New York Zoological Society. Osborn Laboratories of Marine Sciences and New York Aquarium records

The New York Aquarium was founded in 1896 at Castle Clinton in Battery Park, at the southern tip of Manhattan. Soon thereafter, in 1902, the New York Zoological Society (NYZS) was given control of the Aquarium, which the Society has operated ever since. NYZS installed Charles H. Townsend as the Aquarium’s Director, and under his leadership the Aquarium was a wildly popular destination for viewing freshwater and marine animals. From its earliest years the Aquarium also sponsored a research program; Ida M. Mellen, Charles M. Breder, Jr., and Christopher W. Coates were among the scientists employed as ichthyologists in this era.

When Charles Breder assumed the position of the Aquarium’s second Director upon Townsend’s retirement, he had the misfortune of starting his tenure just as New York City Parks Commissioner Robert Moses was eyeing Battery Park for demolition in order to make way for his proposed Brooklyn-Battery Bridge. That bridge was defeated by opponents in favor of a tunnel, but nevertheless in 1941 Moses largely dismantled Castle Clinton, closing down the Aquarium and sending its exhibits to temporary quarters at NYZS’s Bronx Zoo. By the 1950s, Moses supported a new New York Aquarium in Coney Island, Brooklyn, conveniently reachable from the suburbs surrounding the city via Moses’s system of expressways, bridges, and parkways spanning from Westchester to Long Island and eventually across the harbor to Staten Island and New Jersey.

On the NYZS side of things, the construction of the new Aquarium was shepherded by Christopher Coates, who became its third Director in 1956. The New York Aquarium reopened to much fanfare in 1957, and its modernized exhibits were once again hugely successful. Coates retired from the directorship in 1964 and resumed his research efforts. In the meantime, over the ensuing decade, the Aquarium’s next three Directors oversaw the institution through a transitional era characterized by New York City’s changing demographics and increasing financial difficulties.

Meanwhile the Aquarium’s research program had continually expanded in size and scope. Even the closure of the old Aquarium did not deter its scientists; NYZS rented space at the American Museum of Natural History to accommodate new labs focused on genetics and marine biochemistry and ecology. Research interests included oncology, teratology, aquaculture, and marine natural products. This last field was particular fruitful for Ross F. Nigrelli, who was named Chairman of the Marine Biochemistry and Ecology Laboratory in 1957 and who had isolated the antibiotic toxin holothurin in 1952. Starting with the opening of the new Aquarium, Nigrelli and other advocates of the Aquarium’s research program pushed to reunite the labs with the Aquarium proper.

These advocates included NYZS President Fairfield Osborn. Upon Nigrelli’s appointment as the Aquarium’s Director of Research in 1964, Osborn moved to aid Nigrelli with the fundraising, planning, and other efforts needed to make that vision a reality. In 1965 architect Harmon Goldstone designed the laboratories’ new building; during construction the building and the labs were officially dedicated to Osborn and thus became the Osborn Laboratories of Marine Sciences (OLMS), with Nigrelli at their helm. OLMS opened in 1967, and while the period from 1965 to 1975 was a time of growing pains for the Aquarium, the era was OLMS’s golden age. When Nigrelli retired in 1973, his Assistant Director, George D. Ruggieri, SJ, assumed his responsibilities.

A marine biologist and Jesuit priest who had started his career at the Aquarium’s research labs in 1962, Ruggieri quickly gained increasing responsibilities at both the Aquarium and OLMS, having been named Coordinator of Research when the Labs joined the Aquarium in Coney Island in 1967, becoming the Assistant Director of the Aquarium at the same time he took over the directorship of OLMS, and becoming the Aquarium’s Director in 1976. Ruggieri championed the Aquarium and OLMS both within NYZS and outside of it, ensuring the completion of previously planned exhibits whose construction was threatened by budget shortfalls, expanding outreach to donors and politicians as city funding sources dried up, and tirelessly promoting OLMS research efforts even as major sponsors increasingly shifted their attentions away from non-academic research labs. Ruggieri’s passing in 1987 marked the end of an era for both institutions.

The Osborn Laboratories never recovered from the loss. Although the Aquarium continued to support its scientists, no new Director was named after the last one stepped down in 2005, at which time what was left of the laboratories’ research program was folded into the Aquarium’s work. The Aquarium, by contrast, has enjoyed renewed successes. Major exhibits that Ruggieri had started planning for, such as Discovery Cove and Sea Cliffs, were brought to fruition by his successor, Louis E. Garibaldi. Additional new exhibits have come on line since then, with the 2010s seeing a new wave of construction at the Aquarium after the devastating effects of 2012’s Superstorm Sandy.

New York Aquarium Directors

• 1902-1937 Charles H. Townsend
• 1939-1943 Charles M. Breder, Jr.
• 1956-1964 Christopher W. Coates
• 1964-1966 Paul L. Montreuil
• 1966-1970 Ross F. Nigrelli
• 1970-1976 James A. Oliver
• 1976-1987 George D. Ruggieri, S.J.
• 1987-2001 Louis E. Garibaldi
• 2002-2006 Paul Boyle
• 2007- Jon Forrest Dohlin

Osborn Laboratories of Marine Sciences Directors

• 1964-1973 Ross F. Nigrelli
• 1973-1987 George D. Ruggieri, S.J.
• 1987-1994 Louis E. Garibaldi
• 1994-2005 Paul Boyle

1964-1973

Ross F. Nigrelli

1973-1987

George D. Ruggieri, S.J.

1987-1994

Louis E. Garibaldi

1994-2005

Paul Boyle