Kitabı oku: «Peculiarities of American Cities», sayfa 16
CHAPTER XXI.
NEW YORK
Early History of New York. – During the Revolution. – Evacuation Day. – Bowling Green. – Wall Street. – Stock Exchange. – Jacob Little. – Daniel Drew. – Jay Cooke. – Rufus Hatch. – The Vanderbilts. – Jay Gould. – Trinity Church. – John Jacob Astor. – Post-Office. – City Hall and Court House. – James Gordon Bennett. – Printing House Square. – Horace Greeley. – Broadway. – Union Square. – Washington Square. – Fifth Avenue. – Madison Square. – Cathedral. – Murray Hill. – Second Avenue. – Booth's Theatre and Grand Opera House. – The Bowery. – Peter Cooper. – Fourth Avenue. – Park Avenue. – Five Points and its Vicinity. – Chinese Quarter. – Tombs. – Central Park. – Water Front. – Blackwell's Island. – Hell Gate. – Suspension Bridge. – Opening Day. – Tragedy of Decoration Day. – New York of the Present and Future.
Less than three hundred years ago the narrow strip of territory now occupied by what its wide-awake and self-asserting citizens delight to term "The Metropolis of the New World," was a broken and rugged wilderness, which the foot of white man had never trod, not, at least, within the memory of its then oldest inhabitants, a few half-naked savages of the Manhattan tribe, from whom the island derives its name of Manhattan. In 1609 Henry Hudson, an English navigator in the service of the Dutch East India Company, landed near the present site of the Battery, securing, by right of discovery, the territory to the States of the Netherlands. Dutch traders soon followed, and in 1614 a small fort and four houses were erected in the neighborhood of what is now Bowling Green. The infant metropolis was christened New Amsterdam, and Peter Minuits sent out, in 1626, as its first Governor. He purchased the island from its native owners, for goods, about twenty-four dollars in value. Minuits was recalled in 1631, his successors being Wonter Von Twiller, 1633; William Krift, 1638; and Peter Stuyvesant, 1647. In 1644 a fence was built nearly along the line of what is now Wall street, and in 1653 palisades and breastworks, protected by a ditch, were added along this line. These palisades remained in existence until near the beginning of the present century.
Peter Stuyvesant was the last of the Dutch Governors. In 1664 Charles II, of England, gave the territory to his brother James, Duke of York, and an expedition was sent out under the command of Colonel Richard Nicholls, to take possession of it. The fort was easily captured, and the name of the settlement changed to New York. In 1673 the town was recaptured by the Dutch, who again changed its name to New Orange; but the following year it was restored to the English by treaty.
In 1689 Jacob Leister instituted an insurrection against the unpopular administration of Nicholls, which he easily overthrew, and strengthened the fort by a battery of six guns outside its walls. This was the origin of the "Battery." In 1691 he was arrested and convicted on a charge of treason and murder, condemned to death, and executed.
Negro slavery was introduced into New York at an early period, and in the year 1741 the alleged discovery of a plot of the slaves to burn the city and murder the whites resulted in twenty negroes being hanged, a lesser number being burned at the stake, and seventy-five being transported.
From the very first the mass of citizens of New York took an active part in the struggle for independence. In 1765 the "Sons of Liberty" were organized to resist the Stamp Act; in 1770 a meeting of three thousand citizens resolved not to submit to this oppression; and in 1773 a Vigilance Committee was formed to resist the landing of the tea, by whom, in the following year, a tea-laden vessel was sent back to England, while eighteen chests of tea were thrown overboard from another. On the eighteenth of September, 1776, as a result of the disastrous defeat of the American troops, under General Washington, on Long Island, New York fell into the hands of the British, who held it until the twenty-sixth of November, 1783, when they evacuated it. The day is still annually celebrated, under the name of "Evacuation Day."
From 1784 to 1797 New York was the Capital of the State, and from 1785 to 1790 the seat of government of the United States. The adoption of the National Constitution was celebrated in grand style in 1788; and on April thirtieth, 1789, Washington was inaugurated at the City Hall, as the first President of the United States.
