors”. Nine of his sculptures can be found in the parks of New York. There were several benefits to raise money to build the sculpture, one was a performance of Julius Caesar. Ward was able to use images of Shakespeare and details of Elizabethan dress and poses in that time period to capture the essence of William Shakespeare.&nbsp; &nbsp;By 1870, the sculpture was cast at the Robert Wood &amp; Co in Philadelphia. In 1872, the sculpture was unveiled on a temporary base because there were delays with the granite pedestal, that was coming from Scotland. A month later, the temporary base was replaced with the granite pedestal. In 1995, the Central Park Conservancy has&nbsp;paid to restore the memorial throughout the years.&nbsp;</div><div> </div>

William Shakespeare had written thirteen comedies, thirteen historical dramas, six tragedies, four tragic comedies and 154 sonnets, that are still read all over the world today. Shakespeare has been a big influence on many writers and education majors for many, many years and will continue to do so. The memorial of William Shakespeare in New York City was sculpted by John Quincy Adams Ward and was unveiled at the end of the Mall in Central Park between two elm trees on April 23, 1872. It was reveled 308 years after Shakespeare's birth. 

Shakespeare Monument 

Central Park is regarded as one of the oldest municipal zoos in the United States. The state legislature authorized the establishment of a zoo in 1864; however, animals have been kept and observed in the Park dating back to its origins in the 1850s. One of the first animals recorded on exhibition in the zoo was a bear cub that was left with a park messenger boy, Philip Holmes. The cub was initially exhibited at the park’s headquarters, The Arsenal. In 1861 state legislation approved the creation of an official zoo within the park, but the advent of the Civil War put off the actual development until 1864. In the meantime, a temporary collection of animals grew up behind The Arsenal and became known as “The Menagerie”. William Conklin was the Menagerie’s director from the 1860s to the 1880s. The Menagerie grew rapidly in popularity – daily attendance was 7,000 people by 1873 and annual attendance was reportedly three million by 1902. From the 1860s to 1890s, prominent figures in American society made notable contributions to the zoo’s collection. General Custer gave the zoo a rattlesnake, and General Sherman offered an African Cape buffalo. In 1938, the City was donated a “tiglon”. Charles the Tiglon was the offspring of a female African lion and a male Siberian tiger (this combination was considered rarer than a “liger,” which results from the combination of a male lion and female tiger). The Central Park Zoo underwent two major redesigns, the first in 1934 and the second in 1980. The first redesign was a result of heavy criticism regarding poor care and maintenance of the animals on exhibition. At the urging of Robert Moses (Parks Commissioner) and Governor Alfred E. Smith, a new zoo was designed by Aymar Embury II in a mere 16 days. Construction of the new, six-acre zoo took only eight months. The Central Park Zoo opened on December 2, 1934 and Governor Alfred E. Smith was designated honorary zookeeper. Some 12,000 invited guests attended the opening of the 1934 zoo, while 25,000 people lined Fifth Avenue hoping to be admitted. By the 1980s the zoo had fallen into disrepair, it was even called “the Rikers Island for animals” by Parks Commissioner Gordon Davis. The City decided in 1980 to transfer management of the zoo to the New York Zoological Society and the zoo now led by the Wildlife Conservation Society. The question of how exactly to revive the zoo was publicly debated, some ideas included transforming the zoo into an insect zoo (due to the relatively small size of the plot) or possibly a farm for children raised into the City to learn about rural life. Both plans were ultimately cast aside. During the transition period, the zoo decided to transfer many larger animals to other, larger facilities – though kept the polar bears and sea lions. The zoo’s redesign took place from 1983 to 1988 at a cost of $35 million. When the zoo reopened on August 8, 1988 it was truly transformed. The architects worked to “make the zoo barless” and rearranged the exhibits by continents and biomes (the three biomes were – tropical, temperate, and polar). Several of the Zoo’s animals became famous, or infamous, over the years. In the 1990s, two male penguins (Silo and Roy) “adopted” and looked over a baby penguin chick. Silo eventually left Roy for Scrappy, a female bird from SeaWorld. In 2009 the Zoo installed its first new exhibit since 1988, a snow leopard enclosure, at a cost of $10.6 million.

