USA > New York > New York and its institutions, 1609-1871. A library of information, pertaining to the great metropolis, past and present > Part 8
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In 1790 the first sidewalks on Manhattan were laid. They. extended along Broadway, from Vesey to Murray street, and on the opposite side for the same distance along the Bride- well fence. These were narrow pavements of brick, flag-
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1
STREETS AND AVENUES OF NEW YORK.
stone being yet unknown to the authorities. No plan for numbering the streets was considered until 1793, when a crude system was introduced. The old cobble-stone pave- ments have been succeeded by the Belgian or square-stone ; and of late the Nicolson and the Stafford, different. styles of wooden, have been introduced. A concrete pavement, com- posed of gravel, broken stone, cinders, coal ashes, mixed in definite proportions with tar, pitch, resin, and asphaltum, has been spread over the streets, with tolerable success in some instances, and perfect failure in others. Eighty-five miles of the Belgian have been laid, which probably gives the best satisfaction of any introduced. It consists of blocks of bluish trap-rock, made slightly pyramidal in form, and set in sand with the base upward. It is very even and durable.
The avenues, from First to Twelfth, numbering from .the . East river, are designed to be eight miles long (except the Sixth and Seventh, which are cut off by Central Park), are one hundred feet wide (except Lexington and Madison, which are eighty feet), and one thousand feet apart. The cross streets are from one mile to two and a half miles in length, sixty feet wide (except one in ten, which is one hun- dred), and two hundred and sixty feet apart. The first city railroad was constructed in 1852, and opened with great cere- mony, the President of the United States officiating. There are now seventeen lines of horse cars, and numerous omnibus lines, which carry in the aggregate a hundred million passen- gers annually. These run continuously in all directions, though most of them pass or terminate near the City Hall, which is still the great centre of business attraction. The one hundred and ten monthly magazines, the thirteen daily, and the two hundred and forty weekly, newspapers are nearly all printed within sight of the City Hall, Park Row and Printing House square producing many of them.
The City Hall, the centre of the city 'government, the Court House, the HIall of Records, the printing, the general Post Office, the principal wholesaling, insurance, and banking
108
NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
houses, being clustered in the lower part of the city, make it. the business centre toward which everything still converges. The principal ferries to New Jersey, Staten Island, and Brooklyn make their landings opposite this locality ; and op- . posite this point is now being constructed the lofty East river bridge. Streets in this locality are crowded with cars, carriages, omnibuses, loaded carts, and wagons of every de- scription, from dawn 'till dark, at all seasons of the year, heat and storm but slightly interfering with the busy programme. Bankers, merchants, clerks, agents, in fine, persons of both sexes, and of every age, calling, and country, go rushing by with such rapidity that the modest countryman, though anx ious to cross one of these surging thoroughfares, finds himself much in the situation of the rustic in Horace, who stood wait- ing on the bank for the river to run by.
The two principal lines of uptown travel are through Hud- son street and Eighth avenue on the west, and Bowery and Third avenue on the east. The elevated railroad, the track laid on iron posts about sixteen feet above the pavement, passes up Greenwich street and Ninth avenue. Various methods for securing rapid transit are being agitated at this time. The plan for the " Pneumatic Tunnel" involves the construction of an underground road, commencing at South Ferry, extending under Broadway to Central Park and above that point, together with a Fourth avenue branch to Harlem river. The company claim that, when the road is completed, they will be able to transport more than twenty thousand persons per hour each way.
The " Underground Railroad" proper, is another inde- pendent and separate enterprise.
The " Arcade Railway," if constructed, contemplates the use of the width of the streets and avenues under which it passes, excepting five feet on each side, to secure the founda- tions of the buildings. The road will contain sidewalks, roadway, lamp posts, telegraph wires, hydrants, and sewers, the whole covered with arches of solid masonry, rendered
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WALL STREET.
water-tight, and supported by heavy iron columns. The routes selected are the line of Broadway from the Battery to the intersection of Ninth avenue, thence to Hudson river ; also branching at Union square, and following the line of Fourth avenue to the Harlem river. It is estimated to cost over $2,000,000.
The " Viaduct Railway" is another style of elevated road. This wealthy company proposes to erect its lower depot at Tryon Row, causing its road to form an easy connection with the East river bridge. This road, if constructed, will run through the rear of the blocks, have a line on the east- ern and one on the western side of the city, each extend- ing to Westchester County. It is to be built on brick arches, supported by heavy iron columns, which will them- selves stand on inverted arches of solid masonry constructed in the ground. It is estimated to cost from $10,000,000 to $20,000,000. One of these roads is certain to be constructed at no distant day.
