Little Germany, New York
Encyclopedia
Little Germany, known in German
as Kleindeutschland and Deutschländle and called Dutchtown by contemporary non-Germans, was a German
immigrant neighborhood on the Lower East Side
of Manhattan
in New York City
. The neighborhood's ethnic cohesion began to decline in the late 19th century from the population dynamics of non-German immigrants settling in the area, and the loss of second-generation families to other German-American communities. The decline was exacerbated in 1904, when the General Slocum
disaster wiped out the social core of the neighborhood.
provided a constant population influx for Little Germany. In the 1850s alone, 800,000 Germans passed through New York. By 1855 New York had the third largest German population of any city in the world, outranked only by Berlin
and Vienna
. The German immigrants differed from others in that they usually were educated and had marketable skills in crafts. More than half of the era's baker
s and cabinet makers
were Germans or of German origin, and many Germans also worked in the construction business. Educated Germans such as Joseph Wedemeyer, Oswald Ottendorfer
and Friedrich Sorge were important players in the creation and growth of trade union
s, and many Germans and their Vereins
(German-American clubs) were also often politically active. Oswald Ottendorfer who was the owner-editor of the Staats-Zeitung, New York's largest German-language newspaper, was among the wealthiest and most socially prominent German-Americans in the city. He also became the undisputed leader of the newly important German Democracy, which would help Fernando Wood
recapture the mayor's office in 1861 and elect Godfrey Gunther as mayor in 1863.
At the time, Germans tended to cluster more than other immigrants, such as the Irish, and in fact those from particular German states preferred to live together. This choice of living in wards with those from the same region was perhaps the most distinct and overlooked feature of Kleindeutschland. For instance the Prussians, who by 1880 accounted for nearly one-third of the city's German-born population, were most heavily concentrated in the city's Tenth Ward. Germans from Hessen-Nassau tended to live in the Thirteenth Ward in the 1860s and in the ensuing decades moved northward to the borders of the Eleventh and Seventeenth Wards. Germans from Baden by the 1880s tended to favor living in the Thirteenth Ward, and Wurttembergers began by the 1860s to migrate northward into the Seventeenth Ward. The Bavarians (including Palatines from the Palatinate region of western Germany on the Rhine River, which was subject to the King of Bavaria), the largest group of German immigrants in the city by 1860, were distributed evenly in each German ward except the Prussian Tenth. Aside from the small group of Hanoverians, who had a strong sense of self-segration forming their own "Little Hanover" in the Thirteenth Ward, the Bavarians displayed the strongest regional bias, mainly toward Prussians: at all times the most distinctive characteristic of their settlement pattern remained that they would be found wherever the Prussians were fewest.
In 1845, Little Germany was already the largest German-American neighborhood in New York; by 1855, its German population had more than quadrupled, displacing the American-born workers who had first moved into the neighborhood's new housing, and at the beginning of the 20th century, it was home to almost 50,000 people. From a core in the riverside 11th Ward, it expanded to encompass most of the 10th, 13th, and 17th Wards, the same area that later became known as the Jewish Lower East Side. Tompkins Square Park
, in what is now known as Alphabet City
, was an important public space that the Germans called the Weisse Garten. There were beer gardens, sport clubs, libraries
, choir
s, shooting clubs, German theatres, German schools, German churches, and German synagogues. A large number of factories and small workshops operated in the neighborhood, initially in the interiors of blocks, reached by alleyways. There were major commercial streets including department stores. Stanley Nadel quotes a description of the neighborhood at its peak in the 1870s:
to commemorate the end of the school year. A large paddlewheeler, the General Slocum
, was chartered for a cruise on the East River
to a picnic site on Long Island. Over 1,300 passengers, mostly women and children, participated in the event. Shortly after departing, a fire started in a storage compartment in the forward section. Although the ship was equipped with lifeboat
s and preservers
, both were in disrepair. The inadequacy of the safety equipment, compounded with the poor leadership of Captain William Van Schaick, caused an estimated 1,021 passengers to die by fire or drowning. Although only one percent of Little Germany's population was killed by the disaster, those lost were members of the most established families, the social foundation of Little Germany's community, and the extent of the disaster had enormous repercussions on the St Mark's parish. The disaster as well as the accelerated exodus that was already well underway and the future anti-German sentiment that would occur during World War I would lead Kleindeutschland to extinction. Some bereaved parents, spouses, children, and friends committed suicide. To further complicate matters, the desire to find a culprit, conflicting public opinion, and family quarrels among survivors about the distribution of money from a Relief Fund led the culture of Little Germany to turn sour. The final indignity was the jury's refusal to find Captain Van Schaick guilty of manslaughter; one of the only things he was ever punished for was lack of safety-preparedness, which was sufficient for him to receive a ten-year prison sentence.