The Central Park Zoo dates back to the 1850s and is one of the oldest municipal zoos in the United States. The state legislature officially authorized the establishment of a zoo in 1864, however, animals had been kept and observed in Central Park dating back to its origins in the 1850s. Prior to the official organization of the zoo, the park was home to an animal display known as "The Menagerie" behind the Arsenal. The zoo is one of the most beloved institutions in the city, however, it has faced significant criticism for its treatment of animals over the years. In response, the zoo has seen two significant redesigns as a result of these concerns to provide more space for the animals. The first redesign of the zoo occurred in 1934, and the second happened in the 1980s. Today, many of the larger animals are gone owing to space limitations. However, some popular exhibits from the early 1900s such as the sea lions still remain - a prominent feature from the 1934 redesign. The zoo's latest exhibition was installed in 2009 and features three snow leopards. 

Central Park Zoo

William Tecumseh Sherman was born into a prominent family in Lancaster, Ohio on February 8, 1820. His father, Charles R. Sherman, was a justice on the Supreme Court of Ohio. In 1829, Sherman’s father died unexpectedly. Soon after, he was sent to live with family friend, lawyer, and budding Whig politician, Thomas Ewing. When Sherman was sixteen years old, Ewing secured for him an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point. Four years later, in 1840, Sherman graduated near the top of his class.  After graduating from West Point, Sherman fought in the Second Seminole War in Florida before being transferred to Fort Moultrie on Sullivan’s Island at the entrance to Charleston Harbor. Unlike many generals of the Civil War, he did not serve in the Mexican War. In 1850, Sherman married Ellen Ewing, the daughter of Thomas Ewing, in Washington, D.C. The couple settled in St. Louis. Three years later, Sherman resigned from the military to pursue a business career. The Panic of 1857, however, derailed his plans. He then relied on two friends from the South, Braxton Bragg and P.G.T. Beauregard, to secure for him the position of superintendent at the newly founded Louisiana State Seminary of Learning and Military Academy (now Louisiana State University) in 1859.  When Louisiana seceded from the Union in January 1861, Sherman resigned from the position and returned to St. Louis. With the help of his younger brother, Senator John Sherman, he secured a commission as a colonel in the Union Army that spring. Sherman commanded a brigade at the First Battle of Bull Run and afterward received a promotion to the rank of brigadier general. He then briefly helped to oversee the federal occupation of Kentucky before becoming a divisional commander under General Ulysses S. Grant. In the spring of 1862, Sherman participated in the Battle of Shiloh and shortly after received a promotion to the rank of major general. The following year, while commanding XV Corps, he helped Grant capture Vicksburg, which gave the Union complete command of the Mississippi River.  During the final two years of the conflict, Sherman brought the war to the Deep South and, through hard war policies, struck a blow against the Confederacy’s ability to wage war. In May 1864, he invaded Georgia, capturing Atlanta on September 2. Sherman then commenced his famous “March to the Sea.” In November and December 1864, his army trampled through the heart of Georgia, destroying rail lines, toppling telegraph poles, burning factories, and stealing food and supplies along the way. By Christmas, Sherman had captured Savannah. In early 1865, he turned northward and invaded the Carolinas. Sherman captured Columbia on February 17 and defeated Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston at the Battle of Bentonville the following month. On April 26, 1865, Johnston surrendered his army along with all Confederate troops in Georgia, Florida, and the Carolinas to Sherman. It was the largest surrender of southern forces during the war.  After the war, Sherman remained in the military and was promoted to the rank of lieutenant general in 1866. When Grant became President of the United States in 1869, Sherman became the commanding general of the U.S. Army, a position he would hold until 1883. He died in New York City in 1891 at the age of seventy-one.  Shortly after Sherman’s death, his friends in the New York Chamber of Commerce appointed a committee to raise funds for the erection of a monument in honor of the Civil War hero. In 1892, the committee commissioned esteemed sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens and architect Charles McKim to design the statue and pedestal, respectively. Unveiled in Manhattan’s Grand Army Plaza on May 30, 1903, the monument consists of a larger-than-life-sized gilded bronze equestrian statue of Sherman led by a female allegorical figure representing “Peace.” The two sculptures rest on an oblong, pink granite pedestal adorned with six gilded bronze wreaths. The original plan was to install the monument in Riverside Park near Grant’s tomb. Sherman’s family, however, objected to the idea and later settled on Grand Army Plaza.

