by Most, Doug
12: BOOM!
James Groake took hold of a lantern with a candle burning: Wolf Koplan v. Boston Gas Light Company, Defendant’s Bill of Exceptions, Superior Court, Suffolk County, Massachusetts (Alfred Mudge and Son, 1900).
The biggest attraction besides the subway project: “Fall of Babylon,” Boston Daily Globe, February 9, 1897.
Just after eight o’clock: Wolf Koplan v. Boston Gas Light Company; “Court Admits It,” Boston Daily Globe, November 19, 1898.
two thousand leaks, or about twenty per day: Wolf Koplan v. Boston Gas Light Company.
The leather badge: “Licenses to Boston Bootblacks and Newsboys,” Boston Traveller, March 5, 1868.
When Koplan got to his corner: “The Suit of Wolf Koplan, the Bootblack,” Boston Journal, October 19, 1900.
The smell had been getting worse for months: “Told by Eyewitnesses,” Boston Daily Globe, March 5, 1897.
responsible for killing a cat: “Piling up Facts,” Boston Daily Globe, April 1, 1897.
“The subway people were to blame”: Ibid.
When the police officer Michael Whalen first detected the smell of gas: “Many Smelled the Gas,” Boston Daily Globe, March 5, 1897.
“Do you smell that?”: Wolf Koplan v. Boston Gas Light Company.
“Are you the Boston Gas Light Company?”: Ibid.
A few minutes before noon, three crowded streetcars rounded the corner: “Story of the Explosion,” Boston Daily Globe, March 5, 1897.
As Wolf Koplan gave one last wipe: “The Suit of Wolf Koplan, the Bootblack,” Boston Journal, October 19, 1900.
He cut his right thumb badly: “Court Admits It,” Boston Daily Globe, November 19, 1898.
“The people didn’t have a chance for their lives”: “People in Car Had No Chance,” Boston Daily Globe, March 5, 1897.
Reverend W. A. Start, the Tufts University bursar: “Six Killed, Others May Die,” Boston Daily Globe, March 5, 1897.
“It certainly seems that this accident could not have occurred”: “Mayor Quincy’s Statement,” Boston Daily Globe, March 5, 1897.
Carson wasted no time touring the tunnel: “Subway Is Not Injured,” Boston Daily Globe, March 5, 1897.
“It isn’t often that home news outshadows the inauguration of a new president”: “Story of the Explosion,” Boston Daily Globe, March 5, 1897.
On July 3, 1897, Sam Little invited a dozen reporters: “Rapid Transit Insured,” Boston Daily Globe, July 4, 1897.
On August 25 the joyous mood of the city: “Derrick Toppled Over,” Boston Daily Globe, August 26, 1897.
“remarkable … so conservative an American town”: “Boston’s Subway Finished,” New York Times, August 15, 1897.
13: “FIRST CAR OFF THE EARTH!”
She must have been quite the sight: “First Car off the Earth!,” Boston Daily Globe, September 1, 1897.
“birds were bubbling with the exuberance of morning”: Ibid.
“It has more galleries, colonnades, piazzas, and passages than I can remember”: Charles Dickens Online: The Works and Life of Charles Dickens, http://www.dickens-online.info/american-notes-page16.html.000.
Strapping James Reed: “Reward for Faithfulness,” Boston Daily Globe, September 1, 1897.
“All aboard for the subway and Park Street”: “First Car Off the Earth,” Boston Daily Globe, September 2, 1897.
He announced that his name was C. W. Davis: “First Car off the Earth!” Boston Daily Globe, September 1, 1897.
A “horror of tunnels”: Fogelson, Downtown, 57.
“the roaring of the ocean after a storm”: Report to the Massachusetts Legislature, Massachusetts Commission to Promote Rapid Transit for the City of Boston and Its Suburbs, April 5, 1892, 155.
“Oh, dear, isn’t it delightful”: “First Car off the Earth!” Boston Daily Globe, September 1, 1897.
“What a difference there was in the ride this morning”: Ibid.
“O, Mister Captain, stop the ship!” Ibid.
“Bravo, bravo”: Ibid.
“Damn me if I’ll go through this again”: Ibid.
They were especially admiring of the subway employees: Ibid.
“hissed along like a brood of vipers”: Ibid.
The turnstile was a new contraption for the times: “Novelty Over,” Boston Daily Globe, September 3, 1897.
When one exceptionally overweight gentleman got stuck: “Every Car Crowded,” Boston Daily Globe, September 2, 1897.
By 11:15 A.M., one office had sold 2,500 tickets: Ibid.
“Why can’t the conductors take cash fares on the cars as before”: Ibid.
