USA > New York > New York City > History of New York City : embracing an outline sketch of events from 1609 to 1830, and a full account of its development from 1830 to 1884 Volume II > Part 20
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By means of the combined agencies of railroads, steamboats, the canal, express companies, and the. electro-magnetic telegraph-all
# For a minute and most interesting history of the public markets of the city down to 1860, see " The Market Book," by Thomas F. Devoe, now (1883) and for many years the superintendent of markets. Mr. Devoe was born at Yonkers, N. Y., in 1811. In 1>15 his father removed to New York City. After receiving a common-school education he was apprenticed to a butcher, and for many years he was a leading business man of New York in that line, beginning for himself in 1833. Fond of the military profession, ha became colonel of one of the New York City regiments. During the Civil War he was an earnest supporter of the government in every way in his power. Colonel Havne's " Market Book" will ever rank among the most important literary contributi . . tothe social history of New York City.
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HISTORY OF NEW YORK CITY.
recent products of restless enterprise-the inland trade of the city of New York had enormously increased in 1850, at which time it was estimated the expresses travelled 20,000 miles daily in discharge of orders. The telegraph, speaking from distant villages and cities. ordered goods which were swiftly carried by express, steamboat, or railroad from the seller to the buyer. The merchant of Cincinnati who, before these facilities existed, consumed many weeks in travelling to and from New York twice a year for the purchase of goods, could now be supplied in the course of a few days without the fatigues of a long journey. With equal facilities the products of the great West were brought to the seaboard for consumption there or for exportation beyond the seas, and so the West was enriched and became a more valuable customer to New York.
With these new conditions the methods of trade in New York were changed. Formerly the dry-goods merchant, for example, kept a full assortment of goods in that line, and it required much business tact to keep each line full. In the third decade the change alluded to began. One house was engaged in trade in woollens exclusively, another in cottons, another in silks, and another in fancy goods. There speedily appeared another subdivision of the dry-goods business. For example, one merchant dealing in woollens kept only tailors' goods, another goods for women's wear ; in cotton, one confined himself to prints, another to white goods ; and in silks, one dealt only in piece goods, and another in ribbons and smaller articles. Then came a more minute subdivision --- a dealer in hosiery, a dealer in lace, in pockethandker- chiefs, and shawls. And such is the state of trade in New York to-day. In trade and in the professions specialties are the order of the day.
At this period (150) New York City had become a largely manu- facturing town. Almost every kind of mechanical and manufacturing industry had its active representatives there. According to the census of 1850, the total number of manufacturing establishments in the city was 33ST, with $34,232.822 capital invested, and employing 83,620 persons. The annual product of these establishments was valued at $105,218,308. Of the persons employed, 29,917 were women and children. The section of the city containing the largest number of these establishments (1851), the largest amount of capital invested ($12,672,995), the greatest number of persons employed (35, 704), and turning out products of the greatest value (831,310,642), was the Second Ward, the smallest in the city. It is bounded on the east and west by the East River and Broadway, on the south by Maiden Lane and Liberty Street, and on the north by Ferry and Spruce streets.
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THIRD DECADE, 1850-1860.
The citizens had, by wise forethought and generous and judicious expenditure, provided themselves with an ample supply of pure and wholesome water ; at the beginning of the third decade they were called upon to consider the expediency, not to say necessity, of provid- ing themselves and their posterity with a spacious breathing-place, an area of healthful enjoyment, physical and social, in the heart of the great city-its greatness so plainly discerned by the eye of faith and sure prophecy in the near future.
The hint which led to efficient action in the direction of providing a great public park for the city of New York was given by that devout worshipper of the beautiful in nature and in art, the late A. J. Downing. In 1830 he made a summer tour in England. He visited some of its most attractive places, especially country seats, and inspected and studied the mediaeval architecture, and the landscape gardening so exquisite in many places, and especially the great parks of London. In a letter written to the Horticulturist in September, after describing the London parks, he remarked : "We fancy, not without reason, in New York that we have a great city, and that the introduction of Croton water is so marvellous a luxury in the way of health that nothing more need be done for the comfort of half a million of people. In crossing the Atlantic, a young New Yorker, who was rabidly patriotic, and who boasted of the superiority of our beloved commercial metropolis over every other city on the globe, was our most amusing companion. I chanced to meet him one afternoon, a few days after we landed, in one of the great parks in London, in the midst of all the sylvan beauty and human enjoyment I have attempted to describe to you. IIe threw up his arms as he recognized me, and exclaimed :
"" Good Heavens, what a scene ! And I took some Londoners to the steps of the City Hall last summer to show them the park of New York !'
