The Lost Henry Ammon James Mansion - 735 Park Avenue

 

from the collection of the New York Public Library

British-born architect Frederick Junius Sterner arrived in New York City in 1906.  He purchased an architecturally outdated brownstone on East 19th Street and transformed it into a Mediterranean-style villa with a stuccoed facade and red tile roof.  Within five years, he had remade numerous high-stooped brownstones around the city into modern mansions for numerous wealthy patrons.  

Henry Ammon James would add his name to Sterner's client list in 1916.  On January 29, the Real Estate Record & Guide reported that Sterner was designing renovations to the old brownstone at the northeast corner of Park Avenue and 71st Street.  The plans included the removal of walls and stairs, "rearrange [the] roof," creation of "new areas," and installing modern "plumbing, wiring and heating."  The remodeling would cost James $25,000, or about $756,000 in 2026 terms.

The vintage four-story-and-basement house, built in the 1870s, originally faced 71st Street.  Sterner reconfigured the layout, placing the entrance on Park Avenue.  The "new areas" in his plans included extending the building to the north.  Sterner transformed the high-stooped house into a modern Elizabethan Revival-style townhouse.  Two projecting, two-story bays distinguished the Park Avenue elevation, and multi-paned, leaded windows throughout gave the house a sense of antiquity.  The otherwise symmetrical design was upset by the peaked attic level with its disparate sized gables.  It stopped short of the northern extension.

Hemry Ammon James, Yale College Class of 1874, 1870-1912 (copyright expired)

Attorney Henry Ammon James was a widower.  Born in Baltimore on April 24, 1854, he was educated by a private tutor before entering Yale.  He married Laura Brevoort Sedgwick on September 21, 1891 and they had two children, Dorothy, born in 1892, and William Ellery Sedgwick, born in 1895.  Laura died on November 1, 1907.  

In addition to his law practice, James was the president of the East Hampton Electric Light Company.  The family's country home, which Henry and Laura built the year they were married, was in East Hampton, Long Island.  

A postcard depicts the James' sprawling, shingle-style summer house.

William Ellery Sedgwick James went by Ellery.  When the family moved into the remodeled mansion, he was attending Yale University.  He and Louise R. Hoadley were engaged to be married in Southampton in June 1917, but, as was the case with hundreds of couples across the country, the war in Europe changed their plans.  On April 14, 1917, The New York Times said, "as Mr. James has joined the officers' reserve corps of Yale University the date for the wedding has been advanced."  The couple was married in St. Bartholomew's Church on April 25.

The war did not interrupt Ellery's schooling and he graduated later that year.  But shortly afterward he left his bride at home and went overseas with the American Expeditionary Force.  He would see battle in France with the 324th Field Artillery.

Sterner placed the service entrance in the northern extension, directly under the conservatory.  The American Architect, December 12, 1916 (copyright expired.

Dorothy's engagement to George Griswold Haven was announced on February 2, 1925.  It would be an extremely short engagement.  Three days later, The New York Times reported that the couple had been married the previous morning in St. George's Church.  "When Mr. and Mrs. Haven return from a wedding trip they will live at 6 East Fifth-third Street, which has been Mr. Haven's home for many years," said the article.  George G. Haven was the president of the Metropolitan Opera House Real Estate Company and the senior member of the banking form of Strong, Sturgis & Co.  Dorothy was his second wife, his first having died a few years earlier.

Thousands of diamond shaped panes composed the openings.  The American Architect, December 12, 1916 (copyright expired)

Five months later, on July 21, 1925, George and Dorothy had breakfast in their East 53rd Street mansion at 8:00.  Afterward, Dorothy left to go shopping.  An old friend, Dr. E. Eliot, stopped by unannounced at around 10:30.  The butler informed him that George was in his room.  "I'll go up and see him," responded Eliot.  He entered the bedroom to find George's body on the bed.  The New York Times reported, "He had shot himself through the jaw.  The bullet had lodged in the brain, killing him instantly."

Henry Ammon James died at the East Hampton estate on the afternoon of August 2, 1929 "after a long illness," as reported by The New York Times.  The newspaper noted that he "was a member of the University, Century, Metropolitan, Maidstone, Garden City, National Golf and Jekyll Island clubs."

James left an estate, according to The New York Times, of $2,993,392, or about $57.7 million today.  The bulk of the estate was divided, essentially, equally between Dorothy and Ellery, although Ellery received the Park Avenue mansion and its contents.

Two months later, on October 1, The New York Times reported that Ellery had purchased the abutting house at 103 East 71st Street.  The move was potentially intended to protect the mansion from developers.  But if that were the case, James changed his mind.

