31st Annual SIA Conference Brooklyn, New York June 6-10, 2002
If you will not be on the Friday tour going to Steinway & Sons, you may wish to come early and attend one of the public tours which the company runs on the first two Thursdays of each month. These are lengthy tours and cover manufacturing aspects in detail. Tours fill up fast and are limited to 20 people. Call in late April to determine whether a tour will be available: 718-721-2600.
Cast iron studios tour 1:00-4:00 THIS TOUR IS FULL
We'll begin at the Manhattan studio of Shuli Sade in a former electrical manufacturer's building and hear about the building's history and her photography of industrial and engineering sites. This will be followed by a brief walking tour of cast iron buildings in Tribeca/Soho. Final stop will be in the studio of Gerry Weinstein, in the 1867 building owned by General Tools, where refreshments will be served along with a look at his collection of model steam engines and other industrial artifacts plus O-scale New York Central train layout. Attendees may choose to return to the hotel via subway or by walking over the Brooklyn Bridge. (Photograph below by Shuli Sade)
Accompany Estelle Haferling, "made, born and bred in Brooklyn," for a walking tour mixing history and memories of the waterfront neighborhoods where she spent the first 16 years of her life, such as DUMBO (Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass) and Williamsburg. Stories of lost sounds, like the Myrtle Avenue El, and long-gone smells, of coffee roasting and beer brewing, will accompany you as you stroll beneath the Manhattan and Brooklyn bridges where freight rails still lay in the Belgian block streets, and 19'th and early 20'th century warehouses and factories line the ways. You will visit Vinegar Hill and its surprise of 19'th century houses, walk by the Brooklyn Navy Yard and its Admiral's House, ca. 1810, and hear one young girl's story about what it was like to live there in the mid-20'th century.
Gowanus Canal by boat: 12:00-3:30 THIS TOUR IS FULL
After lunch on your own, gather for a gourmet scoop at the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory in the 1926 fireboat house at Fulton Ferry Landing prior to boarding the Chelsea Screamer at 12:30 at the River Café dock for a narrated tour of the mile-and-a-half-long Gowanus Canal, authorized in 1848. Stops are planned at the 1911 Douglass Street Pumping Station, which sat idle for 40 years, but was re-started in 1999 to flush clean water into the canal, and the 1888-89 Carroll Street bridge, one of the oldest bridges in New York City and the oldest known extant American bridge of the retractile type.
Opening reception: 6:00-9:00
The evenings reception will be held in the rotunda of the beautiful 1848 Greek Revival Brooklyn Borough Hall, built as the city hall before the consolidation of New York City in 1898.
Choose from eight all-day tours: 8:00-5:00
Protecting the Harbor
This tour, led by Paul Bartczak, Roebling Chapter president, examines the evolution of military technology in the New York area including different types of 19th-century fortifications at Fort Wadsworth, 20th-century fortifications and anti-aircraft missile defense at Fort Tilden, and 20th-century naval aviation at Floyd Bennett Field. Beginning at Fort Wadsworth on Staten Island, the group will spend the morning visiting the Museum Visitor Center, Battery Weed and Fort Tompkins. After lunch we will proceed to Ft. Tilden, on the Rockaway Peninsula in Queens where two 16-inch gun emplacements and a Nike missile launch facility will be viewed. The tour will conclude at Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn where the group will visit the original 1931 control tower and hangars, and the Navy's 1942 Hangar B, with a collection of nine aircraft undergoing conservation/restoration.
Extreme Steam- hardhats required
Conrad Milster, steam engineer and historian, will lead this tour which includes Pratt Institute’s power plant, an ASME landmark that has been continuously generating electricity for Pratt’s facilities since 1887 (to download a PDF issue of Prattfolio, Pratt’s alumni magazine, with a cover story on the power plant, go to http://www.pratt.edu/alumni/prattfolio/pdf/prattfolio.pdf). Also on the itinerary is Cascade Laundry, which generates its own power using natural gas, but keeps a Skinner Unaflow for back-up, as described in this Laundry Today article. Queensboro Hospital has two 500-kw engines that are no longer used, but will have its 250-kw Ridgeway back-up running for us . A stop at Domino Sugar, said to be the only sugar refinery in the U.S. still making sugar cubes, will cover both the sugar processing and the power plant. Late addition! This tour will also see the steam engines still in use in P.S. 157 in the Williamsburg neighborhood.
Southwest Brooklyn Waterfront
The southwest Brooklyn waterfront developed as a major transshipment point with gargantuan warehouse facilities. We will tour the rail operations of Bush Terminal, a district first developed in the 1890s, which grew to cover 200 acres and once handled one-fifth of the goods moving through the Port of New York. Mead & Josipovich, a custom architectural woodworking shop located in the cavernous Brooklyn Army Terminal, designed by Cass Gilbert, will show us their operation. We will visit the nearby Kraft Foods plant (recently purchased from Nabisco) where Now and Later candies are made, and Sahadi Fine Foods, an importer and manufacturer of Middle Eastern foods housed in a recently renovated 1890 former electrical meter factory. Fixture Hardware, a 55-year-old company making shelving brackets and other fixtures, will also host a tour.
