The 1827 Israel Clark House - 21 Vandam Street

 

Enclosed today, the narrow horsewalk (left) provided access to the rear yards.

In 1826, mason and builder Israel Clark broke ground for his two-and-a-half story house at 21 Vandam Street.  It sat on what had been the sprawling Richmond Hill estate, leased from Trinity Church by John Jacob Astor I.  Astor was busy erecting scores of buildings on the land, and it is possible that Clark was involved in the massive project, resulting in his acquiring this plot.  To enhance the marketing of his houses, Astor had paid the land rent years in advance.

Completed in 1827, 21 Vandam Street was similar to many of the Astor structures rising on the surrounding blocks at the time.  Twenty-two-feet wide, its Flemish bond brick facade was trimmed in brownstone.  While the entrance was less elaborate than those of some neighboring homes, its transom was outlined with delicate carving.  Two prim dormers punctured the peaked roof.  Almost every house constructed at the time had a secondary building in the rear yard--in this case a small brick house.  It was accessed by a three-foot-wide horsewalk, or passageway, between 21 and 23 Vandam Street.

Israel and Sarah F. Clark remained in the house until around 1831.  The following year, George W. Howe, a merchant doing business on Old-Slip, lived in the main residence and John Pollard, a painter, leased the rear house.  When the property was offered for lease on January 24, the announcement stressed, "without ground rent."  It included "the substantial well finished brick dwelling house in front, and a brick dwelling on the rear, well finished."  The announcement pointed out, "The above is rented for $700 per annum."  That figure would translate to about $1,225 a month in 2024.

James A. Hearn, a drygoods merchant, occupied the main house the following year, while architect Edward Gray lived in the rear.  In 1841, the family of Rev. James I. Ostrom moved in.  He was the pastor of the Eighth Avenue Presbyterian Church on West 18th Street.  The Ostroms' son, John W., enrolled at New York University the year they moved in.

The Ostrom family lived here at least through 1843.  Sharing the rear house that year were carpenter Cornelius Degraw, laborer Michael McCusker, and Percival V. Seaman, who listed his occupation as "whitesmith."  (A whitesmith was a tinsmith, or, in some cases, a finisher of iron works.)  Degraw took a civil service job in 1844, becoming an assistant captain in the Third District Watch, which was tasked with looking for fires and criminal activity.

The rear house became home to Deborah P. Havens in 1845.  The widow of Peter Havens, she would remain at least through 1851.  The main house saw a succession of renters throughout that time.  In 1845, they were Charles A. Marchant and his wife, and by 1848 the family of William D. Stewart lived here.  That year, on April 25, their 13-year-old son William Jr. died.  His funeral was held in the house the following day.

The Daniel Karr (sometimes spelled Carr) family occupied the front house in 1851.  Daniel Karr, Jr. was a merchant doing business on William Street.  Boarding with them that year was the Mason family, who had an 11-year-old son, Charles.

On the cold afternoon of February 14, 1851, Charles H. Mason took his kite out, and climbed to the roof of the rear house to fly it.  The New York Herald reported, "It seems the poor boy was flying his kite on the top of the three-story house, and on walking backwards he fell over on to the shelving roof of a two-story house next door."  That house sat in the rear yard of 19 Vandam Street.  Charles fractured his skull and broke and arm in the fall.  He died at 10:00 that night.  The New York Herald cautioned, "We hope this will be, in some degree, a warning to boys venturing on the tops of houses to fly kites."

The newspaper had good reason to warn kite-flying boys.  The Evening Post noted, "This is the second fatal accident which has resulted from flying kites on the tops of houses within the last week."

Around 1856, Abraham Whitley purchased 21 Vandam Street.  His affluence was reflected in his advertisement on June 28 that year.  "For Sale--The Schooner Rebecca Clyde, five years old, 62 or 63 tons burthen, now lying at the Brick Yard Dock, half a mile above Port Richmond, Staten Island, in fine order, calculated to go to any part of the world.  Price very low.  For particulars inquire of Abram Whitley, 21 Vandam st. N.Y.

Whitley married Henrietta Bedell in Staten Island in 1839.  Following his death around 1859, Lewis Bedell, presumably her brother, moved in.  He ran an oyster business on Spring Street at the Hudson River.  In 1860, Catharine King, a widow, lived in the rear house, while Nathan Rathbun, a fish dealer, boarded in the main residence.  

Lewis Bedell left Vandam Street in 1864.  Henrietta Whitley took in a boarder, John S. Scully that year.  Scully was a broker with offices at 8 Battery Place.  His occupancy came to a disastrous end in 1865.  The New York Herald reported,

About ten o'clock yesterday morning a fire originated from a spark on the roof of building No. 21 Vandam street, occupied by J. S. Scully.  The roof and attic story were destroyed.  Loss on furniture about four hundred dollars, insured for fifteen hundred dollars in the North River Insurance Company.  The building is owned by Mrs. Whitley. It is damaged about five hundred dollars and is insured.

Henrietta's damages would equal about $9,270 today.  It was possibly during the renovations that the handsome paneled fascia board--unexpected on a Federal period house--was installed below the cornice.

In 1870, Henrietta Whitley got a long-term renter for the rear house.  William Dodd listed his profession as "brass" and would remain into the 1890s.

