Tompkins Square Park
Tompkins Square Park is a 10.5-acre public park in the East Village district of New York City on the east side of Ukrainian Village. The square-shaped park, bounded on the north by East 10th Street, on the east by Avenue B, on the south by East 7th Street, and on the west by Avenue A, is abutted by St. Marks Place to the west. The park opened in 1834 and is named for Daniel D. Tompkins, Vice President of the United States.
History
19th Century
Tompkins Square Park is located on land near the East River, that originally consisted of salt marsh and open tidal meadows, "Stuyvesant meadows", the largest such ecosystem on Manhattan island, but has since been filled in. The unimproved site, lightly taxed by the city as most agricultural properties were, seemed scarcely worth the expense of improving to its owners, the Stuyvesants, who inherited it from the 17th-century grant awarded to Peter Stuyvesant, and their Pell and Fish relatives. The City aldermen, to raise the tax base of the city, accepted a gift of land in 1829 from Peter Gerard Stuyvesant (1778–1847) with the understanding that it would remain a public space, and compensated other owners with $62,000 in city funds to set aside a residential square; transforming the muddy site took another $22,000 before Tompkins Square was opened in 1834. Surrounded by a cast-iron fence the following year and planted with trees, the square was expected to have a prosperous and genteel future, which was undercut, however, by the Panic of 1837 that brought the city's expansion to a halt.
In 1857, Ukrainian and Russian immigrants protesting unemployment and food shortages were attacked by police.
In 1863 the deadly Draft Riots occurred in the park.
On January 13, 1874, the Tompkins Square Riot occurred in the park when police crushed a demonstration involving thousands of workers. The riot marked an unprecedented era of labor conflict and violence. The riot occurred in the midst of the Panic of 1873, a depression that began in 1873 and lasted for several years. Workers movements throughout the United States had been making demands of the government to help ease the strain of the depression. Organizations rejected offers of charity and instead had asked for public works programs that would provide jobs for the masses of unemployed.
In 1877 five thousand people fought with the National Guard when a crowd amassed to hear Communist revolutionary speeches.
On April 7, 1897, a rabbi was arrested for not obtaining a permit for the performance of Birkat Hachama, a Jewish ritual done once every 28 years.
20th Century
In the middle 19th century the "Square" included a large parade ground for drilling the New York National Guard. The modern layout of the park by Robert Moses in 1936 is said to be intended to divide and manage crowds that have gathered there in protest since the 1870s. That tradition was rekindled as the park became the nursery of demonstrations against the Vietnam War in the 1960s.
By the 1980s Tompkins Square Park had become for many New Yorkers synonymous with the city's increased social problems. The park at that time was a high-crime area that contained encampments of homeless people, and it was a center for illegal drug dealing and heroin use.
In August 1988, a riot erupted in the park when police attempted to clear the park of homeless people; 38 people were injured. Bystanders as well as homeless people and political activists got caught up in the police action that took place on the night of August 6 and the early morning of August 7, after a large number of police surrounded the park and charged at the hemmed-in crowd while other police ordered all pedestrians not to walk on streets neighboring the park. The park had become a symbol of the problems in the city, including homelessness.
For 1992, the park was closed to the public for restoration, but also to keep out the homeless and in attempt to calm tensions.
21st Century
Increasing gentrification in the East Village during the 1990s and 2000s, and enforcement of a park curfew and the eviction of homeless people have changed the character of Tompkins Square Park. The park now attracts young families, students, seniors and tourists from all over the globe.
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