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Edgar Allen Poe
Born Edgar Poe in Boston in 1809, he lived his first years in Virginia where his father was a traveling actor. Both parents died when he was three, and he was taken in by a wealthy planter named John Allen, who re-christened him Edgar Allen Poe. At 17, Poe enrolled at the University of Virginia . . . (cont.)
Click here for more on Edgar Allen Poe and the artists of Greenwich Village.
Built in 1831, the Dispensary was a low cost clinic affiliated with New York Hospital. In the old days, New York was plagued by regular eruptions of malaria, cholera, and yellow fever, and people came up here to the farms to escape. Edgar Allen Poe was said to have come here for treatment in 1851. . . (cont.)
In 1797, Newgate Prison was opened on the banks of the Hudson just a few blocks from here, serving as the principal penitentiary for the State of New York . It sat perched on a rampart over-looking the Hudson from the foot of Christopher St. The prison itself was considered a model of reform . . . (cont.)
Here's a photograph taken in 1860. St. Joseph's is at center left. Notice the wooden canopies hanging over the sidewalk. It almost looks like a western town. And the rails set in the avenue. Those were precursors to the El's. Horse-drawn omni-buses like the one on screen would have traveled along it . . . (cont.)
Click here for more on the evolution of 6th avenue and the elevated railroad.
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