The 1854 Antonio di Alfaro House - 206 East 16th Street

 

Robert Voorhies purchased eight lots on the south side of East 16th Street, just steps from elegant Stuyvesant Square in January 1852 for $16,800--just over $700,000 in 2026 terms.  The houses he erected on the site went up with blinding speed and only nine months later he had sold nearly all of them.  Among the buyers was Antonio Franchi di Alfaro, who paid $11,000 for the westernmost house, 82 East 16th Street.  (The address would be renumbered 206 in 1864.)

Alfaro's wife was Maria Ignacia.  They had recently relocated from Cuba where Antonio had been a professor of Greek at the University of Havana.  He now listed his profession as "printer" at 7 Spruce Street, but continued his work in languages.  The same year he moved his family into the East 16th Street house, he wrote and published a Spanish language guide.  It explained a spelling system titled "Castilian-phonetic Spelling or According to Pronunciation."  Franchi Alfaro, presumably a son, lived in the house and worked in the Spruce Street business.

The Alfaros' handsome Anglo-Italianate-style home was four stories tall and faced in red brick above a brownstone base.  The segmentally-arched windows of the upper floors wore pretty cast iron lintels that sat upon ornate corbels.  Their sills rested upon especially decorative brackets.  An arched corbel table and three foliate brackets supported the cornice.

Alfaro offered the house for sale in September 1858, describing it in the New York Herald as, "A handsome, well built four story modern house, in a very genteel neighborhood, with all improvements, between Union and Stuyvesant parks."  The residence was sold quickly.  On November 11, 1858, the title was transferred to Frances Bryant Godwin.

Frances, known as Fanny, was the daughter of William Cullen Bryant and Frances Fairchild, and the wife of Parke Godwin.  Godwin and Bryant worked together in the publishing firm of William C. Bryant & Co.  The East 16th Street house became home to both the Bryants and the Godwins.

Frances Fairchild Bryant, from the collection of The Bryant Library

William Cullen Bryant, from the collection of the Library of Congress

William Cullen Bryant was, as well, the editor of the New York Evening Post, a poet, and an orator.  Perhaps his best known poem was "Thanatopsis," published in 1817.  By the time the family moved into the 16th Street house, he was well-known for his ardent stands on abolition, workers' rights and free trade.

Born in 1816 in Paterson, New Jersey, Parke Goodwin married Fannie Maria Bryant in 1837.  Like his father-in-law, he was a journalist (he had worked for the Evening Post from 1837 to 1853), an outspoken abolitionist, and author.  When he and Fannie purchased 82 East 16th Street, he was a co-editor of Putnam's Magazine with George William Curtis.

Frances "Fanny" Maria Bryant Godwin, from the collection of The Bryant Library

Parke Godwin, Current Literature, Vol. 36 1904 (copyright expired)

Bryant's and Godwin's close professional relationship was reflected in a letter Bryant wrote home to Frances during a business trip on January 16, 1861:

Dear Frances.

I think I shall not return till Friday.  I want to finish the revision of the Memoir of Cooper, and this I must do from materials furnished by "Pages and Pictures from Cooper," a big book, too large to be conveniently brought out to Roslyn.  The publisher Townsend, the same who published the Forest Hymn, is waiting for me.

All well here.  The E. P. is virtually in Godwin's hands, and he begins to breakfast earlier.  Only some papers are to be executed as soon as they are drawn up.

Yours ever, W. C. B.

(The "E. P." Bryant referenced was the Evening Post.)

The house was regularly the meeting place for The Sketch Club, also known as The Twenty-One.  Its purpose, according to historian and author James T. Callow, was "the cross fertilization of art, literature, and other professions [that] united artists and patrons, and forced each member to broaden his outlook."

By 1864, the dwelling (now numbered 206 East 16th Street) was home to John Chamberlin.  Because he did not list a profession in city directories, he may have been retired or simply affluent enough to be a "gentleman" who did not need to work.  When the family left in November 1867, an auction of their furnishings was held.  The announcement hinted at their high-toned lifestyle.  Among the items were an "iron silver safe" (which would have held the family's table service), mahogany bedroom and dining room furniture, and a rosewood parlor suite.  The rosewood piano was made by Decker & Co. (the headquarters of which was nearby on Union Square), and the china was imported from France.

The house was purchased by Jacob and Abbie W. Russell.  Russell was a director in The Safe Deposit Company of New York.  The couple would remain until about 1880, when Henry Clay Miner and his wife, the former Julia Lucinda Moore, moved in.

Born in 1842, Henry Clay Miner was well-known in the New York theater.  The impresario operated a number of prominent theaters, most notably the Bowery Theatre and the Harry Miner's Theatre.  He pioneered the concept of circuits—booking acts into a string of popular venues rather than a single theater.  Miner grew wealthy in the theater business.  

Henry Clay Miner, Notable New Yorkers of 1869-1899 (copyright expired)

Henry Clay Miner would later be highly involved in politics, serving as a United States Representative from New York from 1895 to 1897.  By then, the Miners would have been gone from 206 East 16th Street for years.  

They quickly sold the house to Johanne Hesse who resold it to John C. Oscar in 1886 for $1,600.  It would finally have a long-term owner when Oscar sold it to attorney Thomas M. Canton and his wife Susan around 1889.

