Van Wart & Wein's 40 Fifth Avenue

 

image via landmarkbranding.com

Development of Fifth Avenue above Washington Square began with the Henry and Laura Brevort mansion at the corner of West 9th Street, completed in 1834.  Within seven years, the Church of the Ascension was erected on the corresponding corner of 10th Street, and by 1858 the northern half of that block was filled with sumptuous rowhouses, like the Henry Rutgers Remsen mansion at 40 Fifth Avenue.

Four mansions, including the Remsen house at No. 40 (left) filled the northern block between 9th and 10th Streets.  from the collection of the New York Public Library

At the end of World War I, lower Fifth Avenue had drastically changed.  Like the Brevoort mansion, which was demolished in 1925, private homes were quickly being replaced by upscale apartment buildings.  In 1927, the four houses at 40 through 46 Fifth Avenue and those at 2 through 10 West 11th Street were acquired by Moses Ginsberg's 10 West 11th Street Corporation.  

On September 16, 1928, The New York Times reported that demolition of those structures had begun.  On the site, said the article, would be a 15-story-and-penthouse "100 per cent cooperative building to be known as 40 Fifth Avenue."  The article pointed out that the location was "one of the most unusual corners of lower Fifth Avenue" because it was flanked by churches, ensuring light and ventilation.  The structure, "will be from plans by Van Wart & Wein, architects, with McKim, Meade [sic] & White, architects for the purchasers."  

As the structure neared completion, an advertisement in The New Yorker on December 15, 1928 called the location, "The corner of corners."  It boasted, "40 Fifth Avenue, now under construction, will occupy one of the few corners in New York combining residential desirability with complete sunshine and light protection on all sides."  

The ad boasted that the apartments would have "spacious rooms with ample baths and closets, glass-enclosed loggias, wood-burning fireplaces and mechanical refrigeration."  Prices, said the advertisement, started at $10,500 (just under $200,000 in 2026 terms).  Along Fifth Avenue would be four "maisonettes," essentially private homes within the building with separate entrances on the avenue.

McKim, Mead & White was kept busy with the interior designs.  Future homeowners had begun purchasing the apartments months earlier.  Among the first was Eugene V. Connett Jr., who  had purchased a six-room and three-bath apartment on the 12th floor in June 1928.  And on August 15, The New York Times reported that H. Hamilton Holden had purchased the triplex maisonette at 46 Fifth Avenue.  "The apartment contains eleven rooms and four baths," said the article.

Completed in 1929, Van Wart & Wein had turned to New York's colonial past by designing the building in the neo-Georgian style.  Its three-section base was divided by intermediate cornices and clad in limestone and red brick.  Above the 10-story shaft, the top section was crowned with a brick-and-stone-balustraded parapet, behind which the penthouse level was topped with a striking Georgian-style cupola.  

photograph by Beyond My Ken

Among the initial residents were commercial artist Bert Pagano, whose 8th-floor apartment contained six rooms and three baths; his brother, Guido Pagano; attorney Joseph Force Crater and his wife, Ella; stockbroker Floyd Y. Keeler; and William A. Force 3d, president of the William A. Force Company, Inc.

Born in 1885, Floyd Y. Keeler was a partner in the brokerage firm of Orvis Brothers & Co.  He and his wife, the former Elizabeth Rapallo Irving, had two adult daughters.  

Shortly after moving into their penthouse here, Keeler left town on a business trip.  Early on the morning of April 13, Elizabeth woke up to find a man "rummaging about in the bedroom," as reported by The New York Times.  The burglar quickly realized that he had chosen the wrong apartment to rob.  The article said, 

Mrs. Keeler, who weighs only 100 pounds, but who served in the Red Cross Motor Corps during the World War, made a flying tackle and grappled the intruder just as he was about to make his way out of the window to the roof.

The burglar wriggled free, but not before Elizabeth pulled off one of his shoes.  He headed down the fifteen flights of stairs while Elizabeth telephoned the police.  Two detectives arrived at 40 Fifth Avenue just as a man, wearing only one shoe, exited.  Frank Vagedes was arrested and the following morning he appeared in the Essex Market Court.  The New York Times commented, "Mrs. Keeler returned his shoe."

Joseph Force Crater was born in 1889, the son of Irish immigrants.  A graduate of Columbia University, he was closely associated with Tammany Hall leader Martin J. Healy.  He and his wife, the former Stella Mance Wheeler, were married in 1917.

Justice Joseph Force Crater (original source unknown)

Just months after buying their penthouse apartment, in April 1930, Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed Crater a Justice of the New York Supreme Court.  Shortly afterward, the state initiated an investigation into corruption within New York City agencies.

Like all the well-to-do residents of 40 Fifth Avenue, the Craters had a country home.  Theirs was in Belgrade Lakes, Maine and they were there in the summer of 1930 when, late in July, Crater received a telephone call.  On August 3, he returned to Manhattan, telling Stella he would return in time for her birthday on August 9.  When he did not return after ten days, Stella initiated a search.  Justice Joseph F. Crater had vanished.

On September 6, The New York Times reported that Stella was still in Maine, "suffering from a nervous breakdown."  In what would be the most intensive and publicized missing case until Jimmy Hoffa's disappearance in 1975, newspapers nationwide updated readers nearly daily.  Sanitariums were searched, bank records were examined (he had cashed two checks totaling $5,150, or about $100,000 today), and numerous leads were followed.

