I Didn't Throw Away My Shot: Seeing Hamilton in NYC

I thought I would take my shot in the hopes of seeing Hamilton while I was in New York. Thus, I entered the Hamilton lottery with dreams of snagging a couple $10 tickets to see the show on Broadway. Of course I knew the odds were not in my favor. Sadly, I struck out not once, not twice, but three times. Had the show featured most of the original cast, perhaps I may have been more inclined to spend $300-$400 per ticket for a seat in the nose bleed section. Oh well, the tour comes to Louisville next year and I plan to take my shot over and over again in the hope of snagging some cheap seats.


Though I failed to strike gold in the Hamilton lottery, all was not lost. There was no need to hang around the Rodgers Theater and let my problems surround me. I could still have my shot at seeing Hamilton and a few others in the cast while I was in Manhattan. After all, the actual historical stars of Hamilton were nearby. All I needed to do was (cue Petula Clark) go downtown. . . . where I could forget all my troubles, forget all my cares. So, I went downtown. Downtown Manhattan, no finer place for sure. Downtown at Trinity Church, everything was waiting for me: Alexander Hamilton, the Schuyler sisters, and Hercules Mulligan.




Alexander Hamilton

Eliza Schuyler Hamilton

Hercules Mulligan

Angelica Schuyler Church

Trinity Church, an active Episcopal parish which has been an institution in New York City for more than 300 years, stands at the intersection of Broadway and Wall Street. In 1697, the first of three Trinity Church's was built at the head of Wall Street of facing the Hudson River marking it the first Anglican church on the island of Manhattan. The first Trinity Church burned in 1776 during the American Revolutionary War. A second Trinity Church was completed in 1790. At this point in time, all Anglican churches in the former colonies had legally separated from the Church of England to become the Episcopal Church. The second church faced Wall Street and was both longer and wider than the first. The new steeple soared to a height of 200 feet. President George Washington and members of his government were regular worshipers in the new Trinity building during the brief period New York City was the capital of the United States (1789-1790). Notable parishioners from this time include John Jay, who briefly served as Acting Secretary of State before being appointed the first Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, and Alexander Hamilton, the nation's first Secretary of Treasury.

In 1838, the support beams of the second Trinity Church buckled. After consulting with a prominent architect, the congregation decided that the best course of action was to demolish the current structure and to construct a third church. Richard Upjohn was hired to design the new church. Upjohn, who appreciated Anglo-Catholic liturgical style and English Gothic architecture, designed a church that looked like a 14th-century English parish church. Trinity Church, consecrated on Ascension Day 1846, is considered one of the first and finest examples of Neo-Gothic architecture in the United States. With a 281-foot high steeple, Trinity was the tallest building in New York City until 1890, when the city's skyline was transformed by modern skyscrapers.

First, Trinity Church stands at the head of Wall Street along Broadway.

Here are some exterior photos of Trinity Church.

And now, the actual historical stars of the Broadway smash hit. Alexander Hamilton's final resting place at Trinity's graveyard.

Alexander's better half, Eliza Schuyler Hamilton, who lived a long, and eventful life (1757-1854).

Hercules Mulligan, 1740-1825. A tailor in British-occupied New York during the American Revolution, Mulligan used his position to discreetly extract intelligence from his clients, many of whom were British soldiers, which he then passed on to General George Washington. Mulligan was a member of Trinity Church and served on its vestry.

Angelica Schulyer Church, an American socialite and sister of Eliza Hamilton (1756-1814). She is buried on the opposite side of the graveyard from a number of historical figures, including the $10 dollar, founding father, Alexander Hamilton who was her brother-in-law.

Note: Trinity Church History courtesy of Trinity Church's website.

Who's Buried in Grant's Tomb?

Grant's Tomb, New York City

I admit, I have a special place in my heart for General Ulysses S. Grant. From the moment I read and critiqued William McFeely's 1981 Pulitzer Prize winning biography in my first graduate course on Civil War Era biographies I was hooked. My general dislike of the book prompted me to search out better scholarly works on Grant and I soon found that the literature on Grant was lacking both in interpretation and focus on his instrumental role during Reconstruction (generally considered to be the postwar period 1865-1877). I found Brooks D. Simpson's study, Let Us Have Peace to be the best book on Grant's years in between the end of the Civil War and the presidency; however, even this book failed to acknowledge Grant as a key player in arresting the course of President Andrew Johnson's Reconstruction policies and his actual interest, rather than general disinterest, in pursuing a political career. I immediately notified my mentor that I wanted to pursue a study of Grant between 1865-1869 for my Master's thesis. That project, which earned me my M.A. in history, has yielded three scholarly manuscripts in a graduate, state, and national journal in my field.

