The New York State Inebriate Asylum building

I have an abiding interest in the history of mental health care. In the mid-1990s, when I was a Ph.D. student in history, I took a short-term research consultancy at the New York State Archives, which was just starting a grant-funded documentation project focusing on mental health, the environmental movement, and the Latino communities of New York State. The State Archives needed someone who could quickly pull together a summary overview of the history mental health treatment and policy in New York State, and I needed a summer job.

The experience changed my life. Over the course of eleven weeks, I researched and wrote an eighty-page report and decided that I really didn't want to write a dissertation that examined the role of male activists in the British women's suffrage movement. I wanted instead to examine the working lives and work culture of the men and women who staffed the wards of the mammoth, custodially oriented institutions that dominated the provision of mental health care from the mid-19th through the mid-20th centuries -- a topic that brought together the history of labor, medicine, gender relations, and public policy in all manner of interesting ways. At the same time, I also started thinking that, dissertation or not, I would be much happier working in an archives than in an academic institution.


For a variety of reasons, I left graduate school a few years after I became an archivist. However, my interest in the history of mental health care remains very much intact. Since my research focused specifically on New York State, my interest has an architectural dimension: five psychiatric facilities in the United States have been designated National Historic Landmarks, and four of them are located in the Empire State. Whenever I get the chance to visit one of these landmarks, I do so.

Yesterday, I was in the Binghamton, New York area to attend an Appraisal of Electronic Records workshop offered by the Society of American Archivists -- which I highly recommend. After the workshop ended, I headed to the eastern edge of the city of Binghamton to visit the campus of what is now the Greater Binghamton Health Center to photograph the structure that housed the New York State Inebriate Asylum, the first facility in the United States that treated alcoholism as a disease.

The asylum, which was built between 1857-1866, was designed by Issac G. Perry, who ultimately became the lead architect of the New York State Capitol. Even though the crennellated turrets that once graced its roof were removed in 1954 in a desperate attempt to stop persistent roof leaks, it remains a Gothic Revival masterpiece . . . .

N.Y. Binghamton State Hospital, 1890-1910?. Series A3045, New York State Education Department, Division of Visual Instruction, Instructional Lantern Slides, [ca. 1856-1939], bulk 1911-1939, NYSA_A3045-78_D47_BiH, New York State Archives, Albany, N.Y.

. . . but, oh, how one wishes that the turrets had survived.

The inebriate asylum's treatment methods were unsuccessful, and in 1879 Governor Lucious Robinson asserted that the state's approach to the treatment of alcoholism was a failure. The inebriate asylum became the Binghamton Asylum for the Chronic Insane -- a custodial facility meant to house people who did not respond to the therapeutically-oriented care offered at the state's facility in Utica. Given that Issac Perry, who oversaw the retrofitting of the facility, had based his original design for the inebriate asylum upon the "Kirkbride model" of insane asylum construction, which emphasized the role of formally symmetrical architecture in restoring order to disordered minds, I suspect that the transition from "inebriate asylum" to "insane asylum" was a rather easy one.

The Binghamton Asylum for the Chronic Insane became the Binghamton State Hospital in 1890 and the Binghamton Psychiatric Center in 1977. In the final third of the 20th century, the state constructed a modern facility immediately to the west of the old Inebriate Asylum building, and only a few administrative offices remained within the older building's central transept.

For much of its history, the Inebriate Asylum building was actually t-shaped. The main building survives, but the "service" wing that housed kitchens, laundries, and other essential facilities was torn down at some point in the late 20th century; a parking lot now occupies the space where this wing once stood. However, two small brick structures, one attached to each wing of the main building, have survived. I'm not certain what these structures were used for, but I suspect that they housed activity rooms. As you can see, the materials used to construct the rear facade of the main building were not as fine as those used on its front: monochromatic Syracuse limestone covers the front facade, which for decades was readily visible from downtown Binghamton, but locally quarried stone was used for the rear facade. (Note also the wholly enclosed fire escape.)

Even today, traces of the building's former grandeur remain. For example, a stained glass window still graces the chapel that formerly occupied the third floor of the central transept. A.D. Wheeler, who received permission to enter the structure and photograph its interior, discovered that some of its intricately detailed woodwork, light fixtures, and stained glass has survived.

Wheeler's work also documents the building's interior decay, but one need not go inside in order to see that this structure is in peril. In 1993, a section of the parapet above the front entrance to the south transept collapsed. The few remaining offices within the structure were hastily relocated, and the building has been completely vacant ever since. The state stabilized the facade with concrete and removed the south transept stairs for safekeeping, but it's plain that even the repairs are starting to crumble.

The Inebriate Asylum building was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1997, a fact that is reflected in signs that dot the Greater Binghamton Health Center campus. However, in the late 1990s the State of New York attempted to sell the property on which the building stands -- without making any reference to the fact that a landmarked building stood on it. In 1999, the National Trust for Historic Preservation responded to the state's move by placing the Inebriate Asylum building (and psychiatric facilities in Buffalo, Poughkeepsie, and Utica) on its annual list of the nation's most endangered historic sites.

The State of New York still owns this building and the land on which it stands. Binghamton has fallen on hard times, and there's no shortage of available property in the area. A couple of years ago, it even seemed that the building would be given new life: a determined area legislator and the president of the SUNY Upstate Medical University, which is based in Syracuse but was looking to expand in Binghamton, announced that the Inebriate Asylum building would be completely renovated and turned into a medical education center. Unfortunately, scandal led the president of SUNY Upstate to tender his resignation last November, and its seems that SUNY Upstate's plans for the Inebriate Asylum building have been put on hold. In the meantime, the building quietly continues decaying.

Niagara Falls and the 2012 Conference on New York State History

 Horseshoe Falls, as seen from Goat Island, Niagara Falls State Park, 16 June 2012.

Last week, I spent a couple of vacation days at Niagara University, which hosted the 2012 Conference on New York State History. I realize that an academic conference isn't everyone's idea of leisure, but the Conference on New York State History is a little less formal than the typical academic conference. Moreover, it gives me the chance to see friends and former colleagues who are now scattered throughout the state and to don my historian hat, which doesn't get nearly as much use as it once did.