Nassau, a narrow and gloomy street, has long been the trade centre of cheap and miscellaneous books, though much of this has lately found its way up town.
WALL STREET.
Wall, a short and crooked street, though immensely straighter than many who spend their time in it, is the great financial centre of the country, and is lined for the most part with magnificent banking-houses. On the corner of Nassau, stretching from Wall to Pine, and fronting on each. stands what was originally the Custom House, now the Sub- Treasury, a white-marble fire-proof building, ninety feet hy two hundred, with a rotunda sixty feet in diameter, the dome supported by sixteen Corinthian pillars. The building occu- pies the site of the old Federal Hall, where President Wash- ington was inaugurated ; it is a partial imitation of the Par- thenon at Athens, and cost nearly twelve hundred thousand
110
NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
dollars. Here the Government deposits its one hundred millions of gold, and here its great monetary transactions are made. In the basement is the pension bureau. Farther down, and on the opposite side of the street, stands what was built for the Merchants' Exchange. It covers an entire block; its portico is supported by twelve front, four centre, and two rear Ionic columns thirty-eight feet long, four and a half in diameter, each formed from a single granite block weighing forty-five tons. The rotunda is eighty feet in diameter, and the crown of the dome, which rests on eight Corinthian columns of Italian marble, is one hundred and twenty-four feet high. It was built many years ago, by an incorporated company, and cost $1,800,000. It was pur- chased by the Government several years since for $1,000,000 and is now the United States Custom House. As London is England, so, in a sense, Wall street is New York, if not America. Here " Bears" and "Bulls" in sheep's clothing meet in frequent and fierce rencounter, and alternately claw and gore each other. Beneath the frowns of the lofty spire of old Trinity, these calculating votaries of mammon play with fortunes as boys do with bubbles, and while a few rise and soar, many decline and burst. Wall street seldom contains above fifteen millions of gold outside the Sub-Treasury, but the nec- essary and speculative transactions in this alone amount daily to seventy millions, and on the 24th of September, 1869, amounted to several hundred millions, one broker alone pur- chasing to the amount of sixty millions. The gold transac- tions of 1869 are said to have reached thirty billions, and the aggregate business of Governments and stocks, to have also exceeded twenty billions. The rapidity with which money is counted, and vast amounts of stocks, bonds, and miscellaneous securities exchanged, is perfectly astonishing. Most of the counter-trade is performed by young men and striplings, the advanced and calculating minds spending most of their time in the private office. The most crowded and busy centres of
111
BROAD STREET-BROADWAY.
New York appear cheap and tame, after spending an hour in Wall street.
BROAD STREET.
The continuation of the narrow Nassau proper south of Wall street, having all at once strangely widened, is called Broad street. During the last few years brokers and specu- lators of every description have crowded into its silent pre- cincts, until it has become the most noisy and tumultuous speculative centre on the island. Here stands the elegant marble structure containing the far-famed, gorgeously fur- nished Gold Room, where the daily sales take place, often amid such excitement and din as we cannot describe. The Board of Brokers was organized in 1794, and the entrance fee has risen from fifty dollars to three thousand. The Board numbers about four hundred and seventy members in good standing. Each member has a safe in the vault, with a combination lock. The Board claims to be composed of honest and honorable men only. Besides this there are various other specific boards of all kinds of speculators -- stock-brokers gold-brokers, oil-brokers, and cliques-uniting and dissolving as occasion may offer opportunities of gain to ambitious and unscrupulous men. Among these originate the gold scrambles, the railroad wars, the raid on the banks, and other panics which crowd the streets with well-dressed, but frenzied men, some flushed and violent, some pale and staggering, turning prematurely gray over the wreck of their earthly · hopes.
BROADWAY.
Broadway begins at Castle Garden, the extreme southern point of Manhattan, unites at the Central Park with the Boulevard, making the longest street on the island, thirteen and one-half miles, and is lighted by over one thousand gas lamps. This street is eighty feet wide, and contains many
112
NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
of the principal business houses, hotels, and places of amuse- ment. Not a few of these cover an entire block, are built of marble or iron, are five, six, and sometimes seven stories above ground, and two below, with well-lighted vaults extending to near the centre of the streets. Broadway is the glittering promenade of wealth, beauty, fashion, and curiosity.