In the meantime, Henrietta Whitley moved to West 23rd Street in 1878 where she operated a boarding house.  She sold 21 Vandam Street to James and Fannie A. Peacock.  Like Israel Clark half a century earlier, Peacock was a carpenter and builder.

William Lennan listed his address here in 1899, possibly in the rear house.  He worked at Monahan's Express Company, and on Valentine's Day that year he and a 14-year-old co-worker, Joseph de Burbery, went drinking.  The Morning Telegraph reported, "they thought they would celebrate the holiday in a most becoming manner, so they repaired to a brewery on Vandam and Spring streets, and consumed so much beer that the proprietor thought they would burst.  Then the two youths went out into the street and knew no more."

A policeman found the pair passed out in a snow bank.  "They were hung over a railing and thawed out at the station house," said the article.  De Burbery supposed the beer in his stomach had frozen solid "and he won't feel relieved until the Spring thaw."  The two were fined $5 each--about $185 today--for drunkenness.

James Peacock died on December 1, 1905.  His funeral was held in the parlor on December 4.  Nine years later, on October 16, 1914, The New York Times reported, "Mrs. Fannie A. Peacock, widow of James Peacock, who was a carpenter and builder for many years in old Greenwich Village, is dead at her home."  Fannie was 73 years old.

William Sloane Coffin purchased 15 houses in the neighborhood from Trinity Church in August 1919, including 21 Vandam Street.  Three years later, in September, he offered it for sale, describing it as the "three-story basement modern dwelling."  (The term "modern," obviously, referred to the updated elements like plumbing and electricity.)  It was purchased by Mandelbaum & Levine, Inc. for $25,000 (about $436,000 today).  In reporting the sale, the New York Herald mentioned, "This is one of the twelve [sic] old dwellings purchased by Mr. Coffin from Trinity some years ago and which have been altered into modern dwellings, retaining the Colonial features of open fireplaces, mantels and large rooms."

The basement and parlor floors were converted to an Italian restaurant, Our Little Place, which opened in 1923.  (It was at this time, no doubt, that the dormers were combined, making the attic floor more usable.)  The restaurant was run by brothers Bruno and Renato Trebbi.  

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

The following year, on March 11, The Musical Digest reported that Italian baritone Antonio Scotti had given a dinner in honor of conductor Gennaro Papi of the Metropolitan Opera.  The article quoted the invitation, "The place of our rendezvous is 'Our Little Place,' which is at 21 Vandam street (three streets below the west side Houston street subway station.)"

In 1925, the New York Evening Post reported that Bruno Trebbi had purchased 21 Vandam Street from Mandelbaum and Levine.  By the Depression years, the name of the restaurant was changed to Renato 21.  In 1934, its "Gala New Year's Eve Party" cost patrons $2.50 per person and included "special dinner, music, dancing and favors."

Renato Trebbi purchased the building from his brother in June 1935.  Although lore insists that Renato 21 was a speakeasy, there is no evidence that it was ever anything but a charming Italian restaurant.

The top floors of the house were rented.  Living here in 1940 was the Schrecder family.  Henry and Anna Schrecder were born in Germany.  Still living with them was there 21-year-old son, Walter.

In 1941, The New Yorker described Renato's "way down at 21 Vandam Street" as "fairly exclusive."  The New York Evening Post went further, writing,

Renato Trebbi has been operating this two-story establishment at this address for 18 years. Paintings and caricatures of animals (and some of the regular patrons) decorate the bar on the lower floor; two dining rooms upstairs feature murals by Tony Sarg, paintings of old New York and photographic murals of Lake Como and the Riviera. Entertainment on Friday and Saturday nights by Victor Zana, pianist.

A 1957 advertising postcard showed the rear garden.

Renato's was a destination spot for decades.  On June 11, 1959, The Villager wrote, "Under the genial guiding hand of Renato Trebbi, this south Village restaurant has few peers," adding, "250 guests can be accommodated at one time--the walnut paneled private dining rooms are sumptuous."

On May 3, 1972, Cue magazine said of Renato's, "In summer, bordered by rose gardens, there is one of the loveliest outdoor dining patios in New York."  But the end of the line for the half-century old restaurant was near at the time.

In 1974, 21 Vandam Street was converted to one apartment per floor.  A subsequent renovation completed in 2007 resulted in an apartment in the basement level, a duplex on the parlor and second floors, and an apartment on the third.  The sign for Renato's, painted over, still hands from its handsome wrought iron bracket.

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The Otto Hahn House - 552 East 87th Street

 

552 East 87th Street (right) is a mirror image of its next door neighbor.

In 1880, the once bucolic district around the hamlet of Yorkville, about five miles north of the city, was seeing rapid development.  John C. Henderson, a fur, hat, and strawgoods merchant, joined the trend in 1881 by acquiring the blockfront along East End Avenue, wrapping the corners of East 86th and East 87th Streets.  He commissioned the architectural firm of Lamb & Rich to design 32 brick-faced houses.  They would comprise the first of his residential enclaves "for persons of moderate means."  The plans, filed in October 1881, placed the cost of each house at $6,500, or about $192,000 in 2024.

