Thursday, July 18, 2013 – New York City
It was a wonderful day. A bit hazy, a few clouds and lots of blue sky. Did I mention that it was the hottest day of the year at 100 degrees f and 55% humidity. It still wasn’t as hot and uncomfortable as it was in Charleston. We still braved the elements and made our way into the city.
We had purchased tickets for a bus and walking tour of New York through New York City Tours. At 7:00 in the morning we were greeted by a cheerful driver named Carson, who had driven for this company for the last 15 years. He retrieved us right from our RV Park along with a family of 5. We then proceeded to a couple of other hotels where we picked up another dozen or so folks to accompany us on our journey. Fortunately, the bus was airconditioned and equipped with a restroom.
Carson deftly navigated us through the narrow streets in our 43 foot chariot taking the Lincoln tunnel. We were but a “drop” in an ocean of buses headed into New York. Carson tells us that every day during a couple of hours of the morning rush hour over 17000 buses will make there way through the Lincoln tunnel. If you multiply that number by all the other bridges and tunnels that enter NYC you get a whole lot of buses. There are over 18 million people living in the greater metropolitan area of NYC and a lot of them work in NYC – so you get a lot of commuters. Not to mention that there are 8 million residents in NYC, all of whom are trying to get from one point to another. So although it is crowed – it all seems to work rather efficiently.
Our first stop is near is just on the other side of the tunnel where we pick up Andy, our tour guide for the day. On hops a guy who looks a little like George Carlin but with straggly grey hair and a bit of a disheveled look. The kind of look you get when you have been out all night doing who knows what. Elisa and I both thought that this was going to be one of “those” tours – you know, the kind where you know more about the sites than the tour guide, where the tour guide mumbles the obvious and you get zero useful information. Well, we couldn’t have been more wrong. One thing Andy had in common with George Carlin was a sardonic wit that made the volumes of information he gave us about each site entertaining and funny at the same time. He was great and we would strongly recommend Andy.
Our first stop was Times Square. Now, I’ve been to Times Square many times, but never like this. It was now a little before 9:00 AM and it was devoid of people. There was relatively light traffic in and around the square. It was great; we had our run of the square and we got lots of great photos.
From there we headed over to Central Park stopping across the street from the famous Dakota Coop apartments. The Dakota is home to Yoko Ono and John Lennon before his death. It also boasts other residents like Roberta Flack, Lauren Bacall, Maury Povich, Connie Chung and many other famous folks. There is an apartment available so it could be your address too…if you have $20 million that is. Elisa and I decided to pass – $20 million and it doesn’t even have central AC – notice the window air conditioners in the photo above. From there we walked into Central Park entering through Strawberry Fields, a memorial to the late John Lennon who was unfortunately gunned down by a crazed killer just outside of the Dakota. The main feature in this part of the Park is the mosaic with one simple word – “Imagine” and little else is needed to let you know this is in memory of John Lennon.
Andy provided us a wealth of information about Central Park. We already knew from our trip to the Biltmore that the principal designer of the Park was Fredrick Olmstead. What we didn’t know that it was the first Park he designed. What we also learned was how Central Park came to be. In the 1830’s NY was slowly emanating north from what is now the Financial District. The Wall street area was originally New Amsterdam – founded in the 1600s. Wall street was a tangle of streets running every which way. The city was continually growing, so the architects of NYC re-planned the city into the grid system of streets and avenues we have today. There is one notable exception to the grid – Broadway. They were going to remove it, but it had become the equivalent of their “high speed throughway” going into and out of the city. It had started as an Indian trail and then turned into a wide wagon trail. So they left it in the grid. The designers were ambitious, laying out the grid for many miles out beyond the then city farther than anyone at that time thought the City would extend. In the 1850’s there was no real park for the residents. So they carved out a 2.5 mile by .5 mile rectangle in the grid and called it Central Park. Problem was that it was several miles from the actual city center, but that was the space available. They held a design competition for the Park and Olmstead won. The 800 acres of land that Olmstead was givern was a misture of marshy land, some covered with solid bed rock and others of clear cut meadow. What he created is an amazing image of nature as he wanted to portray it. Although the park is only 6 miles in perimeter Olmstead created a network of 28 miles of pathways, with many of them winding over and under the other so that the residents would all be able to experience the Park in relative privacy. The park was divided into zones with gardens, fountains, lakes, forests and even a sheep meadow, complete with grazing sheep. At that time, Parks were not intended for exercise, so it wasn’t until much later that ball fields and bike lanes were added. The Park is managed by the Central Park Conservancy a non-profit foundation that also operates many of the museum surrounding the Park. The Park is supported largely through donations and it is preserved for the people of NY and can not be developed.
