Downing’s Oyster House
1825–c.1871
Oyster House
Alternate Names:
Downing’s Oyster Cellar
Ownership:
George T. Downing (1857–c.1871)
Thomas Downing (1825–1857)
Location:
3-7 Broad Street at Wall Street, Basement*
Publications:
Lamback, Briona. “The Double Life of New York’s Black Oyster King.” Gastro Obscura (Atlas Obscura), September 28, 2022.
Malinowski, Sarah. “Thomas Downing – NYC Oyster King & Abolitionist.” Fishers Island Oyster Farm. Blog, February 22, 2021.
Spilman, Rick. “Thomas Downing, From Son of Slaves to Oyster King of New York City.” The Old Salt Blog. Blog, February 22, 2020.
Korfhange, Matthew. “How a Child of Virginia Slaves Became the Oyster King of New York – and a Favorite of the Queen of England. The Virginian-Pilot. February 15, 2020.
Lam, Francis. “How Thomas Downing Became the Black Oyster King of New York.” The Splendid Table, March 14, 2018. [Interview with Joanne Hyppolite featured in Episode 654, “The Oyster King and the Seagull Test,” originally aired March 16, 2018.]
Harris, Jessica B., Albert Lukas, and Jerome Grant. Sweet Home Café Cookbook: A Celebration of African American Cooking. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, 2018: 12, 76, 79, 84. [Includes a recipe for “Thomas Downing’s NYC Oyster Pan Roast, p.79.]
Adams, Lucas. “Places You Can No Longer Go: Downing’s Oyster House.” Atlas Obscura, July 7, 2016 (illustrated).
Moore, Nigel. “The Venerable Thomas Downing – Black Oyster King of New York.” The Oyster’s My World. Blog, October 20, 2014.
Grimes, William. Appetite City: A Culinary History of New York. New York: North Point Press, 2009: 35-36.
Kurlansky, Mark. The Big Oyster: History on the Half Shell. New York: Random House, 2007: 162-170, 205, 230.
Hewitt, John H. “Mr. Downing and His Oyster House: The Life and Good Works of an African-American Entrepreneur.” New York History 74, 3 (July 1993).
Batterberry, Michael and Arione. On the Town in New York from 1776 to the Present. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1973: 99.
Nevins, Allan and Milton Halsey Thomas, eds. The Diary of George Templeton Strong, 4 vols. New York: Macmillan Company, 1952: 2:482 (‘The Turbulent Fifties, 1850-1859‘: December 30, 1859), 3:21 (‘The Civil War, 1860-1865‘: April 13, 1860), 4:223, 373-74 (‘Post-War Years, 1865-1875‘: July 10, 1868; July 18, 1871).
Washington, S.A.M. “George Thomas Downing: A Sketch of His Life and Times.” Newport, Rhode Island: Milne Printery, 1910.
Dayton, Abram C. Last Days of Knickerbocker Life in New York. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1897: 128-129, 131-133.
“It was whispered about that the oysterman had influence at the Custom House, Post Office, and City Hall. These rumors had the effect of drawing many office seekers to the cellar, who treated him with the marked respect usually bestowed on the power behind the throne” (132).
Downing, George T. “A Sketch of the Life and Times of Thomas Downing.” A.M.E. Church Review 4 (April 1887).
Barrett, Walter. The Old Merchants of New York City, second series. New York: Carleton, 1864: 74. [Brief mention of Downing’s as a regular haunt of merchant Schuyler Livingston.]
Notable Guests:
Jacob Barker (Financier & Lawyer)
Alfred Ely Beach (Editor of The Sun)
James Gordon Bennett (Editor of The Herald)
Erastus Brooks (Editor of The Express)
Jonathan I. Coddington (Postmaster)
Charles Dickens (Writer)
James B. Glentworth (Inspector of Tobacco)
Fitz-Greene Halleck (Writer & Bookkeeper for John Jacob Astor)
Philip Hone (Diarist & Former Mayor of New York City)
William George Howard (8th Earl of Carlisle)
Charles King (Editor of New York American)
Abraham R. Lawrence (President of the Harlem Railroad)
Major Noah (Editor of The Messenger and Dispatch)
William M. Price (District Attorney)
Col. William L. Stone (Editor of The Commercial Adviser)
Samuel Swartout (Collector of the Port of New York)
George Templeton Strong (Attorney, Vestryman, & Diarist): “A hot and busy day. The usual lunch of roast clams at Downing’s.” (1)
John Van Buren (Attorney General of New York):
“Scene: Downing’s Oyster Cellar. John van Buren at the counter devouring his shilling’s worth of bivalves. Dirty little —,who has recently tried a case with John in which he was beat…steps up beside him, resolved to say something crushing…
‘Mr. Van Buren is there any client so dirty that you wouldn’t undertake his case?’