, in particular in Williamsburg
, and farther uptown on the East Side of Manhattan, in Yorkville
. At the same time, the press of new mass immigration into the city of not only Germans – whose numbers peaked in the 1880s – and Irish, but also large numbers of Russian and eastern European Jews and Italians from the south of that country caused Little Germany to contract, so that rather than taking up a large portion of the East Side below 23rd Street
, it was eventually bounded by 14th Street
on the north, Grand Street
on the south, Broadway
on the west, and the East River
on the east. As well, the new mix of immigrants coming in changed the character of the area, so that what had been Kleindeutschland began to transform into the Lower East Side
. The Slocum disaster accelerated the process, as in its wake, much of the remaining German population moved, to Yorkville and elsewhere.
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
as Kleindeutschland and Deutschländle and called Dutchtown by contemporary non-Germans, was a German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
immigrant neighborhood on the Lower East Side
Lower East Side, Manhattan
The Lower East Side, LES, is a neighborhood in the southeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is roughly bounded by Allen Street, East Houston Street, Essex Street, Canal Street, Eldridge Street, East Broadway, and Grand Street....
of Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. The neighborhood's ethnic cohesion began to decline in the late 19th century from the population dynamics of non-German immigrants settling in the area, and the loss of second-generation families to other German-American communities. The decline was exacerbated in 1904, when the General Slocum
General Slocum
The PS General Slocum was a passenger steamboat built at Brooklyn, New York, in 1891. The General Slocum was named for Civil War officer and New York Congressman Henry Warner Slocum. She operated in the New York City area as an excursion steamer for the next thirteen years under the same ownership...
disaster wiped out the social core of the neighborhood.
Growth
Beginning in the 1840s, large numbers of German immigrants entering the United StatesUnited States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
provided a constant population influx for Little Germany. In the 1850s alone, 800,000 Germans passed through New York. By 1855 New York had the third largest German population of any city in the world, outranked only by Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
and Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
. The German immigrants differed from others in that they usually were educated and had marketable skills in crafts. More than half of the era's baker
Baker
A baker is someone who bakes and sells bread, Cakes and similar foods may also be produced, as the traditional boundaries between what is produced by a baker as opposed to a pastry chef have blurred in recent decades...
s and cabinet makers
Cabinet making
Cabinet making is the practice of using various woodworking skills to create cabinets, shelving and furniture.Cabinet making involves techniques such as creating appropriate joints, dados, bevels, chamfers and shelving systems, the use of finishing tools such as routers to create decorative...
were Germans or of German origin, and many Germans also worked in the construction business. Educated Germans such as Joseph Wedemeyer, Oswald Ottendorfer
Oswald Ottendorfer
Valentin Oswald Ottendorfer was a United States journalist associated with the development of the German-language New Yorker Staats-Zeitung into a major newspaper.-Education:...
and Friedrich Sorge were important players in the creation and growth of trade union
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
s, and many Germans and their Vereins
Voluntary association
A voluntary association or union is a group of individuals who enter into an agreement as volunteers to form a body to accomplish a purpose.Strictly speaking, in many jurisdictions no formalities are necessary to start an association...
(German-American clubs) were also often politically active. Oswald Ottendorfer who was the owner-editor of the Staats-Zeitung, New York's largest German-language newspaper, was among the wealthiest and most socially prominent German-Americans in the city. He also became the undisputed leader of the newly important German Democracy, which would help Fernando Wood
Fernando Wood
Fernando Wood was an American politician of the Democratic Party and mayor of New York City; he also served as a United States Representative and as Chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means in both the 45th and 46th Congress .A successful shipping merchant who became Grand Sachem of the...
recapture the mayor's office in 1861 and elect Godfrey Gunther as mayor in 1863.
