USA > New York > New York City > Leslie's history of the greater New York, Volume II > Part 35
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floor, on a level with the street at the entrance, and sloping down at a convenient grade for the purposes of a lecture hall, is the Auditorium, which will seat nearly eight hundred people. On the second floor is the library, and a museum of historical curiosities, started in 1864, dis- plays its unique treasures on the top floor. The library of the Society contains not so great a number of books, about forty-five thousand, but attention has been paid especially to rare books. It has the origi- nal edition of Audubon's " Birds of America," and also the " Cabinet du Roy," consisting of 49 volumes. Dr. Henry R. Stiles, the histo-
TALMAGE'S LAST TABERNACLE.
rian of Brooklyn, was its first librarian. The Society, like its proto- type in New York, has done some valuable service to the public in issuing from the press volumes of special interest. It was but natural that the Battle of Long Island, which many, with a great show of reason, think ought to be called the Battle of Brooklyn, should en- gage its intelligent attention and the expenditure of some of its funds. An account of it, the result of the most painstaking modern researches, was published in two volumes, edited by Professor Henry
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P. Johnston, of the College of the City of New York. Another. pub- lication was that of the unpublished letters of Washington, edited by Moncure D. Conway. But perhaps the most interesting book of all was that Journal of Two Travelers in 1679, which is usually referred to as the Labadists' Journal. The discovery of this journal was due to the diligence and historical acumen of the Hon. Henry C. Murphy, one of the founders of the Society, and an ex-Mayor of the city. In 1857 President Buchanan appointed Mr. Murphy Minister to The Hague. This gave him fine opportunities for following up clews of historical interest suggested by his previous searches into the early records of Brooklyn. Many articles came from his pen, elucidating the subject of the first emigration from Holland, and also that of the peculiar names borne by many of his fellow-townsmen. But matter of a more permanent character came to his hands. He discovered in the origi- nal manuscript this journal of Dankers and Sluyter, two Labadist sectaries, who came out to America to look out for a good place for a settlement or colony of their co-religionists. He saw at once of what immense importance these written pages were. They gave a picture minute and true of everyday life in New York, on Long Is- land, on Staten Island, in New Jersey, and many other places, at the very heart of the Colonial Period. The manuscript was translated by his order, and the Long Island Historical Society published it, mak- ing a good-sized octavo of it. It is indispensable to the study of colonial days in and around New York, and the fact that every writer who has to deal with the subject eagerly scans its pages, and quotes largely from it, shows how great a desideratum such a work was. But this was not all. Mr. Murphy made another remarkable dis- covery. We have already alluded to it in a previous volume, but it will bear repeating here. This was the letter of Rev. Jonas Michael- ius. It was found among a lot of dusty documents in the possession of an official of a civil court in Holland. The letter was dated August 11, 1628; it was unearthed in 1858, and it told the world that there was a minister of the Reformed Church on Manhattan Island five years before the time it had hitherto been thought there was one there. It gave also a clear insight into conditions at Fort Amsterdam at the very beginning of colonization. Mr. Murphy had this letter translated, and a facsimile of it published, together with the trans- lation. The original was afterward secured by Librarian Moore of the Lenox Library, where this invaluable document now reposes.
More than once we have had occasion to mention the Brooklyn Institute. We have noticed how one after another of several literary enterprises finally ended in being absorbed by, or becoming a part of, this institution. In this way we must trace its roots to the Appren- tices' Library Association, of which we have already spoken. This declining, the books and classes were transferred to the building of the Brooklyn Lyceum, on Washington Street, near Concord. The
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Lyceum had been organized in 1833, and in 1841 had been able to erect a substantial building of granite; but it did not prosper, and in 1843 the Apprentices' Association purchased its edifice. At the same time an amended charter was obtained from the Legislature, and the name of the corporation changed to the title now so familiar, the " Brooklyn Institute." One whose name is inseparably connected with the Institute was Mr. Augustus Graham. The old Lyceum build- ing was heavily mortgaged, and the sum raised to pay for it by the Apprentices' Association had also left a mortgage for them to bear. On July 4, 1848, Mr. Graham paid the mortgage and gave the build- ing free from all incumbrance to the Trustees of the Institute. Dying shortly after, it was found that by his will he had bequeathed $27,000 to it as a permanent endowment fund, to be utilized in three different ways: $10,000 for the support of lectures on scientific subjects, and for the purchase of scientific apparatus and collections; $12,000 for the securing of lectures on Sunday evenings on " The Power, Wisdom, and Goodness of God as Manifested in His Works," and $5,000 for the maintenance of a School of Design, and in establishing a Gallery of Fine Arts.
