Madison Avenue in Midtown: From Residential Byway to Ad-World Shorthand
How a street laid out in 1836 and named for a dead president became, within Midtown, the physical address for an entire industry's name.
Neighbourhood · Manhattan, New York
Midtown
Midtown is a neighbourhood in Manhattan, New York.
From the archive
Stories about Midtown
East 45th Street: From Rail Cut to Terminal City's Quiet Flank
A short Midtown block built on buried railway tracks, a hotel named for a president, and a recent chapter that put it back in the news.
East 41st Street: The Midtown Block the Grid Had to Work Around
A short Midtown South street whose path was interrupted by a 19th-century reservoir, rebuilt around a landmark library, and reshaped again by the rise of Grand Central.
East 40th Street: The Quiet Seam Between Murray Hill and Tudor City
A short Midtown crosstown street with no single origin story, but a real one: it sits at the hinge between a vanished colonial estate and one of the city's first planned urban enclaves.
East 39th Street: Reading Midtown's Layers on a Quiet Crosstown Block
A short crosstown street near Fifth and Madison Avenues carries, in its uneven mix of buildings, the imprint of three overlapping eras of Manhattan development.
Fifth Avenue Tower Urban Plaza: Midtown's Zoning-Born Open Space
A paved pocket off Fifth Avenue near East 39th Street traces back to a 1961 zoning bargain — though the plaza's own construction history remains largely undocumented.
East 36th Street: Rowhouses, a Robber Baron's Library, and a Name of Uncertain Origin
A short Murray Hill block whose history runs from disputed farmland legend to J.P. Morgan's private library — and the landmark status that later tried to pin it all down.
Part of Every Street Guide.