In the decades after the Civil War, New Yorkers with money had several options for housing.
For the really loaded, there were stand-alone mansions and the new luxury residential hotels; upper middle class residents could go with a brownstone row house or one of the early “French flats” apartment buildings.
If you were working class or poor, however, a tenement awaited you. And if you were so broke you couldn’t afford (or were excluded from) a tenement, you could cobble together a shack—housing so primitive that it’s hard to believe existed across Manhattan.
Yet thanks to some talented but unheralded landscape painters, viewers can get a visceral sense of the substandard wood shacks some residents called home in the 1860s and 1870s.
Ralph Blakelock is one of these landscape painters. Born on Christopher Street in 1847 and the son of a doctor, Blakelock dropped out of the precursor to today’s City College in the 1860s and devoted his life to painting romantic, sometimes darkly evocative moonlit landscapes of New England and the American West, explains Artsy.
Back in Manhattan in 1874—where he tried to support a wife and nine children with the meager proceeds from his art while slipping into the throes of mental illness—Blakelock depicted these wood shacks (top image) in a painting he titled simply “Shanties in Harlem.”
Harlem at the time was transforming from a rural district into a place for the middle class, but the hardscrabble shacks in Blakelock’s painting are startling.
Blakelock also painted “Shanties, Seventh Avenue and 55th Street” (second image). These shacks would have stood four blocks below the new Central Park, and area fast becoming a wealthy enclave of mansions and early apartment houses.
An earlier work from 1868 shows a lonely small wood house with a sloping roof at Fifth Avenue and 89th Street, today the site of the Guggenheim Museum (third image).
Another landscape painter, Howard Nesmith, born in 1859, captured the shacks that once stood on today’s Second Avenue and East 72nd Street. Nesmith painted this image (fourth from top) in 1879, showing hilly terrain and rough-hewn homes.
Nesmith’s “East Foot of 72nd Street,” from 1876, is something of an impressionist view of a wood house perched precariously on the side of a hill by the East River (fifth image).
What became of these shacks and shanties? By the early 1900s, they had all likely disappeared, replaced by brick and mortar residences and office buildings. I wish I knew what drew Blakelock and Nesmith to them.
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THE ANNUAL FALL FOR ARTS FESTIVAL BRINGS OUT THE WONDERFUL ART. THE THEMES WERE MYTHICAL AND RIVERSDE RYHTHMS. TODAY ARTISTS WORKED TO COMPLETE THEIR WORKS AND THE DEPTH AND QUALITY ARE AMAZING. TAKE A STROLL THROUGH THE RIVERCROSS LAWN DURING THE COMING WEEKS.
LA _GALERIA _DEL_LEON ON INSTAGRAM
RAJ THE MIRRORS GLITTER IN THE SUNSHINE
DAN MINER’S WONDERFUL ABSTRACT PAINTING AFTER BEING DETAILED AND
COMPLETED THIS MORNING
HONESTY, BRAVERY, KINDNESS, CALM, RESPECT
AU YU WONG BAMBOO IN THE SHADE OF OUR TREES
DEMING LIAO RECENTLY EMIGRATED FROM CHINA . HE AND ASSOCIATE METICULOUSLY DETAILED THIS PAINTING, IT IS THE FIRST ONE YOU SEE WHEN WALKING NORTH FROM THE SUBWAY.
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OUR JULIA GASH TAPESTRY THROWS HAVE ARRIVED.
100 % COTTON 48″ x 60″ MADE IN USA $75- CHARGE CARDS ACCEPTED ORDER YOURS TODAY OR AVAILABLE AT RIHS KIOSK STARTING ON SUNDAY
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ANNUAL FALL FOR ARTS FESTIVAL BRINGS OUT THE WODNERFUL ART. THE THEMES WERE MYTHICAL AND RIVERSDE RYHTHMS.
NOT ALL THE ART WAS FINISHED TODAY WITH BLUSTERY AUTUMN WEATHER.
YING AND YANG WAS THE TITLE, DONE WITH SPRAY PAINT.
ART,MEDITATION AND NATURE BY THOM HEYER
DAN MINER’S WONDERFUL ABSTRACT PAINTING
RIOC STAFF TOM IMPERATI, AMANDA DOMINGUEZ, BRYANT DANIELS AND KEVIN BROWN SPENT A LONG COLD DAY MAKING SURE ALL WENT WELL TODAY. THANKS TO THE RIOC STAFF WHO MADE THE DAY SO SUCCESSFUL.
WE WILL HAVE MORE IMAGES TOMORROW. SOME ARTISTS WILL BE BACK TO FINISH ON MONDAY.
MONDAYPHOTO OF THE DAY
A MAN WALKING WITH SOME TYPE OF GOOGLE CAMERA BY TRAM ON THURSDAY
WEEKEND PHOTO
CITY CENTER THEATER ON WEST 55TH STREET.
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
JUDITH BERDY
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
The private homes of Manhattan’s wealthy citizens had moved northward before 1853 when the luxurious marble-fronted St. Nicholas Hotel opened on Broadway between Spring and Broome Streets. The exclusive hotel, which cost about $1 million to construct, would attract handsome retail stores around it.
In 1859 Homer Bostwick hired architect John Kellum to design an upscale emporium building across the street from the St. Nicholas, at Nos. 502-504 Broadway. Kellum had just dissolved his partnership with Gamaliel King, and was now partnered with his son as Kellum & Son.
The cast iron storefront of clustered columns and regimented arches was manufactured by the Architectural Iron Works. Its catalogue listed these capitals as “Gothic.” Above, the four stories of white marble were distinguished by two-story arches, separated by slim engaged columns which would later earn the style “sperm candle” because of the similarity to candles made from the waxy substance found in the head cavities of the sperm whale.
