Emery Roth's 1909 The Whitestone - 45 Tiemann Place

 

photograph by Anthony Bellov

Following the death of former Mayor Daniel F. Tiemann in 1899, his widow, the former Martha Clowes, continued to live in their free-standing home at 607 West 127th Street.  Martha was born in 1807 and The New York Times said that she "retained her faculties in spite of her age."  She died in the house at the age of 97 on October 2, 1904.

Five years later, the newly organized Charter Construction Co. purchased the Tiemann property and hired Emery Roth to design an apartment building on the site.  The 34-year-old, Hungarian-born architect produced a show-stopper.  Completed at a cost of $185,000 (just over $6.5 million in 2026), its style has been called "Classical Revival."  In fact, Roth started with a blank Renaissance Revival canvas and adorned it with liberal splashes of Arts & Crafts and Vienna Secession.  

Roth anchored his tripartite design by cladding the one-story base in beige brick and the upper sections in brownish red brick.  A stylized Greek key band of terra cotta framed the entrance and ran below the second floor.  Green tiles of magnolia leaves--their branches alternating left and right--filled the spaces.  A Vienna Secession panel above the doorway announced the address.  

photograph by Anthony Bellov

The windows of the second floor were connected by a colorful terra cotta belt course with diamond panels, and they wore striking terra cotta lintels and cornices.  The diamond motif was repeated under the intermediate cornice above the fifth floor and again above the sixth-floor windows.  A deeply overhanging copper cornice with Vienna Secession arches and rondels completed the design.

photograph by Anthony Bellov

Offering apartments of two or three rooms, the Whitestone filled with professional and erudite tenants.  Among the earliest were Betty McDonald Bigelow, a 1909 graduate of Vassar, and Claude Stuart Hammond, a part owner of Teachers Magazine.

In 1920, the two-block long West 127th Street was renamed Tiemann Place, in honor of its esteemed former resident.  The Whitestone received the new address of 45 Tiemann Place.

Living here at the time was the enterprising W. H. Katz.  On July 25, 1921, he incorporated the Sound Tire Service, Inc. 

As early as 1924, attorney Nelson Jarvis Waterbury Jr. and his widowed sister, Elizabeth Jarvis Waterbury Streeter, occupied an apartment.  The siblings were the only occupants that year to appear in the Social Register of New York.  

Nelson and Elizabeth had grown up in a mansion at 13 West 56th Street in what was known as Millionaires' Row.  Their father, Nelson Jarvis Waterbury Sr., was County District Attorney from 1859 to 1861 and was Grand Sachem of Tammany Hall and Judge Advocate General of the State Militia.

Nelson Waterbury Jr. received his law degree from Columbia College in 1882.  Born in 1848, Elizabeth was the widow of William Henry Streeter, who died in 1902.  She died on January 28, 1925, her obituary noting, "Funeral private from her late residence, 'The Whitestone,' 45 Tiemann Place."

The building had attracted artistic figures by then.  Among the residents was composer and arranger Julius E. Andino.  Born in Puerto Rico, he came to the United States in 1894.  First working as a piano accompanist at the Grand Italian Conservatory of Music in Brooklyn, he eventually found his way to Tin Pan Alley, working anonymously for several leading songwriters.  In 1912 he founded the Musician's Music Publishing Co. and shortly afterward began writing scores for silent pictures.  His Schirmer's Photo-play Series was published in 1915.  While living here, he advertised his services under the nickname "Andy."

The Billboard, September 17, 1927 (copyright expired)

Andino was assuredly well-acquainted with a neighbor in the building, Laura Sedgwick Collins.  A musician, composer and actress, she was born in Poughkeepsie in 1859.  Among her compositions was a march, "The Two Republics," which was performed at the unveiling of The Statue of Liberty.

Laura Sedgwick Collins, A Woman of the Century, 1893 (copyright expired)

Also living here at the time were author and painter Harold Speakman and his wife, the former Russell Lindsay.  Born in Greenville, New Jersey on November 30, 1888, Speakman studied at the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts and in Paris and Munich.  

His far-flung resume was staggering.  He served on the front in Italy in World War I, and made a "thousand-mile journey on foot around Ireland" in 1924, according to Who's Who in America, which added that he "descended the Mississippi River from headwaters to Gulf by canoe and houseboat" in 1926-1927.  Among his books were Songs of Home and The Youngest Shepherd, both published in 1917; the 1919 From a Soldier's Heart; Beyond Shanghai, published in 1922; and Hilltops in Galilee, This Above All, and Here's Ireland, published in 1922, 1923, and 1925 respectively.

Russell Speakman was an artist as well.  She often collaborated with her husband in illustrating his articles and accompanied him on his adventures.  In 1928, for instance, they journeyed to India.

Upon their return, in August 1928, Harold Speakman was "operated on in Milwaukee for an internal trouble," according to The New York Times.  Six weeks later, at around 5:30 on the afternoon on September 24, he entered a cab and told the driver to take him to Bellevue Hospital.  Frank McGlynn would later recall that Speakman told him he was going to meet "a man riding a white horse."

At the hospital, Speakman paid McGlynn his 70 cent fare, walked a few paces toward the entrance, "drew a pistol and fired once."  The 39-year-old had shot himself in the temple.  The New York Times reported, "He died without regaining consciousness."  In his coat pocket was a grim note addressed "To Whom It May Concern."  

