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Nanette Shaw
Famous NYC Book Collection Available for Research Selected Materials Featured in Exhibition and On Line What is probably the most important and certainly the most idiosyncratic collection of historical materials on New York City ever privately assembled was turned over to public scholarship on Thursday, September 7, with the dedication of the Seymour B. Durst Old York Library and Reading Room at The Graduate Center of The City University of New York. The late Seymour Durst, a New York City real estate developer, started the collection in the early 1960s and by the time he died in 1995 it filled nearly every nook and cranny of his five-story East Side townhouse. The Graduate Center’s Reading Room contains 3,000 of the most rare books along with furnishings from the study in Seymour Durst’s original "Old York Library" townhouse. In addition to books, the collection includes photos, images, postcards, maps, and other New York City memorabilia. The bulk of materials not in the reading room will be available in the Old York Library Research Room at The Graduate Center. Columbia University historian Dr. Kenneth Jackson spoke at the 5:30 p.m. dedication ceremony, which was held on the date of Durst’s birthday. The occasion also marked the opening of an exhibition of photos, maps, paintings and other memorabilia from the Old York Library at The Graduate Center. In addition, a Virtual New York History website is being developed by the school’s New Media Lab, which will provide access to many of the materials. In addition to donating a significant portion of the collection, The Old York Foundation, created by Mr. Durst and now headed by his daughter Wendy Durst Kreeger, has provided a $2 million endowment to support maintenance of the collection, a curator, creation of the online project, and two Seymour Durst Fellowships to be awarded to Graduate Center students studying New York City history. Seymour Durst had a passion for New York City history. In all, there are about 9,000 titles, encompassing four centuries of New York City history, plus about 3,000 glossy photos, 20,000 postcards about New York, historical maps, and thousands of pamphlets, guidebooks, magazines, newspapers, and various New York ephemera. The photos include materials from the morgue of the now-defunct New York Herald Tribune. Many of the postcards are mailed versions with messages that provide personal reactions to landmark locations and events. Among the more rare items are one of the ten copies of the 1811 Commissioners Grid Map that outlined the City’s path of development for the rest of the century; the six-volume first edition of Stoke’s Iconography of Manhattan Island, showing maps and views of the city before 1915; and the Manuals of the Common Council, 1841-1870, a.k.a. "The Valentine Manuals." (See Backgrounder for more examples.) According to Wendy Durst Kreeger, " the collection was donated in large measure to the Graduate Center because of their commitment to insure the integrity of the way my father organized the material, as well as the ability to provide educational access and scholarly use presented by this vital public institution." She also remarked that her father assembled the collection "out of a love of information and history." He often opened his home library to individual authors and researchers. A photographic stroll along Fifth Avenue as it appeared in 1911 is among the highlights of the exhibition of maps, photos, paintings, and other visual material from the collection. These rare Fifth Avenue photos document both sides of the street from Washington Square to 93rd Street, including the former B. Altman building at Fifth Avenue and 34th Street, in which The Graduate Center is located. They will be displayed in linear sequence in The Graduate Center’s Art Gallery, allowing viewers to take "a stroll along the Avenue" as it appeared about 90 years ago. Several dozen other items will also be displayed in the Art Gallery and the Media/Information Center, both located on The Graduate Center’s lobby level. The exhibition can be viewed Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., from September 8 to November 30. In addition, many of the materials from the collection will be made available on line through the Virtual New York website, an on line resource of historical materials and information about the City which is being created by The Graduate Center’s New Media Lab. The New Media Lab is working on the project in partnership with Yale University Press, which has given permission to use portions of Dr. Jackson’s Encyclopedia of New York in the Virtual Library. The Durst family has been involved in New York City real estate for over 85 years. Their firm was started in 1915 by Seymour’s father Joseph, who came to this country ten years before with $3 sewn into the label of his coat. Over the years they continued to acquire property in Midtown Manhattan, as Joseph’s sons, Seymour, Royal and David joined the firm. When Joseph handed over the reins to his sons, they had developed four major office buildings along Third Avenue. During the 60’s they began to develop properties on the Westside. The firm is now headed by Seymour’s son Douglas, who, along with his cousin Jody, was responsible for the successful completion of the