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85-565: It was first called the Gilsey Building, having been built by Peter Gilsey, then a noted tobacco and cigar dealer. Gilsey had been on the brink of suicide because of despondency over hard luck. He rose from a street peddler to be a millionaire, and became closely associated with the growth of New York in the latter half of the 19th century . His hotel, the Gilsey House, stood for years at the corner of 29th Street and Broadway. This

170-738: A Metropolitan Police District . Resistance resulted in the New York City Police Riot of 1857. While the police were busy with their feud, the Dead Rabbits Riot between two gangs in Five Points occurred in July, lasting two days, and was stopped only by intervention of the state militia. It was the worst riot in New York City up to that time. Historian Tyler Anbinder says the "Dead Rabbit" name "so captured

255-497: A Dead Rabbit stepped in front of his barricade and used his pistol to kill two Bowery Boys and wound two others despite heavy fire. He was finally knocked unconscious, reportedly by a small boy whose brother was a Bowery Boy. The police returned to the area but were unable to re-enter and were forced to retreat several times with heavy losses. That evening, they called upon Captain Isaiah Rynders to use his influence to stop

340-458: A Miss Wessells, who afterwards married Mr. Pell. They refused to sell and the land remained a part of the Pell estate. Gilsey took a long lease, employed an architect of advanced ideas to plan an iron frame building and began operations. He had already agreed to lease the corner store to Benedict Brothers, jewelers, and the store next adjoining on the south to John Forsythe, the haberdasher . While

425-477: A cigar stand under the stairway on the ground floor. It was demolished in May 1927. 40°42′35″N 74°00′37″W  /  40.7097°N 74.0104°W  / 40.7097; -74.0104 History of New York City (1855%E2%80%931897) The history of New York City (1855–1897) started with the inauguration in 1855 of Fernando Wood as the first mayor from Tammany Hall , an institution that dominated

510-495: A complex internal structure to solve issues of ventilation, steam heat, gas lighting (and later electricity), and plumbing. The city's housing involved a wide variety of styles, but most of the attention focused on the tenement house for the working class and the apartment building for the middle class. The apartment building came first, as middle-class professionals, businessmen, and white-collar workers realized they did not need and could scarcely afford single-family dwellings in

595-426: A dark region where, from a careening building, a dozen gruesome doorways gave up loads of babies to the street and the gutter. A wind of early autumn raised yellow dust from cobble and swirled it against an hundred windows. Long streamers of garments fluttered from fire escapes. In all unhandy places there were buckets, brooms, rags, and bottles. In the street infants played or fought with other infants or sat stupidly in

680-460: A dramatic appearance in the middle of the 19th century and permanently reshaped shopping habits and the definition of service and luxury. Similar developments were underway in Paris and London . New York became a regional and national destination for upscale shoppers, thanks to its development of the modern department store. London and Paris were developing department stores around the same time, and

765-560: A dry goods store. Benjamin Altman and Lord & Taylor soon competed with Stewart as New York's earliest department stores. By the 1880s New York's retail center had moved uptown, forming a stretch of retail shopping from "Marble Palace" that was called the "Ladies' Mile". By 1894 the major stores competed in the Christmas season with elaborate Christmas window displays; in 1895 Macy's featured 13 tableaux, including scenes from Jack and

850-612: A few moments. The truce lasted only an hour or two as fighting resumed near The Tombs , supposedly brought about by a group of women from the Five Points who had provoked the Dead Rabbits into attacking the Bowery gangs. Bringing reinforcements, the participants were estimated at between 800 and 1000, armed with bludgeons, paving stones, brickbats, axes, pitchforks, and other weapons. Several hundred other criminals also arrived in

935-419: A large street cleaning force. William Tweed , better known as Boss Tweed , had become the sole leader of Tammany Hall by 1867. From April 1870, with the passage of a city charter consolidating power in the hands of his political allies, Tweed and his cronies were able to defraud the city of some tens of millions of dollars over the next two years and eight months, most famously with the construction bill for

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1020-419: A lavish courthouse . The efforts of reform-oriented Democratic politicians, especially Samuel J. Tilden , as well as aggressive newspaper editors aided by the biting cartoons of Thomas Nast , helped elect opposition candidates in 1871. Tweed was convicted of forgery and larceny in 1873. Tweed's fall put an end to the immunity of corrupt local political leaders and was a precursor to Progressive Era reforms in

1105-637: A major reform of the New York City Police Department in 1895–97 during his term as President of the Police Commissioners. Epidemics ( typhus , cholera , diphtheria , and tuberculosis ) were rampant in the city's slums. Horse manure covered the streets. In winter, when all the grime froze, walking on the sidewalks was a challenge. Dead pigs and other carcasses remained on the street for weeks. In 1894, Colonel George E. Waring Jr. introduced sanitary reforms using

1190-476: A popular Broome Street resort and meeting place for the Bowery Boys and other local criminals. They managed to surprise the Bowery gangsters inside the building, and armed with iron bars and large paving blocks, they proceeded to wreck the bar room, rip up the floor of the dance hall, and drink all the alcohol in the place. News of the incident quickly reached the Bowery Boys, who then called upon other gangs of

1275-561: Is credited as the first modern nightclub. It opened in 1886 as a "social hall", originally functioning as a home for dance and political activism events. The post-war period was noted for the corruption and graft for which Tammany Hall has become proverbial, but equally for the foundation of New York's pre-eminent cultural institutions, the Metropolitan Museum of Art , the Metropolitan Opera . The Brooklyn Museum

1360-528: Is no evidence of a Dead Rabbits gang existing at all, and that the alleged organization was in fact a misnomer for the Roach Guards . In Anbinder's telling of events, in the aftermath of the gang war, reporters relied heavily on the Bowery Boys for information. The Bowery Boys likely tarred the Roche Guards with the slang term "dead Rabbit party", referring to thieves, and the press continued using

1445-675: The Bowery area. It was the largest disturbance since the Astor Place Riot in 1849 and the biggest scene of gang violence until the New York Draft Riots of 1863. Order was restored by the New York State Militia , supported by detachments of city police, under Major-General Charles W. Sandford . On the evening of July 4, 1857, while the rest of New York was celebrating Independence Day , members of

1530-468: The Bronx River . The Brooklyn Bridge , completed in 1883, epitomized the heroic confidence of a generation and drew the two cities of Brooklyn and New York inexorably together. As Brooklyn annexed the remainder of Kings County in the decade from 1886 to 1896, the issue of consolidation grew more pressing. The modern city of Greater New York — the five boroughs — was created in 1898, with

1615-577: The Christmas shopping season . Increasingly, the clientele were women from wealthy or upper-middle-class families. In 1862, Stewart built a new store on a full city block with eight floors and nineteen departments of dress goods and furnishing materials, carpets, glass and china, toys and sports equipment, ranged around a central glass-covered court. His innovations included buying from manufacturers for cash and in large quantities, keeping his markup small and prices low, truthful presentation of merchandise,

1700-703: The East Side and the East River by younger criminals emulating the Irish gangs. Many of the Five Points gangs, most notably the Dead Rabbits, resented the implications made by police and newspapers that they had been involved in criminal activity. The Dead Rabbits paid for a letter to The New York Times , denying those assertions. We are requested by the Dead Rabbits to state that the Dead Rabbit club members are not thieves, that they did not participate in

1785-545: The commuter area of New York, allowing development of suburbs for commuters of more modest means in Upper West Side and other distant areas. Plans were made for subways to still more remote exurbs such as Harlem and the West Bronx . In the late 19th century, the island's schist bedrock encouraged the early skyscrapers whose successors characterize its skyline today. The Great Blizzard of 1888 exposed

