Hudson River Railroad

1871: The New Grand Central Depot at 42nd Street & Fourth Avenue, Manhattan

September 24, 2025 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

What follows is a July 15, 1871 Scientific American article about the opening of Manhattan’s Grand Central Depot, a predecessor to the current Grand Central Terminal, built on the site of a previous 42nd Street Station. This structure was later expanded and became known as Grand Central Station before its final reincarnation as the current Grand Central Terminal in 1913:

Among all our large commercial buildings, the railroad depots are those of which New Yorkers have least cause to be proud. Discomfort, shabbiness, and dirt, concentrated in ill-ventilated structures, have generally hitherto been all the accommodation to the public that our railroad kings have seen fit to give. [Read more…] about 1871: The New Grand Central Depot at 42nd Street & Fourth Avenue, Manhattan

Albany’s Livingston Avenue Railroad Bridge: Some History & Future Plans

September 3, 2025 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

This article was original published in the July 6, 1867 Scientific American.

Our engraving [presented here] represents this structure [the Livingston Avenue Railroad Bridge in Albany] as it appeared in March, 1866, which was shortly after its completion. [Read more…] about Albany’s Livingston Avenue Railroad Bridge: Some History & Future Plans

1851: The Opening of the Hudson River Railroad

February 28, 2025 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

What follows is an article published in the Sydney Morning Herald of New South Wales, Australia on January 23, 1852. Chartered in 1846, the Hudson River Railroad was built to connect the Troy and Greenbush Railroad with the city of New York.

On Wednesday, [October 3, 1851] the ceremony took place of opening the Hudson River Railroad, in its entire length from New York to Albany. Hitherto the portion of the road between Poughkeepsie and Tivoli [in Dutchess County] (twenty-six miles) was not in operation, and the passengers were conveyed in a steamboat between those two points. Last week the road was completed, and the cars ran over it privately. Last week it was [also] publicly opened, by running two excursion trains each way and returning. [Read more…] about 1851: The Opening of the Hudson River Railroad

Abraham Lincoln’s Funeral Train in Albany

November 29, 2024 by Joseph D. Collea Jr. 1 Comment

Just before 11:00 o’clock on April 25, 1865, mourners waiting at the East Albany Station (in Rensselaer, NY) heard the sound of a train emanating out of the darkness to the south along the Hudson Valley. All doubt was soon removed by “the whistle of the locomotive, announcing the approach of all that was mortal of the martyred dead.” Further confirmation was added by the boom of artillery.

By order of Albany Mayor Eli Perry, a minute gun was to commence a measured fire from the moment of the train’s arrival until the President Lincoln’s casket was placed in the capitol building. Commanded by Captain Harris Parr, the battery performed exactly as directed. [Read more…] about Abraham Lincoln’s Funeral Train in Albany

“Locusts of the East”: The Yankee Invasion of New York

March 9, 2024 by Guest Contributor 3 Comments

New York by 1820 was becoming a “colony from New England” to use the phrase of President Timothy Dwight of Yale. The “Puritan Pope,” as he was some times called, estimated that 60 to 67 percent of the people of New York had originated in the “land of steady habits.”

The few thousand Puritans who had established a new Zion around Boston in the 1630s were a remarkably energetic, prolific, and self-assertive people. The thin soils on the hilly lands, the harsh winters, and the stern theology of John Calvin created a distinct community spirit and shaped a unique character. [Read more…] about “Locusts of the East”: The Yankee Invasion of New York

Railroads, The Spuyten Duyvil Disaster & Faustian Legend

June 9, 2022 by Jaap Harskamp Leave a Comment

On September 27th, 2025, it will be two hundred years ago that the world’s first public railway, known as the Stockton & Darlington (S&DR), was opened in north-east England.

As well as carrying coal, the train offered space for six hundred passengers, most of them traveling in wagons, but some distinguished guests were allocated a seat in a specially designed carriage called The Experiment. [Read more…] about Railroads, The Spuyten Duyvil Disaster & Faustian Legend

Four Nymphs, a Satyr and Manhattan’s Ladies’ Mile

May 8, 2022 by Jaap Harskamp Leave a Comment

Until the mid-1860s the Fifth Avenue area around Madison Square was Manhattan’s “aristocratic” heart. Its brownstone mansions were occupied by the city’s elite. The gradual incursion of commerce into this residential haven started with high-class hotels.

In 1864 Hoffmann House was one of the first to open its doors. Owned by Cassius H. Read, it was located on the corner of 25th Street & Broadway and contained tree hundred rooms with all the latest conveniences. The establishment proudly advertised its lavish furnishings, carefully chosen artworks, and refined French (Parisian) cuisine. At a time that hotel living was becoming a fashionable alternative to owning a family mansion for wealthy New Yorkers, Hoffmann House was recommended as the most comfortable and homelike residence in the metropolis.

During the 1880s the hotel’s “grand salon” became one of New York’s “secretive” attractions for a very specific reason. [Read more…] about Four Nymphs, a Satyr and Manhattan’s Ladies’ Mile

Hudson River Railroad

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