-FIFTH AVENUE.
While Eighth avenue is the principal avenue for business purposes, Fifth avenue is distinguished for the splendor of its private residences, to which, with the exception of a few magnificent churches and institutions, it is entirely devoted. It begins at Washington square, near the centre of the city, and extends northward in a perfectly straight line for six miles, and is pre-eminently the street of palaces. The build- ings are large, constructed of marble, or of the several varie- ties of free-stone, the fronts ornamented with cornices, entablatures, porticos, and columns, elegantly carved and sculptured. Everything is massive and expensive, and the surrounding streets so far partake of its magnificence that one may travel miles amid unbroken lines of palatial splen- dor. Here dwell the millionaires who control so largely the shipping, the railroad, the banking, and the legislative inter- ests of the country. Much unoccupied space still remains on this peerless avenue for wealth and genius to lavish their dazzling inventions. For the relief of Broadway, Laurens street is now being widened and made to connect Fifth ave- nue with West Broadway. This opens another general
thoroughfare for uptown travel, and will probably attract its share of business firms. It will greatly disturb the quiet and, mar the beauty of the lower portion of this brilliant avenue, and already a number of its palaces, near Union square, have been converted into business houses.
.
7
THE BOULEVARD.
We live in a fast age, and New Yorkers are a fast people ; hence, it seemed intolerable to some that the law regulating driving at the Park should restrict every man to six miles an hour, and arrest summarily every blood who dared to disre- gard the rule. Nor was the private trotting course between the Park and High Bridge adequate to the demand. A great public drive, broad and long, where hundreds of fleet horses could be exercised in a single hour, was the demand that came welling up from the hearts of thousands. . One was accordingly laid ont on the line of the old Bloomingdale Road, beginning at Fifty-ninth street with an immense circle for turning vehicles. On the 21st of September, 1868, the work of grading commenced ; and during 1869 an average force of 740 men was employed. This street extends from Fifty-ninth to One Hundred and Fifty-fifth street, a distance of about five miles, is one hundred and fifty feet wide, with a narrow line of shrubbery and flowers extending through the centre, defended by solid curbstones. In the construc- tion of this street it was found necessary to remove, by exca vation and blasting, 350,000 cubic yards of rock and earth, and to provide and deposit 300,000 cubic yards in certain depressed localities, to perfect the grade. The bed of the street is formed of set stone, covered with pounded stone, after which it is graveled, rolled, and the surface otherwise improved. The sidewalks are very capacious. This street is expected to be one of the later wonders of Manhattan, and land is held at fabulous prices along its entire length.
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
IV.
THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN.
HOTELS, ASTOR HOUSE-FIFTH AVENUE-ST. NICHOLAS-GRAND CENTRAL-COOPER INSTITUTE-ACADEMY OF DESIGN-THEATERS- AMERICAN BIBLE HOUSE-PUBLISHING HOUSES-THE PARK BANK LIFE INSURANCE BUILDINGS-CITY HALL-NEW YORK COURT- HOUSE-NEW YORK POST-OFFICE-STORES : A. T. STEWART'S- CLAFLIN'S-LORD & TAYLOR'S-TIFFANY & CO .- NUMBER OF- 1 BUILDINGS.
HE architecture of Manhattan has greatly varied in the different periods of its history. As in all new settle- ments where timber abounds, the first build- ings were constructed of logs. Indeed, nothing else appears to have been employed until 1647, when the first stone house was finished, an event of such transcendent importance, that the generous Dutch celebrated it by drinking one hundred and twenty-eight gallons of liquor on the occasion. During the first forty years after the settlement of Manhattan, the old Holland style of architec- ture entirely prevailed. Some of these buildings had narrow foundations, with high peaked roofs ; others were broader at their base, one, and sometimes two stories high ; the gables, which always faced the streets, were sometimes of brick, but oftener of shingles rounded at the end. Many of the roofs were bevelled, projecting at the eaves sufficiently to shelter a small regiment of troops. The gutters of many of the houses extended to near the centre of the streets, to the great an- noyance of travelers in rainy weather. The front entrance was usually ornamented with a high wooden porch called a stoop, where the women spent the shady part of the day.
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ASTOR HOUSE
ASTOR HOUSE-Broadway, Barclay and Vesey Streets.
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115
THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN.
