USA > New York > Bronx County > The Bronx and its people; a history, 1609-1927, Volume II > Part 19
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physician-in-chief ; a policy that has, thus far, not proved disappointing." The report of the Attending Staff of St. Francis Hospital for 1925 remarks :
"The close of the year nineteen hundred and twenty-four establishes a record of fifty-nine years of uninterrupted service to the community. Since the opening of the present buildings in nineteen hundred and six, there has been continued progress in the medical, surgical and charita- ble relief which the Sisters have been able, through the generosity and encouragement of their friends and patrons, to bestow on the sick and needy of The Bronx and of the City, and this without regard to creed, color or nationality. During the past twelve months, 5,525 patients received treatment in the institution, which comprised 99,383 days of hospital care. In the surgical division 4,056 operations have been per- formed. Notwithstanding the poor physical condition of many of the patients and the serious and complicated nature of their ailments, the results have, as heretofore, been most gratifying. Among the con- tributing factors to the encouraging results of the year's activities are the extraordinary cleanliness of the institution, the unstinted medical and surgical supplies suitable for the treatment of the patients, the ex- cellent and liberal food supply and the careful and unremitting super- vision, by the Sisters, of every detail of the work.
"During the past year, the employment of an additional number of trained nurses has proved most beneficial in the increased care and comfort afforded the patients and the lessening, in no small degree, of the heavy burden recently borne by the limited number of available nursing Sisters. As a still further effort toward the attainment of our ideal, and the maintaining of the high standard established for hospitals, a training school for nurses and attendants is to be added to the ac- tivities of the institution. There is now under construction two addi- tional stories to one of the buildings which, when completed, will provide about forty rooms for the purpose mentioned. It is needless to say that, under the present high cost of building, this can only be ac- complished at a considerable outlay. The estimated expense, including equipment, will be about $125,000. To meet this heavy, yet very neces- sary demand upon the resources of the institution, we make a special and urgent appeal to everyone who may be in sympathy with the humane work carried on by the Sisters to contribute to the extent of his ability. Every offering, be it large or small, will be most gratefully received. For 'verily it is more blessed to give than to receive', and in giving all shall be blessed. It may not be superfluous to again call attention to the fact that the Sisters are, by their Charter, not permitted to have any endowment fund whatsoever with which to tide them over financial emergencies, and that much that comes to the hospital comes through the efforts of the Sisters themselves, largely through their sup-
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plications from door to door. Assuredly a hazardous basis for a large institution! Yet upon this basis, with Divine help, their wonderful work goes on. To the many friends of the institution we desire to express the great appreciation and deep gratitude of the Sisters for the assistance always so cheerfully given. To our associated workers, to the Sisters for their sublime and unwavering devotion to the care of the patients under our charge, and to the House Staff, who have been uniformly courteous and efficient in the discharge of their exacting duties, we wish to record our hearty appreciation.
"John Dorning, Physician-in-Chief."
Controversy-The old question as to whether or not professional men were best qualified to choose their colleagues came up again on March 22, 1927, when eight members of the 112 members of the medical staff of The Bronx Hospital resigned because the final choice of new medical members had given to the board of directors rather than to the physicians. The resignations were sent to Alexander Selkin, president of the institution, and were accepted a few days after their receipt. William S. Sidney, superintendent of the hospital, and spokes- man for the directors, said that leaving the choice of new medical men in the hands of the old ones would be detrimental to the hospital. At the same time, Dr. A. A. Berg of No. 10 East Seventy-third Street, one of those who resigned, issued a statement saying that choice by laymen would lead only to favoritism.
Dr. Berg's statement, after calling attention to the work of its signers in the hospital, said that when the institution was founded "the medical board, composed of experienced, educated medical men, best qualified to pass judgment on medical matters, was to have control of all hospital affairs, save only in the administrative affairs and in the expenditure of money. Upon that basis the hospital received its charter, carried on its work and achieved a considerable measure of usefulness in the community." Some years ago, the statement continued, the lay board began to follow an inclination to interfere with the medical board functions. A by-law was passed that nominations of the Medical Board should be submitted to the Lay Board for approval as to moral character, and later, said the statement, the Lay Board asked that all nominations be made by a joint committee, which was to be composed of an equal number from both boards. Finally, it said, at a recent joint committee meeting, the lay members insisted on giving the board of directors the final appointing power.