Kellum & Son stacked nubby, faceted blocks up the side piers, which provided a somewhat incongruous frame when compared with the otherwise gentle lines of the facade. Below the stone cornice a corbel table carried on the arched motif. High above Broadway two stone urns were the finishing touches.
While the building was completed in 1860, the Civil War prevented tenants from moving in until 1866. That year C. G. Gunther & Sons moved into the top floor. Described as “The oldest and largest fur house in the United States,” it was founded in 1820 by Christian G. Gunther at No. 46 Maiden Lane and remained at that location until now. The firm, now headed by C. Godfrey Gunther, not only imported raw furs and skins, but manufactured fur clothing and accessories.
In May 1866 china and “fancy goods” dealers John Vogt & Co. moved into the first four floors. Founded in 1852 it had been operating from William Street. In its new store, according to the History of New York in 1868, “may now be seen the most magnificent and choice stocks of merchandise” and “an endless variety of curious, chase, quaint, and elaborate designs, and combining superb beauty of shapes, colors, and embellishments with rare excellence of materials and most exquisite workmanship in respect to moulding, carving, etc.”
The first floor was the “Porcelain Ware” showroom. Here well-do-to female shoppers browsed among dinnerware, tea services, and “toilet ware.” The second floor contained “Bohemian and Belgian Glass Ware, Lava Wave, German China, and Parian Marble.” Reproductions of classical statuary suitable for Victorian parlors were available here. Among the copies available in 1868 were “Cupid captive by Venus; Sybilla, with guitar; Paul and Virginia (from that memorable and pathetic story); [and] Mounted Amazon attacked by a leopard.” The third and fourth floors were used for warehousing stock.
Only four months after John Vogt & Co. opened, disaster struck. On October 8, 1866 The New York Times reported “A destructive fire occurred in the marble building No. 502 Broadway, on Saturday night. The building was occupied by C. G. Gunther & Sons, furriers, and John Vogt & Co., dealers in china and glass.” The devastating fire roared through the floors and sparks set St. Patrick’s Cathedral several blocks away on Mott Street ablaze.
Damage to the church and “its interior adornments” were estimated at $150,000; while the Broadway emporium was gutted. The Times reported “the edifice was reduced to ashes.” The losses suffered by John Vogt & Co. and C. G. Gunther & Sons was around $350,000–approximately $5.4 million in 2017.
The History of New York noted “the whole edifice underwent a thorough and costly refitting and adornment.” Undaunted, both companies moved back into the restored building.
By 1872 John Vogt & Co. had left and C. G. Gunther’s Sons had expanded throughout the lower floors. Formerly a wholesale house, it now opened both a men’s and a women’s store. On December 28, 1872 an advertisement in Harper’s Bazaar offered “Ladies’ Furs,” an “elegant assortment of seal-skin fur, in all the leading styles of sacques and turbans.”
Choosing its audience carefully, C. G. Gunther’s Sons placed its ad for menswear that same month in the Army, Navy, Air Force Journal & Register. The advertisement gave a hint of the wide variety of items manufactured and sold here. Well-to-do patrons were offered “caps, collars, gloves, gauntlets, etc., including the latest styles in seal skin fur.” There was also a “large and elegant stock of fur robes and skins for carriage and sleigh use” and “seal coats and vests.”
Earlier that year, in October, the New-York Tribune dedicated an article to C. G. Gunther’s Sons. It described the luxurious pelts used to create items worn by Manhattan’s wealthiest citizens. “The most costly furs are those made from the Russian and ‘Crown’ Sable, which always have been and always will be fashionable.” The article explained that the term “Crown” sable indicated these were the skins used by the Czar.
The prices quoted were an indication of the C. G. Gunther’s Sons’ carriage trade customers. “The price of a set, consisting of muff and boa, or collar, varies from $115 to $1,000. The darker the fur the more expensive, other things being equal.” The cheapest price mentioned would be equal to about $2,300 today; the most expensive about $20,000.
The Tribune’s article included mention of the extraordinary number of furs–a list that would shock readers today. Included were fox, chinchilla, mink, ermine, seal, beaver, monkey, marten, bear, buffalo, wolverine, lynx and wildcat. The writer decided “the purchasers who cannot find their wants immediately supplied must be difficult to please.”
A would-be burglar was attracted to the expensive goods within the store early on a September morning in 1874. Michael Moreno, described by The Times as “an Italian living at No. 59 Crosby street,” was noticed loitering outside by the night watchman. The guard used a forceful incentive to prompt the Moreno to move on; but was trumped. “The watchman caught hold of the Italian and drew his club, as if to strike him, when the latter drew a revolver.”
Hearing the commotion, Police Officer Corey rushed in. He grabbed Moreno by the collar, only to find the revolver now pointed at him. For his bold move Moreno received a “stunning blow on the forehead” by the policeman’s baton.
The blow was severe enough that the next morning he was moved from his jail cell to Bellevue Hospital. But he had not learned his lesson about 19th century law enforcement yet. The newspaper reported that he was “so threatening” that an officer was called in to help the nurses undress him. Finally he was placed in a strait-jacket.
If the authorities had searched Moreno for weapons, they missed his knife. He managed to escape from the strait-jacket then attacked the police officer with the knife. The policeman “was obliged to use his club to protect himself.” It all ended badly for the combative would-be burglar. “At a late hour last night Moreno was lying in a dangerous condition in the hospital,” reported The Times on September 19, 1874.
Although C. G. Gunther’s Sons had returned to the building after the ruinous fire a decade earlier, it would no do so in 1876. The conflagration of February 8 quickly became known nation-wide as the “Great Broadway Fire.” The Tribune described it in florid Victorian prose saying “The air rushed into the vortex of the ascending flame from every direction, and lifted the fire in gigantic billows that rolled aloft in roaming surges to a great height.”