On February 1, 1931, District Attorney Crane told reporters that the investigation "would end in a few days."  Ransom notes and telephone calls received by Stella had proved to be bogus.  In the meantime, Stella Crater found herself in a difficult position.  With no proof of her husband's death, she had no income.  On January 14, 1932, Surrogate James A. Foley granted her an allowance of "$50 a week and the use of their apartment at 40 Fifth Avenue."  The New York Times said, "Mrs. Crater said she had been accustomed to living at the rate of $15,000 a year and that she had no other means of support."

Six years later, on March 15, 1938, The New York Times reported that Stella Crater had been evicted from her apartment.  Her attorney announced, "Mrs. Crater was resigned to abandoning her home, being without funds."  The disappearance of Joseph Force Crater remains one of America's great unsolved mysteries.

photograph by Spencer Means

Also occupying a penthouse apartment at the time of Crater's disappearance was another attorney, William E. Carnochan.  Born in 1869, he joined the law firm of Parsons, Closson & McIlvaine in 1891.  Never married, he was a member of the University and Lawyers Clubs.  In December 1930, while the nation was focused on the search for his neighbor, Carnochan suffered a nervous breakdown.  His sister, Sara Willard of Troy, Pennsylvania, temporarily moved into the apartment to care for him.

Five months later, Carnochan was still unwell and suffering from insomnia.  On April 23, 1931, he went onto his terrace, climbed the four-foot high parapet, and jumped to his death, landing on the Fifth Avenue sidewalk.  

The majority of the owners within the building, of course, were much less dramatic.  More typical of the initial owners were John Phillips Logan and his wife, the former Gertrude Hardman.  Born in 1880, Logan was a member of the wholesale dry goods firm of J. P. Logan & Sons on Canal Street.  Their country home was in Seabright, New Jersey.  The couple were members of the Essex County Country Club and John was, additionally, a member of the Montclair Golf Club and the New York Athletic Club.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

Also living here in the 1930s were Reverend Dr. Archibald Romaine Mansfield and his wife, the former Ella Huntington.  Dr. Mansfield studied ministry at St. Stephen's College and graduated from the General Theological Seminary in 1896.  He received his honorary D. D. degree from St. Stephen's in 1915.

In 1896, according to The New York Sun years later, "New York's water front was notorious as a hotbed of crime and vice and Dr. Mansfield saw a wide field for service there."  He established a lodging house where sailors "were not in danger of being robbed or shanghaied," said the newspaper.  Mansfield's riverfront mission grew until, by the time he and his wife moved into 40 Fifth Avenue, the Seamen's Church Institute occupied a 13-story building on South Street.

Still living here in the 1940s were Eugene V. Connett and his wife, May Brewer.  Connett was the founder of E. V. Connett & Co.  The couple's country home was in Amagansett, New York.  A long time member of the Union League Club, Connett was the chairman of the club's art committee.

image via cityrealty.com

While the private mansions of lower Fifth Avenue did not survive, the apartment houses that replaced them did.  And  today they retain the upscale aplomb that they enjoyed a century ago.  Among the most distinguished is 40 Fifth Avenue, the unique site of which still provides it special notice.

The John W. T. Nichols House - 42 West 11th Street

 

In 1840, builder Andrew Lockwood, carpenter Erastus Freeman, and mason James Harriot began construction of a row of 11 brick-faced houses that would nearly fill the south side of West 11th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.  Completed in 1841, the two-and-a-half-story homes sat upon rusticated brownstone basements.  Handsome doorways with Corinthian-capped pilasters, sidelights and transoms were recessed within the expected Greek Revival-style brownstone frames of flat pilasters and a heavy entablature.  The attic windows punched through the fascia of the delicately denticulated cornices.

No. 42 West 11th Street saw a succession of professional occupants (who possibly rented) over the first decades.  In 1884, for instance, it was home to John H. Kitchen, a builder who was appointed receiver of the United States Underground Cable Company in December that year.  (The firm was organized in 1882 "to manufacture and lay underground electric cables, both for telegraphic purposes and lighting, and for telephonic purposes."  Perhaps ahead of its time, the company failed.)

Early in 1897, merchant John White Treadwell Nichols purchased 42 West 11th Street, ending the turnover in occupants.  Born in Brighton, Massachusetts on October 30, 1852, he married Mary Blake Slocum in 1876.  They relocated to New York City in 1884, at which time Nichols became a partner in the cotton goods commission house of Minot, Hooper & Co.  The couple had three sons, George S., John Treadwell, and William Blake; and three daughters, Helen Slocum, Elizabeth, and Susan Farley.

Nichols had suffered from poor eyesight from an early age.  The Textile World Journal later explained, "He went to work in the woolen business in Boston at the age of fourteen years, as poor eyesight prevented his continuing his studies."  The journal said, "Mr. Nichols encouraged the development of devices that would operate to relieve others distressed in that way."  He commissioned the development of a switchboard operated by bells rather than lights.  It was installed at Minot, Hooper & Co., and, after being thoroughly tested, "was submitted to broader commercial usage."

At one point, Nichols turned his attention to his female employees, and established a women's restroom in his firm's building at 51-53 Leonard Street.  It was one of the first women's rest rooms in a large commercial building.

