From the Wurts Brothers: Wall Street, looking west from a bit east of William Street, in 1887. Only three buildings in this picture remain. The first is Trinity Church, at the head of the street at Broadway, with the spire visible at the center. The second is Federal Hall, the low building with the gable roof just to the left of the foreground lamppost. It was built as the New York Customs House and in 1887, that building was about halfway through its period of use as the United States Subtreasury.
The third is in the foreground on the left, so we don’t have a good view of it. 55 Wall Street was constructed as the Merchants’ Exchange, and in 1877 was used as the Customs House. Later on it was doubled in height, but the view from this angle was not changed by that alteration.
Trinity was built between 1839 and 1846; Federal Hall between 1834 and 1842, and 55 Wall between 1836 and 1842. 55 Wall Street was in part a response to the damage done during the Great Fire of 1835; Trinity is the third church on its site and is in part a response to damage to the second building by storms in 1839; and Federal Hall is an entirely masonry building constructed, in part, to address concerns about fire.
The disasters I’ve just mentioned were in the past; another lay a year in the future when this photo was taken. The very tall poles with multiple cross-arms were there to carry wires for multiple competing telegraph and telephone companies. Those wires were badly damaged all over the city by the Great Blizzard of March 1888, leading to them being buried. There was a relatively short period where those big poles existed downtown, and it’s hard to get good pictures of them.
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