The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-11-15

 of any fashionable street, is transitory. Even in it's palmiest days Fifth Avenue represented nothing characteristic ex- cept wealth. Now business is rapidly driving out the costly residences, fore ing them into side streets and to the newer fashionable sections further up town Almost the entire length of the avenue below Central Park is already given over to business and to the kind of business that keeps daylight hours-of- flee buildings wholesale salesrooms and retail shops After nightfall it is compar- atively silent and deserted
 Broadway. on the other hand, lives ev- cry moment of every twenty-four hours. When the daylight fades the electrics be- gin to bathe it in their brilliant glow. Nowhere else in the world are such mill lions of lights used in outdoor illumina ton as along that two-mtle stretch of Broadway between Madison Square and Columbus Circle, which has come to be known as the Great White Way. And be- fore the last of these lights has winked itself out as the last of the all-night crowd turns it's steps homeward-or more likely hotelward-the glow is bright again in the East and a fresh army of toflers and pleasure seekers is rolling down Broadway to take up the burdens of an- other day.
 Broadway is a long street. It extends from the southernmost tip of Manhattan to it's extreme northern point when the Harlem and Hudson join to shut it off from the mainland. This is a distance of some fl or 15 miles. As a matter of fact the street retains it's name and identity all the way along the eastern bank of the Hudson to Albany, 140 miles away. Along it's course within the boundaries Of the Island it exemplifes every activ- ity of the city and nation of which it forms a part. More than 1,500.0o0 people live along it and 10000, 600 trips day are made on foot and in vehicles along and below it's surface. Thirty million busi- ness transactions involving amounts from a penny to millions of dollars take place along it during every "A hours. It is a business, shopping, theatre, hotel and residence street and as many a confirmed Broadwayite has discovered it is possible 10 find almost every conceivable means of making and spending money within its limits.
 Beginning it's course at the Bowling Green where the Dutch burghers of New Amsterdam smoked their evening pipes and sniffed the salt breezes coming up the bay, for the first half mile of its length Broadway is the street of big bus- ness. the home of the trusts. Almost at it's lower end. Number PC, is the Standard Oil building it's 20 floors devoted entirely to the activities of the great oil combi- nation and it's subsidiaries. Along this part of the street are the offices of the big steamship companies. the Steel corpo- ration, the Rubber trust and scores of other great aggregations of capital rep resenting hundreds of millions of invested capital. Interspersed with these are banks, insurance companies, lawyers and brokers offices and all the varied ma ohnery required in the operation of great financial undertakings.
 Further up, between City Hall Park and Union Square. Broadway runs through the heart of the wholesale dis trct. For some two miles 1t is lined with great merchandising establishments in which are gathered the manufactured products of every part of the world. Above this in turn Is the retail district. The crowds which, further down, con sisted chiefly of men show as great a majority of women as soon as Fourteenth street is passed and the big department stores which have succeeded the whole sale establishments are thronged with smartly dressed shoppers
 The shopping section of Broadway has been moving rapidly uptown during the past few years and has crowded out number of hotels and theatres It's north ern limit now is Herald Square, at least this is the location of the furthest uptown big department store. Here at Thirty fourth street too is the most crowded spot in the city or in the world. By care ful computation more than 100000 per sons pass here every day and this num- Der will be still greater when the new Pennsylvania terminal is completed and the tunnels under the East and North rivers meet near by
 Above Thirty-fourth street extends tho Rialto," "The Great White Way" Champagne Alley" to quote few of the pet names New Workers have given to their favorite stretch of Broadway This is the region of hotels, restaurants and theatres. Longacre Square Is the capital of this gay principalty. Less than eentruy ago the cows pasturing on the peaceful acres of the old Astor farm were almost its only tenants. Now forms the new Hotel Astor stands on the site of the old farmhouse. 20 theatres are within stones throw and famous res- taurants are grouped all about. More money is spent every day within the space of these half-dozen blocks for food, drink and amusement than in any 1 like area in the world. Longacre Square is the core of the evening life of the Me- l lropolis, where the lights flash the bright est, where the crowds of pleasure seekers are thickest and where all that is typi-