1871 Holmes Map of the Upper East Side, Manhattan, New York City

This is an 1871 John Bute Holmes cadastral map of the Upper East Side in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. Constructed in an unusual manner, the map depicts the Upper East Side along a diagonal that stretches from Ninety-Sixth Street and Fifth Avenue to Seventy-Fourth Street and Avenue B. New York's now famous grid system acts as the base, along with the lots that were created by the 1811 Commissioner's Plan, which allows the neighborhood's evolution to be illustrated. One such detail is Fourth Avenue. Here, dashed lines mark the present sides of the avenue, several feet into the lots on either side. A large former estate is illustrated between Eightieth Street and Seventy-Eighth Street.

Harlem Commons

We have found a reference to the sale of the Harlem Commons in 1825, although we have been unable to unearth any concrete details about this event. Based on a close examination of the map, it seems likely that the Harlem Commons were sold by the then-independent city of Harlem to New York, which is why this map was commissioned. This may also explain the extremely strange diagonal design, because the border between New York and Harlem was a diagonal for much of its existence before Harlem was annexed by New York City. What we have managed to unearth about the Harlem Commons, which was very little, suggests that this land was used for the communal grazing of livestock when Harlem was still made up largely of rural farms and estates. The 1825 sale may simply have been a shift toward a more urban existence in Harlem and wanting to get the most out of the land before the city was annexed.

Holmes' 'Farm Maps'

In the early 19th century most of Manhattan was undeveloped farm lands, the property of wealthy landowners with claims dating to the Dutch period of New York's history. The northern 2/3rd of Manhattan was dotted with farm lands and sprawling gentlemanly estates, many with great manor houses overlooking the Hudson River. The Commissioner's Plan of 1811 and the 1807 Commission Law, laid the street grid through many of these properties and gave the city the right to claim these lands under eminent domain, providing due compensation to the landowners. While this work occurred early in lower Manhattan, central and upper Manhattan were not formally acquired by the city until the mid-19th century.

Holmes became fascinated by the early history of Manhattan real estate ownership, recognizing the wealth to be accrued by accurately understanding the history of city land ownership, division, and inheritance. Moreover, Holmes allied himself with the corrupt Tweed administration, assuring himself and his allies even greater wealth and political power from the eminent domain seizure of old Manhattan estates. Holmes created a series of maps, reminiscent of John Randall's 'Farm Maps', overlaid with property data, showing the borders of old estates, and notating the breakup of the lands among various heirs. The complex work of compiling the maps earned Holmes a fortune, with one newspaper suggesting on his death in 1887 that some of his individual maps were worth more than 30,000 USD. There is no complete carto-bibliography of Holmes' maps, but we believe there to be at least 50 maps, possibly more.

Provenance

This map was acquired as a part of a large collection of New York cadastral maps associated with the lawyer Ronald K. Brown, a Deed Commissioner operating in the late 19th and early 20th century with an office at 76 Nassau Street, New York - not far from Holmes' own office. Most of the maps in the collection, including the present map, bear Brown's stamp on the verso. The maps were passed to Dominic Anthony Trotta, a real estate agent working under Brown. Brown seems to have ceased business around 1919, but Trotta continued as a real estate agent, becoming a New York Tax Commissioner in 1934 under the Fiorello H. La Guardia administration. The maps remained with Trotta's heirs until our acquisition of the collection.

Publication History and Census

This map was created and published by John Bute Holmes in 1866. Three examples are recorded in the OCLC as being part of the institutional collections at Princeton University, the New York State Library, and the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee. Although uncatalogued, we believe that the New York Public Library also has an example.