Frankly, I needed a little time away from everything. Personal circumstances have repeatedly pulled me away from home for the past couple of months, and as a result I've neglected a lot of things (e.g., this blog) as of late. I really needed to spend a little time in a place that was neither Albany, New York nor northeastern Ohio, and the conference's location in the Niagara Falls region -- conveniently situated between the two -- enabled me to combine a brief holiday and a preplanned visit to Ohio.

I initially planned to blog about the conference as it was taking place, but on my way to Niagara Falls I decided that I would focus on absorbing information and catching up with old friends and that I would start pulling together blog posts after I arrived in Ohio. However, once I got to Ohio, I found that other matters demanded my attention. Now that I'm back in Albany, I've finally got the time and the energy to reflect upon what I learned.

I arrived at Niagara University on the morning of the second day of the conference, just in time to attend Session 402, “Upstate/Downstate: Dimensions of a Problematic Dichotomy.” My friend and former boss Peter Eisenstadt (who blogs over at Greater New York) noted that although the precise location of the upstate-downstate boundary has long been subject to debate, it's plain that the distinction came into being in the 1890s and increased in popularity during the first half of the 20th century and that its emergence marks a notable change in New York City residents' conception of their relationship to the state: the term “upstate,” which became common parlance well before its “downstate” counterpart, has always connoted distance from the center. Prior to the term's emergence, regional conflicts were pervasive but tended to die out relatively quickly. However, by the end of the 19th century, conflict between New York City and the rest of the state was sharp and persistent. This situation was inextricably tied to the rise of New York City as a demographic and economic power, and Tammany Hall and Wall Street looked to many outsiders as manifestations of the city's boundless appetite for wealth and power. Moreover, owing to the constant drain of westward migration, many rural New York communities perceived themselves to be in decline.

The upstate-downstate division was initially political. In an effort to contain a city they saw as grasping and unmanageably large, Republicans representing rural areas devised a series of electoral ratios that ensured that New York City's residents were underrepresented in the state legislature; this situation persisted until the 1960s. The city's political leaders in turn articulated the belief that the state was strangling the city, and Tammany and anti-Tammany reformers often made common cause over the city's relationship to state government.

The political divide eventually became a cultural divide, and Eisenstadt asserted that the underlying irony of the upstate/downstate divide is that it came into being just as a series of political changes brought the city and state into closer alignment. Charles Evans Hughes, Al Smith, and other early 20th-century governors articulated a progressive philosophy of government, and the liberal consensus that dominated state politics for much of the 20th century held that the problems of all New Yorkers, urban and rural alike, could be addressed by an engaged citizenry and an active government.

Michael Frisch noted that “upstate” is a proxy term that stands in for a variety of things, including issues of class and the relationship between a cosmopolitan metropole and its rural periphery. He then discussed several instances in which the New York Times's coverage of Buffalo highlighted these issues.

Several decades ago, a group of Frisch's students did an oral history project focusing on unemployment in Buffalo. The New York Times was intrigued by the project and decided to make it the focal point of a Sunday magazine cover story. Frisch and his students were responsible for writing the initial draft of the story, and when Frisch received the edited version of the story, he was stunned by the nature of the changes the editor had made: although the Times's overall stance was, if anything, more politically left than he and his students had taken, it stripped out passages in which the interviewees had reflected critically upon their lives and privileged their emotional reactions and their struggles. The implications were clear: the working-class Buffalonians at the center of the article lacked the ability to comprehend their own circumstances -- and the Times's well-educated, generally affluent readership would assume responsibility for intellectually analyzing the causes of their suffering. Frisch and his students were able to force the Times to accept some editorial changes, but the final version of the article nonetheless flattened the complexities of the interviewees' lives.

The Times's biases of class and sophistication also shaped its coverage of local efforts to celebrate the centennial of the 1901 Pan-American Exhibition. Frisch and other people involved in organizing the event hoped that it would serve as a springboard for a re-imagining of Buffalo's future. However, they found that the local business community wasn't eager to remind people that President William McKinley was assassinated in Buffalo and that the Pan-American Exhibition depicted African-Americans and non-Western cultures in appallingly racist ways. They also discovered the Times's coverage of the commemoration centered upon the contrast between Buffalo's booming past and its hardscrabble present, not on its efforts to rebuild itself.

I missed the deadline for securing lodging at Niagara University and ended up staying in a hotel in downtown Niagara Falls, New York.  While driving from the university campus to my hotel, I found myself thinking a lot about the ways in which the upstate-downstate divide and class bias shape one's perceptions. I did a little advance reading before I visited the city, and it's plain that it has fallen on hard times. The 1956 collapse of a hydropower plant that made the city an attractive base of operations for numerous chemical companies seems to have set the city's decline in motion; the New York Power Authority built replacement facilities but diverted a substantial amount of the power they generated to the New York City area. The wave of deindustrialization that swept through the Great Lakes states during the last third of the 20th century hit western New York particularly hard. As anyone who's read about Love Canal knows, the now-vanished chemical and manufacturing plants left behind vast quantities of toxic waste, some of it radioactive; most of the uranium that went into the bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was refined in Niagara Falls plants, and the city's industrial facilities played a key role in building the nation's nuclear arsenal during the first decade of the Cold War. A catastrophic urban renewal project that gutted the city's historic downtown has limited its ability to capitalize upon its glory days as a tourist destination. The emergence of Niagara Falls, Ontario as a center of tourist activity and the Niagara Falls State Park restaurants and shops that enable day-trippers to purchase food and souvenirs without stopping in the city further further complicate the city's efforts to reorient itself toward tourism. The corruption and desperation that all too often flourish when life becomes a struggle for a piece of an ever-shrinking pie also keep the city from righting itself.