The Nichols family were involved in philanthropy.  John and Mary were aboard an ocean liner headed to Europe in April 1906 when news came of the San Francisco earthquake and fire.  Nichols immediately wired his firm, recommending that it "extend credits and especial courtesies in the stricken zone."  Other businesses joined the movement.  The Textile World Journal said, "it is remembered in the business district as probably the first step in commercial relief."

A year later, when The Association of the New York School of Philanthropy was formed, Helen S. Nichols was elected secretary-treasurer.  

At the time, the aristocratic tenor of the lower Fifth Avenue neighborhood was threatened.  When the two houses at 44 and 46 Fifth Avenue, at the corner of 11th Street, were offered for sale in the spring of 1907, Nichols purchased them.  On May 4, the Record & Guide commented, "It is said that Mr. Nichols bought [them] for the purpose of helping to preserve the old-time residential character of lower 5th av."

It was around this time that Nichols purchased a 36-acre estate near Cove Neck in Oyster Bay, Long Island.  It abutted Theodore Roosevelt's Sagamore Hill, and was near the estate of J. Pierpont Morgan, Matinicock Point.  Nichols commissioned Minerva Parker Nichols, the wife of his second cousin, to design the house, which became known as The Kettles.

The Kettles.  image via minervaparkernichols.com

At some point, Nichols purchased 44 West 11th Street and combined the two, removing the stoop of 42 while retaining the address.  It was no doubt at the same time that both houses were raised to full three floors and identical cornices installed.  The Spur described the Nichols home in 1915 as, "Two houses thrown into one, it is a very spacious dwelling with the old-fashioned high ceilings of half a century ago."

The original appearance of 42 and 44 West 11th Street can be seen in the unaltered house at the right.  Although the Nichols house retained the address of 42 West 11th Street, the entrance was technically at 44. image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

On June 12, 1910, The New York Times began an article saying, "The old Floyd homestead [in Mastic, Long Island], built in 1730, and the ancestral home of Gen. William Floyd, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was the scene of a wedding at noon today."  John Treadwell Nichols was married to Cornelia Du Bois Floyd.  George was his brother's best man, and William was one of the ushers.  The article said, "A special train brought 100 guests from the city, and many came in automobiles."

Among those arriving in a car may have been George Nichols.  That year he registered his new Matheson 50 automobile.

George's new car would have looked much like this 1910 model.  The $3,000 price tag would translate to about $95,300 in 2024.  Cycle & Automobile Trade Journal, 1910 (copyright expired)

Nichols's hope of preserving the old-time atmosphere of the neighborhood apparently extended to their own home's interiors.  When John and Mary combined the two houses, they did not install electricity and, in fact, had never installed gas.  On January 9, 1915, The Sun announced, "There will be a meeting of the Neighborhood Club on the evening of January 13 at the home of Mr. and Mrs. John W. T. Nichols, 42 West Eleventh street.  The artists will be Francis Rogers and Bruno Huhn."  On February 1, The Spur followed up:

It seemed like stepping into the romantic past when the members and guests of that unusual New York organization, the Neighborhood Club, entered the reception room of Mrs. John W. T. Nichols, at 42 West Eleventh Street, and found it lighted by candles.  The Nichols house is one of the few on Manhattan Island in which gas has never been installed; there are no chandeliers--only side lights.

It may have been the proximity of the Morgan and Nichols summer estates that sparked romance between George and Jane N. Morgan.  On June 11, 1917, the New-York Tribune reported that the couple had obtained their marriage license in Oyster Bay.  Somewhat shockingly, the article said, "No one accompanied the couple, the two driving to the clerk's office in Mr. Nichol's machine."

The wedding was performed on November 14 in the Church of St. John at Lattingtown, where both families worshiped during the summer season.  The Sun reported, "Two special cars were run from the Pennsylvania Station, New York, to accommodate the guests," adding that the couple, "will probably make their home on the Nichols estate at Oyster Bay."  (In fact, they moved into the West 11th Street house and shared The Kettles in the summer.)

The following year, the Morgan family and George and Jane Nichols were the victims of a bizarre extortion plot.  On September 17, 1918, The New York Times reported, "For eighteen months past somebody has been trying to extort $20,000 from Mr. Morgan and his daughter, Mrs. Jane Nichols of Glen Cove, L.I."  It said that a series of letters mailed from Lansing, Michigan promised sure death if instructions were not followed.

The writer asserted that he represented a gang in close touch with the Morgan family.  He said the entire family was inoculated with a disease germ which would cause their death in three years.  J. Pierpont Morgan, Sr., the writer said, had met death through this germ.  The antidote for the germ, however, could be purchased from him for $20,000.

Federal agents began "dickering" with the writer through personal columns in newspapers in Lansing and Detroit.  A plan was finally agreed upon by which the $20,000 would be handed over to an "unnamed man" in Lansing.  On September 17, 1918, J. B. Thorn, a 51-year-old janitor, was arrested.  

John White Tredwell Nichols died of heart failure in his sleep on April 25, 1920 at the age of 72.  His large estate was left mostly to Mary, to be divided among the children after her death.  A $5,000 bequest was made to Harvard University to establish the George Nichols Fund in honor of John's father.  He remembered, as well, his long-time domestic staff.  Ellen Barr, who worked at The Kettles, for instance, received $1,000 (about $14,600 by 2025 conversion).

Mary lived on here with Susan, who was unmarried; and George and Jane and their two-year-old daughter Jane Norton.  A second child, George, was born on May 15, 1922.  The population of 42 West 11th Street was reduced by one when Susan married writer John Trowbridge Pulsifer in 1924.   

