Kingdon Gould's 1928 160 East 72nd Street

When George Jay Gould died on May 16, 1923, his son, Kingdon, was living with his family in a handsome home at 160 East 72nd Street.  The extended Gould family had inherited substantial personal fortunes from the estate of Kingdon's grandfather, railroad mogul Jay Gould.

Kingdon got his somewhat unusual first name from his mother, Edith M. Kingdon.  He had married Annunziata Camilla Maria Lucci on July 2, 1917 in St. Patrick's Cathedral and by now had two children, Silvia Annunziata and Edith Kingdon Gould.  A third child, Kingdon, Jr. was born in 1925.  The family maintained a sprawling country estate at Lakewood, New Jersey.

The Goulds' lifestyle was about to change.  In 1927, the same year he sold his interests in family-owned mines in the West, he demolished the East 72nd Street mansion.  Gould's intention was not to relocate; but to modernize his family's living conditions.  Lavish apartment buildings designed with moneyed residents in mind had risen throughout the upper sections of the city since the late 19th century.  By now members of society's uppermost echelons lived in modern, spacious apartments the size of private homes.

Gould hired architects Taylor & Levi to design his building.  Completed in 1928, it rose 14 stories plus a penthouse.  The architects married a jazz age take on Renaissance architecture with elements of a Mediterranean villa.  Faced in ruddy-colored brick, it was highlighted by orange-toned stone and colorful terra cotta.  Leaded windows, balconettes and arched openings at the top floor worthy of a Medici provided a sense of age.  The design culminated in an unusual scalloped roofline topped with massive urns.

Now lost, the massive stone urns along the scalloped parapet were a prominent feature when this photograph was taken in 1929.  photo by Samuel H. Gottscho from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

The building offered immense cooperative apartments.  There were just two each on the first four floors.  Each of the floors from the fifth through the 10th contained just one 11-room apartment; and the 11th and 12th floors comprised a 17-room duplex apartment that included a double-height music room.   The initial prices ranged from $14,000 to $51,000--the most expensive equaling about $715,000 today.

Columns of different stone, colorful terra cotta plaques, and variegated stone provides an old-world feel.

But the most impressive apartment was reserved for the Gould family.  Engulfing the top two floors plus the penthouse, it contained 20 rooms and 8 bathrooms.  The top floor included a screened terrace to the rear, another terrace at the front, and a squash-tennis court in between.   Kingdon's widowed mother was an artist and a penthouse level studio was included for her.

As intended, the building attracted well-to-do buyers.  Before construction was completed, The New York Times noted, "Miss Carol N. Rhoades, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Lyman Rhoades of 130 East Sixty-seventh Street" had purchased an apartment; and shortly afterwards Robert Le Roy traded his brownstone at 182 East 75th Street for an eighth floor co-op.

Le Roy was a partner in the legal firm of Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft and the secretary of the Museum of the City of New York.  Both he and his wife, the former Grace A. Moore, had at one time been well-known tennis players who had won many trophies.  They had married in 1911.

At around 1:00 on the afternoon of January 16, 1932, while Robert was at work and Grace was out, the Le Roys' doorbell rang.   Mary Dolan, one of the three servants at home, opened the door to a man who blurted "Got a package for Mrs. Le Roy" and pushed past her.

Before the maid could speak, two other thugs barged in.  One brandished a pistol and forced Mary back to the servants' area.  She was soon joined by the cook, Amanda Kornder, and another maid, Anna Fagan.   While the terrified women were held at gunpoint, they could hear the other two men ransacking the apartment.

The Great Depression had little effect on most of the residents of No. 160 and Mary Le Roy had left the apartment decked out in expensive jewelry.  Nevertheless, the thieves were about to find about $10,300 worth of jewelry in her bedroom (more than $175,000 in today's dollars).   Police noted that they "overlooked, however, a considerable quantity of jewelry."  Before they left with their loot, they warned the three servants to keep quiet.

