Greenwich Village | Page 9

the city's history, passing through startling changes and transformations, the scene of great happenings, the background of illustrious or curious lives,--it is probably more typical of the vertiginous development of New York than any single section. The Indians, the Dutch, the English, the Colonials, the Revolutionists, the New Americans, the shining lights of art, science, fashion and the state, have all passed through it, confidently and at home. The dead have slept there; wicked men have died there and great ones been honoured. Belles and beaux have minced on their way beneath the thick green branches,--branches that have also quivered to the sound of artillery fire saluting a mighty nation newborn. Nothing that a city can feel or suffer or delight in has escaped Washington Square. Everything of valour and tragedy and gallantry and high hope--that go to making a great town as much and more than its bricks and mortar--are in that nine and three-quarters acres that make up the very heart and soul of New York.
The lovely Arch first designed by Stanford White and erected by William Rhinelander Stewart's public-spirited efforts, on April 30, 1889, was in honour of the centennial anniversary of Washington's inauguration; it was so beautiful that, happily, it was later made permanent in marble, and in all the town there could have been found no more fitting place for it.
In every really great city there is one place which is, in a sense, sacred from the profanation of too utilitarian progress. However commercialised Paris might become, you could not cheapen the environs of Notre Dame! Whatever happens to us, let us hope that we will always keep Washington Square as it is today,--our little and dear bit of fine, concrete history, the one perfect page of our old, immortal New York!
Father Knickerbocker, may you dream well!
CHAPTER II
The Green Village
God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb down Greenwich way!--THOMAS JANVIER.
Did you know that "Greenwich Village" is tautology? That region known affectionately as "Our Village" is Greenwich, pure and simple, and here is the "why" of that statement.
The word wich is derived from the Saxon wick, and originally had birth in the Latin vicus, which means village. Hence, Greenwich means simply the Green Village, and was evidently a term describing one of the first small country hamlets on Manhattan. Captain Sir. Peter Warren, on whom be peace and benedictions, is usually given the credit of having given Greenwich its name, the historians insisting that it was the name of his own estate, and simply got stretched to take in the surrounding countryside. This seems rather a stupid theory. The Warrens were undoubtedly among the earliest representative residents in the little country resort, but by no stretch of imagination could any private estate, however ample or important, be called a village. But Greenwich was the third name to be applied to this particular locality.
Once upon a time there was a little settlement of Indians--the tribe was called the Sappocanicon or Sappokanikee. Like other redmen they had a gift for picking out good locations for their huts or wigwams--whatever they were in those days. On this island of Manhattan they had appropriated the finest, richest, yet driest piece of ground to be had. There were woods and fields; there was a marvellous trout stream (Minetta Water); there was a game preserve, second to none, presented to them by the Great Spirit (in the vicinity of Washington Square). There was pure air from the river, and a fine loamy soil for their humble crops. It was good medicine.
They adopted it far back in those beginnings of American history of which we know nothing. When you go down to the waterfront to see the ships steam away, you are probably standing where the braves and squaws had their forest home overlooking the river.
But their day passed. Peter Minuit--who really was a worth-while man and deserved to be remembered for something besides his thrifty deal in buying Manhattan for twenty-four dollars--cast an eye over the new territory with a view to developing certain spots for the Dutch West India Company. He staked out the Sappokanican village tentatively, but it was not really appropriated until Wouter Van Twiller succeeded Minuit as director general and Governor of the island.
Van Twiller was not one of the Hollanders' successes. R.R. Wilson says of him, "Bibulous, slow-witted and loose of life and morals, Van Twiller proved wholly unequal to the task in hand." Representing the West India Company, he nevertheless held nefarious commerce with the Indians--it is even reported that he sold them guns and powder in violation of express regulations--and certainly he was first and forever on the make. But before he was removed from office (because of these and other indiscretions) he had founded Our Village,--so may his soul rest in peace!
Not that