#cityboat

A Book of Seafaring Journeys for the Seafaring Nerd

A guest blog by R. Tetelbaum

North Brother Island, the former site of Riverside Hospital from 1885 until shortly after the death of infamous resident Typhoid Mary in 1938, is a wonderland of New York City’s past that has been rapidly reclaimed by nature. While in service it quarantined, treated, and burned the bodies of those afflicted with communicable diseases such as smallpox and tuberculosis. In the 1940s it was a housing location for war veterans attending school in New York City and then in the 1950s a rehabilitation center for adolescent drug addicts until its complete abandon in 1963.

With the abandon were left not only the structures themselves but a glimpse into the life of those who worked on and inhabited this island. Among the island’s many treasures, oddities, and forgotten souls, the ruins and periods of which are worthy of their own archeological and historical research, is a small library whose sole inhabitants are books abandoned in a fashion that paints an unfortunate scene suggesting the shelves were more valuable than the print. They were left to rot among the bare walls and the asbestos, dust, and dirt.

The spiritual value of the print is what attracts this seafaring nerd to the library. On the surface are rough piles of books in various states of decay. Below that, what often appears as a dirty floor is yet another layer of books fossilized in elements one may not want to breathe in. Some of this layer is either beyond restoration or is so only to the most passionate and patient devotee to the Dewey Decimal System. While mostly unrecognizable literature to us hoi polloi, it’s the journey of the book that is fascinating. Who read these books and how did they affect their lives? Did it sit in the hands of Typhoid Mary, or in the hands of an adolescent heroin addict held against her will in a windowless basement cell? A veteran soldier? Many books, religious in nature and catered to the young, contain drawings of the devil and the cross and perhaps belonged to students whose imaginations were more interesting than the zealous, pious drone of their teachers. Many with words of love and longing to those that lived on the island inscribed on the inside cover. Some with library checkout cards invoking memories of a time when we knew what a library was.

One book of note, Where Angels Fear to Tread and Other Tales of the Sea by Morgan Robertson (1899), sent this nerd on a tailspin into history. After careful restoration with a coffee grinder brush and a bathtub it was possible to recover some of the decayed outer surfaces, while the interior has shockingly remained undamaged by the elements for over 50 years, surviving well over a century in total since its printing!

A bookplate, also ex libris, or “from the books of…” is a printed label signifying the book’s owner. This book bears such a label on the inside of the hardcover and gives hint to the origin of the book and its landing on the island. Ex libris Salusbury and the Salusbury arms denote the origin of the book to a member of the noble Salisbury family of Wales which dates back to the 11th century. Satis est prostrasse leoni roughly meaning that “it is enough for the lion to have

overthrown,” a phrase used throughout history in varied form and context but dating back to the rhetoric of Aristotle, and used here in the writing of Ovidius after being exiled by Augustus:

“The greater someone is, the more easily placated his wrath, and a generous spirit uses the opportunity for merciful moves. It is enough for the magnanimous lion to have thrown down the bodies, and the fight meets its end when the enemy lies on the ground: the wolf, however, and the disgraceful bears press the dying enemy and so do whatever wild beasts are of lesser distinction.”

Sir Frederic Hamilton Piozzi Salusbury (1895-1960) and Field Marshall Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig (1861-1928) were two prominent members of the Salusbury family living during the active years of the island. Salusbury, a British soldier who served in World War I and II and later became the acting British Ambassador to Greece, along with Haig who commanded as a general during World War I, by way of other soldiers or directly could have plausibly donated this book to the American Red Cross, whose stamp resides on the page following the bookplate. In fact, after retiring from the service Haig devoted the rest of his life to veteran's interests, including the creation of the Haig Homes charity to fund housing for veterans, befitting the island’s purpose in its later active years. By way of soldiers, uncertain years, and uncertain means, this book made its way, bookplate intact, across the Atlantic into the hands of resident souls on an island of untold secrets, horrors, hopes, and dreams.

Also an anecdote of no small importance, the author Morgan Robertson, was the self-proclaimed inventor of the periscope.

An urban explorer’s wet dream and possibly the last tourist location in New York City that hasn’t been corrupted by $6 pretzels is legally closed for good reason as the buildings and some of the surrounding landscape are unsafe due to decay and overgrowth. In 2014 Mark Levine, the Chair of the City Council’s Park Committee, expressed his interest in the island as an environmental education destination. The New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, owner of the island, on occasion does grant permission to visitors but on the date of this article states it is not accommodating requests through at least the fall of 2016 due to a natural resources project it is managing. To the brave seafaring urban explorer, these rules may not be a barrier, but should be a word of caution, if one wants the utterly spellbinding and truly spiritual experience. Once open to even a limited public, most of the magic will be lost, and the opportunity to see the parts worthwhile may be gone forever. If ever open to the public at large prepare yourself for tickets, roped-off areas, Japanese tourists with the latest model camera, and prohibitively expensive pretzels.

As to Robertson’s tales themselves? What happens on the East River, stays on the East River.