From Boats to Boxes
On our way to the Brooklyn Navy Yard, we'll stop at Ulano Corporation, a manufacturer of films and solvents for the silkscreen printing industry and get a look at their film coating line. At what was officially called the New York Naval Shipyard operated by the Navy from 1801 to 1966, we'll visit the 1851 graving dock, which has been in continuous use to the present day and peek in on some of the manufacturers which have re-used the yard's buildings. Pfizer, founded in Brooklyn and operating in the borough since 1849, will be another stop. We hope to also observe a modern version of box-making, a process developed in Brooklyn. The first machine for folding paper boxes was developed by Robert Gair at his DUMBO factory and patented in 1879.
Stone Cold Iron
This tour will take in the stone cutting operations at Michael Colonna's small traditional shop in Queens' Middle Village and the historic restoration work at A. Ottavino in Ozone Park. There will be a stop at one of the many historic cemeteries in the area and we'll take a break with Dallis Bros. Coffee roasters. The elevated trains of East New York, Brooklyn, and Shore Iron Works, a fabricator of structural steel, will put the iron in our diet. While in East New York, we'll also stop in at Renaissance Wood Products, a custom handcrafted woodworking firm.
East New York
East New York, sight of a key turning point in the Revolutionary War’s Battle of Long Island, was developed for industry in the 19th century due to the easy access it provided to Jamaica Avenue, a major roadway leading from eastern Long Island to the growing commercial port. By the 1960s, it was one of the New York City’s most distressed neighborhoods. We will visit several of the manufacturers that have moved into this once blighted neighborhood, including Adriatic Wood Products, a high-volume producer of wood moldings, and Fabricon, a maker of fiberglass carousel horses. Legion Lighting, a third-generation family business making fluorescent lighting fixtures has also invited us in. On our way to this neighborhood, we’ll stop in at Bell Bagel & Bialy and savor the aroma of these fresh-baked Jewish favorites. Late addition! This tour will also visit the Hillside shops of the Long Island Rail Road.
The Other Borough THIS TOUR IS FULL
We had to have one tour focusing on Queens , the other borough that shares the western tip of Long Island with Brooklyn. A no-longer-used but intact Interborough Rapid Transit substation will be a highlight. Substation #27, one part of a large network supplying power to the subway system, was built in 1923 using surplus equipment from the original 1899 electrification of the elevated lines. We also plan a tour of Steinway & Sons, making pianos here for nearly 150 years. Cecilware, a maker of commercial coffee brewing equipment will be a stop. We will also see the post-WWII Astoria Generating Station, undergoing a repowering project to replace oil-fueled boilers with combined-cycle gas turbines.
Brooklyn and Its Bridges
This rigorous and fast-paced tour, conducted with the assistance of the New York City Department of Transportation , will include all types of bridges in the borough, from America's first concrete bridge, the 1872 Cleft Ridge Span in Prospect Park, to Robert Moses-era expressways and movable spans over Brooklyn's industrial waterways. We will inspect the on-going rehabilitations of the Williamsburg and Manhattan bridges over the East River and conclude with the Brooklyn Bridge. Be prepared to walk and climb steps.
Newcomers' Reception 6:30-8:30
First-time conference attendees are invited to join the SIA Board and chapter officers for refreshments and networking.
Show and Tell: 7:00-10:00
This informal forum for sharing your latest
IA discovery or research-in-progress will be held at Polytechnic
University. You are encouraged to bring slides and artifacts.
New York cheesecake will be served, so save space for dessert.
To place your presentation on the schedule, please contact Bob
Stewart (robert.stewart13@worldnet.att.net),
or sign up at the registration table at the conference.
