incredulous persons, who knew what had been done in that direction in Europe, were quite determined in their opinion that the inconvenience of telegraph poles ought to be abated. On the 22d of March, 1880, City Councils passed an ordinance in which it was said, "In order to test the practicability and deficiency of several underground systems of telegraph, authority is hereby given to lay an underground line or lines of telegraph wires, tubes, or cables under the following streets: Beginning at Walnut Street wharf, thence west on Walnut Street to Dock Street, thence along Dock Street to Third Street, thence along Third Street to Chestnut Street, thence along Chestnut Street to Juniper Street, thence along Juniper Street to the new public buildings. . . . Each and every person or persons who may desire to lay underground wires, tubes, or cables, under the provisions of this ordinance, shall notify the superintendent of Police and Fire-Alarm Telegraph within ten days after the passage of this ordinance, in order that all such wires, tubes, or cables may be laid at one time in the same trench. The trench shall not exceed eighteen inches in breadth, and shall only be open between the hours of seven o'clock P.M. and six o'clock A.M., and not more than five hundred feet of the streets under which said lines, tubes, or cables are to be laid shall be opened at one time, and shall be placed in condition for travel as fast as the said lines, tubes, or cables are laid."1

1 Up to 1884 there has not been much advantage taken of this privilege. An electric wire for lighting, peculiarly prepared by lead insulation, has been laid down between the Public Ledger office, at Sixth and Chestnut Streets, and the clothing establishment of A. C. Yates & Co., on the south side of the same street, near Seventh. Underground conductors for electric lighting upon the public lamp-posts have been laid down on the south side of the same street, communicating with the Record building on the north side, and extending as far as Eleventh Street. By ordinance of April 3, 1883, the Metropolitan Underground Telegraphic, Telephonic, and Electric Light Cable Company was authorized to lay

down wires, tubes, and cables upon the same streets mentioned in the ordinance of 1880, with extensions on Fourth Street, south from Chestnut,

to the office of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company; on Eighth Street, from Chestnut and Walnut, and along Walnut to West Washington Square and the office of the American District Telegraph, below Walnut Street; also along Delaware Avenue, between Dock Street and Washington Avenue; and on Ninth Street, from Chestnut Street to Fairmount Avenue, this work to be done by underground conduits. At the same time privileges of laying conduits on several streets were granted to Henry C. Gibson, Thomas S. Harrison, George Philler, and Winfield S. Russell, upon the following streets: Chestnut Street, from the Delaware River to Thirty-second Street; Twenty-third Street, from Chestnut to Sansom, and down the latter to Sixth, and down Sixth to Walnut, also Walnut Street, from Sixth to the Delaware River; Tenth Street, between Sansom and Filbert; Filbert, between Merrick and Ninth Streets; Market Street, between Sixteenth and the Delaware River; Third Street, between Market and Washington Avenue; Washington Avenue, from the Delaware River to Broad Street; Ninth Street, from Filbert to Green;

In 1884 the following telegraph companies were in operation in Philadelphia:

American District, principal office southeast corner Third and Chestnut Streets, with twelve branch offices. American Rapid, 103 Chestnut Street, eight branch offices.

American Union, 517 Chestnut Street, two branch offices.

Baltimore and Ohio, 304 Chestnut Street, ten branch offices.

Bankers and Merchants, 229 Chestnut Street, three branch offices.

Baxter Overland, 1001 Chestnut Street.
Continental, 30 South Third Street.

Delaware and Atlantic, 400 Chestnut Street. Mutual Union, 103 Walnut Street, five branch offices. Philadelphia Local, 107 South Third Street, twentythree branch offices.

Philadelphia, Reading, and Pottsville, 204 South Fourth Street, one branch office.

Western Union, corner of Tenth and Chestnut Streets, thirty-six branch offices.

