Morbid Tour

The unfortunate case of the ‘HooDoo’ Contractor.

For a moment just imagine the city of 115 years ago – an overcrowded, teeming mass of people,
tenements, grand structures and commerce in Lower Manhattan, less crowded as you moved up the
Island but being developed around the Rapid Transit lines of the elevated trains, growing residential and
entertainment districts and retail centers, further up towards the marble of Inwood and the Bronx,
there are farmlands and space and air and sky and light.

When you think about the great engineering achievement of the New York City subway, you might
assume that lots of people had to lose their lives in order for the work to have gotten done. Officially,
the figure given for deaths of people during construction of the first few subway lines, is 74 – not so
many, huh? Especially given that the number of workers topped 7,700 in those first years. Tonight I will
tell you the story of the most unlucky man to have gotten involved in this mammoth project, a man
pursued by accident and destruction along a stretch of Manhattan only a few blocks long but a place to
be avoided during the unlucky year of 1902.

The Rapid Transit Subway Construction Company began tearing up the streets of Manhattan 111 years
ago. Building was divided into sections and each section had a sub-contractor who headed up that part
of the project. Overseeing all the work in the city was the head contractor, John MacDonald, and the
Chief Engineer of the Rapid Transit Commission, William Barclay Parsons.

Parsons had made an important decision when designing the system and that was for the subway to be
shallow, instead of deep like the Underground in London and other cities, so that building would be
easier, cheaper, faster and the end experience better for the user, the passengers, us! He did design and
plan for some sections to be deeper under the ground, however, up at Fort George in Washington
Heights and in Manhattan, between 34 th and 42nd Streets. It was this Murray Hill/Mid Town section that
proved to be so dangerous, so unlucky for the sub-contractor in charge, Major Ira Shaler.

Shaler had earned his title during the Spanish-American war and by all accounts was a good man, willing
to get his hands dirty and work alongside his men. 1902 had started in a very unfortunate way for
railways in New York. On January 8th, a train coming into Grand Central depot crashed into the train in
front of it , in the tunnel underneath Park Avenue. The driver claimed that he couldn’t see either the
signals or the other train because of all the smoke and steam from the engines. 15 people lost their lives
and many more were injured – people were killed in the impact, some were killed by venting steam, and
were boiled alive, many others were badly burned. This accident lead directly to the electrification of
the railway lines coming into Grand Central and for the new terminal, built in 1913 to become one of the
first electrified buildings in the world.

A few weeks later, on January 2th 1902, some loose papers started a fire inside a powder house at Park
avenue and 41st Street housing lots and lots of dynamite that Shaler was using to drill and blast through
the bedrock under Park Avenue. The massive explosion caused widespread destruction of property,
including the Murray Hill Hotel where two employees and one guest were killed. Three others were also
killed, an engineer and mechanic, workers in the tunnel and another young man. Over 100 other people
were injured, some due to flying glass and masonry. “It appeared as if an earthquake or a terrible
hurricane had struck the city and laid it waste” according to the New York Times, so terrible was the
carnage. Ironically the subway tunnel itself was not badly damaged and the accident did not hold up
continuing construction. Major Shaler, his foreman and assistant foreman were indicted for
manslaughter soon after the accident and each held by the coroner to $10,000 bail.

Work continued. In February, another fatal fire began in the 71 st Regiment Armory on Park Avenue at
33rd Street. Directly in front of the armory tunnel work was going on and, in fact workers from the tunnel
were credited with being the first to raise the alarm and helping to save the life of the janitor and his
family whom they roused and rescued from the burning building. Despite great efforts, the fire spread
to car barns of the Metropolitan Railway Company and to the Park Avenue Hotel, via the elevator shaft,
in which 17 people lost their lives, some of whom jumped to their deaths from the 6 th floor. At one point
there was panic that another powder house full of dynamite for the subway was ready to explode,
however Major Shaler himself came to reassure the public that the powder house was nowhere near
the fire.

And the work of building the subway continued. The very next month, Shaler suffered yet another
accident along section 4. This time, there was a tunnel cave-in along Park Avenue between 37 th & 38th
Streets! Though the collapse did not injury any workers under the ground, it caused severe damage to
several houses belonging to prominent citizens, whereby their stoops and the whole front of their
buildings fell into the excavations. The accident did not delay work on the tunnel too much but August
Belmont, owner of the IRT and the Subway Construction Company ended up buying at least three of the
damaged house for a reported $1 million.

And the work of the subway continued, with Shaler at the helm of section 4, until one fateful day in
June. On this day, Shaler alongside William Barclay Parsons and his deputy, George Rice, were inspecting
a section of tunnel at about 40th Street. They had been debating how best to shore up the roof of this
section of tunnel since the rock was proving to be so uneven and unstable. Much of it was timbered but
some had been removed to allow the sandhogs to get to work removing rock from above. They were
inspecting one particular boulder that looked a bit precarious, Parsons poked a stick into it and stepped
back to see what would fall, and despite knowing that he should stay under a protected roof, Shaler
stepped under the unprotected section and the rest of the boulder came tumbling down, burying him in
about a ton of rock. Parsons and Rice were safe and untouched just inches away. As he lay there in
agony, stoic as ever, he exclaimed that he thought his back may be broken. Eventually he was taken to
hospital where he died twelve days later.