In August 1930, he sold the corner properties to developer Michael E. Paterno.  The New York Times reported that he intended to erect an apartment building on the site.  

William Ellery Sedgwick James died at the age of 37 on November 26, 1932.  

Seven years later, the syndicate named 737 Park Avenue Corporation had acquired the additional properties necessary to go forward with the apartment building project.  On November 25, 1939, The New York Times reported that workers "started this week to demolish six old private residences to make way for an eighteen-story apartment house which will go up on that corner."  Designed by Sylvan Bien, the replacement structure was completed in 1940.

photo by Godsfriendchuck

many thanks to Doug Wheeler for suggesting this post

The Henry Clews, Jr. House - 145 East 19th Street

 

In 1849, Edwin Forrest was the reigning American tragedian, the position held in England by Irish-born William Macready.  A fierce rivalry existed between the two actors and local loyalty to Forrest was intense.  On May 10, Macbeth opened at the Astor Place Opera House with Macready in the title role.  Thousands crowded into the streets of the fashionable neighborhood to voice their dissatisfaction.  The protests turned to violent rioting.  On May 13, the Sunday Dispatch listed the names of the 25 killed and 120 injured during the melee.  The "long and melancholy list" included among the fatalities, "Kelly, 104 East Nineteenth street."

Kelly's brick-faced house was one of a row erected in 1843.  Three stories tall, its Greek Revival design was typical of hundreds of homes, with a high stoop that led to the entrance within a sturdy brownstone enframement, and simple sills and lintels.

By 1851, Edward Chester, an educator, and his family lived at 104 East 19th Street (renumbered 145 in 1867).  The Chesters maintained a small domestic staff.  Like many families, when they left for the country in the summer they let unnecessary staff go.  On June 27, 1855, an advertisement in New York Daily Herald read:

Plain Cook and Washer--A gentleman leaving the city, wishes to procure a situation as above for a person now in his family, and whom he can highly recommend.

When the family returned five months later, they began restaffing.  An ad on November 30 read, "A seamstress and a plain cook wanted--who thoroughly understand their business, in a small family.  Apply personally at No. 104 East 19th-st., after 12 o'clock.  None but Protestants need apply."

The Chesters remained through 1857, after which the house was operated as a boarding house.  Among those living here in 1858 were Professor Candido Berti and artist Nestor Corradi.

In 1881, Maud Parish and her husband moved here from the boarding house at 208 East 14th Street.  Parish was a frescoer with the firm Pottier & Stymus.  The New York Evening Post said he, "earned a good salary, and had provided well for her support."  The couple had been forced to move following scandal.  Four other boarders in the 14th Street house had discovered missing clothing and jewelry.  A search uncovered the stolen items in Maud Parish's rooms.  The items--worth $500, or about $15,400 in 2024--were returned and Parish convinced the victims not to press charges.

Now at 145 East 19th Street, Maud made friends with Josephine G. Gabadau and her invalid mother.  In May 1882, Josephine "missed some jewelry and $30 in gold from her trunk," which was stored in a room on the third floor, according to The New York Evening Post.  The Sun reported, "Shortly after, she saw one of the ornaments on the person of Mrs. Maud L. Parish, a fellow boarder."  Maud told Josephine she had bought it, and since it was not an unusual piece, the subject was dropped.

Then, on June 14 a fire was discovered in the storeroom.  When it was extinguished, the contents of Josephine Gabadau's trunks were missing.  She went to Police Inspector Byrnes and told him of her suspicions.  After an investigation, Maud confessed, admitting to setting the fire to hide the theft.  She was arrested on July 24.  Tragically, according to The New York Evening Post, "Mrs. Gabadau was made so ill by fright that she died."

In 1908, George and Antoinette Finck and his wife purchased 145 East 19th Street.  They leased it to Henry R. Jaeckel for three years.  When his lease expired in 1911, they rented the house to recently divorced millionaire Henry Clews, Jr.

Clews hired architect Frederick Junius Sterner to remodel the outdated residence.  Sterner had been transforming the block since 1906 when he purchased his own home at 139 East 19th Street.  He removed the stoop, gave the new entrance at the basement level a brick surround and a colorful tile plaque above the doorway, covered the brick facade in stucco and decorated it with three cast-stone plaques.  A sloping tile roof completed the slightly Mediterranean feel.

