USA > New York > New York City > Leslie's history of the greater New York, Volume II > Part 37
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tracks were built under it, and the hotel made to rest on flat cars. These were connected with three engines, and so perfeet were the arrangements that not a window was broken or a ceiling disturbed by the moving. It was at Brighton that Seidl gave his unsurpassed concerts, but the angry storms of a few winters ago annihilated the pavilion made famous by that great conductor, and now he too is gone. Far away the choicest spot on the island is, of course, " Man- hattan Beach." A railway was built to reach it, and the narrow gauge and rolling stock of the railway that ran within the Exposition grounds at Philadelphia were utilized. Two magnificent hotels stand on the property. The sand has been covered with soil and sod to the extent of several acres, and lawns, with handsome ornamental flower- beds, produce a grateful effect. The simple music pavilion. with open approach, has been converted into a spacious circular theater by the sea, where comic opera regales the visitor at night. Here, too, pyrotechnic displays of the most original character are nightly pro- vided. The musical celebrities have been Levy, the cornetist. Gilmore, and Sousa, and their splendidly appointed bands.
All these delights and the people who administered them, some of whom remained during the winter, came under the supervision of the town of Gravesend. This did not, in all respects, improve the morale of the township, and gave, finally, vast opportunities for political cor- ruption. And within this province of human activity Gravesend achieved notoriety. The town gained the attention of the whole coun- try in a startling manner at the election of November, 1893. The man at the head of the political machinery of the town, the " boss " of it. in short, was John Y. MeKane. He was apparently a most respecta- ble character. He had built a church for the Methodists, was a class leader, and the superintendent of their Sunday-school. In a county history, the description of him (probably dietated or inspired by him- self), is very touching. " But. above all else," says the writer, " stands the modesty and grace of a Christian character." And then there is a little unconscious showing of the cloven foot: " The demands which his position makes upon him every day in the week, render it specially difficult to live in strict observance of all religious duties." One of these difficulties was the ownership of a hall for prize fights, and other small indiscretions like this, such as West Brighton attractions were apt to encourage. The same inspired account gives a list of Me Kane's offices in the town : Supervisor, Police Commissioner, Presi- dent of the Town Board, President of the Board of Health, President of Police Board, President of the Water Board. Such a man, of course, owns a town, and he proposed. in 1893, that it not only should vote as he wanted it, but should poll so large a number of votes against a certain candidate whom he hated, as should defeat any majority that might be rolled up in his favor else- where in the county. And this is the way the Sunday-school
ROAD
11
LACER BEER
ARTES'S und BRUTAL
THE GRAVESEND ELECTION OUTRAGE-ASSAULT ON WATCHERS.
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superintendent undertook to do it: the population of Graves- end in 1890 was reported to be 8,400; the natural vote for such a num- ber of people, men, women, and children, would have been about 1,600. The registry rolls indicated that there were 6,200 voters. The candidate against whom this fine scheme was directed was Will- iam J. Gaynor, who was up for Justice of the Supreme Court. He exercised an undoubted right in sending clerks to copy the registry lists. These were beaten by MeKane's heelers, and arrested by his policemen for drunkenness and vagrancy. Mr. Gaynor obtained an order from Judge Cullen compelling the Inspectors of Election in Gravesend to produce the registration lists. The Inspectors con- cealed themselves and fled out of the State. For Election Day twelve watchers were appointed, and they went to Gravesend armed with injunctions from Judge Barnard to forbid MeKane interfering with them. Colonel Alexander S. Bacon tried to serve the injunction on MeKane, but he held his hands behind him, and used the now famous expression : " Injunctions don't go here." Colonel Bacon was locked up after being very roughly handled, and so were a few of the others. The rest returned to Brooklyn and reported how matters went. Colonel Bacon was released by an order from the Supreme Court. MeKane placed a strong guard around the polling booths. These had all been gathered into one spot on the plan of the old historic lay- ing out of Gravesend at its first settlement, whereby every district was described by lines emanating from a central plot. Having thus all the voting under his own eyes, 3,500 votes were cast of the 6,200 registered, which was still doing very well, considering that the ut- most limit of voters naturally could have been only 1,600. Of these thirty-five hundred votes, Gaynor received one hundred