USA > New York > New York and its institutions, 1609-1871. A library of information, pertaining to the great metropolis, past and present > Part 9
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THE PUBLISHING HOUSES of New York form an imposing and interesting department of the city. The buildings of the Harpers, the Appletons, and of Charles Scribner & Co., are very extensive. The new Methodist Publishing and Mission Buildings, corner of Broadway and Eleventh street, are the headquarters of the most extensive denominational publish- ing interests in the world. The enterprise began in Philadel- phia in 1789, with a borrowed capital of $600. In 1804 it was removed to New York, and in 1836 was destroyed by fire, inflicting a loss of $250,000 upon the denomination. Besides paying for various church interests $1,335,866.25, the agents
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THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN
in 1868 reported a net capital of $1,165,624.55, which has since been increased to over $1,500,000. The new buildings
METHODIST PUBLISHING AND MISSION BUILDING. (Broadway, corner Eleventh street.)
on Broadway were purchased in April, 1869, and cost nearly a million dollars. . The structure is of iron, with five lofty stories, and a basement which extends nineteen feet under Broadway and fourteen feet under Eleventh street, and has a . floor of nearly half an acre. Besides furnishing salerooms for books and periodicals, elegant offices for agents, editors, missionary secretaries, rooms for committees, preachers' meet- ings, etc., etc., enough is still rented to pay the interest on the cost of the entire building.
Many of the periodicals of New York are issued from colossal iron-fronted structures, which would have been an astonishment to our fathers. . The Herald building, covering the site of Barnum's old museum, is perhaps among the finest
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
of this class. The Times building, erected several years earlier, is another fine structure, occupying a commanding position at the head of Park Row, that ominous center of compositors and printing ink. Near by stands Printing-
NEW YORK HERALD BUILDING AND PARK BANK. (Broadway, corne, Ann street.)
House square, in or around which are published the Tribune, World, Observer, Sun, Day-Book, Examiner and Chronicle, Scientific American, Evening Muil, Baptist Union, Rural New Yorker, Independent, the Agriculturist, Methodist, Christian Union, etc.
RIBUNE
WORLD
NEW YORK
TIMES
TENING MAIL
ICA
SHEER
ER
TRACT SOCIETY
Al ARY ROW
MERICAN NEWS PAPER ADVERTISING AGENCY
GEO. P. ROWELL.& COMPANY
١ × ١٠٠١
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THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN. ,
THE PARK BANK, adjoining the Herald building and facing St. Paul's (Episcopal) church, is an elaborate and colossal mar- ble structure, erected at vast expense, and forms one of the most striking architectural wonders on lower Broadway. The interior is if possible more exquisite in its appointments than the exterior. The offices and business parlors of its chief officers are cushioned and otherwise gilded and adorned in the richest manner.
THE LIFE INSURANCE COMPANIES have of late virtually un- dertaken to excel all others in architectural enterprises. The building just reared by the Equitable Life Insurance Com- pany, on the corner of Cedar street and Broadway, is an ex- ample of what men and money can accomplish, and may be termed one of the later wonders of Manhattan. It has a frontage of 87 feet on Broadway, is 187 feet deep on Cedar street, and is 137 feet high. . Its massive iron columns and substantial construction give the surest evidence of perman- ency.
The building of the New York Life Insurance Company, . corner of Broadway and Leonard street, is scarcely less strik- ing. It is constructed of white marble in the Ionic order, its chief entrance-way being richly ornamented. The public need not be alarmed at the report of the millions lavished by the managers of these companies on imposing business temples, as the demand for first-class offices is so great that a large revenue is annually realized from the investment.
THE CITY HALL, commenced in 1803 and completed in 1811, was for many years the finest edifice in America. It is . 216 feet long. and 105 wide. The front and ends are of white marble and the rear of New York free-stone. The Mayor, clerk of the common council, and many other officials occupy its rooms. On the second floor is the Governor's room, 52 by 20 feet, used for the reception of distinguished visitors. It contains General Washington's writing-desk, on which he penned his first message to Congress, and is decorated with inany fine portraits of the Governors of New York, and other
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' NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
distinguished Americans. The building is surmounted by a tower containing a bell weighing over 9,000 pounds, and a
CITY HALL.
