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| photograph from "Collins' Both Sides of Fifth Avenue" 1910 (copyright expired) |
By the turn of the last century, Manhattan’s millionaires
were panicked by the threat of hotels and other businesses interloping into the
Fifth Avenue mansion district. The silent invasion had begun decades earlier, however.
When wealthy New Yorkers returned from their summer homes
following the summer season of 1876, they found that the new Grosvenor Hotel
had opened. Sitting in the most
fashionable section of the city, on the northeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 10th
Street, the hotel consumed two building lots—Nos. 35 and 37 Fifth Avenue. The
lack of protest from neighbors was no doubt due to its restrained architecture
and high-class clientele.
The six-story brownstone cube was reserved and
unassuming. Its main decorative elements
were found in its balconies; the sixth floor balcony wrapping the building like
a cornice. It was one of the first
examples of a residential hotel in the city and upon its opening The New York
Times was vocal in wondering what took so long.
“Notwithstanding the vast hotel accommodation of this City
it is curious that so little provision is made to insure to guests of the
wealthier class the quiet of family life,” the newspaper opined on September
17, 1876. In order to ensure that the
hotel would be run along the most cultured lines, the steward of the exclusive Union League Club was brought in to
manage it. Known only as "Mr. Ames" he resigned his
position to take the job.
“Thirteen years’ connection with the Union League Club has
admirably qualified him for the duties which he has lately undertaken, and,
accordingly, his house is a model of good management,” said The Times. The
moneyed residents were given the flexibility of furnishing and decorating their
large suites.
“The plan is to let the rooms in suites to guests of the
wealthier and more cultured classes, who furnish them according to their own
taste and judgment. These suites of
rooms are provided with all the requisites of a modern home, and the privacy of
each one is perfect.”
The newspaper noted that the concept of living in what was
essentially a luxury apartment building with a common dining area relieved the trouble
of maintaining a mansion. “The cuisine,
restaurant, and all those little details which sometimes make housekeeping an
anxious burden are attended to by Mr. Ames, so that the responsibilities of the
guests do not travel outside their apartments.”
By the time of the article, every suite had been taken
except one. “The plan has been found to
work admirably, and is alike commended by those seeking for the comforts of
family life and by men of thoughtful and studious habits who are in quest of
perfect quiet and retirement,” The Times concluded.
Even the most upscale hotels in the most refined
neighborhoods were not immune to trouble.
Life for black Americans in the post-Civil War North was little better
than in the South in terms of the jobs available to them.
Two such men, Richard Branch and Alfred Dillard had found employment as
waiters in the Clarendon Hotel in the fashionable resort of Saratoga. Shocking to well-heeled Victorian readers,
The Times reported on October 15, 1877 that “Branch and Dillard, unknown to
each other, had been keeping company with the same white girl.”
The girl’s deception would come to a tragic end on the
evening of October 4. When 27-year old
Richard Branch arrived unexpectedly at her home, he found Dillard there. “This aroused Branch’s fury to such a degree
that he rushed at his rival, pulled out a knife, and inflicted upon him a fatal
stroke.”
Branch fled to New York City and found a job in the
Grosvenor Hotel. But detectives were
close on his heels. A description had
been telegraphed to New York police and ten days after he murdered Dillard,
they tracked him to the elegant hotel.
As well-dressed, horrified residents looked on, he was arrested and taken to the
police Central Office, to await transfer to Saratoga for trial.
By the 1890s the Grosvenor was accepting high-class
transient guests as well. One was a
25-year old Englishman who arrived on the steamship Aurania on January 7, 1895. Upon disembarking, he hailed a cab and asked
to be taken to the Grosvenor Hotel “at Ninth street and Fifth avenue.”
It was probably the incorrect address that led the cabbie to assume he could easily dupe the foreigner.
He drove the man to a different location. The Englishman changed his clothes to visit
friends on Staten Island and the cabbie assured him he would take care of his
luggage.
When he returned to the city around midnight, he realized
that the Grosvenor Hotel was not the place he had been originally taken. “The young man took a cab and drove about the
city until 10 o’clock this morning, trying to find the place,” reported The
Times the following day. “He thinks he
has been buncoed.”
By now the hotel was being managed by Paul W. Orvis, who
came from a family of hoteliers.
Although his father had been in the dry goods business, his brothers
Edward and William were co-managers of the Equinox House in Manchester,
Vermont; and George managed the upscale Osborne apartment house.
In October of 1897 Orvis added one more item to the hotel's list of advantages. An advertisement in The Sun
listed “beautifully furnished apartments, superior cuisine and service” and
added “Fifth avenue asphalt pavement completed.”
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| Brownstone mansions line Fifth Avenue south of the Grosvenor. Carriages bump along the avenue, still brick-paved when this photograph was taken. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York, http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult_VPage&VBID=24UAYWUWY8VR&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=894 |
A false alarm of fire on West 9th Street on July
31, 1900 resulted in an expected injury to a hotel employee. A gust of wind entered the window of R. L.
