Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 14.djvu/596

NEW YORK. Booth. The University Club membership is restricted to graduates of colleges. Its club house, an imposing structure of granite, opened in May, 1899, at Fifth Avenue and Fifty-fourth Street, is one of the finest in the city. The New York Yacht Club also has a magnificent club house on West Forty-fourth Street.

New York has about 40 hotels that may be ranked as first-class, with as many more in the second class, and perhaps 100 of a lower grade. The largest and best-known is the Waldorf-Astoria. It is built upon the site of the family mansions in which lived for many years John Jacob Astor and William Astor, his brother. This structure covers the block between Thirty-third and Thirty-fourth streets, bordering Fifth Avenue, and having a depth of 500 feet. It is 16 stories in height, and contains over 1000 rooms for guests, a large ballroom, and a number of smaller apartments used for public dinners, concerts, etc. The Buckingham, at Fifth Avenue and Fiftieth Street; the Holland House, at Fifth Avenue and Thirtieth Street; the Murray Hill, at Park Avenue and Forty-first Street; the Manhattan, at Madison Avenue and Forty-second Street; the Netherland and the Savoy, at Fifth Avenue and Fifty-ninth Street, are large and luxurious hostelries, which accommodate from 800 to 2000 guests. Farther downtown, a number of the Broadway hotels, such as the Fifth Avenue, at Twenty-third Street, the Hoffman House, at Twenty-fifth Street, and the Imperial, at Thirty-second Street, are equally popular. Several immense hotels, among which may be mentioned the Plaza, at Fifty-ninth Street and Fifth Avenue, and the Majestic, at Seventy-second Street and Central Park West, are known as family hotels of the best type. The most luxurious restaurants in the city are Delmonico's, at Forty-fourth Street and Fifth Avenue, and Sherry's, almost opposite. In the business district the Café Savarin, in the Equitable Building, is well known.

The great number of immigrants landing at the port of New York, the poorest of whom remain in the city, tends to increase the dependent class. The administration of public charities is under a separate department governed by a commissioner, who appoints two deputies and other subordinate officers. New York City differs from other large American cities in that it grants large subsidies to private charitable institutions, the amount spent in this way exceeding that apportioned to public charities. In 1901 the city maintained three almshouses, with 3646 inmates, and 11 hospitals, two of which are asylums for idiots, with 53,991 patients. Nearly all of the city institutions and some of the State and private institutions are located on Randall's, Ward's, and Blackwell's islands, in the East River. Sailors' Snug Harbor, a home for aged seamen, is on Staten Island. This institution derives an income of $250,000 from valuable Broadway real estate, with which it is endowed. The orphan asylums of New York are under private control. Private charity is active and thoroughly organized; and much has been done to correlate the different agencies by the Charity Organization Society of New York City. The society has a number of sub-committees in charge of the different districts into which the city is divided. The Brooklyn Bureau of Charities performs a similar function in that borough.

Among the more important organizations which give attention to charitable work are the United Hebrew Charities, Children's Aid Society, Saint Vincent de Paul Society, and the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor. The conditions in the crowded sections of the city have been greatly improved by the work of Social Settlements and similar institutions, of which there are a large number, some denominational, others non-sectarian. Manhattan alone has some 25, the best known of which are University Settlement and the Educational Alliance.

The problem of passenger transportation within the limits of New York City and its residential areas offers peculiar difficulties. The wholesale business is at the lower end of Manhattan Island, and the shopping districts in the middle, while the dwelling districts are at the upper end, and across the waterways in the surrounding regions. The crowding and discomfort on the various car and ferry lines during the ‘rush’ hours surpass anything of the kind known in any other city of the world. There are car lines on almost all the thoroughfares leading north from the business district, the limit of surface transportation in this direction having been practically reached. The first elevated railroad was opened on Ninth Avenue in 1870, from the Battery to Fifty-ninth Street. The Sixth Avenue line, opened in 1878, extended from the Battery to the Harlem River, the upper half being on the line of Ninth and Eighth avenues. Similar lines were built on Third and Second avenues to the Harlem River, and later the Third Avenue line was carried across the Harlem River into the northern suburban districts. The elevated roads, on which it was found practicable to run trains by steam at a high rate of speed and at very short intervals, with a minimum of danger, soon proved utterly inadequate for the traffic. In 1886 the first cable line in Manhattan was established on 125th Street. In 1898 the underground electric trolley system was introduced and rapidly supplanted the cable all over Manhattan. The overhead trolley system still prevails in other portions of Greater New York. In 1902 the elevated roads began to run their trains by electricity. A contract was awarded in January, 1900, by a commission created for the purpose, for an underground rapid transit railway system running from one end of Manhattan to the other, with a branch, starting at 104th Street, to the Bronx. Work upon the subway was begun in February of that year. The time fixed by the contract for the completion of the system was four years and a half, and the original price was $36,500,000. The contractors were conceded the right to operate the road for fifty years. Thirty-five stations are provided for on the main line and 13 on the Bronx branch. An extension of the subway to Brooklyn was decided on in May, 1901. The cars are operated and lighted wholly by electricity. Express trains run on two central tracks.

There is a very extensive ferry system between Manhattan and the surrounding region. Besides the ferries to (q.v.), lines connect with Jersey City, Hoboken, Weehawken, Fort Lee, Staten Island, and other points. During the winter months the ferry traffic is somewhat impeded by occasional fogs and floating ice. The construction of the Brooklyn Bridge (see ) in 1883 greatly facilitated communication with