| Description |
xv, 453 pages, 32 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations (chiefly color), maps ; 25 cm |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (pages 427-434) and index. |
| Contents |
Acknowledgments -- Preface: The Bowery Theatre burns -- Introduction: 1825-1835: "One of the greatest commercial towns in the world" -- Ten hours -- "Like a phoenix from her ashes" -- Overturning Manhattan -- "I would buy every foot of land on the island of Manhattan" -- London on the Hudson -- The city and the arts -- Panic and promise -- Covering the waterfront -- Quenching a city's thirst -- The Croton River flows into the city -- The power of the fire engines -- Firemen and politics -- Corporation pudding and death -- "A burial can scarcely take place without disturbing a previous one" -- A southern city in the north -- The search for freedom -- Creating breathing space -- A rural retreat in the gridded city -- A melting pot boils over -- An ungovernable metropolis -- The approaching storm -- Maelstrom -- Ending the deadly embrace -- Coda: the phoenix takes flight. |
| Summary |
"On a freezing December night almost two centuries ago, a fire erupted in lower Manhattan. The city's inhabitants, though accustomed to blazes in a town with so many wooden structures, a spotty water supply, and a decentralized fire department, looked on in horror at the scale of this one. Philip Hone, a former mayor of New York, wrote in his diary how "the progress of the flames, like flashes of lightning, communicated in every direction, and a few minutes sufficed to level the lofty edifices on every side." By the time the fire was extinguished, a huge swath of land had been transformed from a thriving business center into the "Burnt District," an area roughly the same size as was devastated during the September 11th attack. In the end, nearly 700 buildings were destroyed. So vast was the conflagration that it was immediately and henceforth known as the Great Fire of 1835. Manhattan Phoenix reveals how New York emerged from the disaster to become a global powerhouse merely a quarter of a century later. Daniel S. Levy's book charts the city's almost miraculous growth during the early 19th century by focusing on the topics that shaped its destiny, starting with fire but including water, land, disease, culture, and politics, interweaving the lives of New Yorkers who took part in its transformation. Some are well-known, including the land baron John Jacob Astor. Others less so, as with the Bowery Theatre impresario Thomas Hamblin and the African-American restaurateur Thomas Downing. The book celebrates Fire Chief James Gulick, who battled the Great Fire, examines the designs of the architect Alexander Jackson Davis who built marble palaces for the rich, follows the abolitionist Arthur Tappan, chronicles the career of the merchant Alexander Stewart, and reveals how the engineer John Bloomfield Jervis succeeded in bringing clean water into homes. The city's resurrection likewise owed much to such visionaries as Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, who designed Central Park, creating the refuge that it remains to this day. Manhattan Phoenix offers the story of a city rising from the ashes to fulfill its destiny to grow into one of the world's greatest metropolises--and in no small part due to catastrophe. It is, in other words, a New York story." -- Amazon.com. |
| Subject |
Fires -- New York (State) -- New York -- History -- 19th century.
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Manhattan (New York, N.Y.) -- History -- 19th century.
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New York (N.Y.) -- Social conditions -- 19th century.
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Fires. (OCoLC)fst00925697
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Social conditions. (OCoLC)fst01919811
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New York (State) -- New York.
(OCoLC)fst01204333
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New York (State) -- New York -- Manhattan.
(OCoLC)fst01312688
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| Chronological Term |
1800-1899
|
| Genre/Form |
History. (OCoLC)fst01411628
|
| ISBN |
9780195382372 (hardcover) |
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0195382374 (hardcover) |
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9780197624791 (electronic book) |
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9780199700202 (electronic book) |
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