In 1791 the city was visited by yellow fever. In 1795 and 1798 it reappeared, with added violence, over two thousand persons falling victims to it during the latter year. It made visits at intervals until 1805, after which it did not reappear until 1819. It came again in 1822 and 1823, occasioning considerable alarm, but since then its visits in an epidemic form have ceased.
In 1820 the surveying and laying out of Manhattan Island north of Houston street, after ten years of labor, was completed. The opening of the Erie Canal, in 1825, gave the city a fresh impetus on the road to prosperity. The first steam ferry between New York and Jersey City was started in 1812. In 1825 the city was first lighted by gas; while the great Croton Aqueduct, through which it receives its immense water supply, was not completed until 1842.
In December, 1835, the most disastrous fire ever known in the city destroyed over $18,000,000 worth of property. In July, 1845, a second conflagration consumed property to the amount of $5,000,000. Both these great fires were in the very heart of the business portion of the city.
In July, 1853, an industrial exhibition was opened, with striking ceremonies, in a so-called Crystal Palace, on Reservoir Square. This building, in the form of a Greek cross, was made almost wholly of iron and glass, being three hundred and sixty-five feet in length each way, with a dome one hundred and twenty-three feet high. The flooring covered nearly six acres of ground. This structure was destroyed by fire in 1858.
New York has been the scene of several sanguinary riots within the past half century. In 1849, when Macready, the English tragedian, attempted to play a second engagement at the Astor Place Opera House, the friends of Forrest attacked the building, resulting in calling out of the military, the killing of thirty-two persons, and wounding of thirty-six others. In July, 1863, a mob, made up of the poorer classes of the population, rose in fierce opposition to the draft rendered necessary by the requisition for troops by the general government. For several days this mob was in practical possession of the city, and it was dispersed only by a free use of military force. This mob resulted in the death of one thousand persons, and the destruction of $1,500,000 worth of property. In 1871 a collision occurred between a procession of Irish Orangemen, who were commemorating the Battle of the Boyne, and their Catholic fellow-countrymen, during which sixty-two persons lost their lives.
The summer of 1871 was made memorable by the discovery that the most stupendous frauds upon the public treasury had been carried on for several years, by certain city officials, some of whom had been extraordinarily popular. A mass meeting, called at Cooper Institute on the fourth of September, appointed a committee of seventy-six to take measures for securing better government for the city. The elections in November following resulted in a complete sweeping out of the obnoxious officials, many of whom were subsequently prosecuted, convicted and imprisoned, or obliged to fly the country.
New York City, the greater portion of which lies on Manhattan Island, is situated at the mouth of the Hudson River, some eighteen miles from the Atlantic Ocean. Its extreme length north from the Battery is sixteen miles, while the average breadth of the island is one and three-fifths of a mile. The city has an area of about 27,000 acres, of which 14,000 are on Manhattan Island, and about 12,000 on the main land; while the remainder is in the East River and the Bay, and includes Ward's, Blackwell's, Randall's, Governor's Ellis', and Bedloe's Islands. It is bounded on the north by the town of Yonkers; on the east by the Bronx and East Rivers; on the south by the Bay; and on the west by the Hudson River. Manhattan Island is separated on the north, from the main land, by Spuyten Duyvel Creek and Harlem River, both names recalling the Dutch origin of the city.
The more ancient portion of New York, from Fourteenth street to the Battery, is laid out somewhat irregularly. As far north as Central Park, five miles from the Battery, it is quite compactly built. Various localities in the more northern and less densely built-up part of the island are known by different names; as Yorkville, near Eighty-sixth street; and Harlem, in the vicinity of One-hundred-and-twenty-fifth street, on the eastern side; and Bloomingdale and Manhattanville, opposite them, on the western. North of Manhattanville, near One-hundred-and-fiftieth street, is Carmansville, and a mile and a half further north are Washington Heights; while Inwood lies at the extreme northwestern point of the island. All these are places of interest, and offer numerous attractions to the visitor.
That part of New York lying on the mainland, comprising the twenty-third and twenty-fourth wards, was added to it in 1874, and contains many thriving towns and villages. Prominent among them is Morrisania, with avenues running north and south, and streets crossing them at right angles, and numbered in continuation of those of Manhattan Island. Numerous other towns, with a host of beautiful country residences, are scattered over the high and rolling land of which this late addition to the area of the city is composed; but with the exception of Morrisania it has not yet been regularly laid out for building purposes. The whole country in this section of the city, with a romantic natural beauty, to which wealth and artistic taste have largely contributed, is a perfect paradise of picturesqueness.