Lamb & Rich's Queen Anne group brought individual designs together into a charming streetscape of arches, towers and gables.  Starting with a charming mews called Henderson Place that opened onto East 86th Street, the assemblage would be called "the new Henderson Place residence colony."  It ended with 552 East 87th Street.

At just 17-feet-wide, it was a mirror image of 554 East 87th Street.  The two houses shared a split brownstone stoop.  A complex terra cotta plaque sat between the single-doored entrance and the vast, arched parlor window.  A blind panel below the hall window at the second floor featured brick laid in a sideways herringbone pattern.  The third floor took the form of a mansard with slate fish scale shingles.  The symmetry of the two houses was enhanced by a shared dormer.

Henderson leased the houses.  His tenants in 552 East 87th Street at the turn of the century were the family of Otto Hahn.  Hahn and his wife, the former Eleonore Funk, had one daughter, E. Adelaide, born in 1893.  

The erudite Eleonore was a graduate of Hunter College.  She involved herself in various women's clubs, including the New York State Federation of Women's Clubs.  She home-schooled her precocious daughter through her elementary years.  

Interestingly, E. Adelaide always used her first initial, and it is uncertain whether it even stood for a name.  In November 1907, St. Nicholas Magazine: An Illustrated Magazine for Young Folks launched a children's contest in categories ranging from verse and prose to drawing and photography.  Thirteen-year-old E. Adelaide won the cash prize in "Puzzle-Making."

That was the same year she was enrolled in the Hunter Model School, the high school run by her mother's alma mater.  E. Adelaide Hahn graduated from Hunter College in 1915 with majors in Latin and French and a minor in Greek.  She earned her masters degree in 1917 from Columbia University, and in 1921 became a member of the classics faculty at Hunter College.

Eleonore continued her involvement in social issues.  On July 8, 1937, The New York Times reported that she would address the Chautauqua Women's Club on children's rights.  The article noted that she and her daughter had won the club's "first and second prizes, $10 and $5, respectively in the annual prize spelling match," adding, "Miss Hahn is head of the Latin and Greek Department at Hunter College."  

E. Adelaide Hahn had earned her Ph.D. at Columbia University in 1929.  She became chair of the classics department of Hunter College in 1936, remaining in that post until her retirement in 1963.

E. Adelaide Hahn, from the Database of Classical Scholars of Rutgers School of Arts and Sciences.

In the meantime, on December 18, 1921 (the year E. Adelaide Hahn joined the Hunter faculty), the New-York Tribune reported that the Henderson estate had sold "the three-story 17-foot dwelling at 552 East Eighty-seventh Street, in the new Henderson Place residence colony" to Dr. Thomas Kirby Davis.

A 1913 graduate of Johns Hopkins Medical School and a specialist in nervous and mental diseases, Davis was on the staff of Bellevue Hospital.  Like her predecessor in the house, his wife, the former Rosa Vedder Mabon, was well-educated, a 1913 graduate of Bryn Mawr College.  The couple had married in 1917 and had one son, William M. Davis, born in 1919.

Davis was Rosa's second husband.  She was formerly married to William Mabon.  Her American roots went deep and three of her ancestors had served in the American Revolution.

Shortly after moving into the East 87th Street house, Davis became director of neurology and psychiatry at the Lenox Hill Hospital, a post he would retain until 1952.  William followed his father's professional footsteps.  From 1944 to 1949 he was an intern and then a resident in medicine and pathology at St. Luke's Hospital, and in 1951 became Chief Resident at Bellevue Hospital.  

The Davises receive a delivery from a rug cleaning firm in 1941.  image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

The Davises moved to Danbury, Connecticut in 1961 following Dr. Davis's retirement.  The East 87th Street house became home to Bertram Clarke and his wife, the former Muriel Barudin.

Born in 1911, Clarke was a member of the Grolier Club, formed in 1884 by lovers of books.  He was described by The New York Times as "a prominent designer of art books and typography."  After serving in the Coast Guard during World War II, Clarke came to New York City in 1946, designing at the Limited Editions Club.  He did freelance work with David Jacques Way on the typography of the Frick Collection's 12-volume catalogue.  In 1953 the two formed Clarke & Way, Inc.

Upon Clarke's death at the age of 83 on February 19, 1994, The New York Times remarked, 

Mr. Clarke's talents were much in demand in the art world.  He designed catalogues for David Rockefeller, Paul Mellon, Jayne Wrightsman and Laughlin Phillips.  And he designed and printed the folio edition "Georgia O'Keefe" published by Viking.  He also designed the catalogue of "Georgia O'Keeffe, Arts and Letters," for the National Gallery of Art.

It is unclear how long Muriel Clarke remained in the house.  Always a single family home, little has changed outwardly after its more than 140 years existence.

photographs by the author

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William M. Dowling's 1937 19 East 88th Street

 

In 1935, William M. Dowling designed a 15-story-and-penthouse apartment building for Nathaniel Wallenstein on the northeast corner of 88th Street and Madison Avenue.  His bold, late Art Deco design included triple-height fluted pilasters on either side of the entrance that terminated in stylized scallop designs.  The address was announced in jazzy Art Deco figures within the spandrel between the second and third floors, directly above the doorway.  By contrasting light and dark brick, Dowling created vertical central sections on both elevations.  

