Why the magpie?
The Century’s first archivist, Rodman Watson Gilder (Cen. 1914-1954), originally drew the magpie in 1940 on the frontispiece of the first album he created of Centurion bookplates. He captioned the illustration the “totem of archivists” – a nod to the magpie’s natural proclivity for foraging and collecting raw materials for their nests. Gilder’s four volumes of assembled bookplates now reside in the Century’s archives among the other collections built upon his original efforts.
We continue to spot his beloved magpie throughout our records – and it has thus evolved into an insignia for the dedicated and curious archivist. It also symbolizes the Century itself, which perches with pride and reverence atop its rich history and, through the establishment of the Century Association Archives Foundation (CAAF) in 1997, assures its professional preservation and availability to member and public researchers.
An editor by trade and historian by avocation – his 304-page tome The Battery (1936) traced the events, oddities, and personalities dotting the legacy of Manhattan Island’s southern tip – Gilder was praised in his 1954 Century memorial as, “one of the most interested and useful members the Club has ever been blessed with.”
He was also at the center of a constellation of Centurion artists and writers, including his father Richard Watson Gilder, a poet and editor who founded the Art Students League and hosted salons near the Century with his painter wife Helena de Kay, as well as his uncles on both sides, two sons, and father-in-law Louis Comfort Tiffany. He is depicted as a young boy in the bas-relief bronze sculpted by family friend Augustus Saint-Gaudens, hanging adjacent the bar off the Billiard Room.
During four decades of membership, Gilder served on almost every committee possible, including the Board of Management. He also chaired the Centenary Book Committee, ultimately editing and publishing the remarkable The Century, 1847-1946. Its depth and breadth, not to mention wit, makes it the most regularly cited reference resource in the Century Archives. Perhaps as importantly, memorial author George Martin notes, “It was fun for him and for all the rest of us, too.”