The more important buildings such as the "Stuyvesant Huys." near the water edge, now Moore and Front streets, and the " Stadt-Huys " or City Hall, on Pearl street, were set in the foreground, to be more readily seen from the river and bay. The first buildings erected on Wall street were block-houses.
But if this Holland style lacked elegance, it possessed the merit of durability. One in a fine state of preservation taken down in 1827, was marked 1698, and many after stand- ing more than one hundred years showed no signs of decay. The last of these Knickerbockers has now disappeared from Manhattan, though they still linger on Long Island, and up the Hudson. The English conquest introduced a greater variety, which has continued to change and multiply its forms until the present time. As early as 1670, stone and brick were principally employed ; iron, so extensively used at pres- ent, has been introduced during the last thirty years. A builder in Water street, about the beginning of the Revolution, exchanged leaden sash for wooden, a novelty too great for the times, for the trustees of Trinity after the great fire of 1778 still retained the leaden frame.
The architecture at present may be said to be thoroughly eclectic, as nearly every style known to the student may be found, several at times blending, in the same edifice. Trin- ity church on Broadway, is of the Gothic; St. George's in Stuyvesant square, of the Byzantine ; St. Paul's Methodist Episcopal, on Fourth avenue, is of the Romanesque ; the City Hall is of the Italian; the Tombs of the Egyptian ; while the Synagogues present the Moresque, and the distinctive form of the Hebrew style.
HOTELS .- The hotels form an important part of every large town, and in many instances one of their chief attractions. What would Clifton, or Saratoga, or New York be to the great traveling public, without their hotels. The hotels of New York rank among the largest and finest in the world Among them may be mentioned the Astor, Metropolitan, St. Nicholas, St. James, St. Cloud, Hoffman, Everett, Claren-
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
don, New York, Fifth Avenue, Grand Central, Gilsey, and a hundred more, many of which are of equal notoriety.
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FIFTH AVENUE HOTEL.
THE ASTOR HOUSE was erected in 1836, by John Jacob Astor, then the richest man in America. It is a six-story granite, on Broadway, overlooking the City Hall Park, and covers the spot where Mr. Astor resided during most of his business life. The front extends across a narrow block, and the building affords accommodations for six hundred guests. Architecture on Manhattan has so. decidedly improved since its erection, that its glory has long since departed. Its exte- rior appears sombre and heavy, its windows are small and unadorned, no balcony or colonnade tempts the inmates into public view, and its single massive entrance is not really in- viting. Under the management of the Stetsons it has, how -. ever, long ranked among the very first hotels of America.
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THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN.
FIFTH AVENUE hotel stands opposite Madison square, at the junction of Broadway, Fifth avenue, and Twenty-third street. The structure is of white marble, six stories high, fronting on three streets, and after devoting, as is the custom, most of its first floor to stores, has accommodations for a thousand guests. It is beautifully located and forms a rich center of fashion and speculation. It was erected and is still owned by Mr. Amos R. Eno, formerly a New-England youth and the architect of his own fortune.
THE ST. NICHOLAS, opened in 1854, stands. on Broadway, between Broome and Spring streets. The structure is of white marble and brown freestone, is six stories high, with six hundred rooms, and can accommodate a thousand persons. The St. Nicholas is also a richly furnished hotel, conducted on the American or full-board plan, and has been the theater of many brilliant occasions.
THE GRAND CENTRAL hotel, opened August 24, 1870, is the largest in the United States. It stands on Broadway between Amity and Bleecker streets, with a frontage of 175 feet, and extends to Mercer street, being 200 feet in depth. It covers the ground once occupied by the Lafarge House, afterwards the Southern Hotel and the Winter Garden Theatre. The edifice is constructed of brick and marble, is ten stories high, and covers fourteen full lots, for some of which Mr. Higgins paid eighty-three thousand dollars apiece. The dining-room affords space for 600 persons to sit at table at once; the plate and furniture are magnificent, costing half a million, and the arrangements for observation, health, and comfort, the most exquisite. The building is 127 feet high at the cornice, which is surmounted by a heavy Mansard roof, the top of the flag-staff being 197 feet above the pavement. Thirty miles of steam coil are employed in heating the edi- fice, the floors amount to 350,000 square feet, requiring seven acres of carpeting, besides an acre of marble tiling ; and the cooks, waiters, chambermaids, hallmen, and clerks amount to
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
GRAND CENTRAL HOTEL, BROADWAY, OPPOSITE BOND STREET.
a small brigade. The price of board is $3, $3.50, and $4 per day.
