Stephen Crane

Port Jervis Evening Gazette/August 28, 1896

New York’s Delicatessen Stores—Indecency on the Bill Board—Proctor’s Amusement Palace—New Use for Hoop Skirts—Names Which Suit the Occupations.

New York, August 27. One of the necessities which the conditions of metropolitan life has created is the delicatessen store. Within the memory of New Yorkers not very far advanced in years these shops could be counted with two figures, and to most people, the contents of the little store, filled with cans and jars of strange shapes and stranger names, were objects of wonder and awe. With the growth of the city new conditions have arisen, the hasty lunch, which the delicatessen store furnishes, has become a necessary feature of city life and caterers of delicatessen have thrived and multiplied until now their number is legion.

For some unexplained reason the reformed police administration, early in its career, singled out the harmless and petty traders as subjects whom they could annoy with impunity. An obnoxious sanction of the blue laws regulating the time of opening and closing of the shops was made the basis of a systematic police persecution, and violators were promptly hauled before a city magistrate, to be as promptly discharged. The dealers are now strongly organized for protection, public opinion is with them, and they will probably have something to say on Election Day.

It is a queer commentary on the taste of the theatre goers of New York that nastiness is regarded as a marketable commodity, and that the near approach to the danger line of indecency is calculated to attract patronage. The billboard of a prominent Roof Garden announces with all the prominence that display type can give that its star dancer has been found “Not Guilty” and that she will continue the poses and the dances interrupted a few weeks ago by the police. The low tone pervading the entertainments provided by some of our theatrical managers would almost justify an official censorship of the Theatre. The 3rd Ave. Arcade, of Proctor’s Amusement Palace, has just been opened to the public, and will add greatly to the facilities enjoyed by that favored resort. The want of a place of amusement for the middle east side of the city was greatly felt until the advent of Proctor, and will be further supplied with the opening of the handsome, new Murray Hill Theatre at 42nd street and Lexington avenue, billed to occur on October 19th.

Third avenue, over almost its length, has been a most malodorous thoroughfare for the past few months, the street having been ripped open to permit the laying of new gas mains, a work which has proceeded too slowly when the health and comfort of the residents along its route is taken into consideration. It does not seem to have occurred to the proper authorities that a more reasonable time for this illness breeding work could have been selected than in the heat of summer, but then when is there any regard shown for the rights of the humble citizen?

The writer is not an authority on feminine apparel, but it does seem to him that the once useful and admired hoopskirt has been resurrected from its long abiding place and is now doing inflation duty within the sleeves of up-to-date girls. If this inflation continues to progress the girls will be compelled to weight their shoes to prevent a premature ascension to heaven.

It is to be hoped that an example will be made of the policeman who arrested an unoffending and innocent woman on 6th avenue the other night. This is a form of outrage that has become very frequent of late, and the disgrace and exemplary punishment of some of the official brutes would have a beneficial effect in serving as a warning to overzealous policemen.

What’s in a name? John Feaster is the promising name of the proprietor of an up-town restaurant, while the Raines defying nam of Weinbeer is owned by a gentleman who dispenses liquid refreshments to the thirsty further down the avenue, and Wah Shing, a countryman of Li Hung Chang, does Wah Shing in his Third avenue laundry.

One of the most unsavory sections of the city is that running from 100th to 115th street, from Second avenue east to the river. This section is entirely given over to the Italians and the entire neighborhood is squalid in the extreme. Tall, poverty-stricken tenements with bulging walls are crowded to overflowing with the natives of sunny Italy, and the streets are filled with the same importation. The sidewalks are littered with a miscellaneous assortment of boxes, barrels and pushcarts filled with fruit and vegetables in an advanced state of decay, and the atmosphere is redolent with the bouquet of garlic and onions. The colony is a miniature city in itself, and it speaks well for the thrift of its inhabitants that every block has its Banca ltalia.