Victorian Society New York

Ever curious about the origins of our global communications?

On June 10, author James M. Tabor will discuss his new book, “Lightning Beneath the Sea,” which chronicles the story of American entrepreneur Cyrus Field’s vision to lay out a 2,000-mile telegraph cable across the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. Cyrus believed that wiring the world for near-instantaneous communication would bring about peace on Earth. In 1866, after enduring over a decade of catastrophic failures and staggering losses, Field would finally lay his great cable, ushering in the global information age.

This event is co-sponsored with The General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen of the City of New York and is available to join in-person or online.

Purchase tickets:

Lightning Beneath the Sea: The Thrilling Race to Wire the World | The Metropolitan Chapter of the Victorian Society in America Please support our lecturers by purchasing their books through the VSNY Online Bookstore. « All Events Lightning Beneath the Sea: The Thrilling Race to Wire the World June 10 @ 6:00 pm - 7:00 pm « The Colonial Revival: The American Architectural Style Victorian Society New York Annual Meeting & Aw...

On April 27, 1897, President William McKinley spoke at the dedication of Ulysses S. Grant’s Tomb in Riverside Park in New York City. He proclaimed, “A great life, dedicated to the welfare of the nation, here finds its earthly coronation. . . Architecture has paid high tribute to the leaders of mankind, but never was a memorial more worthily bestowed or more gratefully accepted by a free people than the beautiful structure before which we are gathered.”

While Grant’s Tomb is one among the pantheon of presidential graves, it is unique. Designed in 1890 by John Hemenway Duncan for a location that was sparsely settled and barren of buildings, he envisioned “a monumental tomb, no matter from what point of view it may be seen.” Built in the neoclassical style favored in the Gilded Age, its white granite and Doric columns harkened back to the ancient Greeks and Romans.

Located in America’s most diverse city, it attracts an equally diverse range of visitors. In a nation once again divided, Grant’s Tomb remains an ideal place to renew the American motto, “E Pluribus Unum.”

Learn more about the history and legacy of Grant’s Tomb in the latest issue of “Panorama,” VSNY’s quarterly newsletter: https://buff.ly/EpuTHiV

(Text adapted from Louis L. Picone’s “Grant’s Tomb and National Reconciliation” in “Panorama, Winter 2026”)

Photos:

1) Interior view of the coffered dome central to the design of President Grant’s Tomb. Credit: Bruce M. White for the White House Historical Association

2) Exterior view, The General Grant National Memorial at Riverside Drive and West 122nd Street in New York City. Credit: Bruce M. White for the White House Historical Association

3) Interior view of the caskets of President Ulysses S. Grant and his wife Julia Dent Grant, The General Grant National Memorial. Credit: Bruce M. White for the White House Historical Association

4) Mural by artist Allyn Cox depicting Union General Ulysses S. Grant accepting Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s surrender beneath an American eagle bearing a banner embellished “E Pluribus Unum, Let Us Have Peace.” Credit: Bruce M. White for the White House Historical Association

Happy birthday Margot Gayle!

May 14 is the birthday of Margot Gayle (1908–2008), a founder of the Victorian Society in America in 1966. Gayle was a renowned preservationist whose kitchen table in Greenwich Village served as an early headquarters for the organization. Two of Gayle's major preservation wins were the restoration of the Jefferson Market Courthouse (pictured in the photograph) and the designation of the SoHo Cast Iron Historic District.

Image: From the New York Public Library, licensed under CC 1.0

On June 11, the Victorian Society New York will celebrate its 60th Anniversary and Annual Meeting at the House of the Redeemer (pictured). House of the Redeemer is an Italian palazzo–style mansion that was formerly a private house built for Edith Shepard Fabbri, a great-granddaughter of Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt, and is now an Episcopalian oasis on the Upper East Side.

In addition to the evening’s festivities, the board of directors will present their work from the past year, vote in new board members, and celebrate the 2026 award winners in publications, exhibitions, preservation, and more. Tickets are free to VSNY members and $50 for the general public (with complimentary membership included).

Reserve tickets: https://buff.ly/duQVsN3

We gratefully acknowledge our Sponsors: Building Conservation Associates, Higgins Quasebarth & Partners, Richard Hampton Jenrette Foundation, Li · Saltzman Architects, and Zaskorski & Associates.

Photos courtesy House of the Redeemer.

Call for Proposals! VSNY is now accepting applications for micro-grants from the Margot Gayle Fund for the Preservation of Victorian Heritage.

The Margot Gayle Fund for the Preservation of Victorian Heritage was established in 2003 to honor Margot Gayle (1908–2008), an eminent preservationist who was one of the founders of the Victorian Society in America. The fund supports monetary micro-grants for projects related to the preservation, conservation, and interpretation of material culture in the New York metropolitan area from c. 1837 to 1919. Projects may focus on any aspect of material culture from this period, including but not limited to architecture, landscape design, fine and decorative arts, and other aspects of visual culture, technology, and industry.