They had managed to get inside the building by sheer force.  According to the 60-year-old service elevator operator, Frederick Spielberger, later, four men had entered the service entrance and ordered, "Take us up to the eighth floor."  One of them pulled out a knife and forced Spielberger to the rear of the car while another bound his hands behind his back with picture wire.

While the criminal with the knife stood watch over Spielberger, the others went to the Le Roy apartment.  When they returned the elevator man noticed, "they had two leather jewelry boxes and a small silver one, which they tucked inside their coats."  They took the elevator to the basement where one man removed the fuses so it could not be operated.  They warned Spielberger not to move for 15 minutes then rushed up the stairs to a waiting automobile.

The heist was just the first committed by the gang in rapid-fire succession in the district.   When they robbed the home of Harry Glemby on January 21, it was the fourth within six days.  Among the other victims was William A. Rockefeller.

In the meantime, the Gould family entertained lavishly in their massive apartment.  A dinner to celebrate the engagement of Priscilla St. George to Angier Biddle Duke was given on December 26, 1936, for instance.  There were more than two dozen guests.  For more opulent affairs tents would be erected on the terraces.

The wedding of Silvia Annunziata Gould to Charles Dabney Thomson, took place in the apartment on January 14, 1938.   The ceremony was set in the library, which had been outfitted with an altar draped in old Venetian lace.  An organ had been installed solely for the occasion.  Later that year the apartment was the scene of the debutante entertainments for Edith Kingdon Gould, including a dance on November 26. 

That year, the Le Roys had a house guest, Mrs. Elsa Houtermans.  She became frantic when her son, a German citizen, was arrested in Russia.   She pleaded with Albert Einstein for his help.  He wrote to Mrs. Houtermans at the East 72nd Street address, enclosing a letter to the Russian ambassador in Washington he had written on her behalf.  "You can add some explanatory information about the career of your son and send both letters in the same envelope to the ambassador," he instructed.

In 1938 Kingdon Gould suffered a stroke from which he never totally recovered.  In the fall of 1945 he became critically ill and died in the apartment on November 7 at the age of 58.

The Le Roys, whose country estate was in Glen Head, Long Island, were still in the building at the time.  Robert Le Roy was 61 years old when he died on September 8, 1946.

The following month the Gould apartment would be the scene of another wedding.  On October 12 Edith was married to Guy Martin in the two-story music room which, according to The New York Times, "had been arranged as a small chapel for the wedding."  Members of the wedding party came from as far away as London, Chicago, California and Washington D.C.

At the time of Edith's wedding the building was populated by the families of financiers, lawyers and businessmen.  But by the 1960s at least one tenant from a far different profession--show business--had arrived.

Actress Joan Fontaine divided her time between her fifth floor apartment and her Eaton Square residence in London.  In the spring of 1966 she was in Britain, so she offered the apartment at No. 160 to Vivien Leigh and Jack Merivale who were appearing in the Broadway production of Anton Chekhov's Ivanov, directed by John Gielgud.  (Leigh and Merivale had been involved in an undisguised romantic relationship since 1958, even before her 1960 divorce from Lawrence Olivier.)   The two remained in the apartment throughout rehearsals and then for the five and a half weeks the play ran.

Artist Don Bachardy described visiting Fontaine's apartment in 1976 in his 2000 book Stars in My Eyes.  He eyed a red-varnished wooden armchair as a possible seat for the actress to pose. 

I learned from her later that the tiger's head of the seat had been designed by Salvador Dali especially for her, and that she herself had executed the needlepoint work.  I asked if it would be a comfortable chair for her.  'Yes, perfectly.'  Her tone implied: Why else would it be in my sitting room?

While upscale apartment buildings of the 1920s in other parts of the city had suffered decline by now, such was not the case along East 72nd Street.  In the 1980s, No. 160 was home to Princess Lee Radziwill, sister of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis; Count Demetrio Guerrini-Maraldi (described by The New York Times as "an accomplished sportsman...a student of history, a linguist and raconteur, a man of discipline and high standards known for his wit and humor); and James Niven, son of screen actor David Niven.  Apartments at the time were priced at about $3 million.

