The Viele Map

"No other city is so spitefully incoherent"

--James Baldwin

Welcome to Manhattan Unlocked Walking Tours

Discover the hidden-in-plain-sight history and have fun decoding the architectural assortments of New York's most iconic (and architecturally complex) neighborhoods.

About Us

Manhattan Unlocked began as a blog over a decade ago to explore and explain the complex and captivating histories behind New York's constellation of neighborhoods that stretch nearly five miles from the Battery to Central Park--what most people consider New York City. It was a journey to test the waters for a book project, and the results were promising enough to dive into discovering the single story history behind the architectural creation of New York City. Our method of research and exploration involved creating immersive walking tours for key New York neighborhoods that together tell a unifying story of the city.

Our Walking Tours

Join us on a journey through time and space and re-discover long lost geographies and bygone transit systems. Manhattan Unlocked walking tours cover neighborhoods with their own unique stories to tell, but that were all part of the "city's" move uptown from City Hall to Central Park.

What Makes Our Tours Special?

  • Historical Insights:We believe that understanding Manhattan's long lost geography is crucial to grasping how "the city" moved uptown.
  • Transit Tales:Learn how different forms of rail transit--from horsecars in the 1850s to subways in the 1900s--shaped the city's architectural diversity.
  • The Pump Uptown:Discover how the daily act of "commuting to work" played a pivotal role in the city's growth, turning it into the vibrant metropolis we know today.
  • The Book: Build: The History of New York City on the Island of Manhattan

    While our walking tours provide a taste of Manhattan's history, we're also hard at work on a book that will dive deep into the city's past and explain the logic behind the "conveyer belt" of neighborhoods running up Broadway and Fifth Avenue, along a path of modern-day "ruins" of forgotten "cities."

    Join Us on a Walking Tour

    We are relaunching our walking tours over the Fall 2023 after the challenges of covid. We hope to see you on a tour of the history behind the world's most inspiring streetscapes.

    Re-launch dates:

    Sept 18: Midtown Manhattan Art and Architecture Walking Tour

    Midtown west

    Sept 27: Holdouts! Based on the Alpern & Durst Book

    Midtown east

    Oct 10: Recreate the Most Requested Walking Tour of 1840s New York

    NoHo & SoHo to City Hall

    TBD: Explore the Ruins of a Forgotten City in the Middle of Manhattan

    Astor Place to Madison Square

    TBD: A Disastrous History of Housing the Poor

    Chinatown and The Lower East Side

    In the meantime, the old blog for "testing the waters" remains below.

    Click Here to See Tours

    Thursday, January 13, 2011

    Morningside Heights: History is in the Lay of the Land

    The last post, Why the West Side is Different, talked about Morningside Heights as an impediment to west side traffic, a virtual “island in the air.” This post will explore more of the plateau, its terrain, its major tenants through history, and what can be seen today in the streets and buildings that reveal its past.
       
    Below is Morningside Heights on the Viele map with the “pure grid” superimposed over the terrain—the oldest and (proposed) newest features of the area when the map was drawn up in 1865.  But at the time, only the Bloomingdale Road existed, and the narrow lane branching off at 111th Street.  It’s the nonconformist road to the left.

    According to the Encyclopedia of New York City, the Bloomingdale Road “opened in 1703 and ran from what is now 23rd Street to the northern  end of Bloomingdale Village, near what is now 114th Street. In 1795 the road was extended north to 147th Street and linked to the old Kingsbridge Road."

    So from 1703 until 1795, the Bloomingdale Road ended at the bend in the road at 115th Street, just before the river.  The narrow road that branches off at 111th Street seems to have been a dry passage up to the plateau.

    AAA 
    courtesy of kottke.org

    And the bend in the road is still visible today!

    This is 114th Street and Riverside Drive looking north; dog and walker are crossing Broadway at 115th Street (toward the Hudson).  Not only can you see the bend in the road, there’s a slight dip where the river crossed through!   Beyond the third traffic light, at 116th Street, the road follows the “new” orientation of Riverside Drive.
     
