-I
 

.34th   Street  crossing:  at  Fifth   Avenue,  showing  entrance
to  A.   T.   Stewart's mansion.

THE CENTENNIAL OF FIFTH AVENUE

1824—1924

When Fifth Avenue was opened in 1824 the city still
lay far to the south. Greenwich Village, in which the
Avenue has its roots, was a little rural hamlet way off
in the country, to which natives rarely came unless with
trunks and bags, prepared to stay at least a fortnight.
Four milestones lay between it and the City Hall, and the
journey was made on awkward, lumlsering stages that
made the trip once a day. The road to town was hilly
and besprinkled liberally with "thank ye mam's" of a
ruggedness and frequency that would be the despair of
the traveler of today.    Yet the old maps show us that it

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