Holly's Hurricane

Holly’s Hurricane

Marie Carter

Grace Goodrich Press

Astoria, New York

Copyright © 2018 by Marie Carter

Published by Grace Goodrich Press. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without the publisher’s written permission, except for brief quotations in reviews.

www.mariewritesandedits.com

Printed in the United States of America

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

ISBN: 978-1-721563-53-1

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018908853

Table of Contents

1. Penn Station (1910 – 1963)

2. Manuel de Gerrit de Reus, 1641

3. Siegel-Cooper (1896 – 1917)

4. The Old Brewery at Five Points (1792 – 1852

5. The Conspiracy of 1741

6. King George III Statue (1770 – 1776) & Prison Ship Martyr’s Monument (1908 – )

7. Barnum’s Museum (1842 – 1865)

8. Green-Wood Cemetery (1838 – )

9. General Slocum Disaster, 1904

10. Ellis Island Hospital (1902 – )

11. Smallpox Hospital on Roosevelt Island (1856 – )

12. The Crystal Palace (1853 – 1858)

13. Steinway Mansion (1858 – )

Acknowledgments

For Honey Bear

For Mum and David

"The New York designer Milton Glaser was the first to put the in a sentence: I NY. This long-lived slogan…has succeeded far beyond its creator’s anticipations. It sends an unmistakable warm embrace, disarming the city visitor who might otherwise tremble before the urban chase. I NY is ingenious above all because it has a truth at its core to do with our love of place and how that in turns creates community."—Anatomies by Hugh Aldersey-Williams

"American vision, daring, restlessness, engineering skill have all been properly read into this marvelous transformation from brownstone into Babylon. As for building eternity, the need does not exist. Thirty years from now they will be tearing up the city once more."—The New York Times, 1926

1. Penn Station (1910 – 1963)

One minute I am sitting with my mum in the nursing home in Boston, England.

The next I was transported to the Strid, the stream that lurks about a hundred yards from the nursing home, with all the danger signs. It looks perfectly benign, but because of its deadly combination of fast currents and underwater rocks, anyone who has ever jumped in, or gone swimming in the Strid, has died. They put the first danger signs up about fifty years after the third person had gone missing, but still, about twenty years ago some troublemaker had dipped a toe in and was grabbed by the current as if by a hungry monster, angry with the daredevil for even tempting fate.

I was standing by the Strid when I saw a man who looked faintly familiar, sporting pince-nez glasses, a salt and pepper thick mustache, and wearing a bowler hat. He was stylishly dressed and a little portly—in fact, I would have said he had a similar profession to mine—like an architect, except he seemed to be from another era. He took his hat off as a gesture, and I could see his hair was parted down the middle. He beckoned me to come closer and gestured for me to look into the water. The remarkable thing was, I didn’t feel unsafe. There was something fatherly about the man, something I trusted. As I drew closer and closer, I noticed a kind of whirlpool gaining more and more momentum in the Strid. The noise of the water suddenly became deafening which was a shock to me, as I couldn’t hear it earlier.

The man said very simply, Hello, Ms. Williams.

And then, without warning, to my horror, the man pushed me in. I was instantly suctioned into a whirlpool but, to my amazement, I didn’t get wet. And, in spite of my age, I felt no discomfort. In fact, I felt light, and all of my daily aches and pains seemed to evaporate. I found myself in a vacuous tunnel-like interior, and I was falling like Alice down the rabbit hole, but in slow motion, as though I had developed wings. This was a relief. At my age, broken bones are harder to repair.

