Review by Booklist Review
Visitors arrive at New York's Grand Central Terminal to travel by train, but they also come to admire its celestial ceiling and architectural marvels. Hoyt's descriptive narrative relates how this landmark was originally an engineering achievement meant to save lives and was later at risk of being demolished. It focuses on the dangers of train congestion at the turn of the twentieth century and a collision that motivated chief engineer William J. Wilgus to create a fleet of steel trains that would run entirely on electricity, as well as two levels of train tracks underneath the city to ease congestion. This magnificent plan would, of course, need an equally fabulous train station. Szalay's colorful, loosely rendered illustrations highlight Wilgus' creative process, designing the underground system, and working with architects to make the terminal a work of art. But as air travel became increasingly popular, city planners wanted to replace Grand Central Terminal with a skyscraper. This informational STEM picture book with an emphasis on problem-solving concludes with celebrity interventions and lasting visitor highlights.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by School Library Journal Review
K-Gr 4--Hoyt and Szalay's words and pictures respectively recreate a noble idea followed by a miraculous set of circumstances, including the right people in the right place at the right time, who set it in motion. Anyone who has ever set foot into Grand Central Terminal in New York City knows what an iconic hub it has become. But who had the vision? William J. Wilgus was a chief engineer who saw that the coal-powered trains were part of a gigantic, city-clogging problem, and when two trains crashed and 55 people were "injured or worse," he set about inventing trains that would be steam-powered and require electricity. He also came up with plans that included two stories of train track, as much steel as three Eiffel Towers, a notion to run those tracks underground, and enlisted the wealthy Vanderbilts to fund it. The details of this story are themselves electrifying--that one man envisioned all this and then set about making it happen is clearly explained, fully illustrated, and brilliant. There are fights! The Vanderbilts have their own ideas about who should be the architects. There are delays! Arguing materials, paths, logistics--it all takes time. Then, the building opens about a decade after it's first considered, and it's beautiful. The stories after that are also included--from the sale of the "air rights" above it to bring in money, to the dawn of the aviation age and Grand Central's fall into disrepair. Resplendent paintings, in a style that borrows the flat forms of American folk art, bring all this to life, while the afterword and time line of events help readers get their bearings in history, not only of New York City, but globally as well. VERDICT A charming tale, and to think it's all true! Whether readers are train and construction buffs or not, this is a living, breathing biography of a building, and the man who believed in it from the ground up. Extraordinary.--Kimberly Olson Fakih
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
Hoyt (The Greatest Song of All: How Isaac Stern United the World to Save Carnegie Hall, rev. 7/22) returns to New York City's past to trace the history of what was touted as the "biggest, grandest, most magnificent railroad station ever built" -- Grand Central Station. The book opens in 1902, when chief engineer Wilgus had the radical idea to replace the city's smoky, sooty, street-level coal-powered trains with cleaner electric trains and move them underground -- a prodigious undertaking. Readers then learn about the contest between rival architects to design the new depot; details about the new Grand Central Terminal when it was completed in 1913 and as it grew (it soon housed restaurants, a movie theater, a tennis court, a hotel, a library, a ski slope, and more); and then its decline years later when it was slated for demolition and saved by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and others, who fought to have the iconic building designated a New York City Landmark. Hoyt's lively text is chockful of information, presented in a child-friendly way (for instance, readers learn that Wilgus's plan required thirty thousand tons of riveted steel, the equivalent of three Eiffel Towers). Szalay's textured, detail-fueled digital illustrations ably convey time and place. Extensive back matter includes even more information, "Fascinating Facts About Grand Central Station," a timeline, and source notes. Martha V. ParravanoJanuary/February 2024 p.113 (c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
A brief account of the iconic terminal's birth and rebirth. Hoyt builds her narrative around a profile of William J. Wilgus, the engineer who oversaw Grand Central's completion, put it on sound financial footing by ingeniously proposing the sale of its "air rights," and played a significant role in making New York's railways generally safer. The result is a colorful tale of robber barons, competing architectural visions, and urban development on a truly grand scale. Along with glimpses of the building's wonders both past (a movie theater, a ski slope, the original red carpet that was rolled out for passengers of the elegant Twentieth Century Limited train) and present, the author gives a nod to the eminently successful efforts led by Jackie Onassis to preserve and restore the renowned historical structure. Szalay's graciously expansive illustrations are too sparsely populated to evoke a realistic picture of Grand Central's customary crowds; the scattered human figures are racially diverse. And if the single cross-sectional view of the terminal's underground is cramped and inadequate, the art overall does capture a good sense of both the massive scope of the construction and the finished building's majesty, inside and out. Begging a ludicrous claim that the Hudson River is 40 miles away "across town," closing facts and comments offer further enticements to prospective visitors. A rare introduction to one of New York City's more influential but lesser-known builders, and his "Grand" work. (timeline, source list) (Informational picture book. 7-9) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