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1870-495: The garment industry and some high technology industries of the Second Industrial Revolution such as sewing machines and pianos . It was an important center for other hi-tech items such as hard rubber products and electrical goods. Petroleum and chemical works sprang up along Newtown Creek , Bayonne, New Jersey , and other industrial suburbs . In modern major cities, the department store made

1955-581: The 2014 television series, Hell on Wheels has a few Dead Rabbit characters. A book of poetry by Richard Griffin , The Dead Rabbit Riot, A.D. 1857: And Other Poems , was published in 1915. Patricia Beatty's 1987 historical children's fiction novel Charlie Skedaddle mentions Dead Rabbits (the main character is a Bowery Boy). The riot of 1857 is dramatized (briefly) in Chapter XVIII of MacKinlay Kantor's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel "Andersonville" (1955). Artist George Henry Hall 's 1858 painting

2040-517: The Beanstalk, Gulliver's Travels and other children's favorites. The department store was especially important for women; in middle-class families women took control of the purchasing, and the department stores catered to their tastes. Furthermore, ambitious young women from the middle class who wanted a career were welcomed into the clerical ranks, where they developed social skills to work with their upscale customers. New inventions facilitated

2125-524: The Bowery to join them and confronted the Five Pointers at Bayard Street, where one of the largest street gang battles in the city's history occurred. At around 10:00 a.m., amid savage fighting, a lone patrolman bravely used his club to move through the gangsters in an attempt to take the ring leaders into custody. He was knocked down and attacked by the crowd, stripped of his uniform, and beaten with his own nightstick. He managed to crawl back to

2210-544: The Central Park design were the multiple circulation plans for pedestrians, horseback riders, and pleasure vehicles. The crossing routes for commercial traffic were concealed in sunken roadways screened with densely planted shrub belts so as to maintain a natural setting. It was the nation's first great urban park ; Olmsted taught Americans a new sensibility in park environments and urban planning as an applied science with his radically naturalistic park design. Prior to

2295-642: The Civil War, in 1861, Mayor Wood proposed New York City secession from the United States as a neutral sovereign city-state to be called Tri-Insula as a way to avoid the ravages of war. Despite strong local Copperhead sympathies, the proposal was not well received. The city provided a major source of troops, supplies, equipment, and financing for the Union Army . Powerful New York politicians and newspaper editors helped shape public opinion toward

2380-508: The Dead Rabbits led a coalition of street gangs from the Five Points (with the exception of the Roach Guards with whom they had been fighting) into The Bowery to raid a clubhouse occupied by the Bowery Boys and the Atlantic Guards . They were confronted outside the building by their rivals and were driven back to Paradise Square after vicious street fighting. Altercations continued as far away as Pearl and Chatham Streets , in

2465-629: The Five Points was reported, although none of these attacks reached the levels seen during the riots. The most serious incident occurred the next day, when a group of Bowery Boys fought members of the Kerryonians in Centre Street, but they were chased back to the Bowery and Chatham Square by the time police arrived. Sporadic fighting continued for another week, most being confined in German-American neighborhoods ( Little Germany ) in

2550-606: The New York Dead Rabbits is told, in highly fictionalized form, in Martin Scorsese 's 2002 film Gangs of New York , which was partially inspired by Herbert Asbury 's 1928 nonfiction book Gangs of New York . In the 2014 film, Winter's Tale , the Dead Rabbits and the Short Tails are featured prominently; a similar theme pervades Mark Helprin 's 1983 novel of the same name. The fourth season of

2635-504: The Pacific coast reduced New York's share of imports and exports to about 47% in 1910. The city's banking resources grew 250% between 1888 and 1908, compared to the national increase of 26%. Between 1860 and 1907, the assessed value of the land and buildings on Manhattan rose from $ 1.7 billion to $ 6.7 billion. The city and its suburbs, mainly Brooklyn and Long Island City , also became important in light industry . Its factories dominated