The street address, in a jazzy Art Deco font, is integrated into the spandrel above the second floor.

Architects had been wrapping casement windows around the corners of buildings for several years.  But Dowling took his design a step further by chamfering them within the sharply angled corners.  The streamlined terrace and balcony railings have been compared by architectural historians to ocean liner designs.

No. 19 East 88th Street was completed in 1937.  An advertisement called it "this ultra-modern new building" and a "town residence for a selected tenancy."  The apartments, ranging from three to five rooms, were described as, "individually planned--No two alike!"  An ad touted, 

Most modern appointments.  All electric kitchens! Dropped living rooms; spacious foyers' dressing rooms with triple mirrors; glass-enclosed showers; recessed radiation.  Central Park--in all its beauty--just beyond your w-i-d-e casement corner windows.

Among the initial residents was investment adviser Russell Field Prudden.  Born in Lockport, New York in 1894, he had been senior bank examiner of the State Banking Department from 1930 to 1933.  Prudden was the founder and publisher of Prudden's Digest of Investment and Banking Opinions and the author of The Bank Credit Investigator.  

The New York Times described Prudden as being "active socially here and in Palm Beach, Fla., and Southampton, L.I.,"  where he maintained homes.  His entertaining in town was typified in The New York Times reporting on December 3, 1937, "Russell F. Prudden of 19 East Eighty-eighth Street entertained with a dinner last night at his home for Mr. and Mrs. Knox B. Phagan of Bronxville, later taking his guests to a theatrical performance."  

Another early resident was Allen Boretz, who signed a lease in December 1937.  The songwriter and playwright had scored a Broadway hit seven months earlier when Room Service (co-written with John Murray) opened at the Cort Theatre.  It would run for 500 performances, closing on July 16, 1938.

The Federal Theatre Project produced Room Service in San Francisco in 1938.

In 1939, his play Off to Buffalo opened, while Room Service resulted in offers from Hollywood.  Boretz would write or co-write screenplays into the 1940s.  Among his credits were the 1943 It Ain't Hay and the 1946 Ziegfield Follies.

Typical of the early tenants were Bert Kulick, vice president of the Syndicate Exchanges, Inc., proprietors of motion picture theaters; Daniel I. Crowley, president of the Crowley Tar Products Company of New York and Chicago; and Hugo F. Jaburg, president of R. C. Williams & Jaburg Bros., a food products firm.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Dr. N. Philip Norman and his wife lived here by 1944.  The Consultant Nutritionist for the New York City Department of Heath and Hospitals, he was described by Dr. Francis M. Pottenger, Jr., president of the American Academy of Applied Nutrition in 1947 as "one of the well known nutritionists in the east, and...the author of many excellent articles and books along these lines."  Recognized as a pioneer nutritionist, in 1948 he co-authored Tomorrow's Food with James Rorty.

Norman's leisure time was devoted to an expertise far afield of his professional bailiwick.  In 1944, the New York Sun described him as "for many years a maker of river steamboat models."  His hobby made him a leading authority on steamboats and their architecture and history.

Architect Daniel Paul Higgins and his wife Anna lived here by 1944.  A partner in Eggers & Higgins, The New York Times said he was...

prominently or exclusively responsible for a long list of architectural successes, including Constitution Hall for the Daughters of the American Revolution, the National Gallery of Art, the American Red Cross Building and the great-columned Pantheonistic Jefferson Memorials--all in Washington; interior designs for the S. S. America and four Grace Line ships and innumerable libraries and office buildings (example--the Aetna Life Insurance Company headquarters in New York and the Senate Office Building in Washington).

The Higgins's apartment was furnished with 18th and early 19th century American furniture.  images from the collection of the Library of Congress.

In addition to his busy architectural career, Higgins was a member of the Board of Education and "served on the board of so many youth movements that he could not remember all the names," according to The New York Times.  Among them were the Boys Clubs of America, the Police Athletic League, the Boy Scouts of America and the Catholic Youth Organization.

from the collection of the Library of Congress

Daniel and Anna Higgins had two adult children.  They maintained a country home in Carmel, New York, and a Colonial period house in Truro, Massachusetts.

The Higgins's country house in Massachusetts.  from the collection of the Library of Congress.

On December 18, 1953, the Kingston, New York newspaper The Daily Freeman reported, "Daniel P. Higgins, 67, widely known architect...is seriously ill in New York Hospital."  He died the following week, on December 26.  His lengthy obituary in The New York Times mentioned, "he left the ranks of fledgling draftsmen to create his own blueprints and culminate his career as partner in one of the country's foremost architectural firms, Eggers & Higgins."

Influential in his own sphere was Russian immigrant Jacob Potofsky, who lived here with his wife Blanche Lydia Zetland by the 1960s.   The couple was married in 1951.  (Potofsky's first wife, Callie Taylor, had died five years earlier.)

Potofsky started his career at the age of 14 as a "floor boy" in a Hart, Schaffner & Marx garment factory.  He rose through the ranks of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America until, in 1946, he became its president.  The New York Times would call him "a man renowned for his skills as a conciliator within the union movement."  Potofsky died at the age of 84 on August 5, 1979.

