Analog City: NYC B.C. (Before Computers)

Analog City: NYC B.C. (Before Computers)uncovers the array of tools, technologies, and lost professions that supportedNew York City as it exploded into a global metropolis in the pre-digital era.Focusing on the period between the 1870s and the 1970s, Analog City examinesthe technologies that enabled the city to reach its position as the “capital ofthe world” in an age before the speed and capacity of today’s digitaltechnologies. Set against a contemporary backdrop of 24-hour news cycles andhigh-speed trading—in which questions about privacy, truth, and the impact ofsocial media are increasingly pressing—the exhibition uncovers this bygone eraof paper files and pneumatic tubes, of note cards and telephone directories,and examines how New York thrived as a center of finance, news, research, andreal estate in an era before personal computers and the internet.

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