Skip to main content

Stuyvesant Square Park, Manhattan

Stuyvesant Square (1930)
New York Public Library

Stuyvesant Square Park is a park spanning from East 15th Street north to East 17th Street and from Rutherford Place east to Nathan D. Perlman Place. The square is commonly thought to be named for Peter Stuyvesant, the last of the Dutch Director-General of the colony of New Netherlands until it was ceded to English control in 1664. It is actually named for Peter Gerard Stuyvesant.
Stuyvesant Square (1905)
Museum of the City of New York

The park lies within what was the Stuyvesant family farm. The farm once stretched from the Bowery to the East River and from 3rd Street to 14th Street. The park itself is in the approximate location of the original Stuyvesant family mansion.

Randel Farm Map 1818-1820

In 1836, Peter Gerard Stuyvesant and his wife Hellen Rutherford reserved four acres of the family farm and sold it to the City of New York for $5 as a public park, with the proviso that the City of New York build a fence around it. The park square, originally to be named Holland Square, ultimately was named for it's namesake benefactor. Peter Gerard Stuyvesant co-founded the New York Historical Society and was among the richest Americans at the time. He is also the great-great-grandson of Peter Stuyvesant.

Stuyvesant Square (1815)
New York Public Library

The Square remained vacant until a 1839 lawsuit by Stuyvesant spurred development of the valuable land, and caused the City to enclose the land. The cast iron fence erected in 1847 still stands today, and is thought to be among the oldest and possibly the second-oldest park fence in New York City. The oldest park fence surrounds Bowling Green, erected in 1771.

Stuyvesant Square (1918)
Museum of the City of New York

The park's two fountains were installed by 1850 and opened to the public. The park was rehabilitated in the 1930s, with modifications by landscape architect Gilmore D. Clarke, including construction of comfort stations, playgrounds and other built amenities.

Stuyvesant Square and Beth Israel Hospital (1929)
Museum of the City of New York

Park monuments include:

Director General (Governor) Peter Stuyvesant (1591-1672) the last governor-general of the Dutch colony. The statue by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, was unveiled in 1941 with Stuyvesant standing on his peg leg. The statue was donated by the Netherland American Foundation, and was exhibited by the Netherlands Pavilion in the 1939 New York World's Fair. Ironically, the sculpture faces the Friends Meeting House of the Quakers, a denomination he persecuted in life.

Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904) the renowned Bohemian composer and director of the National Conservatory of Music of America. Among his compositions is "Music From The New World" The Czech's former home was 327 E 17 Street, today the site of The Robert Mapplethorpe Residential Treatment Facility - a unit of the Mount Sinai Beth Israel Medical Center. The facility is named for the avant-garde photographer. The bronze monument, by Croatian-American sculptor Ivan Mestrovic, was unveiled in 1963 and relocated to the Square in 1997 from the roof of Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Hall.

Beth Israel Hospital From Stuyvesant Square (1935-1941)
NYC Department of Records

The nearby fashionable Stuyvesant Building, located at 17 Livingston Place, was once home to publisher George Putnam, magazine editor Elizabeth Jordan, and Elizabeth Custer, widow to General George Armstrong Custer.
Friends Meeting House (1935-1941)
NYC Department of Records

Currently named Mount Sinai Beth Israel Medical Center, then Beth Israel Hospital opened its location at the corner of Stuyvesant Square in 1929. The neighborhood has a rich history of hospitals that served first the German and Irish immigrants that began moving into the new rowhouses and brownstones in the neighborhood, but were soon followed by Jewish, Italian, and Slavic immigrants. Current and former neighborhood hospitals included The New York Infirmary for Women and Children founded by Dr. Elizabeth Blackwell at 321 E 15 Street, The New York Lying-In Hospital, the Hospital for Joint Diseases, the Salvation Army's William Booth Memorial Hospital, Manhattan General Hospital, and St. Andrew's Convalescent Hospital.
Friends Meeting House (1935-1941)
NYC Department of Records

The nearby St. George's Episcopal Church opened in 1856. The parish had been founded in 1749 as a chapel of Trinity Church on land donated by Peter Gerard Stuyvesant, and was attended by J.P. Morgan. The Church was first built from 1846-1856 as an early example of the Romanesque Revival. The church burnt down in 1865, but was rebuilt to match the original. It's spires were removed in 1886.

