CHAPTEB XXZIZ.
 

(1800.)

Broadway &om Vesey to Dnane Street—^Hontagnie*B Gnrden—Cox^s Garden

—Contoit Garden—The Bn^is Farm^Origin of Chambers Street

—Pint Dry Goods Store—Exhibition of Sewing Machine.

More than half of the eighteenth century bad passed when Mr.
Marschalk surveyed the present Broadway from Vesey street to Duane street.
and slow, Indeed, was tho growth of tbis section after the stroot had boon
opened. The Fields, as has heen said, was the rallying point Of the cUl^ens
on occasions momentous and otberwlEC. and to ibis muy be attributed the
establishment opposite them, In the days preceding the Revolution, of sev¬
eral public gardens, wblch wero the principal features of tbo neIght>orhood.
Near the northerly coruer of Murray street was Montagnle's Garden, and
on the block above Cox's Garden. Tho former was for a time the head¬
quarters of the LilKirty Boys, and directly opposite It thoy raised their suc¬
cessive poles, which were as often demolished by the soldiers and the Tory
faction. In 1770 a party of soldiers who had failed to demolish a liberty
pole drove tho onlookers Into the Montagnle house at tbe point of the
bayonet, and destroyed Its doors and windows. The owner Incensed the
patriots a short time afterward, however, by renting his rooms to members
of the opposite faction, and the patriots removed their headquarters to a
building which they purchased at the lower end of tbe Fields, Hampden
Uall. before written of. Montagnle continued to occupy tbo premises, but
changed the name to tho United States Garden, until 1S02. when John H-
Contolt, a confectioner, became the owner. Ho conducted It until ISOS.
afterward removing to near Park Place and establishing tbe New Tork
Garden, which bo transferred Iu ISOS to No. 355 Broadway, the Park
Place site giving way to private residonces. The old Contoit Garden passed
Into the hands of Augustus Parlse In 130G, and some years after was suc¬
ceeded hy a building called tbo Parthenon, which In 1S25 was occupied
OS a musoum under tbe auspices of Roubeu Peaie. Tho museum occupied
the second^ third and fourth stories, says nn advertisement of tbe date
mentioned, and "has a terraced roof commanding a capital view of the park
and all the neighboring streets, together with the city and harbor."

These gardens and a few scattered small buildings wore tbo only im¬
provements existing opposite the Fields until the period when the name
of the street wns changed to Broadway for its entire distance north of
Vesey street, and when U was extended to the Rutgers farm, near Duane
street, in 1794. After this year tbo march of private Improvement began
on the block between Vesey and Barclay streets, and flne residences, built