145 East 19th Street was originally a match to the house to the left.  image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Born in 1876, Clews had struggled to find his identity.  His family was among the wealthiest and most prominent in New York and in Newport.  Before he was 21 years old, he had been expelled from Amherst College, dropped out of Columbia University, and was ousted from Leibniz University Hannover.  His father brought him into the family banking firm, but his passion was art.  Clews studied sculpture under Auguste Rodin and by the time he moved into 145 East 19th Street had had two exhibitions in New York.  

On December 19, 1914, Clews returned from Europe, but he did not go directly home.  Instead, he went to 8 Washington Square where he married Elsie Whelen Goelet, the former wife of Robert Goelet.  The New York Times said, "The marriage took place quietly at the home of the bride...a few hours after the license had been obtained, in the presence of the immediate families."

A year later, on October 30, 1915, The New York Times reported, "Following the wedding, the couple lived at Mr. Clews's studio at 145 East Nineteenth Street, and later sailed for Europe, where they have since resided in Paris."  The couple would not return to East 19th Street.

Leasing the combined houses next door at 147-149 East 19th Street (another Sterner transformation) since 1911 was artist Robert Winthrop Chanler.  They, too, were owned by George and Antoinette Finck.  In 1919, Chanler purchased his studio from the Fincks, as well as 145 East 19th Street.  The Record & Guide reported he paid $35,000 for the former Clews residence and studio.  The price would translate to $616,000 today.  On July 9, The Sun remarked, "The Clews and Chanler houses are among the most unique in the city, and their occupants have spent large sums of money in fitting them up."

William Astor Chanler, Prominent and Progressive Americans, 1904 (copyright expired)

Chanler's brother, William Astor Chanler, and his wife, the former Beatrice "Minnie" Ashley, moved into 145 East 19th Street.  Born in Newport in 1867, Chanler had served in the New York Assembly and the United States Congress.  After his Congressional term ended in 1901, he turned to traveling, writing and exploring.

Beatrice "Minnie" Ashley Chanler.  Arts & Decoration, March 1921 (copyright expired)

Minnie Chanler had been a stage actress, artist and author.  She made the house the scene of lavish entertaining.  On December 1, 1925, for instance, The New York Times reported that the French Ambassador to the United States, Emile Daeschner, had arrived from Washington "to attend the Lafayette fête tonight at the Astor."  The article noted, "Mr. Daeschner will be a guest at a dinner which Mrs. Chanler will give just before the fête at her home, 145 East Nineteenth Street."

It would be among the last entertainments for the Chanlers here.  The couple moved to Europe where William died in 1934.

In the meantime, 145 East 19th Street was the studio and residence of artist Albert Sterner in the mid-1930s.  Coincidentally or not, he was the brother of Frederick J. Sterner, who had remodeled the house two decades earlier.  Born in London in 1863, after moving to New York from Chicago in 1918 he taught at the Art Students League.

Alfred Sterner, from the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration

In 1947, the house was converted to apartments with a doctor's office in the lower level.  There were now a duplex on the former parlor and second floors, and one apartment on the third.  In the remodeling, Sterner's tile panel over the doorway was chopped out and the brick removed.

Nearly half a century later, in 1992, owner Lee Ann Jaffee began reconverting the house to a single-family home.  She hired architect Richard Ayotte to design what The New York Times journalist Christopher Gray described as "a nominally Greek Revival doorway," which, he said, "does not reverse the earlier dilution of the house's character."  Under Ayotte's renovation, said Gray, the house "is also to get back the window lintels it lost long ago, as well as deep parlor windows."

At some point, the doorway was remodeled again, this time in a valiant and overall successful attempt to reproduce the original Sterner appearance.

photographs by the author

Robert W. Chanler's "House of Fantasy" - 147-149 East 19th Street

 

In 1843 a row of Greek Revival homes was completed along the northern side of East 19th Street between Irving Place and Third Avenue.  Three stories tall above English basements, they were faced in red brick and trimmed in brownstone.  Among them were 106 and 108 East 19th Street (renumbered 147 and 149 in 1867), both of which were operated as rooming houses by the 1890s.  

On September 19, 1910, Antoinette and George Finch purchased the two houses, which were described by the Record & Guide as "brick tenements."  Seven months later, on April 5, 1911, The Sun reported, 

George Finch is having plans prepared for turning the two four story buildings at 147 and 149 East Nineteenth street into a studio building.  The improvement is an interesting one, as it is likely to have a decided influence on the future character of this neighborhood, which at present is a tenement district.  The alteration, which will cost about $10,000, is not a speculative improvement, as the property has been leased for five years to a party whose name Mr. Finch said he could not divulge at this time.  