Some of the spaces retain their lavish original appointments.  photograph via cityrealty.com 

The floorplans of Kingdon Gould's 1928 project remains unchanged.  Residents still enjoy the sprawling spaces and in many cases the handsome original interiors.   And casual passersby could not suspect that one of America's wealthiest families lived in 20 rooms here during the Depression years.

photographs by the author

The E. S. Bayer Mansion, No. 32 East 70th Street

On May 27, 1907 the 84-year old Louisa Elizabeth Kemp died in the family home at No. 32 East 70^th Street.  The Kemp family had owned the brownstone house for decades; but Louisa would be the last Kemp to live here.

Within the year the house was leased to John Gall, and then on March 2, 1910 the William Kemp estate sold the house to Edwin S. Bayer who announced “that an American basement alteration is contemplated.”

The Harvard-educated lawyer had married Laura K. Kayser in 1895.  The bride was the daughter of immensely wealthy Julius Kayser, founder of the Julius Kayser & Co., manufacturers of gloves.  Bayer resigned from the law office of Frederick DeP. Foster and joined his father-in-law’s firm as Treasurer.

Nearly eight months after purchasing the old brownstone, the Kemps’ architects, Taylor & Levi, completed plans for their new home.  Rather than “an American basement alteration” the new owners had opted for an entirely new building.  The Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide reported on October 29, 1910 that it would be a six story residence costing about $50,000—in the neighborhood of $1.3 million today.

The New-York Tribune was more specific, saying “The façade of the building will be of brick, with limestone trimmings in the French Renaissance style of architecture.”

The modern structure stood out among its Victorian neighbors -- photo by Irving Underhill from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Construction took two years, resulting in a limestone-faced neo-French classic mansion worthy of nobility.  Visitors passed through tall stone fence posts topped with massive huge stylized pinecones.  Above the arched openings of the first floor, two floor-to-ceiling windows behind stone pseudo-balconies mimicked French doors.  At the fifth floor a full balcony stretched the width of the home, flanked by elaborate carved urns on paneled pedestals.  But the architects reserved perhaps the most imposing elements for the steep slate-tiled mansard dominated by a massive dormer and flanked by hefty chimney breasts.

The paneling for some rooms was imported from old European houses.  The paneling for the living room (lower photo) was hand-carved in Oberammergau after a design by Grinling Gibbons.  The portrait is of Louise-Henriette de Bourbon, later the Duchesse of Orleans photos from Arts & Decoration May 1922 (copyright expired)

Wealthy families with small children dealt with the issue of grown-up dinner parties and entertainments without the interruption of small family members.  The Bayers’ had two children, Sybil and Edwin, Jr., and their solution was evident from the New-York Tribune’s brief description of the mansion’s layout, which included “a wine cellar, cardroom on the ground floor, drawing room, dining room and large conservatory on the first floor, a child’s dining room on the third floor in the extension, a playroom on the fourth floor and sleeping quarters above.”

A medieval tapestry hangs on the dining room wall (above).  The card room can be seen at the end of the entry hall (below). The Architectural Review, January 1919 (copyright expired) 

The Times added “A number of the rooms were imported from France, and the livingroom and library are paneled to the ceiling with French and English woodwork.  The house contains more than thirty rooms and eight baths.”

The French mansion was the setting for Edwin Bayer’s extensive collection of Gothic art, as well as an eclectic collection of antique furnishing.  Arts & Decoration wrote in May 1922, “Many of the most famous houses really do not succeed, but the New York home of Mr. and Mrs. Edwin S. Bayer is an artistic achievement.  It has the mature quality of a fine old home of many generations.”

The Bayers' drawing room is shown at left.  To the right is the massive fireplace in the dining room.  The Architectural Review, January 1919 (copyright expired) 

The magazine complimented “No order to a decorator or expert could have brought together the glowing, luxurious Nattier, the groups of powerful yet exquisite Renaissance bronzes, the reserved and aristocratic Chinese porcelains and the superb needlework chairs.”