Telephone Lines.-The honor of the invention of the telephone is disputed between the friends of Elisha P. Gray, of Chicago, and Professor Graham A. Bell, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. These scientists were engaged in experiments to demonstrate the practicability of conveying sounds by telegraph in 1873 and subsequent years. Each of them demonstrated the possibility of sending such sounds. At the Centennial Exhibition at Philadelphia, in 1876, the uses of this invention were shown by Professor Bell to Gen. U. S. Grant, President of the United States, and to Dom Pedro, emperor of Brazil, by wires stretched between the Main Building and Machinery Hall, and this seems to have been the first public notice of the invention. Before this time, in the early part of 1876, Bell, in Massachusetts, succeeded in carrying on a conversation between two different houses, the recipients of the sound being drumheads of goldbeaters'-skins, with a circular piece of clock-spring glued to each membrane. The tones of an organ were transmitted some distance about the same time. On the 13th of February, 1877, Bell made very successful demonstrations at Salem. He sent messages from Salem, Mass., to Boston, twenty miles away, and answers were received. On the 27th of the same month Gray, at Chicago, received by this means the tones and airs of a musical instrument which was connected with the telephone and played at Milwaukee, eighty-five miles away. The

Tenth. These grants were subsequent to an authority given to the Underground Conduit Company to lay a conduit on Market Street, from Broad Street eastward, the expectation being that telegraph, telephone, and electric light companies would make use of it. Except by the Thomson-Houston Electric Light Company, there has been little use of this convenience. The hope that the telegraph-poles would be shortly done away with entirely has not been strengthened by the passage of the ordinance, March 21, 1883, which gave to the Baltimore and Ohio Telegraph Company authority to erect poles and wires between Fort

Mifflin, crossing Penrose Ferry bridge, and by way of Penrose Avenue and Passyunk Avenue to Mifflin Street and to Second, up the latter to Callowhill, and down Callowhill to the Delaware River, and along Delaware Avenue to Pier 19. A general ordinance to regulate the introduction and use of underground conduits, electrical cables, and wires for electrical conductors in the streets of the city of Philadelphia, was passed June 21, 1882. It was intended to encourage the laying of wires underground, but did not make that course an absolute necessity.

Maxim, Jablakoff, and Thompson & Houston. In the latter part of 1883 the gas lamp-posts on Chestnut Street, between Ninth and Eleventh, were, by permission of Councils, used for electric lighting, carried underground by the Thompson & Houston method, the electricity and power being furnished from the Record building.

CHAPTER LIII.

FERRIES, BRIDGES, PUBLIC LANDINGS, AND WHARVES.

Ferries on the Delaware.-The earliest road between New York and Philadelphia crossed the Delaware at the Falls, and below where the town of Trenton was subsequently located; but the increasing necessities of the settlements and, more particularly, the founding of Burlington soon called for united action on the part of Pennsylvania and New Jersey to provide another point of crossing lower down the river. Governor Andrew Hamilton, of New Jersey, took the initial step by writing to Governor Markham in October, 1696,

"That it was formerlie with great difficultie that the post could goe

criminals or runaways." This statute was in force until 1712, when it was superseded by the act of XII. George I. for "establishing and regulating ferries over the Delaware River and Neshaminy Creek." In 1716 the Assembly of New Jersey established the rates of ferriage between Philadelphia and Burlington, as follows: Hire of a boat in winter (from Michaelmas to Lady Day) for a single passenger, 58. 9d. ; single passenger in company, 18.; in the summer, 48. 6d.; single passenger in summer, 9d. New Jersey also required the boatmen to take out a license.

A ferry between Philadelphia and the Jersey shore immediately opposite was authorized in June, 1695, by the court of Gloucester County, N. J., by this decree: "The Grand Jury consenteth and presenteth the property of Daniel Cooper for keeping a ferry. over the River to Philadelphia at the prices following, that is to say: for a man and horse one shilling and sixpence; for a single horse or cow, one shilling and threepence; for a single man ten pence, and when ten or more six pence per head, and six pence per head for sheep, calfs or hoggs. To which ye bench assents."

Feb. 22, 1718, an act was passed by the Pennsylvania Assembly for " erecting a ferry at or near the land of Daniel Cooper, deceased," and also "to Gloucester in the Western division N. J." When, on the

and trade, and yt for remedie whereof and accommodation of Travellers a ferry hath been erected on Jersie side att a great chairge, but that the way was not yet returned from the Landing on the pennsylvania side to King's road wch is three quarters of a mile and easily cleared; and therefore Requesting the Gov and Council to approve the said road and give the necessarie orders for clearing it."