The mystery of the renter's identity was soon cleared up.  On April 30, 1911, a headline in The New York Times read, “'Sheriff Bob' Chanler Will Join the Colony at Gramercy Park” and the sub-headline added, “With Mrs. William Astor Chanler He Will Move to the Nineteenth Street Section, Which Has Been Charmingly Reconstructed.”

Born on February 22, 1872, Chanler had an impressive pedigree.  He was the great-great grandson of Peter Stuyvesant and the grandnephew of Julia Ward Howe, John Jacob Astor III and William Backhouse Astor, Jr.  Chanler, who had just stepped down from his position as Sheriff of Duchess County, was also a newlywed.  He married Natalina (known as Lina) Cavalieri on June 18, 1910.  She was his second wife.  His marriage to Julia Remington Chamberlain had ended in divorce in August 1907.

It was Chanler who had chosen architect Frederick Junius Sterner to combine and remodel the two houses into a residence-studio.  In 1906, the British-born architect had arrived in New York from Colorado, purchased a high-stooped brownstone on the East 19th Street block, and transformed it into a Mediterranean-style villa with a stuccoed facade and red tiled roof.  One by one, he remodeled houses Pygmalion-like to fantastic, romantic structures, resulting in what Harriett Gillespie, writing in American Homes and Gardens in 1914, would call, "the Block Beautiful."

After removing the stoops, as he did with most of his transformations, Sterner covered the facade with stucco.  Wrought iron faux balconies appeared at the second and fourth floors.  A sloped, tile roof was flanked by stepped Flemish gables.  The wooden doors with iron strap hinges that sat within brick surrounds were surmounted by tympana filled with polychrome scenes of giraffes executed by Chanler's close friend, Charles Cary Rumsey.  They were, most likely, a nod to one of Chanler's most successful paintings to date, Giraffes, which was exhibited at the Salon d'Automne in Paris in 1905.

from the Rokeby Collection, Barrytown, New York

While 147 and 149 East 19th Street were being joined and remodeled, Chanler temporarily moved his studio into the converted carriage house down the block at 124 East 19th Street.  At the time, Current Opinion magazine called Chanler, “America’s most imaginative decorator.”  The artist’s murals decorated residences like that of William K. Vanderbilt, but they were in no way traditional.  The catalog for a later exhibition would explain, “Chanler’s career represents a series of reactions against conventions social and aesthetic.”  It said, “Surmounting in turn the inherited handicaps of family tradition and material affluence, he has won his way to a virile autonomy of thought and action which is to-day his most cherished possession.”

Lina Chanler would never move into the completed house.  The couple separated after their honeymoon and divorced in June 1912.  (Charles Green Shaw would later say, "He has been married twice and considers matrimony the greatest joke in the world.")

In the meantime, Chanler decorated what he called his House of Fantasy.  Years later, the Buffalo Evening News would comment, "His famous House of Fantasy, at 147 East 19th street, New York, is a demonstration of his eccentric nature.  The place has been rendered colorful and exotic by furnishings and decorations created by the artist to accord with his own desires rather than the routine of the conventions."

Although none of the interiors survive, contemporary accounts describe vibrant murals.  In an essay for the Vizcaya Museum and Garden's Robert Winthop Chanler, Lauren Drapala noted, "The building housed the largest collection of Chanler's work, an extensive study collection of live animals for modeling in his artwork, a vast library of rare books, and an assortment of houseguests, both friends as well as artisans in his workshop."

Robert Winthrop Chanler's 1905 painting Giraffes is presumed to be the inspiration for the tympana over the doors at 147-149 East 19th Street.  The International Studio, 1922 (copyright expired)

Members of Chanler's in-house menagerie--birds, fish, snakes and such--which he kept as models for his paintings, as well as his house pets sometimes took it on the lam.  On July 24, 1913, an ad offered a $50 reward for the return of a French bulldog.  Three years later, on July 15, 1916, the New York Herald reported, "Somewhere on Manhattan Island the small French bulldog belonging to Robert W. Chanler is making a frantic search for him."  In 1918, an ad in the Evening Telegram read, "Lost--A pink head parrot with gray body; good reward," and the following year, on March 10, an advertisement said, "Lost--A Parrot--green and yellow Macaw parrot, in neighborhood of 147 East 19th St.; generous reward."  The advertisements would continue for years.

Meanwhile, the House of Fantasy was known as much for its owner's parties as for his artwork.  Known as "Papa" to his friends ("pronounced in the French fashion," according to Charles G. Shaw's 1918 The Low-Down), Chanler threw a New Year's Eve party in 1917.  The following day, the New York Herald wrote, "A sequal to Nero's fiddle solo as Rome burned was enacted last night in a studio at No. 147 East Nineteenth street."  The New-York Tribune explained that the guests, "danced the old year out...while fire that started in a defective flue at 145 East Nineteenth Street ate its way under the floor toward them.  Some one discovered the blaze and the firemen put it out in jig time."