and five. Such an outrage upon the very basis of American institutions could not be passed over. The whole country was aroused by what was perpetrated in little Gravesend. Brooklyn was wild with indignation and horror. William Ziegler, a public-spirited citizen, of whom we shall hear more anon, offered to back Judge Gaynor (who was elected by a majority of over thirty thousand) to the amount of $100,000, if he would prosecute McKane. A large fund was raised. to which many citizens of Brooklyn subscribed small amounts, showing how generally the feeling of outraged American citizenship had spread, and a regular organization was formed to conduct the trial. The District Attorney then in office was not fully trusted by the people, and the Governor, at their solicitation, exercised the right to appoint Edward M. Shepard Deputy State Attorney to conduct the case. In bravado, McKane and his friends (who were not exclusively Sunday- school teachers), went off to Virginia on a shooting and fishing excur- sion after election, but upon his return he was arrested, and the trial began on December 30, 1893. On March 1, 1894, every sharp device and subterfuge having failed to save him, McKane was con-
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victed and sentenced to six years' imprisonment in the Sing Sing State Prison. Even then delays were caused by getting stays from judges on pleas of " reasonable doubt." There was an attempt made also to get the case under the review of the Supreme Court of the United States on some technicality. But the points presented were brushed aside by the judge as of no importance, with a strongly im- plied hint that it was mere trifling to have made the attempt at all. On April 28, 1898, MeKane finished his term in prison, all efforts to get him pardoned having fortunately failed. It was in the midst of all this excitement, the echoes of which rang around the country, that Gravesend was made ready for annexation, and on July 1, 1894, it passed into Brooklyn City, with New Utrecht, as the Thirty-first and Thirtieth wards, respectively.
Brooklyn, as thus enlarged, was undergoing some radical changes of appearance in the vicinity of its first most populous portion. The bridge made some very serious alterations in the region of the old " Ferry." Its encroachments were first visible ou Washington Street. The old St. Ann's Church, on the corner of Sands Street, had to go for the approach as first planned. On Sands Street the oldest Metho- dist Church in the city was swept away. Block after block was eaten up by the insatiable tracks of the bridge cars, ou Washington Street, demolishing finally the Brooklyn Institute, and threatening every- thing on the south side as far as the City Hall. For the rest the character of the street naturally changed for the worse. Here many of the old Brooklynites used to live in fine mansions, traces of whose departed glory can yet be discerned in their decay; and at 165 (later 189) it was that Seth Low was born, in the house occupied by the great shipping merchant, his father, A. A. Low. A proposition that was never carried ont was also inspired by the desire to perfect com- munication with the great structure so quickly become a main artery of travel, and contemplated a wide avenue direct to the bridge. following out the line of Flatbush Avenue. A commission to consider and report upon the feasibility of this plan was appointed by the Mayor, and met October 5, 1894. To this period must also be accred- ited the remarkable development of the Prospect Park slope, that long and steady decline from the park at Ninth Avenue, down past Eighth and Seventh, and Sixth as far as Fifth, and beyond. Between Ninth and Sixth, and from Flatbush Avenne to about where the num- bered system of streets begins, this section was fast filling up with the most elegant residences, occupied as soon as built. This brought the historie Reformed Church hither from Joralemon Street, and made every church in the vicinity a necessary success, for the kind of people dwelling in such homes-which really were homes, not staying- places, as flats are-were mostly such as made permanent and gen- erons supporters of churches.
An event of importance at this time was the death of Brooklyn's and
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America's greatest preacher and platform speaker, Henry Ward Beecher. He occupied his pulpit on Sunday, March3, 1887, and evinced no signs of failing in mind or health. On the next Sunday he was no more. He was stricken with apoplexy during the week, and on Friday, March 8, he died. The people of the city and of the whole country re- ceived the intelligence with deep emotion. At Albany the State Legis- lature passed a resolution to pay him State honors at his funeral. The Mayor ordered the flags of the city to be hung at half-mast. There had been a memorial service at the Academy of Music in honor of Gen. John A. Logan, and Beecher was to have spoken at it. The same com- mittee which had been in charge of this service was asked to take charge of Mr. Beecher's funeral. It was his own wish to have no dis- play of mourning, and the church was one mass of bright flowers.