The foreigner who visits New York usually approaches it from the lower bay, through the "Narrows," a strait lying between Staten Island on the left and Long Island on the right. From the heights of the former, a beautiful island, rising green and bold from the water's edge, frown the massive battlements of Fort Wadsworth and Fort Tompkins; while on the latter is Fort Hamilton; and in the midst of the water, gloomy and barren, is Fort Lafayette, famous as a political prison during the late war. New York Bay is one of the most beautiful, if not the most beautiful, in the world. Staten Island rises abruptly on one shore, with hills and valleys, green fields and trees, villages and villas; and on the other shore are the wood-crowned bluffs of Long Island. Within the bay Ellis' Island is near the Jersey shore; Bedloe's Island is not far from its centre, and is the selected site of the colossal statue of Liberty which France has presented to New York; while Governor's Island, the largest of the three, lies to the right, between New York and Brooklyn. Each island is fortified, the latter containing Castle William and old Fort Columbus.
The bay is dotted with the shipping of every nation. Ocean steamers are setting out on their long journeys, or just returning from foreign shores. The finest steamboats and ferry boats in the world dart hither and thither, like water spiders on the surface of a glassy pool. Tugs, oyster boats, and sailing vessels of every size and description, are all represented. It is a moving panorama of water craft. As the city is approached, gradually, from the distant haze which broods over it, is evolved the forms of towers, spires, and roofs, and all its varied and picturesque outlines. The city presents a beautiful view from the bay. It rises gradually from the water's edge, some portions of it to a considerable elevation. A prominent feature in its outline is the graceful, tapering spire of Trinity Church, while higher still rises the clock-tower of the Tribune building. Other towers, spires and domes, break the monotony of roofs and walls. Approaching the mouth of the East River, the most striking objects are the massive towers of the Suspension Bridge, one on either shore, while between them is the bridge, swung upon what seem at a distance like the merest cobwebs.
At the extreme southern end of Manhattan Island is the Battery, already referred to, a park of several acres, protected by a granite sea wall. It presents a beautiful stretch of green turf, fine trees and wide pathways. On its southwest border is Castle Garden, a circular brick structure, which has a history of its own. It was originally constructed for a fort, and was afterwards converted into a summer garden. A great ball, to Marquis Lafayette, was given in it in 1824; and General Jackson in 1832, and President Tyler in 1843, held public receptions there. Then it was turned into a concert hall, and is chiefly famous, as such, as being the place where Jenny Lind made her first appearance in America. It is now an emigrant depot, and on days of the arrival of emigrant ships, it is very entertaining to watch the troops of emigrants, with their quaint gait, unfamiliar language, and strange, un-American faces, passing out of its portals, and making their first entrance into their new life on the western continent.
Just east of the Battery is Whitehall, the terminus of numerous omnibus and car lines, and the location of the Staten Island, South and Hamilton ferries. There, too, is the depot of the elevated railways, which extend in four lines, two on the eastern side and two on the western, the entire length of the city. The Corn Exchange, an imposing building, is at the upper end of Whitehall. At the junction of Whitehall with Broadway is a pretty, old-fashioned square, shaded with trees, and surrounded by an iron fence, called Bowling Green. This was the aristocratic quarter of the city in its early days. No. 1 Broadway, known as the "old Kennedy House," was built in 1760, and has been, successively, the residence and headquarters of Lords Conwallis and Howe, General Sir Henry Clinton and General Washington, while Talleyrand lived there during his stay in America. Benedict Arnold concocted his treasonable projects at No. 5 Broadway. At No. 11 General Gates had his headquarters. A few of the old buildings still remain, but they have many of them already given way to more modern and more pretentious structures. The posts of the iron fence around Bowling Green were once surmounted by balls, but they were knocked off and used for cannon balls during the Revolution. An equestrian statue of King George III, which once ornamented the Square, was melted up during the same period, and furnished material for forty-two thousand bullets.