In spite of this great benefaction, the institute did not greatly flonr- ish for several years. Its building was deemed rather unadapted to modern needs, and in 1867, thirty thousand dollars were expended in remodeling it, with the result that the chief efforts of the institution were directed during twenty years toward taking care of and getting rid of a mortgage, necessitating the use of the income of the Graham fund for this mundane purpose rather than for the advancement of the intellect of Brooklyn's citizens. Thus for twenty years it did no more than circulate the books of its library, conduct classes in drawing, and secure annual addresses on Washington's Birthday. In 1887, however, with the mortgage gone, the Institute took on new life. It was almost entirely reorganized. Its membership was divided into departments, each representing a different branch of art or science, each depart- ment forming a society by itself, yet in one association with the others. This new arrangement at once attracted citizens interested in various branches of science: the Brooklyn Microscopical Society became the Institute's Department of Microscopy; the American As- tronomical Society, most of whose members happened to reside in Brooklyn or New York, became the Department of Astronomy, and added thirty-two members, and the former society added sixty-four; the Brooklyn Entomological Society, with forty-one members, be- came its Department of Entomology; the Linden Camera Club of Brooklyn, twenty-six strong, became its Department of Photography, and, in addition, there were formed the Departments of Physics. Chemistry, Botany, Mineralogy, Geology, Zoology,, and Archeology. These twelve departments now ( 1888) began to hold monthly meet- ings. During the season of 1889-90 great prosperity attended the
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work of the Institute. The membership was more than doubled, and eight new departments added : Architecture, Electricity, Geography, Mathematics, Painting, Philology, Political and Economic Science, and Psychology.' The number of lectures given was increased from ninety to two hundred and thirty. In 1891 the Department of Music was added, and in 1892 that of Pedagogy, with a membership of two hundred and six. The encroachments of the bridge upon Brooklyn territory along Washington Street had now reached the old Institute Building, and it had to go, but it derived a sum of $72,000 from the sale of the property. The work of the Institute had before this begun to affect the minds of public men. It was deemed desirable to erect a museum, something like those on Manhattan Island, and in 1891 the Legislature at Albany authorized the city to expend $300,000 for the erection of a proposed Museum of Arts near Prospect Hill. Accord- ingly, a splendid site was set apart for it upon the Eastern Parkway Boulevard, from Washington Avenue to the Prospect Hill Reservoir. Upon this it was proposed to build an edifice of enormous proportions. A mere corner of it-the northwest wing-was finished, and was thrown open to the public on June 2, 1897, which would be considered a pretty large structure if we did not have to compare it with the plan of the whole, which demands a building five hundred and fifty feet in length on each of four sides, three stories high and basement. Meantime the twenty-seven departments, into which the Institute has grown at present, go on with their work in various parts of the city. The lectures, class exercises, and other educational gather- ings count more than three thousand, and the attendants at these numbered during the last year, 334,672, the membership being now 5,375. The charter of the Greater New York includes provisions for the continuance of all laws affecting the Institute. An annual sum not exceeding twenty thousand dollars is authorized for the care and maintenance of the Museum Buildings; and the charter also secures for it the establishment of a Botanic Garden on the Park lands south of the Museum site.
