The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1884-12-24

WOat CONSIDER the De5t American pldj
ever written, 1.-The Mighty Dollar" me
him in a private box, John Stetson's own
and he (the visitor) actually had the limo
cence and the ingenuousness to say to me,
81 would like to take in Barnum's museum
tomorrow afternoon" Hal bless my but.
tons. Barnum's museum was burned out
years and years and years ago, and the mar
bic edifce which serves ss q monument to
the elder Bennett long years ago took its
Place, fronting, not the lower end of City
Hall Park, known and seen OF all men for o
hundred years, but what stands in its place,
the magnificent granite pile known as the
Federal building, in which are all the United
States Courts and the vast machinery OF the
Postoffice as well. Even the City Hall Park,
you see. is no longer as it was. remember
distinctly, within the past twenty years, too,
when that whole scope, beautifully grassed
and so6ded til fountains here and there
bubDling aad parking in the summer sun,
was iDclosed By iron posts, connected one
with the other by iron chains, long since
passed away, for now there is no fence of
any sort or kind. and, instead of single ed.
ifce, the City Hall sitting like diamond
upon the circumference of ring, there are
not only the Postoffice and the City Hall,
but what is sssuredly called still Tweed
new county court house." and number
of smaller buildings devoted to other
branches of the city's economy.
Union SQUARE
we reach, significant place, and yet how
changed. My mother. born in John street.
when residences there lined its entire length,
recalls the time distinctly when her uncle
and the various public institutions OF the
city, lived in State street, near Castle Garden,
and had country place on the precise spot
where Union Square now stands. In our
time, of course, it has always been
square: remember when it
was lighted by little oil lamps, then, when,
with vast and unpopular extravaganza, gas
supplanted them, and now, when II is made
bright and brilliant as the MONDAY sun by
huge electric volumes of brilliancy, sent out
by an apparatus, hoisted hundreds of feet,
far up toward the clouds. Oh, what tre-
mendous meetings have been held in that
place. The greatest, perhaps, was the tire.
mendous demonstration of 1850, presided
over by John A. Dix, when, from every por-
ton of this country, multitudes came as del
egates to the great Union meeting. Oh,
what a sightl Is there any picture so ex-
quisite, is there any canvas SO magnificent,
can any panorama be devised so superb in
its length and breadth, as this tremendous
gathering, the outpouring of human nature,
assembled with q com mon impulse, with q
with a common deter mination of indorsing
resolutions, absolute, clean cut and fixed in
purpose? l tIow not. Within the memory
OF my youngest reader Union Square was
belted about by sumptuous residences. Now
know of none remaining The Springler
Institute was for many years the leading
female seminary of the city, standing on the
western boundary of Union Square. Tiffany,
think, was the first to make break, then
followed Saronv, Bretano Bros, aud a vari.
ETY. of trades of various desert ption. while
on the eastern side theatrical agents, res
tauranis of German, French, Spanish and
Italian style, and business firms of various
"a o Y q
northern boundary is lined with magnif.
cent warehouses, and the southern is occu-
pied entirely by the Union Square Theatre,
with the Morton House and their various
dependencies.
Pass we in search OF landmarks until we
come to the Fifth Avenue hotel.
What is it that looks so stranger
What is it that's gomez
WHY, THE OLD CLOCK
Bless its buttons, where is the old cleck2
This hotel was opened in 1858. 1t was be-
Eeved to be so far ''up in town" that nobody
woald ever go to il, and was regarded as the
supremest fOllv that Mr.. Amos L. Eco,
father of Mr.. John Emo and Amos Il. Emo,
old schoolfellow and friend OF mine, could
possibly commit. Mr.. Emo was and is y real
estate operator, and when he built that hotel
be builded better than he knew, for to-day
it is doing more business than any of its
rivals, and is exactly in the centre Of every
sOcldl, HUhuClul, DuSiDtS9 duUtpOllbkCol kntcf-
est of Manhattan Island. But never mind
about that, the clocks the thing with which
to catch the attention OF the reader. The
clock stood at the top OF a lofty iron pillar.
Just run your mind back twenty-six years, a
trife over that, bat between twenty-six and
twenty seven years, 1t is generation, under
ordinary circumstances, it is half a dozen
generations under existing circumstances.
In 1858 James Buchanan was President, and
secession was beginning to unfold its pur.
poses. Abraham Lincoln had not even been
nominated, and nobody supposed he would
be- Ninety nine men in every hundred
would have said If asked, who Will be the
nominee Of the Republican party in the
next campaign William II. Seward OF
New York; but, as we we'll remember the
fight between Seward and Chase and Came
ron was 60 bitter that compromise became an
absolute essential, and Lincoln's name
fortunately was settled upon. The
Prince OF Wales. with all his glitter
ing suite, occupied rooms IN the
Fifth Avenue Hotel, and their Anglican
eyes rested curiously upon the facs OF this
old clock, now not Only pulled to down, bat
pulled to pieces. Think Tor a moment OF the
scenes that have iranspird beneath the
shadows OF that clock. When was 8 little
boy, visiting in Boston, / remember dis
tiDcIly procession. the grand marshal OF
which was handsome fellow on magnifi-
The bearing of one accustomed to the saddle,
Frank Howe. He came 10 New York and
during the war was the agent of Massschu-
setts in this city, possibly of all the New
England States. | don't know as TO that.
Every incoming regiment was met at the
Forty second street depot by Frank Howe,
the same fellow / saw in boyhood at the head
of the Boston procession, and he either rode
or walked, as the case might be, from the
Forty-second street depot down Fifth ave
nue. to Broadway, and down Broadway 10
the Battery, with some escorting body OF
troops on the way TO the front. One and all
of these soldiers, raw in experience ALSO
lutely unaware of what they we're going TO,
passed by that clock in broad daylight or al
night and il is no unreasonable fancy 70
assume that eysrv mothers son looked 70
see what time of day it was The war went
on. Many and many q regiment was called
| from the sterile farms ct New England and
the water va bed coast along its rock-bound
| every one 81 which passed through that
square q 4 By that clock. Thank God &c
| many OF them returned. Who can ever for
| get tie universal uprising that saluted the
| announcement that was was ended and thai
| peace reigned once more from Maine tC
| Texas and from Massachusetts, 10 California,
| Home again marched the gallant bands, dec
| mated, some of them. all of them wounded
| and injured, but al thank God, victorious
and past that npliited, clean faced clOcl