“Streetscapes,” The New York Times, 17 April 1988. by Christopher Gray.

Coalition to save Brooklyn’s Long Island Rail Road Terminal Newsletter Cover, circa 1985.

Early photograph showing the main entrance to LIRR Terminal, Flatbush Avenue El, 4th Avenue in background,

and Hanson Place in the foreground (note the Hanson cab extreme left)

Opening ceremony of the Long Island Railroad Terminal in 1907 taken form the second story across Hanson Place

(Present location of Williamsburg Savings Bank)

Note the heads and ball finials at the top of building.

Picture of the demolition crew posing for the closing ceremony. 

Note the ball finials (the originals were removed in the 1950’s)

1994 photograph showing the detail of the pediment at the top of the main entrance

(Not the cap stone has already been removed)

Architectural humor… In the early eighties I commissioned six duplicate finials and tried to get the M.T.A. to allow them to be installed.

No!, their response in a word.  IN 1994, when I negotiated my purchased of the main entrance,

I asked the demolitioncontractor if I could install the ball finials in their six original locations at the top of the main entrance. 

His response was, “sure, as long as they come down the same day.” 

The photograph witnesses part of that day.

Photograph showing the completed installation of the duplicate ball finials.  This view is very nearly as it appeared in 1907.

Post office occulus (round window). 

Note view of the interior showing light coming through the roof. 

This occulus is one of two and was most recently used as a wading pool surround for my daughter.

Interior view of the waiting room with demolition nearly complete. 

Originally there was an eighty by eighty foot skylight above the waiting room and a

glass floor that illuminated the tracks below.

Isometric drawing showing the main entrance at Hanson Place, the two larger secondary

entrances on Flatbush Avenue, and the two story waiting room.

“LIRR terminal stashed in back yard,” Brooklyn Paper Publications, 5 May 1994.