Get the police, ambulance and take me to where bodies belong.  You will receive further instructions later as to what to do with me.

photograph by Anthony Bellov

Dr. Walter Charles and Ruth Crucet Strodt were occupants of The Whitestone at the time of the tragedy.  The couple were members of the American Mathematical Society, and Dr. Strodt was an instructor of math at Columbia University.  He would write technical books like Principal Solutions of Ordinary Differential Equations in the Complex Domain.  

Born in Norfolk, Virginia on March 2, 1917, Ruth was a 1937 Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Barnard College and had been an assistant professor of mathematics at St. Lawrence University. 

Among their neighbors in the building was Helena M. Dickinson, who also had a mathematical bent.  She was a member of the American Statistical Association as early as 1928.

Other residents in the late 1920s and early 1930s were Dr. Edward Oliver Salant and Priscilla M. Rhodehamel.  Dr. Salant earned his Ph.D. in London and was a National Research fellow in physics at New York University.  Rhodehamel graduated from the Syracuse School of Library Science in 1931.  She started work in the Administration Office of the New York Public Library in 1936.

With war ranging in Europe, Roswell D. McClelland and his wife, the former Marjorie Miles, left the comforts of The Whitestone.  The couple were married in 1938.  McClelland (known to his friends as Ross) had degrees from Duke and Columbia Universities; and Marjorie graduated from Stanford and did graduate work in child psychology at the University of Cincinnati and Yale.  

On August 1, 1940, The New York Times reported that they had boarded the Pan American Airways Yankee Clipper from "the marine base at La Guardia Field" the previous day.  The article said the couple "will take charge of the Rome office of the American Friends Service Committee."  It added, "The McClellands said they hoped to study conditions in refugee camps in Spain and Southern France."  

This photo of the McClellands was taken in 1940, the year they left The Whitestone.  from the collection of the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.

The McClellands would not return to The Whitestone.  The American Friends Service Committee ceased operation in 1941 when the United States closed its borders to refugees.  The couple was disconsolate.  They wrote home in July that year:

We comfort ourselves by thinking of the 108 people that we have helped to emigrate since we set up shop in October, but we wish that the number could have been larger.

Rather than return home, the McClellands relocated to Marseilles where Ross worked to rescue prisoners in internment camps and Marjorie helped to get children from the camps and from Jewish  homes for a 1942 rescue transport to the United States.

They then moved to Geneva, and when President Franklin D. Roosevelt created the War Refugee Board in 1944, he placed Ross as his Presidential Representative.  Marjorie ran the AFSC office there.  After the war (during which the McClellands' two sons were born), Ross was made a U.S. Foreign Service officer and later the United States ambassador to Niger.

Living in a fifth-floor apartment at 45 Tiemann Place in 1983 were 20-year-old Robert McKnight, who was unemployed, and his mother.  In November that year, Robert was arrested in the subway "on charges of possessing cocaine and brass knuckles," according to the Staten Island Advance.

Two months later, at around 7:30 on the night of January 27, 1984, Robert McKnight climbed to the roof of 45 Tiemann Place and waited in ambush.  When 34-year-old police officer Dennis Brennan came down the street in a three-wheeled scooter, McKnight fired.  The Staten Island Advance reported that the bullet, "crashed through the windshield and into his chest."  Brennan, amazingly, survived after an eight-hour long operation at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center. 

McKnight was taken from 45 Tiemann Place in handcuffs.  Associated Press Laserphoto, Staten Island Advance, January 30, 1984

Robert McKnight was arrested in the hallway of 45 Tiemann Place at 8:30 in the morning on January 29.  Police could not give a motive for the crime.  McKnight was charged with attempted murder of a police officer.

photograph by Anthony Bellov

An early example of Emery Roth's apartment building designs and one of its most striking, The Whitestone does not get the adulation it deserves.  While remarkably intact on the exterior, its lack of landmark designation makes it vulnerable to desecration.  

many thanks to historian Anthony Bellov for suggesting this post

The Max and Julia G. Wolff House - 26 West 87th Street

 

In May 1891, real estate developer James A. Frame purchased five lots on the south side of West 87th Street between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue.  The upscale rowhouses that Frame erected on the site were designed by the architectural firm of Thom & Wilson.  Like the others, the easternmost house, 26 West 87th Street, was four stories tall and faced in brownstone.  A doglegged box stoop led to the rusticated parlor level, above which a rounded bay dominated the second floor.  The stacked openings of the third and fourth floors were separated by a molded cornice and spandrel panels decorated with carved swags.  Fluted pilasters framed the third floor openings, and graceful swan's neck pediments with swags capped those of the fourth.

The residence became home to Max and Julia G. Wolff.  Born in Aldorf, Germany in April 1852, Wolff founded the Palace Ribbon Manufacturing Company in 1889.  His wife, the former Julie Stern Gutman, was born in Brooklyn in September 1870.  Three children would be born in the house: Irving Gutman, in 1894; Helen Rose in 1896; and Lawrence (known as Pete), in 1902.