This monument commemorates William Tecumseh Sherman (1820-1891), one of the leading Union generals during the Civil War. A native of Ohio and graduate of West Point, he is best remembered for his 1864 “March to the Sea,” during which his army trampled through the heart of Georgia, destroying rail lines, toppling telegraph poles, burning factories, and stealing food and supplies en route to capturing the coastal city of Savannah. Shortly after Sherman’s death in 1891, his friends in the New York Chamber of Commerce appointed a committee to raise funds for the erection of a monument in honor of the Civil War hero. In 1892, the committee commissioned esteemed sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens and architect Charles McKim to design the statue and pedestal, respectively. Unveiled in Manhattan’s Grand Army Plaza on May 30, 1903, the monument consists of a larger-than-life-sized gilded bronze equestrian statue of Sherman led by a female allegorical figure representing “Peace.” The two sculptures rest on an oblong, pink granite pedestal adorned with six gilded bronze wreaths.

William Tecumseh Sherman Monument

Anti-colonial rebellions erupted throughout Latin America in the early 19th century. For example,&nbsp;Chile fought and secured independence in a bloody series of wars between 1810 and 1826. Mexico also secured its independence between 1810 and 1821, followed by Venezuela between 1811 and 1823, and Argentina between 1810 and 1818. With the leadership of revolutionary general Simón Bolívar, the people of present-day Ecuador, Venezuela, Colombia, and Panama fought and defeated Spanish forces between 1819 and 1826. In the wake of the Haitian Revolution, Southern leaders feared that Latin American independence might become a threat to the institution of slavery. If the United States failed to expand its influence over the region, Southerners protested, the rebellions against Spain might become the opening phase of a continental revolution against slavery. At the same time, the Monroe administration welcomed the rebellion against Spain for strategic reasons, seeing an independent Latin America as a boon for US commerce.&nbsp;Monroe’s successor, John Quincy Adams, was particularly supportive of the new republics and accepted Simón&nbsp;Bolívar’s invitation to send delegates to a trans-continental congress in Panama despite Southern protest.&nbsp;Although the United States continued to isolate the Black republic of Haiti, the government extended full diplomatic recognition to each of the new republics by 1826.&nbsp;<div> Bolívar and his fellow rebels found inspiration in America’s fight against Britain and rebel leaders hoped to replace the colonial rule of Spain with democratic republics. United only in their desire for independence, each of these nations experienced years of political turmoil following the defeat of Spain. Bolívar became so alarmed by these events that he proclaimed himself the leader of a provisional government he hoped would provide temporary stability for northern South America. The republican-turned-dictator was soon forced to abdicate and may have fled to Europe had he not died of tuberculosis in 1830.</div>

Simón Bolívar became one of South America's leading revolutionary generals, with victories that led to the independence of Panama, Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, and Bolivia (which was named after Bolívar). Many Americans supported the efforts of Latin American revolutionary Bolívar during the 19th century. Although he helped to liberate Latin America from Spain, Bolívar’s legacy is troubled by the region’s instability after his death in 1830. 

