USA > New York > Bronx County > The Bronx and its people; a history, 1609-1927, Volume I > Part 33
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Water the Ancient Highway-Sloops, periaugers, batteaux, and canoes constituted the vehicles of communication in the early days. As in all new countries, water was the natural highway; and the waters of the Sound, the-Hudson, and the Harlem, all adjacent to the shores of the territory of what is now the borough, gave easy and convenient access to Manhattan Island and to the settlers near the shores. West- chester Creek was navigable for sloops and when Captain de Connick and Fiscal Van Tienhoven went to eject the English settlers at Oost- dorp, they ascended the river and creek in vessels of that class. The Bronx and the Hutchinson rivers were both navigable for several miles in batteaux and canoes, the former to West Farms and the latter to Eastchester. In recent years the federal government has deepened the channel of the latter stream so that heavily laden coal vessels and small steamers are able to ascend at high tide as far as the city dock at Mount Vernon, contiguous to old St. Paul's Church, and just over the boundary line of the borough. From time out of mind and almost to the present generation a regular sloop trade was carried on from Westchester borough town to New York City. In an advertisement of the Rev. Samuel Seabury there is a paragraph which says: "Westchester is about nineteen miles from New York, by Land, and about fifteen by Water; and a Water-passage may be had almost every Day, when the Weather will permit, in good safe Boats." There was a regular sloop trade also to Eastchester, even during the Revolution; and it was by first capturing the market sloop engaged in this trade with New York that the Darien whaleboatmen were able to effect the capture of the "Schuldam," the British guard-ship. The building of these vessels began very early. Shonnard in his "History of Westchester County," on the authority of the Rev. Theodore A. Leggett, a descendant of one of the patentees of the West Farms, states that John Leggett, a ship- builder, executed, on November 30, 1676, a bill of sale as follows :
"John Leggett of Westchester, within the Province of N. Y., ship- wright, to Jacob Leysler of N. Y. City, merchant, a good Puick, or ship, 'Susannah' of New York, now laying (sic) in this harbour, and by the said Leggett built in Bronck's river near Westchester, together with masts, Lay boat, and other materials."
The shipbuilding industry, thus begun in 1676, or earlier, has con- tinued to the present day in the territory of the borough; but it is now principally carried on in the old manor of Pelham, at City Island, where yachts and pleasure craft are built, repaired, and laid up out of season.
There was boat communication, moreover, by way of the Harlem River and Spuyten Duyvil Creek; for in November, 1776, Lord Corn-
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wallis carried his troops in a flotilla of boats through the river and creek to the Hudson for the attack on Fort Washington from the Hudson River side. That these streams had always been navigable was one of the arguments used by Lewis G. Morris and his supporters in their opposition to Macomb's dam. In their communication inland the settlers at first used the old Indian trails. The principal village and fort of the Siwanoys was on a hill to the south of the present Unionport, overlooking Westchester Creek. From the strong stockade, palisaded in the Indian fashion, the hill came to be known as "Castle Hill," a name by which it is known today. A village of the Man- hattans was located at Spuyten Duyvil Neck, and another at Nepper- haem, the present Yonkers; while above the latter are the villages of Weckquaesgeeks, all members of the Mohican tribe. In their com- munications with each other and with their neighbors on Manhattan Island by way of the "wading place" there was formed in time a plainly marked trail extending from Paparinemo to Castle Hill, called in Doughty's patent to Archer the "Westchester Path." From Westchester another plainly marked trail led by way of Eastchester across Hutchin- son River and contiguous to the Sound, through the Rye woods to "the great stone at the wading place" at the Byram River, the eastern boundary of the colony and of the State. It extended still further into Connecticut, also occupied by the Siwanoys, as far as the villages of the Pequods, a kindred tribe of Mohicans. It was by this path that many of the Connecticut settlers found their way into the Dutch colony of New Netherland and gave Stuyvesant so much trouble. This was preëminently the "Westchester Path."
