Mulberry Bend
Encyclopedia
Mulberry Bend was an area in the notorious Five Points
neighborhood in Lower Manhattan
. It was bound by Bayard Street in the north, Cross Street (changed to Park in 1854) in the south, Orange (changed to Baxter in 1854) Street on the west and Mulberry Street on the east. The "Bend" in the street layout was due to the original topography
of the area. Orange and Mulberry Street
s headed from southeast to northwest then turned north at the "Bend" to avoid the Collect Pond and surrounding low-lying wetland
.
Mulberry Bend was one of the worst parts in the Five Points with multiple back alleyways such as Bandit's Roost, Bottle Alley and Ragpickers Row. In 1897 thanks in part to the efforts of Danish photojournalist Jacob Riis
Mulberry Bend was demolished and turned into Mulberry Bend Park. The urban green space was designed by Calvert Vaux
. In 1911 it was renamed Columbus Park.
A few tenement buildings on the east side of Mulberry Street dating from the era before the park was built are still there including 48-50 Mulberry Street mentioned in Riis
' book How the Other Half Lives
.
Cross Street was renamed "Mosco Street" in 1982 after Lower East Side
community activist Frank Mosco. The section of Cross Street between Mulberry and Baxter Streets was demapped and added to Columbus Park along with the triangular plaza between Cross and Worth Streets. Worth Street, which was originally laid out in 1859, has since become the southern boundary of Columbus Park.
Five Points, Manhattan
Five Points was a neighborhood in central lower Manhattan in New York City. The neighborhood was generally defined as being bound by Centre Street in the west, The Bowery in the east, Canal Street in the north and Park Row in the south...
neighborhood in Lower Manhattan
Lower Manhattan
Lower Manhattan is the southernmost part of the island of Manhattan, the main island and center of business and government of the City of New York...
. It was bound by Bayard Street in the north, Cross Street (changed to Park in 1854) in the south, Orange (changed to Baxter in 1854) Street on the west and Mulberry Street on the east. The "Bend" in the street layout was due to the original topography
Topography
Topography is the study of Earth's surface shape and features or those ofplanets, moons, and asteroids...
of the area. Orange and Mulberry Street
Mulberry Street (Manhattan)
Mulberry Street is a principal thoroughfare in Manhattan, New York. The street was listed on maps of the area since at least 1755. The "Bend" in Mulberry in which the street changes direction from southwest to northeast to a northerly direction was to avoid the wetlands surrounding the Collect Pond...
s headed from southeast to northwest then turned north at the "Bend" to avoid the Collect Pond and surrounding low-lying wetland
Wetland
A wetland is an area of land whose soil is saturated with water either permanently or seasonally. Wetlands are categorised by their characteristic vegetation, which is adapted to these unique soil conditions....
.
Mulberry Bend was one of the worst parts in the Five Points with multiple back alleyways such as Bandit's Roost, Bottle Alley and Ragpickers Row. In 1897 thanks in part to the efforts of Danish photojournalist Jacob Riis
Jacob Riis
Jacob August Riis was a Danish American social reformer, "muckraking" journalist and social documentary photographer. He is known for using his photographic and journalistic talents to help the impoverished in New York City; those impoverished New Yorkers were the subject of most of his prolific...
Mulberry Bend was demolished and turned into Mulberry Bend Park. The urban green space was designed by Calvert Vaux
Calvert Vaux
Calvert Vaux , was an architect and landscape designer. He is best remembered as the co-designer , of New York's Central Park....
. In 1911 it was renamed Columbus Park.
A few tenement buildings on the east side of Mulberry Street dating from the era before the park was built are still there including 48-50 Mulberry Street mentioned in Riis
Jacob Riis
Jacob August Riis was a Danish American social reformer, "muckraking" journalist and social documentary photographer. He is known for using his photographic and journalistic talents to help the impoverished in New York City; those impoverished New Yorkers were the subject of most of his prolific...
' book How the Other Half Lives
How the Other Half Lives
How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York was an early publication of photojournalism by Jacob Riis, documenting squalid living conditions in New York City slums in the 1880s...
.