Statue of Simón Bolívar

José Martí (full name: José Julián Martí y Pérez) was born poor to Spanish immigrants in Havana, Cuba on January 28, 1853. Despite the unenviable circumstances of his birth, he received some formal education during his early years. Possessed of incredible intellect, Martí published several poems by the age of 15. In 1868, Cuba experienced a revolutionary uprising to overthrown Spanish rule. Martí sympathized with the revolutionaries and supported the movement for Cuban independence. The following year, he established a newspaper, La Patria Libre (“The Free Fatherland”). His support for the Cuban revolutionaries along with his political newspaper drew the ire of Spanish authorities, who arrested him. Martí was sentenced to six months hard labor and later, in 1871, was deported to Spain.  While residing in his ancestral homeland, he continued his education, earning a master’s degree and a law degree from the University of Zaragoza in 1874. After earning his degrees, Martí lived in France, Mexico, and Guatemala before returning to his native Cuba in 1878. His stay, however, proved short; Spanish authorities once again exiled him to Spain the following year. Martí then left Spain to live for a short time in France and New York City, before settling in Venezuela. There, he founded the Revista Venezolana (“Venezuelan Review”), whose articles angered the country’s dictator, Antonio Guzmán Blanco. Fearing for his safety, Martí returned to New York City. While living in the United States, he continued to write poetry, newspaper articles, and essays.  Despite being deported from Cuba twice and serving six months hard labor for his beliefs, Martí’s revolutionary spirit and desire to see his native island achieve its independence never wavered. While residing in New York City, he founded the Cuban Revolutionary Party in 1892 and began plotting an invasion of Cuba, which he and others hoped would finally bring about the end of Spanish rule on the island. Martí left New York City in late January 1895 and, after spending some time in Florida, landed in Cuba in April. The following month, on May 19, he was killed during a skirmish with Spanish forces at Dos Ríos. In the 1950s, sculptor Anna Hyatt Huntington created a bronze, over-life-sized equestrian statue of Martí. The last major work of her career, she gifted the statue to the Cuban government, which donated it, along with a dark granite pedestal, to the people of New York City. In 1959, the statue was cast at the Domico Scoma bronze Works in Queens, but—in a twist of irony—a revolution in Cuba and subsequent strained diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States delayed its dedication. In 1965, the statue—which depicts the moment Martí was fatally wounded in battle in 1895—was finally unveiled. Nearly thirty years later, in 1992, the Central Park Conservancy completed a full restoration effort on the statue. The organization financed the project through donations from Cuban-American across the United States. Today, it is one of three equestrian statues in Central Park (along with that of Simón Bolívar and José de San Martín) that honor important figures in Latin American history.

The bronze, over-life-sized equestrian statue honors the life and work of José Julián Martí (1853-1895). Born in Cuba in 1853, the poet and journalist supported Cuban independence from Spain in the late nineteenth century. Despite being deported from Cuba twice and serving six months hard labor for his beliefs, Martí’s revolutionary spirit and desire to see his native island achieve its independence never wavered. While residing in New York City, he founded the Cuban Revolutionary Party in 1892 and began plotting an invasion of Cuba, which he and others hoped would finally bring about the end of Spanish rule on the island. Martí left New York City in late January 1895 and, after spending some time in Florida, landed in Cuba in April. The following month, he was killed during a skirmish with Spanish forces at Dos Ríos. In the 1950s, sculptor Anna Hyatt Huntington created the statue. The last major work of her career, she gifted the statue to the Cuban government, which donated it, along with a dark granite pedestal, to the people of New York City. In 1959, the statue was cast, but—in a twist of irony—a revolution in Cuba and subsequent strained diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States delayed its dedication. In 1965, the statue—which depicts the moment Martí was fatally wounded in battle in 1895—was finally unveiled. Nearly thirty years later, in 1992, the Central Park Conservancy completed a full restoration effort on the statue. The organization financed the project through donations from Cuban-American across the United States. Today, it is one of three equestrian statues in Central Park (along with that of Simón Bolívar and José de San Martín) that honor important figures in Latin American history.

