1,000 Places to See in the U.S.A. & Canada Before You Die (38 page)

Where New York Was New Amsterdam

New York, New York

This is the New York you remember from all those black-and-white 1930s movies: narrow streets, looming skyscrapers, businesspeople in suits, and cabbies with that quintessential New Yawk accent. Today the cabbies are
mostly from India, but the rest is pretty much the same—that is, as long as you bear in mind that the one constant in New York is change.

It was down at the southernmost tip of Manhattan Island that the Dutch colony of Nieuw Amsterdam was born in 1625. In 1626, the colony’s governor, Peter Minuit, made his now-legendary $24 purchase of the island from the Indians near what is now the Bowling Green, a tiny triangular park at the very base of Broadway. Once a larger patch that served as a cattle market and parade ground, it was converted to a park for lawn bowling in 1733. Immediately south is the U.S. Customs House. Designed by Cass Gilbert and completed in 1907, it’s one of the finest beaux arts buildings in New York and is now home to the New York branch of the National Museum of the American Indian.

Just next door, in Battery Park, is Castle Clinton, which welcomed about eight million arrivals as the city’s official immigration facility between 1855 and 1890, when operations moved to Ellis Island. Built as an offshore fort during the War of 1812 (subsequent landfills later joined it to Manhattan, creating Battery Park), it’s now a historic monument, a concert venue, and the jumping-off point for ferry service to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island (see p. 192). Around the park are a series of monuments to various casualties of war and history, among them Fritz Koenig’s 25-foot bronze sculpture
The Sphere,
which stood in the plaza of the World Trade Center until the September 11 attacks. Rescued from the rubble, it was moved here in March 2002 to serve as a temporary memorial.

For an authentic piece of colonial history, head a few blocks east to the Fraunces Tavern. Built in 1719, this Georgian-style yellow brick house was the site where Washington gave his farewell address to the Continental Army, in 1783. You can tour the museum upstairs or enjoy a meal in its quaint restaurant downstairs. From here, walk north to legendary Wall Street. Named for an actual wooden wall erected by the Dutch in 1653 to ward off Indian attacks, it’s been the center of commerce in the New World for more than two centuries. The New York Stock Exchange, the largest securities market in the world, sits at the center of the action at Broad and Wall, housed in a handsome 1903 beaux arts building. Across the street, a statue of George Washington marks the entrance to Federal Hall, where he was inaugurated as the country’s first president in 1789. Federal Hall served as the first seat of U.S. government from 1789 to 1790—when New York was the capital of the newly formed U.S.—but it was demolished in 1812 to make room for the current structure, which served as New York’s customs house from 1842 to 1862.

Wall Street is also home to Trinity Church, at one time the tallest structure on the New York skyline at 281 feet. Built in 1846 by William Upjohn, the Episcopal church is now dwarfed by practically everything around it, but still functions as a house of worship and as a peaceful refuge, its graveyard holding the remains of such notables as Alexander Hamilton and Robert Fulton. Five blocks north is St. Paul’s Chapel, part of the Trinity Parish (see p. 195).

Farther north on Broadway, you won’t be able to miss the lovely 58-story Woolworth Building, which was the tallest building in the world when it was built in 1913. Designed by Cass Gilbert in the neo-gothic style, it resembles an extremely tall, narrow Notre Dame, full of lacy stone traceries, gargoyles, turrets, and spires. Just across the street is the south end of City Hall Park, a pretty public space surrounded by municipal government buildings, including the surprisingly small City Hall (not open to visitors). To the east, South Street Seaport encompasses twelve square blocks of 18th- and 19th-century buildings along historic cobblestone streets. Much of the area is taken up with mall-like shopping and dining establishments, but the South Street Seaport Museum is another matter, its galleries providing a view of the days when Manhattan was ringed with the masts of sailing ships, bringing cargo from around the world. Outside, at its piers on the East River,
the museum’s collection of historic vessels sits permanently moored or at anchor.

W
HERE:
the southern tip of Manhattan island.
Visitor info:
Tel 212-484-1200;
www.nycvisit.com
.
M
USEUM OF THE
A
MERICAN
I
NDIAN:
Tel 212-514-3700;
www.nmai.si.edu
.
F
RAUNCES
T
AVERN:
Tel 212-425-1778 (museum) or 212-968-1776 (restaurant);
www.frauncestavernmuseum.org
.
Cost:
dinner $50.
When:
museum closed Sun–Mon.
T
RINITY
C
HURCH:
Tel 212-602-0800;
www.trinitywallstreet.org
.
S
OUTH
S
TREET
S
EAPORT
M
USEUM:
Tel 212-748-8600;
www.southstseaport.org
.
When:
closed Mon, Apr–Oct; Fri–Sun, Nov–Mar.
B
EST TIMES
: Mon and Thurs afternoons for free concerts at Trinity Church; summer evenings for music at the South Street Seaport.

Beacon of Romance, Symbol of a City

New York, New York

Soaring 1,454 feet into the New York sky, the Empire State Building is the most perfect, enduring symbol of the city, a Promethean achievement that rose during the Great Depression. It reigned as the tallest building in the
world for over 40 years, and, since 2001 when the Twin Towers fell, it is once again the city’s tallest. Though perhaps not the most beautiful of New York’s skyscrapers (the Chrysler Building usually wins that title; see p. 186), it is undoubtedly its most iconic and beloved, its art deco peak lit up in the colors of the season, transforming it into a lighthouse that marks the metaphorical center of town.

