Geography – Page 2 – The Gilded Hour

Croton Water Reservoir

Croton Reservoir on Fifth Avenue Easter 1897, shortly before demolition.

Croton Distributing Reservoir, also known as the Murray Hill Reservoir, was an above-ground reservoir at 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue in the New York City borough of Manhattan. It supplied the city with drinking water during the 19th century. The reservoir was a man-made lake in area, surrounded by massive, high, thick granite walls. Its facade was done in a vaguely Egyptian style. Along the tops of the walls were public promenades, offering panoramic views. After construction was completed, it became a popular place to go strolling for residents of New York City; Edgar Allan Poe enjoyed his walks at this location. The reservoir held a total capacity of 20 million US gallons .

When established, the Croton Aqueduct was NYC’s foremost water source. Water was introduced into the Croton Distributing Reservoir on July 4, 1842; before that date, water was obtained from cisterns, wells and barrels from rain.

The Croton Distributing Reservoir was torn down at the end of the century; in the 1890s. Today, the main branch of the New York Public Library and Bryant Park exist at that location. Some of the reservoir’s original foundation can still be found in the South Court at the New York Public Library. Today water is primarily supplied to New York City via its three city water tunnels. The Central Park Reservoir still remains, but since 1993 has no longer been in use.

Herald and Greeley Squares

Herald Square was named for the NY Herald Newspaper headquarters It is formed by the intersection of Broadway, Sixth Avenue and 34th Street. The intersection is a typical Manhattan bow-tie square that consists of two named sections: Herald Square to the north (uptown) and Greeley Square to the south (downtown).

Greeley Square lies between West 32nd Street and West 33rd Street and between Broadway and Sixth Avenue, and is taken up almost entirely by a triangular park It is named after Horace Greeley, who was the publisher of the New York Tribune, the Herald’s rival newspaper.

Bowtie Configuration Horace and Greeley Squares ca 1880

A rare photograph of Greeley Square in 1893

Greeley Square, about 1870. Brown, Henry Collins (ed.) Valentine’s Manual of the City of New York for 1916-7 New Series (New York: The Valentine Company, 1916), before p. 183.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Herald

Index Map: Manhattan Districts 1883

Click for larger version. There are many other maps included on specific pages.

Coenties Slip

From Wikipedia (original links intact)

Coenties Slip, originally an artificial inlet in the East River for the loading and unloading of ships that was land-filled in 1835, is a historic pedestrian walkway in Lower Manhattan, New York City, in the heart of the Financial District. It is perpendicular to Pearl Street and originally extended east to South Street, a distance of three blocks. New York’s first City Hall once stood at Coenties Alley and Pearl Street, just to the north of Coenties Slip.^[1] Although surrounded by skyscrapers, a row of buildings from the 19th century still stand and are in active use by small businesses.

The construction of these high rise buildings resulted in the removal of the blocks between Water Street and Front Street, and between Front Streetand South Street. Part of 55 Water Street and part of the New York Vietnam Veterans Memorial are built on land that was once part of Coenties Slip. Both Coenties Slip and Coenties Alley are named after Conraet Ten Eyck and his wife Antje.^[2]

In 2003, Gerard Wolfe reported the pronunciation of Coenties to be /ˈkoʊ.əntiːz/ koh-ən-teez.^[3] Earlier reports include/ˈkwɪnsiːz/ kwin-seez (1896),^[4] /ˈkwɛntʃɨz/ kwen-chiz (1917),^[5] and /ˈkwɪntʃiːz/ kwin-cheez (1908).^[6]