However, after hearing Eisenstadt's and Frisch's presentations, I couldn't help but think that the story of Niagara Falls is just a little more complicated. The city's downtown is charmless, many of the storefronts on its Main Street are vacant, some of its residential neighborhoods are laden with boarded-up homes, and approximately 60 percent of the city's residents receive some form of government assistance, but even a cursory glance reveals the existence of neighborhoods filled with well-maintained late 19th-century and early 20th-century homes, a substantial South Asian immigrant community, and several massive manufacturing plants that are clearly still operating. It's all too easy to take a quick look at a place and conclude that it's beyond salvaging -- and that the people who reside in it lack the ability to think critically about their circumstances. The more I thought about the city's recent history, the more I understood why so many of its residents dislike and distrust New York City -- and Albany and Washington -- and why they have refused to give up hope that their city will once again be a prosperous, appealing place. I also started to grasp why controversial gubernatorial candidate Carl Palladino garnered so much support in this area.

 Rainbow immediately to the north of the Horseshoe Falls, as seen through the artificial rusticity of Goat Island, Niagara Falls State Park, 16 June 2012.

Those of you who are regular readers of this blog know that I become something of a shutterbug when I'm on the road. However, I consciously refrained from taking a lot of pictures of the city of Niagara Falls. The city is home to a number of appealing 19th-century buildings and to some cool modernist structures, but so many of the images that I started mentally framing struck me as being perilously close to ruin porn. I like aestheticized decay as much as the next person, but it's one thing to find off-kilter beauty in a psychiatric facility slated for demolition and another to gawk at a community that's carrying on in the face of hard times and leave the impression that the hard times are permanent and irreversible.

American Falls and the Rainbow Bridge connecting Niagara Falls, New York and Niagara Falls, Ontario, as seen from Goat Island, Niagara Falls State Park, 16 June 2012.

So what did I do? I took pictures of the falls themselves, which may look natural but in fact are shaped and controlled by the New York Power Authority, Hydro Ontario, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and Niagara Falls State Park, which was landscaped by Frederick Law Olmstead. Nothing in or around Niagara Falls is as simple as it seems.

A walking tour of downtown Buffalo

Earlier today, I taught a digital preservation workshop for the Western New York Library Resources Council (WNYLRC).  I couldn't have asked for better hosts or for a better group of attendees, but by the end of the day I was absolutely drained.  I didn't want to spend the late afternoon and early evening vegetating in front of the TV in my suburban hotel room, so I headed into Buffalo -- a city I've driven through on countless occasions but have rarely had the chance to explore -- to check out the city's built environment. 

It's painfully evident that Buffalo has suffered hard times -- vacancies abound downtown and the East Side, the neighborhood separating downtown Buffalo from the suburb in which my hotel is located, is home to a striking number of boarded-up buildings and urban prairies.  However, it's also plain that Buffalo is an architectural gem.  Its downtown is home to a striking number of buildings that any city would be proud to claim as its own.

 Case in point:  the Electric Tower, formerly known as the Niagara Mohawk Building.  This white terracotta Beaux-Arts beauty was designed by James A. Johnson and was completed in 1912.

 This vacant former Waldorf Lunch building at 5 East Huron Avenue is much more modestly sized, and it may not look like much in the harsh sunlight of late afternoon . . . .

 . . . . However, when you get close to it, you see all kinds of fascinating details: a stunning typeface, subtle contrasts between matte and shiny metal, sleek Art Deco lines that would be right at home in Miami's South Beach neighborhood.

 Downtown Buffalo is home to a significant number of Art Deco buildings, most notably its City Hall (see below), but the former Buffalo Industrial Bank building at 17 Court Street is one of my favorites.  This not particularly good photo doesn't do it justice.

 It's only when you start examining its decorative details that its beauty snaps into focus.  Look at the frieze depicting the "gods of industry" between the second and third stories . . . .

 . . . . And this decorative metalwork at street level.

 The Liberty Building at 424 Main Street sits diagonally opposite the Buffalo Industrial Bank Building.  Designed by British architect Alfred Bossom and finished in 1925, it's unusual in that it's a) neoclassical in style and b) has two replicas of the Statue of Liberty sitting atop its roof.

 Both replicas were sculpted by Leo Lentilli.  One faces east, and the other faces west.

 As noted above, Buffalo City Hall, which dominates Niagara Square, is an Art Deco masterpiece.  It was designed by John Wade with the assistance of George Dietel and completed in 1931.  Owing to the strength and position of the late afternoon sun, I wasn't able to get a good picture of the building's front (you'll find a good one here), but even the back is spectacular.

Everywhere you look, interesting details pop out, among them the columns at the front entrance and the friezes by Albert Stewart.

The decorative tiles on the building's tower are stunning.

The statue of former Buffalo mayor and U.S. President Grover Cleveland that stands at the building's northwest corner was festooned with flowers; interestingly, the statue of former U.S. President Millard Fillmore situated at the building's southeast corner lacked any decoration.

The Buffalo City Court building immediately southeast of City Hall.  My first reaction upon seeing it:  "People of Buffalo, you have my sympathies."  The building, which was completed in 1974, exemplifies the much-reviled Brutalist style of architecture, and it doesn't harmonize well with City Hall, most of the other buildings that face Niagara Square, or the elegant white memorial to President William McKinley, who was assassinated in Buffalo in 1901.  However, as I walked around Niagara Square, it kept catching my eye.  As an abstract form, it is kind of interesting; I'm just grateful that I don't have to work inside it.

 Even though the curved exterior of the Michael J. Dillon U.S. Courthouse, which opened last year and is a certified "green" building, echoes the curvature of Niagara Square (which is more a traffic circle than a square), it also seems badly situated: it flanks the northwest corner of City Hall.  It's a nonetheless a refreshing change from the bland neoclassicalism of all too many newer federal government buildings, and in a different setting it would be nothing short of stunning.

A few blocks southeast of City Hall stands another architectural masterpiece:  The Prudential Building (formerly the Guaranty Building), which was designed by eminent Chicago architect Louis Sullivan and his colleague Dankmar Adler.  Completed in 1896, it is an early and superb example of the steel skeleton skyscraper.

Two of the building's exterior walls are covered with terracotta tiles, and the decorative elements incorporated into these tiles are astoundingly beautiful.

An unanticipated burst of rain brought my sightseeing to an abrupt end, but also brought a delightful surprise as I was driving back to my hotel.