In addition to his legal work as a defense attorney, Canton was a Commissioner of Deeds.  He had arrived in New York from Dublin in 1849 at the age of 20.  He and Susan were married in 1859.  At the onset of the Civil War he enlisted in the 69^th Regiment and served with the Army of the Potomac.  He had reached the rank of first lieutenant before his first battle—Bull Run.  His military service ended when he was wounded on August 25, 1864.  He was twice brevetted for bravery, earning the rank of colonel.

Canton defended some of Manhattan’s most egregious criminals, including Samuel Greenstein, charged with first and second degree rape in March 1899; Joseph J. Cronin, who went on trial for first degree grand larceny in April 1900; and James Kennedy whose list of charges in October that year included abduction, assault in the second degree, and first and second degree rape.

The two houses next door, originally part of the 1854 row, were converted to St. George's deaconess house in 1902.  When this photo was taken in 1941, an Art Deco apartment building had nuzzled up to the western side of 206 East 16th Street.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Susan M. Canton was 75 years old and in failing health in January 1907.  On Thursday, February 7 she had contracted pneumonia and was “plainly in a dying condition.”   A trained nurse, May R. Traub was called to the house to attend to her.   She later described Susan’s condition saying, “Mrs. Canton was so ill and weak that she could not hold a spoon in her hand” and “she was delirious.”

Thomas Canton had been sitting up with his wife since midnight the day before.  Susan’s niece, Emilie Randall, “an actress,” and a nephew, John Hepenstall, held vigil as well.   When, after more than 24 hours with no sleep, Canton went upstairs to bed, the relatives jumped into action.

Around 2:00 in the morning they found a notary to draw up a new will that divided Susan’s entire estate of around $15,000 between them.  According to court papers later, “the dying woman was propped up with pillows and her lifeless hand was drawn over the paper in imitation of a signature while she was practically unconscious.”

Emilie hid the will and three hours later Susan M. Canton was dead.  The grieving Thomas Canton had no idea of what had transpired while he slept.  Susan’s funeral was held in the house on Sunday afternoon, February 10 at 1:00.

Canton was stunned when he obtained letters of administration on the estate and found he had been removed from the will.  What followed was a long court battle during which time the probate of the will was held up.  “Surrogate Beckett says that the drawing, signing and witnessing of the will were plainly done in a great hurry and under circumstances that warrant the Court in refusing to admit it to probate,” reported The Sun.

The attorney representing Emilie Randall (consistently referred to as “an actress” in the press) and John Hepenstall attempted to prove that “the Cantons had not been happy in the closing years of their lives.”  The judge was unmoved by the argument.  The Sun reported on March 22, 1908, ‘the Surrogate holds that ‘bickerings, disagreements and jealousies’ that existed were not remarkable in a couple who had been married for forty-eight years and that they had lived together in as much peace and harmony as could reasonably  be expected.”

On March 21, 1908, Surrogate Beckett ruled in favor of Thomas Canton saying, “the will was drawn when Mrs. Canton was so near death that she did not realize the importance of the act."  He said that “influence was used to prevent the property from being left to her husband.”  In reporting on the decision the New-York Tribune once more reminded readers, “Miss Randall is an actress.”

Although he was 79 years old at the time of the decision, Canton quickly remarried and rewrote his will, leaving his entire estate to his new wife, Minnie Walling.

On April 22, 1912, the Veterans’ Corps honored Thomas Canton at a banquet in the Union Square Hotel.  It was the 51^st anniversary of the day his regiment was deployed to the South.  He was, as reported by The Evening World the following day, the “only survivor among the thirty-three officers of the Sixty-ninth Regiment who marched down Broadway April 23, 1861, on their way to the civil war.”

The ugly incident that had surrounded Susan’s will stayed with Canton.  On March 4, 1913, he added a codicil to his will.  His fear of connivers trying to get part of his estate was obvious in his wording.

Dating it “Wilson’s Inauguration Day” he still left everything to his wife, Minnie, but explained:

The will written on the preceding was written by the testator without the influence of any person.  After due deliberation I believe the provision I have made for my wife is the best I could have made for her.  In a former will I devised her my real estate in fee simple.  I have made the change entirely with a view to her interest, which by care will return a moderate income for life.  I feared that if she had the power of sale or mortgage it would pass out of her hands, as frequently happens to inexperienced women.

Nine days after he signed the revised will, the 83-year-old Thomas M. Canton died.  Other than $500, which he left to St. Ann’s Church, his $33,328 estate passed to Minnie W. Canton—a bequest equal to just over $1 million in 2026.

By now the Canton house had been architecturally separated from the rest of the row.  In 1902, the abutting houses at Nos. 208 and 210 had been drastically redesigned for use as a deaconess house for nearby St. George’s Church.

Following the end of World War I, 206 East 16^th Street became home to English-born Ernest Kilburn Scott.  A consulting engineer, he had served with the ministry of munitions for two years, part of that time with the explosives department.  He remained in the house at least into the 1920s.

In 1944, furnished rooms were being rented in the once proud house.  Three years later it was converted to apartments—one on the first floor and two on the second—with furnished rooms on the upper stories.

Another renovation came in 1962 when the first and second floors were converted to a duplex apartment, and the third and fourth converted to one apartment each.  Despite the renovations inside, the exterior of the narrow 1854 residence survives remarkably intact.

photographs by the author