Brooklyn’s Changing Complexion

Bullard, Melissa Meriam

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-50176-5_8

Melissa Meriam Bullard²

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Abstract

Post-Civil War Brooklyn changed in its physical and social complexion. Brooklyn’s high society found refuge in the fashionable new Brooklyn Club and subscription assembly balls, but it destabilized. Exclusivity and press reports of Brooklyn’s new wealth consciousness contrasted sharply with festering urban social problems, poverty, and waves of new immigrants. Plans for post-war commemorative monuments and Prospect Park lay mired in social tensions and local politics. Economic instability accompanied a decline in US maritime shipping. The financial crisis of Black Friday 1869 shook Brooklyn’s elite. Luther Wyman got caught in Tammany Hall’s scandalous net that stretched into Brooklyn. The ranks of Brooklyn’s early generation of renaissance patrons thinned as Brooklyn drew closer to New York City with plans for Roebling’s Brooklyn Bridge over the East River.

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Notes

1.
BHS, Flat Maps (B B-[1920].Fl), Map of the borough of Brooklyn: showing location and extent of racial colonies (New York, NY: A. R. Ohman Map Co., H. B. Petersen, Daughtsmen & Engravers, 1920).
2.
BE 22 January 1867, 2; 11 March 1869, 2.
3.
Ibid., 24 Jul 1871, 4, taken from census figures.
4.
BE, 30 May 1892, 5. Col. William B. Coan.
5.
Mrs. Stranahan, president of the Woman’s Relief Association, submitted three reports of the ladies’ activities and successes, ibid., 30 June 1865, 3; BHS, Collection of Brooklyn Civil War relief associations records, Woman’s Relief Association, unnumbered.
6.
Remarks by Rev. Farley of the Church of the Saviour, BE, 30 June 1865, 3.
7.
Luther Wyman, Judge Greenwood and three others served as advisors, ibid., 6 May 1867, 2; 13 May 1867, 2.
8.
By Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Act II, Scene 2. On Bulwer-Lytton, see Sarah Stanton and Martin. Banham, Cambridge Paperback Guide to Theatre (Cambridge; New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 49.
9.
It consisted of Luther Wyman, J. S. T. Stranahan, and a Mr. Reeve, BE, 12 February 1866, 2. For catering services, Stratton’s bakery billed Luther Wyman as chairman of the Committee for 716 dinners at the Arsenal, which, with the addition of various whiskeys brought the total discounted bill to $1,300, BHS, Collection of Brooklyn Civil War relief associations records, War Fund Committee, unnumbered.
10.
BE, 27 February 1866, 2.
11.
Ibid.
12.
http://cypresshillscemetery.org/timeline-2/history/ [accessed 2 October 2016]. Today Cyprus Hills is part private cemetery and part national military cemetery.
13.
Quoted in BE, 21 March 1873, 4; also NYT, 21 March 1873, 5.
14.
BE, 2 May 1874, 3; 9 May 1874, 6.
15.
Obituary, ibid., 6 July 1868, 2.
16.
BMA, BPS Minutes, 1:281–82 and BE, 10 July 1868, 2.
17.
BE, 19 Jul 1873, 4.
18.
Ibid., 3 October 1871, 2.
19.
Ibid., 24 November 1869, 2.
20.
Ibid., 10 October 1870, 2.
21.
Ibid., 29 December 1871, 4; New York Tribune, 30 December 1871, 2.
22.
BU, 14 Sep 1863, 1. Walter S. Griffith, president of the Home Life Insurance Co. of which Luther Wyman was a director, also served as trustee. The Union listed no fewer than fourteen of Brooklyn’s forty-two principal patrons as stockholders, including Luther Wyman, ibid., 17 September 1863, 2.
23.
BE, 15 April 1889, 1.
24.
See ads in the Brooklyn Daily Union in 1863, BU 1. 1, 14 September 1863, 1. Their New York agent, Roche brothers and Coffey, 69 South St., NY, had far flung agents in Cincinnati, St Louis, Connecticut and Massachusetts.
25.
