Customer Reviews

The Late, Great Pennsylvania Station

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...that such a magnificent work of art was not deemed worthy of preservation in 1963. In the opinion of a number of architectural historians, Pennsylvania Station was the grandest building ever erected in the United States. The photos in this marvelous book certainly make that case very convincingly. And they give me an overwhelming sense of melancholy. I'm just a tad too young to have any recollection of the lost station, but I regularly pass through its depressing successor. One architectural critic opined that whereas the old station made you feel like royalty in entering the City of New York, the current station makes you feel like a scurrying rat. Lorraine B. Diehl is passionate about her subject. She grew up in the neighborhood, and the great station fascinated her from childhood, when it was a vast, wondrous world for her and other kids. As she matured, she came to appreciate not only the architectural details, but the station as a backdrop to American history, witnessing the comings and goings of countless people in peace and in war. In one of her favorite quotations, Thomas Wolfe (in "You Can't Go Home Again") said that the great station was "vast enough to hold the sound of time." Whether you're interested in railroads, architecture, engineering (the story of how the railroad tunnelled under the Hudson River and built the station is fascinating in itself) or history, this book is a must read. If you're ever in New York, make a point of taking one of the author's free tours of the station, 12:30 PM on the 4th Monday of each month from the information desk. She's as an engaging a guide as she is an author, and you'll see some hidden remnants of the old station that other visitors can't.

If you've heard of Penn Station and its destruction, but don't know the history or details, this is EXACTLY the book you are looking for if you want to know about it. It includes an entertaining and informative history of the station, amazing pictures, and remarkable insight into the forces that led to the station's destruction.

It is simultaneously a fond tribute to an architectural masterpiece, and a saddening description of civic apathy.

Hopefully Ms. Diehl will put out another edition with updates and description of plans for a new Penn Station.

I was barely seven years old when old Penn Station was torn down, but I remember the sadness and outrage of my neighbors in Brooklyn. I had only been to the station once or twice but I was too young to remember. I didn't really understand the big fuss about its destruction. And after it was gone, I don't remember there being too much grieving.

Now looking back, through films and books, I understand what it was all about. "The Late, Great Pennsylvania Station" by Lorraine B. Diehl is the best book on the subject that I've come across. Her analysis of the rise and fall of McKim's great station is both awe-inspiring and heart-breaking. The smattering of beautiful photographs is a plus, as well. Penn Station's demise, of course, could be regarded solely as a loss for the city but, as Ms. Diehl explains, the real legacy of the destruction was the enormous preservation/conservation movement that followed. In the aftermath, so many other buildings were spared a similar fate.

There are those who say that the people behind Penn Station's demolition were justified (Ms. Diehl rightly avoids villifying anyone). The apologists for the destruction claim that Penn Station was too big, in the wrong place, and was in the red. The Empire State Building was erected ten blocks south of the midtown business area and three miles north of the Wall Street district. It was a very big building and rarely had over 50% occupancy until the 1950s, when it finally began earning money. Should it have been knocked down too?

There are many losses for which we mourn, but one might never expect to mourn for a building, let alone an old train station. But Pennsylvania Station itself was as monumental as the tragedy of its thoughtless, needless destruction by the greedy, short-sighted ends of small-minded businessmen, and the inexplicable and inexcusable civic apathy that let it happen. Today's Madison Square Garden is the most horrendously designed sports arena in the nation; that and the pitiful remains of Penn Station that lie buried beneath it only deepen the wounds inflicted by the loss of McKim, Mead and White's masterpiece.

Diehl paints a loving portrait of a stone and steel palace of mythical proportions, one so vivid and poetic that the very idea of this magnificent, colossal monument lying in ruins while a banal pile of concrete went up in its place becomes truly heartbreaking. Through this book Penn Station becomes in death what it was in life: romantic, majestic, inspiring.

This was a moving book that made me wish I was around to see Penn Station in all of its glory. The author does not hide her disgust for the new structure -- often calling it "squalid". I couldn't agree more. The only think worse than the current station is the horrendous arena that sits above it.

One wish, though -- for more photographs.

Lorraine B. Diehl has written an account that covers the birth, life and death of the former Pennsylvania Railroad station that will make you feel like you have walked in the station yourself.From the story of the sandhog tunneling under the Hudson river to the sculptor who carved the stone eagles perched above the entrances, Diehlbuilds an image in your mind along with the wonderful photographs through out the book that will evoke a feeling of loss without ever having stepped foot inside.This detailed and well researched account will make an excellent additionto any architecture or railfans bookshelf.

This book is facinating and so well written, I really could not put it down, the author has a real sence for the history and importance of the building, I agree it could have used more visuals, but that is a minor quibble and really does not take away from the merit of the book. I must take some exception to the review of Mr. Jendrysic, in all due respect he misses the point totally of perservation when he says the building was a white elephant that was in the wrong place and in the red, that may have all been true, but in those cases you find other uses for the building, like Paris did with the Orsay train station and the colossel Louvre as well as Versailles, I mean would you call for the pulling down of Versailles??? and the Orsey Museum is spectacular. This was not just any building, this was a masterpiece a true treasure, that could have been coverted to other uses, buildings of this quality should be persevered, period, not torn down like some 50's tract house. I highly recommend this book in everyway, if you have any interest in great buildings or just wonderful books quite frankly, then you will not be disappointed in this book, you are right about one think Mr. Jendrysic this book is first rate.

Much has been written about the late, great, Pennsylvania Station, and yet it can never be too much. This landmark should be standing today, with it's pink granite shinning in the sun, and being a becon in cloudy weather. In the 1960's, in many other cities their grand "Union Stations" were being sectioned off and abandonded, some are still standing as ruins today, this is part of the irony of Penn Station's demise, even in the 1960's there were hundreds of passenger trains using the facility daily, and this number has been climbing since.

The author gives us all the facts and figures about this station, from it's planning, short life, and needless destruction. However she also paints the human picture of this building, and in doing so lets us understand how the public allowed this building to slip away.

The opening of Penn Station was celebrated during the final years of the Gilded Age, acted as shelter to thousands during the Great Depression, and it served as a virtual military base during the WW II years.
To the multitudes of returning vets, and their famalies, the railroads and Penn Station represented the past, and times that they all would rather forget. Remember back then there was not the mental health counselling available to the returning soldiers, and one way they coped was to simply forget the past, and all that it contained.

In this book we see that the stations fate was sealed with VJ Day, and the social changes that started to take shape with WW II's end.
By the 1950's, Airplanes and Interstate Highways were in, Railroads were out. Yet at least in the NYC area, commuter trains still played an important role that never went away. The beautiful building was allowed to decay, and was altered by a private company without any accontability required to the public.

By the early 1960's some of the public finally woke up, and NYC's Landmark Preservation Committee was formed, by it was too late for the "Temple of Transportation".

This book also contains an excellent compliment of photos, including a number from the 4 year, yes, four year period it took to destroy the station.

Ken

Excellent book on the grandeur of the original Penn Station, one of the most exceptional building in North America before it was destroyed in 1964 for what we have now, a hideous train station that looks like a basement in Jersey!

Years ago, when I first saw this book I had no clue that penn station looked like this. I stood there in a bookstore, mouth agape, saying to myself "This is what penn station looked like" I immediately bought the book and was shocked, and angry that a monument like this would be allowed to be destroyed.

I you enjoy trains or architecture or are a new yorker, get this book.