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Park Row

intro


"At one end of the Row all that is above the earth is of magnitude and magnificence. There stands the highest building in the metropolis of the New World, a monster pile of steel and stone, a monument to its builders' skill, a city and a world within four towering walls. It is a footprint of the twentieth century.

South of the Brooklyn Bridge, the dividing line of Park Row, are the offices of seven of the great daily newspapers of the metropolis... Printing House Square, the triangular eddy in Park Row, is the free library of the men and women who read the daily history of the world as they walk or run... The great chalk lines of current history written on the bulletin boards, the fall of a kingdom, the rise of a republic, told in a sentence, slacken each passing footstep for a second, and keen eyes and active minds grasp the daily record of the world as it is made.

Park Row is a scene of life and action at all hours of the night. The great newspaper offices at one end of the street are never closed. At the other end there are places where the flotsam of this miniature world may spend the gains of their lost self respect at any hour. Eating, drinking, working, and begging never end in the Row. Rest and sleep are for other parts of the city."

Excerpt from Walter L. Hawkley, "Park Row," Epoch Vol. 29 (1903), 278-280, https://books.google.com

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