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The Cathedral of
Commerce |
Today started off pretty damn early (well for a weekend). I had to wake up so that I could get up and leave for about 9am to get to my walking tour at 10am. Now some people may ask why I don't take the subway (As I found out later on Sunday a bunch of lines don't actually run on the weekends so that's one reason) but my main reason is that I want to know this city. I want to walk around, I want to see the building, I want to get to know the area and explore.
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The NY skyline, will change in the next
15 years. |
Not bragging - stating a fact, I have quite a good internal compass and sense of direction. I almost always know where I am and where North faces (to those youngin's with them Zphones and samdsungs and whatever, that's more important and reliable than your google maps). I find that going around, seeing things and looking at the city will help me know it and understand it better than if I was under it. Plus it was a beautiful day (so beautiful that I would later get a sunburn).
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They called it Pearl
Street because it is
where Oysters came up |
I met up my tour group today at 10am to do the tour of Brooklyn Bridge, Brooklyn Heights and DUMBO. I actually had the same tour guide as I did last week so I was quite happy and excited - I knew that he knew his stuff and was well trained.
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City hall! It has an orange flag outside
because of the Dutch! Also the back
was quite ugly because they assumed that
people would never move behind the building
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We started off with a bit of the history of the city (which I get a brief of every single time I go on a tour) which I drowned out a
bit but snapped back into attention when our tour guide started talking to us again! We started off by learning a bit about the Woolworth Building, which for a very long time was the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere until the Chrysler building was built! It was also known as the Cathedral of Commerce because of it's neo-Gothic style.
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Beautiful wavy building.
First few floors are actually
public school! |
It was pretty cool because it was also one of the first times that people could actually walk around and pick and chose clothing to buy. Before, they would ask the reception desk for a specific article of clothing and size from them and
that was when they'd buy it. Now, people could see these clothing articles and walk around the store with it. It made them more likely to buy it as they would walk around the store with the clothing, almost as though they owned it. Those clever tricksters.
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They had love locks..
but some people
put in love headphones. |
As we were going over the bridge, we stopped (which was brutal because it was SO SUNNY out) and talked about the people who had built the Brooklyn bridge. Initially, the bridge was to be engineered by Chief of Engineering, John A. Roebling. However, just a few weeks in, he passed away from what was originally an amputation that would later turn into tetanus and death.
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| Beautiful plaque for the Roeblings |
When he passed away, his son, Washington Roebling took over the bridge. Unfortunately, this Roebling developed caisson disease, which affected him so badly that he became bed-ridden. He had to give his wife, Emily Roebling the plans for the bridge. Emily Roebling ended up going above and beyond. She went took over all the duties and become the first ever woman field engineer. She took over duties like day-to-day supervision and project management. She dealt with politicians, engineers and all the work that was associated with the bridge - all to the point where people actually thought she was behind the bridge's design. When the bridge opened up, she was the first person to cross it by carriage. She ended up studying and excelling in engineering and math.
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| Halfway across the bridge |
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The memorial building in Brooklyn
with people hanging outside. |
We looked at some other buildings that were on the horizon and spotted the beautiful One World Trade Center (some people call it the Freedom Tower but it is not officially called that for fear of retaliation and fear that it may become a target) and I found out that it is exactly 1776 feet tall. Important because that was the year of independence for the United States.
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This is the corner where Clinton has
the headquarters for her elections |
It's interesting because before, the Chrysler building and 40 Wall Street used to battle to see who was tallest (So I told you about how the Chrysler building, after 40 Wall Street was built, had secretly built a needle in their basement and 3 days after 40 Wall Street was declared the tallest building, Chrysler put up the needle). Both sides argued about the issue of structural integrity and whether or not it counted as the tallest building if the tallest point did not count towards anything.
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| In Brooklyn Heights! :) |
After the Empire state Building was put up, the argument was over. Unfortunately, the Empire State building has had several suicide attempts. One in particular, was interesting. Because the building is so far up and kind of isolated with very few tall buildings around it, it creates a massive wind tunnel. One such woman tried to attempt suicide and as she jumped off, she was pushed back into the building by the wind. New York wasn't done with her yet.
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This was owned by the
Roeblings. but it was
torn down by the
Jehovah's Witness...
which is where they
started wanting to save
historical monuments
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It's interesting because the classic New York skyline will change soon. In the next 14 years, New York is expected to gain 30 new skyscrapers. On top of that, they're planning on building one in Brooklyn as well.
