The Book of
Philadelphia
By Robert
Shackleton
©1918
The Penn
Publishing Company
Philadelphia
Chapter
VIII
OLD
SECTIONS OF THE CITY
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NLY gradually
does one come to realize, even though familiar with the city for years, that
Philadelphia retains much more of the old, in buildings, than does any other
American city. Much of the old is shabby, but shabbiness is a frequent adjunct
of age, especially of a city's age. In Philadelphia there gradually comes the
impression of square miles of buildings, shabby with time and desertion; and
then one begins to pick out here and there, buildings of especial interest, and
to visualize the days that are gone; and at the same time one realizes that
much of the city's present-day prosperity is directly dependent upon these
shabby-seeming streets. One is apt for a time to have an impression of a
wilderness of gray despair and disrepair. But although there is much of the
shabby poor, there is also a great deal of shabby comfort, in the ancient
quarters. And at
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any moment one may come upon the fascinating. There
still stands the home of the Reverend Robert Blackwell, of the New York family
who owned Blackwell's Island, which long ago became a spot of associations
anything but churchly. This Blackwell who came to Philadelphia was the
wealthiest of clergymen in America and one of the wealthiest men of this
wealthy city. His home, at 224 Pine Street, was one of the splendid homes of
the time. It is now sadly wrecked, it is dirty, dilapidated and dingy, and much
of its splendid interior panelings and ornamentation have been torn out and
carried away. Its glory has departed. Yet even now, it can be seen that its
outside cornice, facing the street, is of intricate and elaborate design and
workmanship; indeed, it was among the few most elaborate cornices of the city.
And there is the Powel house, also among the finest
of all, at 244 South Third Street, with unusual overmantel in the main bedroom,
and unusual paneling; but it is now dingy of aspect, shuttered close, not
remindful of its glory when Washington was a guest here, and when John Adams,
in one. of those letters of his which are still a gustatory joy, wrote of a
dinner here in phrases overflowing with joyful listing of the curds and creams
and sweetmeats, the jellies, the tarts the syllabub, the floating island, the
cheeses and the drinkables.
Among
mementoes of the past there are some which, although of unusual interest, are
easily and generally and literally overlooked. I mean the old-time
footscrapers, of which many are still to be
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found, old ones, fine old ones, within the heart of
the old portion of the city, built into the sidewalk, at the foot of the house
steps.
A pair of winged griffins, back to back lion-pawed
very strong, particularly pictorial, are near Third and Buttonwood streets. In
numerous places there are the old curled-ear, wrought-iron scrapers, of the
blacksmith's handiwork. On South Third Street I remember a scraper with classic
urn above a hooped-over top; and not far away, on the same street, is one of
almost the same design, except that the hooped-over top is taller and more
slender.
The admirable designs and the variety, make these old
Philadelphia foot-scrapers extremely worth while. An interesting scraper on
Walnut Street, is another of the hooped-top kind, made by some unknown Peter
Visscher of an iron worker, with eight wrought-iron curls upon it which must
have, delighted the artisan's heart and
which are a delight to look at to-day. Another on Walnut Street is curiously
made, with a wrought rosette on either aide. A pair of very old ones from a
pair of bracings for the bottom of the iron balusters of the steps in front of
a house on Pine Street.
These are but examples. The number of old scrapers
still remaining is large and the proportion, of interesting ones is great. And
these lowly examples of early artisanship are worthy of search and examination.
There
is still a great deal of fine old wrought iron work that is more prominent than
the scrapers.
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There are lovely old iron rails at front doorsteps,
many of them with the classic palmette, one of the things which so often make
architects refer to things of Philadelphia, little or big, as "pure
Greek." Everywhere is the interesting. There are adorable little curving
marble steps, ironrailed, rising rather steeply to the doorways; and when they
are in pairs, converging to a center, these are house-door approaches of great
distinction. There are fanlights, there are pent-eaves, there are pilasters at
many a door, and here and there one still may see an old-time knocker. And it
is sorrowful to see such a proportion of the old made squalid and sodden by
ill-usage. And the squalid so frequently merges into the mere shabby, and
alternates with it, that one is constantly liable to confound the two
qualities. There are many decent and decorous people living on what at first
glance seem altogether dirty and deplorable streets; and there is still much of
excellent and prosperous business carried on in shabby old buildings.