"I consoled him with the advice to be less conceited thereafter in his cockneyism, and to show foreigners the Hudson and Niagara, in- stead of the City Hall and the Bowling Green. But the question may well be asked, ' Is New York really not rich enough, or is there abso- lutely not land enough in America to give our citizens public parks of more than ten acres (' "' *
* The London parks at that time were six in number, containing 1442 acres-namely, St. James's, 87 acres ; Green, 56 acres ; Hyde, 349 acres ; Regent's, 450 acres : Green- wich, 200 acres, and Victoria, 300 acres. In addition to these were numerons " squares. " as large as the largest in New York, and near the city were ninie spacious gardens -
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HISTORY OF NEW YORK CITY.
Mr. Downing's letter describing the London parks and the significant question and suggestions contained in it made a deep impression on the publie mind. Indeed Mr. Downing only voiced the thoughts of a multitude of citizens. The matter was talked up in social, political. scientific, and art circles, and in the spring of 1851 Ambrose C. Kingsland, who had just been elevated to the mayoralty of the city, sent a communication to the common council (May 5th), in which he strongly urged them to make some suitable provision for the enjoyment and health of the citizens in the upper wards, in the form of a spacious public park. This recommendation was supported by an array of weighty reasons in favor of such a measure. IIe observed that there was no park on the island deserving the name. He concluded by saying, "I comnend this subject to your consideration in the con- viction that its importance will insure your careful attention and prompt action."
The common council took speedy and favorable action. Under au- thority conferred by the State Legislature, the common council pur- chased a large portion of the land now included in the Central Park. In the autumn of 1853 the Supreme Court appointed William Kent, Michael Ulshoeffer, Luther Bradish, Warren Brady, and Jeremiah Towle commissioners of estimate and assessment to take the land for the Central Park. In this labor the commissioners were industriously engaged for almost two years. It involved the purchase and examina- tion of the titles of over seven thousand lots on the borders of a large and rapidly growing town, the adjustment of numerous private claims, and the reconciling of a variety of interests. The Supreme Court un- hesitatingly confirmed their report, and on February 5, 1856, the comp- troller announeed to the common council that, as by the act of 1833 the payment of the awards to the owners of the lots and of the ex- penses of the commissioners must be made immediately on the confir- mation of their report, it had become the duty of the city legislature to make an appropriation to meet those charges. Accordingly an ordinance was passed for the payment of $5, 169,369.69, of which sum
, . namely, Kensington, 75 acres ; Kew Pleasure Grounds, 130 acres ; Horticultural Society's Garden, Chiswick : Royal Botanic Garden, Regent's Park, 18 acres ; and the Chelsea Botanic Garden, Temple Gardens, Hampton Court Gardens, and Beulah Spa. Numerous other parks were in the vicinity of London, such as Windsor, and various " commons," forming a sort of chain around the city, all free to the public, and comprising several thousand acres. London gave to every 100.000 inhabitants 500 acres of " breathing space," while all the parks and squares of New York City, comprising in the aggregate not one hundred acres, were giving to each 100,000 of its inhabitants only 16 acres of breathing space.
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THIRD DECADE, 1850-1860.
81.655,590 was to be paid by the owners of lands adjacent to the Park, in view of the benefit they would receive from their neighborhood to it.
The superficial area proposed to be included in the Park was 760 acres. The plot is an elongated parallelogram in form, about two and a half miles in length and half a mile in width. Within that space were the receiving reservoir of 33 acres, the State Arsenal and its grounds, and the grounds of the St. Vincent's Academy, 24 acres ; ground then owned by the corporation, 135 acres, and ground for streets and avenues according to the city survey, leaving an area of 376 acres to be bought.
