"The Carolina" - 45 St. Mark's Place

 

Born in Newtown, New York on April 10, 1777, Samuel Barker Harper married Christiana Arcularius in 1799.  The couple had five children--Amanda, Andrew, James Phillip, Selina Elizabeth and Margaret Matilda.  Samuel Harper was a merchant and an alderman.

Samuel Baker Harper, from the collection of the New-York Historical Society

Starting in 1831, Thomas E. Davis erected handsome Federal-style brick residences on East 8th Street between Second and Third Avenues.  He lobbied the city to rename the block St. Mark's Place.  Renaming a short section of streets was a relatively common practice and indicated an elevated status.

Similar residences followed suite and in 1842 Harper moved his family into the newly built house at 45 St. Mark's Place.  Unlike Davis's, it was in the currently popular Greek Revival style.  Faced in red brick and trimmed in brownstone, it was three bays wide and three stories tall above an English basement.  The double-doored entrance was framed with substantial brownstone pilasters that upheld a heavy entablature.

The population of the house increased as the Harper children married.  Margaret Matilda was 25 years old when she married Oliver Smith Fleet on August 24, 1843.  The newlyweds moved into her family's new home.  Fleet was the head of Oliver S. Fleet & Co., a drygoods firm.

Selina Elizabeth and her husband, Andrew Dimmock, were married around 1851 and they, too, lived with the family.  Dimmock, too, was a drygoods merchant.

James Phillip Harper, who was born in 1814, was working in his father's business by 1845.  On June 23, 1853, he married Margaret Perego.  He brought his bride back to the St. Mark's Place house where their son, James, Jr. was born on September 29, 1861.

And, finally, Amanda married William H. Sackett and they, too, lived in what must have been increasingly tight conditions.

Christina Arcularius Harper, from the collection of the New-York Historical Society

In the summer of 1858, the extended family traveled to Europe.  On Saturday afternoon September 11, Police Officer Stone noticed "two young fellows hurrying away from the residence of Mr. Wm. H. Sackett, No. 45 St. Mark's-place," as reported by The New York Times.  (Why the newspaper identified the residence as Sackett's rather than that of his father-in-law is puzzling.)  Knowing that the Harpers were abroad, Stone took chase.  "Being pretty nimble on foot he over took one of them," said the article, "and took his prisoner and his bundle to the Station-house."  In the meantime, the other youthful burglar was captured by another officer.  

"The booty consisted of about $280 worth of silk dresses," reported The Times.  (The value of the high-end gowns would translate to around $11,000 in 2025.)  The thieves, 16-year-old Robert Muret and 18-year-old James McCabe confessed to other burglaries in the neighborhood.

On July 18, 1860, Christina Harper died at the age of 84.  Her funeral was held in the parlor two days later.  Samuel survived her by two years, dying at the age of 86 in the St. Mark's Place house on July 29, 1862.

The following year, the Harper heirs sold the house to Samuel M. Lederer and his wife, Alice.  Lederer was the senior partner in the drygoods firm Samuel M. Lederer & Brother.

At the end of the Civil War, the formerly aristocratic neighborhood was flooded with immigrants from Germany and Eastern Europe.  The mansions of St. Mark's Place were quickly being razed for tenements or converted to rooming houses and shops.  In 1872, Samuel and Alice Lederer moved far uptown to 106 East 58th Street.  

They renovated 45 St. Mark's Place to a tenement, adding a fourth floor and remodeling the facade with trendy neo-Grec details--a fashionable new stoop and areaway ironwork, an impressive new entrance frame, and neo-Grec-style lintels.  A complex cast metal cornice was surmounted by a parapet that announced the building's new name: Carolina.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

Unlike rooming houses, the Carolina's apartments had what today would be called kitchenettes.  An advertisement in The Sun on June 13, 1874 pointed out they came "with light housekeeping accommodations," indicating that basic cooking was possible.  An advertisement on December 2, 1876 listed the rents at "$4.50, $5, and $6 per week."  The most expensive would translate to $180 today.

Although technically a tenement, the Carolina's residents were professional.  In 1880, they included Frederick W. Kamm and William Balck, both clerks; William Formes, who listed his profession as "manager;" and Henry A. Wells, a real estate agent.

By 1899, Morris Weiss and Henrietta Krauss owned the property (their relationship is unclear).  Both lived in the building among their tenants.  While living here, Henrietta taught in the primary department of Public School 13 at least through 1905.

On October 5, 1900, Morris Weiss joined 25 other owners on the block to petition for electric street lights--a notably modern innovation.  They complained that the few gas street lamps on the block were often unlighted and even those that were lit "do not properly answer the purpose for which they are intended."  The petition pointed out "the numerous burglaries or attempted burglaries in this street." 

On March 28, 1907, Morris Weiss and Henrietta Krauss leased the "parlor flat," as described by the Record & Guide, to dentist Frederick J. Marshall.  He converted the apartment to his home and office.

Living here the following year was Malvina Lobel.  She read an interview with Police Commissioner Theodore A. Bingham in the North American Review in which he deemed "that fifty per cent of the criminals in New York City are recruited from the ranks of the Jewish race."  She was infuriated.  On September 3, 1908, The Evening World reported, "A mass meeting of indignation and protest against the published statistics and statements of the Commissioner is to be held tomorrow night at the home of Mme. Malvina Lobel, at No. 45 St. Mark's place."  The article said, "Mme. Lobel is herself an enthusiast of all matters relating to her race, and is very bitter against the Police Commissioner."

Another tenant involved in Jewish affairs was Dr. Julius Broder, who lived here in 1910.  In April that year, he joined Charles Roser and Herman Gordon in establishing the Jewish Uplift Society.  The New-York Tribune reported, "The object of the new organization is to suppress and prevent 'white slavery'" and to provide a shelter for women "who wish to reform and [it] will provide employment for them."

Although the parapet was removed, the elaborate cast metal cornice survives.

The building was sold in 1958.  An alteration was completed in 1978 and it was most likely during that renovation that the parapet was removed and the neo-Grec lintels shaved off.  For whatever reason, the handsome entrance was preserved.  The building holds four apartments today.

photographs by the author