Ridin’ in a horse car the other day I met an old friend of mine who has been on the police force for years, John Elder, and whose brother-in-law, Milne Parker, was the man who first introduced horse cars into New York.
This Milne Parker was quite a character in his way, and the boss coach-builder of old New York. All the big coachmakers served their time under him. Brewster was his apprentice once. So was Joe Godwin, who has retired on his money long ago, and Flandrau, and Jefferson Brown, and a lot of others.
Well, this Parker was an ingenious chap, and used to run his wagons from the shop to the show room–or what answered the purpose of a show room–on a sort of truck, runnin’ on a sort of tramway or a railroad. An idea struck Parker, and he began to experiment on this railway and this truck, to see how much power would be required to move the truck along on the tramway.
He calculated pretty closely, and at last figured out just how large and heavy a car could be moved along a railway on the level by one horse. Then he set to work and built just such a car.
He then applied to the city fathers–there weren’t so many of ‘em then as now–for permission to lay at his own cost a track down along some principal street, to show how a car could be moved along by horse-power.
After some little palaverin’ the permission was granted (it didn’t cost the city anythin’ to let a citizen do anythin’ at his own expense) and a railway was laid down from Prince to Houston streets along the Bowery. Then the car was carried or carted to the railway and dumped on it, and a horse was attached to it. The car was rough but strong–about the general size and makeup of one of the Bleecker street bobtail cars, though smaller. On the day appointed for the openin’ of this “one-horse railroad” there was a big crowd all along the Bowery, and the police were kept busy keepin’ the crowd out of the car. Bein’ so small, all the city fathers, most of whom were pretty large, couldn’t get in the car at once.
So the Aldermen divided themselves into squads and took their first ride in a New York horse car by installments. Some of the smart Aldermen “doubled” on ‘emselves, turned repeaters and got a ride two or three times. At last all the Council had “done the grand tour” from Prince to Houston streets and return, and bein’ perfectly satisfied, and seein’ that really a big thing had just been successfully begun, they invited Parker to a big dinner, and so treated ‘emselves, as well as Parker, to a jamboree.
From this one horse, one car and one block of railway, spread all the hundreds of miles and thousands of cars and horses of the city railroads of New York–old Vanderbilt being one of the first to see the money in ‘em, and to get a valuable franchise from the city for a song, which franchise under the shape of the Fourth avenue railway, helps to-day to fill the everlastin’ pockets of “his son William.”
Parker was also interested in stages, and it is claimed that he started the very first line of “local” stages or ‘buses that traversed the city of New York. This first line was known as “Asa Hall’s line,” and ran from the corner of Canal and Broadway–Canal street bein’ then pretty far uptown–down to the Bowlin’ Green.
These original ‘buses were even clumsier than the ‘buses of to-day; they only held six or eight people, were small, uncomfortable, and made a terrible racket. The fare was six cents, and was carefully collected before the ‘bus started or the moment the passenger got in.
After a while they started a line of stages from the City Hall to Yorkville. This was considered at the time a great evidence of the growth and prosperity of New York. Just to think of it: a daily line of stages between New York and Yorkville–one stage a day each way–fare twenty-five cents–four horses to each stage. And the driver tootin’ his horn all the way, just as they do this very day in “coachin’,” So, you see, how true it is that “the story repeats itself.”
In the course of time this Yorkville line passed into the hands of Kellinger, who kept the old Five-Mile House, near where the Rink stands now. Then Kip & Brown started a stage line on the west side of Broadway, and so the ‘buses got their foothold in New York.
This Milne Parker was one of the three city magistrates of his day. These city magistrates were the same as the police justices now, only they only got $1,500 a year instead of $6,000. Hobson, Merritt and Parker were the three city magistrates, and answered their purposes very well. When the Tombs was finished they moved their quarters thither, and presided over affairs with a tremendous amount of dignity and style.