The statement was signed by the eight physicians who, beside Dr. Berg, are : Dr. Martin Rehling, of No. 208 East Sixty-first Street ; Dr. A. Hymanson, of No. 1225 Park Avenue; Dr. Reuben Ottenberg, of No. 15
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West Eighty-ninth Street; Dr. S. P. Goodhart, of No. 116 West Fifty- ninth Street; Dr. Meyer Rosensohn, of No. 20 West Fiftieth Street; Dr. Hermann Grad, of No. 40 East Forty-first Street; and Dr. Henry Heiman, of No. 125 West Eighty-sixth Street.
Mr. Sidney said that "the Board of Directors took advantage of no one in adopting the policy of final selection by the board. The policy is quite in line with the growth and expansion of The Bronx Hospital. Medical men should not have the final say in the selection of their co- workers, for they are apt to choose their own friends to the detriment of the institution. The Board of Directors will be glad to have the physicians of the hospital make recommendations for the medical staff, but final selections are to be left to the board. After all, the rules of The Bronx Hospital are now in vogue in almost all the hospitals in New York City."
CHAPTER XVI BANKS AND BANKING
The business of banking in The Borough of The Bronx, like that art itself, has been a natural growth springing out of the needs of accumu- lating wealth and a diversified commerce. The bank does not come to a growing town or county completely organized and capitalized with great resources back of it. Neither does it build its solid walls within a hamlet of rude cabins. There must first be in existence some degree of maturity in business, some considerable accumulation of wealth and an active commerce with exterior regions. As long as man uses his own wealth he is a capitalist. It is only when he begins to employ the money of others and develops an organized system of credit that he becomes a real banker. Lyman J. Gage, a member of the McKin- ley cabinet, pointed out a generation ago the natural genesis of the banker: "As the business of banking is the outcome of the need of its facilities, so the men who assume control of its operations are usually those not trained by a long course of apprenticeship at the counter and the desk, but such as happen, by reason of their natural aptitude and the circumstances surrounding them to be drawn into the vocation. Thus the first bankers in any given community are usually those not trained for bankers, but from other callings-successful merchants, law- yers and men of versatility and ready adaption."
The North Side of New York or the territory above the Harlem, it has been said, bears a relation to the city of New York at large similar to the relation which the Great West does to the country. A few years ago General E. L. Viele called that territory "a land of great promise of infinite possibilities and the seat of future empire." No city in the world, he went on, had such a wealth of public parks and pleasure grounds as lie within its area; no city in the world had such natural and economical advantage for commerce, or on so grand a scale. None had a more salubrious climate, or such a variety of surface, nor had any other city such facilities for traffic. It was out of this great abundance and its contiguity and partnership with the heart of the world's great- est city that the banking business in The Bronx had recently developed.
Score of Important Houses-The banking interests in the Borough of The Bronx are represented by over a score of important houses. There is the branch house of the Banco di Napoli, situated on 149th Street, near Cortlandt Avenue. There is a branch of the Bank of the United States at Freeman Street and Southern Boulevard. There is the Bronx
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Borough Bank on East Tremont Avenue, with a branch on White Plains Avenue. There is the Bronx County Trust Company, formerly the Twenty-third Ward Bank, on 137th Street, Third and Lincoln avenues, with branches at No. 2808 Third Avenue and No. 960 Boston Road. There is the Bronx National Bank at No. 369 East 149th Street, with a branch at No. 32 Westchester Square. There is the Bronx Savings Bank at Park and Tremont avenues. There is a branch of the Capitol National Bank at the corner of Longwood and Prospect avenues. There are branches of the Colonial Bank on East Fordham Road and Morris avenue, Gerrard Avenue and East 167th Street. There is a branch of the Commonwealth Bank at Third Avenue and 155th Street. There are branches of the Corn Exchange Bank at No. 375 East 149th Street, Tre- mont and Arthur avenues, Fordham Road and Decatur Avenue, Burn- side and Jerome avenues, Clinton Avenue and 169th Street, Kingsbridge Road and Creston Avenue, 170th Street and Jerome Avenue. There is the Cosmopolitan Bank at No. 803 Prospect Avenue, near Westchester Avenue, with a branch at No. 1294 Southern Boulevard. There is the Dollar Savings Bank at 147th Street and Third Avenue. There is a branch of the East River National Bank at 184th Street and Third Ave- nue. There is the Fordham Savings Bank at No. 2480 Grand Concourse, near Fordham Road. There is a branch of the Hamilton National Bank at East 170th Street, near Jerome Avenue. There are branches of the Irving Bank-Columbia Trust Company at 148th Street and Third Ave- nue; 163rd Street and Southern Boulevard; Fordham Road and Marion Avenue. There is a branch of the Italian Discount and Trust Company at No. 363 East 149th Street. There is a branch of the Manufacturers' Trust Company at Southern Boulevard and Westchester Avenue. There is the North Side Savings Bank at No. 3230 Third Avenue. There is the Port Morris Bank at 138th Street and Willis Avenue. There are branches of the Public National Bank at No. 3817 Third Avenue at Claremont Parkway, No. 982 Southern Boulevard, 180th Street and Cro- tona Parkway, 163rd Street and Prospect Avenue, and 138th Street and Willis Avenue. There are also branches of the State Bank at Union and Westchester avenues and 158th Street, at Southern Boulevard near Westchester Avenue; and Tremont Avenue, near Marmion Avenue.