“It’s a shame to have such incompetents doing such work”: “First Car off the Earth,” Boston Daily Globe, September 1, 1897.
“Nearly everything went as smooth”: Ibid.
“If a woman should fall”: Ibid.
“Hmmm”: Ibid.
“I think Boston is going to like it and like it a great deal”: Ibid.
14: THE BRAINS, THE BUILDER, AND THE BANKER
“In spite of these precautions, however, the air in the tunnel is extremely offensive … small, badly ventilated”: W. M. Barclay Parsons, “Report on Rapid Transit in Foreign Cities,” 1894, 10.
“decidedly novel features”: Ibid., 51.
“These motors are designed to attain a speed of fifty miles per hour”: Ibid., 52.
“This is due largely to the confusion”: Ibid., 57.
“the nervous and active temperament of the people”: Ibid.
“There is a wide-spread popular idea”: Ibid., 60.
“On [steam] locomotives”: Ibid., 10.
“the balance of economy is in favor of electricity”: Ibid., 63.
On March 12, 1895, fifty angry developers stampeded into a meeting: “Property Owners Object,” New York Times, March 13, 1895.
“I feel that an elevated railroad would be ruinous to this property”: Ibid.
“What character of construction other than a viaduct would you advise?”: Ibid.
“I am prepared to act understandingly”: “Great West Side Wins,” New York Times, March 20, 1895.
“More than 1,800 years ago”: Report of the Board of Rapid Transit Railroad Commissioners for the City of New York (W. P. Mitchell and Sons, 1896), 114.
“It means the end”: “Decides Against Tunnel,” New York Times, May 23, 1896.
“You must excuse me”: “Mr. Parsons Not Communicative,” New York Times, May 23, 1896.
“exceedingly expensive … It is therefore not unlikely that within a couple of years”: “Boston’s Subway Finished,” New York Times, August 15, 1897.
“We have the worst”: New York Transit Museum with Heller, City Beneath Us, 20.
“They are very similar to our Boston plans”: “Subway Plans Favored,” New York Times, October 7, 1897.
he drank a glass of pilsner at ten thirty before going off to bed: William Steinway Diary, entry for August 6, 1896, http://americanhistory.si.edu/steinwaydiary/diary/?entry=12040&search=burglar.
“I am not and will not be a presidential candidate”: “So says Ex Secretary of the Navy William C. Whitney: ‘I am not a candidate!’” Boston Daily Globe, June 10, 1895.
Her head slammed with a sickening thud: “Met with an Accident,” Boston Daily Globe, February 22, 1898.
The Times projected that if the new route carried: “Profits of the Underground Road,” New York Times, November 29, 1899.
one of New York’s most famous lawyers, Wheeler H. Peckham: “Boston’s Subway Favored,” New York Times, October 7, 1897.
Even the steady rain and soggy snow falling: “Damp Day for Old New York,” New York Times, January 1, 1898.
Before leaving, Parsons penned a seven-page letter: Malcolm, William Barclay Parsons, 19–20.
He offered to build the subway within three years: “All City Railways in One,” New York Times, March 30, 1899.
In a statement released by his company on April 17, 1899: “Subway Bid Withdrawn,”
New York Times, April 18, 1899.
mountains of peanut shells, and random pieces of clothing: “City’s Greeting to 1900,” New York Times, January 2, 1900.
“Money is not so cheap now”: “Bids for Rapid Transit,” New York Times, January 12, 1900.
On Monday around eleven o’clock, January 15, 1900: “Two Rapid Transit Bids Are Received,” New York Times, January 16, 1900.
“I expect to get the contract”: Ibid.
“My Dear Mr. Orr”: “Mr. Whitney to Mr. Orr,” New York Times, January 18, 1900.
“Absurd!”: “Mr. M’Donald Gets Rapid Transit Work,” New York Times, January 17, 1900.
he enjoyed a quiet dinner and drinks at the Hotel Savoy: Ibid.
“Yes, I am Mr. McDonald’s financial agent”: “Rapid Transit Situation,” New York Times, January 30, 1900.
Three weeks later, on February 24, 1900: “The Rapid Transit Contract Is Signed,” New York Times, February 25, 1900.
“Here is the gentleman who gives me the privilege of signing this contract”: Ibid.
“I am a contractor, not a railroad man”: Brian Cudahy, A Century of Subways: Celebrating 100 Years of New York’s Underground Railways (Oxford University Press, 2009), 10.
“I found the door closed”: James Blaine Walker, Fifty Years of Rapid Transit, 1864–1917 (Law Print, 1918), 169.
“I resolved to go straight to a man who was all powerful”: Ibid.