The Bayer family maintained a sprawling country estate in Mt. Kisco, New York; but occasionally would join other millionaires in fashionable resorts.  Such was the case in the spring of 1918 when The Sun reported that they had “taken a cottage in Florida row” in White Sulphur Springs, Virginia.

A few days later, on April 9, the newspaper updated its readers on the activities of out-of-town socialites.  “Water sports in the swimming pool attracted sojourners during the afternoon.  Diving for tin pie plates was great sport among the swimmers.”  The Sun listed Laura Bayer among those frolicking in the pool.

Both the "principal bedroom" (above) and the boudoir were markedly French in style.  The Architectural Review, January 1919 (copyright expired) 

Julius Kayser died in his mansion just a block away at No. 18 East 71^st Street on March 9, 1920.  His will gave Laura $100,000 outright; and left a staggering $5 million each to the Bayer children upon their 24^th birthdays.  Edwin S. Bayer now rose to President of Julius Kayser & Co.

Sybil was 21 years old in 1926 when she visited relatives in Paris.  While there she met 24-year old American Vincent Edward Brown, who was on business with an automobile company.  High school educated, Brown had held a series of unimpressive jobs, including a position as a clerk with the Standard Oil Company. 

Unknown to the Bayer family, a romance blossomed between Sybil and Vincent (who lived in New Jersey).   Two years later, on the evening of Wednesday, January 25, 1928, and just months before she would inherit her massive fortune from her grandfather, Sybil left the East 70^th Street mansion.

She jumped into Vincent Brown’s automobile and the couple sped off to Rye, New York.  Around 10:30 they obtained a marriage license from the town clerk.  Then they were married “with the utmost secrecy” in the home of Justice of the Peace Edwin C. Thomas early the next morning.

On Friday they returned to the city and moved into a furnished room on East 53^rd Street, “the rent for which is $17 a week,” according to The New York Times.  “Mr. Brown had formerly occupied a room at the address, and on Thursday he arrived with his bride to inspect a large room on the second floor of the four-story building, the ground floor of which is used for shops.”  The cheap accommodations were in stark contrast to the French-style mansion in which Sybil grew up.

If society was shocked at the news, Edwin S. Bayer was infuriated.  Servants responded to journalists knocking at Bayers’ door with the message, “Absolutely no statement to make.”

Reporters flocked to the 53^rd Street building and loitered outside waiting for the heiress and the clerk to emerge.  They went to great lengths to avoid publicity.  “Mr. Brown would see no one yesterday, and to avoid being interviewed, the young couple went out through a trap door in the roof and reached the street by way of another house,” reported The Times on January 29.

Three days later the Browns moved to slightly more comfortable quarters in the Don Carlos apartment hotel at No. 150 East 50^th Street.  The Times reported “A one-room apartment costs $150 a month, which is considerably more than the $17 a week furnished room which the couple occupied at 133 East Fifty-third Street after their secret marriage in Rye, N.Y., last week.”

Friends surmised that either Brown had “turned his attention to the real estate business” or that Laura Bayer had given them financial assistance.  If she had, it was without the consent of Sybil’s father who cut all ties with his daughter.  The Times advised “Inquiries at the Bayer home…regarding the report that Mrs. Bayer was making an effort to bring about a reconciliation between her husband and their daughter were referred to Mr. Bayer’s office, at 343 Fourth Avenue.  There it was said Mr. Bayer had no statement to make.”

Later that year, on December 15, Edwin Bayer underwent an operation in the Leroy Sanitarium at No. 40 East 61^st Street.  His condition did not improve and Sybil came to his hospital room.  The father and daughter were finally reconciled.  On New Year’s Eve the 59-year old millionaire died with his family, including Sybil, at his bedside.

Shortly after Laura’s mourning period ended she married Count Antoine Sala of Paris and Antibes, France in 1931.  The art expert had been a member of the French Embassy in Washington.  On March 4, 1931 The Times reported that Countess Antoine Sala had sold the 70^th Street house to Clendenin Ryan.

