Drawing upon the extensive Civil War collections of the New-York Historical Society, Carry Me Home: Dispatches from the Civil War will explore the ways in which those in the field recorded their experiences, shared information among themselves, and conveyed details back to those on the home front. Throughout the Civil War, soldiers, prisoners and hospital workers documented their experiences by writing letters, keeping diaries and drawing pictures. Their primary audience was family and friends but their outpourings were also attempts to come to grips with what they experienced and, at least in a few cases, conscious efforts to chronicle details for future generations. They were joined in the field by newspapermen, illustrators and photographers, many of whom were assigned to specific units and traveled with the troops, the first generation of  "embedded" journalists.

The New-York Historical Society will project building-sized images of the genocide in Darfur onto the Museum's exterior walls to make a dramatic statement about the need for action in Darfur. Photographs of Darfur, taken by internationally acclaimed photojournalists, will be projected onto the Central Park West side of the Historical Society every night for one week from approximately 5:30 pm until 10 pm beginning Thursday, October 18.

The Landmarks of New York is an exhibition which explores the history of New York as revealed by its historical structures. The exhibition’s ninety photographs of New York landmarks, including thirty newly donated by former New York City Landmarks Commissioner Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel, are critical documents that chronicle the city’s past from the seventeenth through the twentieth centuries. As the city grew, single family houses were replaced by apartment buildings and then skyscrapers; agriculture replaced manufacturing, which was supplanted by commerce and the movement of goods and services. All of these structures tell the story of New York’s journey from a small colonized village to a world class city.
 

To commemorate the 10th anniversary of September 11, the New-York Historical Society presents a special exhibition, Remembering 9/11. 

Note: This Exhibit will be closed April 21, 2012
The African-American struggle for civil rights is the subject of a series created by British photographer, Platon. Seen through a fresh perspective, Platon’s photographs sensitively capture the dreams, fears, disappointments and triumphs of a people who have striven for decades to overcome hardships and achieve equality in our society. Works in the exhibition include photographs of the Little Rock Nine, Dr. King’s Birmingham prison cell, Olympians Tommie Smith and John Carlos, Muhammad Ali, and Joseph McNeil and Franklin E. McCain, who were among the students who participated at the famous sit-in for civil rights at the Woolworths in Greensboro, North Carolina on February 1, 1960. (Many of these images appeared in The New Yorker issue of February 15–22, 2010.)

With his calligraphic brushstrokes and densely cluttered, multi-figured compositions, Reginald Marsh recorded the vibrancy and energetic pulse of New York City. In paintings, prints, watercolors and photographs, he captured the animation and visual turbulence that made urban New York life an exhilarating spectacle. His work depicted the visual energy the city, its helter-skelter signs, newspaper and magazine headlines and the crowded conditions of its street life and recreational pastimes.

An exhibition of 83 photographs documenting some of the most significant buildings and public parks in New York City will be on view at The New-York Historical Society from April 30 through July 12, 2009, in the exhibition Landmarks of New York. The exhibition has traveled to 82 countries under the sponsorship of the United States Department of State since 2006 and is now coming home to New York for its final showing. The photographs in the exhibition will then enter the collection of the New-York Historical Society, through a donation from the exhibition's curator, Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel.