Peculiarities of American Cities

by Willard W. Glazier

Booth's Theatre is on the corner of Sixth avenue and Twenty-third street. It is the most magnificent place of amusement in America; built in the Renaissance style, with a Mansard roof. Opposite is the Masonic Temple, in Ionic and Doric architecture. At the corner of Eighth avenue and Twenty-third street is the Grand Opera House, once owned by James Fisk, Jr.

New York is at once spendthrift and parsimonious in the naming of her streets. Thus, she sometimes repeats a name more than once, and again, bestows two or three names upon the same street. There is a Broadway, an East Broadway, a West Broadway, and a Broad street. There is Greenwich avenue and Greenwich street. There are two Pearl streets. There is a Park avenue, a Park street, a Park row, and a Park place. On the other hand, Chatham becomes East Broadway east of Bowery; Dey street is transformed into John street east of Broadway; Cortlandt becomes Maiden Lane at the same dividing line; and other streets are in like manner metamorphosed. Fourth Avenue, beginning at the Battery as Pearl street, changes to the Bowery at Franklin Square. At Eighth street, without any change in its direction, it becomes Fourth Avenue; from Thirty-fourth to Forty-second streets it is Park Avenue, and then relapses into Fourth Avenue again. This is one of the most interesting avenues in the city; as Pearl street, its windings and its business occupations have been referred to.

Bowery has a character all its own. It takes its name from Peter Stuyvesant's "Bowerie Farm," through which it passes. In it is probably represented every civilized nation on the globe. It is unqualifiedly a democratic street. While Fifth Avenue represents one extreme of city life, the Bowery represents the other. Here are the streets and shops of the working classes, consisting of dry and fancy goods, cigar shops, lager beer saloons, shoe stores, confectionery stores, pawnbrokers' shops, and ready-made clothing, plentifully besprinkled with variety and concert saloons and beer gardens. There are no elegant store fronts or marble stores here. The buildings are plain brick edifices, three or four stories in height, the upper stories occupied by the families of the merchants, or as tenement houses. The Germans visit the beer gardens with their wives and families, to listen to what is sometimes excellent music, and to drink beer. The concert saloons are, some of them, the resorts of the lowest of both sexes. Near Canal street is the site of the old Bowery Theatre, which, having been thrice destroyed by fire, has been thrice rebuilt, the last time, quite recently, and is now known as Thalia Theatre. A generation and a half ago the gamins of New York reigned supreme in the pit. Now that they have been relegated to the gallery, they still criticise the performance with the frankness and originality of expression characteristic of the "Bowery boys" of old. One should visit the Bowery at night, when the workmen and shop girls, having finished their daily labor, are out for recreation and amusement. Then he will gain an idea of one phase of city life and people which he would not obtain otherwise.

At Seventh street, where Third avenue branches off, looking down the Bowery, and occupying the entire block to Eighth street, is Cooper Institute, containing a free library, free reading-room, free schools of art, telegraphy and science, and a hall and lecture room. Peter Cooper was one of the representative men of New York. Acquiring a large fortune by strictly honorable methods, he devoted a generous portion of it to charitable objects, and this Institute is one of the lasting monuments of his generosity. He was a true philanthropist, a man of broad thought and kindly impulses, whose name was honored by all classes of the community. He died in April, 1883, at a ripe old age.

Occupying the block between Third Avenue and the Bowery, which is now dignified by the name of Fourth avenue, is the Bible House, the largest structure of its kind in the world, except that of London. Here the Bible is printed in almost every known language, and here are congregated the offices of the various religious societies of the city and country. The Young Men's Christian Association and Academy of Design occupy opposite corners at Twenty-third street, on the west side of the avenue. The exterior of the latter is copied from a famous palace in Venice, and it is peculiar as well as beautiful in its appearance. From Thirty-second to Thirty-third streets is the immense structure intended by A. T. Stewart as the crowning charitable object of his life, to be, perhaps, in some sort, an atonement for injustice of which he may have been guilty toward the working classes. It was designed as a hotel for working women, but in its very plan indicated how little its founder understood the nature or needs of that class. At its completion, after his death, it did not take many weeks to demonstrate that working women preferred a place more home-like, and fettered by less restrictions than this palace-prison; and so the edifice was turned into an ordinary hotel.

Park avenue commences at Thirty-fourth street, being built over the track of the Fourth avenue car line. In the centre of this avenue, over the tunnels, are little spaces inclosed by iron fences, and containing a profusion of shrubbery and flowers. The avenue abounds in elegant churches and equally fine residences. At Forty-second street is the Grand Central Depot, seven hundred feet in length, its exterior imposing, and with corner and central towers surmounted by domes. At Sixty-ninth street, between Fourth and Lexington avenues, is the new Normal College, an ecclesiastical-looking building, the most complete of its kind in America.

Retracing our steps to near the foot of Bowery, we come to Chatham street, where the Jews reign supreme, and which is the vestibule of the worst quarter of the city. Passing along a pavement festooned with cheap, ready-made clothing, one comes to Baxter street, and from thence to the Five Points, once the most infamous locality of New York. Here, a generation ago, a respectable man took his life in his hands, who attempted to pass through this quarter, even in broad daylight. It was the abode of thieves, burglars, garotters, murderers and prostitutes. Hundreds of families were huddled together in tumble-down tenement houses, living in such filth and with such an utter lack of decency as is scarcely to be credited. But home missionaries visited the quarter, established mission-schools and a house of industry, tore down the disgraceful tenement-houses and built better ones in their place; and to-day the old Bowery, Cow Bay and Murderers' Alley are known only in name. The Five Points is at the crossing of Baxter, Worth and Parker streets, and is really five points no longer, the carrying through of Worth street to the Bowery, forming an additional point. The locality is still dreadful enough, with all its improvements. Drunken men, depraved women, and swarms of half-clad children fill the neighborhood, and even the "improved tenement houses," as viewed from the outside, seem but sorry abodes for human beings. This is the heart of a wretched quarter, which extends westward to Broadway, and almost indefinitely in other directions. Mott, Mulberry, Baxter, Centre, Elm and Crosby streets are all densely populated, containing numberless tenement houses. It is possible to walk through some of these streets and never hear a word of English. Mulberry and Crosby streets are especially the homes of Italians, who on Sunday mornings pour out of the tenements upon the pavement and street below in such throngs that a stranger can scarcely elbow his way through. The Chinese have taken possession of the lower part of Mott street, and established laundries, groceries, tea-houses, lodging-houses, and opium-smoking dens. The latter are already attracting the attention of the public, and a feeble effort has been made by the city government to put a check upon their evil influence. These streets are a festering sore in the very heart of the city, and require attention.

The Tombs, the city prison, famous in the criminal history of New York, is located in the midst of this quarter, on Centre street, occupying an entire block. It is a gloomy building, constructed of granite, in imitation of an Egyptian temple. Within these forbidding walls is the Tombs Police Court, where, early each morning, petty cases are disposed of by the magistrate upon the bench; and here prisoners are kept awaiting trial. Eleven cells of special strength and security are for murderers awaiting trial or punishment. There is also a special department for women. In the inner quadrangle of the building murderers are made to suffer the utmost penalty of the law, and the last act of many a tragedy which has excited and horrified the public has been performed here.

It will be a relief to turn from the gloom and wretchedness of the Tombs to the sunshine and freedom of New York's great breathing place. Central Park contains eight hundred and forty-three acres, and embraces an area extending from Fifth to Eighth avenues, and from Fifty-ninth to One-hundred-and-tenth streets. Originally, it was a desolate stretch of country in the suburbs of the city, varied by rocks and marshes, and dotted by the hovels of Irish and Dutch squatters, its most picturesque features being their goats, which picked up a scant living among the rubbish with which it was covered. Its whole extent is now covered with a heavy sod, planted with trees and shrubbery, and furnishes many miles of drives and walks. Every day in the year it has numerous visitors, but on Sunday, one must fairly elbow one's way through the crowds. In the southeast corner are the Zoölogical Gardens and the old State Arsenal; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, recently opened, is north of Belvidere, on the east side of the Park. The Egyptian Obelisk stands on an eminence west of the museum. Winding paths conduct the visitor to the Mall, a stately avenue shaded by double rows of elms, and ornamented at intervals with bronze statues of celebrated American and European statesmen and poets; also a number of groups which are especially fine. The Terrace is at the northern terminus of the Mall, and leads by a flight of broad, stone stairs to Central Lake, the prettiest body of water in the Park, dotted by gondolas. A fountain, with immense granite basins, and a colossal statue of the Angel of Bethesda, stands between the terrace and the lake. Beyond the lake is the Ramble, consisting of winding, shaded paths, and covering thirty-six acres of sloping hills. From the tower at Belvidere, a magnificent piece of architecture, in the Norman style, may be obtained a fine bird's-eye view of the Park. Just above Belvidere are the two reservoirs of the water works, extending as far north as Ninety-sixth street. Beyond that the Park is less embellished by art, and is richer in natural beauties. From the eminence upon which stands the old Block House, on the northern border of the Park, a magnificent and extensive view may be obtained of the hills which bound in the landscape, and including High Bridge.

One should visit the water front of New York, which circles the city on three sides, to gain an idea of its immense commerce. A river wall of solid masonry has been commenced, which, when completed, will make the American metropolis equal to London and Liverpool in this respect. A perfect forest of masts lines the wharves, representing every kind of craft, and almost every nation that sails the seas. Twice a week European steamships leave from the foot of Canal street; while from various points along the wharves, indicated by handsome ferry or shipping houses, boats go and come, to and from every port on the river or on the Atlantic coast. At Desbrosses and Cortlandt streets ferries connect with Jersey City. South, Wall and Fulton ferries give access to Brooklyn; while other ferries convey passengers to other points on the rivers and bay.