The idea for the 102-story building was born in the mind of John J. Raskob, a General Motors vice president who wanted to compete with Walter Chrysler’s new building up at 42nd and Lex. The announcement of the building’s construction came on August 29, 1929, just days after the stock market hit its then all-time peak, but by the time work on the foundation began in January 1930, the market had crashed. Whether because of the crash or in defiance of it, work went on. It officially opened in March 1931—only 13 months after construction began—and was a huge commercial flop. Only 30 percent of its office space had been rented, and 56 of its 103 floors had no occupants whatsoever. In its first year, the building’s owners made as much money from tickets sold to its observation decks as they did in rent.

The Empire State Building is the second tallest building in the U.S. after the Sears Tower in Chicago.

But in the long run, none of that mattered. Nor does the fact that an early plan to tie up dirigibles to the building’s tower never materialized. The fact is that before it was even complete, the Empire State Building had become New Yorkers’ proudest collective achievement, and an international icon too. In the 1933 film, King Kong scaled the building after escaping from his captors, battling biplanes before tragically
falling to his death. In 1957, Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr made plans to meet on the observation deck and resolve their star-crossed love. In 1993’s
Sleepless in Seattle,
Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan mimicked that
Affair to Remember
with their own sky-high rendezvous. And every day, thousands of visitors make their own elevator trip up to the observatories on the 86th and 102nd floors (the lower one the perennial favorite, the higher one glassed in and cramped) for a view that can stretch up to 80 miles in all directions and make you feel you’re king of the world.

W
HERE
: 350 5th Ave. Tel 212-736-3100;
www.esbnyc.com
.
B
EST TIME
: Feb for the Empire State Building Run-Up, when more than 100 runners tackle the 1,576 steps leading to the 86th floor.

America’s Original Bohemian Quarter

New York, New York

In or around 1916, the artist and provocateur Marcel Duchamp and several cohorts climbed to the top of the memorial arch in Washington Square Park and, brandishing Chinese lanterns and singing the “Marseillaise,” declared
Greenwich Village “a free republic, independent of uptown.” And so it has remained, karmically if not politically.

The Village dates to the early 17th century, when Dutch settled the land. After the English took control of Manhattan in 1664, the area became known as Grin’wich, and in 1712 it was formally incorporated as an independent village—a northern suburb of New York, which was still concentrated down at the tip of the island (see p. 172). Increasing numbers of New Yorkers settled in the area, and the Village became so established that in 1811, when New York officials adopted a plan to segment all of Manhattan Island into a rigid street grid, they were forced to exempt the Village from the new rules—which is why today, even New York residents sometimes get lost trying to find their way through the Village’s illogical tangle.

Fame settled on the Village gradually during the 20th century, when it became one of the capitals of American bohemianism. First came the artists such as Duchamp and Edward Hopper, writers Eugene O’Neill and Henry Miller, and all manner of radicals drawn by the area’s low rents and tolerant sensibility. By the 1950s, the Village was home to such Beat Generation writers as Allen Ginsberg, and in the ’60s it was the center of America’s folk music revival, its coffeehouses birthing the careers of Bob Dylan and countless others. At the end of the decade, the Village saw the birth of the American gay rights movement when police raided a gay bar called the Stonewall Inn—and the patrons fought back.

Though its most radical days may now be behind it, the Village still provides much-needed relief from New York’s more businesslike quarters, its maze of streets and alleys holding architectural gems, classic bars, off-Broadway theater, and vibrant street life. Washington Square Park is the epicenter of the area, its 10 acres surrounded by the myriad buildings of New York University. On the park’s northern side, the Washington Arch was erected on a design by Stanford White between 1889 and 1892, commemorating George Washington’s inauguration as president 100 years before. Behind it, lining the park, is a row of landmark Greek Revival mansions dating to the mid-19th
century, when the park was one of New York’s best addresses. Today, the park is still a hotbed of activity on most days, with both performers clustered around its central fountain and Village residents taking their ease on benches, playing chess, and walking their dogs.

To the south, Macdougal Street and Bleecker Street still retain some of their boho 1960s flavor, lined with shops, classic low-rent restaurants like Mamoun’s Falafel, and music clubs like Café Wha? and the Back Fence. Near Mamoun’s, tiny Minetta Street is an exemplar of the Village’s screwy street pattern, snaking through to Sixth Avenue in a way you don’t find uptown. Around the corner, on West 3rd Street, the Blue Note is the city’s most upscale jazz club, attracting big-name performers. Farther west, on Seventh Avenue, the Village Vanguard is its most revered, a tiny, triangular basement venue that in its 70-plus years has seen performances by the likes of John Coltrane, Dexter Gordon, and Miles Davis. Farther west, the epicenter of the Village’s gay community is Christopher Street and Sheridan Square at Seventh Avenue, site of the Stonewall Inn and the Oscar Wilde Bookshop, credited as being the world’s first gay bookstore.

West of Seventh Avenue the Village turns into a gingerbread town full of narrow tree-lined streets, small cafés, pocket-size parks, and legendary bars like Chumley’s, a tiny former speakeasy whose door is still unmarked, and the White Horse Tavern, where poet Dylan Thomas literally drank himself to death in 1953. Newer spots, such as the always-packed “gastropub” the Spotted Pig, already appear to be legends.

Visit in late October and you’ll get swept up in the annual Greenwich Village Halloween Parade, the country’s biggest and arguably most entertaining Halloween celebration. It offers a kind of pass to the Village’s historical mystique, allowing anyone who shows up—masqueraders and watchers alike—the illusion that they too are part of a great, free-spirited bohemian continuum.