As many Forgotten New York readers know I worked an overnight shift in the Grand Central Terminal area for a financial printing firm in spring 2018. I dislike reading financial copy (I have no interest) and didn’t like leaving the house at 10:20 PM to arrive for my midnight to 8 AM shift. However, I got plenty of night photography in walking to and from the office building, which was none other than #216 East 45th Street, where I began my career (pretty much) with Photo-Lettering, the city’s biggest type shop, in 1982. I also got some “different light” photography in when I left the office around 8:15 AM. One of these days I’ll devote an entire post to those two months, though photos have dribbled out here and there.
Cutler Letter Box and Mail Chutes pop up in office buildings all over town, though they don’t get the traffic they used to have (recently I found another in the lobby of the old St. George Hotel in Brooklyn Heights, which is also an entrance for the #2 and 3 trains). The Cutler chute is a glass-fronted vertical mail collection system that allowed tenants in multi-story skyscrapers, hotels, and office buildings to drop letters from upper floors straight into a ground-level mailbox. Apparently the glass chute is behind a wall on the one seen at the top in the Graybar Building passageway leading to GCT.
The craftsmanship in brass is evident on these boxes, manufactured by Cutler Mail Chute Co. in Beaux-Arts and Art Deco. Rochester arechitect James Goold Cutler first designed and built these mail chutes in 1883. The boxes haven’t been installed since 1997 because they came to be considered fire hazards.
Check out the ForgottenBook (HarperCollins, 2006), as well as Forgotten Queens (Arcadia, 2013). I also have a chapter in the anthology “New York Calling: From Blackout to Bloomberg” (Reaktion, 2007). As always, “comment…as you see fit.” I earn a small payment when you click on any ad on the site, which helps in site upkeep and also aids Greater Astoria Historical Society.
10/29/26