1940s nurses revisit Roosevelt Island's Octagon.

In 1942, as part of their Christmas tradition, the students of The Metropolitan Hospital School of Nursing gathered to sing Christmas carols in the hospital's Octagon Tower, one of New York's most significant architectural landmarks, located on the north end of what at the time was called Welfare Island.

The name of the person who snapped the iconic photo of the nurses on the "flying staircase" is lost to history but the image lasts on. The School of Nursing graduated its last class in 1958, and soon after the Metropolitan Hospital moved to East Harlem and the Roosevelt Island building was abandoned, its wings demolished, and then its magnificent Octagon Tower virtually destroyed by fires--the entire structure reduced to 8 walls.

But on May 20th, the nurses--many now in their 80s and 90s--returned after more than a half century hiatus to their alma matter. Disembarking from buses in front of the historic Tower, many gasped, others cried, as they looked up at the now fully renovated and immaculately restored Octagon.

"We have our home back!" exclaimed Lilian Kovarik of Riverhead, NY, class of 1948 and Vice President of Alumnae Association. "There are so many memories here for us--from singing carols on the staircase around the tree and the creaking sounds of the night watchman as he made his rounds on the top floor, to the daydreaming of catching the ferry to go into the City."

Representing an eight-year labor of love by architect/developer Bruce Redman Becker, The Octagon Tower was completely restored to its former 19th century glory with a reinvention of the seven-story monumental spiral stair. Today, the Tower includes 30,000 square feet of lobby area and residential amenities, as designed by David Rockwell. Flanking the Tower are two residential wings, where the old hospital wings once stood. The central stair seemed to evoke the most nostalgias for the nurses: Several alumnae had the same memory of--at 17 or 18--their mothers sobbing at the base of the stairs, waving goodbye as their daughter's ascended. Grace M. Stuart, MD, an anesthesiologist intern from 1949, who lives in Eastchester, NY, regaled fellow alumnae with the story of her daily ritual of sliding down the banister (all 5 flights!) on a pillow she would take from the operating room. Along with the other alumnae, the 85-year-old simply posed for a photo this time around.