Structures along Broadway collapsed during the massive fire. Harper’s Weekly, February 1876 (copyright expired)
Buildings collapsed, others were gutted. Nos. 502-504 Broadway was heavily damaged. The tailor’s trimmings firm of Lesher, Whitman & Co. took advantage of catastrophe by quickly purchasing the building. Three days later, even while The Times remarked “The public interest in the ruins of the buildings destroyed by fire Last Tuesday night was unabated yesterday,” it reported “Messrs. Lesher, Whitman & Co. yesterday purchased the premises No. 502 and 504 Broadway, at present occupied by Messrs. C. G. Gunther & Co. as a fur store.”
The article explained that Lesher, Whitman & Co. would take over the building “as soon as Messrs. Gunther & Co. shall have removed.” One month later C. G. Gunther’s Sons moved into “the new and capacious building No. 184 Fifth avenue” at 23rd Street.
Elegant carriages once waited outside the building as the wives of millionaires shopped for glassware and, later, furs.
Lesher, Whitman & Co. conducted business from the restored building with little fanfare for more than a decade. The only upheaval seems to have been the ongoing battle with the New York District Rail Company in 1886 and 1887. The company proposed to build a “railroad underneath Broadway.” Stephen R. Lesher, head of the firm, vehemently fought against it.
It was not until 1889 that trouble came; not through business troubles, but through love. Stephen Lesher’s son, Charles S. Lesher, was 20 years old at the time and still lived in the family’s handsome house at No. 330 Madison Avenue. He was employed by the insurance firm Weed & Kennedy on Pine Street.
The young man became enamored with 28-year old Leonore Mitchell, described by The Times as “a handsome woman.” Shockingly, Lenore asserted that the two were “on intimate terms,” and Charles admitted, according to the newspaper, “that he had spent a good deal of his time in her company.”
But, according to Leonore, he became fiercely jealous. It came to a climax when he called on her at her home at No. 21 West 31st Street on March 4. During the preliminary hearing she declared he “induced her to drink a glass of wine in which he poured a quantity of digitalis.” Soon afterwards she became ill and “was compelled to call in a doctor, who saved her life.”
Lesher was arrested for attempted murder. His accuser appeared in the courtroom on May 14 “fashionably attired and was accompanied by a colored maid, Laura Paul.” She told the court that when he called on her a few days after the incident, he admitted to poisoning her; “but said that he had been drinking, or he would not have done it.”
Lesher insisted it was all a lie and that Leonore was simply attempting to blackmail him. He claimed to have a letter from her in which she confessed to attempted suicide. His father provided the $1,000 bail pending his court case.
More heartbreak came to the Lesher family six years later when Charles’s older brother Stephen visited the family’s ranch at Rockwood Station, Texas. While riding there his horse stepped into a prairie dog burrow and fell, rolling on top of Lesher. He suffered internal injuries and decided to return to New York “to get competent advice.” Doctors gave him morphine to ease the pain on the trip.
There was no railroad connecting Texas and New York; so Lesher boarded the steamer Neuces. According to other passengers, when the 35-year old went to his berth at 11:00 on the night of June 18, he was “cheerful.” But when Stephen Lesher, Sr. met the Neuces in New York Harbor four days later he would not be greeting his son, but retrieving his body. The 35-year old had been found dead in his berth, the apparent victim of an overdose.
At the time Wertheimer & Co., makers of gloves, was also in the Broadway building. On Christmas Eve 1891 Bloomindale’s ran an advertisement noting “Special–We have secured the entire sample stock of Lined Gloves from Wertheimer & Co…Ladies’ and Men’s, with and without fur tops.” The department store announced that although they were normally priced at up to $2.98 per pair, “We shall put these out as a great Holiday Special at 79c. per pair.” The store warned “Only 1,200 pairs; lingerers may be losers.”
Lesher, Whitman & Co. would remain in the Broadway building until 1900. In the meantime, other firms leased space. Benjamin & Caspary, cloak makers, were here by 1897. The firm sent a letter to the Citizens’ Union headquarters in October that year, endorsing Seth Low for reelection to mayor. It said in part “We wish to inform you that we are enthusiastically in favor of the election of Seth Low.”
The endorsement may not have been totally unbiased. Seth Low owned the Broadway building at the time and was, therefore, Benjamin & Caspary’s landlord. The property values along Broadway were an undergoing astonishing boom. In 1898 502-504 Broadway was valued at $250,000 and a year later at $300,000.
As Lesher, Whitman & Co. moved out, D. Jones & Sons moved in. The wholesale shirt makers were best known for their “Princely” and “Emperor” brands. In January 1901 The American Hatter insisted “No shirt buyer can afford to miss this line. Everything that is desirable in plain, fancy and negligee, or any variety of shirt, is here.”
The building was slathered with D. Jones & Sons advertising in 1902. New York, the Metropolis (copyright expired)
Headed by Dramin Jones, the firm included sons Joseph, Morris and Henry. Calling itself “the largest producers of popular priced shirts in the world” in 1902, it maintained a massive factory in Johnstown, Pennsylvania.
The company was joined in the building on January 1, 1904 by Meinhard-Cozzens Company, makers and sellers of ladies’ neckwear and belts. “Neckwear” for women in 1904 referred to the high, stiff collars indispensable to a fashionable Edwardian wardrobe.
Meinhard-Cozzens offered a variety of elegant women’s collars. Fabrics, Fancy Goods and Notions, December 1905 (copyright expired)
By 1909 another women’s neckwear company had moved in. Klauber Bros. & Co. advertised “Embroideries, Laces, Neckwear, and Novelties.”