The stranger in New York sometimes wonders why its principal business street is called Broadway, since there are many others which are quite as broad, some of them even broader. But if he will visit the extreme southern portion of the city, he will quickly comprehend. The old streets are narrow, being scarcely more than mere alleys, with pavements barely broad enough for two to walk abreast, so that Broadway, when originally laid out, seemed a magnificent thoroughfare.
As already described, Wall street formed the northern boundary of the young colonial city. In that early day, as now, wealth and fashion sought to avoid the more plebeian business streets, and so withdrew to the neighborhood of this northern boundary, and established, first their residences, and then their commercial houses. Wall street then became what it has since remained, the monetary centre of the city, only that now it is more than that; it is the great monetary centre of the entire country. On it and the blocks leading from it, all embraced in comparatively a few acres, are probably stored more gold and silver than in all the rest of the United States put together, while the business interests represented extend to every section, not only of the continent, but of the world.
Nowhere else in America are there such and so many magnificent buildings as in this section of the city. The streets are narrow, and overshadowed as they are by edifices six or more stories in height, seem to be dwarfed into mere alley-ways. Nearly every building is worthy of being called a temple or a palace. White marble and brown stone, with every style of architecture, abound. The United States Sub-Treasury Building, at the corner of Wall and Nassau streets, is a stately white marble structure in the Doric style, occupying the site of the old Federal Hall, in which Washington delivered his first inaugural address. Opposite is the white marble palace, in the style of the Renaissance, known as the Drexel Building. A little further down the street, at the corner of William, is the United States Custom House, formerly the Merchants' Exchange, built of granite. It has a portico supported by twelve massive columns, and its rotunda in the interior is supported by eight columns of Italian marble, the Corinthian capitals of which were carved in Italy. Opposite this building is the handsome structure of the Bank of New York. Banks, and bankers' and brokers' offices fill the street, and are crowded into the side streets.
On Broad street, a short distance below Wall, is the Stock Exchange, a handsome, but not large building, which in point of interest towers over all others in the locality. Here are daily exacted the comedies and tragedies of financial life, and here fortunes are made and fortunes lost by that system of gigantic gambling which has come to be known as "dealing in stocks." The operations of the Stock Exchange and Gold Room concern the whole country, both financially and industrially. Here is the true governmental centre, rather than at Washington. Wall and Broad streets dictate to Congress what the laws of the country concerning finance shall be, and Congress obeys. The Bankers' Association holds the menace over the government that if their interests are not consulted, they will bring ruin upon the country; and it is in their power to execute the threat. This power was illustrated on the twenty-fourth of. September, 1869, a day memorable as Black Friday in the history of Wall street. By a small but strong combination of bears, gold was made to fall in seventeen minutes, from 1.60 to 1.30, after a sale of $50,000,000 had been effected, and thousands of men, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, were ruined. Money was locked up, and could not be obtained even at a premium of one hundred per cent. This was the forerunner of the panic which came four years later, in 1873. Then the Union Trust Company failed, carrying with it Jay Cooke, Fisk and Hatch, Henry Clews, Howe and Macy, and other houses. For the first time during its existence the Stock Exchange was closed. Without its closing, not a merchant or banker could have survived. With its doors shut no contract could be completed nor stocks transferred, and it gave people time, which was absolutely needed, to do what they could; or else universal and overwhelming ruin would have swept over the country. As it was, not less than twenty thousand firms went under, and the stringency of the times was felt throughout the nation, depressing business and checking industry, until Congress took measures for its relief.
The names of Jacob Little, Leonard W. Jerome, Daniel Drew, Jay Cooke, Augustus Schell, Rufus Hatch, James Fisk, Jr., Jay Gould, Commodore Vanderbilt, Wm. H. Vanderbilt, and others, are permanently associated with Wall street. Jacob Little was known as the "Great Bear of Wall street." He originated the daring, dashing style of business in stocks, and was always identified with the bears. Meeting many reverses, he died at last, comparatively poor, the Southern Rebellion having swept away his little remaining fortune.
Leonard W. Jerome was at one time financially the rival of Vanderbilt and Drew, with a fortune estimated at from six to ten millions. He assumed an unequaled style of magnificence in living; but reverses came, and his splendid property on Madison Square, including residence, costly stables and private theatre, passed into the hands of the Union League Club, and was occupied by them until they went to their new quarters in Fifth Avenue. He himself is now forgotten, although a man scarcely past the prime of life; but his name is perpetuated in the Jerome Race Course.
Daniel Drew came to New York a poor boy, and, by persistent industry and business capacity, worked his way up to the highest round of the commercial ladder. In 1838 Drew put an opposition boat upon the Hudson, with fare at one dollar to Albany; and shortly afterward established the People's Line, which has been so successful. The panic of 1873 affected him seriously, but he staved off failure until 1875. He died in 1879, leaving next to nothing of the millions he had made during his lifetime. St. Paul's Church, in Fourth avenue; the Methodist Church at Carmel, Putnam County, New York, his native place; and Drew Theological Seminary, are monuments of his munificence while money was at his command.
Jay Cooke, having been already tolerably successful in business, amassed his millions by negotiating the war loan. He was regarded as one of the most prominent and safe financiers in the country; but in 1873 his failure was complete, and he has not since been heard of in financial circles.
Rufus Hatch is one of the successful stock operators of New York. Beginning life with nothing, and meeting reverses as well as successes, he is now known as one of the boldest and most gigantic of street operators.
The name of James Fisk, Jr., is associated with that of the Erie Railroad. He commenced life as a peddler. In 1868 he was appointed Comptroller of the Erie Road, and immediately set about building up the fortunes of that corporation. He appeared on Wall street as an assistant of Daniel Drew; made himself master of the Narragansett Steamship Company, and changed the condition of its affairs from disaster to success. He was one of the conspirators on Black Friday of 1869. He purchased the Opera House and the Fifth Avenue Theatre, finding them both good investments. He was shot by Edward S. Stokes, both himself and Stokes having become entangled with a woman named Helen Josephine Mansfield. After his death his supposed great private fortune dwindled into a comparatively small amount.
Commodore Vanderbilt also started in life a penniless boy, and became, eventually, the great King of Wall street. He built up the Harlem River Railroad, originated gigantic enterprises; sent a line of steamships across the ocean; gained control of the Hudson River Railroad and other roads; and died in 1877, worth not far from $100,000,000, the bulk of which he left to his eldest son, William H. Vanderbilt. The Vanderbilt name has lost none of its lustre in the hands of the second generation. In less than ten years, after a career of unequaled brilliancy in the financial world, William H. Vanderbilt retired, with a fortune probably double that of his father.
Jay Gould also achieved success from small beginnings. He was in company with Fisk in the control of the Erie Railroad, and an associate in bringing about the disasters of Black Friday. Soon after the death of Greeley he secured a controlling interest in the New York Tribune. He is still a power in Wall street, and a great railroad magnate.
Broad street still has historical associations clinging about it. At the corner of Broad and Pearl streets is the famous De Lancy House, built early in the last century by Stephen De Lancy, a Huguenot refugee from Normandy. In this house, on the evening of November twenty-fifth, 1783, Washington and his staff, with Governor Clinton, celebrated the evacuation of the city by the British troops, and a few days later Washington bade his officers farewell, before departing for Annapolis to resign his commission. The house, having passed through successive stages of degeneration, had at one time sunk so low as to have become a German tenement house, with a lager beer saloon on the third floor. It has recently been renovated, and has again put on an air of respectability. It still bears upon it the words: "Washington's Headquarters." All about it are, here and there, the relics of the past, in the shape of houses which once were homes of the gentility, in colonial times.
Pearl street is said to have been originally a cow-path, and it is certainly crooked enough to justify such an origin. It is the locality of the Cotton Exchange and the cotton brokers.
