This past Sunday morning, I wanted to get out of the house (since I work from home all week), but couldn’t decide where to go. The weather was questionable (chance of rain), so I wanted an adventure that had some possibilities of being inside and/or outside. I’ve been exploring Hudson River towns in recent months, but wanted something new, so I came up with this idea: a “9W Improv.” U.S. Route 9W goes up the west side of the Hudson River, and I decided I would head up the Palisades Parkway and then get off on 9W somewhere new, someplace I hadn’t been before. I didn’t bother mapping it out, I just started driving and figured I would see a spot to switch from the Palisades to 9W and then go from there. I had no final destination in mind, I just figured I’d go until my curiosity was satisfied.
So I’m cruising along the Palisades Parkway, and see an exit for “New City.” I’ve never been, so I took the exit. As I’m heading east towards 9W, I spotted the Sinclair Oil green dinosaur, which I haven’t seen in a long time. Not sure if it’s a geographical situation, as Sinclair Oil is still in business, it just seems like I used to see them everywhere as a kid and don’t really remember seeing them much as an adult in the NJ/NY area. To be honest, I never knew why a gas station had a dinosaur as a “mascot,” or logo, but learned that the reason is that it used to be a common thought that oil deposits beneath the earth came from the dead bodies of dinosaurs (which is now a generally discredited misconception). In 1933, Sinclair Oil sponsored a dinosaur exhibit at the World’s Fair in Chicago, meant to better explain the idea of a link between the formation of petroleum deposits and the time of dinosaurs, and the exhibit included a massive 2-ton animated model of a brontosaurus. Next came a promotional line of rubber brontosaurs at Sinclair stations, and eventually it became the logo.
Wouldn’t it be fun to have one of those in your backyard? I like how the chain around its neck looks like he’s on a leash.
Next stop for exploration: Haverstraw, NY. As I’m driving through town, I saw this large metal sculpture on the side of the road (on Broadway), so I pulled over to take a closer look.
At first glance, it looks like the style of Mark di Suvero, but there were no signs or anything identifying it. I Google-searched for “Mark di Suvero Haverstraw,” but come up empty there. Does anyone know if this is indeed one of his pieces? (if so, please share info in the comments section below). Here’s two more views of it for a better look:
As I continued down the road, I didn’t go much more than a mile or two before I saw another large scale sculpture. This one also didn’t have any identification, and the style is not familiar to me at all, as far as guessing who the artist might be. Once again, if anyone has any answers for me, please share in the comments section so that I can give proper credit to the artists.
Well, my day’s adventure was definitely much more than just gas station dinosaurs and unidentified large scale sculptures, so can jump ahead with this link to Part 2.