The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1911-02-02
|MANHATTAN'S Big SHAKING
TREWORS AND CRASH or 81 ass
BRING OFT THRONGS.
$50. 400 worth Of Glass In Manhattan
and Ss.ONO In brooklyn Destroyed
crowd watches On,cc building for
Hours Optical IpcIusiOn the Cause.

HOur>- OpticoI ttciuNOu ue suusV'
About $40, 900 worth Of plate glass. ac-
cording to the est innate Of NJ. +. Cavallon
ad djuster for the New York Plate Glass
! Insurance Company Of <2 Cedar street
was broken by the Jersey City explosion
in Manhattan between the Battery and
Worth street. The jar also set the street
fire alarms going and in one case, in the
Whitehall Building in Battery place. the
explosion broke the glass covering OF an
auxiliary alarm and started the mechan-
ism at work
The result was that the excitement
among the lunch hour crowds in the lower
city was increased by the changing OF
bells on fire engines and trucks as the
tiremen in the lower part OF town clat-
tered out with their apparatus TO answer
the alarms The confusion was made
worse in that the drivers Of the fire en-
gines and trucks could not find the sup.
posed fire
Brooklyn. especially along Fulton street
felt the explosion and Manhattan as for
north as l84th street knew that some
thing had happened. Another blast, "
upper Manhattan said, and it was related
last night that an aged woman who ia
very deaf remarked to her grandson in
an apartment house az the corner Of
Broadway and I8ith street
81 think this matter Of permitting work
men to fire blasts so close to ones home
that it rattles the china is an outrage and
should he stopped"
! cloud of dust and from the streets
/ Nving newspapers greeted downtown
! Manhattan when the lower town went
TO doors and windows TO see what had
happened. Tenants of Office buildings
said thai the momentary totteripo of
creation ,,us ,ba n,,,., -, ,;n,,;,, r,,ss
.,,,.a -
quake had happened. When downtown
! got ont in the streets. particularly in the
neighborhood of Bowling Green il looked
uron rows Of h,;,,i;,os ,,;,h ,,,..r ,,,,d
| "
w,nIo"si IN the olu pattery tohcert
Naiue4 iaclns bauery farH NOT only
we're me Wnoows plowh ou, but IN one
caSr me "ihuow sash az Wen.
imrty-sN persons were taken 10 the
hudson Huusoh street hospital and one TO the
nolse OF henei 10 pe treated Tor cuts
Gausel r' o! nyLns EiasS Inc oniy man
n,o"HnI 20 me hudson street hospital
% who was injured seriously was peter
ulten. employed on a tug IN the haroor
ne ne h'u peeh sla nned against 'ne walls
W Wos w. caon ana nsd sunered fracture
oi po'h pohes OF tne foreieg
- related that an aged negro porter
a.. tne oio stevens House IN broadway.
wher" several windows we're broken.
Ere" pessrsIs,ic az ne came Out upon
ne steps OF 'ne notei ana gaIed across
tne stpceI M the Stamaru oii buliding
a. 20 nroauwaS, wnere not single pane
Oh siass was fractured
yer Sorro"'uiiy
OPTICAL DELrsIoN AFFECTS FOLKS.
Although the excitement of down town
died out after while, as excitements
down town will, there was excitement
which kept up until dark in that part of
bling gravestones in the churchyard of
old St Paul's toward the United States
| Express skyscraper at Rector and Church
streets Traffic COPS tried to maintain
, "A paSsagpway on the west and east sides
of Broadway, bu, it was pretty hard to
The crowd was waiting to see the United
States Express Building fall The story
had go ne out that the building not Only
was out Of plumb bur was tottering
Forget it," snapped the elevator
starter when a reporter entered the build
ing to ask when the skyscraper was going
to crumbe and why. They had one
story out that we had TO stop the eleva tors
for three hours too We didn't. SO far
as | know there wasn't a window broken
in the building"
Nevertheless Broadway waited pa
tientlv for the crash. During the middle
of the afternoon an old man attracted
some attention by taking sight on
the building with a home made plumb
line He worked through the crowd
| n front Of the churchyard, and when he
had reached the iron fence he took from
| This waistcoat pocket a watch 10 which
was alta ched a long gold chain. The old
man knotted the end of the chain 10
the top Of the fence and then stopped
the swaying of the watch with forefineer.
When watch and chain we're stretched
out calmly the man bent n bit and
sighted the upright line of the skv-
scraper along the line of the chain, Fvi.
IDENTIFY he was satisfied after a moment
that the building wasn't leaning. because
he united the chain and proceeded on his
way,
| Prof Hugo M,insterber0 the Harvard
psychologist. would probably set this
! down ali this excitement M Rroadway
and Rector street. as the conta eio,s efrect
OF an optical illusion upon n conrlomern 10
conscio,,sness AS n matter of fact
ever since the United States Express
Building was srected-and the same
nrinciDi,, holds i'm the case ~ the Hudson
Terminal buildings further I'm Trin;tv
place every afternoon. when the ii1ht
comes from behind the skvscraper' il
appears 10 an observer on Broadway