Since the war two important newspapers gained a hold upon the Brooklyn public. The Daily Union was founded in 1863, S. B. Chit- tenden, A. A. Low, and about sixty other Republicans being among the originators. In 1869 its success warranted the erection of a build- ing at the corner of Front and Fulton streets. In 1870 it was bought by Hemy C. Bowen, and Stewart 1. Woodford, Minister to Spain when the late war broke out, was made editor. Somehow snecess did not attend its steps to any satisfactory degree, and in 1877 it was com- bined with the Argus, the title of the united sheets being Union-Argus. The Argus had been started in 1866, but it failed to meet with a large circulation. The Eagle, meantime, was continuing its career of pros- perity. Its large building in the lower part of Fulton Street was be- coming entirely inadequate as a home for it. The Brooklyn Theater property was bought, the building removed, and upon the site was erected a splendid edifice nine stories high. On July 4, 1892. the whole establishment was transferred to the new and commodious quarters, an event well worthy of note in Brooklyn history.
Social life in the enlarged city was enhanced by the organization of two more clubs. The Union League Club was incorporated in 1888. It was the outgrowth of the Social Republican Club of the Twenty- third Ward, formed in 1887. Its object was expressed thus: "To promote social intercourse, to advance the cause of good government, to interest and direct in politics citizens who have hitherto been in- different to their political duties, to encourage attendance at primary meetings, and to perform such other work as may best conserve the welfare of the Republican party." The club had one hundred and forty members in 1889; in 1890 they had grown to seven hundred and fifty. A clubhouse was built in 1890 on the corner of Bedford Ave- nne and Dean Street, fronting ninety-six feet on the former and fifty- five on the latter. On Bedford Avenue, by subscription of a number of the members, but not as an act of the club, a fine statue of General Grant was erected. A more purely social club was the Montauk, or. ganized in December, 1888, and incorporated in March, 1889. Its fine
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house was completed in May, 1891, the cost of the building being $162,686, and its furnishing, $29,586. It stands on Eighth Avenue, Lincoln Place, and the Plaza Circle, its design being Venetian, with loggias, balconies, and rose windows in plenty. The limit to the uum- ber of members was set at five hundred, which was filled in a few months. It was also during the period now in hand that Brooklyn's handsome armories were built, that of the Thirteenth Regiment, oc- cupying nearly the entire block bounded by Sumner, Jefferson, and Putnam avenues; that of the Fourteenth, on Eighth Avenue, Four- teenth and Fifteenth streets; that of the Twenty-third, on Bedford and Atlantic avenues, and Pacific Street.
About the time the bridge was building Brooklyn became noted for its great drygoods emporiums. They started in business first on Fulton Street, in the vicinity of Tillary and Johnson streets. But not many years after the bridge was finished, while everything seemed to be in the heyday of success, one of the most prosperons of the concerns suddenly moved to Fulton Street, between Lawrence and Duffield, op- posite the site of the old Dutch Church in the middle of the road. People thought it was a movement so injudicions as to border on the insane. But it was an act of remarkable foresight. Others of the famous firms followed suit, till, as we said on the first page of this volume, the very heart of business and bustle is now where once all that was Brooklyn (or Breuckelen) tremblingly began its life. And, as a consequence, the neighborhood where these famous emporiums once did business has utterly changed in character. The deserted buildings still stand unocenpied. The fine iron structure of the De- posit Company, with 1868 upon its top, is a silent and desolate witness of the turn in the tide of business. The Brooklyn Savings Bank has been utilized as a Salvation Army " Barracks." Only the wholesale houses that deal in flour or groceries or paints near the ferry keep at their old stands and do their old business. But, otherwise, from the ferry to nearly Court Street, Fulton Street is in a state of desolation. There have been fluctuations in its fortunes before. Anterior to 1850, Dr. Stiles writes : " The principal business portion of the city was in the neighborhood of Fulton Ferry. All the banks, insurance com- panies, and newspaper offices were gathered in the immediate neigh- borhood; the lawyers congregated about the corner of Front and Ful- ton streets, and, in fact, the first block of Fulton Street was the ex- change of Brooklyn, where the prominent men of the city were most apt to be found during business hours. The building of the City Hall altered this, for all the lawyers and most of the incorporated institu- tions moved to that place, and it became the business center. How- ever, there is another change [in 1869], and the lower part of Fulton Street is resuming its former bustle and activity, and, as a business center. is rivaling the ' Hall."" It is to be feared that from the present desertion there will be no return to better things.
