Postcard Thursday: The Death of George Washington

"First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen, he was second to none in humble and enduring scenes of private life. Pious, just, humane, temperate, and sincere; uniform, dignified, and commanding; his example was as edifying to all around him.... [V]ice shuddered in his presence and virtue always felt his fostering hand. The purity of his private character gave effulgence to his public virtues. ... Such was the man for whom our nation mourns." -- Henry ("Light Horse Harry") Lee

On December 14, 1799, former president George Washington breathed his last at Mount Vernon. Washington was not the first Founding Father to pass away -- Benjamin Franklin had died nine years earlier -- but he was already widely acknowledged as the "Father" of his country and quickly transformed into a symbol of America. Dozens of cities, towns, parks, lakes, and boulevards are named from him across the country, and he is memorialized with countless statues and other monuments.

One of the most famous of these statues, by French sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon, was completed during Washington's lifetime. Houdon was hired by the Virginia General Assembly in 1784 and traveled from France to Mount Vernon in the summer of 1785. He stayed at Mount Vernon that fall, measuring Washington limbs and taking a life mask (below) from which he could work once he was back in France. The statue was completed around 1792 and installed in 1796 in the rotunda of the Virginia state capitol.

Starting in the 1850s numerous casts of the Houdon statue were made, including a bronze copy that now stands in the rotunda of New York's City Hall. Prior to that (from 1883 to 1907), the work stood in Riverside Park between 88th and 89th Street near the Soldiers and Sailors monument. According to Peter Salwen's Upper West Side Story, the statue had been unearthed in the arsenal in Central Park by parks commissioner Egbert Viele. According to a contemporary guide to the city, "children of the public schools of the city" raised the funds to have the statue erected in the park, very near Viele's home. By 1907, it had been moved to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. According to a 1908 edition of the New-York Tribune, because the statue was only life size and not "heroic size, as statues have to be to look well out of doors," it was taken to the Met to be put on display. When, precisely, it then migrated to City Hall is unclear, though it seems to be sometime in the 1960s.

Of course, New York has many other Washington monuments, including Henry Kirke Brown's equestrian statue in Union Square, JQA Ward's standing figure on the steps of Federal Hall National Memorial, and the Washington Square Arch, erected to honor the centennial of Washington's inauguration.

 

Footprints in New York: Tracing the Lives of Four Centuries of New Yorkers

Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York City

Postcard Thursday: The Great Fire of 1835

The image in today's postcard (which is actually a commemorative print) depicts an event that took place over three days, December 16-18, 1835. So, technically, Postcard Thursday isn't one day late.

This year marks the 180th anniversary of the Great Fire of 1835, the most devastating fire in the Western Hemisphere since London's near-total destruction in 1666.

As we write in Inside the Apple:

On the night of December 16, 1835, a gas line broke in a dry goods store near Hanover Square in the Financial District; the gas, ignited by a coal stove, caused the store to explode and the ensuing fire quickly fanned southward along Stone Street and northeast toward Wall Street. Not only was it the worst fire in New York’s history, it wiped away almost all of the remaining traces of the old Dutch and British colonial city. 

New York had some of the nation’s strictest fire codes; buildings were never erected with common walls, and brick and stone were favored over cheaper wood (though this was as much about status as safety). Every home was required to have a leather fire bucket affixed to a hook by the door and every business had to have at least two. At the sound of the first alarm, the city’s volunteer fire companies turned out in force. As per instructions, every fire bucket was made ready, and bucket brigades formed to nearby wells and cisterns. Unfortunately, it had been so cold for so many nights that the wells were frozen solid. 

When the firefighters changed tack and headed for the East River instead, they found to their chagrin that the river was frozen, too. With no other source of running water, they were forced to improvise. At the ends of the piers, holes were hacked in the ice and fire engines lowered down to pump water. However, by the time they were able to get any water flowing, the hoses had frozen, and when they did manage to get water up, most of it was blown back as frozen ice into the faces of the firemen. In some places, the only way to stop the fire’s spread was to blow up buildings in its path to create a makeshift firebreak.

Mayor Philip Hone, one of the great diarists of New York in the 19th century, wrote:

“December 17—How shall I record the events of last night, or how attempt to describe the most awful calamity which has ever visited these United States? The greatest loss by fire that has ever been known…. I am fatigued in body, disturbed in mind, and my fancy filled with images of horror which my pen is inadequate to describe.”