I landed weightlessly at the bottom of the steps of an imposing building that looked like an ancient Roman temple. I could barely feel my body, and I noticed I appeared to be see-through; my hands were opaque. The Architect was right behind me, looking at me and smiling, very proper and gentlemanly. He began climbing the steps of the building like an animated fairy sprite, turning and beckoning me to follow. But I stood gaping with a goldfish mouth, entranced. The structure was reminiscent of French palaces and Italian basilicas. The gigantic granite and steel façade was supported by Roman columns. The Architect bounced impatiently on the steps calling to me, Ms. Williams, and becoming afraid I might lose my guide, I began climbing to the top, punctuating each stair with a heavy footstep. I felt like a Roman goddess. Staring at the grandiose clock above me, I noted it was four in the afternoon.

Entering the gargantuan doors, I could hear crackly announcements being made over a PA system for what seemed to be the names of places and times. Commuters in stylish heels clicked past me.

May I offer you a tour? the Architect asked, presenting his elbow, his manners at once charming and archaic. He even wore elbow patches. No one can see you, he said, as if reading my mind.

Are we ghosts? I asked him, but he scoffed at my remark. Was this it for me? Had I died? Where are we? I pressed.

The past, he answered.

What is this place? It felt at once familiar and foreign.

Penn Station, New York City, 1920 when it was in its heyday.

I gasped. I had read about Old Penn Station when I was studying for my Masters at university many years ago. I hadn’t thought about it in such a long time.

We commenced walking at a regal pace. Penn Station, New York, New York, was born in 1910 and died in 1963, the man began.

On the interior, we were greeted by Italian-style shopping arcades with drugstores, clothing boutiques, and elegant restaurants, separated by columns of creamy, smooth travertine marble. There were two statues of important-looking men who were dwarfing the travelers; one was carrying blueprints.

Not a lot of New Yorkers know or remember the original Penn Station, the Architect said, smiling wistfully. It was quite glorious, as you can see. He gestured with his arm for me to drink in the splendor of Penn Station and I did. The walls were 150 feet high, I calculated, as I craned my neck upwards towards its magnificence and abundance of light.

Let’s look at the waiting rooms, he said, guiding me away from the stores, where patrons were chattering merrily.

In the waiting room, people were milling around smoking cigars or hugging and kissing, their faces changed from determined desire to softness as though they had finally found what they were seeking. Semi-circular windows bathed travelers in sunbeams. World maps crowded the walls.

I remember some of this, I said. The original Penn Station had the biggest waiting room in history which was modeled on the Baths of Caracalla in Rome with steel and glass arches. It was every bit as dreamy as it sounded.

Very good, Ms. Williams, the Architect nodded. I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or complimentary.

Pulling me away from the waiting room, the Architect took me back through the stores and into the main concourse of the train station. As we walked, he talked. This was the largest indoor space in New York City and one of the largest public spaces in the world at the time. He turned to look at me curiously for a moment. Do you remember any of this? I feel like I might be patronizing you with all this information.

I must confess it’s been a while since I studied architectural history, and my memory isn’t as good as it once was, I answered him.

The Architect raised an eyebrow but then moved me along, continuing my re-education. The original Pennsylvania Station, designed by Charles F. McKim, of McKim, Mead & White, opened on September 8th, 1910. In a ‘Farewell to Penn Station,’ a New York Times editorial wrote, ‘We will probably be judged not by the monuments we build but by those we have destroyed.’ This marked the beginning of the preservation movement.

The preservation movement, I said, with a faint trace of disgust. I had run into trouble with the preservation movement before.

The Architect did not react to my comment but instead tugged me by the arm whisking me through glorious passageways. The flurry of people were all elegantly dressed as though in reverence to the station itself.

In the main concourse, the soaring, vaulted, glass dome ceilings modeled on crystal palaces dazzled the open arena with sunlight. Staircases and bridges, decorated intricately like lace, spiraled over the tracks that escorted passengers to sunken platforms rendering the majestic construction a clichéd scene from a romantic European film. Lampposts were planted throughout the station with their light bulbs arranged like floral bouquets.

Do you remember why they had to demolish Penn Station? the Architect asked.