Banking Element in Commercial Greatness-The first attempt at banking above the Harlem was at White Plains in 1868, when the Cen- tral Bank of Westchester County was incorporated on October 16 of that year. It opened its doors soon after its incorporation with a capital of one hundred thousand dollars. This concern, after a long and very honorable career, was merged on September 1, 1922, with the West- chester Title and Mortgage Company. But just as what we now call The Bronx, as well as Westchester County, and the communities beyond are in large part the result of an overflow from the life of New Amster-
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dam and New York, so banking and commerce in these communities date their growth from the time when commerce and banking in New York overflowed the Harlem. Banking as we know is merely an element or a function in the larger operations that are involved in the development of the commercial greatness of a community, and banking first becomes a function of importance throughout all this territory with the begin- nings of New York's commercial greatness. The elementary operations of banking had their place in the Tontine Coffee House, from the year 1792, the chief meeting place of the merchants in New York. In 1825 the corner-stone of a new edifice was laid in Wall Street. It was opened for business in May, 1827, having cost two hundred and thirty thou- sand dollars. The postoffice was in this building. The Chamber of Commerce had its rooms there, and there were numerous offices for bro- kers on the basement floor. The merchants occupied offices in the gal- leries. At this, the beginning of the second quarter of the century, New York was the principal market for the products and manufactures of a large part of the Eastern States, of New York State, and New Jersey, and of the southern section of the Union. The city soon began to feel the enormous stimulus to her trade caused by the operation of the Erie Canal. This great work of internal improvement was formally opened in October, 1825. It brought to Manhattan and its neighborhood the control of the trade of the Great Lakes, and the vast and prolific regions which bordered upon them, as well as that of the valleys of the Ohio and of the Mississippi. The Champlain Canal, finished in 1823, was the outlet for the produce of a large section of country bordering on Lake Champlain. It began at Whitehall, at the head of sloop navigation on that large body of water. These two waterways, connecting with the Hudson, constituted an extent of navigation of seven hundred and eight miles. Besides there was the great chain of lakes, with which communi- cation was now established, affording a navigation of sixteen hundred and twenty-five miles, of which over eleven hundred miles were within the limits of the State of which New York was the only ocean outlet. It is not difficult to understand the enthusiasm of New York and the communities around the Harlem over the completion of these magnifi- cent monuments to the genius of the statesman and the enterprise of the people of New York as the commercial emporium of the western con- tinent. Becoming the outlet to a vast territory, it followed naturally that New York should become also the point at which the supplies for that territory would be obtained, as well as the financial centre of ex- change for domestic as well as foreign commerce. The amount of ton- nage which the Erie was capable of transporting with locks all double was estimated at 3,024,000, including both descending and ascending trips. In 1826 the toll on imports on the Erie and Champlain canals was $762,000; in 1827, $859,000.
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The value of the merchandise laden and unladen at the port of New York at this period was seventy to one hundred million of dollars, and the number of merchant vessels in port round the waters of New York varied from five to seven hundred in busy seasons, besides fifty steam- boats. The number of arrivals from foreign ports averaged fourteen hundred, and of coasting vessels, four thousand, per annum. Goodrich, in his "Picture of New York" (1828) estimated "the arrivals at and de- partures of steamboats from this port during the war, or season of about forty weeks, supposing each boat to make but two trips a week both ways, to amount to six thousand four hundred ; and if an average of fifty passengers is allowed per trip, the number will be 320,000." He con- sidered this to be a low estimate, as during the summer travel the Hud- son River steamboats frequently carried from two hundred to three hundred passengers. Great numbers were constantly arriving also by coasting vessels from foreign ports; "the aggregate of the latter de- scription during the last twelve months is 22,000; those by ships, sloops and coasters, generally from southern and eastern ports, and the river craft, amount to an immense number." The port was admirably adapted to this mode of communication. There was an ample depth of water at every wharf. The line of shipping ran from the Battery to Corlaer's Hook on the East River, and to the North Battery on the Hudson, an extent on the two water-fronts of three miles.