It
is curious, yet one sees how natural it was, that coming to a new country with
infinite open space usable, Penn should have planned his new city with many of
the streets as narrow as if they were in the close-cramped, walled-in cities of
old Europe. He probably thought that he was giving the streets, on the average, great spaciousness. But his
rectangular plan, besides marking out most of the streets with what we deem
narrowness, marked also a system of alleys behind all of the streets. They are
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still alleys, although in this finical age they are
called streets. And, ill-kept though most of them are, they still show,
especially two or three running westward from the Delaware River water-front,
just north of Market Street, how pleasantly people of moderate means used to
live, in these little old houses, still standing, of two-stories and an attic;
houses with dormer windows, with projective pent-eaves between the first and
second stories, and each with its little doorstep and its solid shutters.
Originally, the idea frankly was that the less well
to do should frankly accept these less desirable locations, and live in these
small houses in the narrow alleys; and the intent also was to make these
inferior homes really homelike; and in those early days they were.
Numbers
of these old alleys—and the system of alleys extended with the extension of the
city—are still without sewage connection, even behind some of the fashionable
and wealthy streets, and behind prosperous streets of modern business; and
until recently there were many more. Some of these old alleys are mediæval in
suggestion; both evil and mediæval in unsanitariness, in narrowness, in their
rough cobbled paving, in their sharp grading toward the gutter in the center of
the roadway; a gutter which is in some alleys the only sewer. Such places as
the worst of these, with the narrower alley entrances and the loss of light and
ventilation for the homes are paralleled nowhere else in America, and nowhere
in England except in dismal Sheffield or some other duke-owned city. The rent
roll of great
Page
116
estates that own the alley properties gives the
explanation there, and presumably the same explanation holds to a great extent
here; yet assuredly not in all cases.
Numbers of these narrow alleys are still close-packed
with human life, and in grim correlation, human death; and you may still pick
out, here and there, a crowded alley, extremely dirty, with the terrible record
of its deaths during the yellow fever scourge of 1793 still kept in mind.
In
one of these alleys, into which Doctor Rush and Stephen Girard and a few other
brave men penetrated during those yellow fever days, freely risking their own
lives, tirelessly tending the sick and carrying out the dead on their
shoulders, in one of these alleys, now called Spring Street, leading westward
from Front Street, a little north of Market, an alley of smells, of roadways
uncommonly rough, of small houses, of doddering roof lines and ancient gables,
the impression of being set far back into the past comes with curious force.
The alley is really among the very oldest and tradition has it that some of the
little houses here have been standing for over two centuries, and that to one
of them Benjamin Franklin came, as a youth, on his arrival from Boston, and in
this house rented a room, and made his first home in Philadelphia. It is one of
the unsanitary alleys. It does not run through the block from street to street,
but makes a sudden turn to the right, and ends abruptly in this right-angled
offshoot; and in this little offshoot is the old house.
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And it is a pleasure to see that it is pridefully
kept up. It has a brass knocker, and still retains what many a rich house would
envy it, one of those ancient bull's-eyes which are year by year growing more
rare.
There is an undoubted charm about this. The houses
themselves are surprisingly clean and attractive, also, as you suddenly notice.
In fact, it is a place of contradictions. And although you still see features
which you would fain see bettered, there has been a marked holding up of
standards along this entire right-angled cul-de-sac. And you find that the
properties here are not owned by rich men or by estates, but are individually
owned, and mostly by that vanishing race, the Americans, or by old-time Irish,
who, in these days of Southern European inundation, seem markedly American.
There does not seem to be much actual basis for the
Franklin tradition, yet it seems reasonable. Much of the soundest history is
necessarily based upon tradition. And in this case I am inclined to accept the
tradition because of a touch of verisimilitude, a homely, human touch, which
is, that it is still traditionally held that Franklin used to go from here to
the then much nearer riverside, and plunge in and take long swims.