George Nichols was a member of his father's firm, Minot, Hooper & Co. and a noted yachtsman.  In 1925, he was made commodore of the New York Yacht Club.  George captained the Weetamoe in the America's Cup race of 1930, with his brother-in-law Junius S. Morgan as a member of the five-man crew.  Around this time, George and Jane had established their own summer estate, Uplands, in Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island.

In May 1928, Helen, who was married to Mansfield Estabrook, died.  Their three children, James, Laura and John, moved into 42 West 11th Street and The Kettles.  Although Mansfield Estabrook was still alive, in 1935 George and Jane introduced Laura to society at a dance.  The New York Post explained, "She and her two brothers, James M. and John N. Estabrook, make their home with their grandmother, Mrs. John W. T. Nichols, at the Kettles, in the Cove Neck sector of Oyster Bay, and at 42 West Eleventh Street, New York."

The following year, on September 12, 1936, The New York Post wrote, "The various members of the J. Pierpont Morgan clan pride themselves on their exclusiveness, so that the dance given last night by the financier's son-in-law and daughter, Mr. and Mrs. George Nichols at Uplands, their country home at Cold Spring Harbor, to introduce to society their daughter, Miss Jane Nichols was one of the smaller of the debutante coming-out parties of the week."  The article continued,

The dance was held in a marquee on the lawn, and the entire estate was illuminated by colored lights.  Alexander Haas and his Hungarian orchestra, that has played at most of the parties given by this family in the past few years, contributed to the entertainment of the guests, who included members of the young married set as well as many of this season's debutantes.

Mary Blake Nichols died on September 8, 1943 at the age of 89.  Three years later the combined houses were converted to a two-family residence, with a duplex in the basement and parlor levels, and another on the second and third floors.  

The configuration lasted until 1988, when 42 and 44 West 11th Street were separated.  A remarkable restoration of the lost stoop and entrance brought the house back to its 1841 appearance.

photographs by the author

The 1843 Christopher Gwyer House - 267 West 11th Street

 

The full-height fourth floor and Italianate cornice were the result of a 19th-century renovation.

Well-to-do butcher Christopher Gwyer purchased the vacant plot at 59 Hammond Street (later renamed and numbered 267 West 11th Street) from builder and developer Andrew Lockwood in 1842.  Lockwood had earlier erected two handsome homes on the abutting plots at 61 and 63 Hammond Street.  He stipulated in the deed that he would erect a similar house for Gwyer within six months of the transfer.

The Gwyer residence, completed in 1843, equaled and in some ways surpassed its neighbors in elegance.  The four-story house was faced in red brick above the high brownstone English basement.  Handsome ironwork decorated with anthemions and lyres protected the areaway, and stone railings and newels originally graced the stoop.

Beside the imposing brownstone framed doorway, the floor-to-ceiling parlor windows were most likely fronted by a cast iron balcony.   A short attic story took the place of the peaked roof and dormers of the earlier Federal style.

Born on February 7, 1795, Christopher Gwyer operated two meat businesses--one in the Washington Market and the other on Hudson Street.  He and his wife, Mary, had four sons, Christopher Jr., George W., John C. and William E.  

It appears that Gwyer's sister, Sarah, and her husband, Samuel Wignalls, lived here as well.  Wignalls died at the age of 54 on April 25, 1848.  His funeral was held in the parlor two days later.

By 1870, Christopher Jr. and George had entered the butcher business.  The three Gwyers operated their own shops.  Christopher was listed as a meat dealer at 25 Washington Market, while George was a poulterer at 202 Washington Market.  Their father's butcher stall was at 8 Washington Market.

Christopher Gwyer died about 1872.  On June 29, 1873, the New York Dispatch reported, "Christopher Gwyer, Jr., is the oldest son of the well-known butcher of Washington Market, is a handsome brunette, very gentlemanly in his address.  Rich, lively, sharp, industrious, and promises in time to be as fat and as wealthy as was his father.  He has several brothers in the poultry line, who are themselves no chickens."

By the time of the article, John C. Gwyer was working for at least two of his brothers on the accounting side of their businesses.  He was listed in directories as "treasurer" of two of the Gwyer operations.  Christopher Jr. moved far uptown to East 116th Street in 1878.  Mary A. Gwyer, too, had moved by 1887, when she leased 267 West 11th Street to Dr. Robert W. Buchanan.  (By then, the attic floor had been raised to full height with a handsome bracketed Italianate cornice, and up-to-date Italianate entrance doors had been installed.)

Born in Scotland in 1862, Buchanan had relocated to Halifax, Nova Scotia, where he met his wife.  In 1883, he graduated from the Chicago College of Physicians and Surgeons.  He and his wife had a young daughter, Gertrude.  Buchanan set up his medical practice in the house, but unfortunately, according to The Philadelphia Times, "He was not very prosperous.  His wife proved unfaithful, and he separated from her, retaining his daughter Gertrude."

Annie Buchanan returned to Nova Scotia.  The failure of his marriage coupled with his financial problems nearly undid the doctor.  The Philadelphia Times said, "He took to drinking and dissipation.  Then he fell in with a woman named Annie Sutherland, the keeper of a notorious house in Newark."