John Van Buren (swallows his oyster unmoved and looks over his shoulder at Pettifogger with an expression of concern). ‘Why, what have you been doing?'” (2)
James Watson Webb (Editor of The Morning Courier and Enquirer)
Bobby White (President of the Manhattan Co.)
Stephen Whitney (Merchant)
Notes:
Downing’s catered the Boz Ball at the Park Theater in honor of Charles Dickens (nicknamed Boz), on his first American tour in 1842. (3) Boasting 3,000 attendees, the event featured 50,000 oysters, 10,000 sandwiches, 40 hams, 76 tongues, 50 rounds of beef, 50 jellied turkeys, 50 “pairs of chicken,” 25 of duck, and 2,000 mutton chops. (4)
Queen Victoria was famously fond of Downing’s oysters, putting in orders from across the pond and sending a gold chronometer watch to Downing as a thank you. (5)
Downing was involved with the Underground Railroad, hiding enslaved people en route from the south to Canada in his oyster cellars. (6)
When accused of causing a cholera outbreak, Downing stated: “If any gentleman can prove he died of oysters I work in, I’ll pay his expenses to Greenwood [Cemetery].” (7)
A spring flowed under Broad Street and through Downing’s oyster vaults. “Deep enough to feel the tide level at which salt water used to rise years ago,” the spring kept the vault constantly damp, providing “favorable circumstances” for the keeping of oysters over time. According to Hewitt a famous soda water company made use of the same spring. (8)
The New York City Chamber of Commerce closed on the day of Downing’s funeral, April 13, 1866. (9)
3-7 Broad Street was replaced in 1873 by the Drexel Building, which in 1882 became the first building to be illuminated by Thomas Edison’s incandescent lighting. The site was razed again in 1913 to build the J.P. Morgan & Co. Building, which stands today at 23 Wall Street. (10)
The New York Historical Society Museum and Library holds a stoneware pickled oyster jar from Downing’s, c. 1840. The jar featured in the exhibition, “City Workers, City of Struggle” at the Museum of the City of New York, May 1, 2019-January 5, 2020. The Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History & Culture is displaying a similar item in their ‘Cultural Expressions’ gallery. Additionally, the museum’s Sweet Home Café features a recipe for “Thomas Downing’s NYC Oyster Pan Roast.”
Ben “Moody” Harney was inspired by Downing’s to operate his own modern day oyster cart, Brooklyn’s The Real Mother Shuckers. Meanwhile in Richmond, Virginia, Dead Shell Oysters operates a “mobile oyster saloon” as an ode to Thomas Downing, who was born on Chincoteague Island, Virginia. In an Instagram post the owners even claim to be descendants of Downing himself.
* “Numbers 5 and 7 Broad Street held the basement restaurant and Number 3 became an oyster storage cellar with running salt water” (11).
(1) Nevins and Thomas, 1952: 4:223.
(2) ibid.: 3:21.
(3) Grimes, 2009.
(4) Moore, 2014.
(5) Lamback, 2022.
(6) ibid.
(7) Adams, 2016.
(8) Hewitt, 1993: 236.
(9) Moore, 2014.
(10) Miller, Tom. “The Lost Drexel Building – Broad and Wall Streets.” Daytonian in Manhattan. Blog, June 2, 2014.
(11) Kurlansky, 2007: 169.
Cover photo: Nichols, Call. Detail of pickled oyster jar (in the collection of Copps Island Oysters, Norwalk, Connecticut). In Sarah Malinowski, “Thomas Downing – NYC Oyster King & Abolitionist.” Fishers Island Oyster Farm. Blog, February 22, 2021. Accessed February 28, 2023.
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