The Berlin Wall was a concrete partition erected in 1961 by the German Democratic Republic (GDR) to divide the capital city of Berlin. The origins of the wall date to 1945 immediately after World War Two. After defeating Hitler, the Allied powers (United States, Soviet Union, and Britain – and later joined by France) divided Germany and Berlin into zones intended to prevent the country from unification and achieving unbridled power. Great Britain, the United States, and France controlled the three zones that became West Germany (Federal Republic of Germany); the Soviet Union controlled the fourth, East Germany. The capital city of Berlin, although physically located in East Germany, was also divided: the Soviet Union controlled East Berlin, while the Allies controlled West Berlin. This is a fragment of that wall, which was demolished in 1989.

Robert Moses ushered in the era of elevated expressways with the innovative West Side Highway, begun in 1931. First known as the Miller Elevated Highway, in honor of Manhattan Borough President Julius Miller, the roadway was celebrated for its distinctive design features, including decorative guardrails, lampposts, and Art Deco friezes above all the cross streets. Punctuating the guardrails at regular intervals were seals of New York, from the first seal of New Netherland, in 1623, to the seal used by the city of New York when the highway was erected in the 1930s. The massive seals were created in cast iron and are estimated to weigh approximately 60 pounds each. They all bear at least some traces of a later orange paint. What began as a motorist's dream became slowly obsolete, as the narrow on-ramps, extremely tight turns, and Belgian-blocked surface became increasingly hazardous and the city failed to maintain the highway. On December 16, 1973, an entire section of the highway near Gansevoort Street collapsed, swallowing a tractor trailer. The city immediately closed the highway along most of its length and began the slow process of demolition, which was not completed until 1987. These seals were acquired during the 1970s or 1980s by the donor's uncle, Lawrence Zeidler, of Flemington, New Jersey and subsequently given to the donor.

Known as the "Standard Expanded Metal Wastebasket" (model number MO5539500-black), the elegant basket dates from the early 1980s. Produced by Corcraft Products of the New York State Department of Correctional Services, the receptacle is manufactured by female inmates of the prison in Albion, New York (featured in Corcraft's 2004 calendar photograph for the month of July). Each waste receptacle retails at $42.