In November 1911 when Seth Low sold the building to Charles Lane, the three tenants were still here. D. Jones & Son was now known as Phillips-Jones Co.; but was still selling its highly-successful Emperor Shirts. Lane paid Low $251,000 for the property, a price the astonished Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide pointed out was “$194,000 less than the assessed value.”
Lane quickly resold the building a month later. On December 23 the Record & Guide hinted “The buyer is said to be the Coca-Cola Co.” The rumor was colorful but false. The purchaser was William H. Browning of Browning, King & Co. clothiers. He told reporters he had not decided what he would do with the property and “that the purchase was merely for investment.”
Throughout the next nine years the building continued to house apparel manufacturers. Philips-Jones employed 150 men, and 23 women in their shirt making shop. In 1917 another shirt manufacturer, Goodman, Cohen & Co. took 12,500 square feet of space; while Everett, Heaney & Co. dealt in fabrics.
For the first time in decades Nos. 502-504 Broadway was home to just one company when S. Blechman & Sons leased the entire building in July 1920. Listed in directories as “dry goods distributors,” the firm produced hosiery, underwear and other knit goods. And it found itself at odds with the labor unions several times over the next few years.
In 1934 management won a court order prohibiting strikers from carrying picket signs in front of the building. When the union refused to comply, S. Blechman & Sons went back to court, asking for a contempt of court ruling. In a case of deja vu the firm was back in court in 1937 when the union “flouted the injunction which restrained it from carrying signs…asserting that S. Blechman Sons, Inc…was unfair to labor.” The union was fined $250 for that offense.
The following year Simon Blechman commissioned architect Harry Hurwit to design the company’s new $65,000 building. Then in what was apparently a sudden change of mind, it purchased the old Rouss Building at Nos. 549-555 Broadway.
The building was home to Canal Jeans on a much-changed Broadway. photo by Edmund Vincent Gillon from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York
The stretch of Broadway had not been the shopping district of the carriage trade for decades. Until the last quarter of the century its once-elegant buildings would be overlooked and abused. With the renaissance of the Soho neighborhood, Canal Jeans leased ground floor of 502-504 Broadway in 1992.
Through it all, little changed to Kellum & Son’s striking 1860 facade. In 2003 Bloomingdale’s leased the former Canal Jeans store in the building where 112 years earlier it had purchased an entire line of gloves.
In the 1970’s my father leased a floor in 502 Broadway. The neighborhood was mostly textile companies and manufacturers. Canal Jean Co. was downstairs in the retail space with their rowboat out front. The owners of the building would have loved to sell it for $50,000.
“Federal Procession” of nearly 5,000 citizens marched through Lower Manhattan in celebration of the ratification of the Constitution. The Order of the Procession was divided in ten divisions representing various trades and professions. One of those involved in the manifestation was a young Federalist and lexicographer by the name of Noah Webster.
Noah was a member of the Philological Society of New York. Founded in March 1788 for the purpose of “improving the American Tongue,” the Society was eager to take part in the event. Solemnly dressed in black, the philologists paraded in the Ninth Division with lawyers, college students and merchants.
Members of the Society carried symbolic props with them, including a flag depicting the “Genius of America” crowned with a wreath of thirteen plumes representing the States that had ratified the Constitution; a scroll displaying the principles of a “Federal Language” (the text of which has not survived); and the Society’s coat of arms.
From his early Dissertation on the English Language (1789) to his landmark dictionary of 1828, Webster would present himself as an indefatigable champion of American English. His name has become synonymous with the words “dictionary” and “independence.”
Teaching & Textbooks
Born in West Hartford, Connecticut, Noah was the son of a farmer who mortgaged the family business to pay for his son’s law studies at Yale University. During his freshman year on June 29, 1775, he witnessed George Washington moving through New Haven on his way to Cambridge to take command of the American Army. Under Noah’s musical leadership (he was a talented flautist), students escorted the General through town.
After his graduation in 1778, Webster experienced uncertain career prospects. A supporter of the Revolution, he was – like other young rebels – unable to find work as a lawyer. Struggling to decide which profession to pursue, he discovered the writings of the English lexicographer Samuel Johnson and turned his talent to education. The flow of printed materials from London had stalled because of the war between Britain and the thirteen colonies. Schoolbooks were in short supply. Noah set about filling the gap.
Webster published three textbooks: American Grammar (1784), American Reader (1785), and American Spelling Book (1789). He intended to introduce “uniformity and accuracy of pronunciation into common schools.” The fundamental idea had been formulated by Benjamin Franklin who suggested that “people spell best who do not know how to spell.” The more phonetic and logical, the better spelling would be. In political terms that meant opting for “democratic” clarity in linguistics. American English was to be purged of British aristocratic influence.
Webster succeeded in changing the French re and ce endings, theatre becoming theater, center instead of centre, and offense rather than offence; in replacing the English ou in words such has flavor, honor or humor (nabor instead of neighbour was never accepted); and in eliminating unnecessary double consonants (traveler for traveller; jeweler for jeweller).
Other changes Noah proposed were mocked and ridiculed: wimmen (women), blud (blood), or dawter (daughter) never caught on. In later years Webster backed off from his more radical spelling suggestions.
Seize the Moment
In Europe, the French Revolution had created hope and excitement, especially amongst young people. Renewal and liberation seemed concrete possibilities; poverty and injustice were to be eradicated here and now.
A similar sense of urgent anticipation was expressed by American revolutionary thinkers. “Now is the time” Webster wrote in an essay entitled “On Education” in the December 1787 issue of AmericanMagazine. Let us seize the moment and “establish a national language as well as a national government.”
