Today, the Ethical Culture Fieldston School is a prestigious K-12 school serving more than 1,600 students on campuses in Manhattan and Riverdale. But like many long-running New York institutions—including the New-York Historical Society—the school has seen multiple iterations and locations before settling into its current form. The school’s story begins with the Free Kindergarten, which...

The post All Work and No Play: Celebration at the Workingman’s School appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

It is the unofficial start of summer; beaches open, some of us think of auto racing, and we hope for suitable weather for a barbecue. Memorial Day is upon us, and its national observance is 150 years old this year, the holiday Americans once called Decoration Day. The veterans’ group known as the Grand Army...

The post Observing Memorial Day as “Decoration Day” appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Between 1945 and 1960 the number of television sets in use in the United States rose from a few thousand to approximately 60 million. Although many of the programs shown originated in New York City, many of Gotham’s denizens had to endure a steadily degrading signal reception. The cause: new buildings in the vertically growing...

The post Wiring Manhattan: Sterling Communications and Cable Television in New York City appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Dancing geishas, ancient palaces, drifting over misty rivers in a houseboat. The adventures of a businessman traveling through China, Japan, and Korea in 1923 are captured within the detailed correspondence and ephemera saved by Myron S. Falk (1878-1945), an engineer from New York City who was sent on a trip to Asia with the American Silk...

The post The 1923 American Silk Mission to Asia appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

The James Boyd Collection of New York City Etchings in the Department of Prints, Photographs, and Architectural Collections is a particularly lovely survey of etchings by various artists depicting the city between 1910 and 1935. Boyd donated the collection to the New-York Historical Society in honor of his wife, Agnes Boyd, in 1935, and continued to...

The post Selections from the James Boyd Collection of New York City Etchings appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

An earlier post introduced readers to a sampling of artwork from the James Boyd Collection of New York City Etchings. Today’s post highlights works by William C. McNulty, an American painter, illustrator, etcher and art instructor whose work is part of the Boyd Collection. McNulty was born in Ogden, Utah in 1884. He began his career as  an editorial...

The post Selections from the James Boyd Collection of New York City Etchings, part 2 appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

While working on the Patricia D. Klingenstein Library’s hidden collections cataloging project, I’ve found some examples of the different methods authors and printers used to fix small errors in a text after an item was printed. Shown below are a few examples of the corrections that were made directly to the page. In the first...

The post Rare Books Revealed: Text Corrections in Printed Books appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Despite the effects of the Great Depression, the City Planning Commission under Mayor Fiorello La Guardia reported for the period 1920–1939 a staggering increase in New York City motor vehicle registrations from 225,000 to nearly one million. As a result of the evolving needs of constituents, and with a glimmering post-war economic boom on the horizon,...

The post Highway to Hell: Tensions in the La Guardia Administration appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Travel diaries have long been a popular form of self-expression, and can provide us with unique perspectives on cities in the past. The New-York Historical Society holds a number of these diaries within our manuscript collections, with several dating back to the 18th century. Mabel Newton Betticher is one diarist whose collection exists in our holdings. Between...

The post “Her Own Trip”: Reflections of 20th Century New York City appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Modern library conservation was born in the aftermath of a catastrophic flood in Florence, Italy on November 4, 1966. Water from the Arno River devastated the collections of the National Central Library of Florence. An international team of bookbinders and restorers was assembled to save what they could; however in many cases the damage was irreversible. Many lessons were...

The post Lab Notes: The Florence Flood and the emergence of library conservation appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Hailed as the foremost painter of the American Revolution, John Trumbull (1756-1843) is best remembered for the four iconic images that grace the walls of the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. These paintings depict pivotal events in our nation’s early history: The Signing of the Declaration of Independence, The Surrender of General Burgoyne, The Surrender of Lord Cornwallis, and General Washington Resigning his...

The post John Trumbull, Painter of the Revolution appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

This third installment of selections from the James Boyd Collection of New York City Etchings (be sure to see part 1 and part 2) focuses on the work of Edith Nankivell (1896-1984), who, with 46 prints, figures prominently in Box 3. In researching her, I discovered that she is in fact the daughter of Frank...