THE MCKANE TRIAL-SENTENCE PRONOUNCED.
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As was related in the preceding chapter, Brooklyn received a Post- office Building worthy of it as one of the chief cities in the land, in 1892. In 1887 a Real Estate Exchange was organized, incorporated in 1889, the capital then being $100,000. This was increased later to $250,000, and a handsome building was put up and ready for use in 1890, at a cost of $250,000. A feature of recent Brooklyn business enterprise has been the erection of splendid fireproof storage houses, for the safe keeping of furniture and other valuables. This was the result of the insecurity felt by people after the exposure of the inade- quaey of the Brooklyn Fire Department. Upon the site of Talmage's Tabernacle was built the structure of the Brooklyn Warehouse and Storage Company. The company was organized in 1892, among its trustees being Chauncey M. Depew, H. Walter Webb, William R. Grace, and other prominent men. The building has the appearance of a Moorish fortress. It is nine stories high, has a frontage on Scher- merhorn Street of 225 feet, and is 100 feet deep. No wood has been used in its construction anywhere. Its safe deposit vaults have eight
lumdred compartments, with room for two hundred more. Three
freight elevators and one for passengers are provided in it. Its cost was six hundred thousand dollars, and it was opened for business on December 4, 1893. An event of no small interest has been the evolu- tion of the Wallabout Market into its present proportions and ap- pearance. Markets used to be associated with everything shabby and offensive to sight and smell. Now they present handsome build- ings in New York, and the Wallabout is not ontdone by any of these. At first land east of Washington Avenue was only borrowed from the Government. In 1877 a bill was passed providing for the appointment of three commissioners to consider " a proposition to exchange or sell navy yard lands between Clinton and Washington avennes." No satisfactory arrangements were arrived at until in 1891 Brooklyn pur- chased the grounds on which the market was established, for seven hundred thousand dollars. In 1893 the lessees were notified that they must erect substantial buildings on the sites they were occupying by the former permits, or vacate their holdings. Thus arose the unpre- tentious, but neat and pretty, two-story brick market honses, uniform throughout, with quaint crow-stepped gables at frequent intervals to give a faint flavor of the old Dutch times. The market square is nine hundred feet long and two hundred and forty feet wide, and six hundred market wagons can dispose of their contents here in one day.
In the line of industry we come now upon an event of unusual in- terest at the time it occurred, but which subsequent and recent devel- opments have invested with a surpassing and even thrilling concern. This was the building of the heavily armored cruiser, or battleship of the second class, the MAINE. The Brooklyn Navy Yard had the honor of being selected for the construction of this now famous ship
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Even in anticipation of its building it attracted extraordinary atten- tion, as being the first attempt of the Government to build a first- class modern warship in one of its own navy yards. It was announced to be the largest vessel ever put into the water by the United States; and it was to be a wholly American vessel, in design, material, con. struction. Indeed. the work of building her machinery was one of the greatest, if not the greatest, marine-engine construction ever at- tempted in this country. The Quintard Iron Works were the only bidders for so huge an undertaking, and their figure was $735,000. The Maine was authorized by Congress on August 3, 1886; the plans were approved November 1, 1887; bids for materials were opened June 4, 1888, and the first keel plate was laid October 10, 1888. It was but natural that Brooklyn should have watched with eager attention so remarkable a construction going on at the Navy Yard. No less than five hundred men were employed upon the great work, which also made considerable business for the city in other ways. The date set for the launching was Tuesday, November 18, 1890, and a gala day it was for all Brooklyn. There was a great demand for tickets. The work of getting ready for the launch was itself an enormous under. taking. Divers and pile-drivers were busy for several weeks con- structing the launching ways from the stern of the vessel to the water, a distance of fifty feet. On the day of the great event there were present Mayors Grant, of New York, and Chapin, of Brooklyn, Major- General