Early Trails-It was natural that the earliest whites should follow these long established and plainly marked trails. As time passed these trails became wider as the travelers cut down the trees for the convenient passage of their horses or wagons. We find, therefore, in these trails the beginnings of the roads which later developed into some of the principal highways of the region, with such changes in grade and direction as the necessities of wagon roads required-the Albany and the Boston Post roads, and the Kingsbridge Road leading through Fordham, as well as Eastchester Avenue connecting the parishes of St. Peter's and St. Paul's. The Albany Post Road was opened to the Sawkill, or Sawmill River, in Yonkers, as early as 1669. The traveler, having arrived at the end of Manhattan Island over the old Kingsbridge Road from Harlem, would cross Spuyten Duyvil Creek by the ford, the ferry, or the bridge and thus land on the island of Paparinemo. Passage up the west side of the marsh was impossible, and in ancient days the task of filling it in for a roadway would have
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been too costly to have been undertaken. The traveler therefore turned to his right through the marsh, or later over the causeway built by Archer, Verveelen, Betts, Tippett, Hadden, and the inhabitants of Ford- ham, and found himself in that village. Here he would turn to the left along the base of Tetard's Hill, and so north on the higher and dryer ground on the eastern side of the marsh. The road crossed "Tip- pett" Brook about a mile from the bridge, near the Van Cortlandt station of the Putnam Railroad, and then swung eastward in front of and below the Van Cortlandt mansion, to the western side of the valley, up which it passed to Yonkers. After passing through the lands of John Hadden, it came within the manor of Philipseburgh, and the manor-lord thus became responsible for its maintenance. In fact, as the road led to his toll bridge he probably maintained the lower part of it as well. The ancient road, or the greater part of it, still remains and is known to the residents of the section as the old Albany Post Road. It could not have been more than a trail at first; but later the postman traveled on horseback and travelers accompanied him on the way. A woman passenger sometimes rode on a pillion behind the postman. It was not until after the Revolution, in 1785, that stages began running over the post road to Albany. It was not until about 1808 that the present Broadway was filled in on the western side of the marsh. This was done by the Highland Turnpike Company, who hung gates and charged toll. The causeway called Depot Street, con- necting Broadway with the railroad station at Kingsbridge, was con- structed about 1855 by Joseph Goodwin, as a short-cut to the road leading to Highbridge, Morrisania, West Farms, and Westchester.
Roads Through The Bronx Region-If the traveler had turned to his right through the village of Fordham at the foot of Tetard's Hill, he would have passed over the ancient Westchester Path up over the hill (Highbridge Road), into the present Kingsbridge Road. His course would have been then relatively past the Dutch church at Fordham, the southern end of Jerome Park reservoir, Poe Park, across the tracks of the Harlem Railroad at the station opposite St. John's College, Ford- ham (though the ancient road used to go through the college grounds), over Pelham Avenue to Bronxdale, whence he could continue over the Bear Swamp Road to Westchester, or turn to his right over the Unionport Road to Castle Hill. The improvements in this section within recent years have obliterated most of the old roads, so that only the general direction can be given by present thoroughfares. The Highbridge and Kingsbridge roads are ancient highways; east of the Bronx River, the rural conditions still prevail to some extent ; but the progress of development is so rapid that in a few years they
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will have departed also, especially since the completion of the subway has rendered these rural communities accessible. The Bear Swamp Road still exists and leads to Westchester. Its name was derived from a swamp to the east of Bronxdale, where the Siwanoys had an important village near the site of Morris Park race-track. Another road starting from a point on Tetard's Hill beyond the one just described led to De Lancey's Hills at West Farms. This road has long been closed. It branched off from the Westchester and Kingsbridge Road near the present Fordham railroad station, and continued in a southerly direction till it met the line of East 182nd Street, over which it passed approxi- mately to the bridge at East 181st Street below the lower dam in Bronx Park at West Farms, where it was known as the Kingsbridge Road. Its continuation connected the mills with the borough-town of West- chester. The portion of the road lying within the park east of the bridge has been macadamized; but between Morris Park Avenue and the bridge over the tracks of the suburban branch of the New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad, there still remains enough of the ancient highway to convince us that preceding generations might have traveled in style, but they did not do so in comfort.
