Harlem YMCA

The Harlem YMCA is among the more sparkly gems on the neon book's cutting room floor.  In fact, it wasn't supposed to be there.  I had photographed it and even written the following caption for the book: 


Harlem YMCA: 180 West 135th Street, installed c. 1932 

"The great roof signs of the Harlem YMCA date to the building's opening on New Year's Day 1933, making them among the oldest functioning neon signs in New York today. (A vertical sign over the main entrance, not pictured, is a very convincing facsimile of a sign installed around 1950.) Determined not to lose business to movie houses and other less wholesome amusement venues, YMCAs across the United States almost invariably hung large illuminated signs high on their facades by the early years of the twentieth century." 

Two dusky views of the Harlem YMCA's roof signs, which have beamed out over East Harlem from their perch on 135th Street since 1933.  (T. Rinaldi)


The vertical sign over the door of the YMCA seems to have appeared around 1950.  The existing sign is a very convincing facsimile of the original, installed by Silverescent Neon around 1996.  (T. Rinaldi)

Somewhere along the line, the Harlem Y was accidentally dropped from the book. I realized this, to my acute horror, only once it was too late to squeeze it back in.  

As noted in the would-be caption text above, illuminated signs almost invariably hung over the doors and rooftops of YMCAs in New York and elsewhere.  Surviving examples in cities in towns all across the USA still attest to this, but the Harlem YMCA boasts New York's last bit of YMCA neon - with one exception.   

Electric signs became standard equipment for YMCAs across America in the early 20th century. 

Through the basement windows of an old brick building on West 23rd Street, just across from the Chelsea Hotel, passersby can glimpse one other surviving vestige of Y neon.  The sign once hung high aloft from the facade of the same building, formerly the McBurney YMCA, now home to the David Barton Gym.  Only the letter M comes alight today, casting its red glow over the gym's well heeled, well formed patrons writhing on elliptical machines weight benches.   

The McBurney YMCA's old neon sign, now decor at the David Barton gym. (T. Rinaldi)

The sign's innate coolness would surely have sufficed to justify the enormous effort of moving it down here.  But this sign has a special place in history, too - namely, its starring role in a certain music video . . .  

I refer, of course, to the Village People's 1978 gift to humanity, "YMCA".  The video is well worth a look not just for an idea of what the old McBurney YMCA sign looked like in place (or for a good pep talk, should you need one), but for a whole series of shots showing Chelsea and Greenwich Village in the heady days just before the AIDS crisis.  The sign remained in place through it all, until the McBurney branch moved from 23rd Street to its current location (on West 14th Street) in 2002.

No man does it all by himself. (YouTube)

  

IN OTHER NEON NEWS:

• Further down West 23rd Street, a facsimile has replaced the Westside Tavern's old blue BAR sign.

Harlem Neon Nocturne

Forgive me - a short post this week, but a pretty exciting one, I think.  I ran across two fascinating film clips the other day.  They show 125th Street in Harlem on a cold winter's night in 1964.  If you like the old signs as much as I do, this footage will really get your blood flowing. 

Click here for the first film.  (Critical Past)

One of the most fascinating things about these old films is that they show how so many storefront signs were once animated.  Animation is gone from virtually all of the signs from this period that survive in New York today - Manganaro's flashing sign on Ninth Avenue being about the only one that I can think of that still so much as blinks on and off. It's a pretty safe bet that a lot of the old signs that survive today were intended to flash when they were installed.  As the years went by, their owners likely grew weary of having to service their clunky old flashing mechanisms.

Click here for the second film.  (Critical Past) 


I came across these films in searching around for old photos of the wonderful vertical sign at the former Blumstein Department Store, which I confirmed this weekend at the NYPL is the work of the Artkraft Strauss Sign Corp., installed in 1936.  The sign still exists under very boring new vinyl faces installed for Touro College.  The cover-up is a bit of a heartbreak, but we can be grateful the sign is still there at all: of the many that appear in this footage, Blumstein's is one of only two that survive - the Apollo Theater (installed 1940) being the other, though what you'll see there now is a good facsimile of the original. The others - the Spot Lite Bar, Baby Grand Chinese, Lido Bar & Grill, Sugar Ray's, Loew's Victoria, West End theater, Ripley's Clothes, London Character Shoes - have closed up or vanished.

Unfortunately, Critical Past (the web site that hosts these films) doesn't seem to offer information on the provenance of this footage.  The date given (February 1969) seems to be wrong, given what's showing at the Loew's Victoria.  They appear to have been shot by the same person, who did a lovely job indeed.  Critical Past does have a great variety of interesting old films, though, including more historic footage of neon signs in New York and elsewhere - all of it for sale.

IN OTHER NEON NEWS:

• The neon book has reached draft galleys - lookin' good!

• Bad news from Brooklyn: Hinsch's in trouble again (by way of JVNY)

• I have seen the Artkraft Strauss collection at the NYPL, and it is good.

• Check out Cold War Polish Neon online (and brush up on your Polish).

• Over at Project Neon, Kirsten has brought a number of new (to me) old signs to light, including:

   - Westchester Pharmacy in the Bronx

   - Lorraine's Bar and Grill, also in the Bronx

   - Midland Wine & Liquor, in Jamaica

• Doh!  I missed the deadline to nominate neon signs to WNYC's "New York in 10 Objects" project.

• This weekend I head to Cincinnati, Ohio, to visit the American Sign Museum.