At the time, Germans tended to cluster more than other immigrants, such as the Irish, and in fact those from particular German states preferred to live together. This choice of living in wards with those from the same region was perhaps the most distinct and overlooked feature of Kleindeutschland. For instance the Prussians, who by 1880 accounted for nearly one-third of the city's German-born population, were most heavily concentrated in the city's Tenth Ward. Germans from Hessen-Nassau tended to live in the Thirteenth Ward in the 1860s and in the ensuing decades moved northward to the borders of the Eleventh and Seventeenth Wards. Germans from Baden by the 1880s tended to favor living in the Thirteenth Ward, and Wurttembergers began by the 1860s to migrate northward into the Seventeenth Ward. The Bavarians (including Palatines from the Palatinate region of western Germany on the Rhine River, which was subject to the King of Bavaria), the largest group of German immigrants in the city by 1860, were distributed evenly in each German ward except the Prussian Tenth. Aside from the small group of Hanoverians, who had a strong sense of self-segration forming their own "Little Hanover" in the Thirteenth Ward, the Bavarians displayed the strongest regional bias, mainly toward Prussians: at all times the most distinctive characteristic of their settlement pattern remained that they would be found wherever the Prussians were fewest.
In 1845, Little Germany was already the largest German-American neighborhood in New York; by 1855, its German population had more than quadrupled, displacing the American-born workers who had first moved into the neighborhood's new housing, and at the beginning of the 20th century, it was home to almost 50,000 people. From a core in the riverside 11th Ward, it expanded to encompass most of the 10th, 13th, and 17th Wards, the same area that later became known as the Jewish Lower East Side. Tompkins Square Park
Tompkins Square Park
Tompkins Square Park is a 10.5 acre public park in the Alphabet City section of the East Village neighborhood in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It is square in shape, and is bounded on the north by East 10th Street, on the east by Avenue B, on the south by East 7th Street, and on the...
, in what is now known as Alphabet City
Alphabet City, Manhattan
Alphabet City is a neighborhood located within the Lower East Side and East Village in the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is also known as Loisaida, a Spanglish adaptation of 'Lower East Side'. Its name comes from Avenues A, B, C, and D, the only avenues in Manhattan to have single-letter...
, was an important public space that the Germans called the Weisse Garten. There were beer gardens, sport clubs, libraries
Library
In a traditional sense, a library is a large collection of books, and can refer to the place in which the collection is housed. Today, the term can refer to any collection, including digital sources, resources, and services...
, choir
Choir
A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...
s, shooting clubs, German theatres, German schools, German churches, and German synagogues. A large number of factories and small workshops operated in the neighborhood, initially in the interiors of blocks, reached by alleyways. There were major commercial streets including department stores. Stanley Nadel quotes a description of the neighborhood at its peak in the 1870s:
At the beginning of the '70s, after a decade of continuously rising immigration, Kleindeutschland was in its fullest bloom. Kleindeutschland, called Dutchtown by the Irish, consisted of 400 blocks formed by some six avenues and nearly forty streets. Tompkins Square formed pretty much the center. Avenue B, occasionally called the German Broadway, was the commercial artery. Each basement was a workshop, every first floor was a store, and the partially roofed sidewalks were markets for goods of all sorts. Avenue A was the street for beer halls, oyster saloons and groceries. The Bowery was the western border (anything further west was totally foreign), but it was also the amusement and loafing district. There all the artistic treats, from classical drama to puppet comedies, were available.
General Slocum disaster
Disaster struck Little Germany on June 15, 1904. St Mark's Evangelical Lutheran Church had organized their 17th annual picnicPicnic
In contemporary usage, a picnic can be defined simply as a pleasure excursion at which a meal is eaten outdoors , ideally taking place in a beautiful landscape such as a park, beside a lake or with an interesting view and possibly at a public event such as before an open air theatre performance,...
to commemorate the end of the school year. A large paddlewheeler, the General Slocum
General Slocum
The PS General Slocum was a passenger steamboat built at Brooklyn, New York, in 1891. The General Slocum was named for Civil War officer and New York Congressman Henry Warner Slocum. She operated in the New York City area as an excursion steamer for the next thirteen years under the same ownership...
