In 1850, Charles C. Buxton and his family lived at 155 Amos Street, near his grocery store on Bleecker Street. (Amos Street would be renamed West 10th Street in 1857.) He was also an Inspector of the Eighth Ward Public Schools. Buxton would have to relocate his business in 1851, when that building and four others were razed. On the site, five four-story house-and-store buildings, which would later be numbered 372 to 380, were completed in 1852. Arthur H. M. Haddock owned the new building that would be 380 Bleecker Street.
Almost identical to the others, it was faced in orange-red brick above the storefront. Its design straddled the Greek Revival and Italianate styles, the former represented in the residential entrance with its sidelights, narrow pilasters and tripartite transom, and in the flat brownstone lintels and sills. The cornice, on the other hand, was purely Italianate, with multiple scrolled corbels.
Haddock apparently had negotiated with Buxton prior to the demolition, and upon the building's completion, Buxton's grocery store moved into the ground floor. (Haddock ran a cigar business on West Street and lived on West 11th Street with his business partner, William J. Haddock, most likely his father or brother.)
Living above the grocery store in 1853 was the family of Theron Losee, who was in the flour and produce business on Broad Street. Born in Beekman, New York in 1813, Theron married Nancy Brown on September 5, 1842. In 1853 their three children Celia E., Francis, and Theron Jr., were nine, seven, and three years old, respectively. Also living with the family were Irish-born servants Margaret Sheron and Margaret Rogers.
By 1857, the upper portion of the house was occupied by three working class families. Christian Hitzer was a shoemaker; Patrick McKenna was a smith, and John Richard worked in a stone yard.
Charles C. Buxton operated his grocery store here at least through 1858. As early as 1864, William T. Thompson's stationery store occupied the space. Living upstairs that year were John Fling, who did not list a profession, suggesting he was retired; Baptiste Lamargot, a tailor; and P. J. Troy and his wife, Ann, and Ann's teenaged son, John Gilheeny.
John Gilheeny went south to fight for the Union and, like the approximately 500,000 other soldiers who became victims of dysentery, typhoid, pneumonia, and malaria, the 19-year-old fell ill in Virginia. On December 30, 1864, the New York Herald reported that he died "after a short but severe illness." His body was returned to New York and his funeral was held in the Troys' rooms here.
The post-Civil War years saw a rapid turnover in commercial tenants. In 1870, Ann M. Dolbeer ran her fancy goods store here; in 1873, Margaret and Susannah Mossman opened their "skirts" shop; and in 1876 the William Everett & Co. dairy store, was here.
That business was operated by John W. and William Everett. At least one employee, Joel K. Schultz, who lived on Leroy Street, worked in the store. It would remain into the early 1890s, by which time the business had been renamed Everett & Horton.
Living in rooms upstairs in 1895 was the Kay family. Walter J. Kay, who was 17 years old that year, had been working for an embroidery factory making $3 a week (about $115 in 2026 terms), but he lost his job that spring. At around 9:30 on the night of April 4, 1895, a policeman came across Walter sitting on the stoop of 63 Greenwich Avenue, apparently dozing. He shook the teen by the shoulders and told him to move along.
According to Officer Gies, Walter "feebly protested, saying 'Don't,'" and told him that he had taken poison. Walter told him that because he had lost his job, his mother had ordered him out of the house "because he didn't earn more wages," as reported by The Evening World. Four days after leaving 380 Bleecker Street, he swallowed "a dose of oxalic acid," said the article.
Walter was taken to St. Vincent's Hospital where his stomach was pumped. The New York Herald said on April 5, "He has a chance for his life." A reporter visited 380 Bleecker Street where the Kays gave a much different version of the story. They confirmed that they had not seen him since Monday, but said "they had no trouble of any kind with him, but that he was a very stubborn boy." Mrs. Kay was even more direct, telling The Evening World, "he is a bad and wayward boy."