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2720-575: The anniversary of the Battle of the Boyne . These resulted in more than 33 deaths and many wounded. Pioneering photojournalist Jacob Riis documented the poor conditions of immigrant tenement dwellers in his 1890 How the Other Half Lives ; he was befriended by Republican reformer Theodore Roosevelt . Roosevelt lost his mayoral race in 1886 . Reformers did win in 1894, and Roosevelt undertook

2805-427: The area, mostly burglars and thieves, who were not affiliated with either side and simply took the opportunity for looting. Residents and store owners all along the Bowery were forced to barricade their buildings and protect themselves with pistols and muskets. Fighting continued until early afternoon, when a larger police force arrived, sent by Police Commissioner Simeon Draper , and marched in close formation towards

2890-468: The battle. Rynders, the political boss of the Sixth Ward, was long associated with the underworld, and it was thought that he could force them to stop. He agreed, and upon his arrival between 6:00 and 7:00 p.m., he addressed the gangsters from the barricades. Although he tried to reason with them by telling them the futility of fighting, they refused to listen, and Rynders was forced to escape into

2975-489: The building was going up, it was one of the free shows of New York. Idle crowds surrounded the Benedict building, as it was called from the start. The work was slow. It was necessary to teach ironworkers to bolt the pillars and beams together. The iron units were very heavy and were hoisted to their positions by hand derricks and placed in position by main strength. One of the features of the operation that attracted attention

3060-481: The city throughout this period. Reforms led to the New York City Police Riot of June 1857. There was chaos during the American Civil War , with major rioting in the New York Draft Riots . The Gilded Age brought about prosperity for the city's upper classes amid the further growth of a poor immigrant working class, as well as an increasing consolidation, both economic and municipal, of what would become

3145-515: The city. Tammany did not take long to rebound from Tweed's fall. Reforms demanded a general housecleaning, and former county sheriff "Honest John" Kelly was selected as the new leader. Kelly was not implicated in the Tweed scandals and was a religious Catholic related by marriage to Archbishop John McCloskey . He cleared Tammany of Tweed's people and tightened the Grand Sachem's control over

3230-796: The company of his henchmen, when the mob responded by throwing rocks at him. He then traveled to the Metropolitan Police Headquarters where he advised Draper to call in the military. Meanwhile, fires had been set to two or three houses while residents remained under siege by looters and thugs. At around 9:00 p.m., the Eighth and the Seventy-First Regiments of the New York State Militia under Major-General Charles W. Sandford marched down White and Worth Streets with fixed bayonets . Accompanied by two police detachments of 75 men each, they moved ahead of

3315-684: The consolidation of the cities of New York (then Manhattan and the Bronx) and Brooklyn with the largely rural areas of Queens and Staten Island . Dead Rabbits Riot The Dead Rabbits riot was a two-day civil disturbance in New York City evolving from what was originally a small-scale street fight between members of the Dead Rabbits and the Bowery Boys into a citywide gang war, which occurred July 4–5, 1857. Taking advantage of

3400-416: The countryside. Rapid outward expansion required longer journeys to work and shopping for the middle class office workers and housewives. The working class generally did not own automobiles until after 1945; they typically walked to nearby factories and patronized small neighborhood stores. The middle class demanded a better transportation system. Slow horse-drawn streetcars and faster electric trolleys were

3485-475: The crowded streets. In small towns people mostly walked to their destination, so they continued to rely on dirt and gravel into the 1920s. Larger cities had much more complex transportation needs. They wanted better streets, so they paved them with wood or granite blocks. By the end of the century, American cities boasted 30 million square yards of asphalt paving, followed by brick construction. Street-level electric trolleys moved at 12 miles per hour, and became

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3570-475: The disorganized state of the city's police force—brought about by the conflict between the Municipal and Metropolitan police —the fighting spiraled into widespread looting and damage of property by gangsters and other criminals from all parts of the city. It is estimated that between 800 and 1,000 gang members took part in the riots, along with several hundred others who used the disturbance to loot

