A stone's throw from the Manhattan side of the Brooklyn Bridge and the odd new entity called Gotham Park, there's a triangle called James Madison Plaza, along (no surprise) Madison Street. The name "James Madison Plaza" actually combines two nearby street names, Madison Street and St. James Place.
Madison Street got its name back in 1826 when the Bancker family requested the city change the name from Bancker Street because the neighborhood had gotten less desirable, thanks at least in part to a typhus outbreak, as Ephemeral New York relates. One notable nearby house of not-so-great repute was No. 47-49, which in the first half of the 19th century became a venue for a sport called rat baiting. Fighting dogs were loosed into a ring full of captured rats, with humans betting on which dog could kill the most vermin.
Also interestingly, 49 Madison survives, sandwiched between two newer, much bigger apartment buildings.
Rats are still on our minds, of course. Just observe the trash can in James Madison Plaza. Come to think of it, it's sort of surprising that Mayor Adams, the great anti-rat crusader, hasn't thought to revive the wholesome pastime of rat baiting.
The city acquired the land in 1964 and developed it in the late 1970s, planting trees and installing planters. A restoration in 2013 included today's most prominent feature in the little Chinatown park: a polished granite globe, situated in a fountain and turnable by hand (supposedly. I didn't try, seems a smidgen unsanitary.) The sculpture nods to "the international influences of the Chinatown community," according to the contemporary press release, but there's no mention of whose idea or design manifested in the globe, whose polish has somewhat faded over the intervening years.
Also part of the restoration and associated with the fountain are "flowing ribbons of granite pavement."
As in many NYC open spaces, police presence is prominent. Often one sees tall, bright NYPD spotlights, ready to light up at night and shine down to deter wrongdoers.
Rats, like human miscreants, prefer darkness, so maybe the lights help keep them out of the park too. Of course, NYC rodents aren't known for bashfulness. But on my walk-through, on a sunny day in summer, nobody was visibly scavenging except the "rats of the air." (No offense, pigeons. I know we bred you in the first place.)
"Nobody here but us pigeons."
All photos © Oren Hope
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