visit to the Terrace City in 1888 might well occasion culture shock to those of us who live here a century later. Orienting ourselves would be easy enough and we’d recognize the layout and names of streets around Getty Square and landmarks such as St. John’s Church, the Windham Hotel, and the old Square Hotel (Con Edison, until recently; now the discount store Easy Pickings). We would recognize Yonkers from the river to Chicken Island, but the differences from what we know today would be overwhelming.
Yonkers in 1888 was a city of 19,000 people, most of whom lived within walking distance of Getty Square. It was not until the next decade that the Putnam line of the New York Central Railroad and the new electrified trolley cars were available to speed families to seek homes in Park Hill, Shonnard Park and Ludlow. Yonkers was a city few paved roads, no sewers, few electric lights, no fire alarms and no water works. It was a city where woods shadowed South Broadway south of Highland Avenue; Warburton Avenue was lined with handsome residences; Main Street and North Broadway boasted stores such Frost’s Bakery, I. Ipson, Pierpoint’s—the pork store—and Longbotham’s fish and oyster market.
Within the North Broadway/Main Street/Warburton Avenue circle, and continuing to flow through what is today Larkin Plaza, was the dammed Nepperhan River. The damming of the river produced mill–ponds used for water power by John Copcutt and other local barons of industry. These ponds were pestilential from the sewage which poured into them. It wasn’t until after 1892, when Mayor James Weller surreptitiously destroyed the dams and won a subsequent lawsuit, that the water was directed into an underground flume.
The small city of Yonkers had 150 licensed dispensers of liquor, 70 saloons, 30 liquor stores/bars and 25 hotels serving liquor in lavish surroundings—as well as cafes galore in clubhouses. Well might the Yonkers Statesman deplore the “many groups of young men in intoxicating condition acting in a boisterous manner” on the streets.
The main thoroughfare of Broadway was a daily entertaining panorama, drawing bystanders for the passing show of dogcarts, fringed phaetons, victorias, and T–carts. The carts could be seen making way for the horse–trolleys which run on rails as far as Ludlow or, on Riverdale Avenue, as far as Mount St. Vincent. The New York City coach pulls to a stop at the Getty House. One horse pulling a Fleischmann Yeast wagon threw the driver in 1888, and yeast cakes were scattered all over Main Street. In winter, horse–drawn sleighs vied in stylish splendor on both Broadway and Warburton Avenue.
After the ice broke, from about March onward, what a sight were the craft on the Hudson River! A sightseer would hurry to the Lemuel Wells wharf to view the parade of huge, gilt–encrusted ferries six stories high, large wooden rafts, barges, canoes, tugboats, gigantic ice boats. Boat service to New York on the Chrystenah or on the Caroline A. Peene was comfortable and fast. The ships would take you from the dock in Yonkers down to 23rd Street or farther down to Harrison Street. The Alpine could be seen sheering off Peene’s Dock for a river crossing to Alpine Dock and once across, Yonkersites would bargain with the shad fishermen for roe, at 25 cents a pound, or bass, whitefish or Tommie Cod. Best of all, one could sample the delight of “planked shad” on the spot. The Alpine or Daisy would each carry 800 people across the river on Sunday for 10 cents each; and in the spring the very thought of a “shad bake” was enough to draw just about every Yonkersite. The fish were pegged to boards, tipped but steadily balanced and set around the coals. Bacon strips basted the fillets; the roe was fried in skillets. (Dieting was an unknown diversion in 1888.)
No need of public transport for the affluent. The Corinthian Yacht Club, Yonkers Yacht Club, Vesper Yacht Club, Palisade Boat Club own their own private river transport. In fact, 60 members attended the Yonkers Yacht Club dinner at Moultrie’s Restaurant, where they were served wine, champagne and cider and tempting viands. The Palisade Boat Club at Glenwood had a fine clubhouse with pool tables, facilities for bowling and lawn tennis, and a cafe. A regatta in 1891, marking completion of the Civil War Memorial in front of the Manor House featured a parade of 40 boats. On July 4th all the boat clubs celebrated with tub races, swim races and tilting matches and a sky full of fireworks at night.
The Yonkers Canoe Club provided an ever popular sport and arranged ice boat racing in winter, matching their speed against the Hudson River line trains proceeding to and from New York City.
Wintertime brought also ice–skating on the mill ponds. It was never better or colder than in the winter of 1888, year of the Big Blizzard. “Young people rejoiced,” the chronicles tell us, “to enjoy the exhilarating exercise.” The winter sport of curling—a gentleman’s game—was popular, though 40–pound stones with sweepers in front were needed to warm the ice passage; and 10 “fields” were established in the new Van Cortlandt Park. Yonkers champions took part in international matches in St. Paul, Minnesota, and The Yonkers Statesman sent them off with the advice: “Terrace City expects every man to do his duty. It will humiliate us to record defeat.”
