There are companies that service fireplaces and restock wood in Manhattan (for high fees).
Pretty much all luxury apartments here have at least one fireplace. And when I first moved to NYC, even most small apartments had them (usually just for decoration with the chimney bricked up).
Back in the day, it wasn’t a luxury but the main source of heat. You’d have horse-drawn carts selling coal and picking up ash going down the streets all day.
It’s mostly for novelty these days but some businesses here still have wood/coal stoves because converting to gas would cost a fortune
Yes, I imagined there would be. I remembered something about a dispute over chimney smoke among some our elites, and found it below.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/16/nyregion/16bono.html