New York University commissioned its first permanent address, the University Building, at 100 Washington Square East in 1835. Over the course of the19th century, the university quickly became one of the most popular centers of higher education in the nation and was looking to expand. It was then that University Chancellor Henry Mitchell MacCracken proposed moving uptown, as were many other major hospitals and universities at that time. The university purchased a large parcel in the north Bronx and began constructing the new campus in 1894. This neighborhood would come to be known as University Heights.

The campus was centered around the Gould Memorial Library and a 630-foot long colonnade, both designed by celebrity architect Stanford White, overlooking the Harlem river. Chancellor MacCracken was the major force behind establishing the Hall of Fame for Great Americas in this colonnade, which would enshrine in bronze busts famous American artists, educators, politicians, inventors, social reformers, and soldiers. The Hall of Fame was conceived as a temple to American patriotism, history, and civic duty. It became a major tourist attraction revered across the country and was so synonymous with greatness and history that even the short refrain “you will be a bust in the Hall of Fame” from The Wizard of Oz required no explanation.

The nomination process was open to anyone, given that their candidate was a born or naturalized American citizen and deceased for at least 25 years. Groups such as the Daughters of the American Revolution, United Daughters of the Confederacy, UNCF, and Hodenosaunee nation led national campaigns petitioning for a candidate. A select group of electors from across the country voted on these candidates every three years. Sculptors such as Robert Aitken, Richmond Barthé, Daniel Chester French, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, and Malvina Hoffman among many others have their works on display in the Hall.

Despite claims of open and democratic nominations, only two African Americans and eleven women were elected to the Hall. And while Confederate Generals Jackson and Lee were immortalized, the children of Black, Jewish, and Puerto Rican families in the surrounding community were purposefully denied admission to the University Heights campus.

The postwar period was a boon for American higher education and many institutions took advantage of the government subsidies, defense contracts, low interest rates, and high enrollments to rapidly expand. NYU followed suit and expanded the downtown campus with new buildings for the law school and the medical school at Bellevue (both through eminent domain). There was competition from CUNY, which charged no tuition, and SUNY, which, as historian Themis Chronopoulos describes, “enjoyed the unconditional support of Governor Rockefeller.” NYU “was caught between its desire to become an elite national university and its need to boost its enrollments with local students \[it] heavily relied on tuition income because of its lack of a substantial endowment and a high rate of indebtedness”. The university raised admission standards and began to recruit students from across the country and around the world who would be willing to pay the high cost tuition and who additionally needed to rent rooms in the student dormitories. The University Heights campus, however, saw continued decline in enrollment.

Despite improving its national reputation, the fiscal realities of maintaining two, essentially duplicate, campuses caught up with the university. By the late 1960s, NYU was facing an existential crisis over its debt obligations and was “on the verge of collapse.”

At the same time, the Bronx was facing the compounding forces of deindustrialization, landlord abandonment, and urban renewal which deepened segregation and eroded safety across various communities. This triggered a racialized exodus from the borough and the Bronx fell into twenty years of divestment on the part of the city, state, and federal governments. In response, Bronx residents formed tenant and neighborhood associations to hold on to their communities.

Instead of working with the community, NYU too decided to abandon the borough as fears grew that “urban blight” would jeopardize the ability to attract and retain students. All the while, the Hall of Fame was maintained as a line in the operations budget and an endowment for its upkeep was never created. The writing was on the wall when the 1971 induction ceremony for Lilian Wald was relocated to Town Hall on 45th Street in Manhattan as the university believed it was too difficult to attract a certain audience to the Bronx.

In 1973, CUNY purchased the university heights campus and it became the new home for the Bronx Community College. This bailout saved NYU and enabled it to become the institution that it is today (with currently a $4.3 billion endowment and a multibillion annual budget, while the entire CUNY system is run annually for $3.6 billion and BCC for $134 million). As NYU headed for the exit, it faced passionate criticism from the Hall’s electors and national leaders, who believed that transferring authority to the city spelled disaster for their memorial. NYU scrambled to find an alternative, especially given that preparations for the bicentennial in 1976 were ramping up. Roosevelt Island, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Snug Harbor on Staten Island, and the Bronx Zoo were all explored as possible sites for a new Hall of Fame. The recently dethroned chairman of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority, Robert Moses passionately rallied against selling the Hall to the city. His absolutist view was that if NYU could not properly support it, then it should be converted “into a ball field or gymnasium.” CUNY and NYU finally agreed on dividing the expenses until 1976, when it would be completely transferred to CUNY. In 1979, the Hall of Fame trustees decided to officially suspend elections. The last inductees, Clara Barton, Luther Burbank, and Andrew Carnegie, never had their busts commissioned.

Today the Hall of Fame is maintained by Bronx Community College. The accompanying archival material can be found in the archives of BCC, NYU, and other institutions. The Hall of Fame is now used in academic courses as well as public art programming as a jumping off point for discussions around issues of representation in public art and reevaluating the idea of objective greatness. Further Reading Archives of the Bronx Community College. Visions of Greatness. Culkin, K. (2018). Advocacy and memory at the Hall Of Fame For Great Americans. The Gotham Center for New York History. Chronopoulos, T. (2009). Urban decline and the withdrawal of New York University from University Heights, the Bronx. The Bronx County Historical Society Journal, 46(1). New York University Archives. The College on a Hill.