The “favorite” son of multi-millionaire Thomas Fortune Ryan, Clendenin was named after a town in West Virginia.  He had been involved in his father’s business and was treasurer of the Royal Typewriter Company; but following Thomas F. Ryan’s death in 1928, he “held himself aloof from directorates and corporate offices,” according to The Times, to manage his father’s $135 million estate.

Clendenin Ryan almost immediately liquidated the estate’s stock holdings; resulting in the massive fortune being preserved when the stock market crashed the following year.  He moved into the 70^th Street mansion alone, surrounded with a staff of eight.  His estranged wife, the former Caroline O’Neil, lived at No, 834 Fifth Avenue and their three children were grown.

Ryan filled the house with Italian and Flemish masters, rare etchings and other artwork.   The Times noted that since his father’s death, he “lived in retirement, if not seclusion, collecting objects of art as a hobby and managing the estate with remarkable success.”

But Clendenin Ryan was not well.  He suffered from diabetes and had sought help in sanitariums and hospitals for years, to no avail.  Shortly after buying the mansion, he began losing weight and he suffered long periods of depression.  As the 1930s drew to a close, he had gone from about 240 pounds to 150.

Early on the morning of August 21, 1939 the servants noticed the distinct odor of gas in the house “but they dared not disturb Mr. Ryan, who ordinarily breakfasted in bed,” reported The New York Times the following day.

The fumes were so thick that neighbors smelled them and notified police.  Officers scoured the neighborhood looking for the leak as Ryan’s business agent Frank Merklin arrived at the mansion.  Merklin had an office in an upper floor and carried his own key.  As soon as he entered the entry hall he noticed the overpowering smell of gas.

Rushing to the third-floor library he found the nearly 3-inch thick wooden door locked.  He ordered servants to break the door down with an axe.  “Inside they found Mr. Ryan, clad in pajamas, lying dead with his head resting on a book of etchings in a fireplace from which gas was streaming from four jets in a gas log.”  The 57-year old Ryan had been dead for hours.

Merklin, with the help of John Korka, the butler, and Irving Daniel, the handyman, carried the body to Ryan’s bedroom, down a long hall from the library.  Both the servants were overcome by the gas and the butler collapsed with a heart attack.

The mansion became home to Ryan’s son, Clendenin J. Ryan, Jr.   When the United States entered World War II he joined the Navy, becoming a lieutenant commander and serving with distinction at Guadalcanal and in the Solomon Islands.   During his deployment he contracted malaria, dengue fever and other diseases from which he never fully recovered.

A political reformer, Clendenin Ryan, Jr. maintained a large estate, Panther Ledge Farm, near Netcong, New Jersey.  He had been a confidential aide to Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia and the first Commissioner of the city’s Department of Commerce.  During that time he was noted for his energy and buoyancy.  But the mental affliction suffered by his father was now becoming evident in him.

His psychiatrist, Dr. Gerald R. Jameison attributed Ryan’s periods of depression to the diseases he contracted during the war.  “I think myself that his service in the Navy when he got quite sick may have released some nervousness that was not quite apparent before.”

On Thursday, September 12, 1957 the 52-year old committed suicide in the mansion on 70^th Street by shooting himself in the head.  His funeral was held in the Church of St. Jean Baptiste, built with his grandfather’s money, two days later.  He left a personal fortune of over $14 million.

Clendenin’s family remained in the house, still here in May 1960 when daughter Caryn married Roger Wolcott Tuckerman in what was a socially-important event in the same church.

In the latter years of the 20^th century a doctor’s office was installed in the ground floor of the mansion.  But in 2003 the house was restored to a single-family residence, returning the house that has seen more than its share of tragedy to its 1912 appearance.

photographs by the author

The Erdmann Mansion (Friars Club) No. 57 East 55th Street

In December 1904 Minturn Post Collins, gave a lecture to the Real Estate Class of the Y.M.C.A on “Fifth Avenue Investments.”   He began saying “The first point noted on studying the map of the city is the central position of Fifth Avenue.”

