Page 118 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - New York City

116  NE W Y ORK CIT Y AREA B Y AREA

eminent citizens as John Jacob
Astor and Cornelius Vanderbilt.
Washington Irving, author of Rip
Van Winkle (1819) and other classic
American tales, lived here for a time,
as did two English novelists, William
Makepeace Thackeray and Charles
Dickens. Five of the houses were
lost when the John Wanamaker
Department Store razed them in
the early 20th century to make
Great Hall at Cooper Union, where Abraham Lincoln spoke room for a garage. The remaining
buildings are being restored, with
1 Cooper Union the city’s first free library, thanks the Blue Man Group occupying
to a bequest from millionaire the Astor Place Theatre (No. 434).
7 East 7th St. Map 4 F2. Tel (212) 353-
4000. q Astor Pl. Open 11am–7pm John Jacob Astor. It is a
Mon–Fri, 11am–5pm Sat, and for prime American example
lectures and concerts in the Great Hall. of German Romanesque
Closed Jun–Aug, public hols. ^ 7 Revival style.
∑ cooper.edu When the
building was
Peter Cooper, the wealthy threatened with
industrialist who built the first demolition in
US steam locomotive, made 1965, Joseph Papp,
the first steel rails, and was a founder of the New
partner in the first trans atlantic York Shakespeare
cable venture, had no formal Festival, which
schooling. In 1859 he founded became The Public
New York’s first free, non- Theater, persuaded
sectarian coeducational New York City to buy
college specializing in design, it as a home for the The original 19th-century iron stove in the kitchen
engineering, and architecture. company. Renovation of the Merchant’s House Museum
Though no longer free, the began in 1967, and much
school still inspires intense of the handsome interior was 4 Merchant’s
competition for places. The six- preserved during its conversion House Museum
story building, renovated in into six theaters. Although much
1973–4, was the first with a of the work shown is experi- 29 E 4th St. Map 4 F2. Tel (212)
steel frame, made of Cooper’s mental, the theater was the 777-1089. q Astor Pl., Bleecker St.
own rails. The Great Hall was original home of hit musicals Hair Open noon–5pm Mon, Fri–Sun,
inaugurated in 1859 by Mark and A Chorus Line and hosts the noon–8pm Thu. & ^ 8 =
∑ merchantshouse.com
Twain, and Lincoln delivered popular Shakespeare in the Park
his “Right Makes Might” speech (in Central Park) every summer. This remarkable Federal-style
there in 1860. brick town house, improbably
tucked away on an East Village
3 Colonnade Row block, is a time capsule of a
2 The Public Theater vanished way of life. It still has
428–434 Lafayette St. Map 4 F2.
425 Lafayette St. Map 4 F2. Tel (212) Tel (800) 258-3626. q Astor Pl. both its original fixtures and its
967-7555 (tickets). Admin (212) 539- ∑ blueman.com kitchen, and is filled with the
8500. q Astor Pl. See also Entertain­ actual furniture, ornaments, and
ment p336. ∑ publictheater.org The Corinthian columns across utensils of the family who lived
these four buildings are all that here for almost 100 years. Built
This large red-brick and brown - remain of a once-magnificent row in 1832, it was bought in 1835
stone building began its life of nine Greek Revival town houses. by Seabury Tredwell, a wealthy
in 1854 as the They were completed in 1833 by merchant, and stayed in the
Astor Library, developer Seth Geer and were family until Gertrude Tredwell,
known as “Geer’s the last member, died in 1933.
Folly” by skeptics, She had maintained her father’s
who thought no home just as he would have
one would live liked it, and a relative opened
so far east. They the house as a museum in 1936.
were proved The first-floor parlors are very
wrong when the grand, a sign of how well New
houses were York’s merchant class lived in
The Public Theater on Lafayette Street taken by such the 1800s.

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