In the end, the fire had to burn itself out and, in the process, it destroyed much of the area between Broadway and Pearl Street in the financial district. If you happen to be down in that neighborhood, take a walk down the block of Stone Street that connects Hanover Square to Coenties Slip. This is the area known today for its string of restaurants and pubs; the buildings themselves, however, form a sort of memorial to the fire. Almost all of them were built within a 12-month period in 1836-37 to replace countinghouses and warehouses destroyed in the Great Fire. Notice how many of the buildings have extra wide doors (to haul in cargo) and strong, granite curbs to keep goods from accidentally plunging in to the basement.

courtesy of the New York Public Library

There are supposedly no other, official memorials to the Great Fire, despite the fact that it was the largest urban fire since London’s Great Fire in 1661. But when we were writing Inside the Apple, we found one. During the worst of the fire,

a valiant attempt was made to rescue a 15-foot statue of Alexander Hamilton from the floor of the exchange, but just as the statue reached the doorway the roof collapsed, destroying it. The statue, by Robert Ball Hughes, was the first marble statue created in the United States and had only been installed eight months earlier. Though it took 45 years, the statue was ultimately replaced by Hamilton’s youngest son, John C. Hamilton, and it stands in Central Park behind the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This statue in the park is remarkable in that it is made entirely of granite—not the easiest stone to carve—and it has long been thought that John C. Hamilton commissioned the work out of this durable stone so that no matter what calamities might befall Central Park, his father’s statue would endure.

courtesy of the Central Park Conservancy

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Read more about NYC history in

Footprints in New York: Tracing the Lives of Four Centuries of New Yorkers

Available from your favorite online retailers (Amazon, Barnes and Noble, etc.) or from independent bookstores across the country. 

Christopher Columbus in New York City

Monday, October 14, marks the 74th year that Christopher Columbus' "discovery" of America has been celebrated as a national holiday. In New York City, celebrations date back to at least 1792, the 300th anniversary of Columbus' voyage, but didn't really start in earnest until the first waves of Italian immigrants began arriving in the years around the Civil War.

In 1892, the 400th anniversary, New York City went all out in its Columbus celebrations. Three separate statues were planned for Central Park and--since there was already one in the park, donated by a private individual--this would have meant a total of four Columbus monuments in the park alone. In the end, we only have two Columbus commemorations: one in the middle of Columbus Circle (donated by the Italian-American community) and one on the Mall, put up under the auspices of the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society (NYG&B).

Each is worth a visit. The Italian Columbus stands on a 70-foot pillar in the midst of the traffic circle where 59th Street intersects Broadway and Central Park West. It is sculpted of marble by Gaetano Russo and the base is inset with bas relief images of Columbus' first landing.

To reach the other Columbus, enter the park here and walk north on the West Drive (the ring road) to Tavern on the Green/Sheep Meadow. Turn right and walk east along the bottom of Sheep Meadow; when you get to the other side, follow the path as it curves to the left (don't re-cross the ring road) and you'll get to base of the park's formal promenade, known as the Mall. There you'll find the other Columbus. 

This work, often known as "the Spanish Columbus," is by Jeronimo Sunol, a Spanish artist who had already created a similar sculpture in Barcelona. The statue's champion was James Grant Wilson, a Civil War veteran, New York City historian, Central Park lover, and all-around civic-minded citizen. Through the NYG&B, Wilson raised the funds to place this statue in the park, probably as a counterbalance to the Italian piece in Columbus Circle. With so many Italians immigrating to the United States in the late 19th century, it is likely that the subtext of any so-called "Spanish Columbus" was that it was, in fact, a "non-Italian Columbus."

Meanwhile, the Spanish government was interested in commemorating the explorer with its own statue, but plans fell through and it was never built.

Lastly, there was the privately donated piece. It was sculpted by Emma Stebbins--best known for the park's Angel of the Waters--and ended up living for years in a tavern that once stood in the park near the 102nd Street transverse. Stebbins' Columbus later traveled down to Columbus Park in Chinatown and now stands in Cadman Plaza in front of the Brooklyn Supreme Court building. (To visit, take the 2, 3, 4, or 5 subway to Borough Hall. The Columbus Statue is directly in front of the main Supreme Court entrance.)

Much more about Columbus and his appearances in NYC history, art, and architecture can be found in Inside the Apple.

Happy Columbus Day!

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