The Academy of Music, at Fourteenth Street and Irving Place, was built in 1854 by a number of citizens who desired a permanent home for opera. On October 2nd of that year, Hackett took his company, headed by Grisi and Matio, there, the weather being too cold to continue the season at Castle Garden. The building was burned in 1866 and rebuilt in 1868.
In Third Avenue, between Sixteenth and Seventeenth Streets, is an old milestone which marked the third mile from Federal Hall on the Post Road.
The Friends' Meeting House, at East Sixteenth Street and Rutherford Place, has existed since 1860. In 1775 it was in Pearl Street, near Franklin Square. In 1824 it was taken down and rebuilt in 1826 in Rose Street, near Pearl.
St. George's Church
St. George's (Episcopal) Church, at Rutherford Place and Sixteenth Street, was built in 1845. The church was organized in 1752, and before occupying the present site was in Beekman Street.
Early in the century a stream of water ran from Stuyvesant's Pond, close by what is now Fourteenth Street and Second Avenue, to First Avenue and Nineteenth Street, having an outlet into the East River at about Sixteenth Street. In winter this furnished an excellent skating-ground.
Gramercy Park
Gramercy Park, at Twentieth and Twenty-first Streets and Lexington Avenue, was originally part of the Gramercy Farm. In 1831 it was given by Samuel B. Ruggles to be used exclusively by the owners of lots fronting on it. It was laid out and improved in 1840. In the pavement, in front of the park gate on the west side, is a stone bearing this inscription: