It was good to speak with you Friday regarding our ongoing need for interns to assist with: the monuments catalogue, researching historical signs, research and authorship of new thematic texts for DPR website (see previous entries on line at: http://www.nycgovparks.org/sub_about/parks_history/history.html) answering public inquiries and aiding with special projects.
Currently I have need for a highly motivated intern to assist with research to identify available images and information for an exhibition opening at the Arsenal June 23rd, entitled Before They Were Parks. The show will include case studies and types of properties around the city that have become parks, from private estates to cemeteries to former industrial sites. We have already canvassed all of our internal resources, and now need to procure images and information culled from external sources, from various archives to oral histories with former property owners etc. The outcome of this work will be a highly public exhibition that we hope will demonstrate how history informs the present, and illustrate the transformative scenarios that lead to the creation of our public parks, and the “readaptive use” of countless privately held sites around the city, that were converted into public amenities.
Please let me know if whether any students enrolled in your programs would be appropriate for and interested in working on this project.
Thanks.
Jonathan Kuhn
Director, Art & Antiquities
City of New York/Parks & Recreation
The Arsenal, Central Park
New York, New York 10065
Phone: (212) 360-3410
Fax: (212) 360-1373
Peter J. Wosh
Director, Archives/Public History Program
History Department
New York University
53 Washington Square South
New York NY 10012
Phone: (212) 998-8601
Fax: (212) 995-4017
http://history.fas.nyu.edu/object/history.gradprog.archivespublichistory.html