Cities
The United States offered to the world a phenomena not seen before – the birth and growth of cities in almost real-time. London, for example, had been a major settlement as early as 43 AD, while in North America the city of Chicago rose from a newly incorporated town in 1833 to a thriving international city only five decades later.
With the growth of the cities came the growth of services which drew attraction of tourists and professional observers from around the world. Among these were prisons and mental health facilities. Unbelievable as it may seem, cities became tourist attractions in part due to their modern and forward-thinking provisions for the criminally minded and the mentally ill. These were admired by Europeans and Americans alike.
As early as the 1830s guidebooks were published touting the advances in such facilities and recommending sites to be visited by tourists. As the railroads expanded and their schedules became more adaptable to travel planning, tourists flocked to American cities to bask in the nation’s rising status as a leader in the care of the less fortunate.
Many of the new institutions were built in a monumental style rivaling the Gothic cathedrals of Europe in grandeur and enhanced by the natural environment surrounding them. The New York State Prison in Ossining (Sing Sing) was one such attraction, at least to those not compelled to remain as guests. Charles Dickens wrote often, and often admiringly, of American prisons and mental institutions in his travelogue American Notes. In much of the same volume, he was far more critical of other American institutions and architecture.
The fascination with urban growth triggered tourism of cities which rivaled that of America’s natural wonders by the late 19th century, aided no doubt by the emergence of quality restaurants and hotels. Visiting America’s urban centers as a vacation is nearly as old as the urban centers themselves, particularly the western cities which grew from village to metropolis in the span of half a century.