José Julián Martí Statue

José de San Martín was born to Spanish parents in the small town of Yapeyú in what is now Argentina on February 25, 1778. His father, Juan de San Martín, was a soldier and colonial administrator. When he was six years old, he and his family moved to Spain. In 1785, San Martín enrolled in the Seminary of Nobles in Madrid. Four years later, he commenced his military career in the Murcia Infantry Regiment. While serving with the unit, San Martín fought against the Moors in North Africa in 1791, the British in 1798, and the Portuguese in the War of the Oranges in 1801. While fighting the British, he was captured and held as a prisoner of war for more than a year. For his service to the Spanish crown, San Martín received a promotion to the rank of captain in 1804. After Napoleon’s invasion of Spain in 1807 and the subsequent ouster of the Spanish monarch, San Martín supported the Spanish resistance and fought against the French occupation. After the Battle of Bailén in 1808, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel. Three years later, following the Battle of Albuera, San Martín was assigned to command a cavalry unit.  Rather than accept the new command, San Martín left Spain, traveling first to Great Britain and then to Buenos Aires, which at the time was the center of the South American independence movement. There, he offered his services to the revolutionary government and, in 1812, began recruiting and training an army to fight royalist forces and help liberate his native land from Spanish rule. San Martín’s motivations for deciding to take up arms against the country that he had served for more than two decades are unclear. Born not in Spain, but rather a small town located within its vast overseas empire, he—some historians argue—felt a stronger connection to the people of his native land than to those of the mother country. San Martín may also have been inspired by Spaniards’ resistance to Napoleon’s invasion and occupation of their homeland. Still other historians argue that San Martín came in contact with British sympathizers of the independence movement in South America, either while fighting the French in Spain or while in living in London, who persuaded him to change his allegiance.   Regardless of his motivations, San Martín proved a vital asset to the movement. His most remarkable accomplishment came in early 1817. In January and February of that year, San Martín did the unimaginable when he crossed the Andes with his army, a feat often compared to Hannibal’s crossing of the Alps. Soon after, he defeated royalist forces at Chacabuco and then took the city of Santiago. Over the course of the subsequent year, San Martín defeated the remaining royalist forces in Chile, delivering the final blow at the Battle of Maipú on April 5, 1818. With Chile liberated, he sailed to Peru. Pressed by San Martín’s army, royalist forces in Lima eventually withdrew to the surrounding mountains. San Martín then entered Lima and Peruvian independence was declared on July 28, 1821. A year later, he met with Simón Bolívar in the town of Guayaquil in what is now Bolivia. Exactly what was agreed upon at the secret meeting between the two military leaders in unknown. Following the meeting, however, San Martín resigned his post and returned to Europe, where he lived out his remaining years in poverty. He died in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France in 1850.  In 1950, in exchange for a statue of George Washington sent to it by the United States, the City of Buenos Aires gifted a bronze equestrian statue of San Martín to the City of New York. A smaller replica of the one designed by French sculptor Louis-Joseph Daumas and erected in Buenos Aires in 1862, the statue was dedicated on May 25, 1951. In 1995, the Central Park Conservancy, with financial help from the Argentine government, conducted a full restoration effort on the statue. Today, it is one of three equestrian statues in Central Park (along with that of Simón Bolívar and José Martí) that honor important figures in Latin American history.

The bronze equestrian statue honors the life of José de San Martín (1778-1850). Born in the small town of Yapeyú in what is now Argentina, San Martín enjoyed a successful, more than two-decades-long military career serving the Spanish crown before offering his services to the revolutionary government in Buenos Aires, which at the time was the center of the South American independence movement. There, in 1812, he began recruiting and training an army to fight royalist forces and help liberate his native land from Spanish rule. By the early 1820s, San Martín had helped not only Argentina, but also Chile and Peru gain their independence from Spain. In 1950, in exchange for a statue of George Washington sent to it by the United States, the City of Buenos Aires gifted the statue of San Martín to the City of New York. A smaller replica of the one designed by French sculptor Louis-Joseph Daumas and erected in Buenos Aires in 1862, the statue was dedicated on May 25, 1951. Today, it is one of three equestrian statues in Central Park (along with that of Simón Bolívar and José Martí) that honor important figures in Latin American history.