Governor Markham complied with this request by issuing a warrant to Surveyor Thomas Fairman "to lay outt the kings road from dunck Williams Landing (the nearest & most convenient yt may be had & Least predujicial to the Lands and improvements of the neighborhood) Into the King's great road that leads to phila, and that a Return in words of Courses etc protracted figure thereof be made into the Secries office in order to be filed and recorded there as a finall Confirmacion thereof, and the Justices of the Peace for the County of Bucks be ordered to expidite the clearing of the road." Situated a little north of the upper boundary of Philadelphia County, this crossing was for many years known as Dunck's Ferry, and, as it connected with a road leading directly into the city, it afforded the readiest and most convenient passage of the Delaware for travel and transportation. In the Revolutionary epoch it became known as the Bake-House, on account of being the location of a bakery that supplied bread to the army. In 1700 "an act about erecting and regulating the prices of ferries" was passed, by which it was ordered that no ferryman be permitted to ply the river Delaware "in this government" without first giving bond that "they shall not carry out of or into this Province any strangers that may be suspected of piracy or being

vision to continue the ferries at Bristol to Burlington, and at the Falls of Delaware, it precipitated a controversy with the Governor, Sir William Keith, both parties claiming the original prerogative of establishing ferries. Four members of the Council-Richard Hill, Isaac Norris, Jonathan Dickinson, and James Logan-withdrew from the Council, on the plea that sufficient time had not been allowed them for consideration of the bill; but the Governor was not disposed to continue the opposition, and it was approved by himself and the three remaining councilors,-Samuel Preston, Anthony Palmer, and Robert Assheton. On Aug. 18, 1727, another act was passed "for establishing a ferry from the city of Philadelphia to the Landing at or near the house of Wm. Cooper, and another from or near the city bounds to Gloucester, in New Jersey." The eastern terminus of Cooper's Ferry was at what is now Federal Street, Camden. By this act a jurisdiction was conferred upon the Common Council of Philadelphia, which it

1 Daniel Cooper is supposed to have been a son of William Cooper, a worthy and eminent member of the Society of Friends, who emigrated from Cole's Hill, in the parish of Amersham, Hereford County, England, and built a mansion on a high bank above Cooper's Point, called by him Pyne Point, from a dense pine forest which grew there. Cooper took up the land between Pyne Point and Cooper Street, Camden. On Sept. 30, 1681, William Royden bought the land on the Delaware from Cooper's south line to the line of John Kaighn, from whom Kaighn's Point was named. In the succeeding year Cooper bought out Royden's

right, with a guarantee deed from Talacca and other Indians, and so ac

quired ownership of the river front from Cooper's Point to Kaighn's Point. Daniel Cooper's son Joshua and grandson William were long connected with the Delaware ferries.

exercised by appointing Sylvanus Smout ferryman, with a lease for one year from September, 1727. Smout ran his boats across from the foot of High [Market] Street; and when, in 1735, the act of 1727 had expired, the Assembly proposed to vest the ferry right at that point in the corporation of Philadelphia. The Governor contended that he alone possessed the power to create such a franchise, and he did convey it to the city by a patent bearing date of Feb. 4, 1735, addressed by John Penn, Thomas Penn, and Richard Penn to the mayor and commonalty. It recites that the grant covered "the full and exclusive privilege of keeping and maintaining said ferry on this side of the Delaware," and that it should—

"extend northward to the mouth of Cohocksink Creek, wherein the mills some years since built by Thomas Masters dec'd now stands, and

Even in the primitive days there seems to have been a great deal of travel across the Delaware. The long, roomy, clinker-built wherries, with iron-shod stems, were admirable boats of their class. If the ice was broken up in the winter they would be rowed through the channels, and when the river was hard frozen they were dragged across the ice by hand. Ladies and children were then allowed to remain in the boats, but it was expected that the men passengers would turn out to man the ropes. Neither in winter or summer was there any particular time assigned for the departure of the boats, which would, as a rule, only make their trips when they had obtained full complements of passengers.

so far southward from the mouth of said Cohocksink Creek along sd river side to the dwelling house or lots of ground now in tenure of Wm. Hayes, a little below the south bound of the city, & for the better support & continuance of the sd ferry, and that the same may be duly

aforesaid, with right to establish & take tolls etc. Rent one Beaver Skin per annum as of our manor of Springettsbury."