Despite two previous trips to New York City, I had not been able to get up town to see Grant's Tomb. Time permitting, I had tentatively scheduled a visit to Grant's Tomb during my last trip to the Big Apple in 2013 as part of a teacher's workshop. Sadly, I missed another opportunity. During my recent trip to New York in which Heather and I were celebrating 20 years together, I never thought we would have enough time. I had thought of a couple of historical sites I would like to visit if things worked out, but Grant's Tomb was not on the list. Suddenly the schedule opened when plans to see a third Broadway show fell thru so I asked Heather if it would be ok to hit Grant's Tomb along with a stroll through Central Park. So we boarded the subway for the ride uptown to the 125 Street station. From there, it was a good little uphill hike about 4 or so blocks to Grant's Tomb.

 

The beautiful Riverside Church which sits cater-corner from Grant's Tomb.

 

 

The closing 4 words in Grant's 1868 letter accepting the Republican presidential nomination, "Let Us Have Peace."

 

When Grant died on July 23, 1885 as a result of lung cancer (smoked too many cigars!), he had perhaps won the biggest fight of his life--completing his memoirs to help secure his family's financial security after his death. The question was, where would Grant be buried? A site for Grant's tomb in Riverside Park in New York City was offered and accepted by the Grant family.

 

According to the General's wife, Julia Grant, "Riverside was selected by myself and my family as the burial place of my husband, General Grant. First, because I believed New York was his preference. Second, it is near the residence that I hope to occupy as long as I live, and where I will be able to visit his resting place often. Third, I have believed, and am now convinced, that the tomb will be visited by as many of his countrymen there as it would be at any other place. Fourth, the offer of a park in New York was the first which observed and unreservedly assented to the only condition imposed by General Grant himself, namely, that I should have a place by his side."

 

A subscription list of employees of the Freeman,
an African American newspaper in NYC
that contributed $5.05 toward the memorial.

His remains were placed in a temporary vault immediately north of the current tomb. Though public land was provided, as was the case for most Civil War memorials, funding for the construction of a permanent memorial to Grant had to be raised from private sources. The Grant Monument Association was founded to raise such funds, hold a design competition, select an architect, and oversee construction. By 1890, the Association had raised a paltry $150,000, about half a million shy to complete the project. There was also objection to the site in New York City as Union veterans' organization favored a permanent memorial in Washington, D.C. An appeal was made to the New York State Assembly; however, legislators refused the request. Eventually, wealthy New Yorkers managed to raise the necessary funds to complete the memorial. The tomb was dedicated in April 1897.

Grant's temporary vault in Riverside Park north of the present memorial. Grant rested here from 1885-1897.

1897 commemorative program from dedication

Looking south toward Grant's Tomb from Riverside.

 

Now, for a look inside and to see, who, if anyone, is buried in Grant's Tomb? The view above the Grant's resting place is part of a late 1930s restoration project during the New Deal in which murals of the battles Grant had fought, including the moment in which peace was achieved with General Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House in April 1865, were painted on the memorial's walls.  Toward the end of the 1930s, a project began to restore the two reliquary rooms, where battle flags were displayed in trophy cases.

 

 

 

 

As part of the Federal Art Project, artists William Mues and Jeno Juszko were chosen to design the busts of generals who had fought under General Ulysses S. Grant during the United States Civil War. These generals surround the final resting place of Ulysses and Julia Grant.

 

The Federal Art Project also included the restoration of two reliquary rooms where battle flags are displayed in trophy cases.

As you can see, nobody is buried in Grant's Tomb . . . well, at least we know Ulysses and Julia Grant are not.

A Trip to Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, NY (Part 3)

Henry Chadwick's grave, Green-Wood Cemetery

After I found one of the families at the center of my current book project, I sauntered over to the final resting place of Henry Chadwick. An engraved plaque affixed to the monument that the National League dedicated to Chadwick at Green-Wood grandiosely declared him "Father of Base Ball." But Chadwick, an Englishman whose skill lay in his pen rather than a bat, was known as the preeminent writer on baseball. The English born player of ball games such as rounders and cricket arrived in the United States in 1837 and later took a job as a cricket reporter for the New York Times. He first observed the American game of "base ball" in 1856 when he happened upon a spirited match played by two New York clubs on the Elysian Fields that reflected an aggressive, high-energized characteristic of mid-nineteenth century Americans: “Americans do not care to dawdle over a sleep-inspiring game, all through the heat of a June or July day,” Chadwick wrote. “What they do they want to do in a hurry. In baseball all is lightning; every action is as swift as a seabird’s flight.”


Henry Chadwick, 1874

Thus the title of "father of base ball" bestowed upon Chadwick at the time of his death in 1908 must be a mistake if the game and rules of base ball had already been developed by the time Chadwick observed his match. Recent research seems to indicate that others, such as Daniel "Doc" Lucius  Adams, are perhaps more fitting of that title due to their part in developing the rules of the national game. At the very least, Adams and those who developed the rules in the 1840s, are among the "founding fathers of baseball." Chadwick, however, popularized baseball among working-class Americans by translating his passion for the sport into regular columns that he contributed to the New York Clipper and Sunday Mercury. According to baseball historian John Thorn, Chadwick was baseball's greatest booster, who pioneered the box-score with copious statistics that aided his reporting. Chadwick later wrote in his 1868 Game of Base Ball:

"I was struck with the idea that base ball was just the game for a national sport for Americans . . . as much so as cricket is for England. . . . I began to invent a method of giving detailed reports of leading contests at base ball, and, seeing that every thing connected with the game, almost, was new, its rules crude and hastily prepared, with no systematized plan of recording the details of a game, and, in fact, no fixed method of either playing or scoring it, as soon as I became earnestly interested in the subject I began to submit amendments to the rules of the game to the consideration of the fraternity, generally in the form of suggestions through the press, my first improvement introduced being an innovation on the simple method of scoring then in vogue. Step by step, little by little, either directly or indirectly, did I succeed in assisting to change the game from the almost simple field exercise it was . . . to the manly, scientific game of ball it is now."

For more on Chadwick and his role in scoring the national game, see this 2009 NPR piece.

Chadwick biographer, Andrew Schiff contributed the following brief biography for the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR).

A diamond complete with bases surrounds Chadwick's monument at Green-Wood Cemetery.

 

 

Henry Chadwick's plaque in the Baseball Hall of Fame

A Trip to Green-Wood Cemetery, Brooklyn, NY (Part 2)

Before I got on the subway for the ride back into Manhattan, I made one last stop in Green-Wood to see the final resting place of George Catlin, American painter, author, and traveler who specialized in portraits of American Indians in the Old West (more on Catlin's life and artwork below). Apparently, Catlin's in-laws did not think much of him. Instead of being buried next to his wife, who his in-laws made the centerpiece of their family lot, Catlin and his son were placed in the back of the lot.



George Catlin, by William Fisk 1849

However, in 2012, sculptor John Coleman honored Catlin by donating "The Greeter," a depiction of Black Moccasin, a Hidasta chief who met Meriwether Lewis and William Clark in council on the Missouri River in what is now North Dakota during their expedition of the Louisiana Territory and the West.

 

 

Catlin journeyed to meet Black Moccasin in 1832 and painted the elder chief for his Indian gallery. Here is Catlin's 1832 portrait of Black Moccasin:

George Catlin, Eh-toh'k-pah-she-pée-shah, Black Moccasin, aged Chief (1832)
“The chief sachem of this tribe [Hidatsa/Minitari] is a very ancient and patriarchal looking man . . . and counts, undoubtedly, more than a hundred snows. I have been for some days an inmate of his hospitable lodge, where he sits tottering with age, and silently reigns sole monarch of his little community around him, who are continually dropping in to cheer his sinking energies, and render him their homage. His voice and his sight are nearly gone; but the gestures of his hands are yet energetic and youthful, and freely speak the language of his kind heart . . . I have . . . painted his portrait as he was seated on the floor of his wigwam, smoking his pipe, whilst he was recounting over to me some of the extraordinary feats of his life, with a beautiful Crow robe wrapped around him, and his hair wound up in a conical form upon his head, and fastened with a small wooden pin, to keep it in its place . . . This man has many distinct recollections of Lewis and Clark, who were the first explorers of this country, and who crossed the Rocky Mountains thirty years ago.” According to George Catlin, Black Moccasin’s long-stemmed pipe was a calumet, or peace pipe, “mutually smoked by the chiefs, after the terms of the treaty are agreed upon.” Black Moccasin had been a chief when Lewis and Clark visited the Hidatsa village in the winter of 1804-05; Catlin reckoned he was 105 years old in 1832. (Catlin, Letters and Notes, vol. 1, nos. 23, 29, 1841; reprint 1973)

 

