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I recently picked up “The Putnam Division: New York Central’s Bygone Route through Westchester County” by Daniel R. Gallo and Frederick A. Kramer published by Bells & Whistles 1989. Not much attention paid to our area other than the transition from urban to rural at VCP station. Some other points of interest.
Okay, I’ll start with what I think is the obvious in hopes that it gets things going and people showing me wrong. Seems to me the first three photos all show the (presuming Kingsbridge) train station with northbound and southbound platforms, which would make things pretty easy to identify. Might the towering shadow above the apartments in the first photo be the gas works plant?
Peter, Thanks for the tip on the Ewen’s owning Tippet. It took me a very long time to understand where the railroad bridge over Tibbetts was until I was able to identify the Ewen mansion in the background
Nick – great to learn that history about corruption in city contracts.
Nick, Thomas, Peter this is all great, great stuff. The Lehigh University find is an incredible find. (The file I found was the Construction of Bronx Public Works 1893-1935 ) Nick, please let us know if you found a source for the photos individually. One thing that was remarkable to me was seeing the Broadway sewer with culverts for Tibbetts Brook running underneath it as it crossed Broadway/240th St at a diagonal. It shows just how much the ground was raised. Peter what is the source of the view of Tibbetts from 234th st? I’ve added some photos from the Westchester Historical Society including one of the railroad crossing Tibbetts just upstream (on Peter’s map). Also are two views of the Tippett House, seen in Peter’s photo (the first without the railroad crossing warning sign)
https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/4100c4f0-ed31-0133-8c44-00505686a51c
I was looking at this map with Albany Post Road and noticed/processed for the first time how much of the area was confiscated and redistributed by the Committee of Forfeiture!
Just came across this nice view of the Foundry and Spuyten Duyvil Creek mislabeled as Harlem River https://cdm16694.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p16124coll2/id/30382/rec/111
Wow. Great progression from wetlands to cleared land to bleachers.
Thomas, where is that zoomed out photo from?
I attended the event with Nick (now almost a month ago) and was able to write about it, briefly, for the Westchester Rising franchise http://yonkerstimes.com/ceremony-honors-lenape-indians-who-died-for-american-independence/ As I learned, the battle of Kingsbridge was part of strategy by the Wappinger and Mahicans settled in the “praying town” of Stockbridge for independence.
The 1700s seemed to be a rough time for the Native Americans in the Hudson Valley and they were trying to adapt – creating military allegiances, converting to Christianity, assimilating, greatly reduced in population. But heartbreaking is that the Wappingers upstate seemed to be doing pretty well – they had land and tenant farmers, until heirs of the Philipse’s stole it by faking a land deed. A longer version of the semi-local story is here https://www.hhlt.org/land-heist-in-the-highlands/. (Were any local farmers part of the land riot of the 1760s?!)
And so the military alliance with the American patriots was an attempt to gain land and freedom. Since Sachem Nimahm who led the Stockbridge Indians was a Wappinger, which included the local Wecquaesgeek, it’s interesting to consider if any of those fighting knew the area.
Ha. Yes, I do know that saying, but didn’t know its author.
Amazing to learn how we got the Van Cortlandt Park lowlands.
I’m curious whether this is the same white, crumbly “stone” that is in Riverdale Park at the outlook overlooking the low-tide-visible pier at 246th street. If so, I wonder if there was also quarrying done in Riverdale Park.
Found the recording online and it’s good quality so far! Amazing to think that they played at Gaelic Park and not in Van Cortlandt
Thanks to the non-profit Internet Archive https://archive.org/details/gd71-08-26.sbd.dopey.1559.sbeok.shnf/gd71-08-26d1t01.shn
My gosh this is amazing detective work.
I’m curious to know where Finnegansville and Irish Town were
Thomas, this is absolutely fascinating! Thank you for sharing the photos.
When I lived in New Orleans, I was trying to unearth an aluminum fence post in my back yard only to have it drop several feet into a hole. It was a brick lined “night soil” pit that was later bricked over with an arch. The soil was a good couple of feet higher. That the tunnel you saw represents several generations of use, repair, and amendments is easy to imagine.
This is a great area of research! Our poor Park has certainly been cut up.
For more recent history, I’d try folks at the Bronx Council on Environmental Quality (BCEQ)
The golf course question is interesting, too. A fad among the upper classes who had their country estates in the area? A revenue source as part of park planning and department consolidation?
Wow. Great resources and yes, a relative strain on my eyes and language processing. Is it possible that the rickety looking building across from the Macomb’s Mansion partly on piles is said old diner or maybe a previous incarnation thereof?
Nick, I’m just processing the 231st photo looking toward Bailey Ave. Is it possible that the horizontal lines mid picture are the Putnam Line tracks. And the sewering was the start of raised roads/overpasses over the line?
Also, if you have any old photos of the line, I’d love to see those
Thanks!
Wow. That price tag is incredible. I wonder how much the city and state budgets were back then? Perhaps a prize of unification or was the area an earlier part of New York City?
Nick those photos are incredible, thank you.
It’s incredible to think that the Broadway sewering of Tibbetts Brook which to me is an environmental tragedy was seen maybe exclusively as an improvement (over unpaved roads and outhouses). I wonder when drinking water was provided and if that was simultaneous.