COOPER INSTITUTE, a fine six-story brown-stone, covering a block between Seventh and Eighth streets, Third and Fourth avenues, is a munificent donation from the man whose name it bears, and cost nearly half a million. Its enlightened pro- jector grew up in poverty, with scanty means of culture, and the building is the fruit of frugal toil, coupled with a long- cherished desire to promote a knowledge of science and art. among the laboring classes. It contains vast halls for lec- tures, a fine reading-room, evening-schools for young ladies, mechanics, and apprentices, galleries of art, and collections of rare inventions. The large lecture-room in the basement is the most popular public hall in the city, and has echoed to
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THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN.
COOPER UNION. (Eighth street, between Third and Fourth avenues.)
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the eloquence of the most noted men of this country, and many from Europe. It was in this hall that Red Cloud de- livered his great address in the early summer of 1870. The first floor of the building is rented for stores, and brings an income of nearly thirty thousand dollars.
The Free Night Classes in Cooper Union had an average attendance during February, 1871, as follows: School of Sei- ence, 276; School of Art, 643; School of Telegraphy, 35; Scientific Lectures, 545; Oratory Class, 100; total, 1,563. The new classes in English literature and the French lan- guage were attended by 200 and 100, respectively, bringing up the general total of attendance to over 1,800. The School of Design for girls and women has been attended by over eighty daily, and that of Engraving for women by 26. . The
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
number of visitors to the free reading -room was 29,383 ; num- ber of books used, 4,509.
ACADEMY OF DESIGN.
THE ACADEMY OF DESIGN, on the corner of Fourth avenne and Twenty-third street, though not particularly large, is still a building before which the observer will pause, to glance at its Gothic windows and marble walls of many colors, col- lected from various parts of Europe and America. The vis- itor is not slow to conclude that the exterior is, indeed, one of design.
THEATERS .- The first building erected for a theater on the island was in 1761, and opened with the tragedy of "Fair Penitent." The mob destroyed it during the excitement oc- casioned by the "Stamp Act," in 1766. The business has .proved so profitable, that, notwithstanding the fearful havoc made among these houses of wicked amusement by fires and other casualties, they have always been too numerous, and far
(The above cut represents but half the present building.)
THE ASTOR LIBRARY-La Fayette Place, near 8th Street.
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W. KUBE HES. SC.MY.
BIBLE HOUSE, Astor Place, New York.
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THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN.
BOOTH'S THEATER.
too largely patronized for the interests of good morals. About twenty houses of this kind are now maintained ; many of them are of costly constructure, the Academy of Music, Fisk's Grand Opera House, Booth's New Theater, Niblo's, and Wallack's ranking among the first.
THE ASTOR LIBRARY BUILDING, in Lafayette Place, with an imposing entablature, marble steps and floor, is the largest and finest library-room in America. It was projected by the bequest of John Jacob Astor, and afterwards enlarged by his son William B. Astor. The accompanying cut represents the original structure and but half of the building as it now stands.
THE AMERICAN BIBLE HOUSE, a plain six-story brick, with . cellar and vaults, was completed in 1853, at a cost, including ground, of $303,000. It covers three-fourths of an acre, form-
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
ing a front on four streets, of 710 feet. The fronts on Fourth avenue and Astor place are divided into five sections each. The principal entrance on Fourth avenue is decorated with four round columns with Corinthian capitals and moulded bases, resting upon paneled and moulded pedestals, and semi- circular arches are placed between the columns to form the heads of doors, and all surmounted with a heavy cornice and segment pediments. The boilers are placed in the area in the centre of the building, so inclosed as not likely to endanger the operatives in case of accident. Fifty stores and offices are rented in the building, mostly to benevolent societies, bringing an income of nearly $40,000, and making the Bible House the principal centre of benevolent and reformatory movements for the city and State. The Society was organized in 1816, since which its receipts have considerably exceeded $5,000,000. It has printed the Scriptures in twenty-nine dia- lects, assisted in publishing and circulating many of the one hundred and eighty-five versions issued by the British and Foreign Bible Society, and has three times canvassed the en- tire United States, supplying hundreds of thousands of desti- tute families with the Word of God. The Society employs about five hundred hands, and carries on every branch of its vast business in its own building. The Bible House is visited annually by thousands of strangers, and can scarcely cease to be an object of profoundest interest.
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