The wealthy newly-wed with the impressive name knew what he was talking about.   Active in real estate, he was also President of the Bankers’ Investing Co. and he lived just a block from Fifth Avenue at No. 57 East 55^th Street, between Madison and Park Avenues.  Collins’ comfortable brownstone-fronted house sat among similar high-end residences built a generation earlier.  But the “central position” of Fifth Avenue created a dynamic that would change the neighborhood; even a block to the east.

A year earlier, in June 1903, Collins had wed Flora Isham, daughter of the wealthy William B. Isham, President of the Bond & Mortgage Guarantee Co.  The couple was married in the sumptuous Isham country estate north of the city.  They would not remain long on East 55^th Street.

The Fifth Avenue neighborhood of the turn of the century was a tense stand-off between advancing commerce and wealthy mansion owners.  Even as many millionaires fled northward along Central Park, others moved in.  Old brownstones, like that of Minturn Post Collins, were either radically renovated into lavish, modern mansions, or razed and replaced.

While the Collins were considering leaving the area, Martin Erdmann was preparing for his retirement.  In 1906, at the age of 42, the banker stepped down from his position as partner in Speyer & Co.  He was a member of the New York Stock Exchange and had served on its governing committee.  While he retained his directorship in the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad and was a trustee of the Montefiore Hospital, he now had extensive leisure time to devote to his passion: collecting mezzotints.

But first he would built himself a lavish new home.  The bachelor millionaire purchased and demolished the Collins house at No. 57 East 55^th Street.  He contracted the architectural firm of Taylor & Levi in 1908 to design a mansion in its place that reflected his social and financial statue

The commission was one of the firm’s first; Julian Levi and Alfredo S. G. Taylor having joined forces the year before.  Their design drew inspiration from the German Renaissance and the resulting mansion, completed in 1909, was a radical departure from its traditional high-stooped neighbors.

Architecture printed a photograph of the newly-completed house in October 1909.  It stood in start contrast to its brownstone neighbors.  (copyright expired)

Unlike its unassuming and unmarried owner, the house called attention to itself.  By doing away with the space-hogging stoop, the architects added precious interior feet by pulling the façade outward, almost to the property line.  They deftly balanced the somber Germanic tone of the architecture with a capricious storybook quality.   A grouped set of leaded windows in the gable (the height of which nearly equaled the width of the building), began a cascade of openings down the façade, increasing in height and width with each lower floor.

Carved stone railings, decorative strapwork and salt-turned chimneys combined in an imposing fantasy.  Perhaps to protect Erdmann’s highly valuable art collection, the architects claimed they had produced “the most fireproof residence in Manhattan.”

The highly unusual design caught the attention of architectural critics who were torn in their assessment.  Architecture commented that it was “conceived in so different a vein from most New York houses that its propriety can be questioned…but there is much in this house to awaken an intelligence lulled to sleep by monotonous repetition of classic forms.”

East 55th Street in 1908 was quietly residential. -- from the collection of the New York Public Library

Ermann moved in with his extensive art collection and his staff—a footman, parlor maid, cook, housekeeper, chamber maid, head maid, butler, and “horseman.”  Contemporary photographs of the interiors show carved paneling, intricate stairways, long groin-arched halls and heavily-worked ceilings.  A mixture of furniture styles coexisted with one another.  In one room a Hepplewhite side chair, a Dutch dowry chest and a Chippendale side table shared space. 

In almost every room could be seen mezzotints—some frame against frame—hanging on the walls.  Mezzotint printmaking started in Germany around 1642.  The process was used mainly to create portraits and starting around 1760 British collecting of mezzotints was a fashion among the wealthy.  Ermann’s collection was apparently among the largest in the United States.

While most of New York society swirled within the dizzying eddy of balls, receptions and dinners, Martin Erdmann seems to have kept to himself.  While he kept a solitary box at the Metropolitan Opera, his name rarely appeared in the society pages as he quietly busied himself with collecting.

In the meantime the Friars Club, a social club for men in the theatrical industry—actors, impresarios, playwrights, and others--had been established in 1904.  As a fund-raising activity, the group initiated its annual Friars Frolics in 1911.  Among those working on the entertainment were Will Rogers, Victor Herbert, and George M. Cohan.  For his part Irving Berlin wrote “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” for the event.  The funds raised went towards a permanent clubhouse, “the monastery,” which opened in 1916 on West 48^th Street.

