I have written about this short trip downtown… from the heights of Madison Avenue down to the kind’a rundown part of town, 28 Street and Park Avenue South. South of what, you might ask? South of Grand Central Terminal– north of GCT is just Park Avenue. A lot has happened to old New York City—about a hundred years earlier, there was no Park Avenue—it was an open-to-the-sky set of train tracks. And they’re still there but under an arch of steel and asphalt now known as Park Avenue. Not much happening up thataway back then so it was a literal park. People lived in somewhat luxury and walked around. The pictures from then are astonishing to this raised-in-midtown-Manhattan kid. And—that’s why Grand Central Terminal uses that word because it is a terminal the end of the line for trains coming into town from the north (what we now know as Metro North). There is one aspect that is not obvious—which are the “loop around tracks.” That is how the trains can get turned around from their southern direction to going back northward again.
Anyone walking around GCT might notice that the ground angles upward steeply to Park. Fun story: one Fourth of July, there was a serious military hardware display. I lived on 56th off Park and was walking around when an Abrahms Main Battle Tank roared up 54th Street, bounced off the hump of the transition to Park itself which made me and everything around me jump a foot in the air. Including the tank. Point of info: they weigh 65 tons.
Ah yes—the Marvel Editorial offices had moved downtown. Capping our inkwells, taping down our pens, writing our names on boxes. In my case, draining my x-ray plate processor—the gadget that helped me generate the type used in indicias, letter columns, headlines or anything else Marveldom could dream up. April, 1982 a bright and beautiful Monday.
Marie Severin, never one to miss a trick, was early to work that day and passed through the ugly old elevators and through our checkpoint on the 10th Flr. There were some minor details left over from the construction and moving-in carryings on. A wooden box, shallow and open at the top. Eventually to be used for plants. With a speed that defies description, Marie created a sweet final resting place for her office chum Ralph Macchio (no, not that Ralph Macchio)! This was done without a pencil line and straight magic marker…
A particularly curious messenger turns from the scrum to look on in wonder.
Here lies Ralph Macchio (not that… well, you know…)