THANKS, first, to my gracious New York Times colleagues, especially Jeff Roth and David Dunlap, and to my other fellow correspondents on whose reporting I relied. Thanks, too, to my Times editors, Carolyn Ryan, Wendell Jamieson, and Diego Ribadeneira, for their indulgence and encouragement, and to the Times’ Phyllis Collazo.
Frank English, the former Metropolitan Transportation Authority photographer, contributed his passion for Grand Central and was a rich source of visual and figurative images. Beginning with Joseph Lhota, the chairman, everyone at the MTA and Metro-North was enormously gracious and magnanimous, especially Dan Brucker, Paul Flueranges, Robert Paley, Jim Fahey, William Goldstein, Susan Fine, Michael Coan, Mike Vitiello, Harry Kelly, John Kroll, Audrey Johnson, Robert Leiblong, Adam Lisberg, and Robert Saraceni and many of Metro-North’s other 5,800 employees. Marjorie Anders patiently and diligently fielded hundreds of questions and generously vetted details.
Among my favorite sources are archivists and librarians. They actually delight in providing information.
Thanks are due to Tom Lannon of the New York Public Library; Louise Mirrer and her knowledgeable staff at the New-York Historical Society; Susan Henshaw Jones and Sarah Henry at the Museum of the City of New York; Vin Cippola of the Municipal Art Society; Peg Breen of the New York Landmarks Conservancy; Gabrielle Shubert and her team at the Transit Museum; Amanda Burden and her staff, especially Rachaele Raynoff, at the Department of City Planning; and Bob Tierney and his crew at the Landmarks Preservation Commission. Thanks, too, to John Belle, Frank Prial Jr., and Maxinne Leighton of Beyer Blinder Belle.
Grand Central Publishing embraced this book from the beginning. I am enormously grateful to my editor, Rick Wolff, and his team, including Meredith Haggerty, Jimmy Franco, Bob Castillo, Dorothea Halliday, Beth Tondreau, Peggy Holm, and Thomas Whatley.
My agent, Andrew Blauner, deserves a medal for perseverance. This book was his idea and he conscientiously saw it through.
Special thanks to Shelby White, Arthur Browne, Meredith Kane, Paul Neuthaler, Dixie and Barry Josephson, Karen Salerno, and Tom McDonald—you each know how much you helped.
AND, OF COURSE, AN ETERNAL THANK YOU TO MARIE, MIKE, SOPHIE, WILLIAM, AND JeSSICA.