The Gilded Age in New York, 1870-1910

The Gilded Age in New York, 1870-1910 explores New York City during a period of dramatic transformation, from 1870 to 1910. The book examines the stark contrasts between the extravagant lifestyles of the ultra-wealthy and the conditions of the poor who lived in tenements beneath newly constructed skyscrapers. During these four decades, New York developed rapidly with the construction of skyscrapers, subways, streetlights, Central Park, and bridges connecting the boroughs. More than a million poor immigrants crowded into tenements while half the country's millionaires built opulent mansions on Fifth Avenue. The city's population quadrupled in 40 years. The book covers daily life across social classes, including prominent entrepreneurs such as John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Leland Stanford, and J.P. Morgan. It addresses leisure activities at places like Coney Island and Central Park, crimes that reshaped the police force, the rise of social services, and the city's physical expansion. Written by the curator of Ephemeral New York and illustrated with over 300 rarely-seen images and photographs—many colorized for this book—it combines visual material with firsthand accounts to present American society at the turn of the century.