Thomas F. Himmelman lived here as early as 1901. He was treasurer of The American Association of Isaac Pitman Shorthand Writers, established in 1895 "by a number of enthusiastic followers of Isaac Pitman," according to Pitman's Journal in 1912. Himmelman was, as well, an avid reader. He routinely wrote to The New York Times seeking hard-to-find works. On November 30, 1901, for instance, he wrote, "I wish to obtain a copy of a recitation entitled 'The Dandy Fifth.' It is a recitation pertaining to labor." Another letter printed in The Times on February 7, 1903 read, "Will some kind reader inform me where I can obtain a copy of a very comical recitation entitled 'Sweet Kate Paoir,' and another, entitled 'The Continental Ghost'?" The next year, in October, he asked, "Who is the author of a poem entitled 'Uncle,' and where can I obtain a copy of it?"
As early as 1909, the Crist & Herrick real estate office occupied the ground floor. Interestingly, the partners became temporary custodians of a Revolutionary relic in 1911. On January 13, The New York Times reported on the demolition of a old house at 102 Christopher Street. Workers dismantling the foundation discovered "an old milestone inscribed in the large letters of the type used a century or more ago," said the article. The milestone puzzled historians as well as the owners of the property, the Buxton estate. (Whether this Buxton family was related to Charles C. Buxton is unclear, but tantalizing.)
The librarian of the New-York Historical Society was perplexed by the inscription, saying:
What camp is meant? Was it one of the camps of the Revolutionary War of the Continental or British troops, or does it refer to some popular roadhouse frequented by the downtown residents on their drives up the old Bloomingdale and Kings Bridge roads?
The New York Times remarked, "The stone is in the real estate office of Crist & Herrick, 380 Bleecker Street, agents for the Buxton estate.
Thomas L. Himmelman was still writing to The New York Times in 1915, but one letter had nothing to do with books, poems or recitations. It had to do with bicycling. He wrote in part:
In this huge city of ours there are hundreds of men, like myself, chained to an office all day, who have little incentive to take proper physical exercise. We have no funds for an auto, cannot keep a horse, and even walking alone becomes insipid. Consequently, we hang around the house in the evenings and on Sundays or visit the theaters or "movies" or amuse ourselves in other sedentary ways.
He suggested the formation of a bicycle group. "The object is merely to enable decent fellows to get together for a pleasant spin around the suburbs. It may save them from infesting street corners, saloons, or poolrooms," he said.
Paul A. Soran lived here in 1919 when he went to Coney Island on July 4. He went into the surf and did not return. Three days later, The New York Times reported that his body had been recovered.
At 2:30 on the morning of September 3, 1922, a patrolman noticed resident William Shea enter a building at 312 Spring Street. The New York Times reported, "He looked through an opening in the doorway and saw Shea standing near a bag. The man talking with Shea ran upstairs when the patrolman approached." When the policeman opened the bag, he found four quarts of whisky. Shea was dumbfounded, said he did not own the bag, and knew nothing about it. His plea worked. When he faced Magistrate W. Bruce Cobb the next morning, he was discharged.
A plumbing firm occupied the ground floor space in the early 1940s. image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.
In addition to handling the Buxton estate, Crist & Herrick was the realtors for the Arthur H. M. Haddock estate. When the firm sold 380 Bleecker Street for Haddock's descendants Dorothy Hand, L. Estelle Clark and Florence Nickerson in February 1946, The New York Times remarked, "The property was held by the one family for ninety-five years."
For years in the mid-1950s throughout the 1960s, the storefront was home to Reubert Piano Co. Its advertisements offered, "Reconditioned pianos for sale, tuning and expert repairing."
Reubert Piano Co. was supplanted around 1976 by odd bedfellows--the 380 Gallery and 380 Xerox Copy Center. The gallery staged exhibitions, like the portrait sculptures of motion picture stars by Ron Kron in August 1977. The copy center half of the space advertised, "color copies & slide enlargements" that year. The unexpected, symbiotic coexistence continued throughout the 1980s.
Kitschen opened in the space in July 1995. In reporting the opening, The Villager explained, "They sell kitchen accessories from the 1950s." The vintage appliance shop remained for years. By the early 2000s, a Ralph Lauren boutique occupied the space, and in 2014 a Robert Graham store moved in. A Leset boutique currently occupies the shop.
photographs by the author
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