Peter Cooper Square, Bowery, East Village

Photograph shows the back of the Peter Cooper Monument (foreground) in the East Village in New York, NY, looking south from Peter Cooper Square toward Bowery. Third Avenue elevated crossing Fourth Avenue. Photo by Angelo Rizzuto (1906-1967), dated October 1952. Source: Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

Peter Cooper (1791–1883), a native New Yorker, was a philanthropist, industrialist, and inventor, who became one of the most successful American businessmen of his day. He made his fortune in iron, glue, railroads, real estate, and communications. The monument was dedicated on May 29, 1897. More: New York in the 1950s ►