3655-535: The dust, clutter, smells and noises; the only cheaper alternatives were squalid basement rooms in older buildings. Most of the tenements survived until the urban renewal movement of the 1950s. Pre-war steam ferries had already made Brooklyn Heights into a bedroom community for affluent professionals on Wall Street and other urban areas. Elevated railroads , operated by the Manhattan Railway Company , and other new public transport expanded

3740-628: The earlier Metropolitan Police District, eventually developing into the New York City Fire Department . New York increasingly became the national capital for the rapidly expanding tourism and entertainment industries. Steamships and railways brought not just immigrants and businessmen but tourists, and grand hotels were built for upscale visitors. New York's theater district gradually moved northward during this half century, from The Bowery up Broadway through Union Square and Madison Square , settling around Times Square at

3825-410: The emergence of the skyscraper in the 1880s—it was a characteristic American style that was not widely copied around the world until the late 20th century. Construction required several major innovations, including the elevator and structural steel . The steel skeleton, developed in the 1880s, replaced the heavy brick walls that were limited to 15 or so stories in height. The skyscraper also required

3910-651: The end of the 19th century. Edwin Booth and Lillian Russell were among the Broadway stars. Prostitutes served a wide variety of clientele, from sailors on leave to playboys. The first nightclubs appeared in New York City in the 1840s and 1850s, including McGlory's, and the Haymarket. They enjoyed a national reputation for live music, dance, and vaudeville acts. They tolerated unlicensed liquor, commercial sex, and gambling cards, chiefly Faro . Practically all gambling

3995-494: The entire lot. There were typically five story walk-ups, with four separate apartments on each floor. There was minimal air circulation and sunlight. Until the Tenement House Act of 1879, newly built tenements lacked running water or indoor toilets. A law in 1901 required indoor plumbing be retrofitted to older tenements. Garbage pickup was erratic until late in the 19th century. Rent was cheap for those who could endure

4080-484: The few existing open spaces, mainly cemeteries, to get away from the noises, smells, and chaotic life in the city. Landscape painter Asher B. Durand and writer William Cullen Bryant , recalling their rural upbringing and the great parks of Europe, advocated the therapeutic value of nature in the overcrowded city. Along with architect Andrew Jackson Downing , they envisioned a great park. The state government in 1853 provided $ 5 million and eminent domain powers to buy out

4165-501: The fifth floor. The idea of fashioning the frame-work of buildings of iron pillars and beams was not new, but no one in New York was daring enough to experiment with it until Peter Gilsey determined to build at Broadway and Cortlandt Street, which was then one of the busiest street intersections in the lower part of the city. Gilsey had tried unsuccessfully to buy the land, which was then owned by John H. G. Pell of 60 E. 36th Street, and

4250-530: The five boroughs in 1898. Ocean-going steamships and steam railroads, developed in earlier decades, grew to take over most long-distance transport, bringing an ever-increasing stream of immigration and industrialization. The new Republican Party in the late 1850s attempted to cut the power of Mayor Fernando Wood and other pro-South Democrats by abolishing the New York City Municipal Police Department in favor of

4335-474: The guardsmen, clubbing gangsters and rioters. Although neither regiment was at full strength, the show of force was enough to panic the gangsters to flee back to their hideouts. The fighting ceased, with 500 men remaining at the City Arsenal until 4:00 a.m., although police and national guardsmen continued to patrol the district into the next day. American historian Tyler Anbinder claims that there

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4420-480: The hierarchy. His success at revitalizing the machine was such that in the election of 1874, the Tammany candidate, William H. Wickham , unseated the unpopular reformist incumbent, William F. Havemeyer , and Democrats generally won their races, delivering control of the city back to Tammany Hall. Theodore Roosevelt , before he became president in 1901, was deeply involved in New York City politics. He explains how

4505-421: The high-cost real estate districts of the city. Boarding houses were inappropriate for family; hotel suites were too expensive. In outlying neighborhoods there were many apartments over stores and shops, usually occupied by proprietors of small local businesses. Apartment dwellers paid rent and did not own their apartments until the emergence of cooperatives in the 20th century. Turnover was very high, and there

