It’s strange to see this view without the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges spanning the East River and so many massive office buildings towering over lower Manhattan.
But this painting, from the New York Public Library digital collection, depicts a view of New York in 1849.
The East River is crowded with commercial and ferry traffic, and the most towering structures in Manhattan are church steeples.
Brooklyn is still a separate city; it won’t join the City of New York for almost 50 years. Brooklyn Heights is just coming into its own as New York’s first suburb.
Tags: " Brooklyn Heights history, "View of New York From Brooklyn Heights, 19th Century Brooklyn, Brooklyn Heights suburb, Brooklyn in 1849, New York in 1849, paintings of Lower Manhattan 19th Century, six towns of Brooklyn
Ephemeral New York 
August 30, 2010 at 1:09 pm |
I like how outside of the church steeples…the tallest structures in Manhattan are the masts of the ships docked on it’s shores.