I love spending time in Great Lakes cities -- I grew up outside of Cleveland and find the architecture and geography of all of the Great Lakes cities familiar and comforting --  I wish I could spend some more time here.

A day in Oneonta, New York

Yesterday was Veteran's Day, and as a result all New York State offices were closed and I had the day off work. On a lark, I accompanied my friend Ron, who lives in Albany but teaches at the State University of New York at Oneonta, to Oneonta for the day.

Oneonta, which is about 80 miles to the southwest of Albany, is a community of approximately 14,000 nestled in the rolling hills of the Susquehanna River valley. It's a college town, and it has the lively, slightly off-kilter charm that one often finds in such communities.

The land now occupied by the City of Oneonta was originally settled by the Algonquin and the Iroquois. The first Europeans to move into the area were Dutch and Palatine German settlers who moved out of the Schoharie and Mohawk valleys shortly before the American Revolution. The city experienced a boom with the coming of the Delaware and Hudson railroad during the late 19th century and during the early 20th century was home to the largest railroad roundhouse in the world.

The roundhouse was demolished long ago, and the city's economy now centers around higher education (the State University of New York at Oneonta and Hartwick College sit on the hillsides that overlook downtown Oneonta), health care, and retail; Oneonta may have only 14,000 residents, but it's surrounded by numerous small towns and villages whose inhabitants come to Oneonta to shop, eat in restaurants, see movies, and attend concerts and other cultural events.

Oneonta's late 19th century boom is manifest in its architecture, much of which dates from that era. The Wilber Mansion at 11 Ford Street is an excellent example. It was built by George I. Wilber, who was the son of the founder of the nearby Wilber National Bank and who served as president of the bank from 1890-1923. The mansion's inner core was built in 1875, and the porches, turret, port-cochere, and high Victorian decorative elements were added during an 1890 renovation. Since 1999, the Wilber Mansion has served as the headquarters of the Upper Catskill Community Council of the Arts.

The Chapin Memorial Church at 12 Ford Street is directly across the street from the Wilber Mansion. The church, which was dedicated in 1894, is home to the Unitarian Universalist Society of Oneonta. It is the second house of worship that the congregation has built at this site. A 1941 lightning strike destroyed its steeple, which was never rebuilt, and, sadly, most of the congregation's historical records.

Main Street is, as its name implies, Oneonta's main thoroughfare. Two- and three-story commercial buildings dominate the streetscape, and the image above should give you a sense of what Oneonta's downtown looks like. My friend Ron and I had a leisurely brunch at the always awesome Autumn Cafe at 244 Main Street (look for the red awning). If you're ever in Oneonta, this is the place to eat.

After brunch, we headed to the State University of New York at Oneonta campus so that my friend could teach a trio of courses. While he was in class, I took in the exhibits at the Martin-Mullen Art Gallery in the Fine Arts Building (and highly recommend Recent Work: Faculty Art Exhibition, which will be open until 16 December) and spent a little time pondering Joseph Kurhajec's Twisting Force (2005), which occupies a prominent position in the courtyard of the Fine Arts Building.

I then headed over to the James M. Milne Library, where I spent a couple of hours working on an upcoming presentation on disaster recovery and electronic records (posts on this subject are forthcoming), then stopped by the adjacent Jazzman's Cafe for a cup of coffee.

It started snowing while I was at Milne Library and continued snowing as I made my way back to the Fine Arts Building to meet Ron. A few minutes after I took this picture, snow stopped falling in the courtyard and the sun started coming out. However, snow continued to fall on the western side of the Fine Arts Building for at least ten minutes afterward. The SUNY Oneonta campus is no stranger to this sort of highly localized precipitation.

After doing a little shopping, Ron and I headed back to the Autumn Cafe for dinner. We sat in one of my favorite spots, a very Maxfield Parrish-ish elevated alcove, to which has been added a tree full of crows and the Wicked Witch of the West.

On our way back to the car, we took a few minutes to contemplate the Municipal Building at 238-242 Main Street, next to the Autumn Cafe. This Beaux Arts structure was built in the early 20th century and was originally the Oneonta City Hall. It now serves as an Otsego County satellite office building.

I haven't been able to find much information about Oneonta's current City Hall, which sits at 252 Main Street, but I suspect that it was built in the 1930s and that it was a Works Progress Administration project.

The above images are only a taste of what this fun, funky little community has to offer. If you ever get the chance to spend a little time in Oneonta, by all means take the opportunity to do so.

Labor for Your Neighbor

Being in Albany is a little strange right now. Anyone who stays close to the city and its environs could be forgiven for thinking that nothing's out of the ordinary. The bundles of tree limbs that appear on the curbs on trash day make it plain that a storm recently passed through, but that's par for the course for upstate New York in August.

Less than an hour away in any direction, however, life is anything but normal. Irene wreaked havoc in and around the Schoharie Valley, the Catskills, the Adirondacks, and in Vermont. Eleven New Yorkers -- one of them the wife of a recently retired colleague -- and Vermonters died, hundreds of people -- among them a colleague's son and daughter-in-law -- have lost their homes, tens of thousands of others are cleaning up flooded homes and businesses, and many others are largely cut off from the outside world as a result of washed-out bridges and roads. Farmers in eastern New York and Vermont have suffered devastating losses of crops and livestock.

It's increasingly apparent that history is one of the casualties of Irene: historic covered bridges in nearby Schoharie County and in Vermont were swept away by flood waters, the Revolutionary War-era Guy Park Manor in Amsterdam, New York may have to be demolished, and several of my colleagues have helped local governments salvage water-damaged records. All of them have come back to the office visibly shaken by what they've seen.

I realize that Irene's impact wasn't limited to New York and Vermont -- people in twelve states are dead as a result of this storm -- and that several other states are also dealing with severe flooding. However, I also know that a disproportionate number of this blog's tens of regular readers live in the Albany area, so I'm focusing on local matters in this post.

