SENECA VILLAGE

SENECA VILLAGE

COMMUNITY DESTROYED FOR URBAN DEVELOPMENT TO CREATE LUXURY CENTRAL PARK

The Seneca Village Project includes several integrated components: archaeological and archival research and education. The Seneca Village project, which formed in 1998, is dedicated to raising awareness about Seneca Village’s significance as a free, middle-class black community in 19th century New York City. The project facilitates educational programs, which engage school children, teachers and the general public, and bring Seneca Village into public knowledge.

In February 2001, Parks Commissioner Henry Stern, State Senator David Paterson, Borough President C. Virginia Fields, and New York Historical Society Executive Director Betsy Gotbaum unveiled the Historical Sign commemorating the site where Seneca Village once stood.

24_senecavillage_820THE MIDDLE CLASS SENECA VILLAGE

Seneca Village existed from 1825 through 1857. In 1825, when Andrew Williams and Epiphany Davis became the first African Americans to purchase land in the area, which stretched from West 82nd to West 85th streets between Seventh and Eighth Avenues. Within a week of these initial purchases, the Trustees of the AME Zion Church purchased eight lots of nearby land. By 1829, nine relatively substantial houses had been built in the area. Within Seneca Village, 50% of African-American residents owned their own land; which was five times the average ownership rate for ALL New Yorkers. Several Seneca Village property owners, including Albro Lyons, Levin Smith and S. Hardenburgh, were prominent in the abolitionist movement.

The village was built in a desirable location, with proximity to the Hudson River’s ample fishing opportunities and to a natural source of clean water at a nearby spring. The village’s residences ranged from one-room homes to three-story dwellings made of wood and brick. There were three churches, schools and several cemeteries.

It was located between 82nd and 89th Streets and Seventh and Eighth Avenues. Today, this area is part of Central Park. Seneca Village was Manhattan’s first significant community of African American property owners. By the 1840s, it had become a multi-ethnic community African Americans, Irish, and German immigrants, and perhaps a few Native Americans. In 1855, the New York State Census reported approximately 264 individuals living in the village. There were three churches, as well as a school and several cemeteries. Within two years, Seneca Village would be razed and its identity erased by the creation of Central Park which was a government decision at the time called urban development another means take what is profitable and make more slum environment for them.

The Razing Talks of a centralized park in Manhattan park became serious in 1848, with the publication of Andrew Downing’s “A Talk about Public Parks and Gardens.” A horticulturalist and landscape designer, Downing believed that creating public space would advance in urban environments. He believed that Manhattan was the ideal location for a public park because it would promote social freedom by providing a space for interaction between different classes.

The original location selected for this park was at Jones Wood, which was near the East River. Downing immediately opposed the location, claiming that it was too small and would not be effective in serving the larger purpose. In July 1851, the Common Council took Downing’s advice and wanted “the piece of ground lying between Fifth and Eighth Avenues, Fifty-Ninth and One Hundred Sixth Streets.”

When Manhattanites found out about this change in location, they organized a petition against the new location, which gained thousands of signatures. The petition stated that “the time to consummate this desirable object should no longer be delayed,” and that the Council should work as soon as possible on the land which is “so eligibly situated,” referring back to the original location at Jones Woods. Consequently, the subcommittee overturned the plans, and went back to the construction of a park at Jones Woods. This was short-lived, for Fernando Wood, the new Mayor, used his power to veto the resolution on March 23, 1855.

As the campaign to create Central Park moved forward park advocates and the media began to describe Seneca Village and other communities in this area as “shantytowns” and the residents there as “squatters”. The village was razed for park construction. Residents were offered $2,335 for their property. Members of the community fought to retain their land. For two years, residents resisted the police as they petitioned the courts to save their homes, churches, and schools. Some Villagers were violently evicted in 1855. However, in the summer of 1856, Mayor Fernando Wood(D) prevailed, and residents of Seneca Village were given final notice. In 1857, the city government acquired all private property within Seneca Village through eminent domain. On October 1, 1857, city officials in New York reported that the last holdouts living on land that was to become Central Park had been removed.

But when the New York State legislature approved the creation of a Central Park in 1853 and designated the land on which it would be built, the future Park’s footprint included the Seneca Village site. Seneca Village residents were not the only people affected by the plan for Central Park, as nearly 1,600 people lived on the tract of land — though Seneca Village was the most densely populated area of the future parkland.

A newspaper account at the time suggested that Seneca Village would “not be forgotten many a brilliant and stirring fight was had during the campaign. But the supremacy of the law was upheld by the policeman’s bludgeons.”There are few records of where residents went after their eviction and the community was destroyed.

As workers were uprooting trees at the new entrance of Central Park in 1871, on the corner of 85th Street and 8th Avenue, they came upon two coffins, both containing Black people from Seneca Village. This is such a resemblance to the African Burial Ground which was also discovered when construction workers during a dig at 26 federal plaza discovered the body remains which were examined by archeologist and through studies noted it was skeleton remains of African-Americans thus today is now a national landmark by the park administration.

Today there is still much to learn and to record on the living communities there. The Seneca project is still in progress learning more each day about the habitat dwellers, homes, families, religions ect.

The site Archaeologists Nan Rothschild of Barnard College and Diana Wall of City College and their students have been working with Cynthia Copeland of the New-York Historical Society in studying Seneca Village. Together, they have scoured historical archives, searching for documents relating to the history of the Village.

Founders Cynthia Copeland National History Historical Society Curator, Nan Rothschild, and Diana Wall formed the Seneca Village Project in 1998. The project is geared towards the study of the village in an educational context and its commemoration. Herbert Seignoret has also been involved since the project’s inception. We have assembled an Advisory Committee made up of scholars who have studied aspects of New York’s African and Irish culture and history as well as community members who are concerned about Seneca Village. The Committee works with the directors in planning the direction of the project.

A historical mixed society community created and lived in SENECA VILLAGE. They were evicted even with written petitions to the Supreme Court identifying them as land owners who refused to accept a payoff by government officials for their land. As it would be evident for in the 19th century this was very common so they rejected the petitions and all were evicted so Central Park as we know it today exist until the excavation headed by Dr. Cynthia Copeland (Curator) took place and is now a historical national landmark. This is in too much of a similarity to the now AFRICAN BURIAL GROUND which is located in the Wall Street area in which I am so proud of being part of the project.

The Directors

Cynthia Copeland – The New-York Historical Society

Nan Rothschild – Barnard College, Columbia University

Diana Wall – City College of New York, CUNY

The Advisory Board

Alice Baldwin-Jones – Teachers College

Betsy Blackmar – Columbia University

George Brandon – Sophie Davis Medical School, CUNY

Cornell Edwards – African American Episcopal Zion Church

C. Virginia Fields – former Manhattan Borough President

Marlayna Franklin – Urban Historian/Writer

Joan Geismar – Urban Archaeologist

Venus Green – City College of New York, CUNY

Leslie Harris – Emory University

Jean Howson – African Burial Ground Project

Paul Johnson – All Angels’ Church

Celedonia Jones – Manhattan Borough Historian

Cheryl LaRoche – University of Maryland

Olivia Ng – University of Pennsylvania

Edward O’Donnell – College of the Holy Cross

Warren Perry – Central Connecticut State University

Roy Rosenzweig – George Mason University

Herbert Seignoret – City College of New York, CUNY

Gina Stahlnecker – Special Assistant, Sen. David A. Paterson

Rodger Taylor – New York Public Library

David Hurst Thomas – American Museum of Natural History

Eric K. Washington – Writer/ Tour Leader

Craig Wilder – Dartmouth College

Sherrill Wilson – Urban Anthropologist