After our informative stroll through the Park we headed over to Rockefeller Center. On our way we passed by Jackie Onasis’ former residence on Fifth Avenue on the Upper East side of the Park. She purchased the place in the 60s for a mere $300,000. After her death, her kids sold it $9 million to one of the Koch brothers. The Koch’s totally gutted and remodeled it and later sold it for $32 million. Not a bad “flip”. Rockefeller Center was really interesting. In the 1920s John Rockefeller had made a fortune in oil even before there was a market for it wit automobiles. He was now one of the richest people in America. He wanted to build a large complex of offices for is growing empire. To get the permission he needed he agreed that he would build an opera house. The plans were drawn up in 1929 – then we had that little thing called the Stock Market collapse and the Great Depression. One indication of just how rich Rockefeller was is that he proceeded with the project in 1930. Why would he do this with the terrible effects of the depression going on – cheap labor. The project was the largest private construction project of its time; employing over 40,000 laborers. Rockefeller built the buildings in a beautiful Art Deco motif incorporating fabulous art into each building. Rockefeller was not able to purchase the land upon which the center was built. He signed a long term lease for the land from Columbia University. In 1985, the lease was broken and the Rockefeller foundation purchase the land for $400m dollars. In 1989, the entire center was sold to Mitsubishi Holdings of Japan. They paid $billions. Then the Japanese economy collapsed and they had to sell the property for a small fraction of what they paid for it. The Buyer was a syndicate put together by David Rockefeller. It is now owned by the Speyer Group. They invested $75 million into restoring the center into what it is today featuring high end shops on the ground floor and offices above. One of the most famous inhabitants is NBC at 30 Rockefeller Center – yes that 30 Rock of Tina Fey fame. The Today show is still filmed from there. What ever happen to that Opera house that Rockefeller promised he would build – with the depression going on it wasn’t an opera house that was built, instead it was a cinema – now known as Radio City Music Hall. In the 1970s there were plans to demolish the little used music hall. The public was outraged and in 1987 the entire center became a National Historic Landmark – thus saving the Hall. Our stop there also afforded us a great view of the Empire State Building. An interesting story about the Empire State Building was that after its completion in 1931 it sat largely vacant, notwithstanding all the hoopla over its being the tallest building in the world at that time. How could that be…oh yeah, that little thing called the Great Depression. To fill the upper floors of the building the managers of the property were giving free space away to charitable organizations. One of these organizations was the National Catholic Welfare Council. In July, 1945 on an unusually foggy day a B-25 aircraft was making its way up what it thought was the Hudson River. At its appointed time it banked left into what he thought was New Jersey; unfortunately the disoriented pilot was actually flying up the East River and he banked right into the Empire State Building between the 79th and 80th floors and right into the offices of the National Catholic Welfare Council. Fortunately, it was a Saturday morning which kept the loss of life down to only 14 poor souls. The building was open for business by the following Monday. They don’t build them like that anymore.
From there we made our way into Greenwich Village. Andy gave us an very informative account of Greenwich village from community of factorys and mills, to a deserted tenament area, to its revival in the 60’s as an artist colony to what it is today a trendy and culturally diverse community. We stopped here for lunch and were given 45 minutes to sample some of the finest Greenwich has to offer. I chose to eat at Joe’s Pizza, where I had lunch with Sofia Vegara, Matthew McConaughey, Conan Obrien, Leo Dicaprio and many others the place was packed with lots of famous people. click this link to see a photo of all the famous people i had lunch with….
Elisa was able to find a gluten free salad at Murray’s Cheese and Deli.
From there we headed down into the Financial district were we got a good view of Ground Zero and the new construction that is underway. After than we went to the Liberty State Park in NJ where we caught a ferry that took us over to the Statue of Liberty. The weather was gorgeous and afforded us magnificent views of the monument from the French in 1886. I learned that the dedication ceremony was performed amidst protests. You see, the statue was provided by a country deemed to have to little freedom to a country that had too much freedom and it was a statue of a woman given to a country that still had not extended freedom to women in the form of the ability to vote. But for us on this day, there were no protests. In fact it was an emotionally moving experience for Elisa. As we approached the monument by boat, she recalled that her Grand Father would have seen this same site of the statue and the city beyond in 1911 as he made his way to a new life and new world as he came through Ellis Island. At that time, there were no social welfare programs for the immigrants. They were simply expected to be free from disease and have a place to go, a place to stay and a person in the Country to help them. It all worked out for Armido, for he made his way to California and lived a prosperous life and started a great family. The monument took on such greater meaning looking at it through this lens.
Photo 1 – Making our way into NYC in a sea of buses
Photo 2 – Times Square
Photo 3 – the Dakota
Photo 4 – Lennon memorial in Central Park
Photo 5 – Jackie Onassis’ former residence on 5th Ave
Photo 6 & 7 – Rockefeller Center
Photo 8 – Empire State Building
Photo 9 – Greenwich Village on Bleecker St near Carmine
Photo 10 – Statue of Liberty with NYC in the background
For more photos follow this link…
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