At the beginning private interests cast obstacles in the way of accomplishing the design of establishing the Central Park on a grand scale. Owners of land on the southern borders of the proposed park made strenuous efforts to have its domains curtailed at that end, but failed. In May, 1856, the common council appointed the mayor and street commissioner, commissioners of the Central Park, with ample powers. , These officers invited Washington Irving, George Bancroft, James E. Cooley, Charles F. Briggs, James Phalen, Charles A. Dana, and Stewart Brown to attend their meetings as a consulting board. They accepted the invitation. Washington Irving was chosen presi- dent of the Board, and after a long and critical examination of fifteen plans that had been submitted to them for the improvement of the Park, they unanimously adopted the plan presented by Egbert I .. Viele,* which, with slight modifications, has been carried out under successive administrations.
The commissioners were dilatory. A new board was appointed by the Legislature in 1857, and new plans for laying out the Park were solicited. On the first of April, 1:58, thirty-three plans were submitted. One by Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux was approved, and the
* Egbert L. Viele, now (1883) one of the park commissioners, is a native of Waterford, N. Y., where he was born June 17, 1825. He graduated at the West Point Military Academy in 1847, and served through a portion of the war with Mexico. He resigned in 1853 and was appointed State Engineer of New Jersey. He was appointed chief eu- gineer to the Central Park (New York) commission in 1857, and in 1860 of Prospect Park, Brooklyn.' Joining the army in 1861. he was made brigadier-general of volunteers, and accompanied the first expedition to Port Royal Sound. In the siege of Fort Pulaski he was in command of the investing land forces, and in the capture of Norfolk in 1862 he led the advance. He was appointed military governor of that city in August, 1862, and retained that position until his resignation in October, 1863. Since that time he has been a civil engineer in the city of New York. General Viele is the author of a " Hand- book for Active Service, " "Reports on the Central Park," " Topographical Survey of New Jersey, " " Topography and Hydrography of the City of New York," ". The Trans val of New York," and numerous other papers.
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HISTORY OF NEW YORK CITY.
work which produced such grand results in presenting to the city of New York a magnificent park went vigorously on under the super- vision of these gentlemen .* It has fulfilled the prophecy of Mayor Kingsland, that it would " prove a lasting monument to the wisdom, sagacity, and forethought of its founders." t
The Central Park is now one of the most beautiful in the world. The work was fairly begun less than twenty-five years ago, and now it is a striking monument of engineering skill, landscape gardening, and wise expenditure of pablic money. It is the pride and glory of New York. It has eighteen entrances, styled gates, not yet finished.+ They are to be elegant arches of various styles of architecture and
* Mr. Olinsted is a native of Hartford, Connecticut, where he was born in 1822. H. was educated for an engineer and scientific agriculturist, and became a farmer. He made a pedestrian tour in England in 1850, and published a book entitled "Walks and Talks of an American Farmer in England." He travelled extensively in the Southern States in 1852-53, and in 1856 published a book entitled " A Journey in the Seaboard Slave States." Afterward he published other volumes of travels in the region of the slave-labor States, and was appointed architect of the Central Park in 1859.
Mr. Vanx is an Englishman by birth. He came to America in 1852 on the invitation of Mr. Downing, and became his partner at Newburgh, as architect and landscape gar- dener. He sneceeded to much of Mr. Downing's business on the death of that gentleman in the same year. At the time he joined Mr. Olmsted in preparing plans of Central Park (which were approved by the Commissioners), Mr. Vaux had written and published a valuable book on domestic architecture. He has ever since sustained the high pro- fessional reputation which his merits command.
+ In connection with this brief account of the origin of the Central Park, it seems appropriate here to notice the topographical atlas of the city of New York, prepared under the direction of General Egbert L. Viele, exhibiting the elevations and de- pressions of the island and the old water-courses. This map was first exhibited and described in a paper read by Mr. Viele before the Sanitary Association of the city in 1859. He stated that nearly one half the deaths occurring on the earth are caused by fevers in different forms, and that the principal cause of fever is a humid miasmatic state of the atmosphere, produced by the presence of an excess of moisture in the ground from which poisonons exhalations continually arise, vitiating the purer air.
He gave a rapid account of many small streanis which formerly existed in the lower part of Manhattan Island, but which had been filled up as the city grew. These, he said, had not been deprived of their power in sending up poisonous exhalations by being smothered, but. on the contrary, by the production of stagnant water under the surface, were more noxious than before. Many of these streams had produced swampy places, and he declared that five of the little parks in the city-St. John's, Washington, Tomp- kins, Madison, and Gramercy-were located entirely or in part in swamps created by these streams. Some of the streams which ran through Central Park have been util- ized or smothered.