cupola in which is a four-dial clock of superior workmanship, and is otherwise ornamented with a figure of Justice. The building cost over half a million, a large sum for those days. In the rear of the City Hall, and fronting on Chambers street, the authorities have been for eight years engaged in the erec- tion of the NEW. YORK COURT-HOUSE. The building is 250 feet long, 150 wide, and the crown of the dome when com- pleted will be 210 feet above the pavement. . The walls are of Massachusetts white marble, the beams, staircases, and out- side doors are of iron, while black walnut and the choicest Georgia-pine are employed in finishing the interior. Some of the iron beams and girders weigh over twenty-five tons each. The halls are all covered with marble tiling. The main entrance on Chambers street is reached by a flight of
New YORK LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY BUILDING-Corner Broadway and Leonard Streets. drop Copia dela
EQUITABLE LAPE INSURANCE COMPANY BUILDING
tway and Cedar Street.
THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN. 127
broad steps ornamented with marble pillars. The architect has suggested the idea of making the tower crowning the apex of the dome a light-house, which from its great height could be seen from vessels far out at sea. The edifice is Cor- inthian in style, much larger and richer in finish than any public building hitherto erected on Manhattan, and is costing the public vast sums. Many private purses are believed to have been unduly filled in connection with its construction.
OID POST-OFFICE. (Corner Nassau and Liberty streets.)
THE NEW YORK POST-OFFICE, now being constructed at the southern point of City IIall Park, nearly opposite the As- tor Honse, will be somewhat triangular in form, with a front of 279 feet toward the Park, two equal lateral façades of 262} on Broadway and Park Row, and a front of 144 feet at the south-western extremity. The walls are to be of Dix Is- land granite, three stories besides basement and attic, the main
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
cornice 80 feet above the sidewalk, and the crown of the central dome 160 feet. The windows are to be semicircular-
· headed throughout, the archivolts ornamented with voussoirs, and carried on projecting pilasters. The inside, which is to be devoted to the General Post-Office department and the United States Court, will have its appropriate appointments and cor- ridors, while its exterior will be adorned with a profusion of classic pillars, balconies, balustrades, and other marks of genius. It will probably take several years to complete it, and cost as many millions. The post-office department of New York is a colossal enterprise. Over one hundred tons of mail matter are handled every twenty-four hours.
Many of the merchants of Manhattan are immensely richer than the ancient kings, owning stores the floors of which cover from five to fifteen acres, employ thousands of clerks, porters, and seamstresses, and count their income by the million.
MR. A. T. STEWART's retail store, at the corner of Tenth street and Broadway, has eight floors, which, if spread out singly, would cover over fifteen acres. His sales in this build- ing average $80,000 per day, and the daily visitors number from 15,000 to 50,000, according to the season. Mr. Stew- art has just erected the most costly private residence on the continent for himself and family. It stands at the corner of Fifth avenue and Thirty-fourth street, is of white marble, and said to have cost over two millions. Mr. Stewart paid last year a larger income-tax than either of twenty-seven States and more than nine of our territories combined. This gen- tleman has also an immense wholesale store near the City Hall doing a vast business, and is in this line only excelled by II. B. CLAFLIN & Co., who have not only the largest wholesale store, but are the heaviest dealers in dry-goods in America. Their store has a frontage of eighty feet, and extends from Church street to West Broadway along Worth street, a dis- tance of 375 feet. . Beside many purchasing agents abroad, there are about five hundred clerks and other employes attending to the everyday affairs of this colossal business
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CUSTOM HOUSE-Wall Street.
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UNITED STATES TREASURY BUILDING-Cor. Wall and. Nissan Street.
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THE ARCHITECTURE OF MANHATTAN.
theater. The sales of the house have reached seventy mil- lions in a year, and one million in a single day. Mr. Claflin worships at Plymouth Church, Brooklyn.
LORD & TAYLOR have just added another immense business palace to the Metropolis. It stands at the corner of Twentieth street and Broadway, is of the composite order, with a front of 110 feet, a depth of 123, and a height of 122 feet. Its solidity may be imagined from the fact that over a thousand tons of iron were employed in its construction. Though one of the most massive structures on the island, its front is so profusely and tastefully ornamented that one almost forgets that it is a place of business.