In 1789 Webster published his Dissertation on the English Language, dedicating the study to Benjamin Franklin. In the book, he suggested that the import of foreign terms by immigrants, the inclusion of Native American words, the multiplication of Americanisms, the re-interpretation of “old” British phrases, the introduction of scientific terminology and the proliferation of slang, made a specific American dictionary an essential tool for enriching American life and culture.
Webster concluded that these factors would lead to a gradual separation of the American tongue from the English. He insisted that the process should be accelerated through active intervention. The challenge to Americans was not just to create their own democratic system of government, but also their explicit manner of communication in which there should be no differentiation between classes and regions. Noah was an impatient man and time was of the essence.
Webster stood in the vanguard of those patriots who championed a distinctive “American language” that would be free from the corrupting influence of British English, but also protected from internal fragmentation. New nationhood provided unique opportunities for reform. Dissertation was a clarion call for linguistic unity and independence. The conviction that a “national language is a national tie,” was his guiding principle.
American Minerva
In 1793 Founding Father Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of the Treasury under George Washington, recruited Webster to become editor of the newly founded Federalist newspaper American Minerva. Published on December 9, 1793, close to the Tontine Coffee House in Wall Street, it was the city’s first daily newspaper.
Aiming to contain the “earliest intelligence, collected from the most authentic sources,” the paper ran for 744 issues between 1793 and 1796 (it eventually became the New York Sun which finally ceased publication in 1950).
During that period Noah published a series of newspaper articles, political essays and textbooks. Working in an environment of news gathering, Webster must have been overwhelmed by the verbal richness of a rapidly expanding city and the vocal vitality of New York English. The journalistic experience may have served as a confirmation of his earlier “theoretical” reflections.
Webster returned to Connecticut in 1798. By then, his “Blue-Backed” American Speller had become a bestseller. Towards the end of the nineteenth century, about 100 million copies were in circulation. Only the Bible outsold the textbook.
Many of these “spellers” may have been pirated editions, but royalties were sufficient for him to devote the rest of his life creating an American dictionary (Webster’s battle against pirates and plagiarists would lead to the passing of the first federal copyright laws in 1790).
Over his lifetime, Webster published more than fifty books and pamphlets in a variety of fields. Most of his later scholarly work was carried out in his New Haven home at the corner of Temple and Grove Streets. Although his interest was predominantly in linguistics, he did pay attention to other social and communal issues. Public health was one of those.
Benjamin Rush was a physician and medical professor at the University of Pennsylvania. As one of the signatories to the Declaration of Independence, he was also a prominent politician with a strong concern for public health. When in 1793 an epidemic of yellow fever hit Philadelphia, killing nearly ten percent of the population, Rush assumed a leading role in battling the disease.
Webster teamed up with him and conducted a series of pioneering scientific surveys. In 1799 he published a Brief History of Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases, a review of available data and contemporary theories.
Dictionaries
British promoters of Empire at the time were keen to draw parallels with Imperial Rome. It was both an appealing analogy and a warning. Rome had been a civilizing force in barbaric times and it was Britain’s mission to play that role in the modern world. The Eternal City’s decadence should function as a constant reminder to rulers and administrators.
It was the task of grammarians to “fix” the English language, making it a fit vehicle for imperial ambitions just as Latin had been for Rome. A grand linguistic tradition had to be preserved for future generations, whilst banalities, vulgarities and foreign loan words had to be banned. In 1755, Samuel Johnson had published A Dictionary of the English Language, a two-volume folio work containing approximately 40,000 terms.
In his extensive use of illustrative quotations, Johnson looked backwards by selecting authors who “rose in the time of Elizabeth,” the “golden” age of linguistic excellence. Many linguists assumed that Johnson’s monumental effort would suffice for America as it did for Britain. Webster fundamentally disagreed.
In his ambition to standardize the nation’s language, Webster took the next step in 1806 by publishing A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language. He did have a predecessor. The first dictionary compiled in America itself had been published in 1798 in New Haven by a fellow Connecticut lexicographer named Samuel Johnson Jr. (no relation of the English lexicographer; the extraordinary coincidence has created confusion among historians).
The first edition of Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language was published in 1828. His classic volume was larger than Samuel Johnson’s by about a third. Native American speakers contributed terms such as moccasin, canoe and maize; from the French came prairie and dime; from Dutch, cookie and landscape; from Spanish, mesa and canyon; and from Mexican, hoosegow and stampede. Separate words were combined, creating the terms rattlesnake and bullfrog. Neologisms such as gimmick, currency and graveyard were also added.
Webster’s definitions frequently rambled out of scope. His religious and moral agenda shaped descriptions into mini-sermons rather than serve as mere clarifications of meaning. His etymology was flawed because he was unaware of research into the evolution of Indo-European languages from roots such as Sanskrit. Instead, his etymologies conform entirely to the interpretation of words as presented in the Bible.
Just like Samuel Johnson, Webster made ample use of biblical citations. Both were religious men, but the former focused on the Bible as a work of great literature; for the more orthodox Noah it was a tool for moral betterment. His dictionary was prescriptive as he tended to dictate how words should be used rather than record the way in which they were being used.
Webster’s dictionary was a cultural landmark, but a commercial failure. Its first edition sold only 2,500 copies. He was forced to mortgage his home to bring out a second printing and for the rest of his life he was dogged by a sense of failure. Noah died in 1843, almost forgotten and unrecognized.
Legacy
Webster’s legacy was secured by the efforts of editors who “cleaned up” his dictionary. In 1853 publishers George and Charles Merriam achieved success selling the dictionary as a national symbol through a method of “testimonial” advertising. Having sent out gift copies to many prominent figures, they used standard signed thank-you letter as proof of endorsement, angering Washington Irving and others who did not want to be associated with Webster’s enterprise.
American English would pursue its own development, in spite of Webster not because of him. His real legacy was the persistent call for an American literature by advising authors to seek detachment from English literary models.