BU, 1.8, 22 September 1863, 2. The Tacony itself had been captured and repurposed by the CSS Florida and was known for several weeks as the Florida 2. The CSS Florida was built by William C. Miller & Sons, one of several raiders, including the infamous CSS Alabama, constructed in Liverpool and nearby Birkenhead for the Confederacy. The Florida had been deceptively launched as the Oreto. See the account of her exploits and prizes published in the Charleston Mercury, 3 August 1863, available via the Accessible Archives at http://www.accessible.com.
26.
They elected Luther Wyman treasurer and reelected him in 1871 and 1872, ibid., 24 May 1869, 11; 1 May 1871, 2; 26 April 1872, 4.
27.
Ibid., 2 June 1871, 2.
28.
Annual Report of the corporation of the Chamber of Commerce of the State of New York, for the year 1870/71, 122–23, http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=hvd.hb0ym8;view=1up;seq=138-139, last accessed 2 October 2016.
29.
BE, 20 May 1870, 2.
30.
David Brazendale and William Moss, The First Liverpool Guide Book by William Moss, 1797 (Lancaster: Palatine Books, 2007), 16–54; also Graeme Milne, “Maritime Liverpool,” in John Belchem, Liverpool 800: Culture, Character & History (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2006), 257–309.
31.
BE, 30 Jul 1873, 4.
32.
Ibid., 2 May 1873, 2.
33.
Ibid., 19 January 1872, 2; 20 November 1871, 2.
34.
Ibid., 29 December 1871, 2.
35.
William Belden, ibid., 6–7 February 1872, 11; 8 May 1878, 4.
36.
Ibid., 29 December 1871, 2.
37.
They included Abraham Baylis, S. B. Chittenden, Isaac Frothingham, Walter Hatch, A. A. Low, Samuel McLean, H. E. Pierrepont, Henry Sanger, and Alexander M. White, ibid., 6 May 1873, 2; 19 May, 4; The Committee of One Hundred grew out of the Committee of Seventy-Five, and targeted election fraud, the misdeeds of the attorney general, reforming the city charter, and other issues. Manhattan’s Committee of Seventy had worked effectively against the Tweed ring. On the reform efforts in Brooklyn, see Harold Syrett, The City of Brooklyn, 1865–1898: A Political History (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1944), 55–69.
38.
Ibid., 7 July 1889, 7. Wyman resigned in December 1873, giving as a reason his inability to attend the meetings, ibid., 2 December 1873, 2.
39.
The Eagle published many articles about the Mills case, starting in mid-July 1873, especially 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 21, and 23, 4; also Syrett, The City of Brooklyn, 1865–1898, 67–68.
40.
BE, 1 August 1873, 2.
41.
Ibid., 22 June 1869, 3; 1 August 1873, 2.
42.
Ibid., 22 January 1857, 2.
43.
Initially, the project encountered some opposition from ship owners who feared the bridge’s height might be reduced such that big ships would have to lower their topmasts to pass beneath it, ibid., 5 May 1869, 3.
44.
Ibid., 11 April 1857, 2.
45.
The bridge bill containing these terms passed the Legislature in February 1869, ibid., 4 February 1869, 2. The actual cost of the bridge exceeded $15 million.
46.
Ibid., 23 January 1867, 3, here called the East River Bridge. It soon became known at the Brooklyn Bridge, e.g., ibid., 17 August 1867, 2; 17 April 1868, 2. On ferry companies’ lack of opposition, see ibid., 23 December 1868, 2.
47.
Ibid., 7 November 1867, 2.
48.
By composer Henry Mayer, ibid. For the score, see https://jscholarship.library.jhu.edu/handle/1774.2/26178 [accessed 2 October 2016].
49.
The best treatment of the bridge project remains David McCullough, The Great Bridge (Simon and Schuster, 1972). The Eagle followed its construction closely along with the mishaps of the Roebling family, first the death of John Roebling, and then his son Washington’s incapacity from the bends. See, e.g., the long articles following John Roebling’s death at his Brooklyn residence from tetanus developed following a foot injury on the project, BE, 22 Jul 1869, 2.
50.
E.g., William Coit’s remarks, “We are a growing people, we are to have a bridge which will join us to New York, with cables of steel and hooks of iron, Its foundations will be so well bedded in the earth that they shall not be moved,” ibid., 11 March 1869, 2.