Franklin
used to be a mighty swimmer, and he exulted in his physical prowess; and as
life went on, and he acquired medal after medal of honor, from monarchs and
societies and public assemblies, for this or that achievement in science or
statecraft, a story told of another Philadelphian, also a writer,
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118
might have been put upon him with a different
application. For this modern Philadelphian writer, Richard Harding Davis, in
the desire to make an effect at same formal reception, pinned across his breast
several medals received for achievements in war correspondence or other experiences,
whereupon George Ade approached and, running his finger along the line of
medals, touching each as if in awe, to the increasing pleasure of the wearer,
said at length, with gentle questioning, "Swimming?"
Near
this probable Franklin locality is one that is associated with Washington. For
at the southeast corner of Front and Market streets the buildings now standing
thereabouts, although not new, are not of Revolutionary era, and the general
aspect has also considerably changed through the filling in and pushing out of
the waterfront—to that corner, Washington made a daily habit of going, when he
lived in Philadelphia as President of the United States; twelve o'clock was the
usual hour, and he would stand, watch in hand, for a moment, comparing his
watch with the clock in the window of the clockdealer who then occupied this
corner. He was always immaculately dressed; for it was a deep-based belief with
him that a man owes it to himself and to his position in life to dress with
care, and he felt this the more deeply at a time when he knew that his
appearance and personal bearing were of vital importance to a new and
struggling nation, in giving it place in the eyes of the world. And it is also
still remembered. for tradition has brought it down that
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the porters of the then immediate waterside always
took off their hats when he came and stood uncovered till he walked away, and
that he always lifted his own hat in recognition.
Washington,
in those Presidential days of Philadelphia, lived in a fine house on the south
side of Market Street between Fifth and Sixth streets. It was in that house,
long since vanished before the march of business, that he received the terrible
news of St. Clair's defeat; maintaining calm during the dinner party that was
in progress when the message came, then giving way briefly to wild grief and
indignation. It was in that house that Alexander Hamilton, on the day on which
he resigned his post as Secretary of the Treasury, picked up a copy of the
Constitution of the United States, and said: "So long as we are a young
and virtuous people, this instrument will bind us together in mutual interests,
mutual welfare, and mutual happiness; but when we become old and corrupt it
will bind us no longer. "For the wise men of early days well knew that
there were possibilities of disaster which the Constitution, unless backed by
the devotion of the country, would be powerless to check. It was in that house
that Gouverneur Morris tested his bet that he could be successful in treating
Washington familiarly, which nobody had ever done; and so, here it was that, at
dinner table, he patted the President on the shoulder and said, "Old
gentleman, do you believe that?"—only to be crushed into abjection by
Washington's silent look. (Once, at a gathering in
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Virginia, where Washington was in the habit of
meeting his neighbors as a fellow farmer, it was agreed beforehand that the
custom into which they had fallen, of rising at his entrance, be discontinued,
and that all keep their seats; but the very moment that he entered, and glanced
about the room, every man arose.)
The landlord and neighbor of Washington, on Market
Street, was Robert Morris; and Morris sold these holdings to put his money into
what was to be the grandest of all Philadelphia mansions. He bought the entire
block, between Chestnut and Walnut streets, and Seventh and Eighth, and there
put such vast sums of money into his new house as utterly to ruin him. The
house was never completed; before long it was destroyed for business
advancement; and it had an extraordinary quantity of underground structure,
with cellars and tunnels and walls and arches; and portions of these
underground or semi-underground constructions are still existent and from time
to time cause puzzled inquiry.
Another
Morris house, at 225 South Eighth Street, between Walnut and Spruce, built in
1786, may fairly be deemed the best example remaining of the old-time excellent town dwelling house of wealth and
beauty. Though far from being so old as some, it is of pre-Revolutionary style,
and is a broad-fronted building, admirably proportioned, with excellent door
and dormers, with windows twenty-four paned and wooden-shuttered; and it
contains, as do so many of the houses of this city, a great quantity of old
furniture, and old china. It is known as the Morris house,
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and has for some generations been owned by a Morris
family; but, as with the so-called Morris house of Germantown, it was not built
by a Morris nor was it owned by a Morris during the most interesting years of
its existence. It stands—an unusual condition for that part of the city— with a
garden space on either side of it.