On Broadway, at the head of Wall street, is Trinity Church, whose spire was, until a recent period, the highest in the city, being two hundred and eighty-four feet in height. In the early days, when the aristocracy were seeking the select neighborhood of Wall street, this church corporation established itself upon the utmost northern confines of the city. Its original edifice was destroyed by fire, and the present one was erected in 1846. It is of brown stone, in pure gothic architecture, and one of the most beautiful in New York. In the rich carving of the exterior numerous birds have built their nests. It has stained glass windows, and the finest chime of bells in America. Within the church is a costly reredos in memory of John Jacob Astor. A venerable graveyard lies to its north, where repose the remains of Alexander Hamilton, Captain Lawrence, of the Chesapeake, Robert Fulton, and the unfortunate Charlotte Temple. Some of the headstones, brown and crumbling with age, and bearing grotesque carved effigies of angels, date back for more than a century. In the northeast corner is a stately monument erected to the memory of the patriots who died in British prisons in New York during the Revolution. Trinity Parish is the oldest in the city, and fabulously wealthy, the corporation having been granted, by Queen Anne, in 1705, a large tract of land west of Broadway, extending as far north as Christopher street, known as the "Queen's Farm." The land, at that time remote from the city, now embraces some of its most valuable business portions. It is all leased of Trinity Church by the occupants, and the church, when the leases expire, becomes possessed of the buildings and improvements upon the ground, and is thus constantly augmenting its wealth. The claims of the Jans Anneke heirs involve this vast estate. It has three chapels, one of which, St. Paul's, is a few blocks above, on the corner of Broadway and Vesey streets, and is surrounded by a graveyard almost as ancient as that of Trinity.
At the northwest corner of Vesey street and Broadway is the Astor House, which, when it was built, something more than a generation ago, was a marvel of size and splendor, though it is now thrown in the shade by more modern structures. John Jacob Astor, its builder, was born near Heidelberg, in Germany, in 1765, and came penniless to the new world, to seek his fortune. After serving as a clerk, he then engaged in a small way in the fur business, which eventually grew to the proportions of the American Fur Company, and brought to its founder a large fortune, though no one outside his family ever knew its exact amount. He settled most of his affairs before his death, selling the Astor House to his son William, for the consideration of one dollar. Much of his property was in real estate, which constantly increased in value. He died in 1848, and his senior son being an imbecile, William B. Astor, the younger brother, inherited most of his father's fortune. The son became vastly richer than his father, dying in 1875, leaving behind him a fortune of $50,000,000, which was mostly bequeathed to his eldest son, John Jacob, who is now the head of the house.
The Post Office stands opposite the Astor House, on the east side of Broadway, at the southern extremity of City Hall Park. It is a massive structure, of Doric and Renaissance architecture, four stories in height, beside a Mansard roof, costing $7,000,000.
Half a century ago the City Hall Park was the chief park of New York, and the elegance and aristocracy of the city gathered around it. The City Hall stands in the park, and back of it is the new Court House, still unfinished, a massive edifice in Corinthian style, which, when completed, will have a dome two hundred and ten feet above the sidewalk.
On the western side of Broadway, opposite St. Paul's, is the splendid building of the New York Herald. The Herald is the representative newspaper of New York, and is probably the most enterprising sheet in the world. James Gordon Bennett, its founder, was born in Scotland in 1795, and came to America in 1819. After various literary ventures, he decided to establish a paper which should embody his ideal of a metropolitan journal. On the sixth of May, 1855, the first number of the New York Herald was issued, being then a small penny sheet. Mr. Bennett was editor, reporter and correspondent. He was his own compositor and errand boy, mailed his papers and kept his accounts. His rule, from the very first, was never to run a dollar in debt. He succeeded in establishing a paper which has no parallel in history, while, since his death, his son's enterprise has still further increased its scope and popularity. Young Bennett, the present proprietor of the Herald, named after his father, was trained especially for the duties which were to devolve upon him. He is thoroughly at home in French, German, Italian and Scotch. He is a skilled engineer, and can run either the engines or presses of his establishment. He is a practical printer, and can also telegraph with skill and accuracy. He gives strict personal supervision to the affairs of his immense establishment, which yields him a yearly income equaling that of a merchant prince.
Extending from the Herald Building northward, on the eastern side of City Hall Park, is what is known as Printing House Square, including the offices of the principal daily and weekly papers. The magnificent granite structure of the Staats Zeitung faces this square on the north. The immense Tribune Building, nine stories high, with its tall clock tower, flanks it on the east, on Nassau street. The Sun modestly nestles in the shadow of the Tribune. The Times Building is found on Park Row, where also is the World office. Truth lurks in a basement on Nassau street. But a square or two below is the Evening Post Building, where the venerable poet Bryant labored at his editorial duties for so many years. A statue of Franklin occupies a small open triangular space in the midst of the square.
