Amusing the Masses Exhibition Restoring the Weir Greenhouse Dewitt Clinton Award Dinner Note from the President

2015 Amusing The Masses Exhibition Restoring the Weir Greenhouse DeWitt Clinton Award Dinner Note from the President Dear Friends, Amusing the Masses on Coney Island and Beyond. Our Town. A Night at Niblo’s Garden. The Brooklyn Table of Contents BEAT Festival. The artistry of Isadora Duncan. A Moth Mainstage event. A tribute to baseball’s first superstar. What’s the connection? These were all events on Green-Wood’s 2014 cultural calendar–making it the most diverse and exhilarating year in the history of our Historic Fund. The unprecedented breadth, depth, and 4 14 professionalism of our public programs last year was unparalleled and resulted in record attendance and more sellout events than ever before. RESTORING THE WEIR DEWitt Clinton Award GreenHOUSE Dinner Adding to this excitement was Green-Wood’s growing collaboration with the Brooklyn Historical Society. Among the highlights of our partnership was the unveiling and exhibition of a one-of-a-kind Revolutionary Earl D. and Gina Ingoglia Weiner War map co-owned by Green-Wood and BHS. One of the year’s ‘hottest’ happenings was Brooklyn’s On Honored Fire!, our joint series dedicated to the history of Brooklyn’s fire disasters, firefighters, firehouses, and fire 6 house food. PERFORMING ARTS If you took advantage of any of these programs, I thank you. If not, you’re in luck. Here’s what we have on AT GREEN-WOOD 16 tap for 2015. FLORENCE LA BADIE In the spring, BHS and Green-Wood will offer a four-part series, Nature in Our Midst, exploring all things 8 great and green in NYC. Certainly, among the most anticipated events on the calendar is Green-Wood’s commemoration of the WILLIAM F. MANGelS: 17 150th anniversary of the end of the Civil War. Our exhibition, entitled To Bid You All Good Bye: Civil War Amusing The Masses GRANTS FUNDING AT GREEN-WOOD/ Stories, in partnership with BHS, opens in our Historic Chapel on May 23. It will tell the deeply personal JAMES RYDER vAN BRUNT stories of the men and women, interred at Green-Wood, who took part in the War through objects from our archives, as well as items borrowed from public and private collections. 12 BHS will also mark the solemn anniversary with Personal Correspondents: Photography and Letter Writing in 2014 Events Civil War Brooklyn, an exhibition of its evocative 19th-century photography and correspondence collections 18 of wartime Brooklynites at home and on the battlefield. The BHS exhibit opens on April 9. Cover Photo GREEN-WOOD GIvEN NATIONAL Sophia Schrank’s “Somnambulist’s Looking back at 2014, it was truly a banner year – and not just in the arts. We were proud to be the Tango,” at the BEAT Festival SCULPTURE AWARD recipient of three significant grants. First, Governor Andrew Cuomo awarded Green-Wood $950,000 to (Photo by Monica Simoes) help us as we still struggle to recover from the damage inflicted by Superstorm Sandy. Equally exciting was a prestigious grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services that will fund our efforts to survey Board of Directors 19 and catalog our remarkable historic collections. Third, and most generously, we received an additional $2 million toward our new Visitor’s Center in the Weir Greenhouse: $1 million from our Councilmember C. Payson Coleman, Jr., Chairman GREEN-EALOGY Michael C. Brooks, Vice Chairman Carlos Menchaca and the Brooklyn Delegation, and $1 million from the NYC Department of Cultural John R. H. Blum Affairs. Denise Crimmins Clayton Peter Davidson On that note, I’m pleased to report that the restoration of our Weir Greenhouse is moving forward nicely. Michael deV. Flinn If you’ve passed by 25th Street and Fifth Avenue recently, you’ve seen the scaffolding. We’re just starting to Ann Walker Gaffney remove glass windows and wooden structural elements, each of which will be restored in accordance with J. Douglas Maxwell, Jr. Malcolm MacKay the standards of the U.S. Department of the Interior and the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission. Scot Medbury Hugh O’Kane, Jr. Preserving this historic landmark is a responsibility that Green-Wood takes seriously, but progress depends Otis Pratt Pearsall on support from you. I invite you to become part of this landmark’s new history by joining the effort with a Thomas C. Pryor generous donation. John R. Reese Carla P. Shen Looking forward to another great year! See you around the grounds, Sam Sifton Allie O. Sweeney Walter C. Teagle III Earl D. Weiner Richard J. Moylan Design by Archigrafika NEW at green-wood Described by The New York Times in 2011 as a “lacy iron spider Green-Wood’s restoration of the structure has won the support the New York Botanical Garden. At present, the architecture firm has web,” the Weir Greenhouse was built in 1895 by James Weir, Jr. At this of many important funders, including the New York State Historic covered the