TIFFANY & COMPANY have also just erected a fine building on the southwest corner of Union square, on the site origin- ally covered by Dr. Cheever's church. They are said to be the largest dealers in jewelry in the world, their sales amount- ing to several millions per annum, and probably have the largest and finest store of its kind yet constructed.
There are now about sixty-five thousand buildings on the island, of which about thirty-four thousand are of brick, twenty thousand of stone, and eleven thousand of wood. Twenty thousand of these are occupied as tenant-houses and contain over half the population. Many of the churches are large and beautiful, worthy of the times and the people who built them, though it is not complimentary to our Protestant evangelical Christianity, that the three largest enterprises in church architecture undertaken on the island during the last ten years, should result in a Jewish synagogue, a Universa- list church, and a Roman Catholic cathedral ..
Choice architecture on Manhattan amounts to a practical science, which is much studied, and some intrepid genius is every year seeking to eclipse all his predecessors. At this writing the Free Masons are erecting a superb temple on Sixth avenue and Twenty-third street; a fine building called the Seamen's Exchange is rising on Cherry street, at an ex- pense of $100,000, to contain a reading room, savings bank,
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
and other means for improving the condition of sailors. The Industrial Exhibition Company have purchased a plot of twen- ty-two acres between Third and Fourth avenues, at One Hun- dredth street, and are preparing to erect a vast crystal palace, the dimensions of which are to be so immense, that the crys- tal palace of nineteen years ago will be remembered as a. mere " toy-house." What the next generation will undertake we shall not attempt to divine.
V.
BUSINESS IN NEW YORK.
CAUSES OF BUSINESS FAILURE-BUSINESS IN REAL ESTATE- CLASSES OF RICH MEN-POLITICIANS-SPECULATORS AND STOCK GAMBLERS-SUCCESS OF GREAT MEN.
HILE it is true that business is essen- tially the same. the world over, it is equally true that in a great city every- thing is accelerated. In great commercial centers business is reduced to a sort of science, and abundant scope is afforded for the play of the largest and rarest talents. Nearly every man in cities has his specialty, which he plies, paying little attention to the rest of the world. If one thought predominates over all others in the busy . centers of New York, it is that of dispatch. Ev- erything is on a run, and everybody from butcher to baker in a hurry. A clerk fresh from the country, toiling for his board, can scarcely be tolerated on account of his tardiness. Steamboats, horse-cars, and stages are too slow to satisfy the desires of the rushing masses. Every scheme for elevated roads, underground roads, river bridges, or tunnels meets with ten thousand advocates, through the ever-present desire to hasten travel and dispatch business. If you call on a busi- ness stranger, however important your business, you must be able to state it tersely and at once, or you will be summarily dismissed without a hearing. Everything goes on the old maxim, " Time and tide wait for no man." Men get rich in a year, and poor in a day ; " up like a rocket, and down like a stick."
CAUSES OF BUSINESS FAILURES.
THE number of business failures in the metropolis is over- whelmingly large, and to a stranger almost incredible. Many people visit New York, witness its extravagance and glitter, trace the records of a few marvellously successful families, call on the poor boy of bygone years, and finding him a wealthy publisher or importer, dwelling in a palace of brown stone, return home confident that wealth in a great city is almost a' necessity, and that the great misfortune of their lives has been in consenting to follow the slow and modest occupation of their fathers. But success is not the rule in New York. Indeed, it is the rare exception. Where one truly and per- manently succeeds it is almost safe to say ninety-nine fail. There are few houses established which do not sooner or later suspend ; some have reorganized and failed a dozen times ; nine-tenths of all disappear entirely after a few years, leaving here and there one that has triumphantly withstood the shocks of thirty years. The observation of the author has led to the conclusion that nearly every permanent failure may be traced to one of three causes : incompetency, extrav- agance, or dishonesty.
Many who have inherited wealth, and a few who have acquired it, conclude that New York opens the one grand theater upon which they ought to operate. Hence, they launch upon an untried business, in which others have suc- ceeded, but in which they, for want of tact and skill, soon fail, many of them to rise no more. The mania for rapid fortune-making in stocks and other speculations also involves thousands. Few sufficiently understand the chances in the stock trade to deal intelligently and successfully. One or two successful blunders give assurance, which ends a little later in disaster and financial ruin, teaching the sad truth when too late, that all men cannot be successful speculators.