Application deadline: Monday, May 25, 2026

Learn more and download the application: https://buff.ly/gMhJOu4

Image: The E. V. Haughwout Building, New York, a favorite cast-iron building of Margot Gayle; Courtesy Michael from New York City, licensed under CC 2.0

On Tuesday, May 5, VSNY’s Emerging Scholars program continues with Session 2!

The full list of scholars for the evening includes: Qizhen Chen on funerary architecture on the Lower East Side; Jacob Kayen on the architectural and social evolution of four extant Greek Revival row houses at 135-141 Henry Street; Bethany Laskin on the work of Mary Gannon and Alice Hands, the founders of the first-known all-female architecture firm in the United States; and Deborah Wolfson on safety infrastructure in immigrant New York.

Reserve a place: https://buff.ly/274QSWz

Photo: 139-141 Ludlow St, New York, 1940s

On May 7, The Victorian Society in America and The Alumni Association of the Victorian Society Summer Schools are delighted to offer a lecture by Professor Richard Guy Wilson, whose topic “The Colonial Revival: The American Architectural Style” will consider the diversity of the Colonial Revival in America, ranging from red brick Georgian to the Mission of the West, and will emphasize the period 1870–1920, drawing attention to the roots of modern design.

Learn more and register through the link in the bio via “The Colonial Revival.”

Curious about her?

Join VSNY on Tuesday, April 28, to learn about performer Lillian Washburn (pictured). Washburn will be discussed by Christina Hurtado-Pierson as part of Session 1 of VSNY’s Emerging Scholars program.

The full list of scholars for the evening includes: Charlotte Crum on the architectural innovation of New York City’s historic armories; Christina Hurtado-Pierson on performer Lillian Washburn’s shifting personas on the American stage; Sam Simons on Progressive-Era cinematic staging of “white slave” figures; and Kate Singh on childbirth on New York’s Lower East Side at the turn of the 20th century.

Reserve a place at the program: https://buff.ly/Nszryln

Preservation check-in! 🫡

In October 2025, the Preservation Committee of VSNY testified on proposed alterations to the Plaza Hotel, including installing a vestibule and modify a desk and wall cladding at the 59th Street lobby portion of the Interior Landmark. The changes would include repairs to large sections of the original mosaic tile floors, which would be damaged by removal of the vestibule and desk alterations.

VSNY’s testimony was supportive of the work but urged the Commission and the applicant to consider actually *restoring* the floors. In 1989, when the Trump Organization bought the hotel, the stone floors were sealed with a heavy coating of what looked urethane, altering the historic appearance of the tile floors. (The original floors can be glimpsed at the beginning of the 1959 Alfred Hitchcock movie “North By Northwest,” which was filmed at the hotel.)

John Graham, a board member of VSNY and member of the Preservation Committee, had been employed by an architectural firm that worked with the Plaza in the 1980s. He recalled what the original mosaic floors had looked like and even had a portion of the floor saved from an earlier renovation at the Plaza. At VSNY’s urging, Public Meeting Vice Chair Master asked the applicant if there was enough in the budget to include the removal of the urethane, and the applicant affirmed that there would be no problem to do so. We remain hopeful that this addition will be included in the applicant’s restoration at the Plaza.

To read up on VSNY’s past preservation testimonies, visit our Archive of Public Testimony: https://buff.ly/vLdqpxm

Images:

[1] A scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s 1959 film “North by Northwest” with Cary Grant strolling across the tile floor in the lobby of the Plaza Hotel.

[2] A small sample of the Plaza tile floor, removed when an area was core-drilled; Courtesy of John Graham

[3] Detailed view of a similar stone tile floor in a designated church in Brooklyn, although the tiles are not sealed in this case.

One of the most famous instrument makers in 19th-century New York was Henry Erben. His factory, which in the 1840s was the largest in the city, produced organs for cathedrals and churches across the Americas.

The Basilica of St. Patrick’s Old Cathedral houses the last Erben organ that exists in its original acoustic space, from 1868. The organ remained in the loft for 156 years, playing for thousands of funerals, weddings, concerts, and more. Its mechanism and 2,500 pipes were long overdue for conservation and restoration. Given its historical importance, extensive documentation of the organ was made in situ, and a comprehensive program of conservation and restoration was developed with Brunner & Associates organbuilders. Beginning in February 2024, the organ was carefully dismantled and its more than 10,000 components shipped to the workshop in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. In early 2026, after years of labor-intensive repairs, re-installation of the instrument began and the organ was played for the first time post-renovation on Easter Sunday.

Learn more about the organ renovation in the latest issue of “Panorama,” VSNY’s quarterly newsletter: https://buff.ly/gZ0XH1I

(Text adapted from Jared Lamenzo’s “Update on the Urban Erben” in “Panorama.”)

Friends of the Erben Organ

Images:

1) Moving day, 2024, when the organ was dismantled and moved from the church to the workshop in Pennsylvania. Credit: Jared Lamenzo

2) A view from above of the newly discovered stenciling on the pipes. Credit: Jared Lamenzo

3) Preservationist, author, and church organist Jared Lamenzo demonstrating the restored original hand crank system for operating the bellows; organs today typically have electric motor-driven blowers. Credit: Mikhail Lamenzo