New-York Historical Society

💥 🥊 This work packs a punch! Throughout his career #GeorgeBellows was drawn to the gripping spectacle of boxing. "Counted Out" captures the drama of the match as the crowd awaits a decision. The carefully constructed composition places the viewer in the ring and draws the eye upward through the arc of the referee’s arm to the face of the presumed victor. See more in "From Paul Revere to Edward Hopper: Treasures from the Leonard L. Milberg Collection of American Prints, Drawings, and Watercolors"—on view through October 27, 2024. https://bit.ly/3XMl29R 📷 George Bellows, Counted Out (first version), 1921, Lithograph. Collection of Mr. & Mrs. Leonard L. Milberg

💅 Self care? Nailed it. Who invented the modern #manicure? And where did it start? Mary E. Cobb developed the American manicure salon in 1878, working with her podiatrist husband Dr. Joseph Parker Pray right here in New York City. She opened her first parlor in 1878 adjoining his practice at 69 West 23rd Street in New York City.⁣ After she divorced Pray on the grounds of persistent cruelty, she sold her own mail-order line of cosmetics and nail products, and trained women in the art of manicure so they could join the growing beauty industry. Cobb operated fashionable Manhattan parlors and outposts in Chicago and London. She sold Bran-u Nail Powder polish, Pan-za hand cream, Manicure Eko soap, and Cherri-lip—a blush tint for nails, lips, and cheeks. ⁣ ⁣ ✨ Last Chance: Visit "Women’s Work" before the show closes this Sunday, August 25, 2024. https://bit.ly/3DLkndA ⁣ 📷 1) Mrs. J. Parker Pray, 1875. 2) Mary E. Cobb, Jar, 1884-1920; Gift of Bella C. Landauer. 3-4) Mary E. Cobb, How to be Your Own Manicure, 1884, Hagley Museum and Library

#OnThisDay in 1901 The Willis Avenue Bridge, spanning the Harlem River between Manhattan and the Bronx, opens for traffic. The bridge was meant to relieve congestion on the Third Avenue Bridge to the north, which opened in 1898. It cost 2.4 million to build (more than 73 million in today's dollar).⁣ The opening celebration included officials and crowds gathering on the bridge for the ceremony, young girls in patriotic garb marching in a parade, and even the firing of a cannon. ⁣ 📷 George E. Stonebridge Photograph Collection

"The idea of animal companionship has evolved in step with the development of the city itself." Learn more about the history of New Yorkers and their pets in our upcoming exhibition "Pets and the City" in the latest from artnet. https://bit.ly/4dnfGqe

New Yorkers love their pets. Our upcoming exhibition “Pets and the City" traces "the history of animal domestication in New York, from the dogs trained by the Indigenous Lenape and Haudenosaunee peoples to the furry family members living in the city today." Mark your calendars for October 25, 2024! https://bit.ly/4cqsScM

"In each case the objects echo their distinctive historic forms while their content is reworked to reflect on the underside of the Dutch colonial empire—the hidden legacy of death, destruction, and suffering." Read more about the special exhibition "Beatrice Glow: When Our Rivers Meet" as well as "Lost New York." https://bit.ly/3SIYVxB

👶 You could *drop your children off* at this now-bygone department store while you shopped 🛍️ Samuel Klein opened his Union Square store in 1906. Kleins’s flagship location sold everything from clothing to furs, jewelry, and pet supplies. A painting by Anne Eisner shows the exterior of a dressing room at Klein’s—identified in the title as a woman’s sacred space. Department stores provided a pathway for women to disrupt social convention by leaving the home and pushing, unescorted, into public space. See more in "Lost New York." https://bit.ly/4aBuX5B 🎨 Anne Eisner, Klein's Outer Sanctum, ca. 1934–38, Oil on canvas; Gift of Christie McDonald.

#OnThisDay in 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act to enforce the 15th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The 15th Amendment (ratified in 1870) prohibited states from denying any male citizen the right to vote based on “race, color or previous condition of servitude.” However, in the years after the amendment various discriminatory practices were used to prevent African Americans from exercising their right to vote. The 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act were the most significant civil rights bills since Reconstruction. These laws signaled the end of legalized Jim Crow, though the struggle for equality and full citizenship continues. This photo of President Lyndon B. Johnson shows an earlier talk with Martin Luther King Jr., Whitney Young, and James Farmer on December 3, 1963. Learn more in our "Meet the Presidents" gallery. https://bit.ly/2vnWLvF 📷 LBJ Library photo by Yoichi Okamoto

🤯 🌊 The world is your oyster—and *HALF* the world’s oyster population once thrived in the Hudson River system. ⁣ ⁣ Because oysters suck in seawater to extract the nutrients, they filter the water as they eat. The harbor’s original oyster population could clean its waters in just a few days.⁣ (#FunFact: One oyster filters up to 50 gallons of water a day.) ⁣ New York began losing its oyster beds to overharvesting in the early 1800s. Staten Island’s were the first to go, but, in the 1820s, the introduction of seed oysters from the Chesapeake Bay revived them. African American oystermen cultivated and worked the oyster beds, doing well enough to support a growing community in Sandy Ground—home to 50 households by the 1890s. Oyster cultivation sustained Staten Island’s beds until pollution overwhelmed them in the first quarter of the 20th century.⁣ Today, Billion Oyster Project is restoring oyster reefs to New York Harbor in collaboration with New York City communities.⁣ To learn more for #NationalOysterDay you can browse our online exhibition Hudson Rising: https://bit.ly/3JA96iq 📷⁣ 1) Herman A. Blumenthal, Fishermen in a boat with harvested oysters, ca. 1920.⁣ 2) Robert L. Bracklow, Dorlon's on wheels' mobile oyster vendor, ca 1890-1900.⁣ 3) Gluttony Collection oyster plate, ca. 2007, Glazed porcelain; Gift of Virginia Sin.

One of the greatest tourist guides in Hudson River history, William Wade’s panoramic map guided steamboat and armchair travelers alike along a 138-mile route. It marked thousands of points of interest, from buildings to historical landmarks and natural features. These included the brewery of Matthew Vassar, who would later found Vassar College; Sing-Sing prison, then only nineteen years old; George Washington's Revolutionary War headquarters in Newburgh; the site of Alexander Hamilton’s fatal duel with Aaron Burr in Weehawken, NJ; and Ellis Island, forty-seven years before it opened its doors to immigrants. Click through selected sections here and explore the full image for yourself in an installation at the Museum—on view through August 18, 2024. https://bit.ly/4c7bA4j 🚨 Please note: The Museum is closed today and tomorrow but will reopen for regular hours this Sunday, August 4th.