Albany, New York

My efforts to gain admission to the New York State Bar earned me an interview in Albany, New York, this week.  As yet it’s too early to know if I “passed the audition”, but never having been there, it was another adventure.

Albany is the capital of New York, located about 3 hours north of New York City on the west bank of the Hudson River.  It’s a modest sized city, just under 100,000 (it peaked around 135,000 in 1950).  Troy, Schenectady, and Saratoga are just north of the city, and Glens Falls and Lake George are a little further up.   The city was selected as New York’s capital in 1797, but both Albany and New York City experienced substantial growth in the nineteenth century.  NYC far outstripped it, of course, but Albany remained the capital.

Albany seems like Hagerstown – mostly “olde” – but at least it has some substantially new building, including the Empire State Plaza.  The interview itself was at the Abrams Building, formerly known as the Justice Building, at the Plaza. 

EMPIRE STATE PLAZA

     It seems that when Governor Nelson Rockefeller (1959-1973) took Princess Beatrix of Holland around Albany in 1959, he was embarrassed by how shitty the town was.   So he called up his architect friend Wallace and they ripped off Brasilia (Brazil’s newly built capital city) to come up with this. 

     It’s a “mall” type deal, by which I mean a large rectangular plaza with important buildings at each end and other buildings along the sides forming a large rectangle.  At one end is the state capital building which dates from, and looks like it dates from, the nineteenth century; at the other is the huge NY Museum Building.   Along the sides are various state government buildings, a high rise (42 story) Corning Building, the Egg, and the Justice building.  Due to elevator maintenance, the Observation Deck at the Corning Bldg. was closed.  (“Wally World is closed for renovation!  Sorry, folks!”)

NEW YORK MUSEUM

    This is the huge building on the opposite end of the Plaza, with a large walkway going over Madison Ave.   On the ground floor is the museum itself.  I took my time, killing 2 hours, and breezed through it.  Roving through it counterclockwise, there’s Olde Town Albany, Lumber Land, Native American New York – actually quite fascinating to “see” what New York looked like 12,000 years ago – followed by a huge Civil War exhibition (they’re not ALL in Virginia, it seems), and a big exhibit on New  York City itself.  That included a 1941 subway car and one of the burnt up firetrucks from 9/11. 

Getting there.   I took a plane (thanks, Loni!) from DC through Detroit, as Delta doesn’t seem to have any direct routes from DC to Albany.  Albany itself is at the intersection of 87 and 90.   87 comes up from NYC and continues north to Montreal, whereas I-90 comes to Albany from Boston, then goes to Buffalo, Chicago, and eventually Seattle.  I love how I-80 goes west from NYC and winds up in San Francisco.  Thank you, Eisenhower, for America’s Autobahn!  [Would we have our system if Adolf hadn’t impressed Ike?] 

     I can’t say Albany is worth visiting solely for the Plaza, the Capital, and the Museum, but those three elements pull the town up from merely a dreary capital town.