Interestingly, while Chanler's parties were infamous, Charles Green Shaw wrote in 1928, "In the midst of one of his parties he will sometimes sneak upstairs to his workshop and, all by himself, commence a new painting."

After renting 147-149 East 19th Street for nearly a decade, Chanler purchased the property in July 1919 for $57,000 (about $1 million in 2024).  In reporting the sale, the New York Herald remarked, "These houses were altered into what is the largest private studio in the city for Mr. Chanler about eight years ago by the sellers."

While in Europe in 1928, Chanler suffered a heart attack.  On July 29, 1929, the Buffalo [New York] Evening News reported that he had been admitted to a hospital in Kingston, New York, saying, "This is the third heart seizure within a little more than a year...His present illness has given [his friends] intense concern."

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

Chanler recovered, but the scare may have caused him to consider the viability of living alone in the East 19th Street house.  On June 23, 1930, the New York Sun reported that he had returned to the city from Woodstock, New York, but had gone to the apartment of Howland Spencer at 377 Park Avenue.  "Mr. Chanler closed his house at 147 East Nineteenth street last May.  An apartment house will be built on the site," said the article.

The renowned artist never had the chance to carry out that project.  He died four months later, on October 24, 1930.  

The Chanler estate sold the house in May 1945 to Nathan and Blossom Dolinsky.  The couple converted it to five apartments, many of them duplexes.  The configuration survives.  It was most likely the Dolinskys who drilled a hole through one of Charles Cary Rumsey's giraffe panels to accommodate a lamp and removed Sterner's picturesque wooden doors.  Overall, however, the 1911 appearance is intact.

many thanks to Carole Teller for prompting this post

photographs by the author

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The Robert P. Breese House - 249 East 61st Street

 

The Jacobs family lived in the recently completed brownstone house at 249 East 61st Street, just west of Second Avenue, in 1872.  The Italianate style home was one of three identical houses, each just 16-feet-wide and three stories tall.  Abraham and Francis Jacobs had the heart wrenching duty of holding the funeral of their son, Isaac Leon, in the parlor here on January 26, 1873.

The family may have rented the house from a man named Davis.  For some reason he was very eager to divest himself of its furnishings the following year.  And his terms, laid out in an advertisement on April 23, 1875, were decidedly unusual:

The First Class Furniture, mirrors carpets, pianos, &c. of a private family--about $4,000 worth--will be exchanged for Bourbon Whiskey, on a cash basis, and $1,000 cash will be added.  Address Davis, 249 East Sixty-first street, for three days.

With the house now empty, it was advertised for rent in September:  "To Let--Unfurnished, from October 1, the nice little brown stone House, No. 249 East Sixty-first street, in splendid order.  Go see it."

The residence became home to the Hermann Neubert family.  Neubert died at the age of 46 in March 1881, and in April 1886 John Millemann and his wife, the former Annie F. Frey, purchased it for $13,500--just over $400,000 by 2023 terms.

Millemann was a partner with his brother David in the provisions firm of John F. Millemann & Co. on Washington Street.  At some point Annie's widowed mother, Ellen Frey, moved into the house with them.  Ellen died on May 21, 1912 at the age of 87.  Her funeral was held in the house two days later.  

Annie, now widowed, sold the house in July 1919 to Robert Potter Breese.  He and his wife, the former Beatrice Claflin, hired the architectural firm of Sterner & Wolfe to update the vintage brownstone.   Frederick Junius Sterner was well known for his transformations of Victorian rowhouses into Edwardian fantasies.

The renovations cost the Breeses the equivalent of $125,000 in 2023.  The architect removed the stoop and lowered the entrance below grade.  In signature Sterner fashion, the brownstone was stuccoed, romantic pseudo-balconies were installed, and decorative terra cotta plaques applied to the facade. 

A 1941 tax photograph of 249 (behind the sign) and its neighbor provides a before-and-after view of the renovations.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Born in 1886, Robert Breese was a descendant of Samuel B. Morse.  After attending the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, he designed, constructed and raced sports cars in America and France.  Among the racecars he designed and raced were the Breese-Paris and the Breese Midget.

Beatrice was the daughter of millionaire Arthur B. Claflin.  They couple was married in Southampton, Long Island on October 9, 1915.  The New York Times noted, "Mrs. Breese is heir to more than $250,000 under the will of her grandmother, Mrs. Agnes Claflin."  (The amount would be closer to $4 million in 2023.)  The following year a daughter, Beatrice Lawrence, was born.

