Good morning. It's Wednesday. Today we'll look at hidden signatures in places you might not expect people to scribble their names. We'll also get details on Senator Robert Menendez's decision to resign in the wake of his conviction on corruption charges.
This is not about the many things in New York that are hidden in plain sight. This is about things that are just plain hidden — little secrets that are understood only by those who know they are there. Specifically, signatures — the unseen John Hancocks of the people who made something or built something. For generations, the workers at the Steinway & Sons factory in Astoria, Queens, signed the pianos in places not even a virtuoso could find — until the managers said, No more. And construction workers have a long history of signing a beam that is put in place forever — a tradition that extends well beyond New York and usually includes people who designed or financed the building, or are the reason it is being built. Former President Barack Obama signed such a beam at the topping-out ceremony for his presidential center in Chicago last month. His signature won't be visible in the ceiling of the room where the beam is going, which a spokeswoman described as "an intricately designed, angled affair." But there are names hidden in places that are not beams. You could have taken a photograph of the skyscraper at 157 West 57th Street soon after it reached its full height in 2015 and not noticed three names on the core of the building, near the top: Bella, Emma and Tess. I certainly didn't notice them through the viewfinder on the morning I snapped a shot of the building, gleaming almost all the way to the top. Not until months later, when I looked at that photograph again, did I catch the high-level graffiti that someone had put there for half of Manhattan to see — the half uptown, looking south past Central Park. They sound like characters out of Jane Austen or perhaps Edith Wharton. Who they are is a mystery. And the three names were concealed once the rest of the building's shiny skin went up.
There is a trove of names at the Moynihan Train Hall, the station that sped into being during the coronavirus pandemic. The names are on an emblem in the floor that you can walk over. "We had all the workers sign it," said Paul Guarraci, a senior superintendent with Skanska USA Building, who worked on the train hall. But they did sign not the front, the side with the word "Excelsior" that is visible as you glide down an escalator. Everyone who worked on the project — architects, carpenters, engineers, plumbers — was invited to put Sharpie to stone on the back. "Nobody said no, they didn't want to sign it," Guarraci said. "Often you refer to a project and say you built it — I've said, 'I built Moynihan,'" he explained. "That's how you reference a project. It's personal." "I think of it like a painting," he added. "A painter signs his or her name at the bottom." Not every art installation is signed, though. The artist Michele Oka Doner said her name was nowhere on "Radiant Site," the floor-to-ceiling creation with 11,000 golden tiles that she put in a passageway in the 34th Street-Herald Square subway station in 1991. She did sign one of the terrazzo floors for the concourses at Miami International Airport that she designed. The contractor who made the tiles "kept saying, 'You've got to sign this, Mrs. Doner — Mrs. Doner, when are you going to sign it?'" she recalled. Eventually it disappeared, though not like Bella, Emma and Tess. When the new North Terminal was built, part of her installation — the part with the signature — had to be razed. WEATHER Expect showers, and possibly a thunderstorm, with temperatures in the low 80s. Tonight, a chance of showers will linger, with temperatures in the mid-70s. ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKING In effect until Aug. 13 (Tisha B'Av). The latest New York news
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This is how Senator Robert Menendez's congressional career will end: not with a messy, intraparty fight, but with his resignation. Menendez, who was convicted on corruption charges last week, announced that he would resign from the Senate, effective late next month. With the Senate Ethics Committee laying the groundwork for an expulsion proceeding, Menendez decided to leave office rather than risk becoming the first senator to be kicked out since the Civil War. Menendez told Gov. Philip Murphy in a letter that remaining in the Senate would complicate his efforts to appeal the verdict "all the way," including to the Supreme Court if necessary. Murphy, a Democrat, said he would name a replacement to serve until the end of Menendez's term in January. But Menendez left open the possibility that he would run a long-shot campaign as an independent in November. Analysts say he has no real chance of winning another term after 18 years in the Senate. (He was appointed in January 2006, replacing Jon Corzine, who had been elected governor. Menendez won a full term that November and was re-elected twice.) My colleagues Nicholas Fandos and Tracey Tully write that the timing of the decision did not appear to be an accident. By putting off his departure for a few weeks, Menendez will not only give his staff time to adjust to the transition, he will also receive his salary for another month. His health insurance coverage will also continue. He needs both at a time when his finances are crumbling and his wife, Nadine Menendez, is undergoing cancer treatment. His resignation will not immediately affect his federal pension, though he could also lose that if he loses his appeals. METROPOLITAN DIARY Front page
Dear Diary: I was settling into my morning commute on the 4 train from Brooklyn to Manhattan. I had chosen a seat a few feet away from man in a well-tailored suit. Despite there being many open seats, a woman was standing in front of him with the subway pole in the crook of her arm. She was reading a newspaper while holding it open with both hands. I noticed that the man was staring at the front page. After a few moments, the woman rustled the paper and folded the front page backward to continue her reading-and-balancing act more easily. The man let out a quiet sigh and then immediately looked embarrassed when the woman looked down at him. After a pause, she reopened the paper. "Where were you reading?" she said. He pointed to one of the columns. She readjusted the paper so that the front page remained visible while straightening the inside pages. Then she continued reading her article, and the man continued reading his. — Jana Loeb Illustrated by Agnes Lee. Send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here. Glad we could get together here. See you tomorrow. — J.B. P.S. Here's today's Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here. Francis Mateo and Ed Shanahan contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team at nytoday@nytimes.com. Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox.
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N.Y. Today: New York’s secret signatures
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