Louis Stettner and the Glories of Penn Station

When Louis Stettner was born in Brooklyn in 1922, photography was less than a century old, and World War I had recently ended.

Now 93 and residing in Paris, he has lived long enough to see the recent terrorist attacks unfold in real time through countless photographs disseminated every second via Twitter and Instagram.

Mr. Stettner came of age in a world that moved more slowly and gracefully: Witness his classic 1958 photographs of the original Pennsylvania Station in New York. Yet by 1963, the landmark, famed for its glorious architecture, had been demolished to make room for the less-than-grand Madison Square Garden. Hordes of New Yorkers were heartbroken, but the furor helped fuel a movement for historical preservation in the United States.

More than 60 years later, the photographs were published together for the first time as “Penn Station, New York,” a new book by Thames & Hudson, with an introduction by Adam Gopnik. NY Times