Max and Julia Wolff later in life (original sources unknown)

The offices of the Palace Ribbon Manufacturing Company were located at 62 Greene Street, while the mills were in South Allentown, Pennsylvania.  On January 18, 1899, Wolff traveled to the mills, where the foreman, Maurice Zinderstein, had recently been fired.  At the end of the day, around 5:30, Wolff left the office to take a cab to the train station.  As he descended the stairs, he confronted Zinderstein who was brandishing a revolver.

Wolff rushed back up the stairs, but the office door had locked behind him.  As he struggled with the knob, Zinderstein fired.  The Paterson Evening News reported, "Those in the office, hearing the shots, ran out and picked up Wolff and carried him into the building."  The article said that the 61-year-old Zinderstein, "is said to have been drunk at the time."  One of the bullets had missed, but two struck Wolff, one in the back and the other in the thigh.  He was taken by train to St. Luke's Hospital in South Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.  "It was believed there that he had a chance of recovery," said the article.

Back home on West 87th Street, Julia received the terrifying news.  The New-York Tribune reported, "his wife hurried out to South Bethlehem."  Saying that Max Wolff "is well known in the drygoods world here," the article described his injuries as "dangerous, if not fatal."  (Zinderstein, in the meantime, was arrested for attempted murder.)

Max Wolff recovered from the assassination attempt.  In 1915, the family took in a boarder, Dr. George Birmingham McAuliffe and his children.  Born in 1865, McAuliffe's wife, Margaret Gervais, had died the previous year.  He had four children, Felix Vincent, who was 22; George G., who was 21; 19-year-old Gervais Ward; and Aubrey, who was 15.

With tensions worsening in Europe, in 1916 Irving Wolff joined the Army and was sent to the Plattsburg Military Training Camp. 

The house was the scene of Helen Rose Wolff's marriage to Leo Samuel Frenkel on November 24, 1920.  The New-York Tribune reported that the newlyweds would live in the city after "a short honeymoon in the South."

Six months later, on May 22, 1921, the New-York Tribune reported that the Wolffs had sold 26 West 87th Street "to a physician."  That physician was their long-term boarder, Dr. George Birmingham McAuliffe.  He was a clinical instructor of otology at the Cornell University Medical School.  The family's summer home was in Sag Harbor, Long Island.

On November 6, 1922, the New York Herald reported on the engagement of McAuliffe to Marguerite Laux.  The couple would have two children together, Marguerite Georgette, born in 1924, and George Jr., born on March 30, 1926.

Like their neighbors along the block, the McAuliffes maintained a domestic staff, as well as George McAuliffe's trained nurse, Helen Martin (known to her friends as Blossom).  Although she was engaged to be married, Helen caught the eye of the family's butler, Philippine-born Eulogia Lazado, who was hired in 1922.  His romantic advances were not welcomed.

At one point, Helen's rebuffing of his attentions infuriated Eulogia.  Helen's close friend, Mary Harrington, later recounted, "the ringing of a telephone bell probably saved the life of the nurse" when Lazado choked her.  Helen told the incident to Dr. McAuliffe and said she was going to resign.  "She stayed, however, on being assured the butler would not molest her again," reported the Times Union.

On June 8, 1923, Lazado told Helen that he had purchased a $300 diamond ring for her.  According to Lazado later, Helen replied, "Well, I have another man who is worth a lot more than you and will shoot you if you bother me any more."

In a rage, the butler strangled Helen to death.  He pulled down a drapery from the window in his room and--with her knees pulled up to her torso--wrapped her body first in the drapery and then in brown paper and tied the bundle with cord.

Lazado managed to get the package to the Staten Island Ferry with the intention of dumping it into the harbor.  The New York Times reported that he "did not do so because passengers were watching."  On the Staten Island side, he took a taxicab to the Elizabethport Ferry.  The cabbie, Edward Mareuer, helped him carry the bundle to the boat.  Mareurer (not surprisingly) became suspicious and notified Police Sergeant John Miller on the pier just as the ferry began to pull out.

Miller shouted to passengers to stop Lazado from trying to throw the bundle off the boat.  Two deckhands and a passenger seized him and the ferry reversed course back to the slip.  The New York Times reported, "Lazardo, meanwhile, had put up a spirited fight and nearly managed to throw the bundle overboard before he was felled by the fist of one of the ferry's crew."

Sergeant Miller took Lazado and the bundle into the ferry house where Miller began to inspect the package.  "The first thing he uncovered after tearing through a wrapping of heavy manila paper tied with clothesline was the head of a young woman," said the article.  Later, Lazado confessed "that he had strangled the girl in a quarrel over his intended gift of a diamond ring," reported The New York Times.

Five months later, after a sensational trial, on November 19, 1923 The New York Times reported that Lazado was sentenced "to die in the electric chair at Sing Sing."

The carved swags of the top floor pediments were intact in 1941.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Marguerite's engagement to John Egan O'Reilly was announced on April 1, 1946.  Her brother, George, Jr., was with the U.S. Army in Japan at the time, rebuilding the country under General Douglas MacArthur.  

Dr. George Birmingham McAuliffe died on October 1, 1954 at the age of 90.  Marguerite sold the house to Leon Tshernoff, who converted it to apartments, two per floor.

