Bronxites of a certain age who paid attention in their high school history classes might think that Webster Avenue was named for the famed Massachusetts Congressman and orator Daniel Webster. However, lengthy Webster Avenue was so named either for Albert Webster, an engineer in the Department of Public Works, or Joseph O.B. Webster, a surveyor in the same agency. Both men were active at the time the road was laid out in the 1870s.
However Daniel Webster (1782-1852) has a massive memorial of his own in Central Park, where Terrace and West Drives meet east of 71st Street. Webster had a lengthy career in politics that followed an illustrious law career, serving as US Representative from Massachusetts (1813–17, 1823–27) Senator (1827–41, 1845–50), and Secretary of State under Presidents William Henry Harrison, John Tyler and Millard Fillmore (1841–43, 1850–52). He opposed the War of 1812; opposed, then supported, instituting tariffs on imported goods; and opposed early rumblings of southern states’ secession in the 1830s with the phrase “Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable!” Webster supported the Compromise of 1850, which divided the Union into “free” and “slave” states.
Sculptor Thomas Ball’s bronze of the great orator was executed in 1868 and presented to NYC as a gift from Gordon W. Burnham in 1876.
Check out the ForgottenBook, take a look at the gift shop, and as always, “comment…as you see fit.”
8/3/20
4 comments
Or the street could have been named after the dictionary dude.
Passing resemblance to Dr. Martin Abend.
For more on Daniel Webster, I can recommend “Heirs of the Founders: The Epic Rivalry of Henry Clay, John Calhoun and Daniel Webster, the Second Generation of American Giants”
by H. W. Brands – https://pureblather.com/2019/06/14/heirs-of-the-founders/ .
And a fun bit of trivia: Daniel Webster was *twice* offered the chance to be vice-president. He turned it down both times, saying he’d rather be actually dead before he was put in a coffin and buried. He should have accepted – both times, the president died in office…..
He has strong ties to New Hampshire, his family were longtime settlers and he represented New Hampshire in the US House of Representatives for two terms before he moved to Boston. He’s one of only maybe three people to represent two different states in the House, not counting those who were elected in newly created states.