IN THE NEWS

Mumford Plaque Dedicated December 11, 2004

Sunnyside Gardens

Lewis Mumford was commemorated last Saturday, December 11, with a National Register plaque, placed on his former home by the Sunnyside Gardens Preservation Alliance. Mumford (1895-1990), a native of Queens(Flushing) and an original homeowner in Sunnyside Gardens, became America’s leading urban thinker and a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, this country’s highest honor.

Visitors came from as far as Virginia, Massachusetts, and Sunnyside’s sister city of Radburn, N.J., the garden community that Mumford’s colleagues developed when they completed Sunnyside Gardens. At 40-02 44th Street, where Mumford and his wife, Sophia, lived with both their children from 1927 to 1936, the plaque was unveiled by the day’s special guest, the Mumfords’ grandson, James Morss. Morss’s mother, Alison, spent the first two years of her life in this house, and Morss himself lived in Sunnyside Gardens from 1999 to 2003 and later spoke with infectious humor of his time there.

At the unveiling, City Councilman Eric Gioia, who grew up within a block of the Gardens, congratulated neighborhood historians who, by placing the plaque, bear witness to the original planners and active members of this community, who worked together to create a special environment that continues to be beautiful, safe, and friendly.

A reception followed at All Saints’ Church Undercroft, where Father Joseph Jerome, himself a close neighbor of the Mumford house, welcomed everyone with the charge that Lewis Mumford be always remembered.
The keynote speaker was Casey Blake, Professor of History and American Studies at Columbia University, a leading scholar of Mumford’s work.Professor Blake praised his subject as "a master historian of city life and urban design, a theorist of urban and regional planning, an architectural critic... and civic moralist [who] spent his entire adult life defending human-scale urban communities. " Blake reminded the audience that Mumford lacked a college education yet became one of the intellectual giants of the last century.

Indeed, a major theme of the day was that modest beginnings can result in great accomplishments. As with Mumford, so too for Sunnyside Gardens, the neighborhood he espoused, chose to live in, and wrote about. Built to provide affordable housing with open space, it is now recognized as an outstanding planned community, a National Register Historic District since 1984. Neighbors are currently seeking designation by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, in a drive spearheaded by the Sunnyside Gardens Preservation Alliance.

For the reception, the Preservation Alliance provided a cornucopia of food and drink and compiled a collection of Mumford’s autobiographical writings about Sunnyside. In addition, several prominent historians, planners, and preservationists sent testimonials to Mumford’s legacy. These included the prominent historian Kenneth T. Jackson, editor of the Encyclopedia of New York City; Kathleen Howe of the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, on behalf of the State and National Registers of Historic Places; Simeon Bankoff, Executive Director of the Historic Districts Council; and John Young, director of the Queens office of New York’s Department of City Planning, the agency that recognized Sunnyside Gardens as a Special Planned Community Preservation District in 1974.

Many stressed the interlinked importance of Mumford and Sunnyside Gardens. Urban designer Richard Plunz, author of the authoritative History of Housing in New York City, wrote, in part, "It is so important that Lewis Mumford’s legacy is to be commemorated at Sunnyside, undoubtedly in his mind the one place in New York City which most embodied the urban vision which he embraced."

Richard Moe, President of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, expanded this observation: "It is wonderfully fitting that Lewis Mumford is being honored in the place where he lived, because much of his long and distinguished career was devoted to helping us understand what makes a place truly livable. As critic, teacher, historian, philosopher and planner, he articulated a compelling and optimistic vision of what cities should be-and offered an insightful warning about the forces that can destroy a city’s human scale and rob it of its soul. He helped us realize how much we need communities that are attractive, efficient, supportive places to live and work. He reminded us that creating and preserving livable places isn’t someone else’s job. Whether or not we choose to call ourselves preservationists, all of us are deeply in his debt."

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