George Templeton Strong, From the Diaries

George Templeton Strong, From the Diaries

Strong lived in New York at a time when the city was facing many hardships and when it was still taking shape. I enjoyed reading from his diary as I felt as though we were getting a raw and uncut version of a story as opposed to an objective history paper. A few events stuck out to me and I would like to mention a couple.

The stock market seemed to be a major concern for Strong and he seemed to be a smart man from his knowledge of it. However, the market did not seem to be doing well at that time. There were mentions of a financial crisis. It shows that New York was not such a glamorous place at that time as people were facing hardships. Did this shape the politics that were going on at that time?

Strong discussed the civil war between the North and the South in his journal a great deal. Although he was probably of a higher social standing than most others, this is evident that the war was on the minds of many people. His opinion to me seemed to be obviously against the South and for the North. I am not very familiar with United States history, but all this talk about the war makes me wonder about an actual unbiased report of it. Also, would things be very different if the North had not won the war?

These are just two of the events that took place in New York at that time. Is the city still at the pace that it was during the 1800s? Or has things calmed down?