After nearly three decades of living alone in his grand East 55^th Street mansion, the 73-year old Martin Erdman died of a heart attack in the house on the afternoon of January 27, 1937.  His $5 million estate was divided, mostly, among his three sisters.  The collection of mezzotints that he had lovingly labored over for decades was carefully packed and shipped to Christie’s Auction House in London.

A two-day sale in December of that year drew collectors and museums from around the globe.  The British Museum acquired 19 “fine English mezzotints” according to a telegram to The New York Times from England.  “Especially notable among the lot that the museum has obtained, according to experts, is an anonymous plate after Sir Joshua Reynolds showing a young girl holding a rough-haired dog in her arms,” it said.

Erdmann’s mezzotints, which a London reporter said had “aroused considerable interest here”  brought what he deemed “fairly high” prices.  A print of Lady Hamilton as “A Bacchante,” after Joshua Reynolds was purchased by the London dealer, Colnaghi, for 430 pounds—about $42,000 in today’s dollars.

By now the Midtown neighborhood around Erdmann’s mansion was nearly devoid of homes as business buildings sprouted up around it.  The house was purchased by real estate broker Frederick Brown who stayed here for five years.  Then in 1943 he sold it to the American Institute of Physics.

The Institute published technical journals, like the Journal of Applied Physics, and was involved in experiments and research.  On October 29, 1945 the Association of Manhattan District Scientists (which took its name from the code name of the Manhattan Project—responsible for the creation of the atomic bomb) issued a searing statement here calling for international control of the atomic bomb.  By November 1956 the American Institute of Physics was looking for a new, more modern facility and announced a campaign for $500,000 to finance a new building.

Meanwhile, the Friars Club had struggled through the Great Depression, finally being evicted from their clubhouse for failure to pay a grocer’s bill of just over $1,000.  By now, however, the club was back on firm financial footing and acquired the Ermann mansion in 1957.  The new "monastery" formally opened in November.

On that night Joe E. Lewis, then Abbot of the club, led a procession from their former clubhouse to the new one.  Street performances were carried on outside the house and then, in a gesture symbolizing that the doors to the clubhouse would always being opened, Lewis threw the keys into the street.

Taylor & Levi’s still-surviving baronial interiors were ideal for the Friars and little was changed.  Here the club’s famous celebrity roasts took place.  Among the first people roasted in the new clubhouse were Joe E. Lewis, Red Buttons, and Jack E. Leonard. 

Some of the rooms took on the names of notable club members.  The Round the World Bar was named for former Abbot Mike Todd’s 1956 movie, Around the World in Eighty Days.  On the second floor are the Joe E. Lewis Bar and the Milton Berle Room; a floor above are the Frank Sinatra Television Viewing Room and the Ed Sullivan Reading Room.

Like most of the exclusive social clubs at the time, the Friars had a male-only membership.  In 1983 the first woman to attend a roast came about when Phyllis Diller disguised herself as a man and crashed the event.  The end of the male-only status came in 1988 when Liza Minnelli became the first female invited for membership.

In 2004 the City of New York renamed the 55th Street block “Friars Way.”

Martin Erdmann’s architecturally remarkable mansion is little changed.  Built for a quiet, introverted man who shunned attention; it is now the home away from home for those who definitely do not.

photographs by the author

The 1909 Ziegel House -- No. 8 West 86th Street

photo by Alice Lum

The gilded 1890s saw the construction of ornate marble or limestone palaces along the east side of Central Park.  But as the decade wore on, interest in a less fussy form of architecture and residential decoration caught hold.  Rooted in America’s early Georgian or Federal styles, it took the form of red brick and limestone residences like the Andrew Carnegie mansion, completed in 1903. 

Across the park on the Upper West Side, among the more eccentric rowhouses and mansions, the style appeared as well—as reflected in the Charles Rich house at No. 225 West 91^st Street, erected in 1896.  Twelve years later Dr. H. F. L. Ziegel and his wife, Beatrice, would join the trend.

