Prospect Park goers this weekend will notice that the scaffolding enveloping the Grand Army Plaza Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Arch for the last two years is gone. The Beaux Arts monument has been restored after an $8.9 million upgrade.
The preservation project was by the Prospect Park Alliance’s in-house team of architects, in partnership with New York City Parks Department Commissioner Iris Rodriguez-Rosa. The arch’s original blueprints were lost by time, so the architects leveraged modern forensic techniques and technologies.
Cracked and broken stonework was replaced with matching stone. The architects used forensic technology to determine the stonework mortar’s composition, and the arch’s Rosendale cement, tracing it back to the quarry it came from upstate.
Inside, bronze and cast-iron spiral staircases and entrance gates were disassembled for restoration. Original elements were cleaned, and missing ones recreated, and then renewed.
The Prospect Park Alliance created a detailed scan of the inner structure using radar and magnetic investigation, it said. This resulted in the historic structure’s reinforcement with new steel beams, and a new internal drainage system.
Landscaped berms framing Grand Army Plaza to the east, west, and north sides were likewise restored. Invasive plants, trees, and shrubs were removed—194 native trees were planted in their place. Unattractive chain link fencing was swapped out with low, decorative steel fencing.
The Bailey Fountain and John F. Kennedy Memorial’s broken bluestone and granite paving was repaired. A new ADA-accessible curb cut was added to the plaza’s northern entrance.
Brooklyn’s Arc de Triomphe
The Grand Army Plaza Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Arch is an indelible piece of Brooklyn’s urban fabric. It first opened in 1892, and was designed by John Duncan, with sculptures by Frederick William MacMonnies, spandrels by artist Philip Martiny, and bas-reliefs by Thomas Eakins and William Rudolf O’Donovan.
The processional entryway frames Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux’s Prospect Park, and often draws comparisons to Paris’s Arc de Triomphe. It is one of New York’s three triumphant arches, the other ones being the Washington Square Arch and the Manhattan Bridge Arch and Colonnade.
The Brooklyn arch hadn’t been renovated since 1976. One year earlier, the arch was in such dire straits, the quadriga of Columbia statue fell off of her chariot, emblematic of massive divestments in public infrastructure happening in New York at that time, aptly described by Samuel Stein in his book, Capital City. This prompted the city to take action and reinforce the monument.
This being the first restoration in five decades, the arch’s repair recently received the Lucy G. Moses Preservation Award from the New York Landmarks Conservancy.
“While triumphal arches typically recognize great military victories and generals, this arch is dedicated to the rank and file, honoring the young men of Brooklyn who lost their lives defending the union in the Civil War,” said Morgan Monaco, Prospect Park Alliance president and park administrator. “This makes the arch a true monument of the people, welcoming all into Prospect Park and signifying that this is a place where all in our community are celebrated and seen.”
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