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33-783: Manhattan Valley occupies a natural depression running east–west across Manhattan, declining rapidly from high rocky bluffs at the western border of Central Park , and following west the valley created by what was once a minor stream draining from roughly the area of the Harlem Meer into the Hudson River . The area is located on a gentle slope between West 96th Street , a major thoroughfare that runs in its own natural valley and stretches across town through Central Park, and W. 110th Street . From west to east, Broadway , Amsterdam Avenue , Columbus Avenue , Manhattan Avenue , and Central Park West are north–south thoroughfares through

66-697: A " towers in a park " housing development. Another superblock, occupied by the Frederick Douglass Houses , lies just to the north, bordered by Amsterdam Avenue, W. 100th Street, Manhattan Avenue, and West 104th Street . Columbus Avenue also passes through both of these developments. Manhattan Valley was part of the Bloomingdale District, the name given to the farms and houses along the Bloomingdale Road along Manhattan 's Upper West Side . The Dutch Bloemendaal

99-625: A bequest of $ 50,000). He and his brother presented Trinity Church with a memorial to their father: a sculptured reredos and altar costing $ 80,000. He left a bequest of $ 450,000 to the Astor Library , bringing the family benefactions to the institution to a total of about $ 1,500,000. He also gave generously to the New York Cancer Hospital ($ 100,000 bequest), the Woman's Hospital, St. Luke's Hospital ($ 100,000 bequest) and

132-924: A companion of the New York Commandery of the Military Order of the Loyal Legion of the United States —a military society of officers who had served in the Union armed forces. He was assigned insignia number 1909. He regarded his Civil War service as the best of his life and attended the reunions of the Loyal Legion with zeal. Astor donated objects and funds to the Metropolitan Museum of Art (in 1887 he presented it with his wife's collection of valuable laces and left

165-551: The Children's Aid Society . He took an active interest in the Astor Library beyond funding. He was treasurer of its board of trustees, and in 1879 deeded to it the three lots on which the northern wing of the present building was later constructed by him. He presented it with his collection of early books and rare manuscripts. His deeply religious wife Charlotte supported the newly formed Children's Aid Society and sat on

198-470: The Frederick Douglass Houses in the superblock where they stand today. The development of the Douglass Houses greatly increased the density of low-income renters without providing much in the way of amenities (food shops, clubs, restaurants, and open space) for them to use. Rampant graft and corruption associated with the project blighted their opening and brought ill repute to the neighborhood, and

231-525: The 1980s. With this gentrification, rents in the area rose. The estimated population of Latino residents was fast dwindling by 1987. Meanwhile, nonprofit groups started to renovate many structures that were owned by the city, as well as build housing on previously vacant tracts of land. Reactions to this gentrification were mixed. In 1990, one resident stated, "The crime situation is our biggest threat ... but if we get rid of it, we're also faced with gentrification." Coinciding with this gentrification in 1990, crime

264-642: The 1st Viscount Astor and married Mary Dahlgren Paul. In 1859, he built a home at 338 Fifth Avenue , today the street address of the Empire State Building . Later, he had an imposing vacation home, Beaulieu , built in Newport, Rhode Island , and he had a country estate, Nuits , at Ardsley-on-Hudson in Irvington, New York . Astor increasingly visited London in his later years. His son moved there permanently with his family in 1891 and became

297-522: The Bloomingdale neighborhood had the highest juvenile-delinquency rate in Manhattan and the second-highest number of welfare cases per 1,000 residents. New investment came to the area in the 1980s. Soon, however, new investment was brought to a halt by wavering property prices in the late 1980s and early 1990s, combined with the rise of crack use and dealers in the area, which gave Manhattan Valley

330-719: The Niobrara League to aid the Indians and in many other charities. She bequeathed $ 150,000 to charitable organizations. On December 9, 1846, Astor was married at Trinity Church in New York City to Charlotte Augusta Gibbes (February 27, 1825 – December 12, 1887). Her parents were Thomas Stanyarne Gibbes Jr. and Susan Annette Vanden Heuvel. She was a descendant of Charles Apthorp , Jan Cornelius Van den Heuvel , and SC Governor Robert Gibbes . Together, they had one child, William Waldorf Astor in 1848, who later became