If you want to help your flood-affected neighbors, you have several options:

• Governor Cuomo is asking New Yorkers to take part in a “Labor for your Neighbor” volunteer effort on Labor Day weekend to assist in local clean-up efforts in the Schoharie Valley, Catskill and North Country Regions. Volunteers will devote a few hours on Sunday or Monday in the affected regions helping people in flood-stricken areas clear their homes of the mud and debris Irene left behind. The New York National Guard and the New York State Office of Emergency Management will coordinate volunteer efforts and transport volunteers. If you are interested in taking part, sign up here. (N.B.: Advance registration is mandatory -- you can't simply show up and expect to be put to work!)

• If other commitments or health issues prevent you from taking part in Labor for Your Neighbor, you can donate to the United Way of New York via the Labor for Your Neighbor Web page. All contributions will be funneled to reputable charitable organizations serving the affected areas.

• If you're looking for other ways to help in New York, the Albany Times-Union has posted a list of organizations seeking volunteer assistance (advance registration required!) or monetary donations. N.B.: the list includes a historic site and a public library.

• If you want to help our neighbors in Vermont get back on their feet, the Vermont indie newsweekly Seven Days has posted a list of ways you can do so.

Please, please do what you can.

What are you doing New Year's, New Year's Eve?

Whatever you're doing, I hope you're having a lovely time doing it and that 2011 brings nothing but good things to you.

And what am I doing on New Year's Eve? I'm going to spend a quiet evening at home watching DVDs and doing the prep work needed to make hoppin' John tomorrow. I flew into Albany in the midst of the snowstorm on Sunday night, went back to work on Monday morning, worked furiously all week, and really feel the need for a little quiet time.

New York State is one of the twenty-six states experiencing a gubernatorial transition in the wake of November's elections, and in New York governor's take office on New Year's Day. Most governors have opted to take a private oath of office at midnight and a public oath of office at noon.* However, Governor-Elect Andrew M. Cuomo will take the private oath of office at around 10:30 this evening so that his children and other young guests at tonight's Executive Mansion dinner will be able to witness it. He won't be the first New York governor to do so.

Charles D. Breitel, Chief Justice of the New York State Court of Appeals, issues the oath of office to Governor Hugh L. Carey, 31 December 2010, 10:30 PM. Carey, a widower, took the oath at 10:30 so that his twelve children could witness the ceremony before bedtime. New York (State). Governor. Public information photographs, 1910-1992. Series 13703-82, Box 3, No. 8152_012. Image courtesy of the New York State Archives.

*Actually, both oaths are less-than-essential: the official mechanism for taking office is the signing of a notarized document that will be kept on file by the New York State Secretary of State. Governor-Elect Cuomo probably signed such a document, which will go into effect at the stroke of midnight, earlier today.

MARAC Fall 2010, day one

Market Street Bridge over the Susquehanna River, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, 12 November 2010. The Ionic columns at the entrance of the bridge were salvaged from the old State Capitol building, which burned down in 1897.

The Fall 2010 meeting of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference got underway today. I'm offering only a few highlights from a jam-packed and rewarding day:

• Colgate University, the Rockefeller Archive Center, and Syracuse University are investigating the possibility of developing a New York State EAD consortium, with particular emphasis on assisting repositories that have some EAD knowledge and experience but are having problems with publishing their finding aids and securing adequate technical support. If you're interested in seeing how this project proceeds or in contributing your expertise, contact Colgate University Archivist Sarah Keen at skeen - at - colgate.edu

• Kathleen Roe (New York State Archives) delivered a great plenary address on the importance of advocating for archives. Noting that we all need to explain -- to administrators, boards of directors, or local, state, and federal politicians -- the value of archives and what we need to do our jobs as effectively as possible, she offered some practical words of advice:
• Learn the rules of engagement and accept them for what they are. You don't have to compromise yourself or your principles, but you do need to learn how to find your way through established channels. For example, if you're seeking Congressional support for legislation, you simply have to accept that you'll be making your case to the incredibly bright twenty-somethings who run Congressional offices.
• Archival issues are generally poorly understood, and you need to explain, clearly and succinctly, the value of archives: records safeguard rights and benefits, influence major policy decisions, enable people to connect to family and community history, help to document and correct longstanding injustices, and, in some instances, help to save lives. When dealing with legislators, make the story local -- how do records help their constituents? Have records helped constituents secure benefits to which they're entitled? Are archives attracting tourist dollars to their districts?
• Archivists have substantial competencies and qualifications that can be of use to legislators and other stakeholders. We can help legislators manage the ever-increasing volume of records that they create and can help all stakeholders care for electronic materials.
• Don't listen to people who tell you that you can't do what you need to do; just go ahead and do it. You may be pleasantly surprised by the results.
• Don't forget to state plainly what you want. Legislators, administrators, and board members aren't mind readers.

• In "Replevin: Pros and Cons," Joseph Klett discussed the New Jersey State Archives' new Document Recovery and Amnesty Web pages, which encourage holders of alienated state government records to convey them to the State Archives without penalty, lists records known to be missing, and lists records that have been returned to the State Archives. Most of the missing records listed are enrolled laws of the Royal Colony of New Jersey (1703-1775) and the State of New Jersey (1776-1804), which were alienated from state custody a long time ago and which have been sold openly for decades; in fact, the listing on the Web site is based upon auction catalogs from the 1950s onward. Making these lists, which have been shared with law enforcement, readily accessible alerts dealers and members of the public to the fact that the listed records are the property of the State of New Jersey. This is a good thing -- after these Web pages went live, several people contacted the State Archives and voluntarily returned listed records that they held -- and I hope other states follow New Jersey's lead.

• In "Compulsory Candor? Open Records Laws and Recordkeeping," Pennsylvania State Archivist David Haury noted that new ways of doing government business can eliminate documentation of how things are done. For example, press releases, which were once issued and retained in paper format, are now issued electronically -- and even the electronic master copies may be deleted after the releases are posted on the Web. Archivists and records managers have yet to come to grips with the transitory nature of modern recordkeeping.

Bannerman's Castle

Ruins of Bannerman's Castle, Pollepel Island, New York, as seen from Amtrak train 253, 10 November 2010.