# These gates bear the names of the Scholar's, Artist's, Artisan's, Merchant's, Woman's, Hunter's, Mariner's, Gate of All Saints, Boy's, Stranger's, Children's, Miner's, Engineer's. Woodman's, Girl's, Pioneer's, Farmer's, and Warrior's gates. They are situated between Fifth and Seventh avenues and Fifty-ninth and One Hundred and Tenth streets.
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THIRD DECADE, 1850-1860.
ornamentation. It has extensive and beautiful drives and walks, mili- tary parade-grounds, places of amusement for the young, lakes and fountains, a magnificent mall, a beautiful terrace at the northern end of the mall leading down to a lake which affords water for boating and ice for skating, a number of statues * of eminent men, a restaurant, a zoological garden or menagerie, and an ancient obelisk from Egypt.t
Within and around the Central Park are clustered the buildings of important institutions-the Arsenal, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Natural History, the Lenox Library, the Charlier Institute, # etc. The surface of the Park is pleasingly diversified and the drives and walks present agreeable surprises at every turn. Within
" The Ramble is one of the most charming parts of the Central Park. It lies on the hillside, between the north shore of the Lake (retaining reservoir) and the old reservoir. The carriage-ways or drives are very extended, the average width being 54 feet and the aggregate length about 0 miles. The bridle-paths extend about 5} miles, and the length of the walks or footpaths, having an average wilth of 13 feet, is about 234 miles. There are about 30 buildlings of all kinds in the Park, and outside of these seats are pro- vided for about 10,000 persons. The wooded ground covers about 409 acres. Of this area of trees about 500,000 have been set out since the opening of the Park.
In the Park are 48 bridges, archways, and tunnels, 12 of them over- transverse roads. Some of these are beautiful structures, the most notable of which are the Terrace and the Marble Arch, at the southern approach to the Mall. At the foot of the Terrace and near the shore of a little lake, is Bethesda Fountain, the central ornament of the Park. The figure of an angel stands in the attitude of blessing the water, surrounded by various appropriate emblems, with four figures symbolizing the blessings of Temperance, Health, Purity, and Peace. The Mall is a broad path lined with trees extending from the Marble Arch to the Terrace, a distance of about one third of a mile. The Arsenal is a castellated gray brick building, and is the location of the menagerie, which in winter contains the animals of travelling shows.
The statnes in the Park comprise those of Burns, Columbus, Commerce (an ideal figure), Farragut, Fitz-Greene Halleck, Alexander Hamilton, Humboldt, Indian Hunter (an ideal figure), Mazzini, Morse, Walter Scott, Shakespeare, and Webster. There is a bronze figure of a private soldier of the New York Seventh Regiment erected in com- memoration of those members who fell in battle during the late Civil War.
+ The obelisk was presented to the city of New York through the Department of State, in 1877, by Ismail Pacha, then khedive or pharaoh of Egypt. Its removal from its ancient foundation was intrusted to the skill and judgment of Lieutenant-Commander H. H. Gorringe, United States Navy, who performed the task successfully. It is a mono- lith' covered with hieroglyphie inscriptions which carry us back many centuries. Its companion is now erected in London. They were taken from their ancient station near Alexandria. The obelisk in New York stands on a knoll in Central Park near the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It is the sixth in size of the known obelisks of Egypt.
# The Charlier Institute was founded by Elie Charlier, son of a French Protestant clergyman, who, educated at the famous college of Neuchatel, where Professors Agassiz and Guyot began their career as teachers, and, breaking away from the restraints of rigid systems, landed in New York in 1852 with $36 in his pocket and a few letters of introduction. Among the latter was one to the late Mayor Harper, who, when he had
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its borders are two reservoirs of Croton water-the retaining reser- voir, capable of holding 1,030,000,000 gallons, and just below this the receiving reservoir, which holds 150,000,000 gallons more. There are four other bodies of water in the Park, much smaller than these, the total area of all being 433 acres. The most romantic in scenery of all the waters of the Park is Harlem Meer, in the extreme north-eastern corner. The Central Park is visited and enjoyed by all classes of citizens, and is a perpetual blessing to their minds and bodies.