51.
Carol Lopate and Brooklyn Rediscovery (Program), Education and Culture in Brooklyn: A History of Ten Institutions ([Brooklyn], NY: Brooklyn Rediscovery, Brooklyn Educational & Cultural Alliance, 1979), 35–36.
52.
BE, 24 February 1869, 2.
53.
Ibid.
54.
Ibid., 10 June 1869, 2.
55.
H. A. Graef was the designer, ibid., 27 September 1865, 2.
56.
Ibid., 27 July 1871, 3.
57.
The archive of the park and the commissioners’ annual reports are preserved in park headquarters at Litchfield House on the grounds of Prospect Park and on line http://www.nyc.gov/html/records/pdf/govpub/3985annual_report_brooklyn_prospect_park_comm_1861.pdf [accessed 2 October 2016].
58.
BE, 11 March 1869, 2; 18 February 1870, 2.
59.
Ibid., 13 February 1869, 2; 11 March 1869, 2. On the opposition to Stranahan, see also Syrett, The City of Brooklyn, 1865–1898, 49–50.
60.
BE, 31 January 1865, 3.
61.
Ibid., 8 June 1878, 4.
62.
Ibid., 9 October 1871, 4.
63.
Ibid., 7 November 1865, 3.
64.
Ibid., 19 January 1869, 3.
65.
Ibid., 25 July 1871, 2.
66.
Ibid., 17 May 1866, 2.
67.
Olive Hoogenboom, The First Unitarian Church of Brooklyn, One Hundred Fifty Years: A History (Brooklyn, NY: The Church, 1987), 34–36, 53. The Second Unitarian church of Brooklyn, which had formed itself as a more liberal congregation in 1851, while under the pastorates of avid abolitionists Samuel Longfellow, brother of the more famous poet, and Nahor Staples, had already sent over 250 items of warm clothing to the front before other churches had yet involved themselves in war support, ibid, 53.
68.
Ibid., 153–64; Wendy Walker, The Social Vision of Alfred T. White (Brooklyn, NY: Proteotypes, 2009), 5–55.
69.
Ibid., BE, 16 April 1873, 4.
70.
Ibid., BE, 25 November 1872, 11.
71.
BE, 29 March 1866, 2. John McKenzie, on the boards of the Art Association, War Fund Committee, and Polytechnic, served as president of the Dispensary and Luther Wyman, vice-president and trustee, ibid., 15 January 1867, 3. Wyman was re-elected in 1869, ibid., 19 January 1869, 3.
72.
Ibid., 4 December 1871, 2; 6 December 1871, 3; 3 January 1872, 4; 27 January 1872, 1; 12 January 1875, 3; 9 February 1875, 2.
73.
The Eagle published Wyman’s letter of response: “Please accept the sincere and deep regret which I experience in the destruction of your beloved Tabernacle, its noble organ and other appointments. The loss is a calamity to the city of Brooklyn as well as to your own church and congregation. Until otherwise provided for the Academy of Music is at the service of your society, and you are at liberty to make that announcement at your meeting this evening. [signed] L B Wyman on behalf of the Executive Committee of the Academy of Music,” ibid., BE, 23 December 1872, 2; 14 October 1889, 1. The church burned again in 1889.
74.
Ibid., BE, 31 December 1872, 3.
75.
Ibid., 9 Jul 1866, 2. John McKenzie was president of the Dispensary, and Luther Wyman served on the initial committee of three to organize support for the fire victims.
76.
Ibid., 12 October 1871, 2.
77.
Ibid., 26 May 1869, 2.
78.
Ibid., 9 January 1865, 3; 13 January 1865, 1.
79.
Ibid., 6 February 1865, 3.
80.
Ibid., 9 January 1865, 3.
81.
Ibid., 13 February 1865, 1.
82.
Ibid., 9 January 1865, 2. The assessment district covered eleven wards in the city, ibid., 13 January 1865, 1. These three men were only moderately wealthy compared to Manhattan’s richest. The New York City assessments for 1864 had been over $28 million, and the special war tax on incomes expected to generate more than $4 million. Manhattan’s richest, dry goods merchant A. T. Stewart was assessed $92,181 on an income exceeding $1.8 million. William B. Astor and Commodore Vanderbilt’s combined taxes approximated Stewart’s. Moses Taylor, the fourth highest Manhattan tax payer owed over $28,000 on an income of nearly $600,000, ibid., 17 January 1865, 2.