The city marshals were even more tremendous fellows than the city magistrates, and embraced among their number such bright and shinin’ lights as Harry Drinker, called “Drinker, the Judge,” (though he might more properly have been called a judge of good drinkin’); George Relyea, (everybody in old New York used to know George Relyea); Emmanuel Josephs, or Portuguese Joe; and T. McReae. Talmadge was Recorder then, and Counselor Terhune was the favorite Tombs lawyer.
The city marshals, when they had nothin’ to do, on a rainy day for instance, when they did not feel like doin’ anythin’, used to amuse ‘emselves, and forgot their tremendous dignity awhile by holdin’ “a Court of Dover,” as they called it–a mock court in which everybody was fined for everythin’, and every fine was a drink for the crowd. By frequent “practice at the bar” of this court of Dover, Counselor Terhune several times got into a state which unfitted him to practice in the regular courts. Once he got so lively that, drivin’ down-town in a crazy old wagon of his, behind a broken down horse who depended chiefly on the shafts of the wagon to hold him up, he drove the entire rig–horse, wagon and lawyer–right into the bar-room in which the Court of Dover was held.
This bar-room was directly even with the street, standin’ where Howe & Hummel’s offices stand now. Of course the advent of a horse and wagon in this bar-room made a local “stir,” but the stir was still greater when it was found that although the rig had got in without any great difficulty, it couldn’t be got out at all. It had got so wedged in that at one time it was thought that they would have to tear down some of the woodwork to get the wagon and horse out–though this necessity was at last, with infinite ingenuity, avoided.
Once Counselor Terhune appeared in the Police Court as a lawyer in a good deal worse state than the prisoner he represented. He was accordingly reprimanded, and, as an excuse, he made the apology that he had been puttin’ in an appearance at the Court of Dover.
“What court is that?” asked the presidin’ magistrate.
The counselor explained, and explained so funnily that his Honor burst out laughin’.
And instead of “throwing Terhune over the bar,” that is, disbarrin’ him, the magistrate himself, after the adjourning of his own court, went across the street and was initiated into the mysteries of the Court of Dover.
[Editor’s notes: Cornelius W. Terhune was admitted to the New York bar in 1838; the “Court of Dover” events described above likely took place in the 1840s. The long tradition of the “Court of Dover” within the legal fraternity was described by law professor Angela Fernandez in a 2011 academic paper, “The Ancient and Honorable Court of Dover: Mock Trials, Fraternal Orders, and Solemn Foolery in Nineteenth-Century New York State.”
—
The Harlem Railroad was opened November 14, 1832. From the Morning Courier and Enquirer:
“The Harlem Railroad Company with the Mayor, Corporation, and strangers of distinction, left the City Hall in carriages to the place of depot near Union Square, where two splendid cars made by Milne Parker, each with two horses, were in waiting. These cars are made low with broad iron wheels which fit the flanges of the railroad after an improved model from the Liverpool and Manchester cars. They resemble an omnibus, or rather several omnibuses attached to each other, padded with fine cloth and handsome glass windows, each capable of containing, outside and inside, fully forty passengers. The company was soon seated and the horses trotted off in handsome style, with great ease, at the rate of about twelve miles, followed by a number of private barouches and horsemen. Groups of spectators greeted the passengers of the cars with shouts and every window in the Bowery was filled.
“After the experiment, the company and guests dined at the City Hotel and terminated, in a very agreeable manner, the first essay of New Yorkers on a railroad in their own city.
“The comfort and convenience of this railroad to our citizens will be inconceivable. Instead of being cramped and confined to a single lot of ground and a close atmosphere in the city, an acre or two will be purchased and a comfortable house built at a reduced expense, a garden, orchard, dairy and other conveniences follow; and the train of railroad carriages will start from Trinity Church and convey passengers to Harlem and the intermediate stopping places, with as much facility and ease as they are now conveyed to Greenwich Village. These are a few of the advantages which this small undertaking promises; and in fact it will make Harlem the suburbs of New York. For fishing excursions to Harlem River and pleasant summer rides, it is presumed the cars will be kept in constant motion.”]