363-722: The North American fur trade, and Sarah Cox Todd. Astor's maternal grandparents were Senator John Armstrong Jr. and Alida Livingston of the Livingston family . John Astor III studied at Columbia College , graduating in 1839, and the University of Göttingen , following which he went to Harvard Law School , graduating in 1842. He practiced law for a year, to qualify for assisting in the management of his family's immense estate, one half of which later descended to him. In business, Astor dabbled in railroad investment, but

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396-641: The area its earliest landmarks. The neighborhood began to fill out residentially at the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th, when the New York City Subway 's IRT Ninth Avenue Line in 1870 and the IRT Broadway – Seventh Avenue Line in 1904 allowed the public ready access to uptown Manhattan. Columbia's purchase of the Bloomingdale Lunatic Asylum at around the same time as the subway's arrival naturally made

429-463: The board of the Women's Hospital of New York, an institution that to her dismay refused to accept cancer patients. She persuaded her husband to donate the money ($ 225,000) to erect the New York Cancer Hospital 's first wing, the "Astor Pavilion". For twenty years, she supported a German industrial school. From 1872 until her death, she was a manager of the Woman's Hospital, besides taking an active part in

462-597: The city. By the 18th century it contained numerous farms and country residences of many of the city's well-off, a major parcel of which was the Apthorp Farm . The main artery was the Bloomingdale Road, which began north of where Broadway and the Bowery Lane (now Fourth Avenue ) join (at modern Union Square ) and wended its way northward to about modern 116th Street in Morningside Heights, where

495-502: The debacle contributed strongly to Moses's fall from power and ouster. Although community groups such as the Manhattan Valley Development Corporation tried to find alternative solutions for the housing shortage in the area, the city's 1976 fiscal crisis caused many of these alternate plans to be shelved. The crime rate in the area increased dramatically, along with drug use and poverty. By 1960,

528-539: The early 1800s, John Clendening owned a farm that covered much of the valley, roughly from the Bloomingdale Road to 8th Avenue between 99th and 105th Streets, with a large mansion near Amsterdam and 104th Streets. The area was known as the "Clendening Valley". Although the Clendening estate was divided and sold in 1845, the Clendening Valley name persisted until the 1880s, and a Clendening Hotel existed into

561-498: The early 20th century. The construction of an elevated aqueduct to carry the Croton Aqueduct over the valley in 1838–1842 separated the eastern side of the valley from the village of Bloomingdale, which had emerged around the Bloomingdale Road until the 1870s, when it was replaced with an underground inverted siphon, and the old aqueduct was torn down. Early development in the 1870s and 1880s focused on institutional care for

594-660: The following as "people of note" who have lived there: 40°47′57″N 73°57′46″W  /  40.79917°N 73.96278°W  / 40.79917; -73.96278 Central Park Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include the details below. Request from 172.68.168.226 via cp1108 cp1108, Varnish XID 210924852 Upstream caches: cp1108 int Error: 429, Too Many Requests at Thu, 28 Nov 2024 07:47:06 GMT John Jacob Astor III John Jacob Astor III (June 10, 1822 – February 22, 1890)

627-524: The neighborhood by its present name. The new name and recovery were both much bolstered by the non-profit Manhattan Valley Development Corporation (MVDC), founded in 1968. It sought to differentiate itself from other community-development organizations by opposing the demolition of pre-war buildings in favor of renovation and seeking to promote small business and "prevent harassment by out-side management companies prevalent in low income 'minority' neighborhoods." Manhattan Valley has gentrified significantly since

660-514: The neighborhood more attractive as well. The area was populated mostly by Irish and German immigrants through the 1950s. Young boys and girls took advantage of Central Park and Riverside Drive or played stick ball and roller hockey in the streets. The 1950s saw many migrants from Puerto Rico take up residence in the Upper West Side, and a proposed project to eliminate the older brownstone apartments began to drive earlier residents to

693-506: The neighborhood. Amsterdam Avenue, Broadway, and Central Park West proceed in an uninterrupted grid; Columbus Avenue becomes Morningside Drive north of W. 110th Street. Manhattan Avenue originates at 100th Street and proceeds north into Harlem. Several large swaths of Manhattan Valley are made up of residential developments that break the regular city street grid. The area from W. 100th to W.  97th Streets between Central Park West and Amsterdam Avenue consists of Park West Village,

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726-603: The office in 1853. During the American Civil War , Astor served as a volunteer aide-de-camp , with the rank of colonel, to Major General George B. McClellan (then commanding general of the U.S. Army) from November 30, 1861, to July 11, 1862. In recognition of his services during the Peninsular Campaign , Astor was brevetted as a brigadier general of Volunteers in March 1865. In 1880 he became