The landing on the Philadelphia side was probably that long known as the "Old Ferry," just below Arch Street, and William Rawle was chosen ferryman and given a lease for seven years, at the rental of thirty pounds per annum. He died before Feb. 24, 1748, as on that date William Cooper, one of his executors, applied for a new lease in his own name, to run until Francis Rawle, son of the former ferryman, should reach his majority and be able to undertake the business for himself. In 1755 the lease was renewed to the younger Rawle on the same terms as had been paid by his father, and as he was also dead by the time of its expiration in 1762 or 1763, it was awarded to his widow, Rebecca Rawle, and his executors paid the rental up to March, 1769. After the death of Daniel Cooper the ferry on the Jersey side is supposed to have been kept by his son, Joshua Cooper, and then by William Cooper. It got the name, at an early period, of "Lower Billy's," to distinguish it from "Upper Billy's," at Cooper's Point. The Federal Street ferry-house had on its front wall a tablet lettered " D M C, 1764," which were doubtless the initials of Daniel Cooper and his wife. From the earliest settlement of Camden up to about 1810 three classes of ferry-boats were in use. The smallest were the wherries, which would carry twelve or fifteen persons; and next larger were the "horse-boats," for the transportation of horses, carriages, cattle, etc. The principal craft were the " team-boats," which were propelled by horse-power.1

1 Dr. L. F. Fisler, in his "History of Camden," gives the following: Team-boats propelled by horses walking in a circle, and giving motion to the wheels. Ridgway, built by Benjamin Reeves, ran from the foot of Cooper Street; Washington from Market Street, Camden, to Market Street, Philadelphia; Phoenix, Constitution, Moses Lancaster, Independence. The team-boats employed sometimes as high as nine and ten horses. They were arranged in a circle on a tread-wheel connected with the main shaft. By stepping on the wheel the shaft would turn,

cattle per head, fifty cents. These rates were doubled in the winter, but it generally depended on the oldest ferry-master to decide just when the condition of the weather warranted the advance. So long as the horseboats were kept at anchor in the river only the single tolls were to be collected, and when they were brought in to the wharves that was understood to be the signal for enforcing the double tariff. There were several ferry-houses at Market Street and below it, but it is not easy to determine the connection between them and those on the Camden side. The ferry on the north side of Market Street was kept by William Phares in 1800, and by Asa Curtis, of Moorestown, N. J., in 1801. Capt. William Poole followed Curtis and remained until about 1815, when he was succeeded by Clement Reeves, who died some four years afterward. latter's widow kept up the business, but about 1823 relinquished the ferry tavern to her son, Benjamin Reeves. As it was then customary for the ferrymaster to keep an inn at the landing, the names of the ferry and the public-house became identified, so that in the course of a quarter of a century the Market Street Ferry was known at various intervals as Phares' Ferry, Curtis' Ferry, Poole's Ferry, and Reeve's Ferry.

66

The

Not later than 1810 steam ferry-boats came into use, the first being the "Camden," commanded by Capt. Ziba Kellum. It was the first steam ferry-boat built in Philadelphia, and plied between the lower side of Market Street and Cooper Street, Camden. In 1813 the accommodating steamboat 'Twins'" ran from Poole's Ferry to James Springer's Ferry, at Camden, which was that previously known as Cooper's Ferry. Benjamin Reeves built the "Twins," and it was so named from being two hulls decked over. The "Franklin" was another of his constructions, as was also the "Benjamin Rush," a double-hull craft with

and thereby propel the boat. Every day at noon there was an intermission of one hour, from twelve until one o'clock, which was devoted to feeding the horses."

the wheel in the centre,-a type upon which numerous boats were afterward patterned. In 1828 the ferry steamers made up quite a fleet, among them being the "William Wray" and the " Philadelphia." The "Lehigh," commanded by Capt. Joseph Taylor, was the first vessel on the Delaware to employ coal for making steam. The "Vigilant" was built for the Cooper Street Ferry, but was burned after a few weeks of service. The "Delaware," which exploded its boiler on Oct. 31, 1837, was considered a curiosity, on account of having a vertical cylinder and a walking-beam.

In addition to the ferry that started from between Arch and Market Streets, there was one south of Market Street, which was kept, in 1785, by Richard Thorn, and after him by William Phares, John Negus, Joseph Bispham, Asa Gibbs, and John Nicholson. On Mellish's map, dated in 1816, three ferries to Camden are marked at Market Street. In 1819 the rates for passengers were reduced to six cents in the summer, and double that sum in the winter.