A maid in a duplex apartment was the victim of a terrifying incident on May 14, 2004.  After hearing a noise in the upstairs bedroom, The New York Times reported she "encountered the burglar, who...said he would not hurt her.  The burglar restrained her and robbed the apartment of jewelry and other items."  

In an article in The New York Times on March 12, 2006, Christopher Gray mentioned, "most of the casement windows are intact.  Julian Berkeley, the managing agent, said that although the co-op has suggested replacements, 'people just love those windows' and most have kept them."  The old casements have since been replaced with windows that admirably attempt to reflect William M. Dowling's 1936 design.

photographs by the author

many thanks to reader Lowell Cochrane for suggesting this post

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The E. H. Purdy & Co. Building - 42-48 West 13th Street

 

Veiled in fire escapes, the interesting facade is obscured.

In 1869, four high-stooped houses occupied the plots at 42 through 48 West 13th Street.  Sixth Avenue, just steps away, became a shopping thoroughfare following the Civil War and now commerce was spilling onto the side streets--including the formerly exclusive residential 13th Street block.  Elijah H. Purdy, William Phyfe and Robert Clenighen, who composed the firm of E. H. Purdy & Co., acquired the West 13th Street houses and replaced them with a six-story factory building.

Completed in 1870, its handsome Italianate design smacked of the public schools going up around the city at the time.  Slightly projecting pavilions created five vertical sections that were visually enhanced by their openings.  Those of the projecting sections were fully arched, while the others were square-headed.  The prominent cornice rose to a peaked pediment over the central portion.

E. H. Purdy & Co. manufactured wooden moldings, mantles, picture frames and architectural ornaments.  On February 23, 1870, shortly after moving into the new factory, the firm advertised in The Sun for "Picture frame composition casters."

Real Estate Record & Guide, September 30, 1871 (copyright expired)

E. H. Purdy & Co. suffered financial problems in 1886.  Hamilton E. Searle was assigned by the courts to oversee the firm's operations.  It was most likely at this time that A. R. Searle (presumably a son) was made treasurer of the company and the title to the building was put in Fannie J. Searle's name.

As A. R. Searle pointed out in an answer to a potential client's letter on July 2, 1889, "we would say that we manufacture composition ornaments for interior decoration principally."  Architects and builders used the firm for interior detail work--from mantles and fretwork to applied swags and rosettes.

The cornice and pediment survived as late as 1941.  image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

A significant commission to do finish work on a row of high-end houses along 72nd Street near West End Avenue was nearly derailed in the summer of 1890.  On July 17, The World reported, "A strike was ordered against the E. H. Purdy Manufacturing Company, No. 46 West Thirteenth street, yesterday, on account of the employment of non-union men among the cabinet-makers and varnishers."  

Happily for the firm, the issue was resolved.  A week later, E. H. Purdy & Co. advertised for "Boys--Good stout boys wanted for sand papering."

A bicycle policeman passing by the factory shortly around 8:00 on the night on September 6, 1899 saw flames shooting from the second floor window.  The Sun reported the sight prompted him "to pedal for dear life to the nearest fire alarm box."  The article noted the building "is occupied by the E. H. Purdy Manufacturing Company, makers of cabinets and picture frames."

When fire fighters arrived, the large crowd that had filled West 13th Street "greatly hampered the work of attacking the blaze."  Two more alarms were turned in.  At one point, reported the Star-Gazzette of Elmira, New York, "A burning stairway gave way under the weight of several firemen who were precipitated to the first floor, a fall of thirty feet.  All were injured."  The inferno was finally extinguished after greatly damaging the western portion of the structure.  The following day, The New York Times placed the damages at between $40,000 and $50,000--about $1.89 million in 2024.

The financial hit seems to have been too much for the firm.  It was taken over by F. J. Newcomb Mfg. Co., which greatly expanded the business.

The Catalogue of the 14th Annual Exhibition of The Architectural League, 1899 (copyright expired)

Although it listed its business as manufacturers of "picture frames and mouldings," the firm's 104-page catalogue displayed all the details necessary for interior decoration of new homes--carved capitals, delicate neo-Classical ornamentation, an array of rosettes, and nearly limitless moldings.

Two pages from F. J. Newcomb Mfg. Co.'s 1900 catalogue.  (copyright expired)

The firm's vast operation was reflected in its workforce.  In 1901 it employed 145 men, three boys under 18 years old, and one under 16.  They worked 53 hours per week.

Frederick J. Newcomb, president of the company, died in his Westfield, New Jersey home on August 18, 1913 at the age of 66.  The firm continued on, diversifying by 1918 to include "electrical fixtures and mirrors" to its offerings.  It remained in the West 13th Street building at least through 1936.

Around 1940, The Villager moved in.  Along with publishing and printing its newspaper here, it provided meeting rooms for local groups.  On December 30, 1943, for instance, The New York Sun reported, "Dr. Roberta Ma will give an illustrated talk on 'Chinese Gardens' on Monday evening, January 3, 8 o'clock, at the meeting of the Little Gardens Club of New York City, to be held in the Villager office, 48 West 13th street."