Among the earliest tenants was Eleanora Fagan, who moved in on June 21, 1958.  According to Paul Alexander in his Bitter Crop, "it was only after the landlord, Dr. Leon Tshernoff, a physician originally from Palestine, agreed to grant her a three-year lease at a rent of $135 a month that he learned his tenant was Billie Holiday."  Alexander writes that she shared apartment 1B "with her constant companion, a Chihuahua she adored named Pepe."  Although Holiday's husband, Louis McKay, was listed on the lease, he had moved to California.

Billie Holiday, from the collection of the New York Public Library

On July 18, 1959, The New York Times reported, "Billie Holiday, famed jazz singer, died yesterday in Metropolitan Hospital...Miss Holiday had lived at 26 West Eighty-seventh Street.  She had been under arrest in her hospital bed since June 12 for illegal possession of narcotics."  It was the ignominious end to a brilliant career that greatly changed the course of jazz music.

The upper portion of the house returned to a single family home in 2015, with an apartment in the basement.  It was listed for sale that year as $12.95 million.

photographs by the author

The 1852 Isaac D. Brodek House - 333 East 18th Street

 

photograph by Ted Leather

In 1851 construction began on a long row of three-story-and-basement homes along the north side of East 18th Street between First and Second Avenues.  Completed the following year, their Italianate design included arched, double-doored entrances.  Delicate leafy carving filled their spandrels, flanked by scrolled, foliate brackets upholding dentiled cornices.  Similar brackets upheld the cast metal terminal cornices.

Among the nearly identical homes was 212 East 18th Street (renumbered 333 in 1865).  Its initial owners remained only five years, advertising the house in the New York Morning Courier on March 19, 1856:  "For Sale--The three story and basement brick front house No. 212 East Eighteenth street.  Completely modern.  Price $9000.  Possession first of May."  (The asking price would translate to about $343,000 in 2025.)

The ad was answered by Isaac D. Brodek and his wife Hannah.  Born in 1812, Brodek was in the cap business at 125 Maiden Lane with Joseph Aden.  Even financially comfortable families rented unused rooms.  In 1860, for instance, the Brodeks leased rooms on the third floor to Joseph W. Chadwick, a clerk; and John Meehan, who was a contractor.

In April 1861, the Brodeks advertised, "To Let--from the first of May, third floor of the modern built house 212 East Eighteenth street, at a reasonable rate, to a small family of adults."

The "small family of adults" who moved in was Brodek's partner, Joseph Aden, and his wife, Rosetta.  The amiable situation would extend for decades.  The men changed their trade from caps to "trimmings" (accessories like bows, linings, and feathers used by milliners and apparel makers) around the time the Adens moved in.  They would eventually open a fur business, I. D. Brodek & Co., at 5 Howard Street.  

The four adults would have had at least one servant.  Despite what must have been snug conditions, they were joined by the Lande family around 1865.  The couple had two children, Rebecca and Solomon.  Sadly, 9-year-old Rebecca Lande died here on September 4, 1866.  The New York Herald noted that the funeral would be held at 9:00 a.m. two days later "from the residence of J. [sic] D. Brodek." 

The Landes would continue to rent rooms at least through 1869, the year that Solomon Lande entered the College of the City of New York.  

It is unclear if either Brodek or Aden was involved in music, but the 1880 A Dictionary of Music and Musicians noted that the "large and comprehensive library" of the Philharmonic Society of New York, "is kept at No. 333 East 18th Street."  The tome would repeat the fact until its 1894 edition.

In the meantime, Isaac D. Brodek died on January 5, 1885.  His will shocked many, including his extended relatives.  The New York World reported, "Brodek devised his personal estate...to his wife's sister-in-law, Mrs. Rebecca Boxsius."  On April 2, 1889, the newspaper reported that the will "is being contested by a score or more of his nieces and nephews."

Interestingly, Brodek bequeathed the East 18th Street house to Rosetta Aden.  On, March 16, 1887, the same day that the title was transferred, she re-transferred it to Hannah Brodek.

The Italianate-style stoop railings survive.  Typical of the period, the entrance to the English basement was tucked into the stoop.  S-shaped "shutter dogs" at the lower side of the basement and parlor windows seen here once kept shutters firmly opened in place.

Hannah sold 333 East 18th Street to Thomas K. Foster within the year.  In 1888 it was operated as a boarding house.  Among the residents were Charles W. White, a contractor; engineer John Hewitt; Maggie A. Duffy, a teacher in the primary department of Grammar School No. 77 on First Avenue between 84th and 85th Streets; and Dr. S. H. Vehslage.  Veshlage became involved with a heart breaking case in 1889 when he was called to the home of Henry Hashagen at 220 Avenue A.  Hashagen's young daughter had been bitten by a dog that summer.  Two previous physicians had not recognized the symptoms of hydrophobia and by the time Veshlage was called in, the disease was too advanced to help her.

In 1891, Foster sold 333 East 18th Street to Dr. Serr and his wife, Elise.  They continued to take in a few boarders, including Charles J. Collins and his mother, Ellen, here by 1896.  The unmarried Collins worked for the city as a clerk in the Department of Docks.  In 1896, he earned $1,200 a year, and the following year his salary was raised to $1,500 (about $57,800 today).