The history of art in Brooklyn deserves more than a passing notice. It has been noticed that Mr. Augustus Graham, the benefactor of the Brooklyn Institute, left a fund of $5,000 for the establishment of a School of Design and a Gallery of Fine Arts in connection with the Institute. This was in 1851. In the same year was formed the Brooklyn Art Union. It had a chance to arrange for only one exhibi- tion. As it disposed of its pictures by lot, an all too virtuous Legis- lature chose to regard that proceeding as of the nature of gambling. and it went to work very seriously and suppressed the Art Union by special enactment. The next move in the encouragement of art was the organization of the Sketch Club in 1857, among whose forty or more members were counted F. A. Chapman and George Innes. Out of this grew the Brooklyn Art Association, for after a particularly
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successful exhibition in 1861, the club resolved to admit lay members as well as professional artists, changing both its character and its name. This was doubtless dne to the good feeling produced by the generous sums bestowed upon their paintings by patrons; but it proved to be not altogether wise, and frictions between the elements arose as it had happened in earlier days in New York. In 1866 a number of the artists withdrew and formed a new association called the Academy of Design, prominent among whom were H. Carmienke and Alonzo Chappell. The Academy offered free instruction to stu- dents of art, and for this purpose they connected themselves with the Brooklyn Institute, or rather its Graham art school, teaching their classes in drawing also, in consideration for the free rental of the rooms. After a few years the Academy erected a building on the corner of Court and Joralemon streets, the expenses of which were de- frayed by the artists themselves. Besides this it cost each individual member $75 per annum to teach the two hundred pupils that flocked to their classes, which were held six evenings of each week. The fame of that teaching spread far and wide. Committees were con- stantly coming from other cities of the Union, Boston, Philadelphia, St. Louis, and even the neighboring New York, to study the methods these generous and assiduous artists of Brooklyn were pursuing with such remarkable success. But while all this was very gratifying the burden upon purse and time became rather too wearisome at last. The building was abandoned in 1871, and the classes transferred to the basement of that of the Art Association, and in 1872 the Academy of Design disbanded itself. But the study of art is by no means aban- doned in Brooklyn. Adelphi has a school of drawing and painting, and also the Polytechnic, while we have seen that painting is a de- partment of the Institute, and that Pratt devotes a part of its work to industrial and decorative art. Besides there is also the Rembrandt Club, consisting of citizens of Brooklyn who are art collectors and connoisseurs. The philanthropist Seeney, who built the hospital of his name, was a diligent collector of famous and expensive canvases, and one of the best Israels in the Metropolitan Museum in Central Park was given by him. Of artists who have made Brooklyn their home may be mentioned James M. Hart, the landscape painter, fa- mous for his " Morning in the Adirondacks." Wedworth Wads- worth, who does good work in water colors, is a Brooklynite; and so is Edward Howland Blashfield. The celebrated painter of marine views, the late M. F. A. De Haas, was for many years identified with Brooklyn life, a member of the church in Williamsburgh of which Dr. Terhune (Marion Harland's husband) was the pastor. He was boru in Holland, but came to this country in 1858. Another water- color painter of celebrity, whom Brooklyn can claim, is William Ham- ilton Gibson. Nor must we forget Henri Farrer, the most poetic of water-color painters, who gets his inspiration for his landscapes
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(quiet sunsets or gray days, usually), from some fine passage, and then paints out upon the canvas what the lines make him feel. Mr. Farrer was largely instru- mental in organizing the Etch- ing Club and Water Color So- ciety, of which he was Secre- tary for many years. He was born in England, but his home has been in the Twenty-sixth Ward for a long time, so that at least since 1886 he has been a Brooklyn man.
A ministration to its higher life of decided power and effect is Brooklyn's Prospect Park, even as we claimed that Central
PURR
BROOKLYN FEDERAL BUILDING AND POSTOFFICE.