    IMG_1575

    GoogleEarth shows it even better.  We’ll revisit this spot later.

    bloomingdale @ 115

    Much of the buildable land on Morningside Heights is arranged in a diagonal.  Below, Grant’s Tomb, Riverside Church and a few other tenants occupy the upper left corner.  The middle rectangle is the footprint of Columbia University, and the lower right is the property of St. John the Divine, situated on a slightly lower plateau.  (Imagine the boxes arranged diagonally the other way and all the hash marks that would be in the boundaries.)

    Final 111 

    The green boxes are Low Library (directly over 117th Street), Butler Library (on the north side of 114th Street), and St. John the Divine (directly over 112th Street). 

    If you’re familiar with the area, follow Broadway (Eleventh Avenue) up to 121st Street and you can see where the ground drops away and the 1 train emerges out of the north side of the plateau.

    Let’s look at the topography from street level.

    This is Amsterdam Avenue (Tenth on the Viele map) at 117th Street looking south, Columbia is on the right.  117th Street is a high ridge across the center plateau.  In the middle distance you can see the lower plateau of St. John the Divine.  The bus crossing way up ahead is on 110th Street, the south boundary of Morningside Heights.

    IMG_1588

    On the other side of campus, Broadway, you can see the same undulation in the road.  The south boundary of Morningside Heights is beyond that last bump.

    IMG_1619

    Back on Amsterdam, 117th Street looking the other way.  You can see why this area was avoided in the days of horse and foot travel. 
     
    IMG_1590

    Zooming in is even more dramatic…

    IMG_1594

    The hill on Broadway is best seen in this old photo. 117th Street is at the end of the first traffic island (the one with the subway station in the middle of Broadway). The first building on the right is Lewisohn, the Mathematics Building is north of it on Broadway.  In between them is where 117th would run if it crossed campus, the apex.

    symp 11

    Exactly where 117th Street would be, squarely on the apex of the central plateau, sits Low Library.
     
    IMG_0555

    And here’s St. John the Divine, on the lower plateau.  This view is looking east along 112th Street, from Broadway to Amsterdam.

    IMG_0942

    For Seinfeld fans…

    Toms Restaurant

    But these weren’t the first institutions to occupy the choice real estate of Morningside Heights. Before Low Library was built on the high center point, the Bloomingdale Insane Asylum opened its first building in 1821 on the exact same spot.  It would literally be under the rotunda of Low if it were standing today.  You can see the trees in the back appear to descend down the hill.

    bloomingdale asylum ii

    The Bloomingdale Insane Asylum was joined in 1843 by the Leake and Watts Orphanage, which moved onto the lower plateau of today’s St. John the Divine.  For nearly 50 years the two neighbors enjoyed quiet, woodsy grounds. The therapeutic gardens of the insane asylum were located on the lower half of Columbia University, between 114th – 116th Streets.

    Below are the buildings of both institutions, superimposed on the later ones.

    Final 11111

    A few of the buildings are…
    The insane asylum’s first building is directly over Low Library.  Men’s and women’s wings were added within a few years of the first building.
    Macy Villa (a “men’s department”) sits directly on 116th Street.
    The Superintendent’s House is the building closest to Broadway (Eleventh Avenue).
    The conservatory is the cross-shaped building on 117th Street.

    The barn and stables sit over the left side of Butler Library, in the therapeutic gardens.

    The gymnasium and bowling alley sit on the right side of Butler, also in the gardens.

    The orphanage building sits at the south crossing of St. John the Divine.
    A single structure from both institutions survive today.

    For context, the building to the far right is Macy Villa.
    IMG_0554

     Today it is Buell Hall on the Columbia campus.

    IMG_0560

    Macy Villa’s original location was on 116th Street.  It was moved back to build Kent Hall, its beautiful porches removed in the process.  It was built as a residence for wealthy male patients and was the last structure built on asylum grounds, in 1885—just 10 years younger than Low!  You can see the conservatory to the right, nestled in the trees where St. Paul’s Chapel will eventually be.  Also, Grant’s Tomb (1897) is visible in the distance. 

    OldBuellii

    The gymnasium and bowling alley are in the lower left.

    Buell hall

    The insane asylum’s therapeutic gardens (not owned by Columbia yet).  The shrubby boundary in the foreground is 114th Street, the eventual south border of Columbia.  The gymnasium and bowling alley are to the right and Macy Villa is in the back, blending in a bit. 

    symp2

    The photos above were taken sometime around 1900-1910. I’m not sure of the date of the picture below, but it was after the building was moved, since its porches are gone.  What’s remarkable is all the ivy—it grew in just a few decades—1920s?

    macy villa

    The other survivor from the Bloomingdale Heights days (as it was called in the 1800s) is the Leake and Watts Orphanage Asylum.  Along the south side of the Cathedral you can see the 1843 Greek Revival building to the right of the fountain.

     IMG_1577i

    Usually Greek Revival buildings are massive, domineering structures.  Here it looks like a car port next to St. John the Divine.

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    The orphanage in the 1860s, with hopefully soon-to-be-adopted children out front.  The east wing (right side) of the building was removed during the cathedral’s construction.

    IMG_1401
    Museum of the City of New York


    Only the facade seems to be the same, and there’s been a lot of landscaping.  The west wing (left side) of the building is still there though.

    IMG_0955

    Now let’s focus on the roads. Here’s a close up of the narrow lane coming off the Bloomingdale Road. Locally, Columbia students call the old road “Asylum Lane.”  It makes sense, the road ends equidistant between the two asylums.  The reason students are familiar with it is because it left its mark on buildings constructed along its path.

    Final 4

    There are four circles in the image below (they’re very light), and a line showing the path of Asylum Lane.  Two circles indicate Macy Villa (nearby its original location) and the Leake and Watts orphanage.  The other two circles are on the path of Asylum Lane, showing buildings with walls built at angles as a result of the old street!

    1i

    Here’s a close-up showing Broadway and 111th-113th Streets.

    Asylum Lane palimpsest2

    And if you really can’t see them…

    Asylum Lane palimpsest2b

    The buildings themselves were not necessarily built on Asylum Lane; they may have been built alongside older buildings that were, and so had to follow the walls of the those buildings. It's an artifact, a manifestation of the palimpsest, and it can get passed down through generations of buildings. (Another example of the city-as-palimpsest can be found in first post, Ghost of the Broadway Central, it’s short).

    Here’s a street view of those buildings on the west side of Broadway, just north of 111th Street.  Only the middle building has both walls with the Asylum Lane angle.  Asylum Lane would have passed to the right, by the teal awning.
     
    IMG_0940

    The building to the south (left, above) is the Heights Bar and Grill. It has a great rooftop bar and shares one angled wall with its neighbor to the north.

    IMG_0935

    The door is straight.  But the walls and the tile floor point to the area between the orphanage and insane asylum.

    IMG_0937
    IMG_0938ii

    I find it fascinating that in 2011 an interior space can still be determined by an old road from the asylum days of the 1800s.  And in fact, the road is much older than that!

    IMG_0936

    In 1701 Jacob de Key bought nearly the entire Morningside Heights plateau from the city.  In 1735 Thomas Key (an heir apparently) sold the plateau in two chunks: the Hudson (western) side to Adrian Hoaglandt, and the eastern side overlooking the Harlem Plains to Harmon Vandewater.  In the 1700s the plateau was known as Vandewater Heights.  Thus, the chain is: Vandewater Heights (1700s)-Bloomingdale Heights (1800s)-Morningside Heights (1900s).  

    With all of its years of rural tranquility, Vandewater Heights did see one brief flash of spectacular violence with the Battle of Harlem Heights, a small but important morale-boosting victory for the Continental Army. The first (and just about only) time the Redcoats were sent in a retreat.  Here’s a plaque affixed to the Mathematics building on Columbia’s campus to honor the battle in 1776—55 years before the insane asylum moved to the plateau, when Hoaglandt and Vandewater were the main tenants.  

