The New York Public Library, cowering below the surrounding skyscrapers and an eerie foggy atmosphere.
It was a different time back when John Jacob Astor placed a codicil in his will to bequeath $400,000 (equivalent of $11.6 million in 2018) for the creation of a public library. After Astor's death in 1848, the resulting board of trustees executed the will's conditions and constructed the Astor Library in 1854 in the East Village. The library created was a free reference library; its books were not permitted to circulate. By 1872, the Astor Library was described in a New York Times editorial as a "major reference and research resource", but, "Popular it certainly is not, and, so greatly is it lacking in the essentials of a public library, that its stores might almost as well be under lock and key, for any access the masses of the people can get thereto".
An act of the New York State Legislature incorporated the Lenox Library in 1870. The library was built on Fifth Avenue, between 70th and 71th Streets, in 1877. Bibliophile and philanthropist James Lenox donated a vast collection of his Americana, art works, manuscripts, and rare books, including the first Gutenberg Bible in the New World. At its inception, the library charged admission and did not permit physical access to any literary items.
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Lower Manhattan's World Trade Center PATH station, which opened in 2016, at $4B US is considered to be the world's most expensive train station. But it is quite a place to visit... Busy too. It's projected that the station is used by 250,000 daily commuters and millions of annual visitors from around the world.
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135 East 57th Street, Midtown Manhattan. March 2019
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Street photography 5th Avenue style. SooC, Fujifilm X-T3, XF35mmF1.4 R
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Keeping a close watch on me and St. Patrick's Cathedral across the street.
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