4590-492: The imagination of New Yorkers that the press continued to use it despite the abundant evidence that no such club or gang existed." Andbinder notes that, "for more than a decade, 'Dead Rabbit' became the standard phrase by which city residents described any scandalously riotous individual or group." Historians such as Michael Kaplan and Elliott Gorn have argued that an intensifying highly masculine working-class male identity fostered gangs, brawling, and even homicide and rape, which

4675-601: The land owners of what became Central Park. Egbert L. Viele drew the original plans, but Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux made the final Greensward Plan design and have received the main credit. Several American influences came together in the design. Landscaped rural cemeteries , such as Mount Auburn in Cambridge, Massachusetts , and Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn , provided examples of idyllic, naturalistic landscapes. The most influential innovations in

4760-418: The leaders quickly adopted innovations. In 1846, Alexander Turney Stewart established his " Marble Palace " on Broadway , between Chambers and Reade Streets. He offered upscale retail merchandise at fixed prices. Though it was clad in white marble to look like a Renaissance palazzo , the building's cast iron construction had large plate glass windows that permitted major seasonal displays, especially in

4845-636: The machine worked: Middle-class moral sensibilities were deeply opposed to prostitution and all forms of gambling. The reform movement was strongest in the 1890s. Reform was led by men such as the Reverend Charles H. Parkhurst , the leading Presbyterian pastor and president of the New York Society for the Prevention of Crime; reform mayor William L. Strong , and his police commissioner Theodore Roosevelt . Reformers passed laws in

4930-600: The main transportation service for middle class shoppers and office workers. Big-city streets became paths for faster and larger and more dangerous vehicles, the pedestrians beware. In the largest cities, street railways were elevated, which increased their speed and lessened their dangers. Boston built the first subway in the 1890s followed by New York a decade later. The flood of immigration from Europe passed first through Castle Clinton (opened 1855) and then through Ellis Island (opened 1892) in New York Harbor, with

5015-470: The men ran wildly about brandishing firearms. Wounded men lay on the sidewalks and were trampled upon. Now the Rabbits would make a combined rush and force their antagonists up Bayard street to the Bowery. Then the fugitives, being reinforced, would turn on their pursuers and compel a retreat to Mulberry , Elizabeth and Baxter streets. When the police left without their prisoners, the fighting stopped for

5100-483: The mob, and arrested two men believed to be the leaders. The gangsters responded by storming into the low houses lining The Bowery and Bayard Street, forcing residents out, and climbed to the rooftops, where they proceeded to shower the Metropolitan officers with stones and brickbats until they fled from the area. Brickbats, stones and clubs were flying thickly around, and from the windows in all directions, and

5185-428: The mob. After hard fighting, they cleared the streets, forcing both the Dead Rabbits and the Bowery Boys into the buildings and to the rooftops once again. The police followed the gangsters, using their clubs at every opportunity, and began arresting large numbers of men. Some refused to surrender to police, such as one man who, while fighting police, fell off the roof of a Baxter Street tenement fracturing his skull . He

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5270-459: The nearby Statue of Liberty (formally Liberty Enlightening the World ) opening in 1886. Most of the new arrivals headed to destinations across the north and west, but many made New York City their destination. European immigration brought further social upheaval, and old world criminal societies rapidly exploited the already corrupt municipal machine politics of Tammany Hall. Housing, especially in

5355-452: The next few days, those who were killed in the fighting were buried in cellars, hidden passageways, and other locations in the Five Points and Paradise Square. Many known "sluggers" from both sides were noticeably absent from the area following the riot. According to underworld legend, these sites would be used for secret burials by street gangs for the next several decades. Afterwards, occasional violence against Bowery Boys who ventured into

5440-535: The northern half of Park Row , but no police were dispatched. With the exception of a few nearby Metropolitan patrolmen, who were seriously injured, each police faction claimed the responsibility lay with the other. Police inactivity caused the situation to escalate in the next few hours. The following morning, the Five Pointers returned to the Bowery with the Roach Guards and attacked the Green Dragon ,

