Patrick and John J. Farley erected a row of five brownstone-fronted houses on the north side of West 87th Street between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue in 1891-92. Designed in the Renaissance Revival style by Thom & Wilson, their rich details reflected wealth and taste.
Twenty-feet wide, 17 West 87th Street was an A model of the A-B-A-B-A configuration. A dog-legged box stoop led to the double-doored entrance, the proportions of which matched the parlor window. Both sat within matching, heavily carved frames. A bowed oriel dominated the second floor, its windows separated by Ionic pilasters.
On November 26, 1893, the New York Herald reported that "a Mr. Henriques" had purchased 17 West 87th Street. Luis Napoleon Henriques (who often Anglicized his name to Louis) was born on August 24, 1844 in Santa Marta, Colombia. He and his wife, the former Carolina de Morales y Jullien had six sons and five daughters.
Late in 1894, son George, who was 18 years old, sailed to Havana. As it turned out, it was not a good time to visit the island. The Cuban Revolution (which was an attempt to break free of Spanish control) broke out on February 24, 1895. George found himself amid chaos and violence. Finally, he escaped on the steamer Orizaba, arriving in New York on March 25. The teen was immediately suspect.
The New-York Tribune reported, "it was rumored that Henriques had been in some way connected with the revolutionists, and had left Havana hastily. He came on board the steamer without any baggage and with a passport from from a South American nation." (That nation, of course, was Colombia.) The revolutionary mobs, George explained to officials, had stolen his possessions. He was eventually released.
image via NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.
Also detained that year was Albert Fombona, attaché to the Venezuela Legation in Washington D.C. The diplomat was in New York City on September 14 when he was arrested for pressing unwanted attentions on three young women at the corner of Seventh Avenue and West 23rd Street. One by one, as they approached, he would drop his cane to the sidewalk in front of them and ask, "Excuse me, my dear, are you out for a promenade?"
His actions attracted the attention of Policeman Walsh. After the third attempt, Walsh approached and said, "Say, young man, I will give you a promenade. You come with me to the station house." Once there, the indignant attaché sent a message to Luis Henriques, who furnished his bail.
In 1899, Luis Henriques purchased 203 West 38th Street and sold the West 87th Street house to Charles Rohe, a dealer in "provisions and lard," according to The Financial Red Book in 1903. He was head of Rohe & Brother's, president of the Eastern Live Stock Express, vice-president of the West Side Bank and a trustee of the North River Savings Bank.
By 1911, the Rohe children were young adults. The first to wed was Olga. On April 4, 1912, the American Meat Trade and Retail Butchers Journal reported that she would marry Henry C. Steneck in the Holy Trinity Lutheran Church on Central Park West on April 25. Her siblings were part of the ceremony--Gertrude was maid of honor and William and Charles Jr. were ushers. The New-York Tribune reported, "Mr. and Mrs. Steneck will sail on Tuesday on the Kaiserin Auguste Victoria. They will be away about two months."
Olga's wedding was closely followed by William's. He was married to Maude Underwood Wait in Sherry's two months later on June 27. "Mr. and Mrs. Rohe will sail within a few days for Europe, where they will spend the Summer," reported The New York Times.
On the night of January 22, 1913, Charles Rohe received a telephone call from Charles Fink, the collector of Rohe & Brother's. At about 7:30, Fink and William Bornemann were counting money in the company's cashier's cage. The New York Herald reported, "five men dashed up to Rohe & Bro.'s wholesale meats, provisions and oils plant at 527 to 531 West Thirty-sixth street...and at the point of revolvers held up two inside and two outside employees of the firm, vaulted over the wire screen around the cashier's cage and dashed away again with about $700 of the firm's money." The heist would equal about $23,000 today. The robbers escaped in a taxi.
Charles Rohe was certain the robbery was not an inside job. He told police, according to the New-York Tribune, "Fink had been in his employ for a number of years and was a reliable, trusted man."
Gertrude was the next of the Rohe children to marry. On January 4, 1914, The New York Times reported on her engagement to Leopold Sommer. The couple was married on November 11 in the Church of the Advent.
Gertrude posed with her bridesmaids on the day of her wedding. photograph via lookingoppositvely.com
Tragically, five years later Leo Sommer contracted influenza and died on January 16, 1919. He and Gertrude had a two-year-old daughter, Charlotte. Gertrude and Charlotte moved back to her parents house on West 87th Street. Charles Jr., still unmarried, was also still here.
Charles Rohe was president of the North River Savings Bank in April 1922 when he sold 17 West 87th Street to Minnie A. Broadback for $40,000 (about $748,000 today). Broadback resold the house in 1924 to Dr. Benjamin Dubovsky. On March 19, the New York Evening Post reported that he "will occupy it as his residence and professional office."
It appeared that the house was doomed in 1944. On October 12, The New York Times reported, "A twelve-story apartment house for 108 families was filed for a site at 5-17 West Eighty-seventh Street, to cost $450,000." But something derailed those plans. The row survived and in 1960, 17 West 87th Street was converted to two apartments per floor.
The conversion did not affect the exterior appearance of Thom & Wilson's design. More than 130 years after its completion, the house looks much as it did when Luis Napoleon Henriques and his family moved in.
photographs by the author
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