The post Selections from the James Boyd Collection of New York City Etchings, part 3 appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

For much of the 19th century, New York City’s public transportation was racially segregated, and African Americans were forced to ride on specially designated horse-drawn street cars.  Newspapers documented acts of resistance to these policies of segregation by members of the African American community, some of whom took the street car companies to court. Three examples are cited here. On Sunday,...

The post Before Rosa Parks: Segregation on New York City Street Cars appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Set to commence on January 17, 1920, the great social experiment of Prohibition had already begun with a “dry run” for Americans adapting to the restriction of alcohol inspired by World War I. That was followed by a full year anticipating the event through the process of Constitutional amendment and the passage of enforcement legislation...

The post Now on View–“Padlocked”: New York’s Prohibition Years appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

One of the best, if at times maddening parts of any reference librarian or archivist’s job is solving a mystery. What appears at first to be just another query turns into a bona fide challenge. My colleague and I had one such query recently, involving a photo of a clapboard house on East 83rd Street that...

The post Exploring the Geographic Images Collection appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Harry Potter may have come and gone here at the New-York Historical Society but it turns out that the interplay of magic and science that enlivens the Potter series can still be found in the Historical Society’s collections. On this occasion, it emerges from an unidentified colonial physician’s account book. Although it’s generally written in legible scripts, the...

The post Mercury, Sulphur and Vitriol: A Colonial Physician’s Accounts appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

“Se confundió el gozo en el pozo”― “he confused the joy in the well”; which is simply a way of saying that something went wrong which was expected to go right. This was the expression that Saturnino Carrias used in 1848 to express his disappointment upon hearing that the $50,000 dollars in compensation that he...

The post The Struggle for the Reclamation of the Amistad appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

September in New York City marks the beginning of the fall season, but the fashion industry is already looking ahead towards spring with the showcasing of Spring/Summer 2020 collections at New York Fashion Week (NYFW). To celebrate the start of a new fashion season, we’re highlighting the work of world famous fashion photographer, Bill Cunningham...

The post Highlights from the Bill Cunningham “Facades” Photograph Collection appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Five women huddle around an apartment table on January 18, 1923. Some balance babies on their laps. Older children look on. One boy in a knitted cap stares at the camera, more interested by the photographer than by what the ladies are doing. They seem to be copying in notebooks the exemplars from a portable chalkboard...

The post Becoming American: The Education Committee for Non-English Speaking Women appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

The entertainment and moral education of children through books has not always been intertwined. American Puritanism frowned upon the fantastical imaginations that children often have and appreciate. Many children’s books from the eighteenth century instead emphasize the importance of virtuous behavior and the devastating consequences of vice through cautionary tales. Not until the nineteenth century...

The post Now on View–A Tale for Youth: Amusement and Instruction in American Children’s Books appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Happy October everyone! Halloween is upon us which means it’s time to pick out a costume. The Costume Ball Photograph Collection (PR 223) is the perfect collection to inspire your choice. The collection contains photographs and mounted clippings of members of high society attending New York balls from 1875 to 1932. The New-York Historical Society Collection of...

The post Halloween Costume Inspiration from the Gilded Age appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Little is known about long-lived David Grim (1737-1826) outside of the brief personal account of his life held by the New-York Historical Society Library. What can be said is that his memory was sound. A tavern keeper, merchant, and owner of Hessian’s Coffee House from 1767 to 1789, Grim sought to leave behind more than an...

The post “A Correct and Perfect Recollection”: David Grim’s Map of Prerevolutionary Manhattan appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

New Yorkers and Bostonians have a number of things to dispute—Yankees versus Red Sox, Manhattan versus New England clam chowder, good or bad memories of the Super Bowl in 2008 and 2012. We will avoid adding, “Where was the first blood of the American Revolution shed?” as another. Yes, we concede the Boston Massacre of...