Paper Sessions, Polytechnic University
We are grateful to the Department of Civil Engineering of Polytechnic University, which has graciously donated meeting space and audiovisual services for our paper sessions
Session 1. 8:15-9:45
Panel 1A. Working with Water
Panel 1B. The Restoration of the Ben Schroeder Saddletree Factory: Issues and Challenges in Preserving and Interpreting Industrial Heritage
Panel 1C. 19th Annual Historic Bridge Symposium
Session 2. 10:15-11:45
Panel 2A. The Recordation and Interpretation of the Silk Textile Industry of the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor
Panel 2B. Tailings as Cultural Artifact
Panel 2C. 19th Annual Historic Bridge Symposium
Box lunches in the Courtyard 11:45-12:30
Keynote address 12:30-1:00
Annual Business Meeting of the SIA 1:00-2:15
Session 3. 2:15-3:45
Panel 3A. The Once and Future Port of New York & the Brooklyn Waterfront: Maritime Commerce from the 18th to the 21st Centuries. Part 1
Panel 3B. American Icons -- Old and New
Panel 3C. Mineral Extraction
Session 4. 4:00-5:30
Panel 4A. The Once and Future Port of New York & the Brooklyn Waterfront: Maritime Commerce from the 18th to the 21st Centuries. Part 2
Panel 4B. Potpourri
Panel 4C. Ethical Responsibilities of Industrial Archeologists to Local Communities
Banquet, 7:00 - 10:00
After spending the day at our paper sessions, we will hold our banquet at Kino, a restaurant in the DUMBO industrial district (N.R.). Enjoy an elegant buffet and champagne set against views of the gritty waterfront and the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges in this building that once housed part of the Gair box-making empire. Informal walking tours of the area will be offered on the way to dinner. To accompany our dessert, we’ll see historic industrial films from the archives of the National Canal Museum on the big screen over the bar.
To see a panoramic view of the intersection in DUMBO, featuring One Main St. (aka, "the Clock Building") where Kino is located, go to http://www.dumbo-newyork.com/. Click on "Virtual Tours," then click on "1" below "Neighborhood." You can manipulate the camera to turn it upward to see the clock, and down to see the Belgian Block street, or zoom in and out. Views of the waterfront from the DUMBO area can be found by clicking on "Views."
Brooklyn and Queens Waterfront Brunch
Cruise: 9:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m.
Join your Roebling Chapter friends for a memorable cruise of the
I.A. of the Brooklyn and Queens waterfront and brunch aboard a
roomy two-deck boat. Much of the Port's industrial heritage
can best be seen and photographed from the water. We will sail
up the East River, seeing all the bridges from underneath. We
will see classic Brooklyn warehouses, modern container facilities,
active railroad float bridges, the Brooklyn Navy Yard and other
portions of the vast Port
of New York . The tour will be narrated by Thomas Flagg
and other experts. The historic 1931 fireboat, John
J. Harvey , will be in attendance and will salute us with
spouts of water from its monitors.
Mystery Rail Tour: Sunday afternoon after the boat cruise–you can do both!
Willing to take a chance, railfans? We have a commitment for a tour of New York City Transit’s Coney Island shops! We are attempting to arrange to travel there on special cars. The tour may still include a blitz of the transit system, riding on every one of the subway and elevated lines in the borough of Brookyn. We’ll find something to satisfy the "foamer" in you.Brownstone Brooklyn: In & Out of the Park Slope Historic District: 2:30-4:30 THIS TOUR IS FULL
Architect Carl Kaiserman, will lead us on a walk that meanders through Park Slope, one of the largest and finest Victorian rowhouse neighborhoods in America built, in this case, of the brown sandstone that has made New York brownstones famous. Emphasis will be on the development, diversity and adaptiveness inherent in housing, commercial and manufacturing structures in more than a century of change.
Rosenwach Tank Company: 9:00-11:00
For six privileged souls, there will be a tour of one of the two remaining manufacturers of wooden water storage tanks in the city. The Rosenwach family has been making this ubiquitous part of the New York City skyline for over 100 years. Enter your name in the drawing at the registration table when you arrive. The winners will be announced at Thursday's reception.
Lower Manhattan Walking Tour: 10:00-1:00 THIS TOUR IS FULL
Led by George Bulow, we will visit such architectural gems as the Woolworth Building , the New York Stock Exchange and the U.S. Custom House, which houses the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian where an exhibit on the contributions of Mohawk Iron Workers to the building of the skyline will be on display. There will be an opportunity to visit the former site of the World Trade Center.
Historic Coney Island: 9:00-1:30 THIS TOUR IS FULL
Brooklyn historian, John Manbeck, will lead this walk on the Bowery, Boardwalk and Boulevards of Coney Island. We will see the 1918 workings of the Wonder Wheel, have a look at the 1929 Cyclone roller coaster and pass by a carousel in operation for decades. Before we leave Coney Island we'll take time for an authentic Nathan's hot dog.
Bush Terminal Redux: 2:00-4:30
A second chance for an intense tour of the
Bush Terminal rail facilities, led by Doug Diamond. In 1903 Irving
T. Bush, incorporated the Bush Terminal Railroad to serve his
200-acre industrial park begun in 1900 on the waterfront. This
property is currently the home of the New
York Cross Harbor Railroad which has been fairly successful
at what it does - move carfloats from Brooklyn to New Jersey and
back. Since we'll be here on a weekday, we may see some trains
in action.
For More Information
If you have questions about the conference schedule or travel arrangements, contact Mary Habstritt, Conference Chair, at mhabstritt@aol.com or 212-769-4946.
Questions about registration should be directed
to Don Durfee at SIA headquarters, sia@mtu.edu
or 906-487-1889.
SIA Home: http://www.sia-web.org or http://www.siahq.org