Greenhouse in a large plastic tent and also surrounded it RESTORING A GEM point, Weir had been in business for nearly fifty years, with greenhouses Preservation Office, the New York City Department of Cultural with full scaffolding, but soon the octagonal entryway will be open to throughout Brooklyn. This Greenhouse was the crown jewel of his Affairs, the Office of the Brooklyn Borough President, the New the public again as a Welcome Center. career. And there is no question that he wanted it to be something York City Council, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, and The Center will be a vital first stop for visitors as they embark on their Just across the street from Green-Wood’s main entrance, on the special–it was not only to be the pride of his substantial business, but individual donors. To date, $3.6 million towards a $5.39 million budget exploration of Green-Wood. This restoration allows the Greenhouse southwest corner of 25th Street and Fifth Avenue, a transformation is also the pride of his neighborhood–he, his son, and his grandson (both is in hand, and the two-part restoration process has begun. to be a vital part of the neighborhood once again and a destination for afoot. Under the airy central dome of the historic Weir Greenhouse, of whom worked in the family business) lived just feet away. Weir’s The first phase consists of “selective removals and stabilization,” visitors from across the globe. In addition to attracting tourists with an the future is meeting the past. Once a thriving florist that catered to vision came to fruition in architect George Curtis Gillespie’s Victorian which involves stabilizing the original cast-iron core of the interest in the culture and history of NYC, the Center will appeal to Green-Wood visitors, the magnificent structure was designated as a New wonder–a remarkable open space of glass, wood, and iron, with a lofty building and the removal of the badly deteriorated wood, glass, and New Yorkers’ interested in Green-Wood’s history and natural landscape; York City landmark in 1982. But in 2012, the business was closed and central dome. copper roof. Phase Two, scheduled to begin researchers, experienced and amateur genealogists and historians; the structure–all glass, cast iron, wood, and copper–was suffering from The Weir Greenhouse was integrally tied to in summer 2015, consists of the meticulous the growing number of Brooklyn families in the areas surrounding demolition-by-neglect. Preservationists and admiring neighbors feared Green-Wood from its inception, providing flowers and re-creation of the Greenhouse to its original Green-Wood; and school groups. that the building might be lost forever. But, seeing its unique potential wreaths for elaborate Victorian funeral rituals. Into the 1895 condition; original materials will be Green-Wood’s bold ambition for the 21st century is to become a for Green-Wood, president Richard J. Moylan and the board of directors twentieth century, as other nineteenth century florists in the painstakingly replaced with materials that major cultural destination in New York City, by providing extensive led the charge to acquire the Greenhouse in 2012 and make it a part of neighborhood closed, the Weir Greenhouse continued to flourish. duplicate their historic counterparts. For the public programming and visitor services, and maintaining its status as the cemetery’s future. Now, Green-Wood is restoring this designated In 1971, the Weir family sold the Greenhouse to the McGoverns, restoration, Green-Wood has retained the firm of one of the nation’s most beautiful and architecturally important historic Historic Landmark to its original 1895 condition. Envisioned as a much- who continued to operate the floral business until recently. Page Ayres Cowley Architects. Page Cowley sites. The Weir Greenhouse restoration brings Green-Wood even closer needed Welcome Center for tourists, students, neighbors, and scholars has a history restoring greenhouses – she to its vision for the future. We can’t wait to welcome you in! who visit Green-Wood, the project is well underway! completed the award-winning preservation of the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory at Individuals wishing to support this extraordinary project can contribute online or contact Lisa W. Alpert, [email protected] or (718) 210-3011. glass dome -and - Inside the airy wood The greenhouse , under construction , at press time Architectural rendering for restoration performing arts THornTon WIlder’S PERFORMING ARTS at green-wood hornton Wilder must updated with a decidedly multi-artist, site-specific have had Green-Wood Brooklyn vibe. performances and tours. in mind when he Our Town was just one of The majesty and history of its penned his now-classic five unique events staged at exceptional landscape seems to American play Our Green-Wood in 2014, which inspire contemporary TTown.

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