It was a secret that Whitney took to his grave: “Crisis in Subways that Belmont Met,” New York Times, October 2, 1913.
“Constructing the tunnel will be simple”: “Talks of Tunnel Plans,” New York Times, January 18, 1900.
15: PLAYING WITH DYNAMITE
“stood out like poppies in a dandelion field”: “Edwin A. Robinson, Poet, Is Dead at 66,” New York Times, April 6, 1935.
“Haven’t you any water or soap in Yonkers?”: “Dirty Italians Lectured,” New York Times, March 25, 1900.
It was supposed to be a miserable day of rain: “Rapid Transit Tunnel Begun,” New York Times, March 25, 1900.
“The completion of this undertaking”: Ibid.
“Bravo, old man”: Ibid.
“If your laborers shirk work like that”: Bobrick, Labyrinths of Iron, 227.
Two days later, on March 26, 1900, at the corner of Bleecker and Greene streets: “Actual Work on the Big Tunnel Begun,” New York Times, March 27, 1900.
A single actor named Joseph Jefferson played Rip Van Winkle more than 2,500 times: Felicia Londre and Margot Berthold, The History of World Theater (Continuum International Publishing Group, 1999), 213.
At Sherry’s on Forty-fourth Street and Fifth Avenue: New York Public Library, Menus, http://menus.nypl.org/menus/13242.
Giant mastodon bones surfaced near Dyckman Street: New York Transit Museum with Heller, City Beneath Us, 19.
It came to be called the Bloody Pit: Carl Byron, A Pinprick of Light (New England Press, 1995), 1.
“I am no prophet”: New York World, December 23, 2004.
His task was a routine and essential one: “Rapid Transit Sub-Contract Let,” New York Times, March 24, 1900.
A mixture of Italians, Swedes, blacks, and Irish: “Actual Work on the Big Tunnel Begun,” New York Times, March 27, 1900.
“I’m on strike”: “Tunnel Strike Was Brief,” New York Times, April 3, 1900.
It sat on a rock at such a steep angle: Hood, 722 Miles, 87.
Ira Shaler was never the war hero like his father: “Major Ira A. Shaler Dead,” New York Times, June 30, 1902.
“Run for your life!”: “Death in Tunnel Dynamite Explosion,” New York Times, January 28, 1902.
On the morning of January 27: Ibid.
“blow the whole hill to hell”: “Excess of Dynamite Stored in Tunnel,” New York Times, February 5, 1902.
“I thought the end of us had come”: Ibid.
But the hotel manager, a kindly fellow named Washington L. Jacques: Ibid.
“I knew that something big was on hand”: Ibid.
Two months after the fatal blast: “Cave-in and Ruin Along Park Avenue,” New York Times, March 22, 1902.
“This accident.… was one which could not be foreseen”: Ibid.
“Hoodoo Contractor”: “Major Shaler Crushed Under Fall of Rock,” New York Times, June 18, 1902.
They arrived on June 17, a few minutes before eight o’clock, and all three men walked down into the ground: Ibid.
“That stone doesn’t look right to me”: New York Transit Museum with Heller, City Beneath Us, 22.
“I think my back is broken”: “Major Shaler Crushed Under Fall of Rock,” New York Times, June 18, 1902.
“It was simply Major Shaler’s ill fortune”: Malcolm, William Barclay Parsons, 51.
Shaler’s death shook Parsons: Ibid.
“We have the tools and machinery”: “Parsons and McDonald Clash over Subway,” New York Times, September 18, 1903.
“Clash?” Parsons answered: Ibid.
Andrew Carnegie, was awarded the bid to supply: “Sub-Contracts for Tunnel Awarded,” New York Times, April 17, 1900.
The moment the Miners’ Union got word: “Miners Flock to New York,” New York Times, April 28, 1901.
“they are in love with life in the bowels of the earth”: Ibid.
It was about ten thirty at night on October 24: “Death and Destruction by Subway Blast,” New York Times, October 25, 1903; “Ten Were Killed in Subway Disaster,” New York Times, October 26, 1903.
“Kyrie, eleison,” or “Lord have mercy”: Ibid.
“Sorry for you, little man”: Ibid.
“Whether the falling in of the mass of rock was due to moisture”: Ibid.
“a seam that could not have been detected”: Malcolm, William Barclay Parsons, 52.
“The rock was weaker than any of us knew”: New York Transit Museum with Heller, City Beneath Us, 23.
On New Year’s Day of 1904, New York’s newest mayor: “On Handcars Through Six Miles of Subway,” New York Times, January 2, 1904.