And this is remindful of that altogether charming old
house, lovingly known as the "Yellow Mansion," which until a few
years ago stood, garden-surrounded and tree-shaded, in square-fronted serenity,
at Broad and Walnut streets.
The early builders were fortunate in their age, for
it was an age when it was hard to build unattractively; it was an age of
largely unconscious devotion to beauty; these old-time Philadelphians builded*
better than they knew, their conscious stone to beauty grew—only the poets
"stone" must here be rendered "brick." A universal sense of
beauty was diffused, and that is why the Colonial houses of America, or those
built near that time and following those ideals, are such models of taste. And
it is most satisfactory to find so many of the most beautiful ones still
preserved.
To
seek out the best examples in the old parts of the city, go if possible on
Sunday. On weekdays the streets are jammed and cluttered, and there is a roar
and thunder of traffic, and you see nothing but the heavy motor-trucks as you
cross the streets and the crowded sidewalks as you walk, every moment bumping
or bumped if your attention strays from your
____________
Transcriber’s Note:
This is not a transcription error.
The word is as it appears in the book.
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122
stepping. But
on Sunday the entire old-time district is open and deserted, with scarcely a
vehicle, scarcely any people on the sidewalks. Every old house is recognizable.
You see every worth-while gable and doorway and cornice. On weekdays, you think there is nothing there to
see; on Sundays you realize what a very great deal remains.
On South Ninth
Street, at No. 260, there are Kingly instead of Presidential memories; for in
this house, gray-plastered outside, with its end to the street, with a little
portico, with a bow front of wrought-iron, with wistaria clambering about,
there lived for a time a man who called himself Comte de Survilliers, but it
was no secret that he was really Joseph Bonaparte, formerly King of Spain. The
house still contains some fine old furniture of his time, including two fine
Empire sofas, and there is a great room still papered with the scenic paper
which was on the walls when he lived here, with lovely classic scenes in such
soft colorings as now to have become practically black and white.
At the
northeast corner of Fourth and Arch streets stands an old house, built about
1764, of much dignity and excellent lines; a house of three stories and a
dormered attic, and with the line of the front cornice continuing on the side
of the house along the base of the gable. And it has long been regarded as the
home of the first provost of the University of Pennsylvania, William Smith;
although recently some have claimed that his house was in reality the old house
on the diagonally opposite corner.
A distinguished man was Provost Smith,
a peppery
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irascible man,
besides being a man of dignity and learning; and when he was put into jail for
some months through a dispute with the Colonial Assembly, charged with having
assisted a Judge Moore in the preparation of an obnoxious pamphlet, he used his
time to excellent advantage, addressing with perfect composure and even
nonchalance his classes, who gathered outside of the jail window, and becoming
well acquainted with, and engaged to, the daughter of his fellow prisoner,
Judge Moore, and marrying her shortly after his release. To clear his name, he
then voyaged to England, and secured a royal order condemning in severe terms
the unwarranted imprisonment; an order which was quite annoying in its effects,
however, when the Revolution came and made royal favoritism unpopular!
A son of his marriage with Judge
Moore's daughter Rebecca (Rebecca was a favorite name with early
Philadelphians) had a daughter who as a little girl was given a calf for a pet;
and when, like other calves, it grew to cowhood, the British, who had by that
time attained the occupancy of Philadelphia and its immediate vicinity,
captured it. This granddaughter of the Provost learned that the raiding
troopers were of the division of Lord Cornwallis and so to the British camp she
made her way, and was led to the general's tent. She was only some thirteen
years of age, but demanded earnestly that her pet cow be restored. The general
looked at her genially, but asked if she had no father or brother who could
have appealed in her behalf, whereupon the little girl bravely
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124
replied that
her father was then in a military prison in Philadelphia and that her brothers
were with the Continental army. And at this Cornwallis, with all military
courtesy, ordered that her cow be driven back and, as the girl thanked him and
turned to leave, he handed her a little trinket, expressing the hope that she
would pleasantly keep in mind a British officer.
