Fifth Avenue

Fifth Avenue

The Project Gutenberg eBook, Fifth Avenue, by Arthur Bartlett Maurice, Illustrated by Allan G. Cram
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Title: Fifth Avenue
Author: Arthur Bartlett Maurice

Release Date: September 15, 2005 [eBook #16691]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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FIFTH AVENUE
by
ARTHUR BARTLETT MAURICE
Author of "New York in Fiction," "The New York of the Novelists," "Bottled up in Belgium," etc.
Drawings by Allan G. Cram
New York Dodd, Mead and Company
1918

[Illustration: "MASSIVE AND SPLENDIDLY GOTHIC IS ST. THOMAS'S. THE CHURCH DATES FROM 1825. IN 1867 THE PRESENT SITE WAS SECURED, AND THE BROWN-STONE EDIFICE OF THE EARLY SEVENTIES WAS FOR NEARLY TWO GENERATIONS THE ULTRA-FASHIONABLE EPISCOPAL CHURCH OF THE CITY"]

FOREWORD
In the making of this book the author has drawn from many sources. First, for many suggestions, he is indebted to Mr. Guy Nichols, the librarian of the Players Club, whose knowledge of the city is so profound that his friends occasionally refer to him as "the man who invented New York." The author is indebted to the Fifth Avenue Association and to the invariable courtesy of those persons in the New York Public Library with whom he has come in contact.
Among the books that have been consulted are, first of all, the admirable monographs, "Fifth Avenue," and "Fifth Avenue Events," issued by the Fifth Avenue Bank. From these he has drawn freely. Among other volumes are "The Diary of Philip Hone," Ward McAllister's "Society as I Have Found It," George Cary Eggleston's "Recollections of a Varied Life," Matthew Hale Smith's "Sunshine and Shadow in New York" (1869), Seymour Dunbar's "A History of Travel in America," Miss Henderson's "A Loiterer in New York," William Allen Butler's "A Retrospect of Forty Years," Fremont Rider's "New York City," Francis Gerry Fairfield's "The Clubs of New York," Anna Alice Chapin's "Greenwich Village," Theodore Wolff's "Literary Haunts and Homes," Rupert Hughes's "The Real New York," James Grant Wilson's "Thackeray in the United States," Mrs. Burton Harrison's "Recollections, Grave and Gay," Abram C. Dayton's "Last Days of Knickerbocker Life in New York," and Martha J. Lamb's "History of the City of New York." Also various articles in the magazines and newspapers.

CONTENTS
CHAPTER Page
I THE SHADOW OF THE KNICKERBOCKERS 1
II THE STRETCH OF TRADITION 29
III A KNICKERBOCKER PEPYS 41
IV GLIMPSES OF THE SIXTIES 60
V FOURTEENTH TO MADISON SQUARE 78
VI SOME GREAT DAYS ON THE AVENUE 100
VII SOME AVENUE CLUBS IN THE EARLY DAYS 125
VIII LITERARY LANDMARKS AND FIGURES 150
IX FIFTH AVENUE IN FICTION 165
X TRAILS OF BOHEMIA 183
XI THE SLOPE OF MURRAY HILL 199
XII CONFESSIONS OF AN EXILED BUS 211
XIII A POST-KNICKERBOCKER PETRONIUS 226
XIV THE CREST OF MURRAY HILL 244
XV GIANT STRIDES OF COMMERCE 255
XVI BEYOND MURRAY HILL 266
XVII APPROACHING THE PLAZA 285
XVIII STRETCHES OF THE AVENUE 297
XIX MINE HOST ON THE AVENUE 312

ILLUSTRATIONS
"Massive and splendidly Gothic is St. Thomas's. The church dates from 1825. In 1867 the present site was secured, and the brown-stone edifice of the early seventies was for nearly two generations the ultra-fashionable Episcopal church of the city" Frontispiece
FACING PAGE
The Washington Arch. A splendid sentinel guarding the approach to the Avenue. Beyond, houses dating from the thirties of the last century, that mark the beginning of the Stretch of Tradition 14
At the northeast corner of the Avenue and Tenth Street is the Episcopal Church of the Ascension, built in 1840, and consecrated November 5, 1841. It belongs to a part of the Avenue, from the Square to Twelfth Street, which has changed little since 1845 32
Madison Square. Yesterday it was the home of the Flora McFlimsies of the William Allen Butler poem "Nothing to Wear." Today, in the eyes of the Manhattanite, it is the centre of the Universe 68
"The Tower of the Metropolitan Building. Whatever artists may think of it the tower is, structurally, one of the wonders of the world. Exactly halfway between sidewalk and point of spire is the great clock with the immense dials" 86
In the bright sunlight the Avenue glitters with the pavillions of patriotism. Old Glory may be counted by the tens of thousands; England's Union Jack, and the Tricolour of France by the thousands. To forestall the Kaiser the Avenue is "coming across" 112
Where the Avenue and Thirty-fourth Street cross stands the building popularly known as the Knickerbocker Trust Company. Here, in the middle of the last century, "Sarsaparilla" Townsend built in brown-stone, and A.T. Stewart later built in white marble 136
"At