Cross Street was renamed "Mosco Street" in 1982 after Lower East Side
Lower East Side
The Lower East Side, LES, is a neighborhood in the southeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is roughly bounded by Allen Street, East Houston Street, Essex Street, Canal Street, Eldridge Street, East Broadway, and Grand Street....
community activist Frank Mosco. The section of Cross Street between Mulberry and Baxter Streets was demapped and added to Columbus Park along with the triangular plaza between Cross and Worth Streets. Worth Street, which was originally laid out in 1859, has since become the southern boundary of Columbus Park.
Locations in the Bend
- 21 Baxter Street: The Baxter Street DudesBaxter Street DudesThe Baxter Street Dudes were a New York teenage street gang, mostly of former newsboys and bootblacks, who ran the Grand Duke's Theatre from their headquarters in the basement of a Baxter Street dive bar during the 1870s...
were a New York teenage street gang, mostly of former newsboysNewsboysNewsboys are a Christian pop rock band founded in 1985 in Mooloolaba, Australia. They have released 15 studio albums, six of which have been certified gold...
and bootblacks, who ran a makeshift theater with stolen and salvaged equipment, props and costumes in the basement of a dive barDive barA dive bar is a type of bar or pub. Dive bars generally have a relaxed and informal atmosphere—they are often referred to by local residents as "neighborhood bars," where people in the neighborhood gather to drink and socialize...
at 21 Baxter Street during the 1870s. They called their enterprise the Grand Duke's Theatre where they wrote and performed playsPlay (theatre)A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
, musicals and variety shows which were enjoyed by other street toughs and slummers throughout the city. They were eventually closed down for failure to pay the "amusment tax" levied by the city. - 59 1/2 Baxter Street: The location of the alleyway known as "Ragpickers Row" immortalized in a photograph by Jacob Riis.
- 67 Orange Street: Almack's Dance Hall located at 67 Orange Street owned by African-American Pete Williams. It was at Almack's also known as Pete Williams Place that Master JubaMaster JubaMaster Juba was an African American dancer active in the 1840s. He was one of the first black performers in the United States to play onstage for white audiences and the only one of the era to tour with a white minstrel group...
a young African-American dancer performed in the early 1840s. Juba was influential on the development of such American dance styles as tapTap danceTap dance is a form of dance characterized by using the sound of one's tap shoes hitting the floor as a percussive instrument. As such, it is also commonly considered to be a form of music. Two major variations on tap dance exist: rhythm tap and Broadway tap. Broadway tap focuses more on the...
, and step dancingStepping (African-American)Stepping or step-dancing is a form of percussive dance in which the participant's entire body is used as an instrument to produce complex rhythms and sounds through a mixture of footsteps, spoken word, and hand claps...
. In 1842 English author Charles DickensCharles DickensCharles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
visited Almack's on his tour on the Five Points. Watching Juba dance was the only redeeming aspect he found to Five Points.
Where Mulberry Street crooks like an elbow within hail of the old depravity of the Five Points, is “the Bend,” foul core of New York’s slums. Long years ago the cows coming home from the pasture trod a path over this hill. Echoes of tinkling bells linger there still, but they do not call up memories of green meadows and summer fields; they proclaim the home-coming of the rag-picker’s cart. In the memory of man the old cow-path has never been other than a vast human pig-sty. There is but one “Bend” in the world, and it is enough. The city authorities, moved by the angry protests of ten years of sanitary reform effort, have decided that it is too much and must come down. Another Paradise Park will take its place and let in sunlight and air to work such transformation as at the Five Points, around the corner of the next block. Never was change more urgently needed. Around “the Bend” cluster the bulk of the tenements that are stamped as altogether bad, even by the optimists of the Health Department. Incessant raids cannot keep down the crowds that make them their home. In the scores of back alleys, of stable lanes and hidden byways, of which the rent collector alone can keep track, they share such shelter as the ramshackle structures afford with every kind of abomination rifled from the dumps and ash-barrels of the city. Here, too, shunning the light, skulks the unclean beast of dishonest idleness. “The Bend” is the home of the tramp as well as the rag-picker |