first environmentally responsible large scale office project in the country at 4 Times Square. Douglas is President of The Durst Organization and Chairman of The Graduate Center Foundation, and Seymour’s daughter Wendy Durst Kreeger has been actively involved in establishing the library and its endowment. Although a quiet, reserved person, Seymour Durst was not shy about sharing his views with others. He was passionate about his concerns for rezoning manufacturing districts in Manhattan as a way to encourage much needed housing. He successfully fought against the development of Westway, which over time would have made the current redevelopment along the Hudson impossible. He also ran ads at the bottom of page one in The New York Times on a wide range of concerns. By the time of his death in 1995, he had used his "Bottom Lines" some 200 times to share his concerns on topics ranging from inadequate housing, poor zoning rules and his dislike for city planning. It was here that he began his crusade extolling the dangers of our rising national debt long before it was a political issue. He is also known as the creator of the "national debt clock" on the Avenue of the Americas, a second-by-second accounting of the growth of the national debt and each American family’s share of it On September 7, the same day as the dedication of the Seymour Durst Old York Library and Reading Room at The Graduate Center, the clock was shrouded as a symbol that the debt is finally being reduced. Seymour Durst was dedicated to working with New York City high school students and exposing them to meaningful careers that they could pursue. He was a Co-founder of the New York City Job & Career Center. This program, which is still in service, brings students to its center and gives them basic job readiness and interview skills. He also headed and was involved in a New York City Board of Education Cooperative Education project that gave students part time job experience during their junior and senior years in major New York City companies as well as the government sector. The Graduate Center is the doctorate-granting institution of The City University of New York, the largest urban university in the U.S. The only consortium of its kind in the nation, The Graduate Center draws its faculty of more than 1,600 members mainly from the CUNY senior colleges and cultural and scientific institutions throughout New York City. Established in 1961, The Graduate Center has grown to an enrollment of nearly 4,000 students in 31 doctoral programs and seven master's degree programs in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. The Graduate Center also houses 28 research centers and institutes and administers the CUNY Baccalaureate Program. According to a recent National Research Council report, more than a third of The Graduate Center's rated programs rank among the nation's top 20 at public and private institutions, nearly a quarter are among the top ten when compared to publicly supported institutions alone, and more than half are among the top five programs at publicly supported institutions in the northeast. Further information on The Graduate Center's programs and activities can be found on its Web site at: www.gc.cuny.edu. Researchers wishing to study the materials at The Graduate Center can do so by calling curator Madelyn Kent at 1-212-817-7241 to make an appointment, or by going to the Foundation’s website at www.oldyorklibrary.org. The Seymour B. Durst Old York Library and Reading Room at The Graduate Center Durst assembled his library in a manner that would arouse both the envy and despair of the average librarian. It was organized by what he termed the "Durst Quintessimal System" and filled all but four of the 20 rooms in the house. Each room had a different theme and if a book fell into three different categories he would simply buy three copies, one for each related room. Some of the other rooms/categories include the Postcard & Guide Room, a kitchen closet reserved for NY Historical Society publications, the Art & Theatre Room, the Architecture Closet, the Commerce and Finance Room, the Biography Room, etc. The Reading Room at The Graduate Center reflects those categories of organization, and the furnishings include a rug, table, breakfront, and couches from Durst’s study, along with book cabinets built especially for the room. For research purposes, a database has been created that will be accessible online and will make it convenient to use the material. It may be accessed by going to the Old York Foundations website at www.oldyorklibrary.org. The thousands of items encompass such things as an invitation to the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge, which is referred to as "the East River Bridge;" bound editions of Harper’s Weekly from 1850 to 1915; Durst’s own favorite book, E.B. White’s Here is New York; The Bowery on Seventy-Five Cents a Day; an autographed copy of Theodore Dreiser’s My City; and numbered editions of Al Hirschfeld’s 1932 Manhattan Oases (199/200), featuring drawings of city speakeasy bartenders, and the artist’s 1941 depictions of Harlem (445/1000). Among the more rare books, though not directly related to New York City, is an original edition of Thomas Paine’s Common Sense with Paine’s own edits hand-written between the lines. (See press release for more examples.) |