José de San Martín Statue 

By 1898, Spain’s overseas empire was a shadow of its former self. Throughout the nineteenth century, independence movements chipped away at the once vast, powerful empire that stretched from modern-day California to the Caribbean and from present-day Florida to the southern tip of South America. This wave of nationalist uprisings reached Cuba in 1868, when Cuban insurgents frustrated with Spanish rule declared the island independent and fought a spirited, but ultimately unsuccessful ten-year guerilla war with Spain. In 1895, the Cuban struggle for independence resumed.  The events unfolding on the Caribbean island caught the attention of the U.S. government, big business, and the American people. A brutal guerilla war in which Cuban insurgents focused on targets of economic value, such as sugar mills and plantations, not only threatened American investments in Cuba, which were estimated at about $50 million, but also disrupted commerce between the United States and Cuba, which was valued at roughly $100 million annually. In the United States, the yellow press (publications that often sensationalized the news in order to sell newspapers) ran stories on Spanish cruelty. In particular, they focused on the Spanish practice of rounding up Cuban civilians and forcing them to live in detention camps, where many died from starvation, disease, and exposure. These reports tugged at the heartstrings of Americans and increased public support for American intervention. Finally, Spain’s inability to quell the rebellion along with its reluctance to give in and grant Cuba its independence allowed the bloody conflict to drag on for years and garner the attention of the U.S. government.   In December 1897, riots rocked the city of Havana, compelling President William McKinley and Congress to send a battleship, the U.S.S. Maine, to Havana Harbor to protect American citizens and property. A few months later, on February 9, 1898, the New York Journal printed a letter written by Spain’s minister in Washington, D.C., Enrique Dupuy de Lôme, in which he characterized President McKinley as weak. Four days later, on the evening of February 15, an explosion destroyed the U.S.S. Maine, killing nearly 270 American sailors. An investigation by the U.S. Navy concluded that an external explosion probably caused by a mine ignited the vessel’s forward magazine. Despite the fact that the investigation could not determine exactly who was responsible for the tragedy, the yellow press in the United States pointed to Spain and rallied public support for American intervention with the slogan, “Remember the Maine, to hell with Spain!” Impelled by growing public support for American intervention in Cuba, President McKinley asked Congress to draft a series of resolutions. One resolution authorized President McKinley to use military force to end the conflict in Cuba, while another demanded that Spain relinquish its authority over Cuba and withdraw its military forces from the island. When Spain heard of the passage of the resolutions, it severed diplomatic relations with the United States and declared war on April 24. The following day, the United States declared war on Spain.  In the war that followed, the United States scored an overwhelmingly decisive victory. Unprepared and ill-equipped to fight a war against an emerging world power, Spain’s military forces simply proved no match for those of the United States. The fighting lasted roughly four months and resulted in less than 400 American combat deaths, prompting U.S. Secretary of State John Hay to dub it a “splendid little war.” As a result of its victory over Spain, the United States acquired Guam, the Philippines, and Puerto Rico, and Cuba achieved its independence.  Only a few days after the U.S.S. Maine exploded in Havana Harbor, New York newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst began soliciting donations for a memorial to honor the nearly 270 American sailors who lost their lives. Architect H. Van Buren Magonigle and sculptor Attilio Piccirilli were commissioned to design and build it. Located in Merchants’ Gate Plaza at Central Park’s southwestern entrance, the monument consists of a large granite pylon topped with a gilded bronze female figure, Columbia Triumphant, riding in a seashell chariot pulled by three hippocampi. The bronze used for the statue was reportedly recovered from the guns of the sunken battleship. At the base of the pylon is a fountain and several marble figures that symbolize the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, along with the ideas of courage, fortitude, justice, war, and peace. The monument was dedicated on May 30, 1913.