Dr. Serr died around 1900 and the following year Elise Serr sold 333 East 18th Street to George Albert Zabriskie.  Born in 1868, George was unmarried.  Moving into the house with him were his parents--John Albert Zabriskie and Martha Lyon Knox Zabriskie--and George's paternal grandmother, Patience Morgan Zabriskie and maternal grandfather, George Knox.  Interestingly, Ellen and Charles Collins remained as boarders with the new owners.

Born in Ireland in 1815, George Knox came to New York City in 1851.  He founded a wholesale wrapping paper business on Fulton Street.  In the summer of 1860, as he was walking past a construction site at Ninth Avenue and 26th Street, a heavy cornice fell on him.  The New York Times reported, "His neck was broken and his skull fractured.  Dr. Bumstead, who attended him, declared that he could not live more than twenty-four hours."  Bumstead visited his room in St. Luke's Hospital a week later and found that Knox was not only still living, "but gaining strength."  Two additional physicians were brought in.  "None of them could explain how it was possible for Knox to live with a broken neck," said the article.

George Knox was a patient of St. Luke's Hospital for two years, and after his discharge he returned to his wrapping business.  He would suffer another life-altering accident a few years later.  The New York Times reported, "While in St. Louis, he met with an accident which resulted in the forming of a cataract in his left eye.  On account of his neck, the physicians did not dare to operate, and he lost his sight in that eye."

Patience Morgan Zabriskie, the widow of Captain John B. Zabriskie, died in the house on November 29, 1905 at the age of 88.  Her funeral was held in the parlor two days later.  Another funeral would be held there the following year.  George Knox died on June 28, 1906 at the age of 91.  The funeral was held on the 30th.

By then, Charles J. Collins, still unmarried, had risen to secretary of the Department of Docks.  He and Ellen still boarded here.  On October 25, 1909, Charles got a shave in Louis de Kisi's barbershop at 336 Third Avenue.  As he started to leave, according to the New York Herald, "he complained of feeling ill."  De Kisi sat him in a chair and sent someone for a doctor.  He died before help could arrive.  The New York Times said, "Death is believed to have been due to heart disease."

The parlor would be the setting of two more Zabriskie funerals.  John Albert died on February 4, 1915 at the age of 68, and Martha L. Zabriskie died at the age of 88 on January 17, 1927.  Never married, George Albert Zabriskie moved to Ormond Beach, Florida where he would die in 1954 at the age of 85.

The residence quickly became a rooming house, with Berta Gladstone's Nursery School in the basement level.  Her advertisement in The Daily Worker on November 19, 1932 described, "Children of ages four to six now being enrolled in the Kindergarten of our nursery school," adding, "adequate schooling and ideal all day care."

In April 1931, 18-year-old Mae Martin left her home in Providence, Rhode Island for New York City where she intended to become a "dance hall hostess," according to The New York Times.  She took a furnished room here and, when she was unsuccessful in finding a job, she partnered with two men, Henry Kerber, a diamond setter, and Emery A. Bishop, a wagon driver, in a much different venture.  Three weeks after moving into 333 East 18th Street, The New York Times reported that their arrest "led to the clearing up of fifteen restaurant hold-ups."

Alice Mendow, who occupied a room here the following year, also found herself behind bars.  A member of the Communist Party, the 21-year-old attended a protest meeting at Second Avenue and 12th Street on October 14, 1932.  The New York Times reported it, "developed into a free-for-all," saying "fifty policemen, swinging fists and clubs, tried to disperse a mob of 500 angry 'Reds.'"  Among those arrested was Alice Mendow.

In a summer day in 1941, the exterior parlor shutters were closed and canvas awnings shielded the sun.  The original areaway ironwork, which matched the stoop railings, was intact.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Author and editor Geza Garrison Gaspar lived here as early as 1950.  Born in Hungary in 1887, he arrived in the United States in 1920.  While living here he was the editor of a Hungarian-American newspaper Amerikai Magyar Nepazava, and in 1950 published Science, Conscience and God.

Owner Nicklaus Mohr sold 333 East 18th Street (described as a "three-story rooming house" by The New York Times) in June 1965 to Crosby Wells.  The newspaper said he, "plans two duplex apartments, one of which he will occupy."  Instead, the renovation resulted in a duplex in the basement and parlor level, and one apartment each on the second and third floors.

In 1975, resident Andre Dodi opened a cooking class in his apartment.  Dodi trained at the Cordon Bleu in Paris and at Le Pavillon under Henri Soule.  Before opening his class here, he was the private chef to the Uzielli family here in New York City.

The New York Times described his four-class course in 1975 as emphasizing, "practicality and short cuts to classic cooking in Northern Italian and French cuisines."  The course cost $60 and "includes meals and wines," said the article.

Two years later, on September 14, 1977, The Times food critic Mimi Sheraton commented that Chef Dodi, "is more of a showman than a precise teacher and often shows impatience with students' questions." 

photograph by Ted Leather

Crosby Wells owned and occupied 333 East 18th Street at least through the mid-1980s.  A renovation completed in 2002 returned it to a single-family home.  At some point the brick facade was painted and the Italianate areaway ironwork replaced with a commendable attempt at period accuracy.

many thanks to reader Ted Leather for suggesting this post

The Frederick Wm. Saltzsieder Mansion - 324 West 108th Street

 

photograph by the author

On November 5, 1898, the Real Estate Record & Guide titled an article, "Joseph A. Farley's New and Artistic Dwellings."  Farley had just completed three upscale homes on the south side of West 108th Street between Riverside and West End Avenues.  Designed by Janes & Leo, their rusticated Indiana limestone bases supported four floors of gray Roman brick.  Although the article said they were, "in modern French style," the houses would be described as Renaissance Revival in style today.