Fanciful plaques, a trademark of Sterner design, decorate the facade.

The renovations were completed in 1920, but the Breese family would never move in.  While Sterner & Wolfe was transforming their new home, domestic complications involving "a tall, slender woman" had developed.

That year Robert Breese leased the house furnished to Ronald Tree and his bride, the former Mrs. Henry Field.  The couple was followed by series of renters until 1924, the year the Breeses divorced and Robert Breese sold 249 East 61st Street to Richard Washburn Child, the former Ambassador to Rome.  Despite Beatrice Breese's significant personal wealth, the court ordered Robert to pay her $4,500 annual alimony and $20,000 from the sale of the house.

Richard Washburn Child had a change of mind regarding the East 61st Street house.  The following year, in October, he sold it to banker Stephen Galatti.  The New York Times remarked that Child was giving up his New York home because he "intends to live elsewhere."

Born in New Jersey on August 6, 1888, Gallati was a Harvard graduate, and had joined the American Field Service in 1915.  Stephen Galatti had married the recently divorced Grace Sands Coffin on September 25, 1925, a month before purchasing 249 East 61st Street.  Grace had an impressive social pedigree, related to the Schuyler, Sands, Bowne, Livingston and Chew families.

The newlyweds' honeymoon trip had a colorful start.  They arrived at the pier at 10:30 on the morning of September 26.  But they had the departure time wrong.  When they alit from their automobile, the Paris was steaming away toward the Battery with the Galatti luggage aboard.  The New York Times reported, "After a brief consultation the couple decided to sail next Wednesday on the Aquitania, and a radio message was sent to the purser of the Paris asking him to have the baggage held for them in Paris."

A honeymoon in Paris made perfect sense, since Galatti owned a home there.  The couple would, in fact, spend much more time there than in the East 61st Street house.

On November 15, 1927 the New York Evening Post reported that Galatti had leased the house furnished to Paul L. Reinhardt, and his wife.  Mrs. Reinhardt, it appears, did not find the Galatti furnishings to her taste.

In the June 15, 1927 issue of Town & Country, Augusta Owen Patterson reported on her redecorations of two rooms in "her temporary home at 249 East Sixty-first Street."  She said, "Much of Mrs. Reinhardt's furniture has been especially designed, that being one of the privileges possible to Paris."  In Paris, said the article, she "goes hunting--for modern art and modern furniture."  Within the Reinhardt art collection were "the most famous Cézannes, Utrillos, Derains, Braques and Matisse's," said Patterson.

Two view of of the boudoir as redecorated by Mrs. Reinhardt.  Town & Country said, "The furniture is silvered."  photos by Mattie Edwards Hewitt, Town & Country magazine, June 15, 1927.

The article pointed out that the costly redecorating was short-term.   "It must be remembered that these two rooms existed in a house which has been quite casually rented."

On September 25, 1930 a son, Stephen Galatti Jr., was born in the East 61st Street house.  The New York Times mentioned, "Mr. and Galatti are here from their home in Paris for a brief stay."

Four years later, on June 19, 1934, Grace Sands Montgomery Galatti died of heart disease at the age of 35.  Stephen and his son remained in the East 61st Street and Paris homes.

The following year Stephen was appointed Director General of the American Field Service.  The AFS played an important role in World War II, supplying the front lines with corps of volunteer ambulance drivers.  According to Galatti, the service had "carried more than half a million wounded, saved thousands of lives and formed friendships with all races and all nationalities in the United Nations."  The AFS was commended by President Franklin Roosevelt, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, and Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery.  

Following the war, Stephen Galatti founded the AFS Scholarship Program in 1946 and changed its focus from a ambulance corps to an international educational exchange service.  He would serve at its helm throughout the rest of his life.

In 1963 Galatti sold 249 East 61st Street to singer and actor Frank Sinatra.  Galatti died the following year on July 13 at 216 East 39th Street.

During his time here, Sinatra was a familiar face in restaurants like the Colony at 30 East 61st Street.  His residency at 249 East 61st Street would be relatively short-lived.  In 1969, three years after his marriage to actress Mia Farrow, he sold the house to Dr. David Y. Solomon and his wife, Yris Rabenou Solomon. 

The couple was married in 1966 and had a son, Darius, born in 1968.  In 1972 a second son, Teimour, was born.  The boys’ parents had riveting backgrounds.  