The Yonkers Bicycle Club flourished. Undeterred by winter, club members attempted a two mile trek, but two inches of snow slowed them down. The club entertained from Harlem to Dobbs Ferry with their tricycle biking, two on a tandem. Ladies were courted on bicycles built for two. In September 1888 the club sponsored a four mile race; contestants sped over 20 miles an hour.
Tennis enjoyed growing popularity. Wells Olmstead and Landreth King laid out public courts, the Lawn Tennis Club, in 1887 at 215 Palisade Avenue. Trevor built courts on his Warburton estate. The craze for the game grew after 1888, and courts could be found in the ’90s at the Park Hill and Nappachamack tennis clubs. In summer the Yonkers Racing Association ran five races daily with purses of $250 at its Lowerre track.
The Yonkers of 1888 had a sporting landmark. In September the St. Andrews Golf Club was organized with links on the corner of North Broadway and Shonnard Place. Organized by Robert Lockwood, who had interested his friends John B. Upham and John Reid in his enterprise the previous February, the club was named after the one in Scotland.
Yonkersites liked also to stimulate the brain. Knowledge was sought by regular attendance at Lyceum groups, where lectures and debates (on subjects such as Nikola Tesla’s alternating–current “electromagnetic motor”; George Eastman’s roll–film camera; the suffragettes’ Congress on Women’s Rights; and Nelly Bly, intrepid world traveler.) were weekly events. On Wednesday nights at School 6 Berlitz offered courses in German and French, and the Getty House ran a series of lectures and concerts in their Long Room. But perhaps the most uplifting lectures were given in Temperance Hall, where every one of its 250 seats would be filled, mostly by young women. The Woman’s Institute ran a free lending library and there one could hear lectures on women’s suffrage. The YMCA ran a series of Popular Entertainment, lectures ranging from The Power of an Idea and Political Life in Washington to Snobs and Snobbery.
Glee clubs and musicals were popular. The Verein had its Teutonic Society, an established glee club with Metropolitan Opera stars as guests. The Philharmonic Club arranged musical concerts and advertised that in its Mr. Whitney it had the best tenor in the nation.
Dancing classes were run by Miss Winslow. Dances and banquets were sponsored by many societies, the Hibernians, the Verein, the Colored, the Leos (Catholic), the City Club, the Grand Army of the Republic and a dozen lodges; all were active enough to keep the 15 to 20 Yonkers halls busy. Spontaneous joyful dances were not unknown, as when 100 women marched with Harvey’s Band to the Armory where their soldier boys (that is, their husbands and brothers, the members of the 4th Separate Company of the New York National Guard) were drilling. Captain Pruyn kept the men drilling for an additional half–hour but finally relented and a grand lively dancing evening followed.
Yonkers was a mecca for fun–lovers from New York City and other parts of Westchester. Steamships deposited crowds at Dudley Grove at Glenwood, a sylvan recreation park. Later, this grove would provide the site for William Boyce Thompson’s center for plant research.
On the Yonkers/Hastings border there was a busy park with a ferris wheel, carousel and beer garden. And both Yonkersites and out–of–towners could roller skate on the flat floor of the Tarrytown Music Hall. In September the Westchester County Fair, located on 50 acres at Tarrytown Road and Hillside Avenue, rivaled any in the country. Here was a rack track—one of the best half–mile tracks in the country—bordered by a grandstand holding 3,000. Besides displays of cattle, pigs, needlework, fruits and vegetables, great tents held cowboy shows, bicycle races and baby shops; balloon ascensions were among the special events. The fair was climaxed by the Westchester County Ball, held at the Verein hall at Chicken Island. Six special trains brought the merry–makers to Yonkers.
The Music Hall of Yonkers, later called the Warburton Theatre, stood next to Philipse Manor Hall. Built in 1884, the Music Hall was handsome and spacious, seating 700 in an elaborate interior topped by a domed ceiling. In 1888 the Music Hall often served as a proving ground for a fledgling production aimed at Broadway or for one hoping to undertake a major tour. The bill changed twice weekly. While the dramas were of no lasting fame, the spectacles were eye–catching: orchestras of unrivaled talent, Continental brass bands, ballet dancers, cloggers, sumptuous scenery, pretty girls (as many as 35), startling mechanical illusions, Grand Opera voices—all of these would embellish farcical comedies such as A Rag Baby, Tin Soldier, Human Nature, and Our Irish Visitor; moral tales such as Loyal Love; and Silver King; or tragedy such as The Pavements of Paris and The Martyr. In Getty Square, on the department store site now occupied by the library, was the Columbia Concert Gardens, a Kent, Proctor & Proctor vaudeville house.
—Lynette Muller