Not until 1825 did New York recover from the depression of the em- bargo period and the War of 1812-15. In the decade from 1796 to 1806, the most prosperous years, nearly one quarter of the total exports of the United States were from this port. The exports of 1806 were not again equalled in amount till 1825. In 1827 fourteen hundred vessels arrived from foreign ports, of which three hundred and eighty-six were ships, six hundred and nine brigs, and three hundred and eighty-one schooners. In 1825 the tonnage of vessels built in New York amounted to twenty nine thousand one hundred and thirty-seven, divided among twenty- three ships, three brigs, and twelve steamboats. The cotton trade of the South for Europe, and that of the New England manufacturing States, passed through this city. In 1827 there were received 215,705 bales, of which 191,625 were exported, and 24,000 taken by manufacturers. The value of the imports for New York in the year 1825 was $50,024,973, of which over $48,000,000 came in American vessels; that of the exports was $34,032,279, of which over $19,000,000 in American vessels-in all a total foreign trade of $84,057,252, of which over $67,000,000 in Ameri- can vessels. Goodrich gives an interesting historical comparison of the trade at this period: "In the three years preceding the celebrated em- bargo of Mr. Jefferson's administration the exports of New York aver- aged $23,869,250 per annum; and in those years preceding the last war,
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$14,030,035; and during the years 1825-6-7 the average has been $25,000,000."
Later on the commerce of the port steadily progressed. In 1836 the number of tons going to tidewater over the Erie Canal was 419,125. In 1837 the estimated value of all the property transported on this water- way alone was $47,739,877. In the year 1837 there were in the city of New York twenty-three incorporated banks, with an aggregate capital of $20,361,200; the total number of banks in the State, outside of New York, possessed a capital of $16,740,200. There was a safety fund, cre- ated by an annual tax upon the safety-fund banks, which included all but eight of the ninety-eight State banks, amounting to $500,000, and applicable to make good any deficit in case of failure. The oldest bank of the city, the Bank of New York, was presided over by Cornelius Heyer as president, and Anthony P. Halsey as cashier. Among its di- rectors were Gardner G. Howland, Peter Schermerhorn, Charles Mc- Evers, John Oothout, Robert Maitland, Henry Beekman, Edward R. Jones, and Robert Benson. Its capital was $200,000. The Bank of America was presided over by George Newbold. Its board of directors ware George Griswold, Stephen Whitney, Jonathan Goodhue, Benjamin L. Swan, Peter Crary, John W. Leavitt, and Samuel M. Fox. The capital was $1,000,000. Mr. Newbold was an autocrat among the bank presidents, and had matters much his own way until the establishment of the Bank of Commerce, in 1839, which gradually took the lead, and after his death, by its great strength, and the ready availability of its funds through a system of short discounts, served as a kind of check upon the banking system of the city.