    IMG_0564

    The plaque reads: “To Commemorate the Battle of Harlem Heights, Won By Washington’s Troops On This Site, September 16, 1776.  Erected By the Sons of the Revolution in the State of New York.”   Because they’re interesting, here’s an enlargement of the medallions in the lower corners:

       IMG_0566 IMG_0565

    And here’s a map of the battlefield, drawn by Henry Phelps Johnston, 1897. 

    battle of harlem heights
    Courtesy of the Columbia University Press

    The Vandewater property is in grey and the Hoaglandt property in pink.  In 1776 the Bloomingdale Road still ended at 114th Street (see where the solid road ends and the dotted road begins—at the bend in the road at 115th Street).  Here’s a close-up of the area we’re interested in…

    battle of harlem heightsiii

    The black square at the end of the old Bloomingdale Road, and across the river, was the Hoaglandt home since 1735.  Vandewater had also been on the plateau since 1735, but at the time his property didn’t border the Bloomingdale Road.  Harmon Vandewater built “Asylum Lane” along his property line to access the Bloomingdale Road.  (Johnston’s map simply marks it as “Lane.”) Also, it extended in the other direction, towards the park, leading to a path down the cliffs!

    Here’s the map once again, with the blue indicating the Hoaglandt and Vandewater homes, and the full extent of Vandewater’s road leading to Morningside Park.

    Final 3

    One more piece of evidence. In 1784, at the end of the Revolution, Nicholas de Peyster bought the Hoaglandt property, and a year later his brother James de Peyster bought the Vandewater side. 

    Here’s the area again, now from the Commissioner’s Plan of 1811. It was ten years before the insane asylum came; still farmland, but now owned by the Peyster brothers.  You can clearly make out the old Vandewater road, along with another connection leading downtown.  See it on the bottom right?

    comm pla12

    Here’s an approximation of the road as it would appear on today’s grid.

    asylum lane aii

    There are actually three entrances to Morningside Park that could possibly be the old path that led down the cliffs.  If indeed any of today’s entrances are the old path, my best guess would be this one, at 114th Street.

    IMG_1611 

    One last piece of cool history, over near the Hoaglandt house.  It seems choice sites were recycled through history.  This passage is from the book New York of Yesterday, by Hopper Striker Mott, 1908…

    carrigan
    It was still standing when that was written in 1908, but only for another 4 years.  It was torn down in 1912 to build the Hamilton, an apartment building. 

    But this country estate built for the president of Emigrant Savings Bank was contemporary with the asylums. From 1840 – 1912, the Carrigan mansion stood at that bend in the road on 115th Street.  Its Greek Revival architecture was the same style as the orphanage, built just three years later in 1843—the style of the period.  If it were standing today it would be 50 years older than Macy Villa.

    1153a Courtesy of New York Public Library

    And it sat like a time capsule amongst the middle class apartment buildings of Morningside Heights until 1912.

    115ab
    Courtesy of New York Public Library

    Here's the Hamilton today (those are the same buildings on the right as the picture above).

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    And the Hamilton sits just east of the crook in the old Bloomingdale Road, between 114th and 115th Street, where the river once ran through.

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    5 comments:

    1. Wow, this is amazing work! Thank you for sharing your insights on Morningside Heights, a life-long passion of mine. I did a series of radio documentaries on the neighborhood. One can be found here, if you're interested: https://archive.org/details/MorningsideNow-LifeOnTheBlockpart1Of2

      I'd like to pick your brain on some issues. Are you free for a call?

      Best regards,
      Dan McSweeney
      djmcsweeney@gmail.com

      ReplyDelete
    2. Many years ago I lived near 111th and Amsterdam, and i notice there's a diagonal between the Clara Court on 111th)and 1046 Amsterdam. Was there a road there at some time?

      ReplyDelete
      Replies
      1. Hello. I know that angle, as it borders the 111th Street Garden. I believe it reflects the line of the New York Hospital's property (Bloomingdale Insane Asylum).

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