The temptations to extravagance in this age are also so
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CAUSES OF BUSINESS FAILURES.
numerous and potent, that while but few wholly escape the charge, the many are by it plunged into financial and moral . ruin. But few are brave and true enough to cling to first principles amid prosperity. It is so very easy to enlarge our scale of living, and so difficult to contract it, even when necessity admonishes, that multitudes who have industriously climbed the rugged heights of fortune become so linked to fashion and pleasure, as to finally fail, and then " begin with · shame to take the lowest seats." New York is largely a shoal of financial wrecks. Every month gay and attractive families that have led the fashions, and sought to be the admired of all admirers, disappear from society, and are henceforth to old associations . as one dead. Ladies, whose rich parlors have been theaters of music, splendor, and fash- ion, retire to secluded neighborhoods and ply the needle for daily bread. Proud and petted daughters accept such huin- ble situations as they can poorly fill, too many descending to a life of shame. All through senseless extravagance. Most of the leading salesmen in New York are bankrupt-mer- chants, many of whom were once wealthy and lived in costly splendor. Some of them built marble business houses on Broadway which frugality would have saved, but which now stand as monuments to mock them in their poverty.
Dishonesty is another fruitful source of failure. Perma- nent success is rarely or never attained without integrity. The order of the whole moral universe must be reversed be- fore fraud and deception can hope for permanent security. Twenty-five years ago a young man opened a store in New .. York, and for a time rapidly prospered and amassed fortune. He then contracted the unfortunate habit of systematic lying. His brightening prospects soon waned, and bank- ruptcy followed. His career has since been one of crushing disappointments, and after failing in business four times he is now a servant. In 18- a brilliant young man with small capital opened a jewelry store in - street. For twelve years he was regarded the model of probity, and the star of
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
his fortune rose and shone with unwonted brilliancy .. His reputation for thoroughness and integrity was so well estab- lished in financial circles, that he could draw fifty thousand dollars from the banks on his own security. But, alas ! his success corrupted him. He began to invest in real estate, the titles being vested in his friends, and soon the community was shocked with the report of his dishonest bankruptcy. All his later years which with continued integrity would have been the brightest and richest of his earthly career, . have been darkened with litigation, reproach, and self- imposed penury. The policy of providing while in business a rich mansion with fine surroundings, vesting the title in the modest part of the family, is much resorted to, many ceasing". to keep up the semblance of solvency as soon as this is accom- plished. A woman is as base as a man who will consent to be the accomplice in such shocking dishonesty.
We ought here to add, perhaps, that there are also a few honest and unavoidable failures. Small houses are pros- trated by the fall of great ones, and general depressions, panies, and suspensions affect all, but the honest and reliable usually soon start again and retrieve their fortunes.
BUSINESS IN REAL ESTATE.
FROM the English conquest to this day transactions in real estate have been as safe and profitable as alinost any business on Manhattan. The early settlers became wealthy by the simple rise of land, and left vast estates to their posterity. William Bayard's farm, which in 1800 was valued at $15,000 was sold in 1833 for $60,000, to gentlemen who divided it and sold it for $260,000, leaving still an ample margin for subsequent transactions. When the Central Park was first planned, lots could have been bought on Fifth avenue be-
LORD & TAYLOR'S STORE-Broadway and 20th Street.
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OCEAN STEAMER LEAVING THE PORT OF NEW YORK.
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CLASSES OF RICH MEN.
tween Fifty-ninth and Seventy-fifth streets for $500 each, which now bring from $18,000 to $25,000; above Seventy- fifth street they sold for $200 each, now for $10,000 or $15,000 each. A plot of fifty-five lots on Eighth avenue, purchased a few years since for $11,500, is now valued at $300,000 by the successful purchaser, who still holds it. Many of the wealthiest and sharpest men deal entirely in real estate. Panics affect prices in this kind of property, crushing those who deal only in margins, but the solid capitalist who invests well is sure to survive depressions and prosper. The transactions in real estate in our day are enormous, often exceeding a million dollars a day. Business in real estate, like all other speculations, opens a theater for sharpers. \n amusing story is told of a Frenchman who, many years ago, when land suddenly rose to great value, concluded to do like his neighbors-invest something in city lots. Without examining it, he purchased something or nothing near the Wallabout in Brooklyn. Some time after he visited his seller to inform him that he had visited the " grant lot vot he had sell him, and he fints no ground at all ; no ting he finds but vataire." He accordingly asked for the return of his pur- chase-money, but was coolly told that the bargain could not be reversed, and that he must keep the lot. "Den," says the excited Frenchman, " I ask you to be so goot as to take de East Ribber off de top of it." The man again declined, whereupon the Frenchman threatened to go and drown him- self there in order to enjoy his land, and was as coolly told that he might thus employ his water privilege. The poor Frenchman's land is still submerged.