George Catlin was born July 26, 1796 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. His interest in Native Americans may have begun at an early age with tales of his mother’s capture (and safe return) when she was seven by Iroquois Indians and his family’s friendly contact with an Oneida family. Many details about him remain a mystery, but he was determined to paint and document as many American Indians as possible, afraid westward expansion would destroy them and their ways of life. Catlin started his professional life as a lawyer, studying in Litchfield, Connecticut, being admitted to the Bar in 1818 and working with his brother Charles. George began trying his hand at being a miniature painter and portraitist soon after. In 1820 he moved to Philadelphia, living and working as an artist becoming close friends with portraitist Thomas Sully’s future son-in-law, John Neagle. Catlin began exhibiting artwork at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts being elected an academician in 1824. In 1826 Catlin moved to New York and became a member of the National Academy of Design. During this time he painted his first Indian portrait, the Seneca Chief, Red Jacket.

George married Clara Bartlett Gregory in Albany, New York in 1828, with George continuing to work as a portraitist on the East Coast. Wanting to travel west George went to St. Louis in 1830 to meet with Gen. William Clark, commissioner of the new Missouri Territory, hoping to travel with Clark and other military expeditions. In 1832 George began what was to become his most famous era of travel, first traveling up the Missouri River to Fort Union. During this trip Catlin painted a number of Indian tribes, including Sioux, Blackfeet, Cheyenne, and Mandan. George exhibited his growing collection in Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Louisville, and New Orleans. Catlin continued to travel including with an 1834 expedition led by General Leavenworth and Colonel Dodge to Fort Gibson, near Pawnee and Comanche territories in today’s southern Oklahoma. George and Clara traveled up the Mississippi River to Fort Snelling where he was able to paint Sioux, Chippewa, Saux, and Fox. Catlin opened his Indian Gallery in New York City in 1837 with shows in D.C., Baltimore, Boston, and Philadelphia. During this time George tried unsuccessfully many times to have the U.S. Government buy his collection.

With declining interest in his exhibit and the failure to have his collection bought by Congress, George set off for England in 1839. The Indian Gallery opened at the Egyptian Hall in London in 1840. With great personal expense, George self-published Letters and Notes on the Manners, Customs, and Conditions of the North American Indians in 1841. Catlin exhibited his collection in England and elsewhere in Europe, eventually storing the paintings and traveling with performers while he told of his encounters in the American West with artifacts and props. In 1843, he hired nine Ojibwa Indians to travel with the show throughout the U.K. He then hired and toured with 14 Iowa Indians. In 1845, Catlin moved his family and the Iowa to Paris. He toured with the Iowa in Europe while also enjoying the patronage of the French King, Louis-Phillippe. During this period Catlin also painted a series of works depicting the LaSalle Expedition. Unfortunately, the French monarchy fell and George fled to England with his children. Having incurred massive debts throughout his life and now in England, he was forced to put his Indian Gallery up for auction. Railroad tycoon Joseph Harrison agreed to buy the collection in its entirety in exchange for paying off most of Catlin’s debt. Catlin spent much of the rest of his life trying to replicate his Gallery from notes, sketches, and memory making up his Cartoon Collection, which was exhibited at the Smithsonian (1872) after returning to America in 1870, having spent 31 years abroad. Catlin died in New Jersey surrounded by remaining family December 23, 1872.

For more on George Catlin and many of his works, see the Smithsonian American Art Museum's George Catlin webpage.

Battle between Sioux and Sauk and Fox by George Catlin (painted in Paris 1846-48)
George Catlin prized the authenticity of his depictions of Native Americans, and cited the “historical fact” that the Sioux warrior “killed and scalped on his horse’s back.” Catlin painted this work in Paris between 1846 and 1848, when he was creating dramatic, more highly finished paintings for a European clientele hungry for the romance of the American West.

George Catlin, Ball-play of the Women, Prairie du Chien (1835-1836)
George Catlin witnessed Choctaw lacrosse in Indian Territory in 1834, but a year later, at Prairie du Chien in today’s Wisconsin, Catlin saw and recorded the Eastern Sioux/Dakota version of ball-play. He later described the game: “In the ball-play of the women, they have two balls attached to the ends of a string, about a foot and a half long; and each woman has a short stick in each hand, on which she catches the string with the two balls, and throws them, endeavoring to force them over the goal of her own party.” (Catlin, Letters and Notes, vol. 2, no. 52, 1841, reprint 1973; Truettner, The Natural Man Observed, 1979)

Note: Catlin biographical information courtesy of the Sid Richardson Museum