I did. And it made me a little sad to remember. Airplanes and highways were mostly responsible for its demise, I said. And by the 1950s, The Pennsylvania Railroad was struggling to come up with cash, so they optioned the air rights of Penn Station. The option called for the demolition of the head-house and train shed to be replaced by an office and sports complex.

The Architect nodded and took over from there. Nobody believed Penn Station would really be demolished, but demolition did begin in October 1963. In exchange for the air rights to Penn Station, the Pennsylvania Railroad would get a brand-new, air-conditioned, smaller station completely below street level at no cost.

And this glorious train station was demolished to make way for a claustrophobic, underground eyesore, I added.

The Architect continued the story. When word got out to architects of New York City that Penn Station was to be demolished, they came to Penn Station to protest, but New Yorkers paid little attention. The public refused to believe this historic station of mammoth proportions would be destroyed. The Architect sighed as he told me, Destruction began on October 28th, 1963, as protesters watched silently in the rain. Some architects held signs that read ‘Shame.’

It was a shame, I said, sadly, wondering how many buildings I had created so something else could be demolished. ‘One entered the city like a god; one scuttles in now like a rat,’ I added, quoting the architectural historian, Vincent J. Skully. In this regard, I had agreed with the preservation movement. The demolition of Penn Station was a damn shame.

Well, it wasn’t all doom and gloom, the Architect said. The origins of the New York City Landmarks Law are often attributed to the loss of this beautiful station.

Well, so many of those laws are hardly enforced today, I retorted.

You seem to take great pleasure in that, the Architect snapped, looking intensely at me with his pitch black eyes.

Not pleasure; I’m just a realist. The city needs to make room for its growing population and to create buildings that will support modern conveniences. Buildings need to be economically viable. I was about to say more, but the Architect interrupted me to continue his narrative.

The building’s remains, including sixteen-ton decorative eagles and the eighty-four Doric columns were later dumped into the marshlands of Secaucus, New Jersey.

The Architect stopped by a Doric column, his words slowing down. Can you imagine the scale of the loss? he asked, slowly.

Just as he started asking the question, the scene began to blur.

I am back at the nursing home, looking at my mum, who is staring blankly into space.

I can feel the tightness in my hips again and the sore throb of my feet. I look at the room around me, trying to get my grounding. Who are you? Mum asks me, probably for the fifth time today. At least she’s aware enough to know she’s supposed to recognize me. I wish I could see a glimpse of the mum I used to know.

I’m lightheaded from the dream, but I don’t want to alarm anyone, and I’m already embarrassed at having fallen asleep in the home. Perhaps it’s the jetlag.

I’m your daughter, I tell her. My name is Holly. My mum seems unimpressed at the reminder she has a daughter. Her mouth twitches in such a way that she appears as though she disapproves of such an idea.

Would it hurt you to put on some makeup? she says, cruelly. I try not to get involved with her in such arguments; she doesn’t know what she’s saying. Or does she? My mum is a former makeup artist and, even back when her mental faculties were in order, she would often disapprove of my lack of makeup. For years, I’ve rebelled against my mum’s ultra-feminine look. And yet I consider myself to look distinctive with my shoulder blade-length silver hair, full cheekbones, and long limbs. At 5’ 11" I’m somewhat tall for a woman. I also have a habit of wearing colorful vintage clothing. Right now, I am wearing a multi-colored, polyester smock, patterned with triangles and a grass green-colored cardigan.

Where’s Henry? I ask Mum.

Who? she asks, and my heart plummets. She doesn’t even know her husband. Possibly, he is in the bathroom. I wonder if he noticed me asleep?