The post The Battle of Golden Hill: New York’s Opening Act of Revolutionary Bloodshed appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Twenty years before the United States declared its independence from Great Britain, a group of colonial representatives from nine colonies met in Albany, New York during the onset of the French and Indian War. The Albany Congress of 1754 brought together colonial and Indigenous leaders in an attempt to strengthen relations while defending the northern...

The post Benjamin Franklin’s Plan for Unification appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

From the title Scholars and Gentlemen, one of the essential histories written about the New-York Historical Society and that dates from the 1980s, one might get the wrong impression, that only men played a role in the life of the institution over the course of its 216 years. Yet many women have played significant roles...

The post Martha Lamb: New-York Historical Society Pioneer appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

George B. Post (1837-1913), an American architect trained in the Beaux-Arts tradition, is perhaps best known for his New York City landmark buildings, including the New York Stock Exchange, City College, and the Brooklyn Historical Society. After working as a draftsman for Richard Morris Hunt, Post opened his first architectural firm in New York City...

The post Lab Notes: Conserving a George B. Post Presentation Drawing appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

Will we ever get back to watching baseball at Yankee Stadium? It is a fair and frustrating question. Perhaps, as therapy, it helps to go back in time before Yankee Stadium (either the original or the newer one) was even there.  We get this view from the Subway Construction Photograph Collection, and some parts of...

The post Before Yankee Stadium: The View from the Subway Construction Photograph Collection appeared first on New-York Historical Society.

A new research brief illuminates the landscape of professional development in Head Start programs. Using data from the spring 2017 round of the FACES 2014 Survey, researchers explore professional development experiences of Head Start program directors, center directors, teachers, and other staff.

Join the Regional Educational Laboratory Mid-Atlantic and stakeholders from the New Jersey and Delaware Departments of Education for a free four-part series on culturally responsive practices as a strategy for improving education outcomes.

Parents who participated in the Child Support Noncustodial Parent Employment Demonstration (CSPED) reported substantially higher levels of satisfaction with child support services compared with those who did not participate in the program.

Mathematica’s Jonathan Morse and Clint Eisenhower will team up to share their thoughts on state impacts and expectations for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Medicaid program integrity strategy at this year’s NAMPI Annual Conference in Atlanta.

Although most school districts help teachers use data to improve student learning, a new Mathematica study shows that providing schools with data coaches and professional development to support their efforts did not result in increased data use by teachers.

Each October, National Principals Month recognizes the essential role principals play in making schools great.

A Mathematica issue brief synthesizes new and recent evidence on how the two cities’ beverage taxes affected purchases, consumption, and the retail environment.

Early fatherhood can have negative effects on the outcomes of young men, reducing the number of years of schooling they receive and their likelihood of graduating from high school.

From November 7 to 9, APPAM will host its annual Fall Research Conference in Denver, Colorado. As a proud partner of APPAM since its inception, Mathematica will participate in a number of conference activities.

Principals can play an important role in improving instruction and student achievement in their schools. Many professional development programs focus on strengthening principals’ leadership skills.

Mathematica researchers partnered with key clients and contributed to a number of projects that will be presented at the American Public Health Association’s Annual Meeting and Expo in Philadelphia from November 2 to 6.

Mathematica will showcase state Medicaid services and support for CMS projects to modernize data analytics for Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program at the National Association of Medicaid Directors fall conference.

The National Organization of State Offices of Rural Health sets aside the third Thursday of every November—this year, it’s November 21—to celebrate National Rural Health Day.

Under a contract with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), Mathematica’s health experts worked with 24 Medicare Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) and End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) Seamless Care Organizations participating in the Shared Savings Program, Next Generation ACO Model, and the Comprehensive ESRD Care Model to identify the strategies that ACOs use to engage beneficiaries in their care.

Updated nutrition standards called for in the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 (HHFKA) have made school meals significantly healthier, according to a recent article.

Mathematica and Howard University have partnered to host the Summer Institute in Computational Social Science (SICSS), which will give social and data scientists opportunities to explore how they can use real-world data to address ethics and equity in artificial intelligence.

Waterton, Emma