Annie Sutherland was 10 years older than Buchanan.  She fell "desperately in love" with him and convinced him to divorce his wife.  But while she was in love with the doctor, he was in love with her significant fortune.  He obtained his divorce on November 12, 1890.  On November 27, Annie rewrote her will, leaving her entire estate to Buchanan, and two days later they were married.

With his newfound prosperity, Buchanan ended his private practice and became a police surgeon and a "commissioner in lunacy."  Annie gave up her Newark brothel to lead the life of a respectable married woman and step-mother.

Dr. Robert Buchanan, The Philadelphia Times, July 2, 1895

Although professionally successful, Buchanan's domestic life grew tense.  He told peers that she was his housekeeper, not his wife; and confessed to more than one acquaintance he wanted to "dump the old woman."  When Annie threatened to divorce him in April 1892 and return to Newark, taking her fortune with her, Buchanan took action.

On the morning of April 22, Annie made breakfast.  Her husband brought her a cup of coffee.  Soon afterward, she "was taken ill without any preliminary warning," according to The Philadelphia Times.  She died the next day "in the presence of two doctors, a nurse and a clergyman, who, one after the other, had been hastily summoned by the apparently distracted husband."  The death certificate listed the cause of death as "cerebral apoplexy."  Annie Sutherland Buchanan was buried in Greenwood Cemetery on April 25.  She left Buchanan "a fortune, and his little daughter $10,000," said The Evening Post.  (Gertrude's inheritance alone would equal about $345,000 in 2024.)

Two weeks later, Buchanan traveled to Novia Scotia and remarried his first wife (confusingly for newspapers also named Annie).  The marriage, said The New York Times, "made the affair look suspicious."  In May, two men visited the office of District Attorney Nicoll and "said Mrs. Buchanan had been poisoned by her husband."  Undercover police watched the West 11th Street house and trailed Dr. Buchanan.  In the meantime, on June 5, 1892, Nicoll ordered Annie Buchanan's body exhumed for an autopsy.  It revealed no evidence of cerebral hemorrhage, but the presence of large amounts of morphine.

As Dr. Buchanan was walking down Broadway with his attorney, Charles E. Davidson, on the afternoon of June 6, detectives arrested him for the murder of his wife.  His counsel quickly told reporters that Annie Buchanan, "was a confirmed morphine eater, and that if her death resulted from narcotic poisoning, she administered the drug herself."  

At trial, damning evidence came out.  One witness testified that Buchanan "had made preparations for flight to South America," and on April 3, 1893, Annie Florence Warren testified that Buchanan had lamented to her husband, "If I had only had the woman's body cremated nothing would have been found."

On July 2, 1895, The Philadelphia Times headlined an article, "Execution of Dr. Buchanan / The Wife Murderer Pays the Penalty of His Crime at Last."  That morning Buchanan had been electrocuted at Sing Sing prison.

Throughout the sensational case, Mary A. Gwyer had rented 267 West 11th Street to another physician, Dr. George Brockway.  It was the scene of the funeral of his 82-year-old father, Herman R. Brockway, on July 7, 1897.

Around 1900, Mary sold the house to George B. Deane, known in the neighborhood as Old Uncle George.  Born in Greenwich Village in 1817, he was described by The New York Times in 1903 as, "a picturesque and quaint figure of the Greenwich Village section of the city."  A founder of the Republican Party in New York City, he had served in the State Assembly.  The feisty politician had once suggested to Theodore Roosevelt, then president of the Police Board, that he "detail" (or promote) a policeman.  Roosevelt, who had been appointed to his position, replied that "the merit system was in vogue."  (The merit system promoted officers based on their performance.)  Deane was said to have answered, "The merit system was in vogue when you were appointed, also."

The widowed George B. Deane died in the West 11th Street house at the age of 86 on December 29, 1903.  His son, Joseph W. Deane, sold it on March 6, 1906, The New York Times noting it was "formerly owned by the McGuire [sic] estate."

The residence became a high-end boarding house.  Among the residents were Lorenzo N. Rider, a 1906 graduate of Union College and an employee of the Western Electric Co.; George Michael Lawton, who held a Ph.B. degree from Wesleyan University; and Robert H. Wade.  Lawton was affiliated with the Coal and Iron National Bank in 1911, the year that Wade was inducted into the U.S. Army.  He left for camp on April 2 that year.

The substantial stone stoop newels and railings survived in 1941.  image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

An advertisement in The New York Times on October 3, 1920 offered, "Enormous, furnished comfortable back parlor, splendid light, private bath, steam heat. $20."  The rent would translate to about $300 per month today.

The house was occupied by real estate operator F. K. Maximillian and his wife, Adele, at the time.  It appears it was Maximillian who erected the small building in the rear yard, which was accessed through the narrow horsewalk, or passageway, between 267 and 265 West 11th Street.  

The little rear building was home to Adele's showroom.  She designed and made custom children's clothing.  An advertisement in Harper's Bazaar in April 1928 began, "When they are six or one or twelve years old, they delight in wearing the fascinating clothes designed for girls and small boys in my own studio."

A "brother and sister" outfit designed by Adele Maximillian.  Children, the Magazine for Parents, January 1927

The Maximillians remained here into the Depression years.  The former clothing shop became a bake shop in 1940.  On November 22, the Kinderhook, New York Advertiser reported that Dr. Berta Hamilton and Mrs. Piri S. Stanton...have announced the opening of Brick School Tea House Workshop at 267 West 11th street, New York City, specializing in fine cakes, pastries and candies."

