Horse

The Inwood Arch and Mansion: Circa 1896

Thumbnail image for The Inwood Arch and Mansion: Circa 1896

On the west side of Broadway, formerly known as the Kingsbridge Road, at 216th Street, stands a neglected and nearly forgotten monument to Inwood’s past.  The great marble arch, constructed in the 1850’s, once led visitors to the glorious Seaman mansion, which, until the 1930’s, stood on the current site of Park Terrace Gardens on [...]

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CKG Billings Estate

Billings Mansion, Inwood, New York, 1910

We’ve seen photos documenting the splendor of old Northern Manhattan. Breath-taking mansions of a grander time, now gone except for a forgotten arch or lost driveway meandering around a city park. That these architectural wonders were photographed at all is remarkable. But to step inside one of these homes, to see the art, the table [...]

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Suburban Riding and Driving Club

Seaman Arch, Inwood, New York City

In the 1890’s the Harlem River Speedway, currently the Harlem River Drive, became the private playground of New York’s elite. On this taxpayer funded stretch of road, the fabulously wealthy of a bygone era raced horses away from the “riff-raff” of the newly bustling metropolis. One turn of the century playboy, C.K.G. Billings, even designed [...]

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1836 Horse Race

Image of horse John Bascomb from an article on a poem written by old time Inwood, New York resident Isaac Dyckman.

On a cool spring morning in May of 1836 Isaac Michael  Dyckman possibly took leave from his family home in Inwood, on the Northern tip of Manhattan, mounted his steed, and rode the muddy trail to the Union Race Course in far off Long Island for what would prove to be one of the most [...]

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