Fowler’s house at No. 29 West 9th Street and blew a curtain against
a lighted gas jet. The tiny fire was put
out within a few seconds. But a
pedestrian saw the flames and sent in an alarm.
“It was reported that the fire was at the Chinese Consul’s
house, at No. 26, but there was no fire there.
The firemen then thought the blaze was in Dr. Hubbard’s, at No. 27, and
without waiting to ask they smashed off the knob of the front door and rushed
into the house. They found no fire, and
were told it had been in Mr. Fowler’s,” reported the New-York Tribune.
Unfortunately for Grosvenor Hotel clerk William Sears, this
all happened as he was heading to work.
Just as he stepped off the curb, Chief Edward F. Croker’s vehicle was speeding to
the non-existent conflagration.
“In going to the fire Chief Crocker’s locomobile knocked
down Williams Sears…at Tenth-st. and Fifth-ave.
He was crossing the street there, when the locomobile sent him spinning
to the gutter. He was picked up by
bystanders, and Chief Crocker sent his driver back to see if the man had been
badly hurt.”
The hotel clerk refused medical attention and, with the aid
of a friend, walked into the hotel.
While Manhattan’s millionaires moved northward
along Fifth Avenue, the Grosvenor Hotel continued to be home to well-known and
respected citizens. One was Justice Martin
Thomas McMahon of the Court of Special Sessions.
McMahon had been Chief of Staff of the 6th Army
Corps during the Civil War in which, according to New-York Tribune, he
served “with honor and fame.” He was
awarded a medal for bravery for his action in the battle of White Oak
Swamp. Afterward, his varied career included his
position as United States Minister to Paraguay in 1869, United States Marshall
from 1885 to 1889, and later as a U.S. Senator.
On April 19, 1906 the 68-year old McMahon contracted
pneumonia and died in his apartment just two days later. St. Francis Xavier Church was filled with
military luminaries on Tuesday April 24, including McMahon’s brother-in-law,
Rear Admiral Ramsey. The honorary
pallbearers included three Major-Generals, six Brigadier Generals, a Colonel
and a Major. Also included were former New
York Governor Franklin Murphy, Mayor of New York George B. McClellan and
several Justices. Following the requiem
high mass the body was taken by special train to Arlington Cemetery.
Later that year the New-York Tribune commented on the
Grosvenor, calling it “one of the high class family hotels of this city.” The newspaper noted that its residents were “among
many of the leading families of New York, who prefer the comforts to be had in
such a house to living in an expensive dwelling place.”
“There are apartments from two rooms and bath to eight rooms
and two baths…On the fifth floor are special rooms for servants. The hotel dining room is spacious. The prompt and courteous dining room service
is one of the features of the house.”
The Grosvenor Hotel continued its reputation as a venerable domicile
for the best of families. It described
itself in an advertisement in September 1908 as “catering exclusively to
patronage of the highest class, affords a permanent resident for select
families.”
Paul Orvis had moved on by now to manage the Lorraine Hotel
on Fifth Avenue and 45th Street.
In his place William H. Purdy took over the management of the Grosvenor. He was handsomely compensated. He and his wife lived in a sixth floor suite
that would normally cost $2,500; he received a $10,000 a year salary (equal to
about $250,000 today); and a $35 a week dining room account. It was apparently not enough for Purdy.
Brothers Arthur and Leonard Baldwin were the owners of the
hotel and in October 1909 they began an audit of the books. Puzzled over a discrepancy,
they asked Purdy to come to Arthur Baldwin’s office at No. 27 Pine Street on
Monday October 25. The men poured
over the books until 1:00 in the morning on Tuesday. Still the books did not balance.
On Tuesday evening Purdy met with Arthur Baldwin again, and the
scene was repeated. Finally at 1 a.m. Purdy broke down, admitting
he had falsified the books. He left his
employer, agreeing to meet the following afternoon at 2:00 in the office of the
Baldwins’ lawyer.
That day, instead, the 39-year old manager went into a
vacant room purportedly to take a nap.
When he did not appear later, a bell boy knocked on the door. The following day the New-York Tribune
reported “William H. Purdy, manager of the Grosvenor Hotel, at Fifth avenue
and 10th street, was found dead in a room of the building yesterday
afternoon by the proprietor and the day clerk.”
Purdy was fully clothed, lying on the bed. He had poisoned himself. The owner of the Washington Square Garage where
Purdy kept his automobile told investigators later that he had dropped in that
afternoon to say good-bye. Ambrose Cleric had asked him “Why, where are you going?” to
which Purdy replied “I am going away. I
have had trouble at the hotel, and I am going to take another place.”
The noble Grosvenor Hotel would survive another 17
years. On May 30, 1926 The New York
Times noted “On the northeast corner of Tenth Street, the new fifteen-story
Grosvenor hotel apartment is nearing completion. It replaces the dignified Grosvenor, which
had been a landmark there for practically half a century.”
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| photo www.nyu.edu |
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