By 1949, the rear building had been renovated as a residence.  It was rented that year to artist Joan Mitchell and her partner Barney Rossett.  On September 23, 2021, poet Eileen Myles recalled her first visit.  "Turns out there's a tiny metal gate to the right of the building, itself full of grates and scrolls, and it leads to the single-story building behind 267 West 11th, where Joan and Barney actually wound up living."

Today the former Gwyer house is a two-family home.  The stone balustraded stoop railings and newels were replaced with metal versions prior to 1969, but the overall integrity of the residence is greatly intact.

photographs by the author

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The 1846 Payne House - 273 West 11th Street

 

Hammond Street was named for Elijah Hammond, whose 55-acre estate sat near Greenwich Village in the 18th century.  By 1840, the once sleepy hamlet had expanded into the Hammond property and prim brick-faced homes were being erected along its newly laid streets.

In 1845, Nathaniel Weed purchased the two vacant plots at 65 and 67 Hammond Street from George H. Swords.  The following year he completed construction of two three-and-a-half-story homes on the sites.  Identical to its neighbor, 65 Hammond (renamed and numbered 273 West 11th Street in 1865) was faced in red brick above a brownstone English basement.  While the entrances of most Greek Revival homes were designed with heavy pilasters and entablatures, the brownstone enframement here was unexpectedly airy.  Below the cornice were squat attic windows that replaced the dormers of the previous Federal style.

By the mid-1850s, 273 West 11th Street was home to the Payne family.  Theodore Payne was an importer, Thomas was in the express business, and Joseph was a clerk.  Young Edwin Payne would enter the straw goods business by 1860.

Despite the relatively large Payne population within the house, the family took in boarders.  In 1856 and '57 James J. Farrell, an accountant, boarded with the family.  The following year, educators Susan Wright and William W. Holder lived here.  Wright was vice principal of the Female Normal School, and Holder taught in the Boys' Department of School No. 3 on the corner of Hudson and Grove Streets.

An advertisement in the New York Herald on January 17, 1859 offered, "Board--Rooms, with full or partial [board], suitable for a small family or gentleman and wife, in a first class modern house, convenient to cars and stages."

One of the boarders who answered that ad suffered public humiliation a year later.  On February 4, 1860, the New-York Dispatch reported:

Charles M. Johnson of No. 65 Hammond street, on the night of the 30th of January, while in company with a girl named Louisa Powell, at a house of ill fame in Wooster street, was robbed of a gold watch worth $125.  The gold guard-chain having been severed by some sharp instrument.  Louisa was committed for examination.

The embarrassing incident reflected the affluence of the Paynes' boarder.  The value of his watch would translate to more than $4,700 in 2024.

Around 1863, attorney William H. Jelliffe and his wife Almira purchased the house.  While her husband carried on his legal practice, Almira ran a boarding house.  Her tenants continued to be white collar.  In 1864 they included James F. Dummer, who ran a paint business; Archer Martine, who was in the feed business; Henry M. Patterson, a flour merchant; Henry Reeve, who operated two coal yards; and Edward H. Stone, who listed himself an "officer" in a firm at 78 West Street.

Surprisingly, in March 1865 the Jelliffes had an unmarried woman, Constance B. Tallon, boarding here.  The risk that single women would bring scandal precluded most respectable boarding house proprietors from accepting them.  Tallon was a well-heeled young woman and apparently came with excellent references.  She brought with her a trunk that contained her valuables, including $12,000 in United States bonds (about a quarter of a million in today's dollars).

According to her testimony later, at 8:00 on the morning of March 25, "my attention was called to the fact, by some one, that my trunk was unlocked, and I then discovered that some of the bonds had been stolen; when I opened it and examined the contents, I found that $500 in bonds and $100 in money had been taken."  Despite a long investigation, the thief was never discovered.

Ten days before that incident, two boarders had received unsettling news.  On March 15, M. Becker and W. H. Teller were inducted into the Union Army when their names were pulled in the draft lottery.

Henry Reeve was still boarding here in 1868, along with George Cole, Henry Marsh (who made "limbs"), and Jonathan S. Bard, a pen merchant.  Cole suffered a horrific accident on August 29 that year.  The New York Times reported, "George Cole, of No. 273 West Eleventh-street, fell from the 12:30 P.M. train on the New Haven Railroad, on the corner of Fifty-ninth-street and Fourth-avenue."  Cole fell beneath the cars and was run over.  He was taken to St. Luke's Hospital.  Miraculously, his legs were not severed, although both were broken.

William Jelliffe died around 1875.  Almira continued operating the boarding house, her boarders still respectable and well-to-do.  

Henry F. Marsh was still here in 1878, by which time he had switched from producing artificial limbs to making "adjustable frames for drying lace curtains."  He ran the administrative portion of his business from his rooms here.

On November 24, 1884, The New York Times reported, "The inmates of the boarding house of Mrs. Almira B. Jelliffe, No. 273 West Eleventh-street, were roused from their comfortable beds and greatly alarmed by a fire which broke out from some unknown cause in the basement of the house at 2 o'clock yesterday morning."  Happily, although Almira and her boarders were forced into the chilly autumn air in their night clothes, firefighters quickly extinguished the rubbish fire in the basement pantry.  The article said the damage "will not exceed $50."

After having operated the boarding house for three decades, Almira B. Jelliffe died here on November 22, 1895.  