O. O. Howard, commanding the U. S. Army, and one whose fame was not as universal then as now,-Commodore Dewey. Of Brooklyn men present the most prominent were J. S. T. Stranahan, and Dr. T. De Witt Tahnage. Secretary of the Navy Benjamin F. Tracy, himself a Brooklyn man, arrived with his granddaughter, Miss Alice Tracy Wilmerding, who was to do the christening. Ex-Secre- tary of the Navy William C. Whitney was also present, being greeted with extreme cordiality by his successor. At 12.44, noon, precisely, the vessel moved along its stays, and glided gracefully into its ele- ment. The vessels of the Navy present on the occasion, and honoring it with salutes and flag displays, were the Philadelphia, Chicago, Ver- mont, Yankee, Boston, Yorktown, Dolphin, and Despatch. Now fol- lowed the important work of placing the engines, which were re- quired to develop 9,000 horse-power. The dock trial of the engines occurred on September 3, 1894; the sea trial on September 25, 1894, the speed recorded being 18.37 knots; and the ship was put in commis- sion September 17, 1895. She was presented with a silver service by the people of Maine at Portland on November 26, 1895. And so she went forth to her disastrous fate, to be blown up in Havana Harbor on February 15, 1898. The superstitious will take comfort from the fact that the U. S. Ship Trenton, destroyed by the hurricane at Samoa, in March, 1888, was also built at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. being launched on January 1, 1876, and no vessel having been con-
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structed there between these two ill-fated ones. With a view to the sad ending of the Maine, it is pathetic to read some statements con- temporaneous with her construction and launching. " Extraordinary care was taken by the Government," says one, " to insure the quality and fitness of every piece of iron and steel that was required for the construction of the cruiser's hull and machinery." Another said, in comment on the foregoing: " There are, however, many officers who have expressed their disapproval of the vessel for the purposes for which she was designed, but her capabilities will probably be tried at some future time." As a warship she never had that time of trial. as we all know now. On the day of the launching, November 18, 1890, it was said: " The old admirals and officers of lesser rank had seen many warships launched, but here was one of another kind. Will she ever make a figure? Will she achieve distinction? " Surely she has; she never fired a shot at the enemy, but she has done more to injure the perfidious Spaniards by rousing all the navy to the pitch of the highest heroism and determination, than if she had fired her batteries a hundred times.
Brooklyn was treated to a water famine for a few days in November, 1891. While constructing a new line of water-pipes near the Ridge. wood Reservoir, a landslide occurred, burying four men. At the same time a water-main burst, the old pipes that were being removed being very faulty, and the contractors who put in the new ones care- less in handling the defective pipes. For a day or two the greater part of the city was without water, and enterprising peddlers came in with barrels of it filled at country wells, which they sold for ten cents a pitcher. In connection with the waterworks a conspicuous object, both useful and ornamental, was erected in 1893. This was the now familiar water-tower on Prospect Hill. It is of the Norman Gothic order of architecture and looks like a donjon-keep minus its castle. Its top reaches a height of three hundred and forty feet above tide-water, which is sixty-four feet higher than the bridge towers. The tower itself is one hundred and sixty feet high, its foundation being one hundred and eighty feet above tide-water. It is fifty feet in diameter at the base and twenty-five at the top; its material is rongh-dressed dark red granite laid in ashlar courses. Itissurmounted by a tiled roof supported by columns, above a platform for outlook. There is a winding stairs between the outer wall and the iron stand- pipe within, which is seventy-five feet high and eleven in diameter, and capable of holding 115,000 gallons of water. One hundred and forty steps, three feet wide, lead to the top. Its cost was $85,000, the estimated cost being $100.000. In connection with the waterworks, again. a revelation was made of municipal methods which roused the people to use their power to rebuke those who were running the city for their own pockets. East New York, or New Lots, had had its own waterworks before it became a part of Brooklyn; the law annexing it
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