What debases the genius of my countrymen, he cried out, is the “implicit confidence they place in English authors, and their unhesitating submission to their opinions.” If America desired to produce its own literary heroes, the nation had to minimize its dependence on Anglo-European examples. This was the rebellious message that resonated in the ears of subsequent generations of writers and artists.
When on July 24, 1838, Ralph Waldo Emerson delivered an oration entitled “Literary Ethics” at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire, his carefully crafted argument reflected the spirit of Webster. As creators we are grateful for a great history, he told his audience, but “now our day is come.” We will live for ourselves “not as the pall-bearers of a funeral,” but as creators of the present by putting “our own interpretation on things, and our own things for interpretation.”
Nearly half a century earlier, Webster had expressed the same viewpoint with an identical sense of conviction and immediacy.
FRIDAYPHOTO OF THE DAY
OUR JULIA GASH TAPESTRY THROWS HAVE ARRIVED. 48″ X 60″ MADE IN USA WE ARE TAKING ORDERS AND SELLING THEM THIS WEEKEND. SEND YOUR ORDER TO:
New York International Airport, then commonly called Idlewild Airport, when new around 1950. Pan American Airlines aircraft is on a taxiway passing over the Van Wyck Expressway.
Andy Sparberg
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
Illustrations, from above: The New York Grand Federal Procession, July 22, 1788, passing Bowling Green, from Martha J. Lamb’s History of the city of New York: its origin, rise, and progress (Volume 2), 1882; Noah Webster, “The Schoolmaster of the Republic,” print produced by Root & Tinker, New York, 1886 (Library of Congress); Front page of the inaugural edition of the Federalist newspaper American Minerva from December 9, 1793; the title page of Webster’s 1828 edition of the American Dictionary of the English Language; and Korczak Ziolkowski’s tribute to Noah Webster (early 1940s) in Blue Back Square, West Hartford, Connecticut.
JUDITH BERDY Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
On this beautiful autumn, really summer day it was time to get to Manhattan and take my #7 Covid 19 vaccination. The ferry was ontime and I was with about 50 island commuters to 34th Street.
Arriving at 35th Street it was a 15 minute walk to Bellevue Hospital for my vaccination.
Vaccinations at Bellevue are open to the public, as the largest hospital in our municipal Health+ Hospitals system. The impressive lobby leads to this round room where WPA murals decorate the walls.
Check-in takes a few minutes and I was asked to wait in a spacious area. Today I could have the new Pfizer BionNTech Covid 19 vaccine. Moderna is also available along with Flu shots. (RSV is not available here).
A nurse called me into a private cubicle. She asked my the routine questions about allergies and health. She gave the the vaccination and asked me to wait 15minutes. She told me if there were any reactions, I was literally 50 feet from the Emergency Room. After 15 minutes of waiting I was presented with my new Covid 19 vaccination card.
I have tried to get an appointment for a vaccination at our Duane Reade. I find that the area is tight, overbooked and our stressed out pharmacy staff is being asked to do double duty with their primary job as pharmacists.
If you are having a reaction at a pharmacy, 911 must be called. I would prefer to have mine in a medical facility. It is worth the trip to feel more safe.
A quick bus ride up to 42 Street where the UN was back to normal. The security staff was friendly and glad that the the General Assembly events were a memory.
Passing the Ford Foundation building the garden view was boarded up. More renovations from those just done a few years ago. Work never seems to stop in this city. Miss seeing the greenery this time.
After lunch and a trip to Costco in Manhattan the ferry was the perfect ride home.
As I was leaving the ferry pier a woman was trying out a Citybike coming on the road from the tram to the East promenade. As I was about to warn her of the deteriorated pavement, she fell off the bike. The “pavement” here is dangerous especially to a novice rider on the sharp hilly curve.
She said she was not hurt but walked the bike back to the Citibike stand.
This is such a dangerous site, if someone fell and cars coming around the curve.
Image from 1941 brochure celebrating opening of East River Drive
TUESDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY
Beaux Art Lamp post to the right of the Manhattan entrance of the Ed Koch/59th Street Bridge. The other lamp post was taken down when the tram was installed and could pass with out problems. Judy Berdy, after much time searching, located the base of the one removed, had it restored and it was place in front of the kiosk on R. Judy Schneider
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
JUDITH BERDY
Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
Long Island City has a new sculpture park! Located between 5203 and 5241 Center Blvd, the park is a collaboration between real estate developer TF Cornerstone (TFC) and the Queens-based art organization Culture Lab LIC. There are currently three works on display by New York artists. The first is ‘Confidence” by Long Island-based sculptor Paul Maus. This abstract white marble figure is part of a series by Maus that “portrays women asserting their identity against societal pressures.” Next, neon specialist Kenny Greenberg’s original work, ‘ART DREAM,’ features handcrafted neon letters meant to look like part of a crossword puzzle. Finally, Mexican-born artist Erwin List Sanchez’s ‘The Moose Spirit’ is a life-size moose made of 1,000 old railroad spikes. These three pieces were selected from submissions to an open call for outdoor public sculptures in 2022.
Robert Indiana’s iconic LOVE sculpture has returned to NYC! Rockefeller Center, in partnership with The Robert Indiana Legacy Initiative, is showcasing monumental sculptures by the artist now through October 23rd. The centerpiece of the exhibition is LOVE, a 12-foot-high polychrome aluminum public artwork that stood at the corner of 55th Street and Sixth Avenue for decades. The piece was removed in 2019 for conservation. ONE Through ZERO (The Ten Numbers) (1980-2001) can also be seen at Rockefeller Center this month. This piece is made of eight-foot-high numbers crafted from Cor-ten steel. ONE Through ZERO represents the cycle of human life from birth to death and exemplifies Indiana’s fascination with numbers. Accompanying the sculptures is a series of 193 flags surrounding The Rink at Rockefeller Center. The flags feature images from Indiana’s Peace Paintings series, created as a response to the 9/11 attacks.