No. 324 West 108th Street was an "A" model of the A-B-A configuration.  A three-sided bay at the second and third floors provided "an excellent view of the river," said the article.  

Real Estate Record & Guide, November 5, 1898 (copyright expired)

The mahogany inner door of its white-enameled "Colonial vestibule" was flanked by sidelights and topped with a leaded fanlight.  Guests next entered a hall with seven-foot high wainscoting with a plate or stein shelf along the top.  "The hall has a parquet floor, a large fireplace and mantel surmounted by a stepped hood, and supplemented by deep fire-seats on either side," said the article.  The hall led to a "gallery" in the rear "with fluted Ionic columns supporting the ceiling."

In the far rear of the ground floor were a "bicycle room with excellent light" outfitted with a sink; the kitchen and the laundry (accessed by a separate service entrance).  "Back stairs extend from the laundry to the fourth floor, and a dumb-waiter connects the kitchen with the floors above," said the article.

On the second floor, or piano nobile, were the drawing room, the "foyer," the dining room, and butler's pantry.  The Record & Guide described:

The drawing room is in white mahogany and gold, and contains a large Colonial mantelpiece and fireplace.  A high base runs around the room, and full length French windows allow egress to a balcony in the front, which commands an excellent view of the Drive [i.e. Riverside Drive] and river.

The dining room was "English Gothic in design" and paneled with seven-foot high quartered oak wainscoting.  The mantel above the fireplace was supported by Gothic style columns, their capitals carved with lions' heads.  Leaded windows overlooked the rear garden.

The third floor held the "handsome library" in the front.  It was separated from a bedroom by a "salon passage" that held "four large hanging closets, one washstand with closets and drawers and a large cheval glass."  Off the bedroom was a bathroom with a marble mosaic floor.  The floor above contained bedrooms and a bathroom, as well as three small servants' rooms and a servants' bathroom.  A stained glass skylight lit the main staircase.  The article noted, "The houses are wired for electric light and piped for gas."

Joseph A. Farley titled an advertisement for 324 West 108th Street in The Evening Post on February 4, 1899, "One Left of The Best-Planned Houses in New York City For Sale."  The ad noted that the street was "restricted to wide private dwellings."  It caught the attention of Frederick William Saltzsieder and a month later, on March 5, The New York Journal reported that he had purchased the mansion for $41,000 (about $1.6 million in 2025 terms).

A brewer, Saltzsieder was a director of the Consumers Brewing Co., the Hudson Trust Co., and William E. Seitz & Co.  He had married Marie Schneider a year earlier, on May 26, 1898.  It was the second marriage for both, their previous spouses were deceased.  Saltzsieder came into the marriage with three sons, Frederick W., Walter H., and Herbert G.  Marie had a daughter and son, Hedwig Ottilia and Otto Herbert.  Marie was pregnant when they moved into the West 108th Street house, and a daughter, Irma, was born on May 10, 1899.

The affluence of the family was reflected in Otto Schneider's registering his new automobile--a Chalmers 30--in September 1910.  The price would equal about $51,000 today.

Otto Herbert Schneider purchased a Chalmers like this in 1910.  (copyright expired)

    

Hedwig's engagement to Joseph E. Ridder that year caused excitement among the German community.  The prospective groom was the son of Herman Ridder, publisher of the German language newspaper Staats-Zeitung.  On February 4, 1911, The New York Times reported that the plans for the marriage "are now completed" and the date was set for February 11.  The article mentioned that Hedwig was "being entertained extensively."

The wedding was celebrated at the Church of the Blessed Sacrament at Broadway and 71st Street.  The New York Times reported, "There were about 500 people at the wedding ceremony, and about 300 attended the reception which followed at the Plaza." 

Frederick W. Saltzsieder died on March 13, 1913 at the age of 64.  He left $25,000 to Marie (about $817,000 today) and the remainder of his substantial estate to his four children--ignoring Marie's children, Hedwig and Otto.  The slight resulted in a lawsuit.

While the upheaval played out, Marie leased 324 West 108th Street in September to Frederick E. Montgomery.  He was still occupying the house in the spring of 1917 when he enlisted in U.S. Army to fight in World War I.  With her tenant gone, Marie sold the house in May to Thomas Lancaster for $24,500. 

Thomas Lancaster and his wife, the former Ruth Jacques, had two sons, Thomas Jacques and Horace Mayhew.  The younger Thomas attended Columbia University.  Upon graduation, he moved to St. Petersburg, Florida, where he married Eleanor Helena Nelson on September 14, 1926.  At the time, his brother was attending Trinity College.  Horace graduated in 1929 and began a law career in the office of Thomas F. Keogh.

In 1941, the Lancasters converted their home to apartments, retaining one for their own use.  Horace, now 35, was still unmarried and living with them.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor that year, America entered World War II.  Five months later, in May 1942, Horace joined the U.S. Army Air Corps and was assigned to Mitchel Field on Long Island.  The following month, he was given a furlough and visited his parents.  On June 23, The New York Times reported, "First Lieutenant H. Mayhew Lancaster of the Army Air Forces...was found dead yesterday morning in the gas-filled kitchen of the apartment in which he lived with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Lancaster, at 324 West 108th Street.  He was 36 years old."