83.
Ibid., 18 July 1865, 2; 19 July 1865, 2. The figures represent net incomes after rents, interests, improvements, and taxes had been deducted.
84.
Attempts to prohibit publication of the tax rolls date back at least to 1865, ibid., 16 January 1865, 2. Professional men of “small means” were particularly vocal opponents of having their meager assets made public.
85.
Ibid., 1 May 1869, 2.
86.
Ibid., 24 July 1871, 4.
87.
Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America: An Annotated Text Backgrounds Interpretations, ed. Isaac Kremnick (New York, NY: W. W. Norton & Company, 2007), 1: 13. Ticket polices sparked controversy in the cities of Northern England undergoing their own bourgeois cultural uplifts, Simon Gunn, The public culture of the Victorian middle class: ritual and authority and the English industrial city, 1840–1914 (Manchester; New York, NY: Manchester University Press, 2000), 142–43.
88.
BE, 23 March 1865, 2.
89.
Ibid., 10 February 1864, 1.
90.
Ibid, 19 February 1864, 2.
91.
The Academy of Music’s annual reports listed the directors, which lists the Eagle also printed.
92.
E.g., BE, 14 November 1865, 2; 22 January 1866, 2; 27 February 1866, 2; 10 December 1866, 2 etc.
93.
On the importance of British men’s clubs as surrogate homes in a rapidly changing world, see Amy Milne‐Smith, “A Flight to Domesticity? Making a Home in the Gentlemen’s Clubs of London, 1880–1914,” Journal of British Studies 45, no. 4 (1 October 2006): 796–818, and her expanded study, London Clubland: A Cultural History of Gender and Class in Late Victorian Britain, 1st ed. (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011).
94.
BE, 29 November 1865, 2.
95.
Ibid., 2 February 1870; Henry Reed Stiles, A History of the City of Brooklyn Including the Old Town and Village of Brooklyn, the Town of Bushwick, and the Village and City of Williamsburgh (Brooklyn, NY: by subscription, 1867), 3: 925, on the founding, list of directors, and a description of the club’s interior with its supper rooms, card rooms, private rooms, and added at the back, a billiard room with skylight. Two years earlier, members of the Excelsior Base Ball club had founded the Union Club for card games etc. that met initially in members’ homes.
96.
BE, 2 February 1870. Stiles says two hundred, History of Brooklyn, 3: 925. Two black balls automatically eliminated a candidate. Clergymen and army and navy officers could join without paying the $100 initiation fee and $50 annual dues. In that sense of inclusion of non-dues paying members among military and clergy, Club members would have argued theirs was an “open elite.”
97.
Ibid., 29 November 1865, 2.
98.
Ibid., 2 February 1870, 4; For an account of one of the ladies’ receptions, ibid., 18 December 1867, 2.
99.
Ibid., 15 March 1872, 4.
100.
General Woodward, ibid., 5 April 1869, 2.
101.
Ibid., 8 February 1870, 4.
102.
Ibid., 5 February 1870, 2.
103.
Ibid.
104.
Ibid., 8 February 1870, 4.
105.
Such familiar names as E. S. Mills, L. B. Wyman, J. O. Low, and H. E. Pierrepont served on the select committee on subscriptions, ibid., 23 February 1870, 4.
106.
Ibid., 24 February 1873, 2.
107.
Ibid., 6 January 1871, 3.
108.
Ibid.
109.
Ibid., 24 January 1873, 4; 25 January 1873, 2.
110.
Wyman, Low, Chittenden, Pierrepont, and other notables were among them, ibid., 23 June 1871, 4.
111.
Ibid., 19 July 1873, 2; 23 July 1873, 2.

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University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA
Melissa Meriam Bullard

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Bullard, M.M. (2017). Brooklyn’s Changing Complexion. In: Brooklyn’s Renaissance. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-50176-5_8

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-50176-5_8
Published: 11 April 2017
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