5525-465: The one-price policy (so there was no haggling), simple merchandise returns and cash refund policy, selling for cash and not credit, buyers who searched worldwide for quality merchandise, departmentalization , vertical and horizontal integration, volume sales, and free services for customers such as waiting rooms and free delivery of purchases. His innovations were quickly copied by other department stores. In 1858, Rowland Hussey Macy founded Macy's as

5610-527: The paths of the street railways since the middle-class tenants rode the streetcar to work, while the working class saved a nickel each way and walked. The working class crowded into tenement houses, with far fewer features and amenities. Novelist Stephen Crane in Maggie: A Girl of the Streets (1893) wrote of an Irish tenement neighborhood characterized by poverty and violence: "Eventually they entered into

5695-458: The rage in the 1880s. In the horse-drawn era, streets were unpaved and covered with dirt or gravel. However, this produced uneven wear, opened new hazards for pedestrians, and made for dangerous potholes for bicycles and for motor vehicles. Manhattan alone had 130,000 horses in 1900, pulling streetcars, delivery wagons, and private carriages, and leaving their waste behind. They were not fast, and pedestrians could dodge and scramble their way across

5780-578: The riot with the Bowery Boys, and that the fight on Mulberry street was between the Roach Guards of Mulberry street and the Atlantic Guards of the Bowery. The Dead Rabbits are sensitive on points of Honor, we are assured, and wouldn't allow a thief to live on their beat, much less be a member of their club. The Dead Rabbit Riot was featured in the History Channel documentary television series History's Mysteries in 1998. The story of

5865-443: The sidewalk, and wearing only his cotton drawers, he ran towards the Metropolitan headquarters on White Street, where he informed the precinct of the fighting before he collapsed. A small police squad was sent out to break up the fighting, but upon reaching Centre Street , the gangs turned against the police, who were forced to retreat after several officers were injured. They made a second attempt, this time fighting their way into

5950-615: The southern tip of Manhattan, became crowded with newly built tenements and flimsy shacks in the back. Italians settled around Mulberry Street between the East Village and Lower Manhattan, in an area later to be known as " Little Italy ." Many Yiddish -speaking East European Jews came to the Lower East Side . In the Orange Riots of July 1871 and 1872, Catholic Irish attempted to stop Protestant Irish from celebrating

6035-462: The state legislature against any emerging gambling venue. Such laws were enforced in most small towns and rural areas, but not in New York's larger cities, where political machines controlled the police and the courts. In 1874, nearly 61% of all U.S. exports passed through New York harbor. In 1884, nearly 70% of U.S. imports came through New York. The eventual rise of ports on the Gulf of Mexico and on

6120-435: The term despite Five Points locals expressing incredulity at the unfamiliar name. Anbinder writes that "there seems to be no justification for referring to the Bowery Boys' adversaries by [the name Dead Rabbits]." During the two days, eight men were killed and between thirty and a hundred others injured, roughly half requiring hospitalization. It was believed that many gang members were carried off by their friends and, over

6205-579: The upscale membership of the New York Union League Club recruited over 2,000 black men for the 20th United States Colored Infantry to help fill the quotas and to make a major contribution to African American civil rights. The neighboring city of Brooklyn in contrast was more pro-war. In 1865 the Metropolitan Fire District united the fire departments of New York and Brooklyn , and was more successful than

6290-552: The voice of the new Republican Party. As immigration increased in cities, poverty rose as well. The poorest crowded into low-cost housing such as the Five Points and Hell's Kitchen neighborhoods in Manhattan. These areas were quickly overridden with notorious criminal gangs such as the Five Points Gang and the Bowery Boys . Overcrowding spread germs; the death rates in big city tenements vastly exceeded those in