The principal entrance to the Central. Park is at the head of Fifth Avenue, the wonderful street of palaces and churches, club-houses and the abodes of professional men. A pioneer of fashionable " settlers" on Fifth Avenue was W. Coventry Waddell, whose grand house- grand for the time-has been mentioned. Mr. Waddell went into the " wilderness" to build it in 1845, for Fifth Avenue then was little more than a country road, with farm-fences here and there above Madison Square. Mr. Waddell's house and grounds occupied a whole square between Fifth and Sixth avenues and Thirty-seventh and Thirty- eighth streets.
read it, said to the bearer, " Young man, in this country we are all busy, and we all help ourselves. Use my name as a reference, if you wish, and go ahead."
The suggestions involved in this remark deeply impressed the young Frenchman, who was only twenty-five years of age, and he resolved to follow the advice. He ob- tained employment as an instructor of his native tongue in a leading private school in the city. At the end of three years he was enabled to open a small school for boarding and day scholars, which gradually expanded and became widely known as the " Charlier , Institute." Mr. Charlier was thoroughly educated. He possessed an extraordinary aptitude for teaching and a personal attraction which drew everybody toward him. His snecess is probably without any parallel in the history of educational institutions. " Without any board of trustees or corporators, " wrote Dr. Prime, of the New York Observer, nine years ago, " with no funds from charity or the State, relying only on Provi- dence and his own exertions, Mr. Elie Charlier has prospered in his work, adding house to house for his purposes, preparing young men for business and college, and command- ing the attention of parents in the city and distant parts of the country. Nearly two years ago (1872) he determined to provide himself with a building adequate to his present and future wants. Upon the south front of the Central Park, having purchased lots running through from l'ifty-ninth to Fifty-eighth Street, he has erected an edifice of · gigantic proportions, great elegance, solidity, extent, and convenience, covering the whole ground, 50 by 200 feet, five stories in height, with an elegant chapel, spacious school- rooms, beautiful parlors and dormitories and refectory, with a completion of detail, security against fire, and regard to ventilation that include all that modern science and art have contributed for the perfection of domestic and public buildings. And this magnificent structure, an ornament to the Park and the city, he has reared without calling on the public for a dollar, and without making any noise. The cost of the house and lots is $400,000. We presume that no parallel to this enterprise and success can be found."
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THIRD DECADE, 1850-1860.
When Fifth Avenue was graded and the altitude of Murray Hill was diminished, this notable mansion, this suburban villa, was left in the air several feet above the street, to which the lot sloped in a series of grassy banks. Not long afterward the building was taken down, when it was not more than a dozen years old, and on its site was erected the massive edifice known as Dr. Spring's, or the Brick Church. *
* It is said that when Mr. Waddell went to buy the ground on which he built, Mrs. Waddell went with him, and sat under an apple-tree in an orchard while the bargain was in progress. When the mansion was completed he took his brother to see it, and asked him, " What shall I call my house ?" " Waddell's Castor," was the prompt reply. " There is a mustard-pot, here is a pepper-bottle, and there is a vinegar-cruet," he con- tinned, pointing at several towers, large and small. that arose above the eaves on all sides. It had oriels and gables and a spacious conservatory of plants, native and exotic.
Mr. and Mrs. Waddell were leaders in fashionable society in New York. He was a brilliant man and a confidential friend of President Jackson, who gave him public employ- ments that made him rich. He was frank and generons, and always displayed a princely hospitality. His house was the scene of notable entertainments. At Mrs. Waddell's parties one was sure to meet every celebrity. American and foreign, who chanced to be in the city at the time. The house was sumptuously furnished. It had a broad marble hall and elegant winding stairs.
CHAPTER II.
A T the earlier period of the third decade the famous Crystal Palace was erected near the distributing reservoir, between that struct- ure and Sixth Avenue. It was built of iron and glass. There were in it twelve hundred and fifty tons of iron and thirty-nine thousand square feet of glass. It was erected for the purpose of an exhibition of the industry of all nations. It was a beautiful edifice, cruciform, with lofty galleries and a spacious translucent dome in the centre. In it a World's Fair was opened, with appropriate ceremonies, on the 4th of July, 1833. The President of the United States (Franklin Pierce) was the chief celebrant.
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