The Oculus

I went to the George Eastman Museum today.  I have known this wonderful place since 1960, when it was called "The George Eastman House."  This is a view up the main staircase, toward the oval window in the roof, called "an oculus."  In one of our classes, Minor White had us go to Eastman House and memorize where each photograph was on the walls in each room.  Today, there are no photographs displayed on the walls - it is too bright and the photos would fade.  But I could remember today where I saw my first Ansel Adams photographs, and my first aerial photographs by William Garnett which made me want to learn to fly more than ever.  So I spent the day here today, and looked at photographs, and the old camera collection, and the house where George Eastman lived.  I took a lot of photographs, and had my batteries recharged.  What a day!

George Eastman built this, his residence at 900 East Avenue between 1902 and 1905. He created a unique urban estate complete with 10.5 acres of working farm land, formal gardens, greenhouses, stables, barns, pastures, and a 35,000-square-foot, 50-room Colonial Revival mansion with a fireproof structure made of reinforced concrete.  Eastman's house is a neoclassical Georgian Revival facade of decorative craftsmanship. Beneath this exterior were such modern conveniences as an electrical generator, an internal telephone system with 21 stations, a built-in vacuum cleaning system, a central clock network, an elevator, and a great Aeolian pipe organ. Eastman used the house as a center of the city's rich musical life from 1905 until his death in 1932.