By 1961, the National Folding Wall Corp. occupied the building.  It manufactured "folding walls for hotels, institutions, schools and commercial buildings."  Then, in 1967, 42-48 West 13th Street was renovated for residential use and given the inexplicable name "The Bakery Building."  The brick facade has been unnecessarily painted, the cornice and pediment have been lost, and fire escapes obscure the facade. 

photographs by the author

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The Norrie and Sybil Sellar House - 52 West 74th Street

 

With the fortune he garnered in the Singer Sewing Machine Company, Edward C. Clark invested heavily in property in the developing West End--what we call the Upper West Side today.  On October 14, 1882, two years before the completion of his Dakota Apartments, Clark died of malarial fever.  The millionaire left a stretch of property on West 74th Street (from No. 18 through 52) to his one-year-old grandson Frederick Ambrose Clark.

In 1902, Frederick Clark, now a young man, commissioned architect Percy Griffin to design a row of homes on the property.  Griffin, who is not well known today, worked almost exclusively in the stately neo-Georgian style, and the 18 homes of the 74th Street row would be an architectural tour de force.  Completed in 1904, the 25-foot-wide brick-and-stone residences rose five floors with three-story rear extensions.  Each cost, according to The New York Times, $110,000 to construct, or about $3.88 million by 2024 terms.

The Architectural Record, November 1906 (copyright expired)

The Architectural Record, in November 1906, said the block "presents the appearance of a composite whole well studied in its entirety for silhouette fenestration and general composition."  The article added that Griffin, "has varied the individual facade treatments to give to each house a distinctive character, yet to preserve in its composition certain lines, which allow it to properly take its place in the block."

An advertisement in The Sun on October 2, 1904 boasted, "NO residences have ever been offered for rental in New York City comparing with these in construction, equipment, appointments and detail.  They have been designed and built with the careful attention to details of construction given only to the highest class houses built for private ownership."

Anchoring the row to the west was 52 West 74th Street.  Instead of a centered, porticoed entrance, its doorway was placed to the side of a full-height protruding bay.  Three stories of brick trimmed in stone sat above a limestone base, while the fifth floor was discreetly tucked behind a pierced stone parapet.  Inside were 21 rooms (including a billiard room and library), five bathrooms and an elevator.  An advertisement touted a water filter, silver safe, and wine refrigerator.

Clark did not sell the houses, but rented them.  By 1909, Norrie and Sybil Sellar occupied the house.  That same year they purchased the former summer home of Le Grand L. Benedict in Cedarhurst, Long Island.  Norrie Sellar had been a cotton broker, but on February 24, 1909, The Wall Street Journal announced the 36-year-old had been admitted into partnership with the brokerage firm of Dick Bros. & Co.  

Sybil, the daughter of millionaire William Watts Sherman, had grown up in the family mansion at 838 Fifth Avenue and in Newport.  

Norrie and Sybil Sellar, images via househistree.com

Norrie was Sybil's second husband.  Her marriage to John Ellis Hoffman had ended in divorce.  Living with the couple were two children, Audrey Annie (from the first marriage), and Norrie Sherman; and five servants.

The socially-prominent Sellars appeared in society columns repeatedly.  On July 28, 1910, the New-York Tribune reported they had sailed for Europe, noting they "will spend the next six weeks in Scotland."  The Sellars were likely headed to Andrew and Louise Carnegie's Skibo Castle where they were occasional houseguests.

The Sellars were home in time for Sybil to attend the fashionable New York Horse Show with her half-sister Mildred Sherman on November 12.  A known fashion plate, Sybil arrived "in a gown of black velvet, with a mink hat, a mink muff and a mink scarf," according to the New-York Tribune.

Sybil's up-to-date fashion sense had irked a society journalist from The New York Times a year earlier when her choice of headgear blocked the view of the stage at the Metropolitan Opera.  A March 28, 1909 article said, 

At the premier of 'Falstaff' Mrs. Norrie Sellar, in a parterre box, wore a huge hat, huge as to width, and set back on her head to form a wide spreading but not towering frame.  Of light beaver or velvet, it spread out each side beyond her shoulders, and was so fastened to the back of her head as to rise like a frame that slanted from the right shoulder almost diagonally across the head.

The Sellars left 52 West 74th Street in 1913.  Two years later the Clark Estate rented it to George W. Hill "for a term of years," as reported by the New-York Tribune.  When the country entered World War I, the Hills made an extraordinary gesture for the war effort.  On May 12, 1918, the New York Herald reported on some houses and estates being "tendered for hospital sites," while other "patriotic [citizens] make fighters contented."  Rooms in mansions of millionaires like Joseph Pulitzer and Whitelaw Reid were being used by the Red Cross for making surgical dressings or teaching "first aid, home dietetics, hygiene and the like."  The article said, "Among the numerous other houses where Red Cross work is going on mention may be made of the home of Mrs. George W. Hill, 52 West Seventy-fourth."

On April 2, 1921, the Clark Estate sold the residences along the 1904 row.  No. 52 became home to the Milton C. Blum family.  The head of the textile converting firm Milton C. Blum, Inc., Blum and his wife, the former Florence Rice, had two children, Margaret, born in 1905, and Milton Jr., born in 1909.  Florence was the daughter of philanthropist Henry Rice.  

