Old Broadway at City Hall Park

Photograph shows traffic, pedestrians and buildings on the west side of Broadway, facing City Hall Park (right). At the left margin is a portion of the old Astor House, on the southwest corner of Barclay Street. On the opposite corner is the old 6-story American Hotel building, destroyed by fire in 1866 and replaced in the same year by another 6-story office building. This block, from Barclay St. to Park Place is the site of the Woolworth Building, completed in 1913. A Harlem & Yorkville-Direct horse-drawn streetcar is on the right. In 1869, the Post Office began to be constructed on the southern side of City Hall Park, seen on the right.
This part of Broadway was laid out after 1750, when Trinity Church leased lots on its old Church Farm. Before that, Broadway did not extended to the north beyond St. Paul's Chapel.

Looking north Broadway from the intersection of Park Row (to the right). Photograph by the American Studio, about 1860. Source: Photographic views from the collections of the New York Public Library. Continue below...