The principal road that the traveler could take after crossing the causeway to the village of Fordham was the Boston Road, which dates from 1673. This was swung in a curve around the base of Tetard's Hill and up to its top, paralleling the Albany Road for about a third of a mile, then turning sharply to the eastward towards Williamsbridge. Here it crossed the Bronx River and turned north as far as the head of Rattlesnake Brook, where it again turned sharp east to Eastchester. Here the Hutchinson River was crossed, and the road continued through Pelham Manor to New Rochelle. A few miles of the old road re- mained until recently and could be traced. The first portion was that leading up to Sedgwick Avenue, where Jerome Park, and later, the reser- voir obliterated a section of it. From Jerome Avenue to the Williams- bridge reservoir the part remaining was called Van Cortlandt Avenue, and from the reservoir to the bridge over the Bronx River and to the White Plains Road the section was called the Gun Hill Road.
The White Plains and the Boston roads are the same thing from Williamsbridge northward to where the latter turns off toward East- chester. This last portion of the road is called Bussing Avenue, which begins at East 231st Street, one block east of White Plains Avenue, and continues on to the city line. As soon as it enters the city of Mt. Vernon, its name becomes what it has been for over two centuries, the Kingsbridge Road. It has been said that the ancient road should not have been called anything else than the Kingsbridge, or Boston Road, with all respect to the Bussings, who were extensive landowners
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in the locality. Until recently a few of the signs bearing both titles were still to be found along the Bussing part of the avenue. At East- chester the ancient road is connected with Coles Boston Road by a short street called Fisher's Lane; but the two roads do not become one until near New Rochelle. The laying out of the Coles Road diverted travel from the way of Spuyten Duyvil Creek, as the distance was considerably shortened by way of the new road and the Harlem Bridge.
If the traveler in going over the Albany Post Road had turned to the eastward at the bridge over Tippett's Brook near Van Cortlandt station he would have continued on a road leading to the Mile Square, as the purchase of French and others from Doughty was called. This road was parallel to Van Cortlandt Lake for over a mile before it turned to the eastward and then northeast to Mile Square. Today it is the road that bounds the seventh to the eighteenth holes of the golf course at Van Cortlandt Park. It probably had its origin in the travel of the farmers of the Mile Square to the mill at Van Cortlandt's to have their grain ground. The road can still be followed up the steep hill in Van Cortlandt Park, then it turns east into East 233rd Street, the northern boundary of Woodlawn Cemetery. Beyond this the ancient highway existed until the early part of 1912 as a rural lane, winding along as the northeastern boundary of the park and called Mount Ver- non Avenue. After it crosses McLean Avenue, the city line, it is continued in Yonkers over a fine macadam street, called Kimball Avenue. About one thousand feet from the bridge over Tippett's Brook, on the Mile Square Road, a road branched off to the southwest and connected with the Boston Road to the west of the bridge at William's, about East 210th Street. This was the Gun Hill Road, so called from Revolutionary days. It still exists and has been broadened, graded and macadamized. The name is given to the road both east and west of the Bronx River, though the greater part of it to White Plains Avenue is really the Boston Road. A few yards of both these old roads may be found to remain; their ancient junction is within the walls of the reser- voir at Williamsbridge. About three hundred paces from where the Gun Hill Road joined the Boston Road, another road led directly to Yonkers at Valentine's Hill; and this is today substantially Jerome Avenue, crossing the Gun Hill Road between East 210th and East 211th streets. Its extension to the southward to the Macomb's Dam Road and its conversion into a driveway was one of the acts of the Tweed régime in New York. For a couple of years the road was almost im- passable, owing to regrading, sewerage, and the like; and it remained in that condition during the time that the extension of the subway was building up the avenue.
