“Views of Rye” Revisted

– By Peter Jovanovich –

In 1917, a real estate developer named Blakeman Quintard Meyer (a marvelous name) published a book of photographs called “The Views of Rye.” Comprised of photos of some 300 homes and other buildings, mostly in Rye, with a brief accompanying text, the book has remained one of the principal historical records of our town for almost a century.

Since 1987, Rye resident Paul Rheingold has pursued the idea of republishing “The Views of Rye,” juxtaposing the original photographs with new ones, which would show what has happened to the properties. At long last, Rheingold’s publishing dream is coming to fruition, and the new, updated edition of “The Views of Rye” will be issued this fall.

This has been a labor of love for New York attorney Rheingold, photographer and graphic designer Karen Corell, and Knapp House Archivist Richard Hourahan. Hourahan spent months researching old city maps, atlases, deeds, city directories and newspapers to find the properties. Considering that roads and even buildings have been moved over the last 90 years, this was not an easy endeavor.

For Karen Corell, one of the many challenges was to photograph the modern site from exactly the same angle, perspective and distance as the 1917 photograph in the “The Views of Rye.” That meant climbing over rocks and fences to find the right spot, reworking the image to give the same look as a 1917 viewfinder camera, converting the image to black and white with exactly the same tonality and many other steps.

Hourahan and Corell often worked together on site as a team, with Hourahan holding the book up for Corell as she worked to get the identical shot as the original. Says Corell, “The people of Rye are so nice. On many occasions, they opened their homes to us to show their efforts in historic preservation.”

Rheingold hopes that the new “Views of Rye” will “reinforce Rye residents’ interest in creating aesthetically pleasing homes that are distinctive without being jarring to the neighborhood.”