Behind The Scenes

What was your proudest memento from your time at school? Is it the catapult you built for your physics class? The research paper that earned you an A? Your high school diploma? For many schoolgirls in New York in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, it was their needlepoint.  Helping to hone skills in everything from manual dexterity…

Many objects in the Luce Center, where nearly 40,000 objects from the New-York Historical Society’s permanent collection are displayed, are beautiful to look at. But they are also intriguing portals into the past, making us wonder “Why these objects? What makes them so important?” The answer lies in not what they are, but the story…

Most people in America can trace their family back to some sort of immigration wave, whether their ancestors came over on the Mayflower or flew into JFK airport. And withNew York being large point of entry, many families of immigrants either settled here or spent time here before moving on.  With our large collection of…

On September 8, 2011, the New-York Historical Society opened its doors to our Remembering 9/11 installation. With photographs, newspaper clippings and audio accounts of the events of September 11, 2001, we wanted our gallery to be a place to remember and reflect on the events and the time that has passed. With that in mind, we’ve encouraged…

When the New-York Historical Society reopens in November, the 77th Street Rotunda will be adorned with four works from artist Richard Haas’ Cityscape cycle–paintings which depict a 360 degree view of New York City’s skyline. Originally displayed in the employee dining room of the Philip Morris headquarters in 1982, Haas tells us his goal was to…

Art inspires, and sometimes what it inspires is other art. When composer Nell Shaw Cohen first saw Thomas Cole’s The Course of Empire at the New-York Historical Society, she was inspired to write a piece that represented the story seen in Cole’s series. One of the defining works of the Hudson River School of painting, The…

Most people can tell you exactly what happened to them on September 11, 2011. They remember the weather, or what they had for lunch, or the look on their neighbor’s face as the two watched smoke billowing from downtown Manhattan. The attacks of 9/11 affected everyone differently, and that is what the New-York Historical Society…

At the New-York Historical Society, our librarians, curators and conservators aren’t the only ones who get to have all the fun. Though we’re closed for renovations, our high school interns have been hard at work researching our collections. And they have the blog to prove it! On their Tumblr site the interns have been blogging…

Could Tiffany lamps be a national security threat? That’s what seemed to be the case when transporting A New Light on Tiffany: Clara Driscoll and the Tiffany Girls home to America from Germany. “The bomb sniffing dogs alerted on one of the crates,” said co-curator Margaret K. Hofer. “There a big ruckus and the crates had…