Anyone coming south over the Albany Road from Yonkers might,
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instead of turning east at Van Cortlandt's, have continued on a road to the west of Tippett's Brook which led along the base of Tippett's Hill to the junction of Spuyten Duyvil Creek and the Hudson River. This road exists as the Spuyten Duyvil Road, known locally as Dash's Lane, after a gentleman of that name who used to live there, one of the older generation and a friend of "Felix Oldboy." Southward of Kingsbridge lay Fordham Manor. The street called the Highbridge Road, leading from the Bronx side of Farmers' Bridge, was laid out on June 6, 1730, though the bridge was not built until 1759. A week later, in June, 1730, the road leading to the Fordham meeting-house was ordered. This was the old Dutch church which stood near the junction of the Fordham Landing, or Berrien's Landing, and the Ma- comb's Dam roads, or on the grounds of Webb's Academy near the present Sedgwick Avenue. A road also extended before the Revolu- tionary War from that section to Morrisania opposite Harlem. was approximately on the line of Aqueduct Avenue, and crossed Crom-
It well's Creek about East 169th Street, or not far from "Judge Smith's" on Jerome Avenue, thence following the lines of Walton and Mott avenues to Morrisania, but probably through farms and private proper- ty. The lower part of Jerome Avenue was built by Robert Macomb as a leader to his bridge from the road described, both being known as the Macomb's Dam Road. A considerable portion of this road from Featherbed Lane is still called Macomb's Road; it connected Fordham with Devoe's Point. Featherbed Lane is a road connecting Aqueduct Avenue from near the borough end of the Washington Bridge with Je- rome Avenue down a steep and winding way. Different stories are told as to the origin of the peculiar name. One is that during the Revolu- tion the inhabitants living along the road contributed their feather beds for the use of the patriots. A second is that the road was of so spongy a material that to walk on it was like walking on a feather bed. A third is to the effect that the road was so exceedingly rough that to secure any degree of comfort in driving over it it was necessary to have a feather bed in the wagon for a seat-but this would answer equally well for all the colonial roads.
The Fordham Landing Road came under the care of the commis- sioners in May, 1768, as on the third of that month there is an entry in the ancient records to the effect that "Commissioners, at request of freeholders and inhabitants of that part of the Manor of Fordham lying upon the Harlem River to the south of the old Dutch church, viewed the road (laid out to the river by said church), beginning a little to the eastward of the said Dutch church, and thence running southerly as the said road runs to the landing at the back of the house now occupied by Charles Doughty on the patent to Turneur; and have at their re-
OLD GREEN BRIDGE OVER BRONX RIVER IN WHAT ARE NOW THE BOTANICAL GARDENS
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quest now laid out the same road as for a publick highway, to be two rods wide, with privilege to hang gates on the same, provided they are kept in repair so as to swing with conveniency and not other- ways." In early days another road led from the manor-house at Morris- ania to the borough-town of Westchester. This probably followed the line of the present Lafayette Avenue, which was so called from the fact that the distinguished Frenchman passed over the lane to Boston after his visit at Morrisania in 1824. This lane must have joined the present Westchester Avenue near Fox's Corners, as the swamp and meadowland of the Bronx River would have prevented its continuance in a direct line. Westchester Avenue follows the line of the ancient road; this was laid out by the Westchester Turnpike Company after 1800. In 1729, the town authorities of Westchester ordered that a road should be laid out from the King's Road leading from Morrisania to "the landing-place below John Hunt's house." This probably refers to the Hunt's Point Road leading from Fox's Corners.
On account of the close connection between Westchester and East- chester, there was very early a road connecting the two places-one following the old Indian trail. In the patent of Colonel Nicolls to the grantees of the "Ten Farms," the Westchester Path is specifically men- tioned. This is called the Eastchester Road; it passes up the west side of Westchester Creek and joins the Boston Road of 1798 near where Corsa Lane comes from Williamsbridge. From the road connecting Westchester with Williamsbridge, a short distance from the crossing of the Boston, or Coles, road there is a road called the Sawmill Lane leading to Given's Creek, which enters the Hutchinson River near its mouth. It crosses the Eastchester Road north of the Pelham and Bronx Parkway; and from its name one must conclude that it led to a saw- mill. In the will of the Reverend John Bartow, under date of June 24, 1725, we find him devising land in this neighborhood and describing it as "bounded on the north by the road leading to Thomas Haddon's sawmill." The old lane was wiped out in the plan of streets that was carried on.
