Identifier: newnewyorkcomme00vand (find matches)
Title: The new New York : a commentary on the place and the people
Year: 1909 (1900s)
Authors: Van Dyke, John Charles, 1856-1932 Pennell, Joseph, 1857-1926
Subjects: New York (N.Y.) -- Description and travel
Publisher: New York : Macmillan Co.
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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e color of it becomesstartling, bewildering, quite dazzling. The piers on the North River where the big steamersare warped in and the little ones touch or are unloaded, areat least capacious; and capacity is, after all, an absolutenecessity. Huge cargoes have to be handled upon themin short spaces of time, and many donkey engines, der-ricks, and hoists, with scores and scores of longshoremen,are in requisition. Hand trucks, horse trucks, auto-trucks,rumble here and there with boxes, bales, and barrels con-taining goods from everywhere — bananas from Jamaica,coffee from Mexico, tea from China, wine from France,macaroni from Italy, spices from the Indies, sugar fromCuba, woods from Brazil, pulp from Norway, cloths fromEngland, cutlery from Germany. This freight handlingis always more or less compUcated, because the docks arethe distributing places where goods are sorted over andre-shipped to different points throughout the country.Moreover, for every cargo coming in there is perhaps a
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DOCKS AND SHIPS 337 larger cargo going out. Silks and rugs and works of artmay be arriving at one side of the pier; and beef, machin-ery, shoes, be departing by the other side. Add to thisforeign trade, the domestic trade by river, Sound, andshore, by railway and tramway; add further the passengertraffic along these piers from ferry and steamer, the comeand go by car and cab and carriage, and it can easily beimagined that the North River piers and docks are placesof activity, centers of energy. Though thousands are at work about these piers andare continually crossing each others path, there is usuallylittle confusion. Everything moves systematically andeveryone understands the law of traffic in the city,—keep to the right and keep moving. In and out of thesepier sheds all day (and sometimes all night), people, trucks,and carts move in files, loading and unloading, passingand repassing. West Street receives them and rejectsthem and receives them again. The wide thoroughfareseems alw

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