Park does the same for New York on Manhattan Island. It is a good sign when a people set apart so much valuable property and spend up- on it so many good dollars, in order to have a bit of nature at their very
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doors. Prospect Park is as yet somewhat on one side of the populated city; it is not so surrounded on all sides by a developed and well ocenpied city as is Central Park, hence there is a little one-sided- ness of ornamentation about its entrances. Nothing can surpass the elegance of the approaches that face the lower portion of Flatbush Avene. There is first the wide expanse of the plaza, adorned by a beautiful fountain, illuminated by electricity at night. Then rises the graceful classic form of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Arch; and be- yond, at the actual entrance to the two or three paths or driveways that give access to the Park, stand in severe simplicity single shafts surmounted by globes. Between these are to be seen two or more handsome structures of costly veined and polished marble, perfectly round and the stone roof supported by small pillars in close array. In short, these simple little rotundas are representations of Greek fanes. Within the park there are many spots to delight the eyes of the lover of nature, its natural advantages being perhaps superior to those of Central Park. The one who likes to see art assisting nature will be attracted by the displays at the Flower Garden along the lake side. We have spoken of some of these features before, and also of other parks or squares in different parts of the city. The most recent accession is the Forest Park, bordering closely to the edge of the former city near the Jamaica and Newtown boundaries. It is a tract still fresh from the hand of nature, thickly covered with forest, as the name suggests.
Architecture has done much for Brooklyn's streets within the last few years. The City Hall, with its attendant buildings in the rear, form a group of which any town may be prond. The United States Government, after many makeshifts and occupying many ordinary or tumble-down buildings, finally made up its mind to house itself in Brooklyn in a way worthy of itself and of the improved surround- ings. In May, 1891, it took up its quarters in the Postoffice Building, on Washington and Johnson streets, which had been put up at a cost of two millions of dollars. Its material is Bodwell granite, quarried in Maine, and its style is of the Romanesque order. At the southeast corner rises a tower twenty-five feet square to a height of one hundred and eighty-four feet, whence from its topmost pinnacle flies the em- blem of national possession. On Johnson Street it has a front of two hundred and thirty-six feet, with a sharp descent toward Adams, so that the basement on Washington Street becomes an additional ground floor in Adams, convenient for mail wagons. The building has a depth of one hundred and thirty-five feet, which is the frontage on Washington Street, with arched recesses for entrances. Many of the churches of Brooklyn, as might be expected, afford fine speci- mens of that kind of architecture : St. Ann's and Holy Trinity, varying greatly in style and appearance, are each an ornament pleasing to the taste. Perhaps one of the handsomest Protestant churches is the
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old First Reformed Church. It is no longer " the ugly little church in the middle of the road," on Fulton Street. Emigrating thence in 1810 to Joralemon Street, after various metamorphoses it emigrated once more to a newly developing section of Brooklyn, that of the Pros- pect Park slope, so that now it is to be found on Seventh Avenue, at the corner of Carroll Street. It is built of granite so white and fine- grained as to seem marble, and the style is Gothic, with a single tower on one side of the nave in front. It will seat thirteen hundred people, and was dedicated September 27, 1891. A notable feature is a paint- ing on the wall back of the pulpit by Vergelio Tojetti, of colossal size. fourteen by twenty-one feet, representing the angels and women at the empty tomb. The windows also are richly adorned with pictured biblical or allegorical scenes. Some day Brooklyn will have its proud cathedral, as New York has, but it evidently will be as long about getting it. The entire block on Lafayette and Greene avenues, be- tween Vanderbilt and Clermont, is occupied by the episcopal resi- dence and offices, and the uncompleted walls of what promises to be an imposing pile, which the Roman Catholics of Brooklyn intend to rear here. It is of gray granite and, therefore, will have a more somber look than its elegant mate in New York. Several business edifices in the vicinity of the City Hall present a very noble and pleasing appear- ance, perhaps the most ambitious attempt at an elegant exterior be- ing that of the Brooklyn Savings Bank, on the site of the old First Baptist Church, on Pierrepont Street. 'Its style is severely classic, of the Roman order.
To the histrionic art not many temples that deserve extended no- tice have been reared. The latest and best is the Montauk, upon the site of the historic " Abbey," in Enlton Street, near Flatbush Avenne. It can not be said that Brooklyn gives encouragement to the very highest forms of the art. In some of the theaters only the best of plays are to be seen, and the audiences are good. But it is seldom that a company engages to play any piece for more than a week, and along all the billboards different announcements glare upon the vision as the weeks pass along. Doubtless New York is near enough to attract the lovers of the drama who seek its charms for a study of acting, and not for the mere tickling sensation of a new thing, and who are not satisfied, therefore, with one attendance upon a first-class rendition of ancient or modern mas- ters. Perhaps, too, Brooklyn people are more taken with entertain- ments of an intellectual nature. It is a fact that such a course of lectures as those given by Stoddard-on travel, art, history, literature, illuminated by the stereopticon-draw vastly larger and more enthu- siastic erowds in Brooklyn than in New York. The only time these lectures can be made a success in the latter is in Lent, when con- science forbids many to attend the theater. In Brooklyn Stoddard came at any time, and the Academy of Music would be too small to accommodate the eager attendants.