It continued on as a respectable boarding house, home to residents like Mrs. James Webb, a member of the Mary Arden Shakespeare Club.  She hosted a meeting of the group on January 29, 1904, the New York Herald saying, "Members of the club are making a critical study of 'Henry VI.'"

Boarder John H. Jackson's name had appeared in The New York Times a year earlier for a less auspicious reason.  The 18-year-old was a student at the College of the City of New York.   On the night of November 12, 1903, he attended the annual dinner of the Phi Kappa Tau fraternity as a pledge.  He and another potential member, Robert B. Mount, were taken to the areaway under the stoop of a vacant house at 23rd Street and Lexington Avenue.  The New York Times reported, "There, in the cold night air, they were compelled to disrobe and don women's attire.  Thus costumed, they were led out into Twenty-third Street, surrounded by the howling mob of students and forced to lead the procession, to the astonishment and amusement of passers-by."  

Less amused was Captain Gallagher of the East 22nd Street station house.  Jackson and Mount were arrested "on a charge of masquerading in women's clothing."  They were later dismissed "after a mild rebuke at their conduct" by Magistrate Hogan after he heard the details of the case, said the article.

In 1920, 273 West 11th Street was purchased by the Women's Home Mission Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church as the new home of the Immigrant Girls' Home.  It traced its beginnings to 1885, when Helen and James Mathews and their daughter Alma, rented a house in lower Manhattan to house naïve, single women disembarking from ships.  Their actions saved them from the unscrupulous men who preyed on new immigrants.

On February 14, 1921, the Yonkers Statesman reported, "The dedication services of the new Immigrant Girls' Home of the Woman's Home Missionary Society, will take place, Thursday, Feb. 17, at 2:30 o'clock, at the Home, 273 West 11th street, New York. The services will be in charge of the national officers of the Society, and will be followed by a social hour and refreshments."

At the time, Alma Mathews was still active in the cause.  A week after the dedication, a meeting of the Society of Michigan Daughters was held here, the discussion topic being "Emigration," according to the New York Herald.  The article said, "The discussion will be followed by a tea to Miss Mathews, missionary to Ellis Island."

Typical of the women given aid here was Russian actress Madame Pierre Achmathoff, who arrived in New York from Constantinople on the Braga on December 3, 1922.  She came to New York to work with the Moscow Art Theatre Company, and had sent her money ahead to a friend named Edelshty in Brooklyn.  When she arrived with "a number of trunks," according to The New York Times, but no money, she was detained as "likely to become a public charge."

The Methodist Immigrant Home retrieved her from detention, guaranteeing the actress (who arrived with "twenty pieces of baggage and furs," according to the New York Herald) would not become a ward of the city.

Around mid-century, the house was renamed the Alma Mathews House.  In 1953 it housed 22 residents.

In 1957 a portion of the house was converted to classrooms for the Children's Workroom.  An advertisement in The Villager in January 1976 offered "intimate kindergarten" for children three-and-a-half years old through five, and after school programs for students five through ten.  "Our specialty is individualized attention and learning," said the ad.

The Gingerbread School opened here in 1971 and would remain through 1980 when 273 West 11th Street was internally joined with 275.  In 1993 the combined houses were operated by Michael A. Burak, Inc.  Called the Alma Mathews House, it was described as a "hotel operated for clergy and religious officials visiting the U.N. and New York City."

Then, in 2013 real estate broker Dolly Lenz announced that celebrity couple Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick had purchased the combined homes for $35 million.  The announcement suggested they would renovate them as a 50-foot-wide, 13,900-square-foot residence.  It does not appear that ever happened.

photographs by the author

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The 1853 John P. Faure House - 238 West 11th Street

 

Linus Scudder was a well-known builder in Greenwich Village in the decades prior to the Civil War.  In 1852, he broke ground for two identical 20-foot-wide, brick-faced homes at 38 and 40 Hammond Street (renumbered 238 and 240 West 11th Street in 1864).  Three stories tall above brownstone English basements, they were completed in 1853.  Trimmed in brownstone, they were capped by wooden bracketed cornices, each of the closely-spaced corbels dripping an onion-shaped finial.

No. 38 Hammond Street was first home to Charles Griffith, a merchant at 61 Cedar Street.  He and his family lived here until about 1858, when broker Henry Pray was listed at the address.  He and his wife Abby had a teenaged daughter, Sophia.  

Sophia A. Pray died on May 1, 1862 two months before her 20th birthday.  Her funeral was held in the parlor three days later.

It was common for even affluent homeowners to take in a boarder.  L. Blanchard lived here on August 20, 1863 when The New York Times reported on the draft lottery held the previous morning at 10:00 to bolster the Union Army's troops.  At the headquarters at 185 Sixth Avenue, crowds had gathered to witness the pulling of the names from "the wheel of destiny," the article saying they "tremble while they hear."  Among the names drawn that day was L. Blanchard's.

The Faure family purchased 238 West 11th Street around 1869.  Born in 1814, John R. Faure was a partner in the dry goods commission business of Faure & McCash and a director in the Excelsior Fire Insurance Co.  Sharing the house with him and his wife Catherine were their adult son John P. Faure and his wife, the former Lucie J. Halpin.  John P. was a wool merchant, specializing in hosiery.  (Interestingly, Lucie Halpin was an author during the Civil War years, writing under the pseudonym of Miles O'Reilly.)