Earlier today, my friend Maria and I took the train from Albany, New York to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where we'll be attending the fall meeting of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference (MARAC). The Albany-Penn Station leg of the journey was, as usual, lovely. The train runs right on the western bank of the Hudson River, and passengers are always treated with a wide array of interesting sights, among them: lighthouses, bridges, boats and ships, all manner of waterfowl, the United States Military Academy at West Point, and Ossining Correctional Facility (popularly known as Sing Sing).

Bannerman's Castle, which is located about 80 miles of New York City on Pollepel Island, is one of my favorite sights. Built in the first decade of the 20th century by Francis Bannerman IV, who owned a military surplus business, it housed various types of goods. However, over the course of the 20th century the castle and other buildings on the island fell into disuse. New York State assumed ownership of the island and its structures in 1967, and gave public tours until 1969, when a fire tore through the castle and destroyed its roof and floors.

The island has generally been closed to the public ever since the fire, but thousands of Amtrak Empire Service and Metro-North Hudson Line passengers enjoy a fleeting view of it every day. Despite the concerted efforts of the Bannerman Castle Trust to secure funding needed to stabilize the structure, it's quite possible that the castle will continue to crumble: two exterior walls partially collapsed in late December 2009, and some of the remaining walls look disconcertingly unstable.

At present, however, Bannerman's Castle continues to fascinate children and to encourage busy adults to devote a few minutes to contemplating the fragility and impermanence of all things human.

New York State Archives Partnership Trust to honor Richard Dreyfuss in Albany, New York, 28 September 2010

The New York State Archives Partnership Trust, Greenberg Traurig, the Albany Times Union and History^TM are sponsoring an engaging evening of conversation between Academy Award^®-winning actor and 2010 Empire State Archives and History award honoree Richard Dreyfuss and nationally prominent Lincoln scholar Harold Holzer as they talk about Mr. Dreyfuss’ life, work and passion for history.

Many people are familiar with Dreyfuss's storied acting career, but most of them aren't aware of the depth of his passion for history and archives. In May 2004, Dreyfuss and Holzer took part in a similar Archives Partnership Trust-sponsored discussion concerning Ulysses S. Grant, and everyone in the audience was stunned by the depth of Dreyfuss's knowledge of Grant's autobiography and all of the recent scholarship concerning his military and Presidential careers and his personal life. Dreyfuss fielded almost all of the audience questions -- none of which concerned his acting career -- and did so with aplomb and wit. It was a superb event, and I'm really looking forward to seeing Dreyfuss receive a well-deserved award and engage in another discussion with his friend Holzer, who is a first-rate historian.

If you're going to be in Albany, New York on 28 September 2010, please consider attending this event, which will be held at 7:30 PM at The Egg (also known as the Nelson A. Rockefeller Empire State Performing Arts Center), which is part of the Empire State Plaza complex. Tickets are $10.00 per person (plus handling fees). To make reservations, simply call The Egg Box Office at (518) 473-1845.

You may also wish to attend a special reception honoring Richard Dreyfuss that will be held at The Egg from 5:30-7:00 PM on 28 September. Tickets for the reception are $50.00 per person for Archives Partnership Trust members, $65.00 per person for those who wish to become Trust members at the time they purchase their tickets, and $75.00 for non-members who wish to attend the reception, and everyone who purchases a ticket to the reception will receive a complimentary ticket to the program itself. All proceeds from the reception will support the programs of the New York State Archives and the Archives Partnership Trust.

Reservations for the reception must be made by September 22, 2010, and reservations are confirmed when payment is received. No refunds are available. You may purchase reception tickets online or by calling the Archives Partnership Trust office at 518-486-9349. The Trust accepts Visa, MasterCard, AMEX and Discover. Personal checks can be made out to the Archives Partnership Trust and brought or mailed to to the Archives Partnership Trust, Cultural Education Center , Suite 9C49, Albany , NY 12230.

New York State Archivist Chris Ward on gubernatorial records

Last Friday evening, New York State Archivist Chris Ward appeared on Capital Tonight, YNN Albany's statewide public affairs program, to discuss gubernatorial recordkeeping practices in New York State, proposed legislation concerning gubernatorial records management and transfer of archival gubernatorial records to the State Archives, and an upcoming symposium on electronic records. In the process of doing so, she explained -- in clear and easy-to-grasp terms -- what the New York State Archives does and why preserving gubernatorial records is so important. It's a nice segment, even if the quality of the video that Capital Tonight posted to YouTube leaves something to be desired.

Vancouver Archives, UK Web crawling, Preserving Virtual Worlds, Yamasaki Associates records

Just a few things that have flown over the transom as of late:

• The City of Vancouver Archives is soon going to have a fully functioning digital archive that makes use of the open source Archivematica digital archiving system. It's also actively reaching out to the open source/hacker community, which it sees as an emerging user group for its datasets and other electronic records. This is pretty cool -- to the best of my knowledge, no one in the American archival community is really seeking to find out how the coding community wants to make use of archival data. (If I'm overlooking someone, please let me know!)

• The online UK edition of Wired recently posted a great article outlining the copyright and other legal challenges that the British Library faces as it attempts to capture and preserve the nation's Web presence -- a daunting challenge in and of itself. (h/t: Resource Shelf)

• The Atlantic recently highlighted (online and in print) the fascinating work being done by the Preserving Virtual Worlds project, which seeks to preserve video games and virtual environments such as Second Life. It's really heartening to see this project, which is funded by the Library of Congress's National Digital Information Infrastructure Preservation Program, get this sort of media attention.
  

• This (probably) doesn't have much to do with electronic records, but I really want to commend my colleagues at the Archives of Michigan for taking quick, decisive action to save the records of the now-defunct architectural firm of Yamasaki Associates. The firm was founded by Minoru Yamasaki, who designed, among many other important buildings, the World Trade Center complex in New York City and the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration's National Personnel Records Center (Military Personnel Records) in St. Louis, Missouri, which suffered a devastating fire in 1973. Kudos Michigan State Archivist Dave Harvey and all of the Michigan state government personnel and Society of Architectural Historians administrators who helped to save the firm's records. They were given less than a day to do so, and they rose to the challenge spectacularly well.
  