A causeway and bridge stood across Westchester Creek, connecting the villages with Throgg's Neck, from a remote period. In the town records of Westchester, we find under date of July 9, 1678: "It is ordered that ye bridge betwixt Frogges Necke and ye Towne be main- tained and upheld by a rate to be levied and assessed upon all persons and estates that are putt in the county rate belonging to the Township of Westchester, East Chester excepted." As there were a number of farms on Throgg's Neck there must have been a road leading to West- chester, where were the church, the courthouse, and such shops as then existed. Another important road through the middle of the borough
Bronx-19
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was that leading to White Plains, the county seat after 1759. It is still in existence, north from Bronxdale, passing through Olinville, Wakefield, Mount Vernon, and beyond. From Williamsbridge north- ward this highway and the Boston Road were one, until the latter swung off toward Eastchester at the head of the Black Dog Brook. The present White Plains Avenue was laid out about 1863, a little to the west of the old road in general, though passing over parts of it. The work of widening White Plains Avenue to a boulevard one hundred feet in width was begun in the autumn of 1902, after several years of consideration ; it was finished in January, 1908. From below Laconia Park at the southern end of Williamsbridge, another old road leads to Westchester, passing to the eastward of the former Morris Park race- track. As settlers took up farms along the Sound beyond Westchester, a road was laid out connecting with Pelham Manor. Eastchester Creek was crossed either by a ford or a ferry, probably the latter, as the tide runs too strongly at Pelham Bridge to make fording safe, except at slack water. The wooden bridge was not constructed until 1812. This road appears on the military map of the British operations in West- chester County in 1776, as do most of the others, but all with consider- able inaccuracy. This highway, called Pelham Road, joins the Eastern Boulevard, or Shore Road, below Pelham Bridge, on the boundary line of the Pelham Bay Park. From near the Bartow station of the suburban branch of the New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad, a road leads down to Pell's Point (Rodman's Neck) and City Island, as it did in ancient days. The most northerly of the roads in this section is the Split Rock, or Prospect Hill, road, connecting the Shore Road with the old Boston Road by means of Wolf's Lane in the town of Pelham. It was the route of the retiring Americans during the battle of Pell's Point.
This, then, is a fair description of the principal roads of the borough, which existed somewhat over a century ago. We may say, generally, that in the earlier days the roads radiated from two points: the ancient wading place, ferry, or bridge at Fordham, or Kingsbridge, and from the borough-town of Westchester. All travelers from Manhattan Island to the mainland had to cross Spuyten Duyvil Creek from which the roads radiated like the ribs of an open fan-to Yonkers or Albany, to the Mile Square, to Boston or nearer points, to West Farms, or to Westchester. The borough-town of Westchester was also the county- seat until 1759; and in consequence roads from all sections of the county led to it. By the above date the upper county had become so settled as to make it a hardship for the freeholders to go to the southern ex- tremity at Westchester. The Provincial Assembly, therefore, trans- ferred the county-seat to White Plains, a point nearer the centre of
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population as well as area. Through the different generations the names of the same roads have changed quite frequently, so that it is some- times quite difficult to trace some of them under their various aliases. The Highbridge Road, for instance, could not have been called such until after the construction of High Bridge in the period of from 1839 to 1842, yet it existed in very early times. After 1813 a part of it was called Macomb's Dam Road, and was so spoken of in deeds and records. The map of the roads, compiled by Stephen Jenkins to whom we are indebted for the accompanying information, though not absolutely exact as to scale, is near enough to give an idea of the general direction of the principal highways.
It is a cardinal principle of the common law that every landholder is entitled to get to and from his land. In this way, as more farms were occupied, there grew up a multitude of private lanes and roads, of which many in time became public highways, maintained at the public expense, or by tolls, if maintained by the owners of abutting property or by other persons. This permission "to hang gates" appears in a number of cases in the records of the highway commission. Most of the roads of the borough began first as private roads to get to property. After 1850, when the newly built railroads had brought in such a population as to admit of the incorporation of villages, the laying out of highways became more systematic in each locality. That there was no general system can be understood readily by a glance at the map of the borough as it is today, with its intricacies of winding streets and avenues going apparently in all directions. Of course the topog- raphy of the borough has affected the course of the streets to a very large degree. One of the greatest problems that confronted the Com- missioner of Highways of The Bronx, or of Street Improvements, as he was officially known, was to whip the chaos of roads into some sort of systematic arrangement. This is being done gradually in accordance with a plan which has been developing since January 1, 1893, and which has been completed only since 1903. In accordance with this plan, during the last couple of decades, blasting, grading, cutting down of hills, and filling in low places and quagmires have been going on in all portions of the borough. Should a person familiar with a locality where such changes are going on visit it a year or two later, he would find it developed into wide, well-paved streets, lined with solid blocks of residences, factories or stores. A notable street improvement of recent years is the Grand Boulevard and Concourse, which is a great highway extending from Gerard Avenue and East 161st Street to the Gun Hill Road, a distance of nearly four miles. The road is 182 feet wide, and is to serve as a link between Manhattan and the park system of the borough. The idea of the road originated with Louis J. Heintz,
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