CLASSES OF RICH MEN.
THE harvest of this world is gathered by a great variety of leapers ; some are good, some bad. Riches are not always
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
given to " men of understanding, nor favor to men of skill, but time and chance happen to them all." New York has many varieties of rich men. Some are misers wearing the garb of the pauper ; some are dishonest bankrupts clad in the garments of others; some purchase estates with money wrung from the filth and wreck of humanity, while others are the Lord's noblemen, gathering industriously that they may disperse bountifully. We can only notice a few of the more prominent classes of rich men. We begin with the
POLITICIANS .- Years ago it was difficult finding men who were willing to accept the nominations for office in New York, but times have greatly changed. Large sums are now exacted and given for positions. New York, however, con- tains more vitality than its corrupt political record would indicate. Thousands of amiable men do business here daily, and form a large part of the strength of the city, but as they reside outside of the county lines, are entirely counted out on election days. The press of business keeps many vir- tuous men from the polls ; many true men are discouraged, and think it folly to contend with these floods of corruption ; and others, deploring the expensive misrule of the times, quiet themselves with the assurance that their own firm is sound, and their income satisfactory. A company of unscrupulous politicians, composed mostly of Democratic Romanists, have long ruled the elections and governed the city. Money to any amount needed to carry an election is always ready, and thousands of thieves, tipplers, foreigners, and loafers are always in the market to carry out, for a morsel of bread or a glass of bourbon, any behest. But politicians who give their fortunes for their elections, sell their administration to recover their money. Office in New York in these days does not signify eminence, or fitness, or honor, but MONEY. Money in some form brings men to office, and office here almost invariably brings men to money. Nearly all the political sachems of Manhattan have amassed fortunes from the cor- poration. One of its leaders at this writing, reputed to be
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CLASSES OF RICH MEN
worth eight or ten millions, was a few years since a chair- maker, and abandoned his business with very meagre capital for the political arena. It is folly for one to ask a modest favor of a New York official. He is the man to whom favors belong. His ears are closed to everything but golden peti- tions, and silvery requests. A few years of official favor furnish a Fifth avenue palace and a splendid turnout.
KEW YORK STOCK EXCHANGE. (Broad street.)
SPECULATORS AND STOCK GAMBLERS .- It is but fair to state that New York society contains a larger number of unscru-
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NEW YORK AND ITS INSTITUTIONS.
pulous and daring speculators than any other American city. The variety and magnitude of its business, and its connection with all the financial centres of the world, open a wide theater for every legitimate and illegitimate undertaking. Here hundreds and thousands of plotters and schemers con- gregate, and ply their arts with varying successes and re- verses. Men of no principle, and with no interest to serve save their own pockets, by artful inventions, gain the control of railroads, shipping-lines, stock-boards, and other moneyed interests, absorbing everything within their grasp, and paying only such bills as their circumstances compel. A striking example of this is seen in the management of one of the lead- ing railroad interests of the State, its elections being manip- ulated in defiance of all law, under the direction of officers one of whom was a few years since an indigent surveyor, and another a retail pedler of dry goods. Many of these support magnificent style, and live in costly palaces on Fifth avenue during their prosperity. Nothing reliable can, however, be predicted of any of them; they build upon the sand, and if rich to-day may be poor to-morrow, and are quite as likely to be executed as drowned, or to die in a prison as in a palace.
SUCCESS OF GREAT MEN.
MEN are great in what they are, but this can only be known by what they do. During the last hundred years an army of men have come to the surface on Manhattan, whose directness, probity, indefatigable activity, and success have demonstrated their title to real greatness in their respec- tive spheres. Most of them began poor, were born in rural retreats, or in foreign lands, enjoyed very inadequate facil- ities of culture, and were unsupported by friends, or great names. More than one of them entered New York carry-
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