Dubious questions and some litigation were connected with the Kaighn's Point Ferry, which between 1809 and 1815 came into the possession of Christopher Madara through his lease of the property of Joseph Kaighn, below Camden. When the Pennsylvania and New Jersey Steamboat Company was incorporated, in 1815, it proposed to put on a line of boats from Kaighn's Point to Philadelphia; and as Robert Fulton, Robert Livingston, and John Stevens then claimed the sole right of running steamboats in the United States, it bought from them the exclusive privilege for the Delaware River within five miles north or south of Kaighn's Point, and thus the other companies were almost entirely restricted to the use of the old "team-boats" until the Supreme Court overthrew the claim of Fulton and his associates. But in the mean time the Pennsylvania and New Jersey Company had leased the ferry privileges at Kaighn's Point for ninety-nine years, and begun to run the "Union," the finest steamer on the river. Landings were made on the Philadelphia side at South and Washington Streets, and the enterprise might have proved remunerative but for the expense of building wharves and houses on both sides of the river. The income not being sufficient to meet these drains, the "Union" was taken off; and to hold the lease, which contained a clause that it should be forfeited if the ferry was not maintained, a small boat, the "Norristown," was substituted. Not long afterward the line was suspended, in consequence of the destruction of the "Norristown" by fire; and then the widow of Clement Reeves, who had bought Kaighn's Point and opened a hotel, brought suit against the company under the forfeiture clause of its lease, and won her case. She managed the ferry only a short time, and sold out to Ebenezer Toole, and at his death it was purchased by the Camden Ferry Company. He and Mrs. Reeves had done well in their administrations,

having furnished four new steamers for the river transit.

Permission to establish a new ferry at Arch Street was granted by Common Council, on May 27, 1760, to Samuel Austin, he to pay thirty pounds annually to the city, and the lease to continue for three years. It was operated in connection with the house at Cooper's Point, and north of the old ferry landing on the Jersey side. Sarah Austin was credited with the payment of a portion of the rent in 1770, being then a year in arrears. Thomas Austin was, in 1776, a member of the committee of inspection, but proved so unfaithful to the popular cause that he was compelled to resign and sign an abject apology for his conduct. William Austin, yeoman, "late keeper of the New Jersey ferry," was proclaimed as a traitor May 21, 1778. This ferry was frequently called the New Ferry, and after a time the Upper Ferry and Cooper's Point Ferry, being the point of departure for "Upper Billy's." William Cooper was popularly known as 'Uncle Billy," and his wife as "Aunt Becky," so that when the owners of the ferry christened their first steamer the "Rebecca" in her honor, the boat also got the nickname of "Aunt Becky." It had a wooden boiler clamped like a cask, but with iron flues, and was the first stern-wheeler on Delaware waters, from which feature it derived its second nickname,-"The Wheelbarrow." There had been several attempts to establish ferries to Cooper's Point besides those from Arch Street, and in 1819 a boat made the trip across from Green Street wharf. A ferry from Laurel Street to Cooper's Point was in operation for some years, and was known about 1840 as Burnap's Ferry.

In December, 1786, the Lower Ferry to Daniel Cooper's, which started on this side from Robert Waln's wharf, second below the Drawbridge, was begun by Joseph Wright. It touched at Windmill Island, where he erected a half way house, and announced that passengers "would always meet with hearty welcome and a hospitable fire in the cold season to warm and refresh themselves while waiting for an opportunity of evading those large fields of ice which generally float up and down with the tide and obstruct the passage during winter." This ferry was the inciting cause of the efforts made for some years after 1800 to build a bridge between Camden and the island, from which access by a short ferry to Philadelphia would be easy. There were many efforts for that purpose, and a bridge company was chartered.1 But when the sanguine projectors were ready to put their stock upon the markets they found that there was no overwhelming anxiety to invest in such an improvement, and it was abandoned.

1 The leading spirit in this enterprise on the Jersey side was Edward Sharp, of Camden. In order to accommodate the expected travel, he laid out Bridge Avenue, opposite Windmill Island. It was broader than usual with the Camden streets, and was utilized after the establishment of the Camden and Amboy Railroad for the use of its tracks.