In the 1600s, the island of Manhattan comprised New Amsterdam and Harlem. These settlements were separated by wilderness inhabited by Native Americans and wild animals, including wolves. According to James W. Beekman, president of the New York Historical Society in 1869, as late as 1685 there was a proclamation granting the permission to hunt and kill the wolves found on the island. But by 1891, no one expected to see a wolf roaming Manhattan, especially on the Bowery in the crowded Lower East Side.
Archive for the ‘Animal Stories’ Category
1891: The Wolf that Went AWOL on the Bowery in New York City
Posted: 20th June 2015 by The Hatching Cat in Animal StoriesTags: 298 Bowery, Globe Dime Museum, Gotham Base Ball Club, Gotham Cottage, Henry V. Benn, The Bowery
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1891: Timothy McGrath and His Organ Grinder Terrier of the Tenderloin District
Posted: 23rd May 2015 by The Hatching Cat in Animal Stories, Dog TailsTags: Isaac Moses, James Boorman, New York History, New York Institution for the Blind, organ grinder, Timothy McGrath, Weylandt Patent
One organ grinder who broke the mold was Irishman Timothy McGrath, who, for over 10 years, played his hand-organ along 7th and 8th avenues in New York City’s Tenderloin District. Instead of a monkey, Timothy had a grizzly-haired Skye terrier who would sit on top of the organ wrapped in a blanket and holding a basket in his mouth.
1881: An Ode to Fannie Howe, Only a Dog Who Lies in Green-Wood Cemetery
Posted: 19th April 2015 by The Hatching Cat in Animal Stories, Dog TailsTags: Elias Howe Jr., Fannie Howe, Green-Wood Cemetery, New York History, Old Dog Trey, Only a Dog
Only a dog do you say, Sir Critic?
Only a dog, but as truth I prize,
The truest love I have won in living
Lay in the deeps of her limpid eyes.
1879: The Peter Goelet Mansion and the Last Cow to Graze on Broadway
Posted: 2nd December 2014 by The Hatching Cat in Animal Attractions, Animal StoriesTags: 890 Broadway, Cornelius T. Williams, Elbridge T. Gerry, Goelet mansion, Hannah G. Gerry, New York History, Old New York, Peter Goelet
“The extraordinary spectacle of a cow, storks, guinea-pigs, and other animals, feeding quietly in the busiest and most bustling part of Broadway, was one that attracted every stranger’s curiosity, and during the fine days in Summer it was no uncommon thing to see a considerable crowd gathered in front of the house gazing through the iron railing at the unwonted sight within.” — The New York Times, November 22, 1879
1900: Sir Oliver the Parrot, the Mascot of The Lambs
Posted: 8th June 2014 by The Hatching Cat in Animal Stories, Birds and PigeonsTags: Foxy Quiller, Jerome Sykes, Lambs' Club, New York History, St. James Long Island, The Lambs
Sir Oliver was a handsome twentieth-century matinée idol who had a habit of going off script and speaking out of line. Perhaps this was because Sir Oliver was not a man of royalty, but a female cockatoo that had the gift of gab. Or maybe it was because Sir Oliver spent many of her down-time […]