On January 28, 1904, a Thursday evening, Whitney joined his secretary: “William C. Whitney Passes Away,” New York Times, February 3, 1904.
eulogized Whitney in the pages of Harper’s Weekly: “William Collins Whitney,” Harper’s Weekly, February 27, 1904.
Dr. Thomas Darlington, New York’s commissioner for public health, wrote an essay in the Sunday World: Bobrick, Labyrinths of Iron, 232.
If a fuse on the front engine burns out: “Some Subway ‘Ifs’ and ‘Don’ts,’” New York Times, October 27, 1904.
16: OCTOBER 27, 1904
For older New Yorkers, October 27, 1904, had a familiar feel: “Our Subway Open, 150,000 Try It; Mayor McClellan Runs the First Official Train,” New York Times, October 28, 1904.
“Git a programme”: Ibid.
“I don’t want the public to pass judgment on the road”: “Subway Opening Today with Simple Ceremony,” New York Times, October 27, 1904.
“Presented to August Belmont by the directors”: “Loving Cup to Belmont Given at Subway Feast,” New York Times, October 28, 1904.
“The subway would not have been built if I had not taken hold of the work”: Walker, Fifty Years of Rapid Transit, 167.
“When the dirt is off your shovel”: Michael W. Brooks, Subway City: Riding the Trains, Reading New York (Rutgers University Press, 1997), 64.
“Without rapid transit, Greater New York”: “Exercises in City Hall,” New York Times, October 28, 1904.
“Mr. Mayor, Mr. Orr, and Mr. President”: Ibid.
“I scarcely believe that their patience”: Ibid.
“I, as mayor, in the name of the people”: Ibid.
“Doesn’t fit very well”: “McClellan Motorman of First Subway Train,” New York Times, October 28, 1904.
“Shall I slow her down here”: Ibid.
“Slower, here, sloooow-er!” Ibid.
“Well, that was a little tiresome”: Ibid.
In the next f
ive hours, 111,881 passengers would pay to ride the subway: “Rush Hour Blockade Jams Subway Crowds,” New York Times, October 29, 1904.
“Let ’em in”: “McClellan Motorman of First Subway Train,” New York Times, October 28, 1904.
EPILOGUE
In Boston, on September 3, 1897, two day after America’s first subway opened: “Novelty Over,” Boston Daily Globe, September 3, 1897.
F. B. Shipley stood up: “Our Subway Open, 150,000 Try It,” New York Times, October 28, 1904.
And it took barely a minute of operation: “Lost Diamonds in Subway,” New York Times, October 28, 1904.
Sadly for Sprague, who died on October 25: Harriet Chapman Jones Sprague, Frank J. Sprague and the Edison Myth (William Frederick Press, 1947).
A rambling letter to his daughter Laura in 1914: Letter from Henry Whitney to daughter, October 28, 1914, courtesy of Laura Marshall to author.
And all he left behind was $1,221.93, a $400 Dodge: “H.M. Whitney Left $1,221,” New York Times, June 22, 1923.
On a bitter morning in February 1912: “Visit Old Pneumatic Tunnel,” New York Times, February 9, 1912; Brennan, Beach Pneumatic; Hood, 722 Miles, 48.
One count tallied 2,131 shipwrecks: Malcolm, William Barclay Parsons, 78.
On March 21, 2013, a present-day sandhog: “To Save a Man’s Life, a Muddy Tug of War with the Earth Itself,” New York Times, March 20, 2013; “Trapped Worker Rescued by FDNY Says Thanks,” New York Daily News, April 17, 2013.
In New York, 1.7 billion trips: MTA Facts and Figures, http://www.mta.info/nyct/facts/ffsubway.htm; “MBTA Ridership Hits New Record,” Boston Globe, July 31, 2012.
an article appeared in the Los Angeles Times: “L.A. to N.Y. in Half an Hour?,” Los Angeles Times, June 11, 1972.
“Safe, convenient, low-cost, efficient”: Robert M. Salter, “Trans-Planetary Subway Systems,” The Rand Paper Series, The Rand Corporation, February 1978, 1.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Blodgett, Geoffrey. The Gentle Reformers: Massachusetts Democrats in the Cleveland Era. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1966.
Bobrick, Benson. Labyrinths of Iron: Subways in History, Myth, Art, Technology, and War. New York: Henry Holt, 1981.
_____. Parsons Brinckerhoff: The First 100 Years. New York: Van Nostrand Reinhold, 1985.
Brennan, Joseph. Beach Pneumatic: Alfred Beach’s Pneumatic Subway and the Beginnings of Rapid Transit in New York. 2004–05. http://www.columbia.edu/~brennan/beach/.