, was chartered for a cruise on the East River
East River
The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland...
to a picnic site on Long Island. Over 1,300 passengers, mostly women and children, participated in the event. Shortly after departing, a fire started in a storage compartment in the forward section. Although the ship was equipped with lifeboat
Lifeboat (shipboard)
A lifeboat is a small, rigid or inflatable watercraft carried for emergency evacuation in the event of a disaster aboard ship. In the military, a lifeboat may be referred to as a whaleboat, dinghy, or gig. The ship's tenders of cruise ships often double as lifeboats. Recreational sailors sometimes...
s and preservers
Life preserver
Life preserver or Life-preserver may refer to:*Personal flotation device*Lifebuoy, a ring-shaped flotation device*A kind of club...
, both were in disrepair. The inadequacy of the safety equipment, compounded with the poor leadership of Captain William Van Schaick, caused an estimated 1,021 passengers to die by fire or drowning. Although only one percent of Little Germany's population was killed by the disaster, those lost were members of the most established families, the social foundation of Little Germany's community, and the extent of the disaster had enormous repercussions on the St Mark's parish. The disaster as well as the accelerated exodus that was already well underway and the future anti-German sentiment that would occur during World War I would lead Kleindeutschland to extinction. Some bereaved parents, spouses, children, and friends committed suicide. To further complicate matters, the desire to find a culprit, conflicting public opinion, and family quarrels among survivors about the distribution of money from a Relief Fund led the culture of Little Germany to turn sour. The final indignity was the jury's refusal to find Captain Van Schaick guilty of manslaughter; one of the only things he was ever punished for was lack of safety-preparedness, which was sufficient for him to receive a ten-year prison sentence.
Decline
The General Slocum disaster was perhaps the final blow in hastening the end of Little Germany, but for decades before that event, the neighborhood had been contracting in size, both in population and in area. Near the end of the 19th century, between 1870 and 1900, second-generation German-Americans began to leave the old neighborhood to resettle in BrooklynBrooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
, in particular in Williamsburg
Williamsburg, Brooklyn
Williamsburg is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Brooklyn, bordering Greenpoint to the north, Bedford-Stuyvesant to the south, Bushwick to the east and the East River to the west. The neighborhood is part of Brooklyn Community Board 1. The neighborhood is served by the NYPD's 90th ...
, and farther uptown on the East Side of Manhattan, in Yorkville
Yorkville, Manhattan
Yorkville is a neighborhood in the greater Upper East Side, in the Borough of Manhattan in New York City. Yorkville's boundaries include: the East River on the east, 96th Street on the north, Third Avenue on the west and 72nd Street to the south. However, its southern boundary is a subject of...
. At the same time, the press of new mass immigration into the city of not only Germans – whose numbers peaked in the 1880s – and Irish, but also large numbers of Russian and eastern European Jews and Italians from the south of that country caused Little Germany to contract, so that rather than taking up a large portion of the East Side below 23rd Street
23rd Street (Manhattan)
23rd Street is a broad thoroughfare in the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is one of few two-way streets in the gridiron of the borough. As with Manhattan's other "crosstown" streets, it is divided at Fifth Avenue, in this case at Madison Square Park, into its east and west sections. Since...
, it was eventually bounded by 14th Street
14th Street (Manhattan)
14th Street is a major crosstown street in the New York City borough of Manhattan. The street rivals the size of some of the well-known avenues of the city and is an important business location....
on the north, Grand Street
Grand Street (Manhattan)
Grand Street is a street in Manhattan, New York City. It runs east-west parallel to and south of Delancey Street, from SoHo through Chinatown, Little Italy, the Lower East Side to the East River....
on the south, Broadway
Broadway (New York City)
Broadway is a prominent avenue in New York City, United States, which runs through the full length of the borough of Manhattan and continues northward through the Bronx borough before terminating in Westchester County, New York. It is the oldest north–south main thoroughfare in the city, dating to...
on the west, and the East River
East River
The East River is a tidal strait in New York City. It connects Upper New York Bay on its south end to Long Island Sound on its north end. It separates Long Island from the island of Manhattan and the Bronx on the North American mainland...
on the east. As well, the new mix of immigrants coming in changed the character of the area, so that what had been Kleindeutschland began to transform into the Lower East Side
Lower East Side
The Lower East Side, LES, is a neighborhood in the southeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. It is roughly bounded by Allen Street, East Houston Street, Essex Street, Canal Street, Eldridge Street, East Broadway, and Grand Street....
. The Slocum disaster accelerated the process, as in its wake, much of the remaining German population moved, to Yorkville and elsewhere.
See also
- Yorkville, another historically German neighborhood in Manhattan
- List of named ethnic enclaves in North American cities