On February 28, 1908 The New York Times reported that the Ziegels had filed plans for a four-story residence to be built at No. 8 West 86^th Street.  “The house will be of Colonial design,” said the newspaper, “with a façade of brick and limestone.” 

The Ziegels commissioned the architectural firm of Taylor & Levi to design their home which was completed a year later at a cost of $20,000—about $500,000 today.  The result was a charming neo-Georgian home that recalled the pre-Revolutionary streets of Philadelphia, Boston or New York. 

photo by Alice Lum

The dark red brick was accentuated by gleaming white limestone.  Two bandcourses, above the first and third floors, broke the visual weight of the structure.  A handsome columned portico supported the focal point of the home—multi-paned French doors opening onto a wrought iron balcony and capped by an delicately carved tympanum.  A gently-curved mansard punctuated by three dormers finished the motif.

The French doors and carved tympanum steal the show -- photo by Alice Lum

As was most often the case with high-end residences at the time, the deed was put in the wife’s name.  The couple, it seems, held a deep affection for initials; for the title was held by Beatrice S. B. Ziegel.  The highly-esteemed Dr. H. F. L. Ziegel was the house physician at Mount Sinai Hospital and routinely wrote articles published in medical journals.

The house was completed and the Ziegels moved in just in time for a house wedding.  Dr. Ziegel’s cousin, Helen Wile, lived in Rochester, New York.  Her finance, Reuben Mills, was a resident of Nashville, Tennessee.  Perhaps the two families felt it most convenient to hold the ceremony somewhere geographically in the middle and on December 17, 1909 the ceremony took place in the Ziegel home.

Splayed lintels and a graceful broken pediment add to the 18th century motif -- photo by Alice Lum

After the Ziegels left No. 8 West 86^th Street the medical tradition continued as Dr. D. M. Kaplan moved in by 1921; followed by Dr. M. Herman.  Unlike Drs. Ziegel and Kaplan, Dr. Herman’s time in the spotlight was for less-than-respectable reasons.

With Prohibition in high swing, Dr. Herman discovered a way to make easy cash—“prescription bootlegging.”  Often forgotten today is the fact that not all alcohol was banned by the Volstead Act.  Six distilleries were allowed to manufacture “medicinal whiskey.”  They were permitted to sell it to licensed pharmacies which, in turn, could fill prescriptions signed by a physician.

The legally distilled whiskey was highly prized for its quality—not to mention its safety--when compared to bootleg liquor.  It made for an alluring proposition for physicians like Dr. Herman who was arrested on March 17, 1926 along with 26 other physicians, six druggists and four distillery owners.  The New York Times explained how “prescription bootlegging” worked.

“The physicians, two of whom are women, are charged with having sold their prescription books at $125 to $150 each to distillery salesmen, who in turn sold them to druggists.  The books, it is alleged, were signed in blank so that the druggist could fill them out whenever he sold whisky to a customer.”

On February 11, 1945 the house, still a private home, was leased to Dorothy Jewson.  But its status as a single-family residence would not survive into the second half of the century.  In 1953 the house was converted to apartments, two per floor. 

A few years later Martha J. Black moved into one of the apartments.  Known as Jo Jo to her friends, she was a psychiatric social worker at Mount Sinai Hospital; coincidentally the same hospital where Dr. H. F. L. Ziegel had practiced.  A graduate of Swarthmore College and the New York School of Social Work of Columbia University, she was perhaps better known as the daughter of Associate Justice Hugo L. Black of the United States Supreme Court.  In 1959 while living here she married Dr. Mario Lewis Pesaresi, a resident psychiatrist at Mount Sinai.

Dr. Ziegel’s medical tradition in the house continues today, in a manner of speaking--a veterinary clinic operates on the first floor.  A spacious duplex apartment engulfs the second and third floors; while the fourth story still contains two apartments.

photo by Alice Lum

Taylor &Levi’s handsome neo-Georgian home survives beautifully intact; a delightful surprise just steps from Central Park.