For several weeks in April and May, I worked overnights in the Grand Central Terminal area. There are a variety of ways to get from the subway into the Terminal to the streets outside, and I often chose the Graybar Passage, which is a corridor from the Great Hall through the Graybar Building to Lexington Avenue. I have recently written about the Graybar Rats, which are on a Lexington sidewalk canopy, but there are other quirks as well, such as this ceiling mural by Edward Trumbull, whose work also graces the lobby of the Chrysler Building across the street.
Trumbull’s Graybar mural predates his work in the Chrysler by four years, 1926 vs. 1930. The theme here, as you might expect, was modern travel. Unfortunately time has not been kind to the mural; the ones across the street were restored in 1999.
It’s the only remaining ceiling mural in the Passage. Other vaults featured paintings of blue skies and clouds, but were painted over quite awhile ago. Here, the mural shows scenes like an electric train, a bridge resembling High Bridge, skyscrapers and steel manufacturing, airplanes (including Lucky Lindy’s Spirit of St. Louis) and zeppelins, once thought of as a prime competitor to the airplane for air travel until the Hindenburg disaster.
Either the Graybar ownership group or the MTA should part with a few ducats and restore this Trumbull mural — his works in the Chrysler and Rockefeller Center have enjoyed such treatment.
Check out the ForgottenBook, take a look at the gift shop, and as always, “comment…as you see fit.”
5/12/18
3 comments
In the early 1970s, worked at Jack LaLane Health Spa in the basement of the Biltmore Hotel. I used to enter the hotel through a passage off of Grand Central.
I’ve seen this countless times over the decades, and you’re right–they’re definitely fading away.
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The vaulted ceilings there make for great echoes. Unfortunately, they placed retail kiosks at the exact centers of each echo chamber, rendering them useless. I used to be able to stamp my feet, hear the sound echoing back to me.
My favorite building in New York is the Chrysler building.
I had a view of it out of my kitchen window when I lived in Jersey City.
I loved looking at it.
It personifies art deco.
I liked going in and looking at the murals in the lobby.
It’s transportation ceiling mural has a sister transportation mural across the street in Grand Central Station.
It was in disrepair and scheduled to be painted over white!
The renovation was going on, I think, in the late 60s early 70s…
My mentor Dick Millard had a twin brother named Buddy Millard, who also worked at Rambusch Decorating Company at the time.
He begged the powers that be at Grand Central,to let him do whatever repairs needed to be done to the transportation mural so that it would not be painted over and hidden forever.
Grand Central Station granted him permission to repair and restore the mural but he had to do it in the middle of the night, between like midnight and 3 AM, I think.
He did it, and it’s still there.
We all have Buddy Millard and Rambusch Decorating Company to thank for the fact it’s still there.
It is so Art Deco.