Photo Courtesy Four Freedoms Park Conservancy
In honor of Hispanic Heritage Month, the Grand Stairs of Four Freedoms Park, a canvas of large-scale art installations, is now covered by a mural from artist Mata Ruda. Titled Esta Tierra Es Nuestra Tierra (This Land is Our Land), the mural “celebrates the histories, cultures, and contributions of American citizens whose ancestors came from Spain, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central and South America.” It features the portraits of Latino New Yorkers who embody FDR’s Four Freedoms: Brooklynite and freedom-fighter Olga Garriga for freedom of speech and expression, writer and Yoruba priestess Dr. Marta Moreno Vega for freedom of worship, a bodega owner Candido Arcángel, who turned his basement into a homeless shelter, for freedom from want, and transgender advocate Lorena Borjas for freedom from fear. A fifth figure represents the dreamer in everyman. The mural will be unveiled at the Four Freedoms Park Conservancy’s LatinXtravaganza on Saturday, October 7, hosted by Pulitzer Prize finalist Xocihtl Gonzalez. It will be on view through October 15th.
The 191st Street subway station in Washington Heights is considered the deepest station in the system, but its known for something else as well. For years, this station was famous for the street art that covered the walls of its pedestrian tunnel. In early 2023, the walls were painted white and a call was put out for artists to create new murals for the space. Those murals were unveiled this September. Five artists were chosen and they worked with members of the local community to create the murals you see now between Broadway and St. Nicholas Avenue and 1 train station. Those artists are Carla Torres, Rasheeda Johnson, Denise Coke, Daniel Bonilla,and Vicky Azcoitia. Each artist was assigned a section of the roughly 10,000 square feet of artwork space. Their murals highlight characteristics of the surrounding neighborhoods and the people who live there.
Sitting on a ledge in the garden at Villa Albertine’s Fifth Avenue headquarters, you’ll see a bronze version of the title character from Antoine de Saint Exupéry’s 1943 novella The Little Prince. The installation of the statue marks the 80th anniversary of the beloved tale’s publication and its ties to New York City. Now the most translated work of literature of all time, The Little Prince was written in New York City and in Northport, Long Island where the author lived from 1940 to 1943. The statue of the famous character was created by Jean-Marcde Pas and cast in his studio in Normandy, France. The four-foot-tall piece was initially carved from clay, then cast in bronze in one single piece. You can visit The Little Prince at the garden entrance of 972 Fifth Avenue, formerly the Payne Whitney mansion which was designed by Stanford White.
A 55-foot-long whale can now be spotted in the heart of the Garment District! Titled Echoes – A Voice from Unchartered Waters, this steel sculpture created by artist, designer, and researcher Mathias Gmachl “invites viewers to reflect on the impact of everyday activities on nature and the environment.” Located on the Broadway plazas in the Garment District between 38th and 39th Streets, the piece emits an oceanic soundscape that gets interrupted by noise pollution the closer you get. These dueling sounds represent the impact of the industrialized world on the natural one, while encouraging viewers to imagine harmony between them. Echoes will be on view through November 13.
Rendering Courtesy of St. John the Divine
New York City’s largest cathedral is in the process of installing a massive textile work by artistAnne Patterson. On October 12th, Patterson’s Divine Pathways will be unveiled to the public in the nave of St. John the Divine. Over the past few weeks, the local community has gathered at the church to help put the piece together. Pathways is comprised of 1,100 75-foot-long pieces of blue, red, and gold fabric that cascade from the Gothic arches of the cathedral. Each piece of fabric has been written on by someone in the Morningside Heights community who has shared a hope, dream, or prayer. The colors of the ribbons were inspired by the beautiful stained glass windows of the church and their carefully chosen location calls attention to recently restored architectural details. Divine Pathways will be on view through June 2024.
Rendering Courtesy of Ilene Shaw, Design Pavilion Founder & NYCxDESIGN Executive Director, llLab, and L’Observatoire International
As part of NYC’s Archtober celebrations and in partnership with AIA New York and the Center for Architecture, NYCxDesign will host a fall activation called Design Pavilion. This activation will run from October 12th to October 22nd and feature a series of public installations meant to draw attention “to a vision of stellar sustainable and ethical practices through the lens of design.” The series, which is made of three installations at famous NYC landmarks, will also serve as a preview of the NYCxDesign Festival coming in 2024.
In Hudson River Park at West 16th Street, visitors will be able to walk under a Bamboo Cloud. This piece, designed by llLab with lighting by L’Observatoire International, challenges the traditional applications of bamboo, showing how it may be used as a sustainable building material. At Gansevoort Plaza, Public Display designed by Michael Bennett and Studio Kër with programming by Form Us With Love Studio, will encourage public gathering and communication. Finally, projections titled I Was Here will appear on The Podium at One World Trade Center. This digital presentation was conceptualized by Marjorie Guyon with video and animation co-created by Marc Aptakin, Roy Husdell, and Yoel Meneses of MadLabs. After this month’s NYC debut, the installations will travel to other cities.
Last Friday we heard about flooding during the excessive rainfall. We should tell our neighbors in Western Queens and Astoria that their homes are build on swampy ground. La Guardia Airport is built on the “Corona Dumps” a massive landfill.