David Y. Solomon had grown up in Iraq and was the first Jew to be admitted to the Royal College of Medicine in Baghdad.  He fled Jewish persecution, going first to Iran.  There practiced medicine before accepting a fellowship at the Alfred Einstein School of Medicine, part of Montefiore Hospital, in 1961. 

Sterner's plank door (with a clever peephole) features forged strap hinges and a door knocker in the form of a stylized animal.

Yris Rabenou Solomon had grown up in Paris, the daughter of a Persian and a German.  When the Nazi’s took over the city, Yris’s mother fled with her and her two siblings.  Then, in 1948 the family came to the United States.  Yris was a musician and singer, recording mostly French folk music for Columbia Records.  Upon her father’s death, she entered the family’s business with her mother, dealing in ancient Persian and Middle Eastern art. 

Upon purchasing 249 East 61^st Street, the Solomons made gentle renovations, including replacing the garden wall with an expanse of windows and French doors.  The house became museum-like, not only with Middle Eastern art and artifacts, but with Dr. Solomon’s collection of West African art.  He acquired the pieces over a period of half a century. 

According to Teimour Solomon, in the late 1970s the house was a haven for refugees from the Islamic Revolution in Iran.  It had already been an important gathering spot for years.  “Our home was a central point in the lives of a vast number of people from extremely different circles, in the arts, sciences, and politics over a period of fifty years,” he said recently.  

In the 1960s Dr. Solomon was the physician for the Senegalese Ambassador to the United Nations.  Through the ambassador’s recommendations, other high-ranking Senegalese, like the Maribout of Senegal, sought Solomon's services.  He became both physician and trusted friend.  The Solomon house hosted a myriad of high-ranking officials and personalities over the years. 

Following their parents’ deaths, Darius and Teimour Solomon placed their remarkable childhood home on the market with George Vanderploeg of Douglas Elliman in 2023.

photos by the author
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The Frederick J. Sterner House - 154-156 East 63rd Street

British-born architect Frederick Junius Sterner came from to New York from Colorado in 1906.  He purchased a Victorian brownstone on an East 19^th Street block lined with similar high-stoop homes.  Before long he had transformed it into a Mediterranean-style villa with a stuccoed façade and red tile roof.    By 1911 the block was filled with Sterner’s fantastic renovations, earning it the nickname “The Block Beautiful."

In July 1914 Sterner purchased the two three-story brownstones at Nos. 154 and 156 East 63rd Street with plans to convert them into a single residence.  The rear yard would hold a single-story structure for his architectural studio.

Sterner combined the vintage houses internally and remodeled the exterior in his trademark stucco-covered style.  The entrances were moved to the former English basement level.  The studio was accessed by a tunnel behind a gate.  Its brick surround was embedded with ancient-looking sculptures.

The main entrance was behind the brick gateposts at left.  Architecture magazine, April 1915 (copyright expired)

The second floor openings were covered with decorative Mediterranean style grills which were echoed in the playful railing of the two-bay-wide balcony at the top floor.

The gate to the rear studio was a fantasy of sculptures and panels.  photo by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Sterner settled into the house with his sister, Maude.  Working from his Mediterranean style study in 1916 he remodeled the two houses directly across the street at Nos. 153 and 155 into a Spanish Revival style villa for Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt as a wedding present to her daughter, Barbara Rutherford, and Cyril Hatch.

Neither Sterner nor his sister appeared often in society columns for their entertainments.  But an event on February 25, 1916 was a notable exception.  The New York Tribune's article entitled "Young Men Give Backyard Party" reported that Sterner, Frank Crowninshield, Bertram de N. Cruger and Henry Clay had hosted a "'Gothic backyard party' last night in the studio of Mr. Sterner," adding "Many interesting features were arranged for the entertainment of the guests."

Those guests were among the most notable in Manhattan society, including the Mayor, John Purroy Mitchel and his wife; Mrs. John Astor; the I. Townsend Burdens; Charles Dana Gibson and his wife; the Conde Nasts and many others.

In March 1917 Sterner sold the residence to Leonard Moorhead Thomas and his wife, the former Blanche May Oelrichs.  Thomas immediately hired architect F. Burrall Hoffman to make alterations.  A stairway was added, the plumbing updated, and a dumbwaiter shaft installed.

Leonard and Blanche had been married in 1910 and now had two children, Leonard, Jr., who was six years old, and Robin May who was two.  The New-York Tribune commented "Mr. Thomas is the son of one of Philadelphia's wealthiest families, a graduate of Yale, and a member of a dozen clubs.  For months after the marriage he and Mrs. Thomas entertained lavishly at their home in Narragansett Avenue, Newport."

