Willard Suitcases/Margaret D./NYC Talk
Margaret D. came to Willard with almost all of her household, including her car. I posted here and here about her before. / The cutlery in the La Lure box is very cool.
On Tuesday the 9th of February I will be giving a presentation about the suitcases sponsored by the Roosevelt Island Historical Society. It will take place at the New York Public Library branch, 524 Main Street on the island. The start time is 6.30 pm and I would encourage anyone coming to get there a bit early, as the branch closes at 7.45 and we will need to start on time.
There is very little on-street parking, I would encourage everyone to come by public transport. (Hey, it’s New York City!) Here is a link for travel directions. If you are coming by tram, the station is at Second Avenue and 60th Street. You will need to pay with a Metrocard ($2.75). When you arrive on the island, take red bus (free) to the second stop and walk forward about 50 yards to the library. If coming by subway, take the F train from Manhattan to Roosevelt Island. Then the red bus to the first stop and walk 50 yards to the library. If you follow the project online or have been in touch directly, please come up and introduce yourself. I will be in the building by 5.00, I hope, and will have time to chat once everything is set up. Hope to see you there.
I noticed today that the willardsuitcases.com site is acting up a bit. All of the information below the photograph on the splash page seems to have disappeared. Fortunately everything else seems to be working, including access to the cases page. I have a call in to Steve Fox who did a beautiful job designing the site, and I hope we can get it cleared up soon.
Willard Suitcases / Nora M
Even though I am in South Carolina taking a short break, I’m still trying to get quite a bit of editing done on the suitcases project. Nora M’s cases are pretty amazing.
The above shot is a great example of how the museum conserved and catalogued each item in the collection. In the photo below you can see how Peg and I unwrapped and set up Nora’s cutlery.
In the past few days I have been able to upload several more cases to willardsuitcases.com, so please go check them out. On the main page, click on “The Cases” at the top of the page. There are quite a few shots on Nora’s page, so be sure to click “view: all” underneath the “Add To Cart” button.
Have a great week everyone and thanks for following.
Willard Suitcases / Margaret D. / Uniforms
We are still working on Margaret D’s cases. This is the second batch of nursing uniforms that we have photographed. She worked in various hospitals in Upstate New York before coming to Willard as a patient.
All of her things are in good condition, and these garments are all clean and moderately starched.
As I grew up in Meadville, PA (home of Talon Zippers!), I always look at any that are in the collection. It was by far the most popular of all zippers throughout most of the 20th Century. Many of my friend’s parents worked for the company.
I leave tomorrow for the open house that takes place at Willard on Saturday. I will be spending time at the cemetery, and hanging out at the Romulus Historical Society building with Peggy Ellsworth, who is a former Willard employee and trustee of the historical society. If you are attending the event, please track me down and introduce yourselves. I hope to see you there.
Portable Toilets / Diner
I drove back home from Ithaca yesterday and stopped a few times to take some photographs. / I first noticed this collection of portable toilets in Lisle, NY back when I lived in Ithaca and my friend Alex and I would drive around while he “looked for color”. What began as a mild interest turned into a decades long obsession with these practical objects. I even had a long mostly one-sided correspondence with the Portable Sanitation Association. After they moved their offices from Washington, DC to Minnesota I sort of lost interest in sending them postcards.
I always assumed that the company that owned these went out of business, but when I stopped in the antique shop next door, the woman working there said that it was still a going concern.
I often notice this abandoned diner when I am on my way to shoot the suitcases. Yesterday I finally stopped to photograph it. It is in the village of Coeymans and while searching for information about it on the web, I came across this post. (I spent a little time reading this fellow’s blog and it is worth checking out if you live in the Albany area.)
It is always sad for me to see once useful buildings like this be left to rot. I find myself imagining what it would have been like to sit down for breakfast during the time that it was a busy operation. But I suppose the point is that it eventually stopped being busy, and the owners couldn’t afford to keep it going. The Thruway killed the diner.
Big Stick and Chelle’s Kickstarter
When we are on our walks in the woods, Olive is in the habit of picking up a stick and dragging it back to the house. She dug this one out of the snow the other day. I was pretty sure she wouldn’t manage it, but to my amazement she succeeded. Without any exaggeration, I would have to say it was at least 12 feet long and quite heavy.
One of my suitcase backers from Australia, Chelle Destefano, has just put up a kickstarter appeal, and it looks interesting. I would encourage any of you who are interested in abandoned spaces to check it out here.
Kalamazoo Asylum for the Insane
After my fantastic visit to Wittenberg University I drove up to Kalamazoo, Michigan to visit my great friend Ken Schaefer. We were taking a tour of Western Michigan University, where he works, and I looked to the south and saw this. Amazing. The State Hospital has an interesting history, and dates back to the earliest of New York State’s asylums. The only building that remains from the original Kirkbride plan buildings is the water tower, and it is huge.
Driving back home tomorrow. It is about 14 hours and I might break it up back in Erie. We’ll see.
Heritage Center of Clark County
This ⇧ model (made out of corn kernels) is of the building in my previous post. It is displayed at the Heritage Center of Clark County. Incredible Richardsonian Romanesque architecture which houses one of the most interesting local museums that I have ever seen. Really, go check it out if you are ever in this part of Ohio.
So much of downtown Springfield is gone by way of the wrecking ball, which is really sad to me. But the Heritage Center has a fantastic recreation of downtown streets as the were decades ago. When I first came to Wittenberg, my friends and I used to stop in to Sons bar for a beer or two.
