Reading...
Play button
Play button
Use LEFT and RIGHT arrow keys to navigate between flashcards;
Use UP and DOWN arrow keys to flip the card;
H to show hint;
A reads text to speech;
28 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
|
Flushing Remonstrance
|
Letter from residents to Peter Stuyvesant defending Quakers, who had been banned from NYC. Drafted in 1657. Protection of minority rights, evidence of NYC's early religious tolerance. Stuyvesant calls it seditious, arrests authors.
|
|
|
Erie Canal
|
Governor DeWitt Clinton gets state to finance it, opens in 1825. Revolutionizes transportation with route from Albany to Buffalo, transforms USA. Water is cheapest, easiest way to move things, drops shipping prices. One of the most successful public works projects ever until highways.
|
|
|
Croton Aqueduct
|
Designed by John B. Jervis in 1835. Gets mountain water to a reservoir under Central Park. NYC now has one of the best water systems in the world. Also improved hygiene and curbed disease.
|
|
|
General Slocum Fire
|
June 1904, largest loss of life in NYC history pre-9/11. Wiped out mostly German population of Kleindeutschland. Rotten lifejackets, inexperienced crew. Most were women and young children that died. Led to major upgrade in safety regulations on the water, but we don't remember the actual incident because of WWI + context.
|
|
|
1863 Draft Riots
|
Many white NYCers sympathetic to Confederate cause, racial tension in NYC. Rich could buy their way out of draft for $300. Irish immigrants also taken and made to fight right off the boat. Lincoln sends union soldiers to control city, some straight from Gettysburg. Blacks murdered in the street.
|
|
|
Boss Tweed
|
Born in NYC of Scottish descent, held multiple offices complimenting each other: State Sen., Chair of Dems, Grand Sachem of Tammany Hall. Took advantage of Irish but helped them, folk hero. City boss is uniquely American because of decentralization and local government's power.
|
|
|
Dumbbell Tenement
|
Housed around 150 ppl, airless and dimly lit. Very dense population, 1/6 of population on LES. Terrible health conditions, very little fresh air, but ushers in "New Law" - Tenement House Act of 1901 prohibits more construction. Improves quality of low-income housing, design controls.
|
|
|
A. T. Stewart
|
Creates department store at Broadway and Chambers. Now there are pre-fit clothes, not tailored. Revolutionized retail, everything sold in one store. Before dept. store, most business districts were for men. Now they are for women. See Ladies' Mile.
|
|
|
James Gordon Bennett
|
Owns New York Herald. NYC develops "yellow journalism," a.k.a. tabloids. Herald publishes outrageous story of murder of prostitute Helen Jewett. Bennett gains fame because he uses wireless telegraphy (forerunner of radio) to broadcast America's Cup yacht race. Manhattan becomes center of radio entertainment.
|
|
|
Manhattan Water Company
|
Started by Aaron Burr as a bank to compete with Hamilton's Bank of NY. Originally private, but becomes public in 1835. System is inadequate because it is really a bank in disguise. NYC is without good water for decades.
|
|
|
1811 Commissioner's Plan
|
Plan to divide NYC into a grid, stops at 155th street because they say nobody will settle above there for centuries. Note that the plan did NOT include Central Park at this time. "Ruthlessly efficient," sort of a metaphor of NYC as focused on efficiency and making money. Grid is product of "Streets Commission."
|
|
|
Frederick Law Olmsted
|
Designer of Central park with Calvert Vaux in 1858, when they won the contest. Also designed Prospect Park in Brooklyn. Wanted to create an aesthetic experience for the visitors, a park "for the people." He goes crazy in the end and gets put in McLean.
|
|
|
Triangle Shirtwaist Fire
|
1911, kills 146 women and children immigrant workers. Doors were locked for productivity. We remember it because it was the catalyst for the labor movement. Francis Perkins, FDR's Labor Secretary, says the New Deal is born out of this fire.
|
|
|
Prison Ships
|
NYC was loyalist central, also headquarters of British. Most of deaths on US side in war from ships. 4000-11,500 deaths. Legend is that Gen. Howe was having affair with Courtmaster General's wife, so there was shitty treatment. No prisoner exchange because the British were better trained, so it wasn't worth it. We don't remember the dead because they didn't die heroically.
|
|
|
1741 Negro Plot
|
Based on the testimony of a local teenage servant girl, whites and blacks put on trial for conspiring to burn NYC to the ground after several major fires. 4 whites, 17 blacks hanged, a bunch banished from the city. Escalated racial tensions in NYC, shows that NYC was living in fear.
|
|
|
Ladies' Mile
|
A stretch along Broadway and 6th from 10th to 23rd street. They represented the feminization of the business district. Location of many famous department stores leads women into the heart of the city.
|
|
|
George Waring
|
Drainage engineer, made NYC's sewer system. Undermined Tammany Hall and cut through nepotism of city government. Greatly improved NYC's sanitation conditions.
|
|
|
Kleindeutschland
|
Means "Little Germany," located on the LES in East Village. Very tightly-bound immigrant community of Germans, making up 1/4 of the city's population. Many of them leave after so many die in the General Slocum fire.
|
|
|
Gospel of Wealth
|
Published by Andrew Carnegie in 1889. Advocated giving a large part of one's wealth away to charity before death. He was responsible for Carnegie Hall, among other things. "The man who dies rich dies disgraced."
|
|
|
Five Points
|
Slum area in Lower Manhattan that was notorious. People used to take tours of the area. Five streets crossed into one area, giving it the name. Notorious for Tammany Hall connection.
|
|
|
Luna Park
|
Original park at Coney Island. Lots of public transportation, so everyone can go post-Civil War. Most visitors of any park in the world, and of all classes. "Nickel Empire" - 5c buys you a ton. Luna Park eventually burns down in 1944, reopens in 2010.
|
|
|
Packet Service
|
Introduction of shipping schedule. NY merchants get a leg up on other cities. Before, ships would only sail when they were full (of goods or passengers). Now ships ran on a schedule.
|
|
|
Garden City
|
A. T. Stewart founds a village for rich people trying to get out of the city. It was an example of white rich migration to the suburbs, a la Crabgrass Frontier. Garden City Hotel, only high-class hotel on Long Island, designed by McKim, Mead & White.
|
|
|
Black Maria
|
Thomas Edison's movie studio in NJ, first one in America. Movies first exhibited in New York City. Successor was a glass-enclosed rooftop studio in NYC. Another example of NYC being on the front lines of innovation and development.
|
|
|
Transportation Break
|
Take goods from one form of conveyance to another, change in ownership. Ships kept away from weather. NYC is located at perfect spot. Ice free in all seasons, water link through Hudson and Erie Canal. Navigable all the way up. Walter Christaller says through Central Place Theory that transportation explains most cities.
|
|
|
Union Square
|
Union of Broadway and Bowery Road. Historically the start or end of many political demonstrations, like the first Labor Day celebration. However, unlike most other cities, NYC doesn't have places to legally protest.
|
|
|
7th Regiment
|
Elite militia, made up wide socioeconomic diversity. They were the ones that typically broke up labor strikes in NYC, often using real bullets. Precursor to the National guard. Their armory was a source of scandal with its lush interiors and upper-crust architecture, leading people to call the regiment the "Silk-Stocking Militia."
|
|
|
Adriaen Van Der Donck
|
Lawyer and landowner in New Netherland, sort of a "forgotten patriot" of America with his tolerance. Responsible in part for the removal of Peter Keift and of the reprimand of Peter Stuyvesant. Was a populist political activist.
|