Little Letitia
Street used to be notable from its possession of what was known as the "Letitia
house"; some years ago removed to Fairmount Park and now known as the
"Penn house"; it being, supposedly, a house built by William Penn,
and probably for his daughter Letitia. The house as it stands is not as old as
the style of Penn's time, unless it has been somewhat altered; and it cannot
now be learned, with certainty, precisely whether or not this was the veritable
house after all. When people forget, deeds are the only evidence, and deeds,
after all, give only land boundaries; and when a deed covers a tract containing
several houses it is anybody's guess just which is some particularly sought-for
house, or what is the age of a house, except so far as certain indications are
usually evident as to this latter point.
Letitia Street has an undoubted
association of another kind, one which shows that human nature is always
essentially the same. At a little inn, long ago established in Letitia Street,
and long since gone, a young man one day appeared and announced that he had
sold himself to the devil, who was to come on a near-at-hand day and seize him,
unless he could raise redemption money. The people were so impressed by
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his plausible
plight that they actually raised, the money, and on the fateful day came with
it and placed it on a table in the middle of the room at the inn, and then
prayed; the number of ministers present being three. But, "The devil! The
devil at the window!" suddenly cried the young man, interrupting the
fervent prayers. At which everybody fled in wildest panic. And when, after a
while, a few crept hesitatingly back, the young man, and of course the money,
had gone.
One of the
prettiest stories of old Philadelphia is connected with one of the smallest of
the ancient houses of the city, still standing on Arch Street, between Second
and Third. And the most delightful thing about the delightful story is the fact
that Philadelphians are ready to fight, instantly and fiercely, if you speak of
the story as true!—a story which a city of different idiosyncrasies would
gladly grasp for itself. But there is a reason for this. For years, the story
was so sentimentalized, so intensely oversentimentalized, in pictures and
descriptions, as to give a disagreeable flavor. And, too, there was at one time
some financial exploitation which touched the city's pride.
The actual story is sweet and homely.
Elizabeth Ross, Betsey Ross, the widow of John Ross, a nephew of one of the
Signers, supported herself for a time as a lace cleaner and by carrying on the
business of her husband, who had been an upholsterer or "upholder,"
as the word was in those days. She did not long remain the Widow Ross, for a
soldier named Ashburn married her, and after he was captured and
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126
died a
prisoner in England, she was married again, this time to one Claypole,
understood to be a descendant of Cromwell.
Congress, in
June of 1777, voted for a flag of thirteen stripes, alternate red and white,
with thirteen stars, white in a blue field. Washington was in Philadelphia at
the time, over from New York on military business, and the committee which was
appointed by Congress to carry out the idea consulted with him. He knew Mrs.
Ross. She had cared for his lace cuffs, he knew her as a self-respecting,
self-supporting woman, and he led the committee to her house. Under their eyes,
Mrs. Ross cut and stitched, and soon the flag lay before them, the first of our
Stars and Stripes!
There is no
official record of her making that first flag. No importance was attached to
the matter. To Betsey Ross it was merely, as we nowadays should say, "all
in the day's work"; to the committee, and to Washington, it was just a
matter of finding the best woman for the work. Philadelphians say that had it
been Betsey Ross some claim would have been made earlier. But whoever it was
that made that first flag made no claim earlier! And those who doubt that
Betsey did it, I have no one else to suggest.
Old records, although none have been
found referring to that first flag, show that Mrs. Ross was afterwards given
considerable work by the Government as a maker of flags and colors, one single
payment for some ship's colors being fourteen pounds and twelve shillings.
There are traces for years, of
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her having won
her place as a maker of national flags; and she was a woman of some substance,
and of recognized position in business, in an age when women in business were
rare.
At the time of
the Centennial, in 1876, when everything Revolutionary assumed, in
Philadelphia, new and great prominence, a grandson of Betsey Ross told of the
flag-making, saying that when he was a boy of eleven, his grandmother, then
Mrs. Claypole, told in his hearing the story of the making of that first
American flag, under the very eye of General Washington. And at any rate, the
very idea is picturesque, of the scene, that day, in the little low-ceilinged
room of that tiny Arch Street house.
[One of the Ancient Alleys]