6375-568: The vulnerability of the urban infrastructure connecting those buildings, encouraging the undergrounding of electric and telephone lines, and plans were made for a subway line. In 1855, the City of Brooklyn annexed Williamsburg and Bushwick , forming the third most-populous city in America. In 1870, Long Island City was formed in Queens . In 1874, New York City annexed the West Bronx , west of

6460-665: The war effort and the policies of President Abraham Lincoln . The port of New York , a major entry point for immigrants, served as recruiting grounds for the Army. In July 1863, Irish Catholic protestors of conscription began five days of rioting. The " Draft Riots ", the worst in American history, targeted blacks and wealthy Republicans. It was suppressed by artillery units of the United States Army firing grapeshot that killed and wounded hundreds of rioters. Meanwhile,

6545-467: The way of vehicles. Formidable women, with uncombed hair and disordered dress, gossiped while leaning on railings, or screamed in frantic quarrels. Withered persons, in curious postures of submission to something, sat smoking pipes in obscure corners. A thousand odors of cooking food came forth to the street. The building quivered and creaked from the weight of humanity stamping about in its bowels." Tenements were cheap and easy to build, and filled up almost

6630-726: Was a major institution of New York's independent sister city. Various older institutions merged into the New York Public Library . The New York Academy of Sciences , founded early in the century, expanded and promoted other institutions such as the New York Botanical Garden and the American Museum of Natural History . New York newspapers were read across the nation, particularly, the New York Tribune, edited by Horace Greeley ,

6715-466: Was fueled by New York City taverns. The emerging male code emphasized physical courage, defiance of authority, and class pride. Irish and German immigrants brought European influences. Sexual harassment of women increased because women were more visible outside the home, as many worked in factories and shops. Women were regarded as depersonalized objects of lewd talk, and gang rapes became an opportunity for male bonding. From 1800 to 1858, Staten Island

6800-535: Was illegal in the city (except upscale horseracing tracks), and regular payoffs to political and police leadership was necessary. Prices were high and they were patronized by an upscale audience. Timothy Gilfoyle calls him "the first nightclubs." By contrast, Owney Geoghegan ran the toughest nightclub in New York, 1880–83. It catered to a downscale clientele and besides the usual illegal liquor, gambling and prostitution, it featured nighly fistfights, and occasional shootings, stabbings, and police raids. Webster Hall

6885-482: Was promptly killed by Bowery gangsters on the ground, who stomped him to death. Two leaders of the Dead Rabbits were finally arrested by police despite heavy resistance from fellow gang members. The police took them to a nearby police precinct followed by a group of Bowery Boys. Fighting resumed as soon as the police left. Barricades were set up with push carts and stones from which gangsters fired weapons, hurled bricks, and used clubs against their enemies. At one point,

6970-452: Was seldom a sense of neighborhood community. Starting with the luxurious Stuyvesant Apartments that opened in 1869, and the even more lavish The Dakota in 1884, affluent tenants hired full-time staff to handle the upkeep and maintenance, as well as security. The less-lavish middle-class apartment buildings provided gas lighting, elevators, good plumbing, central heating, and maintenance men on call. Apartment buildings were built along

7055-465: Was the first iron frame building erected in New York. The building had been considered a landmark in the Maiden Lane district . It was originally a two-story structure, but later several more floors were added, making it into a six-story structure. When built, it was without elevators and for years, those having business in the building were compelled to use the stairway, climbing sometimes as high as

7140-569: Was the location of the largest quarantine facility in the United States. Angry residents burned down the hospital compound in 1858 in a series of attacks known as the Staten Island Quarantine War . Although there were no deaths as a result of the attack, the arsonists completely destroyed the hospital compound. As the population grew explosively in Lower Manhattan after 1820, middle-class residents were drawn to

7225-455: Was the widespread belief in the city that at some stage of the work the whole structure would topple over. Momentarily, the crowd expected to see it crumble. Perhaps there was a feeling of disappointment among old-timers when the structure was completed and the tenants moved in. From the time the building was erected until a few days before wreckers started to tear down the structure, it housed many jewelry concerns. Gilsey conducted for many years

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