Open Government in the Digital Age Summit, Albany, New York, 19 March 2010

If you're interested in electronic records, digital preservation, and government accountability and transparency, you'll want to attend this event if at all possible. I'll post the full agenda as soon as possible (we're awaiting final confirmation from a couple of speakers), but if you know you can make it to Albany, New York on 19 March 2010, by all means register now! NB: although registration is required, this event is free.

In support of Governor David A. Paterson’s commitment to increased transparency and openness in government, the New York State Chief Information Officer/Office for Technology and the New York State Archives cordially invite you to attend the . . .

Friday, March 19, 2010
8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
New York State Cultural Education Center – Clark Auditorium
Reception to Follow

This Summit, which is free and open to the public, will feature an opening address by David S. Ferriero, the Archivist of the United States.

Paul Taylor, Chief Content Officer, e. Republic, Inc., will present the closing address.

Panel discussions will focus on “hot-button” issues in “open government” including:

• The Meaning of “Open Government” in the Digital Age
  
• Citizen Expectations for Access in the Digital Age
  
• Open Government Implications of Sunshine Laws and Archival Responsibilities

The summit includes additional speakers and panelists of national stature as well as representatives from the highest levels of government, academia, research and industry.

Please visit http://www.surveygizmo.com/s/245446/open-government-registration to register for this exciting event!

Please register by March 12, 2010 as space is limited. An email confirming your registration will be sent to you.

If you have any questions regarding this event, please contact Terry Jovanovic at (518) 473-5115 or terry.jovanovic[at]cio.ny.gov.

A New York State Olympics

If you're getting tired all of the commercials and puff pieces that dominate coverage of the current Olympics, the New York State Archives has added A New York State Olympics, a behind-the-scenes look at preparations for the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, to its Web site and its YouTube channel. Enjoy!

NB: The online version has been edited for length. If you're interested in obtaining a full-length copy of the film, contact the State Archives' Reference Services unit.

Capital Area Archivists event in Schenectady

Late this afternoon, about a dozen members of the Capital Area Archivists of New York met at the Schenectady County Historical Society.

The historical society is housed in an 1985 neo-Georgian home, and a modern addition behind the original building houses its library and archives.

Our host, librarian/archivist Katherine Chansky, first led us on a walking tour of Schenectady's historic Stockade District, which sits on the banks of the Mohawk River. The area was first settled in 1664, but all of the original structures were burned to the ground by a French and Mohawk raiding party in 1690. The settlement was rebuilt and quickly became a commercial center: until the Erie Canal opened, settlers heading west had to travel overland from Albany to Schenectady and then resume traveling by ship.

Although the area suffered a devastating fire in 1819, the neighborhood is home to many 18th-century buildings. Two of them, the Hendrick Brouwer House and the Abraham Yates House, may have been built in the late 17th century.

The Hendrick Brouwer House sits at 14 Front Street, and was known to have existed as of ca. 1705. Some of its cellar beams are 13 inches square, and its foundation walls are 25 inches thick.

Although the building has settled a bit with age (look closely at the doorframe), it is sturdy and well maintained.

The Abraham Yates House, which is at 109 Union Street, is a classic Dutch vernacular home; note the street-facing gable end. The portion of the house to the right of the front door is a later addition.

A look at the side of the Abraham Yates House reveals that it has in fact been the recipient of many additions.

Another structure of note is the Widow Kendall House at 10 North Ferry Street. The home was built ca. 1790, and for many years was the home of Annie Kendall, who did a good business selling cakes and ale. The home's facade likely assumed its present form during the early 19th century.

Joseph Yates, the first mayor of the city of Schenectady and the fourth governor of New York State (1823-1825), lived at 17 Front Street; Yates apparently didn't believe in patronage, so it's not surprising that he didn't have much of a career in state politics. Yates's three-story home was built in 1760, and the two-story addition on the left housed his law offices.


The small circular park at the intersection of Front, Ferry and Green Streets marks the site of Queen Anne's Fort, which was built in 1704 and housed approximately 300 soldiers. The statue at the center of the park commemorates Lawrence the Indian, a Christian Mohawk who befriended the Dutch and English and doggedly tracked the French and northern Mohawks responsible for the 1960 raid.

After about 45 minutes, we returned to the historical society for a tour of its museum, library and archives. The museum's exhibits document Schenectady's origins as a Dutch settlement, rise to commercial and industrial preeminence, and efforts to grapple with recent structural changes in the economy. It's a lot larger than it looks from the outside!

We held a brief business meeting in the museum's dining room:

• CAA President Amy Rupert (Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Archives and Special Collections) outlined CAA's plans to tour of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum in early October and to host a business meeting and event in November.

• I discussed the 2009 Best Practices Exchange and the Partnership for the American Historical Record initiative.
  

• Susan D'Entremont (Capital District Library Council) noted that the 2009 Capital Region Archives Dinner will be held on October 7. She also highlighted the CDLC's new CDLC Digital Collections site, which makes available digitized materials held by a growing number of libraries, archives, museums, and cultural organizations, and New York Heritage, a portal to digitized materials held by institutions throughout the state.

Our visit ended with a tour of the library and archives. The research room, which also houses the library, is incredibly airy and inviting. The large picture window in the back of the room overlooks a creek that feeds into the Mohawk River, and the high windows ensure that the space is flooded with light. Modern temperature and humidity controls (which the museum also has) keep the space cool and comfortable for both collections and people.

I didn't take any pictures of the archives storage area, which is located below the library. The historical society is running a bit short on shelf space (what archives isn't?), but hopes to be able to secure the funding needed to install compact shelving.

This was my first visit to the Schenectady County Historical Society and to the Stockade District, and I was really impressed. The historical society may have a small professional staff, but it's been able to secure a lot of community support and recruit a corps of dedicated and creative volunteers. It sits in the midst of a beautiful and historic neighborhood, and it's pretty plain that the historical society and the neighborhood have a close and mutually beneficial relationship. I'm planning a return visit soon.

A day at the Bronx Zoo

Yesterday, my friend Gloria and I took a trip to the Bronx Zoo. The story of how this trip came to be is kind of complicated, so I'll simply say that I'm glad that it happened. Although I am in many respects ambivalent about zoos, I appreciated having the opportunity to see animals I will likely never see in the wild. I also relished being able to catch up with Gloria, who worked for a long time as an archivist but whose work now centers upon research and grant writing. I don't see her as frequently as I did when we worked in adjacent offices, and yesterday's outing was a real treat.

