Faded Grandeur 2

This is the lobby ceiling in the apartment house where Babe Ruth

lived. The design is 1900-1915. Same style of decor as the

Titanic. Not Leica, though. I took this in 1976 with a Voigtlander

Vitomatic. Skopar lens.<div></div>

Who was/is Babe Ruth? I am sure the picture will enter a different dimension for me once I know something about her life/career. I should really go and look her up on Google but I only have another 10 minutes here before going off to sleep. Tragic Hollywood starlet? Mass murderer? Titanic survivor?

Really nice Robert. B.R was the baseball player?

Babe Ruth was a nightmare Boston would like to forget, but never will be able to.

Asking who Babe Ruth was is like asking who David Beckham is...

Yes, Babe Ruth was a famous baseball player.

Babe Ruth was EXTREMELY FAMOUS, a legend, but we Americans for some strange seem to think the whole world follows baseball. The other problem with making mention of "The Babe" these days without saying who he was is that screw mount Leicas were all there was when he was at the peak of his career, Summars were modern state of the art lenses, and Kodak's new high speed Super Double-X was the film to beat. In other words, most of the folks reading this were a long way from being born when he played baseball.

whos David Beckham ?

david beckam is the king of horse jockeys.

 

with a height of 4'8 and a 85lb body, he won 3 triple crowns in a row with big ben.

 

big ben is a famous race horse.

Robert, beautiful interior, and quite well captured. Too bad about the high-contrast lighting but what can you do?

Somewhere around here I have a picture of the view out the Babe's window. I want to post that shot, as well.

 

This building originally had two elevators, with elevator men 24 hours a day. When I got there, one of the old, elegant elevators was being used for freight; the other had been replaced by a clanky, self-operated unit. The windows in the stairwells had stained glass--each window a different design. Inside the apartments, the flooring had been selected and laid out to make patterns. High, high ceilings, of course. I was poor as a dog when I lived in the building, and it was odd to be so broke and yet surrounded by touches of luxury. The neighborhood at that time was about 75% Cuban--middle-class Cubans who had fled Castro. Years after I left, the population shifted and the neighborhood became drug- and drug-dealer infested.

 

One of my nicer memories was walking over to Yankee Stadium when it reopened in 1976. It was a brief walk: I wonder if the Babe walked to work. BTW, on that reopening day, the widows of both Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig were both alive and present. Mantle and Dimaggio were also alive, and were there as well. And the Yanks won the game!