Located in Merchants’ Gate Plaza at Central Park’s southwestern entrance, the U.S.S. Maine National Monument honors the nearly 270 American sailors who lost their lives when the battleship exploded in Havana Harbor on the evening of February 15, 1898. Designed by architect H. Van Buren Magonigle, built by sculptor Attilio Piccirilli, and paid for by funds raised by New York newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst, the monument consists of a large granite pylon topped with a gilded bronze female figure, Columbia Triumphant, riding in a seashell chariot pulled by three hippocampi. At the base of the pylon is a fountain and several marble figures that symbolize the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, along with the ideas of courage, fortitude, justice, war, and peace. The monument was dedicated on May 30, 1913. 

The U.S.S. Maine National Monument

The Museum of Contemporary Crafts, opened in 1956, focused primarily on providing exhibitions related to craft disciplines - jewelry, ceramics, fashion, etc. The institute addressed the changing direction of craftsmanship in society by helping locate emerging artists whose work linked craft to industry. The patron of the museum, Aileen Osborn Webb, was born into wealth, but she didn't allow her privileged upbringing to hamper her desire to contribute to society. According to Paul J. Smith, who later led the museum, Webb's interest in craft developed during the Great Depression, a time when people were trying to sell any goods they could. She used her time and resources to help these people make a living. From that point forward, Webb continued to develop her vision for the world of craft, as she was involved in the establishment of the Craft Horizons magazine, the American Craftsman Educational Council, and the World Crafts Council along with other programs and organizations. Paul J. Smith, the Museum's director from 1963 to 1987, contributed to the Museum's growth by promoting popular culture and mundane materials that mirrored the social climate of the time. In 1979, the Museum was renamed the American Craft Museum and moved to a larger location at 44 West 53rd Street. Further expansion was necessary as the museum continued to grow, and it moved again in 1986 to 40 West 53rd Street. It was during its time at this location that the American Craft Museum changed its name to the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD). This change was made to reflect the continually widening circle of objects displayed, and to allude to the interdisciplinary nature of the museum's programming. The 44 West 53rd Street remained MAD's home until 2008, when it moved to its current location on Columbus Circle. The museum's current building was designed by Brad Cloepfil. Controversy surrounded this move because the former building at this location was built by Huntington Hartford and was defended by preservationists who didn't want the move to destroy part of New York's heritage. The former building housed Hartford's art collection, which consisted of works from the 17th to the early-20th centuries. It was built in 1964 and designed by Edward Durell Stone. Along with the artwork inside, the outdated museum represented an old New York, rough and realistic. The new building, a representation of the Modernist movement that defines much of the artwork found inside, was criticized by New Yorkers who believed the city was catering to tourists by allowing a museum that reflected Modernism to move in. Nevertheless, MAD won the battle and moved into their new building in September 2008. Known as the Jerome and Simona Chazen building, the new structure features over 22,000 glazed terracotta tiles which reflect MAD's realm of interest. Concrete supports on the ground floor from the original Stone designed building are retained and encased in glass so that visitors may view a piece of the location's history.With 54,000 square feet of new space to utilize - over three times the space as the previous location - MAD greatly expanded its gallery and program offerings. The Open Studio program allows visitors to engage directly with the art and artists by interacting with them during the creative process. MAD is also the only American art museum to display contemporary and historical art jewelry, which it does in the Tiffany and Co. Foundation Jewelry Gallery. The museum features a variety of permanent galleries, such as the Jewelry Gallery, and rotating exhibitions. The museum strives to continue to fulfill the motivation behind its founding; to showcase the role of the creative process in improving our lives.

The Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) first opened its doors in 1956 as the Museum of Contemporary Crafts, with an original mission of recognizing the craftsmanship of contemporary American artists. The museum was founded by Aileen Osborn Webb, a patron of the arts. Today, the museum fosters the creative process and how it influences crafted works that better our contemporary lives. This is accomplished by educating and inspiring the public through exhibitions, family programs, workshops, and classes. The museum also includes a restaurant and theatre to provide visitors with an all-day experience.  

Highlights of Central Park Walking Tour

Alice in Wonderland Statue

Introduction

Images

Backstory and Context

Sources

Additional Information