What is Salmagundi?

Salmagundi refers to either a salad like dish or a pirate-style stew that came about in the 17th and 18th centuries . The stew includes   anything the cook has on hand. 

Salmagundi  as a  salad  has meat, anchovies, eggs, and onions, often arranged in rows on lettuce and served with vinegar and oil, and spiced with anything available.    The French word "salmagondis" means a hodgepodge or mix of widely disparate things. 

Salmagundi is also a name of a  the literary magazine that was found by Irvin Show in  January 1807 in New York.  Irwin Show is American playwright and novelist whose written works have sold more than 14 million copies.
 Irvin used different pseudonyms such as  William Wizard and Launcelot Langstaff and wrote a  lot of satiric articles about the life in New York .  In its seventeenth issue, dated November 11, 1807, Irvin used the word "Gotham" as a nickname  for New York for the first time. I wrote about  it in one of my earlier posts.

Salmagundi is also a name of the club, one of the oldest art organizations in the United States.

Salmagundi Club,   originally called the New York Sketch Class,  it had its beginnings in Greenwich Village where in the studio of the sculptor Jonathan Scott  Hartley a group of artists, students, and friends at the National Academy of Design gathered weekly on Saturday evenings. Hartley  sculpted three of the nine busts around the front of the Thomas Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress in Washington, DC.

The Club adopted its present name a hundred years ago after Washington Irving published "The Salmagundi Papers".   The name also serves as the club dining room's famous "Salmagundi Stew".  

The club had several temporally locations and  in 1917   purchased the 1852 Irad Hawley brownstone townhouse at 47 Fifth Avenue between East Eleventh and East Twelfth Streets. Hawley  was   the  first president of the Pennsylvania Coal Company.  The borough of Hawley in Pennsylvania in Wayne County was named after him. 

The Club offers programs including exhibitions, painting demonstrations, and art auctions throughout the year for members and the general public.

The  club has  three galleries, a library,  and a restaurant and bar with vintage pool tables. All facilities are available for special events and private rentals.

The Club owns a collection of over 1,500 works of art spanning its 140 year history and has a membership of nearly 850 artists and patrons.

The Salmagundi Club offers a variety of Art Classes, all open to the public. All classes are $20 per class to attend and are "walk-in" classes (no advance notice is required). Attendees must bring their own art supplies but easels and tables are provided as are models for the life drawing classes.

Society of Illustrators -a club, museum and a restaurant

For those of you who are looking for a hidden gem in New York City, the Society of Illustrators is certainly one of them.  It is located at 128 East 63rd Street in a graceful, five-story townhouse on a quiet residential block on the Upper East Side. 

The is a gift shop in the lobby and a small two-floor exhibition space. Admission is  free   for all visitors on Tuesdays from 5-8pm. Every Tuesday and Thursday there is a  Sketch  night  from 6:30 - 9:30pm, with nude , partially clothes or fully costumed models and live music.  The price   is $15 and $7 for students/seniors. There's an original Norman Rockwell above the bar on the second floor, and a dining room.   

If you are not the member of the society you can buy a Museum Experience Package with Lunch that includes the full buffet, coffee, dessert and a glass of wine. ($30 per person , not including admission). The dining room is open for lunch Tuesday-Friday from 12:00pm to 2:30pm. From spring to early fall, the  terrace provides a rare opportunity for dining al fresco in the heart of the city.

 The Permanent Collection has of nearly 2,000 works by many of the greatest names in American illustration.

 128 East 63rd  was originally  a carriage house built in 1875 for William P. Read, a personal secretary for financier J.P. Morgan.  In the beginning of 20th century  two brothers bought the house. They converted the   building into a residence and the stable area became a squash court.

The society of Illustrators was founded on   February 1, 1901 by  nine artists and one businessman with the following credo: “The object of the Society shall be to promote generally the art of illustration and to hold exhibitions from time to time.”
In August 1939, the Society   purchased the building for approximately $33,000, which is nearly $500,000 in today’s dollars.

The Racquet and Tennis Club, private club with nude swimming tradition

2013 year photo

The Racquet and Tennis Club is a private social club and athletic club located at 370 Park Avenue, between East 52nd and 53rd Streets, New York, New York.   Construction began on December 20, 1916, and was completed on September 7, 1918. The builder was Mark Edlitz, and the estimated cost was $400,000. The building is about 200 feet by 100 feet (30 m x 60 m) and five stories tall,   with the  height twice the width of Park Avenue. The exterior is stone and brick over a structural steel frame.
The Racquet Court  club was opened in 1876 and   merged with Racquet Tennis Club in 1890. The First Club house was located on West 43 street. The Club moved to it’s current location in 1918.
In the Club Book, published in 1917, said that “The initiation fee for the members is $200 and annual dues - $150. The visitor had to pay  in advance $25  per month. The club house shall  be open up till 1AM and restaurant  from 7AM until 10PM.NO gratuity should be given to any servant” .

1930 year photo

The fee was really high - in 1917  the food costs averaged about $22 a month, which was slightly more than half the $40 average monthly salary of American workers. 

One hundred dollars in 1917  worth the same as $2000  today.  
Racquet and Tennis Club building is representative of the elaborate private clubs constructed in New York during the early twentieth century.
Inside, at the top of the stairs on the second floor was a comfortable lounge.  A dining room, bar, library, billiard room and card room were also housed here. In the floors above were racquets courts, squash courts, changing rooms, and court tennis courts. (Court tennis must not be confused with lawn tennis; it is a completely different game involving sloping walls  with bouncing balls off all four walls).
Today, there are four International squash courts, one North American doubles squash court, one racquets court, and the two tennis courts.
It is as much of a time capsule of the Gilded Age as can be found in Manhattan, and members observe a strict code of silence about all that takes place behind its thick stone walls.  The Racquet Club was able to remain all male by arguing that so long as no business was conducted within its walls, no discrimination was practiced.
The club sold its air rights on Park Avenue to a developer a number of decades ago, resulting in the unusual sight, for New York, of a glass-clad skyscraper rising in the middle of the block, immediately behind the club.
Unlike many other private clubs that once catered exclusively to men and now admit women, the Racquet and Tennis has held fast to its men-only membership policy. (Women are welcome at club social events if accompanied by a male member) 
 In 1987, the club famously refused to allow court tennis player Evelyn David, who lived “a few blocks” from the club,  to train for the Women's World Tennis Championship, citing its men-only rules. There were  only nine court tennis clubs in America at that time and Evelin had to travel 1.5  hours to Tuxedo tennis court.   

As of summer 2012 at least four private clubs In New York City  still bar women — The Holland Society, The New York Racquet and Tennis Club, The Brook Club and The Anglers's Club of New York.
Until 1980s it was a  common practice to have a most natural way on swimming- nude   in Gilded Age private clubs around New York.   Later some of the clubs were forced to admit women.
The New York Racquet and Tennis Club is a rare place where there are  after-work men-only naked swimming sessions. 

Read more: The Tao of Skinny-Dipping ( new York Times)