The Forgotten Immigrant “Lower West Side”

Immigration is the classic New York City story. When we think of historic immigration to New York, we typically think of the Lower East Side. However, there is a lesser known history of immigrants who settled on the west side of Manhattans from the 1840s up to the 1960s. These immigrants included Germans and Irish, Middle Easterners, and Slavic groups, among many others. In 1917, twenty-seven nationalities among 8,000 inhabitants were reported to have lived here.

Today, the area is known as the World Trade Center and the Financial District. While the immigrant hub called the “Lower West Side” by local preservationists no longer exists, this tour aims to uncover its history by taking us back to that era to remind us of what once was—and what could still be possible elsewhere.

On our tour, we will learn about the first Dutch and British settlers in the area, followed by a look into what became “Millionaire’s Row” after the American Revolution, which came to an end after a great fire causing the wealthy Anglo-Saxon residents to move upwards to Greenwich Village. In the 1840s, Irish and German immigrants took their place, followed by Ottoman immigrants in the 1880s, including Arabs, Greeks, and Armenians. Finally, Slavic immigrants moved in by the early-1900s, turning the neighborhood into a true melting pot.

On this walk, we will see the last few vestiges of that era, including the site of the first Dutch settlement, the shrine of the first US-born person given the title of “Saint,” a tenement from the time, and the façade of a former Syrian church. Along the way, we will learn about the history of immigration, the duality of preservation and development, and the future of urban planning in New York.

In Honor Of: This tour was developed in consultation with (and in honor of) Joe Svehlak, local historian and preservationist who grew up in the area in the 40’s, and who has been instrumental in preservation efforts to keep its legacy alive through his organization, the Friends of the Lower West Side.

Note: For private bookings, this tour can be combined with our Remembering Little Syria: The First Arab Americans, Ottoman New York: An Empire in the Empire State, and Wall Street from the Margins tours.