759-513: The property values are the highest. Yet the area remains diverse, representing a microcosm of the larger city in terms of the different ethnicities, ages and socioeconomic groups living within the same community. According to the 2000 United States Census (in which Manhattan Valley's census tracts are 187, 189, 191, 193, and 195), 48,983 people live in the community. Of the population, 44% are of Latino origin, 32% are African Americans, and 24% are Asians, whites, and other races. Fifty-five percent of

792-591: The reputation as one of the easiest places in the city to score a hit. In addition, there was a lot of violence on the streets of Manhattan Valley, especially at night, when gang wars were prevalent. With the Wall Street boom in the early 1980s, Manhattan as a whole experienced a sharp recovery. Seventy years after the Bloomingdale Asylum's closing, the provenance of the name was fading into obscurity, and residents and brokers alike began referring to

825-571: The residents are of very low income (below 50% of the area's median family income, which is $ 13,854). In 2009, the more affluent families resided west of Broadway and east of Manhattan Avenue. Of the Manhattan Valley population, 20.76% had income from Social Security and 23% relied on public assistance. A plaque on the outside wall of the Central Park View, an apartment building at 415 Central Park West (at 101st Street), names

858-478: The road farther north was known as the Kingsbridge Road. Within the confines of the modern-day Upper West Side, the road passed through the hamlets of Harsenville, bounded by 68th Street, 81st Street, Central Park West, and the Hudson River ; Strycker's Bay, located on a now-infilled inlet between 86th and 96th Streets; and Bloomingdale Village, a place near the current Columbia University campus. In

891-772: The sick or aged, and included the Hebrew Home for the Aged, the Catholic Old Age Home, the Home for Respectable Aged Indigent Females, and the Towers Nursing Home constructed as a cancer ward by John Jacob Astor III in 1884. Also located in Manhattan Valley at the time was the New York Cancer Hospital , which was built in 1887 at 455 Central Park West . These, together with the Lion Brewery , gave

924-465: The suburbs. By the 1950s and 1960s, the area went into decline, in line with a trend of general urban deterioration in Manhattan. As middle-class residents left for the suburbs, buildings were allowed to fall into disrepair and were divided into small units for new low-rent tenants, many of them originally from Puerto Rico . Urban renewal programs, headed by city planner Robert Moses , called for several city blocks to be demolished in order to construct

957-471: Was Anglicized to "Bloomingdale" or "the Bloomingdale District", for the west side of Manhattan from about 23rd Street up to the Hollow Way (modern 125th Street ). It originally consisted of farms and villages along a road (regularized in 1703) known as the Bloomingdale Road. Bloomingdale Road was renamed The Boulevard in 1868, as the farms and villages were divided into building lots and absorbed into

990-533: Was an American financier, philanthropist and a soldier during the American Civil War . He was a prominent member of the Astor family , becoming the wealthiest member in his generation. Astor was the eldest son of real estate businessman William Backhouse Astor Sr. and Margaret Alida Rebecca Armstrong. One of his younger brothers was businessman William Backhouse Astor Jr. His paternal grandparents were merchant-trader John Jacob Astor , who made his first fortune in

1023-476: Was declining steeply, although drug dealings were still common: one large drug arrest had been made in December of that year. The Frederick Douglass Houses, which had become frequented by drug dealers, was thought to be stymieing the development of new housing in the area, which included two apartment towers that had been constructed in the preceding two years. The Columbus Amsterdam business improvement district

Manhattan Valley - Misplaced Pages Continue

1056-689: Was organized in the late 1990s to develop stronger business presence along the main thoroughfares of Columbus and Amsterdam Avenues, and to provide entrepreneurial opportunities to locals. In 2005, brokers estimated that properties in the area were approximately 30% less expensive than comparable properties in the adjacent south. The neighborhood's proximity to the much-valued Central Park as well as to three separate subway lines make it attractive to young commuters, and, as of 2006, prices were rising dramatically as New Yorkers were tipped off by their brokers. Many historical brownstones and townhouses were saved from demolition, particularly east of Columbus Avenue, where

1089-483: Was outsmarted by Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt and forced to yield control of the original New York Central Railroad line (from Albany to Buffalo ) to him. His principal business interest was the vast Astor Estate real estate holdings in New York City , which he managed profitably and parsimoniously. Astor was elected lieutenant colonel of the 12th Regiment of the New York Militia. He resigned from

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