I stop looking for Henry and glance over at my mum who is now staring into space, vacant. This is the first time I have come to visit my mum since Henry put her in a home three years ago. As her memory declined more and more, I couldn’t bring myself to see her. I didn’t want to witness my mum’s deterioration or visit her when she couldn’t remember me. But more than that, I feared being faced with my own future. Seeing her for the first time in several years has been a shock. My mum used to keep herself immaculate before she had to go into a home. She had red hair that she kept cut in a bob, smoky eye makeup, and manicured nails. She didn’t have to dye her hair until she hit seventy and then she just let it go grey. She had very few wrinkles. She always had such a youthful outlook and was frequently smiling. Now her hair is well below the chin with split ends; her eyes are sunken and lack their old sparkle. Her movements are stiff. Her back hunches over in a C-curve and her fingers are crooked and withered like an old witch’s.

Another elderly lady, in her nineties perhaps, in a gray floral patterned sweater, cries and complains of loneliness to her elderly neighbor. I want to go home, she says, repeatedly. I want to go home, too, I think.

I know, dear. We all do, says the lady next to her who seems to have some of her faculties in order and is becoming frustrated with repeating her answers.

Another elderly resident in a wheelchair complains she is over-swaddled in blankets. Will you help me? she begs me as I make my way to the restroom or bog as they say over here.

I’ll get the nurse, I offer.

Within seconds, an aide is in the room kindly untucking the prisoner, and I head back out the room on my search for a toilet and Henry. It scares me that someday in the near future this could be me, and who will be there to look after me?

Henry, my stepdad, had told me the final straw for deciding to put Mum in a home was when he found her in a heap on the floor chatting to herself, and unable to get back up on her own after he had returned from a grocery store trip. It was that incident that prompted him to do the inevitable.

I find the bathroom, but not Henry. The toilet smells not just of old-person urine, but also of the attempt to cover up the smell with a floral air freshening product. The walls are covered with pink flowery wallpaper. There is a handrail to the side of the toilet. I take a quick glimpse in the cupboard next to it, where I find toilet paper and a stack of diapers, or nappies as they would say over here, as well as a can of air freshener. We start our life in diapers and end them in diapers, it seems. Closing the cupboard door, I wipe myself, flush, and wash my hands. Upon exiting, I look left and right down the hallway for Henry, but there is no sign of him.

I head back down the hallway, and when I enter the common room, I find Henry seated with my mum again. They are both watching television on Henry’s laptop with headphones. They look sweet sharing a headphone set. They are both laughing. At least she still seems to get jokes, or perhaps she is laughing because Henry is also.

I tap Henry on the shoulder. Where were you? I ask. I was worried.

He looks puzzled. I told you I was going to search for an aide to check on tea time. It seems to be late today. You don’t remember? You had nodded when I told you, he says with concern.

How did I not remember that? I must have been mid-dream or hallucination when he told me. It must have slipped my mind, I say, reassuring him. You and Mum go back to watching the laptop. Henry has definitely aged since I last saw him four or five years ago, though unlike Mum his memory is mostly intact.

What are you watching? I ask Henry, just as he is attaching his earpiece.

The Best One Hundred Years of British Television.

And what are they showing as the best one hundred years?

Susan Boyle on Britain’s Got Talent, Fawlty Towers, Only Fools and Horses, Mr. Blobby.

Mr. Blobby? I answer in surprise. Mr. Blobby was a pink, bulbous figure covered in yellow spots with a clownish grin, jiggling eyes, and thick black eyelashes, whose only word blobby was delivered in an electronically modified voice. He was often featured on Noel Edmonds’ Saturday night variety show. It would be hard to explain the phenomenal popularity of Mr. Blobby in any other country. My mum used to buy me Mr. Blobby cream cakes from the local bakery when I was a teenager.

It’s surprising what some people will remember as the best of British television, Henry says, rolling his eyes. My mum and Henry huddle around the laptop, joined by their earphones, eyes wide and delighted by the entertainment.

While they are watching their program, I scour the room. I have to admit I am pleased with my stepdad’s choice in a home for my mum. There’s a view of what’s called the fens in this neck of the woods, a marshy region, and when the sun sets the sky exudes royal purples and baby pinks. The staff always greets me cheerfully.