As
it says on the sign
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In my senior year of college at Cooper
Union (or more properly, The
Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art), I found myself,
inexplicably and reluctantly, agreeing to be the photography editor of
our yearbook, The Cable as it was called. As a fourth year student
about to graduate with a degree in physics who dabbled somewhat in
photography, I suppose there was some modicum of talent that qualified
me for this role, but what did I know about editing, or design, or most
importantly, yearbooks? Then the liberating truth became apparent and
diminished the esteem inherent to my nomination: there were no other
volunteers, and the job, by default, was mine.
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The Back Room
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Ancient Taps
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I resolved then not to follow
the usual yearbook approach, of capturing
a static image of this year’s graduates posed stiffly in formal attire
in front of an artificial background. No, my photographs would capture
my classmates, the artists and architects, the engineers and
scientists, in a way that reflected the counter-culture of the late
sixties that had so defined our lives for the last four years, and in
the environment in which we had spent them: the Lower East Side of
Manhattan, the Village both east and west, and the Bowery, those
historically rich neighborhoods in which the melodies of a far older
New York were juxtaposed against the chorus of the new age.
Cooper Union was founded in
1859 by the entrepreneur and inventor Peter
Cooper. Standing majestically at the northern tip of the Bowery, once
New York’s most elegant street but since the Civil War a much less
respectable avenue, is its Foundation Building with its Great Hall,
from whose podium Abraham Lincoln delivered the speech that launched
his national political career. One of the oldest colleges in the
country, and the first to offer a free education to working-class
children and women, Cooper Union counts among its graduates Thomas
Edison and Felix Frankfurter.
Mc Sorley's Celebrated Front Bar Room
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With less than a year of formal schooling, Peter Cooper made his
fortune in glue and iron. He designed America’s first steam railroad
engine, the Tom Thumb. As president of the New York, Newfoundland &
London Telegraph Company, he was instrumental in laying the first
Atlantic cable, and with his wife, Sarah, invented instant gelatin. And
he was such a regular patron of McSORLEY'S OLD ALE HOUSE,
the
establishment just around the corner from his new college, that for
several years after his death in 1883, his chair in the back room was
draped in black each April 4.
Author's Photograph Circa 1970
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Little changed from the day it opened in 1854 and in the ownership of
the family until 1936, McSorley’s is the oldest saloon in New York
City. Before 1970, women were not admitted, and those courageous enough
to attempt entry were intimidated sufficiently by the shouting and
bell-ringing from the regular patrons to decline the privilege. No
spirits are served, only ales, simply and reverently, a light and a
dark. The walls of McSorley’s are a museum unto themselves, and on them
are hung in no particular classification such treasures as Houdini’s
handcuffs; portraits of the Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley, all
victims of assassins’ bullets; a painting of a nude playing with a
parrot; and two signs, one warning “Be Good or Be Gone,” the other
declaring “We Were Here Before You Were Born.”
The "Babe"
The House Policy Spelled Out
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It was a tradition among Cooper Union students to designate the last
day of the winter term as McSorley’s Day, and spend the greater part of
it drinking in the tavern, before, between, and after classes, and
eating the plates of crackers, onions and cheese that used to be given
away as a free lunch. It was essential, then, that somewhere in our
yearbook would be an image of that place. But how best to capture it?
One January night between
semesters, the answer came: snow was falling,
lots of it in fact, in amounts that would slow the city to a crawl,
empty the streets of traffic, and populate the sidewalks with just the
aimless and the purposeful. What more enduring memory of McSorley’s
then late on a winter’s night, its bright lights a beacon in the cold,
streaming onto the snow-covered streets of the Lower East Side?
As it ever was, the spirit of Mc
Sorley's is made manifest by a smart and fun loving crowd.
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I took the train to Manhattan, camera in hand, and walked up an
abandoned Eighth Street, forsaking the sidewalk for the easier passage
up the deserted, muffled street, with only the gentle hiss of
snowflakes falling in a synchronized swirl through the cones of light
spreading under the street lamps. I crossed Broadway, the wind roaring
down its canyon, to St. Mark’s Place. As I approached Seventh Street, I
passed a brightly lit storefront, in which sat in display a gypsy
woman, a fortune teller, who leapt quickly from her seat and
enthusiastically waved me in, as if in this near-blizzard, the search
for a fortune teller was the most natural purpose to which a passerby
would be committed.
Ah, but I already knew my fortune, and it was most simple in the
telling: I would signal the bartender with a wag of each index finger
and sit by the coal stove with my two glasses, one of lager and one of
porter. I would smoke my pipe. Then, warmed and renewed, bundled
against the pellets of snow and the brisk winds that would throw them
against me, I would take my leave and stride homeward. But not before
recording for my classmates an image of this timeless legend, this
place that in spite of its location for over a hundred years in one of
the most populous cities in the world, was ours: MCSORLEY'S
OLD ALE HOUSE.
An ale at McSorley's is an experience
unchanged across the generations.
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Mc SORLEY'S OLD
ALE HOUSE
Established 1854
15 East 7th Street
New York,
NY 10003
(212) 474-9148
www.mcsorleysnewyork.com
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