The Friends Meeting House (1961)
NYC Department of Records

The Friends Meeting House and Seminary was completed in 1861 by Charles Bunting. It was built by the Hicksite Friends, a sect of the Quakers.


St. George's Episcopal Church (1980)
Library of Congress

There exists debate whether Rutherford Place is named for Colonel John Rutherford, one of the commissioners to lay the street grid system on the island or Hellen Rutherford, who with her husband Stuyvesant made the donation which founded the square.

St. George's Episcopal Church (1980)
Library of Congress
The park is operated and maintained by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, but receives additional support in preserving the park's historic beauty from The Friends of Stuyvesant Square Park.
St. George's Episcopal Church
Library of Congress
St. George's Episcopal Church
Library of Congress



Stuyvesant Square (1961)
Museum of the City of New York
Stuyvesant Square (1961)
Museum of the City of New York
Stuyvesant Square 1983-1988
NYC Department of Records

Stuyvesant Square (1930)
New York Public Library
Stuyvesant Square (1930)
New York Public Library


The Friends School (1937)
NYC Department of Records

East 15th Street
New York Public Library
East 15th Street
New York Public Library
East 15th Street
New York Public Library
Labels:
Location: Stuyvesant Square, New York, NY 10003, USA

Popular posts from this blog

Franklin D. Roosevelt Drive, Manhattan

East River Drive at 81st Street June 8, 1942 Museum City of New York Franklin D. Roosevelt Drive, formerly the East River Drive, is 9.5 miles long. The FDR Drive extends from the Battery to the Triborough Bridge. The Drive is not designed to current interstate standards, therefore the FDR is closed to commercial traffic. However buses can use the highways in certain locations. Due to its antiquated design, the speed limit maximum is 40 miles per hour. In the 1920s, calls first began for a waterfront highway began - initially being called the "Chyrstie-Forsyth Parkway." The FDR Drive is an amalgamation of sections that were constructed in different styles. Construction of the East River Drive began in 1934. The parkway section from East 92nd street to East 125th required ingenious methods of construction in a narrow right-of-way. A six-lane parkway was conceived by Robert Moses in the 100 foot right-of-way. This section was completed and opened in 1936. East ...
Read more

Shore Acres, Staten Island

Shore Acres  is a neighborhood in eastern Staten Island, between Rosebank and Fort Wadsworth.  The area remains today a secluded enclave of pricey, waterfront homes.  The neighborhood's generally agreed boundaries are Bay Street to the West, Nautilus Street to the North, New York Bay to the East and Arthur Von Briesen Park to the South. Topographical Map of Shore Acres (1906-1913) New York Public Library Arthur Von Briesen Library of Congress The serene Von Briesen Park is 12.77 acres.  The site of Von Briesen Park was the former estate of Arthur Von Briesen (1843-1920).  Von Briesen was a native of Germany, a sergeant during the Civil War and New York lawyer.  In 1876, Von Briesen helped found the German Legal Aid Society which provided free legal services to poor German immigrants in New York.  After rising to the position of President of the society, Von Briesen argued for the broadening of benefits to all immigrants and in 1896 the soc...
Read more

Fort Totten, Queens

Fort Totten Park is a former United States Army installation in Bayside, Queens on the north shore of Long Island. Decommissioned as a military base in the 1970s, Fort Totten is located at the head of Little Neck Bay where the East River widens to become the Long Island Sound. Although the United States Army Reserve maintains a presence since 1974, the property is currently owned by the City of New York. Fort Totten Flag Bearers New York Public Library Construction began in 1862 after the United States government purchased the land from the Willet family.  The former federal military base was composed of 93 acres.  Plans for the Civil War-era project were initially prepared by Captain Robert E. Lee in 1857.  Construction was undertaken five years later to protect the eastern approach of New York Harbor from the Confederate States, along with Fort Schuyler across the East River in the Bronx. The fort was named for General Joseph Gilbert Totten (1788-1864...
Read more