Photographing the People in New York's Old Penn Station

Photographers who captured New York’s old Penn Station sometimes got so wrapped up in the glory and grandeur of its Doric columns and vaulted ceilings that they forgot about the actual travelers passing through. Louis Stettner makes no such omission in his new book, Penn Station, New York, published by Thames & Hudson. To him, the people were the whole point.

And so readers find in this collection a young girl in a party dress, carefully stepping onto dots of light collecting on the station floor, strictly enforcing the rules of game she herself invented. And three uniformed sailors, in various stages of fatigue, slouching against a stately wall. And a commuter pressing an open palm to his bald head while contemplating maybe a busted deal, or a broken marriage, or the inconsequential nature of it all—the mystery is part of the beauty.