The Blums' residency would be relatively short-lived.  In February 1925, The New York Times reported that Blum had sold 52 West 74th Street to "the well-known physician, Dr. Arnold J. Gelarie," noting, "The building contains an elevator and is considered one of the finest on the west side."

The following month, the Harry A. Jaffe Galleries held an auction of the Blums' furniture and artwork.  Among the items mentioned in the announcement were, "distinctive home furnishings, rare English and Italian antiques, Chinese jades and porcelains, tapestries and textiles."

A bachelor, Arnold James Galerie was born in Poland and graduated from the university at Jena, Germany.  During World War I, he worked with the Government as Expert Bacteriologist at the Quarantine Station at the Port of New York.  A specialist in "rheumatic diseases," he was associated with the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research.

On January 19, 1935, the Brooklyn Times-Union reported that Gelarie had been appointed chief of staff and director of medicine and laboratories at Beth Israel Hospital in Passaic, New Jersey.  The article noted, "Dr. Gelarie is the author of numerous medical papers, and also has made contributions on advanced medicine and experimental research to various medical publications."

Despite the considerable commute to his new position, Gelarie remained at 52 West 74th Street at least through 1943.  Major change came in 1946 when the residence was converted to the Park Terrace Nursing Home.  The Department of Buildings documented 14 beds on the ground floor, 19 beds on floors two through four, and 17 beds on the fifth floor.

In 1964, the published room rates here were $7.56 per day and $230 per month.  (The monthly rate would translate to about $2,250 today.)

The Park Terrace Nursing Home operated until February 7, 1975 when the United States Department of Health Education and Welfare shut it down for fire safety violations.  The New York Times reported, "the New York State Department of Social Services had arranged to transfer the home's patients to other facilities."

A renovation completed three years later resulted in two apartments per floor.

photographs by the author

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The Lost George Blumenthal Mansion - 50 East 70th Street

 

photo by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York.

When U.S. Attorney Elihu Root erected his splendid mansion at 733 Park Avenue in 1905, the neighborhood was only marginally fashionable.  But that was quickly changing.  On December 4, 1909, the Real Estate Record & Guide reported, "Within a very few weeks the probability that the entire neighborhood will be devoted to fine residences has been strengthened as the result of the sale of the Union Theological Seminary's block front, between 69th and 70th streets, to Commodore Arthur Curtiss James and George Blumenthal, of Lazard Freres."

George Blumenthal and his wife, the former Florence Meyer, were currently living in the sumptuous residence at 23 West 53rd Street, steps from what was familiarly known as Vanderbilt Row.  But commerce was inching up Fifth Avenue, threatening the exclusivity of their neighborhood.  Construction on their new home would have to wait until the demolition of the Union Theological Seminary, and it was not until April 15, 1911 that the Record & Guide reported that work had begun.

Designed by Trowbridge & Livingston, the limestone-faced, Italian Renaissance-inspired palazzo opened onto East 70th Street.  Prominent intermediate cornices defined the tripartite design.  The rustication and bold voussoirs of the ground floor, or piano terra, were drawn from Florentine models.  Trowbridge & Livingston's restrained ornamentation of the upper floors relied only on molded architrave window frames and subtle corner quoins.

The interiors were intended as much for displaying the Blumenthals' massive art collection as they were for living and entertaining.  Perhaps the most impressive space was the large interior patio complex that was removed from the abandoned Spanish castle Vélez Blanco. The expense of the architectural and artistic details within the mansion were evidenced in an article in The Morning Post of London on February 25, 1913. It reported that "a pair of sixteenth century andirons, surmounted by figures of Apollo and Mercury...are to adorn the new house that George Blumenthal is building at Park Avenue and Seventieth Street, New York." The items had been purchased at Christies for $48,300--about $1.5 million in 2024.

The two-story Spanish patio was a focal point of the Blumenthal mansion.   The 15th century marble fountain came from the Palazzo Pazzi in Florence, Italy and was attributed to Donatello.  from the Watson Library Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, Blumenthal came to America as a youth.  He was the head of the American branch of the French banking firm Lazard Frères.  

This portrait of George Blumenthal was painted by Charles Hopkinson in 1933.  from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

George married the 23-year-old Florence Meyer in 1898.  The couple maintained a home on the Boulevard Montmorency in Paris; a chateau at Grasse, near Cannes in the south of France; and a lodge called Knollwood Club in the Adirondacks.  Florence was equally interested in art and in 1919, as France reeled from the war, she founded La Fondation Américaine Blumenthal in Paris.  It provided financial assistance to rising French artists.

