If you think the parking situation in Hoboken stinks, consider the state of affairs 100 years ago.When horse-drawn carriages, streetcars, and wagons were the way to keep people and the economy moving, manure piled up outside stables across the city – enough manure to raise concerns in a 1912 Sanitary Survey. Imagine the stench! Some people lament the rise of the car culture, but no one mourns the loss of the dung heap.
The Hoboken Historical Museum has just opened City Animals, a new exhibition that examines residents’ changing relationship with the other creatures who’ve called Hoboken home. It includes a look back to the days when hundreds of horses lived and worked in the area. The show is organized in six parts, which illustrate different ways animals have been viewed over the years: as Neighbors, Workers, Food and Clothing, Spectacle and Sport, Pests and Strays, and Companions and Family.
The exhibition features photographs, maps, paintings (including two by Hoboken artist Laura Alexander), sculpture, and artifacts – including a handmade wooden workbench (c. 1890) used in the Kostelecky family business on Bloomfield Street. In the days of real, live horsepower, the Kosteleckys made carriages and wagons, and over the years, the enterprise evolved into an auto-repair shop that remained in business until the 1980s.
As late as 1834, Hoboken had only 700 human inhabitants – and many times that number of wild creatures living in its lush wetlands. The wilds of Hoboken became a natural getaway for New Yorkers and for naturalists seeking specimens.
According to Holly Metz, the Hoboken resident who curated the City Animals show, John James Audubon himself collected creatures in the Mile-Square City around 1840. Several Audubon prints, including an original, hand-colored lithograph from a vintage Audubon book, are included in the exhibit.
Things got wild and woolly in 1843, when P.T. Barnum presented a “Buffalo Hunt and Western Sports Spectacle” in Hoboken. For many years thereafter, Hoboken residents enjoyed a free look at many of the circuses traveling to New York City. Before the advent of the tunnel, rail lines terminated in Hoboken, and the circus animals were unloaded from train cars before they were ferried to Manhattan.
The show also takes a look at the pets and pests that have shared close quarters with Hoboken residents over the years. Visitors are also invited to post photos of their own pets. After the exhibit closes, the photos will become part of the museum collection, documenting the current generation of city animals.
@ Hoboken Historical Museum
City Animals
When: The show runs through Dec. 23. Museum hours are Tuesdays through Thursdays from 5 to 9 p.m. and Saturdays and Sundays from noon to 5 p.m.
Where: The museum is at 1301 Hudson St., Hoboken.
Admission: $2
For more info: Call (201) 656-2240 or see www.hobokenmuseum.org.
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