Suicide among society families was scandalous, and preposterous explanations were often concocted.  Thomas Jacques Lancaster told reporters, "he believed the officer had gone to the kitchen, which adjoined his bedroom, on Sunday night, and that his bathrobe sleeve had caught against the stove, turning on the gas."  He assumed that Horace did not notice the escaping gas, "until awakened by an alarm clock this morning and that he had gone into the kitchen to turn off the gas and had collapsed there before he could do so."

In 1950, the mansion was converted to Windham House, the "national training center for women workers" of St. George's Protestant Episcopal Church on Stuyvesant Square.  The organization remained here until about 1975, when the house became home to St. Luke's Hospital's Alcoholism Program.

In 1981, the alcoholism treatment center was expanded into No. 326.  By 1996 it was operated as the Smithers Center.

image via streeteasy.com

Today there are ten residential condominium units in the co-joined buildings.

The 1899 James A. O'Gorman House - 318 West 108th Street

 

image via apartments.com

Architects Janes & Leo had a close relationship with Joseph A. Farley, designing several rows of speculative, upscale rowhouses for the developer in the 1890s.  On October 7, 1898 the firm filed plans for another project: four resplendent homes at 316 through 322 West 108th Street for Farley.  

Completed late in 1899, 318 West 108th Street was faced in red brick above a limestone-clad base.  The centered entrance atop a two-step stoop sat within a dignified Georgian-style portico.  The three-story midsection included a bowed oriel at the third floor.  The fourth floor sat atop a dentiled and bracketed cornice, while a much more modest terminal cornice completed the design.

The entrance originally sat between the service entrance and a window.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

In January 1900, Joseph A. Farley sold 318 West 108th Street, "a new 5-story American basement dwelling," as described by the Record & Guide, to Justice James Aloysius O'Gorman.  He paid $42,500 for the 22-foot wide house, or about $1.64 million in 2025 conversions.  (O'Gorman had negotiated the price down.  On January 9, The Sun noted, "Mr. Farley was asking $45,500 for the house.")

In reporting the sale, The Sun added, "The buyer is a well-known lawyer."  Born on May 5, 1860, O'Gorman was born "in the upper west side of the great city, not very far from where his present residence, No. 318 West 108th street, is situated," according to The Red Book in 1911.

O'Gorman graduated from New York University School of Law in May 1882.  He juggled his law practice with politics and in 1896 was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention.  He had become justice of the District Court in 1893 and just after purchasing 318 West 108th Street, was elected as a justice of the New York Supreme Court's 1st District.

James Aloysius O'Gorman, from the collection of the Library of Congress

O'Gorman married Anne M. Leslie in 1884.  The couple had seven daughters and a son.  Moving into the 108th Street house was the justice's widowed mother, Ellen.

Ellen O'Gorman suffered a stroke just after New Year's in 1905.  She died early on the morning of January 19.  The Evening World reported that O'Gorman's "secretary telephoned the tidings from the home of the Justice...to Clerk Early, of Part 4, Special Term, of the Supreme Court.  The court was adjourned in consequence."

Like most well-to-do New Yorkers, the O'Gormans spent time in Europe.  The Ithaca [New York] Daily News mentioned, "He has several times taken the entire family abroad, spending no less than $3,500 for steamship tickets alone."

The toughness that James O'Gorman learned as a boy on the streets of his Irish neighborhood came into play as an adult on April 4, 1908.  When he returned home that night, as reported by the Ithaca Daily News, "he discovered a big negro in the house, beating and robbing his butler."  The invader was no match for the 48-year-old jurist.  The article said, "Justice O'Gorman beat the man into subjection with his fists, and then turned him over to the police."

On September 27, 1908, the O'Gormans invited "a number of friends" to the house.  During the evening, the engagement of Mary O'Gorman, the eldest daughter, to Dudley Field Malone was announced.  The wedding took place in the Church of the Ascension on West 107th Street on November 14.  The wedding breakfast followed in the West 108th Street house.

Ellen Katherine O'Gorman was married to William J. Duffy in the Church of the Ascension on March 28, 1910.  The reception followed at 318 West 108th Street.  At the reception, Edith Patricia O'Gorman's engagement to Assistant District Attorney James Edward McDonald was announced.  Their wedding was to take place at the Church of the Ascension in 1911.

On June 18, 1910, the entire O'Gorman family sailed for Europe.  While they were in a little Swiss town, James McDonald sent a telegram to the family "that he could not wait, and said that he would go to Switzerland on the next steamship," reported the New-York Tribune.

On September 9, The New York Times reported that the wedding "took place yesterday morning at the Church of St. Leonhard, Brunnen, Switzerland."  The wedding breakfast was held at the Grand Hotel where the O'Gorman family was staying.  The Times said, "Mr. and Mrs. McDonald will return to this country in October after a honeymoon spent in England and on the Continent."