The Thomases filled the "big room" (top)with antique tapestries and furniture.  The dining room featured an intricately stenciled ceiling, tiled floors and wall murals.  photos by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Although active in society, Blanche's schedule was filled with more than merely afternoon teas and charity receptions.  She was a successful poet, wrote a play, and was a ardent suffragist.  But it was perhaps her striking beauty for which most knew her.  In 1913 French artist Paul César Helleu had arrived in America "to find the most beautiful woman."  As he prepared to sail home to pair he told reporters "I found her.  I found her in Mrs. Thomas."  Blanche would be remembered for the rest of her life as having been deemed "America's most beautiful woman."

Blanche Thomas was considered America's most beautiful woman.  New-York Tribune, April 20, 1920 (copyright expired)

In April 1920 New York society was stunned when it was discovered that Blanche had obtained a divorce in Paris several months earlier.  A reporter from the New-York Tribune caught up with Blanche on April 20 in the East 94th Street apartment she was leasing.  She confirmed the divorce but refused to give details.  "I am sure that our friends would not be interested in anything of the kind," she said.

The living room featured leaded glass windows and a barrel-vaulted Tudor style ceiling.  photo by Wurts Bros from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Of course, they were interested.  And so was the rest of America, especially when news of Blanche's marriage to actor John Barrymore in the Ritz-Carlton Hotel on August 5 was published.

Thomas left No. 154, initially leasing it to banker Walter Lewisohn and his family, and then to the Benjamin Moores.  By 1929 it was home to the well-known and powerful attorney and politician, judge Samuel Seabury and his wife, the former Maud Richey.  

While Seabury busied himself with court cases and politics, Maud entertained.  On November 15, 1929, for instance, The East Hampton Star reported that she had hosted a luncheon here, "preceding the first session of the yearly fall meeting of the Garden Club of America."

Samuel Seabury.  from the collection of the Library of Congress

Seabury was highly involved in politics (in 1916 he was the Democratic nominee for Governor of New York).  As votes were counted in the 1933 mayoral race, candidate Fiorello LaGuardia chose to wait it out at the Seabury house listening to the results on the radio.   On November 9 the New York Evening Post wrote that when his victory was assured, thousands cheered in the streets.  "But in the early Italian dining room of Samuel Seabury's home at 154 East Sixty-third Street, Fiorello LaGuardia, Mayor-elect, sat in a straight chair, oblivious to the back-slapping of his sponsors, deaf to the concessions of his adversaries and the rising tide of his plurality."  LaGuardia could only recall his earlier attempts at office.  "In victory, Fiorello LaGuardia remembered only defeat."

When LaGuardia was reelected four years later, he chose to take his oath of office in the Seabury house.

The Seabury summer home was in East Hampton.  For some reason Samuel came briefly back to the city in July 1938.  Because the domestic staff was with Maud, only he and the chauffeur, John Mooney, were in the house.

Seabury was reading in the library and Mooney was asleep just after midnight on July 12 when an explosion rocked the house.  Both men rushed to the top floor, normally occupied by servants, "where they found flames shooting upward," according to The New York Times.  Fire fighters extinguished the blaze, but not before extensive damage was done to the fourth floor and attic.  Two fire fighters were overcome by smoke inhalation.  Investigation traced the cause to an electrical short circuit.  Had Seabury not made the unusual trip home, the structure may well have been destroyed.

Other than the living room mantelpiece little in these two rooms has been replaced. photos via Guillaume Gaudet via The New York Times

In 1948 the Seaburys sold No. 154 to the Source Teaching Society, run by May Benzenberg Mayer.  Remodeling resulted in the kitchen and other school-related rooms in the basement level, with the upper stories used as "residence of staff," according to the Certificate of Occupancy.  

Mary Benzenberg Mayer had been a student of Dr. Carl Jung.  The purpose of The Source Teaching Society was to "permit modern man to have religious and mystical experiences despite materialistic pressures."  One skeptical writer called it "a group of Jungian nature-worshipers."

A garage replaces an entrance and the fourth floor balcony has been remodeled.

In 1961 another renovation resulted in a triplex in the ground floor through second.  It shared the basement level with a garage.  One apartment each were now on the third and fourth floors.  In 1994 a conservatory was erected on the roof.

Frederick J. Stern's studio survives--albeit it gussied up. photo via Guillaume Gaudet via The New York Times 

By the time the house was placed on the market in 2019 it had been returned, essentially, to a single-family home although the top floor apartment was still in place.

photographs by the author

many thanks to reader Bruce Addison for suggesting this post.