The Metropolitan Transportation Authority of New York (MTA) and Metro-North Railroad open Grand Central Terminal to the public on February 1, 2013 for the celebration of its 100th Anniversary with a full day of activities, including a morning public rededication ceremony and musical performances that will keep visitors entertained well into the evening.
The New York Times writes in “100 Years of Grandeur: The Birth of Grand Central Terminal“:
The terminal was a product of local politics, bold architecture, brutal flexing of corporate muscle and visionary engineering. No other building embodies New York’s ascent as vividly as Grand Central.
The idea for the new Grand Central Terminal came to William J. Wilgus “in a flash of light,” he recalled decades later. “It was the most daring idea that ever occurred to me,” he said.
The Atlantic writes in “Grand Central Terminal Turns 100“:
A century ago, rail travel was at its peak in the U.S., and New York City built the massive Grand Central Terminal to accommodate the growth. Built over 10 years, gradually replacing its predecessor named Grand Central Station, the Grand Central Terminal building officially opened on February 2, 1913.
The Huffington Post takes a great behind-the-scenes tour of Grand Central Terminal — including Metro-North’s secret underground power station, the Operations Control Center, the Eastern Window Bay, and the Tiffany glass clock.
It’s hard to believe that the US military displayed a Redstone rocket in the concourse – though it didn’t bore a hole in the ceiling (History.com, Untapped Cities).
In TIME Magazine’s “100 Years: New York City’s Grand Central Terminal“:
Great public buildings don’t dwarf people; they enlarge them. And for 100 years–it opened on Feb. 2, 1913–one of the greatest has been Grand Central Terminal in New York City. It was a conceptual bank shot. In a nation of wide-open spaces, it carried the American sense of nature’s vast scale indoors, framed it in a serene Beaux Arts classicism and put both things in the service of a signature of the modern age, the railway. It is, by any measure, one of the most gracious public places in the world.
And we nearly lost it. In the late 1960s and ’70s, with railroad ridership in steep decline, Grand Central had a prolonged near-death experience. Its then owner, Penn Central, proposed building a 55-story tower atop the terminal and sued the city to revoke its landmark status. New Yorkers, still mourning the demolition of Penn Station, rallied to save the place. Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis joined the fight. Though in 1976 they won, the station was still suffering from decades of neglect and cluttered with commercial signage. But by 1998, a sublime restoration led by the firm of Beyer Blinder Belle had scraped away the grime and restored the exquisite vistas and magnificent ceiling–and more than that, reawakened the agreeable sense that even just making your train can be a noble experience.
The MTA has launched a new interactive website and is in the middle of a year-long centennial celebration. The New York Transit Museum has published an accompanying book — “Grand Central Terminal: 100 Years of a New York Landmark Book.”
The New York Transit Museum is hosting the exhibitions “Grand by Design: A Centennial Celebration of Grand Central Terminal” and “On Time/Grand Central at 100.”
Grand by Design: A Centennial Celebration of Grand Central Terminal features artifacts and photographs – many rarely exhibited – from the New York Transit Museum collection. The digital exhibit presents the Terminal itself as an artifact, using archival images and interviews that convey the story of the building’s past, present and future in larger-than-life detail.
Amy Hausmann, Assistant Director of MTA Arts for Transit and Urban Design leads this lunchtime tour of the exhibition, celebrating the architecture, crowds, iconography, and poetic’s of Grand Central. The exhibit features site-specific work by notable artists Jim Campbell, Penelope Umbrico, Lothar Osterburg, Patrick Jacobs, Paul Himmel, Olive Ayhens, London Squared Productions, and Pop Chart Lab.
I don’t seem to recall Ellen Driscoll’s “As Above, So Below” tile mosaic in GCT:
The historic ceiling in the main concourse at Grand Central Terminal reveals the night sky with golden stars that form the constellations. Grand Central becomes a metaphor for our connection with the wider world beyond New York City and As Above, So Below takes the viewer around the world to the night sky above five different continents, representing myths, civilization, heavens, and the underworld. These scenes bring to life ancient tales that demonstrate how the stories told about the heavens reflect the way we live on earth. A close look at any of the faces in the work reveal their diversity, as indeed, the people in these mosaics represent many different backgrounds. However, the artist has altered them to take on the attributes of mythical figures. The work summons the everlasting and the ephemeral, reminding us of our spiritual and worldly past while we hurry through the station.
Urban Fabric 