As we walked over the bridge, the tour guide mentioned Governor's Island which was originally called "nut island" because of all of the nuts there. Apparently it is also a very swampy and gross area to be around.
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This was originally named after army
men, however, the Queen was mad and
renamed all the streets. No one knows
what they were originally named before. |
While walking across the bridge, we were told that some IDIOT decided to run across the bridge and scream that the bridge was falling because it was shaking a bit (it's a suspension bridge what do you expect?). People stampeded, some were seriously injured and at least 12 died in this stampede and for a while, people refused to get back on the bridge. It wasn't until P. T. Barnum decided to lead a parade of 21 elephants over the Brooklyn bridge to prove the stability of it. Man, how cool must that have been?
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| Beecher |
We talk a bit more about the area around us and learned the name "Robert Moses" who was a very integral part of New York city (As I found out, Brooklyn merged with NYC in 1899). He designed many buildings, planned 150 parks, many bridges as well as the roads and highways. He really wanted New York to become a car city but, as we all found out... He couldn't actually drive himself. He was very against subways and public transit, which is ironic, because with the way New York is built, there is just simply too much gridlock! New York's grid system may seem smart to many as it is very easy to
know exactly where you are and how to get back home, but with the grid system, even though only 18% of New Yorkers own a vehicle, the traffic is HORRIBLE. There are simply not enough alleyways to actually have cars go out and so when a street is closed down, it is terrible congestion. Not to mention the roads are simply not big enough.
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Plaque for Jackie
Robinson |
As we walked around the Brooklyn heights side, I found out that every Little bit suspicious here... presidential candidate has some sort of tie with New York. Clinton lived in NYC for 90 days, making her eligible to run for governor, Trump was born in Queens and Sanders was born in Brooklyn! Clinton's electoral headquarters is actually in Brooklyn, on the corner of Clinton and Tillery street.
We walked by this huge statue and here we saw this amazing man named Beecher. Beecher was an abolitionist and his church was almost like the Grand Central of the Underground railway. He helped hundreds of slaves escape and for that he is someone to be proud of. He was also extremely progressive, stating that said evolution and Bible could Co-exist. Back in the 19th century.
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One of the first fire
departments to respond to
9/11. The 8 stars are for the
8 firefighters they lost. |
We walked back down and found a plaque where the old Brooklyn dodgers used to play - more specifically, the team that Jackie Robinson used to play with. They were called the dodgers because they dodged trolleys back in the day. Some may argue that this is where the Civil rights movement started, when they realized that blacks could play baseball.
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These railways were active
only just a few years ago! |
We then found out about the battle of Long Island between the British and George Washington (Who only had one natural tooth by the time he was president). On one foggy night, on Brooklyn, while the Americans were pushed all the way to the edge of the island, the British were camping out, waiting for the fog to lift. Washington, knowing that if they lost that night they may lose the war, lit fires and covers everything in cloth (books, horse hooves) and sneaks
across to Manhattan. Had they been captured, the war would have been over.
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| In Trader Joe's |
On our way down, we saw a difference in the housing, there were many houses without stoops, which seemed so odd to me because everyone had stoops. The reason for this was because if there was a stoop, then garbage would not fly into
your door.
As we were walking, the tour guide explained why it was called "DUMBO" - Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass. They're starting to call the area under Harlem "SoHa" for South Harlem.
This city man.
All in all, it was a pretty great walking tour. Seriously recommend Free Tours by Foot if you are ever visiting New York.
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| Up on the rooftop <3 |
I headed over to Trader Joe's afterwards to buy some groceries (honestly just chips and dip don't judge me) and then walked back to the subway to head back home. It was honestly so hot and sweltering outside I almost felt like I was going to pass out. Protip: always wear sunscreen. I failed to do that and got mighty sunburnt. It was horrible.I went home and rested for a little bit before I headed out again later that night. It was my french friend's birthday that night and she wanted to have a nice party on her rooftop.
And so we did.
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The Empire state under
the Brooklyn Bridge! |
She brought us food (she made salads, hummus, guacamole, etc), drinks and a bunch of french people - it was pretty cool. I had a great time just sitting on her roof top and I had a deal with all my french friends, they would speak to me in English and I would speak to them in French. That way everyone remembered and everyone benefitted by being able to understand each other.
Taxi'd back home after a safe and fun night!
