Broadway at 42nd St. 1880

Longacre Square was at the intersection in Midtown Manhattan of 42nd Street, Broadway and Seventh Avenue. Originally named Long Acre by the British Colonists, it was a nexus of the most important roads to the north of the island. George Washington stayed in Long Acre while in New York during the American Revolutionary War. View of Midtown from Empire State Building. ... Main article: Transportation in New York City 42nd Street, NYC 42nd Street is a major crosstown street in the New York City borough of Manhattan, known for its theaters, especially near the intersection with Broadway at Times Square. ... A view of Broadway in 1909 Broadway, as the name implies, is a wide avenue in New York City, and is the oldest north-south main thoroughfare in the city, dating to the first New Amsterdam settlement. ... Seventh Avenue is a thoroughfare on the West Side of the borough of Manhattan in New York City. ... George Washington (February 22, 1732 – December 14, 1799) was the Commander-in-Chief of American forces in the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), and, later, the first President of the United States, from 1789 to 1797. ... Combatants American Revolutionaries, France, Netherlands, Spain, Native Americans Great Britain, German mercenaries, Loyalists, Native Americans Commanders George Washington, Comte de Rochambeau, Nathanael Greene William Howe, Henry Clinton, Charles Cornwallis (more commanders) The American Revolutionary War (1775–1783), also known as the American War of Independence,[1] was a war between...

By the mid-1800s it had become popularly called Longacre after a similar London carriage district, also a home to stables, and carriage shops. William Henry Vanderbilt owned and ran the American Horse Exchange there until the turn of the century. London is the capital city of England and of the United Kingdom, and is the most populous city in the European Union. ... William H. Vanderbilt (May 8, 1821 – December 8, 1885) was a businessman and a member of the prominent United States Vanderbilt family. ...

The first theater on the square, the Olympia, was built by cigar manufacturer Oscar Hammerstein I. More profitable commerce and industrialization of lower Manhattan pushed homes, theaters, and prostitution northward from the Tenderloin District. Longacre Square became nicknamed the Thieves Lair for its rollicking reputation as a low entertainment district. Oscar Hammerstein I (8 May 1847-1 August 1919) was a theater impresario in New York City. ...

It was renamed Times Square on April 8, 1904, by proclamation of Mayor George B. McClellan at the urging of Adolph Ochs, owner and publisher of the New York Times. Times Square, named after the one-time headquarters of The New York Times, is a neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan, New York City, which centers on 42nd Street and Broadway. ... April 8 is the 98th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (99th in leap years). ... 1904 (MCMIV) was a leap year starting on a Friday (link will take you to calendar). ... George McClellan George Brinton McClellan (December 3, 1826 – October 29, 1885) was a major general during the American Civil War. ... Cover of Time Magazine (September 1, 1924) Adolph Simon Ochs (b. ... The New York Times is an internationally known daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed in the United States and many other nations worldwide. ...

References

• Inventing Times Square, W. Taylor, Johns Hopkins U. Press 1996 ISBN 0-8018-5337-0
• NYC-Architecture.com
• Tales of Times Square J. Friedman, 1993 Feral House [ISBN 0-922915-17-2]
• The Devil's Playground J. Traub, 2004 Random House [ISBN 0-375-75978-6]
• Times Square W. Fazio, Children's Press 2000 [ISBN 0-516-26530-X]
• Valentine's Manual of Old New York, H. Brown, Valentine 1922