Off to the Wescott House now. I can’t wait to see it.
Berlin
I moved to Berlin in January of 1986. I really needed to get away from Ithaca, and I had some issues which needed attention. I spent mornings at the Goethe Institute studying German and the rest of the day photographing. I was drawn to the city because of the division; one could see the extremes of Capitalism on the West side, then go through a checkpoint on the same day and see what the Commies were up to. It was like stepping back forty years.
I like the phrase “wer mauert hat’s nötig” which I always took to mean “whoever builds walls needs them”. Which is relevant here as the East Germans built the thing and then called it an “anti-facist barrier”.
In looking over my contact sheets this morning I realized that there are very few people in any of my wall photographs. It always amazed me that even on the West side, people stayed away from it (except the graffiti folks who must have worked at odd hours, as I never saw anyone writing on the thing).
I used to like to take the bus to Steinstücken and wander around. It was an odd little Western enclave almost totally surrounded by the East. You can read about it here. There was a rail line running straight through it and you could stick your head around a corner and be face to face with a guard tower. It always seemed a likely place for a crossing, but I never heard of one. / I met a lot of Berliners and was always interested to hear stories of unique situations with the wall. I was once told that at some locations there were gates where Westerners could use a key to access their gardens in the East. Probably not true, but interesting to think about.
Here is Checkpoint Charlie at night.
The wall has been down for 25 years now. I seriously doubt it was Reagan’s “Mr Gorbachev, bring down this wall” plea that had anything to do with it opening up. More like the East Germans made some really stupid mistakes, which is not surprising as they were running a completely effed up and vile organization.
Willard Tour
I wasn’t sure I would go to the Willard tour this past weekend until I was recently contacted by Ken Paddock. When Ken told me the story of his aunt Helen who died at a very young age as a patient at Willard, I really wanted to meet him. His family had kept an amazing collection of documents and artifacts related to her death in 1928 at the age of 17. She had contracted a disease (possibly scarlet fever) at a young age which caused blindness and other problems, and she was sent by the family to The Syracuse State School for Mental Defectives. She was transferred to Willard when the State School could no longer control her. The collection contains letters written to the family about her situation, including a letter from the head of the State School advising the family why she would be moved. Ken’s mother rarely talked about her older sister, and it wasn’t until just before her death in 2001 that details about Helen’s institutionalization started to come out. It is amazing to me that these artifacts were saved by the family, especially since it seemed that no one spoke much about her for such a long time. I met Ken, his wife Kathy, and their cousin Carol at the Taughannock Falls overlook on Saturday morning and was shown a binder full of artifacts. They encouraged me to talk about her life, and are graciously allowing me to photograph the collection, which I hope to do later this summer. It is great to be able to use her full name as this collection is in private hands and does not come under the state’s control. So, here’s a kind thought for Helen W. Howden, and thanks to Ken’s family for sharing her story.
We got up to Willard at around 12.45 and were organized into groups for the tour. The first stop was Brookside, which is where the medical director and his family lived. It is a lovely early 20th Century house and situated right on the shore of Seneca Lake. As usual I was drawn to one of the three kitchens and took a few shots before I headed downstairs.
This device was used when the family wanted to request something from the staff. When Craig Williams and I were looking at it, the buzzer sounded when another member of the tour pushed a button in one of the upstairs rooms.
Next stop was the game room in the basement. I am not sure which director’s family would have used this foosball table, but it was most likely Dr. Anthony Mustille’s children.
Since I had already been in several of the buildings on the tour, Peggy Ellsworth suggested I come over to the morgue when it was between groups. She is one of the main boosters of Willard’s past, and spends a great deal of her energy keeping the spirit of the place alive. She told me an amazing story of her first day on the job after she had graduated from the nursing school. It involved her first autopsy when she was standing right where she is in this photograph.
It constantly astounds me that evidence of how these rooms were used is still in place decades after Willard’s closing.
The morgue building is a tiny little brick edifice that I had never been able to get into on my earlier visits.
So many interesting aspects to this room.
This is the faucet at the head of the autopsy table.
And who knows why this retractor was left behind?
It is really quite a space, and reminds me a bit of the autopsy room at Ellis Island that I photographed a few years ago. After I left the morgue I headed over to Elliot Hall which was built in 1931.
It reminds me of several of the other state hospitals I have visited; long corridors with day rooms at the end of hallways.
And the stairwells are very similar to ones I have photographed at other institutions.
Before leaving to head home, I stopped by the cemetery where the Willard Cemetery Memorial Project folks arranged this nice remembrance of Lawrence Marek (unfortunately not his real surname) who while a patient at Willard dug over 900 graves for those who died while living at the institution.
The next tour of Willard should take place again next May. It is a great opportunity to meet former staff and see first hand what an amazing place it was, and in many respects, still is.
Willard Suitcase / Delmar H. / Willard Tour
It has been a while since I have posted any suitcases. It is never far from my mind, but there is a lot going on in other areas of my life. There seems to be an uptick in interest for some reason. What usually happens is that a blog or website picks it up and it starts spreading anew. Greetings to new viewers. / I have always loved cases with exotic travel labels, and Delmar’s had a few.
I wonder when he went to South America.
I will be at Willard this Saturday for the annual tour. I would encourage any of you who live nearby to come. There is a$10.00 admission, and it is a rare chance to get into some of the buildings and wander around the cemetery. There are two tours; 9.00 AM and 1.00 PM. I will be at the one in the afternoon . Here is a link with information. Hope to see you there.
Jon Crispin's Notebook 
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