Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Shows vividly how the Great Fire of 1835, which nearly leveled Manhattan also created the ashes from which the city was reborn. In 1835, a merchant named Gabriel Disosway marveled at a great fire enveloping New York, commenting on how it "spread more and more vividly from the fiery arena, rendering every object, far and wide, minutely discernible-the lower bay and its Islands, with the shores of Long Island and New Jersey." The fire Disosway witnessed devastated a large swath of lower Manhattan, clearing roughly the same number of acres as the World Trade Center bombing, Manhattan Phoenix explores the emergence of modern New York after it emerged from the devastating the fire of 1835-a catastrophe that revealed how truly unprepared and haphazardly organized it was-to become a world-class city merely a quarter of a century later. The one led to other. New York effectively had to start over. Daniel Levy's book charts Manhattan's almost miraculous growth while interweaving the lives of various New Yorkers who took part in the city's transformation. Some are well known, such as the land baron John Jacob Astor and Mayor Fernando Wood. Others less so, as with the African-American oysterman Thomas Downing and the Bowery Theatre impresario Thomas Hamblin. The book celebrates Fire Chief James Gulick who battled the blaze, and celebrates the work of the architect Alexander Jackson Davis who built marble palaces for the rich. It chronicles the career of the merchant Alexander Stewart who constructed the first department store, follows the struggles of the abolitionist Arthur Tappan, and records of the efforts of the engineer John Bloomfield Jervis who brought clean water into homes. And this resurgence owed so much to the visionaries, such as Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux, who designed Central Park, creating a refuge that it remains to this day.
Manhattan Phoenix reveals a city first in flames and then in flux but resolute in its determination to emerge as one of the world's greatest metropolises.
Synopsis
Shows vividly how the Great Fire of 1835, which nearly leveled Manhattan also created the ashes from which the city was reborn. 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.