Like their predecessors in the house, the Faures took in a boarder.  In 1870, for instance, it was Elie Bonin, an attorney, and in 1879 William V. Smith, a surveyor, lived with the family.

John R. Faure died on April 6, 1874 at the age of 60.  He was buried at St. Peter's Stone Church Cemetery in Dutchess County.

By the 1890s, Catherine's widowed cousin, William L. Elseffer lived with the family.  His wife, Amanda Shaw, had been "a writer of considerable abilities," according to the 1895 History of Dutchess County.  Elseffer had "attained considerable celebrity as a civil engineer," said The New York Times.  He worked on the development of Central Park, engineered the drainage of the salt meadows between Jersey City and Newark, and in 1887 issued a report to the United States Senate on the Pacific railways.  Elseffer died at the age of 71 on January 2, 1898.  His funeral was held in the house two days later.

The following year, on October 20, 1899, Catherine A. Faure died at the age of 85.  She was buried next to her husband at St. Peter's Stone Church Cemetery in Dutchess County.

By the time of his mother's death, John P. Faure had turned his professional attention from hosiery to civic matters.  He had been appointed a Trustee of the Common Schools of the Ninth Ward on December 19, 1888, and in 1894 was appointed secretary of the influential Committee of Seventy.

The committee was organized in September that year as a response to public dissatisfaction with political corruption, notably in Tammany Hall.  Among its stated principles were that "municipal government should be entirely divorced from party politics and from selfish personal ambition or gain," and "the economical, honest, and businesslike management of municipal affairs has nothing to do with questions of national or State politics."

When reform Mayor William Lafayette Strong took office in 1895, he appointed Faure Commissioner of Charities.  By 1897, Faure was secretary of the St. John's Guild, which provided medical treatment to the children of New York's poor.  The group maintained a Floating Hospital and Faure was chairman of its governing committee.  And when the Spanish-American War erupted in 1898, he became highly involved in Red Cross work.

On July 7, 1898, The New York Times reported, "The Floating Hospital of St. John's Guild yesterday made its first excursion of the season down the North River and bay to the Seaside Hospital of the Guild, with 440 mothers and sick babies and children aboard."  The article said, "Nearly a hundred women, carrying sickly infants in their arms, had already been waiting over half an hour on the pier, so as not to miss the chance of giving their dear ones an opportunity to have a day's outing on the water."  Also on board that day were John P. Faure, who "appeared in a delightfully cool-looking yachting suit, and was accompanied by Mrs. Faure."

The esteem in which the public held John P. Faure was reflected in a letter to the editor of The New York Times on September 1, 1901.  Signed "Conservative Republican," it read:

Allow me to call your attention, for Mayor of Greater New York, to Mr. John P. Faure, former Commissioner of Charities and member of the School Board, a philanthropist, by whose extraordinary efforts 40,000 poor women and children, through St. John's Guild, have been permitted to get fresh air and be restored to health.  Doubtless hundreds of lives have been saved by his humane, but unselfish, devotions to their welfare.

Like all well-heeled New Yorkers, the Faures summered outside of the city.  They spent the summer of 1902 at the fashionable Peninsula Hotel at Seabright, New Jersey.  On August 16, the hotel hosted a "progressive euchre" in the dining hall.  "The spacious hall was cleared and decorated for the occasion, and presented a scene of beauty.  Mirth and jollity reigned supreme," said the New-York Tribune.  Although Lucie Faure did not win the first prize of a cut glass and silver cracker jar, she was awarded a parasol.

In 1904, the Faures acquired a summer home in Ossining, New York.  They were there in 1912 when John headed to Manhattan for business on the morning of June 19.  The next day, The Sun began an article saying, "John P. Faure, Commissioner of Charities under Mayor Strong, dropped dead of heart failure on the station platform at Ossining yesterday.  The unexpected passing of an express train had startled him.  He was 67 years old."

It does not appear that Lucie returned to West 11th Street.  In 1914 the house was occupied by Harry X. Stinson and his wife.  Like John P. Faure, Mrs. Stinson was interested in reform issues and was corresponding secretary of the International Pure Milk League, which lobbied to have inspections of dairy farms and cattle every six months.

Lucie Halpin Faure sold 238 West 11th Street to Charles W. Knight in March 1920.  The Real Estate Record & Guide reported he "will alter [it] into high class studio apartments."  Knight apparently changed his mind, and on July 20, 1921 the New-York Tribune reported he had sold it, saying, "the house will be renovated by the new owner."

Those renovations did not come for another six years.  A fourth floor with a vast, sloping skylight was added, the third floor windows were extended, and a charming multi-paned window was installed at the parlor level.  Among the tenants living here by 1936 was Hila C. Meadow, whom Congress's Special Committee of Un-American Activities tracked through 1940 as voting for the Communist Party ticket.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

In 1987 the house was renovated again, resulting in a duplex apartment in the basement and parlor floors, one apartment on the second, and a duplex on the third and fourth.  Among the residents was Brazilian-born handbag and accessories designer Carlos Falchi.  Born on September 26, 1944, he began his business in Greenwich Village.  Having once worked as a busboy at a Park Avenue South restaurant and nightclub, his high end bags would eventually sell for as much as $5,000.

Falchi sold his unit in 2013.  The purchasers bought the other two apartments in 2021 and 2023, and are currently returning 238 West 11th Street to a single-family home.

many thanks to reader Scott McDowell for requesting this post

photographs by the author

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