French photographer Adolf de Meyer dramatically posed Florence Meyer Blumenthal in the 70th Street library in front of a Renaissance Madonna.  from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Blumenthals' staggering philanthropies were seemingly limitless.  On February 22, 1920, The New York Times reported that George had received "the insignia of Knight of the Legion of Honor" from the French Government.  The article said, "Mr. Blumenthal has been particularly active in the important organization of the Fatherless Children of France."

 from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

George Blumenthal sat on the board of trustees of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  Following the discovery of King Tutankhamun's tomb in 1922, the museum sent an expedition to assist Howard Carter.  The New York Times reported on July 20, 1923, "Mr. and Mrs. Blumenthal made an extended visit to Luxor during the past Winter and had an opportunity to study, which they did with great interest, both the expedition's progress and its needs."  Back home in New York, the couple donated $2,000 "which will make possible the purchase of an automobile for the use of the members of the Museum's Egyptian Expedition," said the article.

 from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Newspapers continually reported on the couple's financial gifts.  On June 19, 1925, The New York Times reported that George had "presented 1,000,000 francs to the Sorbonne" to be used "in the best interests of French culture."  He had previously made donations totaling 8,000,000 francs to the organization.  Later that year, in December, Blumenthal announced he would retire to focus entirely on philanthropy.

 from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Blumenthal's gifts were not always massive.  In the first nine months of 1926, for instance, nine police officers were killed in the line of duty.  On August 28, Blumenthal sent a letter to Police Commissioner McLaughlin that began, "Some of the men of your force who have been killed lately in the performance of their duty have no doubt left families greatly in need of assistance."  He inserted a check for $5,000 (about $90,000 today) "with the request that you kindly distribute this amount among those families which, in your opinion, are most needy and deserving."

That year George and Florence donated $60,000 to the Children's Hospital in Paris.  In recognition of the couple's continued generosity since the end of the war, in 1929 the French Government honored George and Florence by presenting them both the Legion of Honor.  In April 1928, the couple presented a gift of more than $103,000 to erase the deficit of the Mount Sinai Hospital.  The New York Times noted, "The contribution brings the total of Mr. and Mrs. Blumenthal's gifts to the hospital to almost $1,000,000."

 Two views of the ballroom.  from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Blumenthals were in Paris in 1930, when Florence contracted bronchial pneumonia.  She died there at the age of 55 on September 21.  According to the Jewish Women's Archive, during her lifetime Florence had "donated millions of dollars to established institutions and public charities in America and France."

In the basement was a "plunge," or swimming pool, its walls decorated with sea motif mosaics.   from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Two years later, in December 1932, George Blumenthal closed their "spacious home" in Paris, as described by a French correspondent.  A week-long auction was held of the antique furnishings, the 18th century French art, and Blumenthal's extensive library of rare books.  The New York Times Paris correspondent described the items as "a remarkable assemblage of paintings, drawings, engravings, bronzes, porcelain, tapestries, rugs and furniture."  Prior to the first day of the auction, a private showing was held for potential buyers that included "many representatives of the nobility."  

On January 10, 1934, Blumenthal was elected president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  (He had already added the presidency of the Mount Sinai Hospital to his resume.)  In reporting the assignment, The New York Sun mentioned, "He and the late Mrs. Blumenthal gave the museum $1,000,000 in 1928."

 from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

A year later, on December 19, 1935, the 77-year-old married Mary Ann Payne Clew.  His bride was 46.  The Washington Post reported, "the couple's long heralded marriage took place quietly yesterday afternoon at Mrs. Blumenthal's New York apartment."

The newlyweds at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington on December 19, 1935.  The Washington Post.

The article noted, "the Blumenthal home at 50 East Seventieth street in New York, where Mr. and Mrs. Blumenthal will live after a brief honeymoon in the South, contains one of the finest private art collections in the country."

Mary had just emerged from mourning following the death of her broker husband, James Blanchard Clews, on December 17, 1934.   She received half of his $3 million estate.

Mary Ann Clews Blumenthal's bedroom was a slice of Versailles.   from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

On June 26, 1941, George Blumenthal died in the East 70th Street mansion at the age of 83 after what the Times Herald of Washington D.C. called "a lengthy illness."  His estate was appraised at more than $8 million (around $165 million 

today).  A private funeral was held in the mansion on June 30.  The New York Times noted it would be "attended only by relatives, close friends and members of directing boards of organization with which Mr. Blumenthal was connected."

(Mary Ann Clews Blumenthal, incidentally, would marry General Ralph Kenyon Robertson in 1943, and Baron Carl von Wrangell in 1969.)

Blumenthal left the 70th Street mansion and much of the artwork to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  The New York Times explained that the bequest was "for the purpose of having the house dismantled, of having such structural parts of his house as possible installed in the present museum building, of having other structural parts disposed of in such manner as the museum authorities might see fit, and of having the land sold."

World War II delayed the museum's careful dismantling of the mansion, including "removing and installing in its own building what is considered the most valuable structural element in the residence, the celebrated patio from the palace of los Velez," according to The New York Times.  The trustees, said the article, had decided to use the mansion during the war, "for such purposes of storage, work space and exhibition as might be arranged with the city authorities."

On  July 21, 1942, The New York Times reported that the Met "has installed a collection of arms and armor in the residence...and opened it to the public as a temporary branch museum."

On August 15, 1945, three months after Germany surrendered and a month before the Japanese capitulated, the careful demolition of the Blumenthal mansion began.  The next day, The New York Times reported, "The patio and paneling of two of the rooms have been taken by the museum and present plans are to use the patio in the museum's post-war building program."

image by Eden, Janine and Jim

In 1948 ground was broken for 710 Park Avenue, a Sylvan Bein-designed apartment building that survives on the site of the Blumenthal mansion.

many thanks to architect Douglas Burtu Kearley, Sr. for suggesting this post.

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