Shortly after the wedding, Edith became ill.  When the newlyweds returned to New York, according to the New-York Tribune, Edith, "felt too ill to go to an apartment which her husband fitted up for her, and they went to live with her father."  Tragically, the 23-year-old bride died in the 108th Street house on November 18, 1910 "from heart disease."  Her funeral was held in the drawing room on November 21.

The following spring, James A. O'Gorman was elected to the U.S. Senate.  He would split his time between Washington D.C. and 318 West 108th Street until the end of his term on March 3, 1917.

In December 1911, the O'Gormans were "in the midst of the family's preparations for the Christmas festivities," when daughter Anna fell ill.  The New York Times said, "she was removed on Dec. 22 from the O'Gorman home" to St. Luke's Hospital.  There she was diagnosed with typhoid fever.  The newspaper said, "Her illness has led to a postponement of the O'Gormans' plans to leave for Washington this month with the idea of making that city their home for the Winter."  Happily, on December 31, the Washington D.C. Herald reported that Anna "had responded to treatment and is progressing as favorably as could be expected."

The O'Gorman family was in Washington in the spring of 1912.  In their absence, on the night of May 21 their 22-year-old New York chauffeur, Frank Hallett, took the O'Gorman's vehicle for a spin.  The next day, The Sun reported that the senator's chauffeur "was locked up in the West 125th street police station last night on charges of reckless driving, intoxication and disorderly conduct."  

When stopped by police lieutenant Meehan, Hallett said, "I'm Senator O'Gorman's chauffeur and I guess he's somebody.  You don't dare to arrest me.  You'll be out of a job if you do."   The Sun reported, "Senator O'Gorman and his family were all in Washington and at a late hour last night a member of the Senator's household said he guessed Hallett would have to stay in the station house until morning."

Anne Leslie O'Gorman, The Evening World, March 13, 1913 (copyright expired)

The family had another medical scare in 1913.  They were in Washington on March 11 when Anne became ill.  Dr. Howard Hume diagnosed her with "an attack of ptomaine poisoning" and advised "a complete rest," as reported by The Evening World.  Anne brought Alice, Dolorita and Anna back to New York.  The article said that she, "has no plans for her return to the capital and will absent herself from all social activities for several weeks."

Dolorita was the next to marry.  Her wedding to John Anthony Maher took place in the chapel of St. Ignatius Loyola Academy at Park Avenue and East 83rd Street (where the groom had attended) on May 23, 1913.  At the reception in the 108th Street house were the mayor and his wife, the governor and his wife, and the lieutenant governor and his spouse, a judge, Tammany leaders, and a U.S. Senator and his wife.

James A. O'Gorman, Jr. was one of the "junior rookies from schools, academies and colleges all over the United States," as reported by the New-York Tribune, who gave up their summer vacation by going to the military training camp in Plattsburg, New York.  As part of a recruiting campaign, the program gave the preppies the experience of "living the lives of soldiers."  Somewhat sarcastically, the New-York Tribune remarked that well-heeled recruits, "who brought tennis rackets, golf sticks and musical instruments found that they had no time or inclination for the lighter labors of sports."

At the end of his term on March 3, 1917, O'Gorman returned to his law practice as a partner in O'Gorman, Battle and Vandiver.

In 1921, now 23 years old, James, Jr. found himself behind bars.  The Evening World reported on June 6 that Patrolman Rerle, "charged that his prisoner, who wore a tuxedo suit, was abusive toward him."  Rerle had commanded him to move his vehicle from a no parking zone and O'Gorman refused.

The following day, James A. O'Gorman, Jr., appearing repentant, told Magistrate Silberman "that he had not heard a patrolman tell him to 'move along.'"  Whether his father's stature was an influence or not, the judge accepted his story and dismissed the charges.

Agnes O'Gorman was married to Joseph Sanford Shanley in the Notre Dame Chapel on Morningside Drive on June 15, 1922.  The reception would be the last for the family in the West 108th Street house.  On October 13, 1923, The New York Times reported, "Senator James A. O'Gorman sold his five-story American basement dwelling."

The residence was home to several families over the next few decades.  In the 1930s it was home to Harold Keller and his wife.  A journalist, Keller was with the New York American until it closed in 1937.  The newspaper's closing prompted a significant change in Keller's career.  On December 31 that year, the Daily Worker reported that the newly elected District Attorney Thomas E. Dewey had appointed the 31-year-old Keller as one of his two confidential secretaries.

By 1940, carpet merchant Frank J. Gilroy occupied the house.  That year, on September 22, he married Marion Gertrude Higgins in St. Ursula's Church in Mount Vernon, New York.

Mrs. Julie Stern occupied the house at mid-century.  The 84-year-old suffered a gruesome death at the corner of Amsterdam Avenue and 110th Street at 5:15 on the afternoon of January 14, 1951.  She was hit by a black sedan and thrown onto the street.  A woman on the sidewalk waved frantically at a oncoming taxicab driven by Frederick Burke.  So distracted by her attempts to warn him that Mrs. Stern was on the pavement, he did not see her.  The New York Times reported that she, "was killed...after she was struck by a hit-and-run car and then run over by a taxicab."  

image via apartments.com

In 1970 the former O'Gorman home was converted to eight apartments.  In the remodeling, the doorway was moved to the side and the former entrance converted into a window.   A subsequent renovation in 2010 resulted in three duplexes, one of which extends into the new penthouse level, unseen from the street.