The Bank of the State of New York was under the management of Cornelius W. Lawrence, with Reuben Withers as cashier, and in the board were Isaac Townsend, John Stewart, Charles A. Davis, Charles Denison, Henry W. Hicks, and Ferdinand Suydam. In the City Bank were Thomas Bloodgood, president, and among the directors Richard M. Lawrence, Benjamin Corlies, Joseph Foulke, David Parish, Abra- ham Bell, Henry Delafield, and John P. Stagg. The Manhattan Com- pany was presided over by Robert Gelston, and in the board were found the names of John G. Coster, Jonathan Thompson, James McBride, David S. Kennedy, William B. Crosby, William Paulding, Thomas Suffern, James Brown, and Recorder Richard Riker. The Mechanic's Bank had John Fleming for president, and for directors, Jacob Lorillard, Gabriel Furman, Henry C. Dedham, George Arcularius, and Shepard Knapp. The Merchants' was managed by John T. Palmer, president, and Walter Mead, cashier, with Henry I. Wyckoff, James Heard, David Lydig, Peter T. Nevins, Benjamin Lyman, and John D. Wolfe. The National Bank was managed by Albert Gallatin, Jefferson's and Mad- ison's Secretary of the Treasury, whose financial ability was very great,
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and of world-wide fame from his masterly analysis of the national finan- ces. In his board were William B. Astor, Seth Grosvenor, Dudley Sel- den, and Elisha Riggs. The Phenix Bank had Henry Clay for presi- dent, and John Delafield as cashier. Among the directors were Henry Parish, James W. Otis, Garrett Storm, Moses H. Grinnell, and Robert Ray. The Union Bank had Abraham G. Thompson for president, and Samuel I. Howland, Morris Ketchum, and Mortimer Livingston in the management. All of these banks were in Wall Street. The names here given are those of the men who were at the head of the great com- mercial and financial enterprises of the day-every one representative, and familiar as the alphabet to every New Yorker of the passing gen- eration. The Chemical Bank, a private institution, almost a family strong box, was managed by John Mason, president, in person, with his kinsman Isaac Jones, Gideon Tucker, and Thomas W. Thorne at the green table where discounts were made and high finance discussed by a select few. Owing to the fact that the country was developing its material resources in great measure with capital borrowed from Europe-the balance of trade setting against the United States at this period, yearly increasing American indebtedness abroad-New York was at any time liable to a demand for gold from Europe. The value of the strong institutions was then seen, as well as the wisdom of sep- arating the earnings of the laboring class from the general fund.
The Savings Banks-The savings banks, with their conservative man- agement, played an important part in those days of financial fluctua- tions. The New York Bank for Savings, the first in New York and in the United States, founded in 1819, was still directed by John Pintard, one of its original projectors, with Peter Augustus Jay, and Philip Hone, as first and second vice-presidents, and a board of highest ability, ex- perience, and respectability. There were in the year 1837, 26,427 open accounts, entitled to $3,533,716.88. David Cotheal was the president of the Bowery Savings Bank, George Suckley of the Greenwich, Ben- jamin Strong of the Seamen's, with Pelatiah Perit as one of the vice- presidents and Caleb Barstow as the secretary. The fire insurance com- panies were twenty-six in number, most of them badly crippled by the losses of 1835, and some lately reorganized by assessments or contribu- tions to stock. The Farmers' Fire Insurance Company was the only trust company in the city, no others having been organized at that time. It is now better known as the Farmers' Loan and Trust Company.
The general election of 1832 turned, in great measure, upon the ques- tions of finance and free trade. The condition of the national finances was favorable to a dispassionate discussion of the principle. The na- tional debt was nearly extinguished. The rapid growth of the country had so increased its revenues that the secretaries of the treasury who
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followed Albert Gallatin, adhering to his lines of policy and adminis- tration, had been able to extinguish the last remains of the extraordinary expenditure occasioned by the war of 1812. Louis McLane, Secretary of the Treasury, in his report of December, 1832, on the finances, an- nounced that the dividends derived from the bank shares held by the United States were more than were required to pay the interest, and that the debt of the United States might therefore be considered as substantially extinguished after January 1, 1863. Mr. Gallatin, the ad- vocate of this policy of extinction, which seems to have been since ac- cepted by our financial ministers irrespectve of party, was now a resi- dent of New York. Soon after his return from his last mission to Eng- land he settled permanently in New York, taking a house in Bleecker Street in 1829. Here he became one of the leading figures of interest. His long experience of public men and public affairs on the two con- tinents of America and Europe made his counsel eagerly sought after on a great variety of subjects-financial, scientific, literary, and even political, though he had withdrawn from active interest in this direction. In advocating the policy of extinction of the national debt and of a cor- responding economy in the national expenditure, Mr. Gallatin's purpose was a reduction of the revenue by a lowering of the tariff. As the elec- tion of 1832 approached and parties began to formulate their platforms, the advocates of a protective tariff, with a consequent national expendi- ture for internal improvements, and a tariff for revenue only, drew their lines more closely. There was a convention of the advocates of free trade held, and its conclusions were that a tariff of twenty-five per cent was ample, as experience had proved, for all the legitimate pur- poses of government. The non-partisan nature of this convention ap- pears from the presence of Goodhue and Stevens of New York, both of whom were faithful adherents to the great fundamental principles of the Whig party. The later attempt to make unbelief in or support of an economic doctrine a condition of party fealty had not then been for- mulated.
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