We took a chartered bus to the zoo, and for some reason the driver opted not to take the New York State Thruway all the way down to the Bronx. Instead, we headed into New Jersey and then crossed the George Washington Bridge into Manhattan. I've driven over the GW several times, but have never been able to check out the New York skyline while doing so; it's not really possible to do any sightseeing while driving on a two-level, fourteen-lane toll bridge. Grey as the day was, it was nice to have the opportunity to take in the view.

When we got to the zoo itself, we began in the Amphibian House, which is housed in Zoo Center, a Beaux Arts structure that features splendid sculptures of animals. One of the most striking things about this particular zoo is the attractiveness of its grounds. Many of the zoo's 19th- and early 20th century buildings are still standing, and the grounds around them are still are still carefully landscaped. The newer buildings are less ornate but nonetheless complementary, and the grounds have a sylvan, tranquil quality that makes it easy to forget that one is in an urban environment.

The Wildlife Conservation Society, which operates the Bronx Zoo, was founded in 1895. It maintains its own archives, and detailed information about its holdings is available through the New York State Historical Documents Inventory.

We then moved onto the Monkey House, which features a host of captivating small monkeys from South America. The Silvery Marmoset is native to Bolivia and Paraguay.

I kept my camera's flash turned off during my visit to the zoo. Although I'm sure that the animals are used to flash photography and all sorts of other disruptions -- kids sometimes yell at animals, tweens and teens sometimes strike out on their own, and parents don't always instruct or supervise -- I thought it only fair to minimize the amount of disturbance I caused.

We then moved onto the Madagascar exhibit, which is quite new. Fish swam around this partially submerged Nile Crocodile . . .

. . . which was resting its head on rocks above the water line.

This Day Gecko is also a native of Madagascar.

The lemur area sits at the center of the Madagascar exhibit. The Bronx Zoo has at least two Collared Lemurs and at least half a dozen Ring-tailed Lemurs. Photographing them was really difficult: they are fast, active animals!

We moved on to the Birds of Prey area. I loved the almost comically grim look of these Cenereous Vultures, which are native to southern Europe and northern Africa and can be found as far east as China. I vividly recall a sequence of Peanuts strips in which Snoopy pretended to be a vulture . . . until a real vulture landed beside him and scared him senseless. I think that Charles Schultz used a Cenereous Vulture as the model for his drawing of said vulture.

Although we somehow managed to miss the great apes, we spent quite a bit of time in the Africa section of the zoo. The baby Giraffe on the right, who was born in February of this year and dubbed Margaret by zoo personnel, was keeping a close eye on her mother and the other adults.

It's just about impossible to see the entirety of the Bronx Zoo in a single day, and we didn't have the chance to take the monorail that allows visitors to see the elephants and many other large African animals. We saw only this skull, which belonged to a male African Elephant that in 1989 was illegally killed for its tusks. The zoo has situated this skull on the periphery of the Giraffe habitat and posted signs that discuss the problem of poaching and the Wildlife Conservation Society's efforts to combat it.

This Lion cub, named Moxie on account of her playful, gutsy personality, was relaxing in the shade with her mother. Her father was resting nearby.

I mentioned above that I have mixed feelings about zoos, and seeing this Polar Bear brought all of my negative feelings to the fore. As the zoo's Web site indicates, Polar Bears are solitary, highly mobile creatures: a given bear's home range is between 93-186 square miles, and adults travel alone unless they are seeking a mate or raising young. The habitat of the bear pictured above is smaller than my apartment. The bear itself seemed listless and bored; toys, occasional treats, and the opportunity to smell noisy humans and their food are poor substitutes for the freedom to roam, hunt, and reproduce at will.

The Grizzly Bears, who live next to the Polar Bear, seemed slightly happier, if only because they are more social and can be housed as a group and because their habitat is slightly larger than that of their next-door neighbor. Moreover, as the zoo's signage makes it plain, these bears cannot live in the wild. All of them originally came from Montana or Wyoming, and all of them were deemed "nuisance bears" because they persistently visited areas settled by humans. If the Bronx Zoo hadn't taken them in, wildlife authorities would have killed them.

The zoo's signage also indicates that most of these bears carry permanent reminders of their past encounters with humans: x-rays have revealed buckshot or bullets embedded in their flesh. The bear pictured above constantly shakes its head as it walks -- not normal for a bear -- and Gloria and I wondered whether this behavior is the result of past head trauma.

The Tiger habitat, which is much newer than that of the bears, is much larger. The Tigers have a relatively large wooded area in which to roam, and the zoo makes a conscious effort to keep them mentally and physically active. "Enrichment" sessions involving toys or treats (or toys containing hard-to-get-at treats) take place several times a day.

These Père David's Deer exemplify the good work that zoos can do: originally native to China, these deer are now extinct in the wild. The Bronx Zoo and other zoos that hold captive populations of these animals are now trying to reintroduce these deer to their native habitat.

The Bronx Zoo has a lengthy history of helping to rebuild wild animal populations. The American Bison who live at the zoo are descendants of a small group of animals brought to the zoo in 1899. Other descendants of the zoo's American Bison were returned to the West, and most of the 20,000 wild American Bison that roam through Yellowstone National Park and other protected areas trace their lineage to the Bronx Zoo herd.

We ended our day with a late lunch at the zoo's cafe, where we were joined by one of the resident Indian Peafowl. Native to the Indian subcontinent, these beautiful, noisy creatures have the run of the zoo and move freely from habitat to habitat; however, they seem to have sense enough to avoid the areas housing the lions, tigers, and bears. The peafowl and ducks, which are also free to move about the zoo's grounds, have little to no fear of people, and this peacock was not shy about seeking handouts from the humans seated outside the cafe.

We left the Bronx Zoo tired and wet (spring in the Northeast has been cool and very wet, and yesterday was no exception), but very glad we came and enthused about the prospect of making a return trip at some point in the future.