Of all the cities in the world you’d expect New York to have some commemorative plaques, surely. But in the (slightly over) one year lifetime of the Open Plaques project few had surfaced. Until, searching Flickr for photos a few weeks back, Simon stumbled on an entire constellation of them. How had we managed to miss them before? Well, it’s the colour stupid. Oh, and the name. Turns out our NYC cousins have many kinds of plaques but the large set Simon uncovered is red, and they’re termed “cultural medallions”. When you’re searching on keywords and dealing in data these attributes and descriptors make all the difference. Dotted around New York City, with clusters in Manhattan and a sprinkling elsewhere in the Five Boroughs, the figures they commemorate exude a chutzpah that only the city which has bedazzled the globe could generate. There are plenty of Twentieth century icons and many are suitably edgy, such as James Cagney, Cecil B. deMille, George Gershwin, John Steinbeck, Henry Miller, Marianne Moore, Houdini, Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg.
It’s tempting to believe there’s something to be read into the fact that the plaque which triggered this discovery was none other than that for artist, taste maker and impresario of the original pop culture multimedia event – namely Andy Warhol. The man who coined the phrase “in the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes” has acted as the connector and gateway (via the prolific wallyg‘s photo) to a significant upscaling of New York’s location and presence in this service we’re collectively building. Call me biased (and I am) but isn’t this serendipity squared? The typographical and design template for the plaques themselves was created free of cost by influential New Yorker and Italian-born designer Massimo Vignelli, who among other things also designed this iconic NYC subway map in 1972 [detailed view]. Our more humble map is below.
The red medallion scheme itself numbers some 44 plaques so far, and was started in 1995 by the Historic Landmark’s Preservation Center, a privately funded not-for-profit organisation operated to raise awareness of and actively support the city’s heritage. Other non-red plaques abound in NYC of course, including ones for Theoodore Roosvelt, Eleanor Roosevelt, Thomas Edison, Dorothy Parker, The Algonquin Hotel, and one for Thomas Paine in Greenwich Village. Paine was born in Thetford, Norfolk and later moved to Lewes, Sussex (both in Britain) before moving to France and criss-crossing the pond thereafter, a key figure in the French Revolution and the American War Of Independence. His 59 Grove St, Greenwich Village plaque just happens to have a red-painted border on the surrounding brickwork.
We’ve already got dozens of plaques from the USA included on our service, but this much expanded New York set presents a ripe opportunity for plaque hunters – that’s you residents of and visitors to NYC! – to contribute their photos to the listings we’ve now added. So help us create a fuller picture of this particular state of mind. Browse our list, photograph some, collect up any new ones you find and help us build it! [photos CC: courtesy of wallyg and TonyTheMisfit]