Sunswick Creek is a buried stream located in Astoria and Long Island City, in the northwestern portion of Queens in New York City. It originated to the north of Queensboro Bridge and Queens Plaza in Long Island City, flowing north to the present-day site of the Socrates Sculpture Park in Astoria, and emptying into the East River. The creek was named for a term in the Algonquin language that likely means “Woman Chief” or “Sachem’s Wife.”The mouth of the creek was settled in the late 17th century by William Hallet and Elizabeth Fones, who built a milldam at the creek’s mouth to create a mill pond. Due to industrialization in Long Island City, the creek became heavily polluted and was covered-over starting in the late 19th century.
The term “Sunswick” was a neighborhood name formerly applied to the surrounding portions of Ravenswood and Astoria. It is believed to have originated from a Native American language, possibly the Algonquin word “Sunkisq.”[2] The Greater Astoria Historical Society defines the term as “meaning perhaps ‘Woman Chief’ or ‘Sachem’s Wife.'”[3] This name is shared by Sunswick 3535, a bar at the intersection of 35th Street and 35th Avenue.[1]: 98 Additionally, the present-day 22nd Street was formerly named Sunswick Street.[4]
History
17th through 19th centuries
In 1664, the land on the northern shore of the creek’s mouth was purchased by British settler William Hallet (or Hallett), who obtained the plot from two native chiefs named Shawestcont and Erramorhar.[5]: 84 This peninsula, which jutted out onto Hell Gate to the northwest, was acquired in portions and was later renamed Hallet’s Cove.[5]: 84 [6]: 295 Hallet subsequently built a lime kiln on the creek. Sunswick Creek formed a navigable waterway with Dutch Kills, another stream to the south, making it easy for merchants to transport produce and goods along the creek.[5]: 19 A milldam was built at the mouth of the creek in 1679, creating a small mill pond.[7]: 4 Joseph Hallett and Jacob Blackwell built a mill on the creek’s right bank, near its mouth, in 1753.[6]: 296
By the 1860s and 1870s, Sunswick Creek was heavily polluted due to increasing industrialization, a lack of proper sewerage, and the high population density of Long Island City and Astoria.[7]: 4 The historian Vincent F. Seyfried wrote that disease around Sunswick Creek and Dutch Kills had become common by 1866, and that “The damming of the Sunswick Creek cut off the flushing-out of the meadow lands and the salt water that used to ebb and flow became stagnant and slimy and filled with mosquitoes.”[7]: 4 [8] After outbreaks of disease in 1871 and 1875, the marshes surrounding the creek were drained in 1879.[7]: 4 In addition, Long Island City had started building a proper sewage system in the 1870s, which was still not complete by the time Long Island City became part of the City of Greater New York in 1898.[7]: 5 The creek was partially diverted into one of the sewage system’s brick tunnels at Broadway, which was completed around 1893.[1]: 97
20th century
After the consolidation of Queens into New York City, Sunswick Meadows, a lowland north of the present Queensboro Bridge, was infilled with the construction of the bridge in the 1900s and 1910s.[7]: 6 This was accomplished partly by dumping dirt from the excavation of New York City Subway tunnels in Manhattan.[9][10] In addition, street cleaners tossed dry rubbish into the lowland to raise the grade of nearby streets.[11]
In 1915, residents of Ravenswood sent a letter to the New York City Board of Health to complain about the tide gates along Sunswick Creek, which had been installed to alleviate an infestation of mosquitoes. The residents claimed that the tide gates were actually keeping mosquitoes in the creek, since these gates resulted in stagnant water, and threatened to open the tide gates. In response, the Board of Health suggested filling up their land, which the Brooklyn Times-Union reported would require the infilling of 6 acres (2.4 ha) to a depth of 8 to 10 feet (2.4 to 3.0 m). The operation had a projected total cost of over $100,000 (equivalent to $2,892,763 in 2022), which was not affordable for most of the neighborhood’s residents.[12] Early the next year, in April 1916, residents broke down the barriers with axes.[13] Afterward, the New York City health commissioner told a local newspaper that the residents “prefer to live like hogs,” prompting outrage from local residents.[14] Afterward, the Queens borough president, Maurice E. Connolly, announced a plan to install two tide gates on the creek.[15]
By the end of 1916, the New York City government proposed to close up Sunswick Creek, mandating that households living nearby divert their sewage elsewhere.[16] A 1920 Brooklyn Daily Eagle article stated that the former path of the creek had been mostly developed with industrial buildings.[17] During excavations for a sewer line at Vernon Boulevard and Broadway in 1957, construction workers found remnants of the former grist mill on the creek’s mouth.[18]
Legacy
The creek now exists underground as part of a sewage tunnel, which was documented online by urban explorer Steven Duncan.[1]: 97 [19] According to one blogger, during heavy rains, the creek could be heard near the Sohmer and Company Piano Factory, across from Socrates Sculpture Park.[20] In 2011 and 2012, the Socrates Sculpture Park and Noguchi Museum commissioned a work from artist Mary Miss, entitled Ravenswood/CaLL, which consisted of several signs and mirrors along the course of the creek
WHERE TO ON THIS ELEVATOR? SUGGESTION FOR THE MTA:
ADD SIGN THAT SAYS: UPPER PLATFORM DOWNTOWN,
ADD SIGN THAT SAYS: UPPER PLATFORM DOWNTOWN, BROOKLYN & F SHUTTLE FOR LOWER PLATFORM A SIGN THAT SAYS : UPTOWN TRAINS
(LEXINGTON AVENUE ELEVATOR AT 63 STEET STATION)
WEEKENDPHOTO
5 KIOSKS FOR QUEENBORO BRIDGE TROLLEY AT 59TH STREEN AND SECOND AVENUE. ANDY SPARBERG, GLORIA HERMAN AND DAVID JACOBY GOT IT RIGHT
Text by Judith Berdy Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
WIKIPEDIA
JUDITH BERDY
MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM
All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated