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A final word may be added about Brooklyn's devotion to the " con- cord of sweet sounds." The Philharmonic Society was organized in 1857, and its first condnetor was Theodore Eisfeldt. During its first year four concerts and eight rehearsals were given, after which the yearly course included five concerts and fifteen rehearsals. It was due to the society's influence and enthusiasm that the Academy of Music was erected. Commendable stimulns to musical interest was given by Plymouth Church, which allowed its splendid organ to be used for organ recitals on week days. But perhaps nothing contrib- uted so much to the education of Brooklyn's people in the taste for music as the advent of Anton Seidl. He was born in 1850 at Buda- pest. At the age of twenty he was a thorough musician, and recog- nized as being such by many men eminent in the profession in Europe. In the autumn of 1872 he went to Bayreuth to assist Wagner in pre- paring the preliminary work for the performances of the " Nibelung- enring," such as arranging the orchestral parts and correcting the scores and lines. From this close contact with the master he went forth to different cities to interpret his music, and gained in reputa- tion as a conductor from year to year. In 1881 he reached the climax of fame by being permitted to conduct Wagner's operas in Berlin. In 1885, the director of the Metropolitan Opera House of New York in- vited Seidl to come to this country, to take the place of Leopold Damrosch, who had recently died. From the first his career in Amer- ica was a brilliant success. Seidl became the rage, and he carefully used his popularity to arouse the general interest of the public in ex- clusively high toned and elevating classical music. In 1891 he se- ceeded Theodore Thomas as conductor of the New York Philharmonic Society. Two years before, in 1889, a large number of Brooklyn ladies organized a society which named itself after Seidl. Under their anspices Seidl conducted concerts of a popular character in the Pa- vilion at Brighton Beach, which were notable for the high character of the music rendered there. The numbers presented from month to month furnished a regular education in classical method, none but the great masters, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Wagner, Gounod, and other such shining names appearing upon the programs. There were Wagner festivals and symphony nights, and days when only Mendelssohn would be heard. In the winter season the ladies of the Society arranged concerts at the Academy of Music. At Brighton Beach, too, lectures on music, with interpretations of masterpieces, were appointed at times. The last season at Brighton Beach was that of 1896. The music rendered there was not of the kind to attract large crowds constantly, such as went with eager regularity to the rattle- bang-boom of a military band, and so when the wintry storms knocked the Brighton Beach Pavilion to pieces, it was not thought wise to resume the Seidl concerts. It is still vivid in our recollection how with a shock we read of the sudden and premature death of the great conductor on March 28, 1898.
CHAPTER XIV.
TAKING IN THE COMPONENT TOWNS.
ITH pleasing historic fitness and in kindly memory of that nationality whose children first gaye a local habitation and a name to the spot of earth she occupies, Brooklyn se- lected for the motto upon her seal, no pompous Latin motto, but just a plain Dutch proverb: " Eendracht mackt macht." " L'Union fait la force," the French have tried to make of it, but it is a mere translation in words: of the fact they knew nothing till they looked upon the United States of the Netherlands, the Dutch Republic of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries. " E pluribus unum," say we with our forty and more States. She, with her seven small bits of territory, said the same thing practically in Dutch-" In union there is strength,"- and when these Republicans wanted to talk Latin they said, " Concordia Res Parrae Crescunt."-by concord small things grow. Brooklyn had already tried the effect of union upon strength and growth, when Williamsburgh and Bushwick united with her, making one great city of two of the original six townships of Kings County. In this last decade of the century she completed the work of that union, by taking in all of the remaining towns.
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