The American Merchant Mariners' Memorial -- Battery Park

By the time the Second World War broke out, the Merchant Marine had cleaned up its act.  Notorious in the 19^th and early 20^th century for shanghaiing drunken sailors and for sometimes nearly insufferable conditions that included floggings, it now boasted an Academy run closely along the lines of the military.

Even before the United States entered the conflict, the Merchant Marine was pulled into action to transport supplies and fuel to the allies.  There were approximately 55,000 Merchant Mariners in 1940 and an aggressive recruiting effort resulted in swelled numbers.  Long-retired Mariners came back to service to help the war effort.  

According to American Merchant Marine at War, James A. Logan was one of the old salts.  At the age of 76 he returned to serve as cook aboard the SS Joshua Hendy.  And Thomas Cavely, who had been master on the Staten Island Ferry, took command of another Liberty ship.

Unlike the U.S. Navy, the Merchant Marine was able to accept sailors with physical defects—heart or sight problems, for instance—or who were either too young or too old for military service.

Following the attack on Pearl Harbor and America’s entry into the war, Merchant Marine service was both more important and more dangerous.  German submarines focused on the American tanker fleet, manned by the Merchant Marine, that brought essential fuel to England and Europe.

Among these tankers was the SS Muskogee.  On March 22, 1942 it was transporting oil to England.  Captain William Betts was in command of the ship and its crew of 34.  The ship was spotted by the Nazi U-boat U-123.  Captained by 28-year old Reinhard Hardegan, the submarine was tasked with stopping American oil deliveries.

A single torpedo found its mark.  As the SS Muskogee sunk, members of its crew clung to the sides of the ship.  One German crew member snapped photographs of the desperate Merchant Mariners.  Seven Americans, including Captain Betts, made it to a life boat.  Betts pleaded with Captain Hardegan to be brought aboard the U-123 as prisoners.

The German crew member snapped this shot of the SS Muskogee crew members, including Captain Betts, before leaving them adrift. George Betts Collection/Independence Seaport Museum Library

As his crewman snapped photos, Hardegan replied that there was no room aboard the submarine.  The life boat was left adrift and none of the Muskogee’s crew was ever seen again.

By the end of the war, hundreds of Merchant Marine ships had been sunk.  Six hundred and thirty-three Merchant Mariners had been taken prisoners of war and 6,600, including the crew of the SS Muskogee, had given their lives.

Over the subsequent years, the role of the Merchant Marine in the war was little remembered.  In 1976 the American Merchant Mariners’ Memorial, Inc. was organized to commemorate the thousands of merchant ships and mariners that contributed to American military service since the Revolutionary War.  A competition for the design of a memorial was held in 1988.  The commission was awarded to French-born sculptress Marisol Escobar.

Escobar had chosen the events of March 22, 1942 to exemplify the heroism and contribution of the American Merchant Marines.  Somewhat incredibly, the photographs taken by the German sailor that day had survived.  Using the photograph of the Muskogee’s crew members clinging to the sinking ship, she developed a sculptural grouping of four figures and a stylized bow.

Installed on an obsolete stone pier off Battery Park, it was dedicated on October 8, 1991.  Escobar’s powerful and moving grouping captures the last moments of the sailors’ lives.  With no hope of survival, one man still tries desperately to rescue his comrade in the water—their fingertips almost touching. 

The disquieting depiction is made more so with the ebb and flow of the tides.  At high tide the sailor in the water is almost completely submerged; only his forearm extending in frantic desperation above the waves.

Marisol Escobar’s potent work of art—a fitting tribute to wartime Merchant Mariners—is too-often overlooked because of its out-of-the-way location.  It is worthy of a side trip.

photographs by the author

The 1890 Brockholst Apartment -- No. 101 West 85th Street

As the Upper West Side developed, its individual personality quickly became evident.   Real estate operators formed the West Side Association to fight the extension of Manhattan’s grid plan of avenues and streets—they preferred that their own grid be tilted to align with Broadway.   Architects embellished mansions and rowhouses with gargoyles, stained glass, turrets and towers—in stark contrast to the formal styles preferred on the opposite side of Central Park.

And West Siders were much quicker to embrace another concept--apartment living.  Five years after the hulking Dakota flats opened in 1884, John G. Prague began designs for another, The Brockholst. 

The land around the corner of Columbus Avenue and 85^th Street was once the country estate of the wealthy, respected Livingston family.   It was now owned by T. E. D. Powers who partnered with Prague to develop the plots.  The pair would build more than 230 residences in rapid-fire succession.  The Real Estate Record and Guide said in 1890 “They have created a neighborhood.” 

Their Brockholst, on the northwest corner of Columbus and 85^th, was named for Brockholst Livingston, a Supreme Court Justice and brother-in-law of John Jay.  The building was completed by December 20, 1890 when the Real Estate Record and Building Guide praised it as “a truly noble building.”  The publication said “It is a fitting complement to the extensive and magnificent improvements with which Messrs. John G. Prague and T. E. D. Powers have embellished the West Side.”

West 85th Street was still unpaved in December 1890 when the Brockholst opened -- Real Estate Record and Builders' Guide, copyright expired

Six stories tall, the Romanesque Revival pile of brooding brick and brownstone embodied the architectural taste of 1890s Upper West Siders.  The foyer doors at No. 101 West 85^th Street were deeply recessed within a medieval arched entranceway, over which an unidentifiable yet nonetheless scary beast held watch.   Two three-story bays bowed away from the façade, one of which read The Brockholst in wacky 1890s lettering that danced across an intricately-carved band.  Rough-cut blocks, checkerboard stonework, and an irregular roofline interrupted by chimneys pretending to be clustered chimney pots combined in a romantic and massive structure.

Prague worked with Tiffany & Co. in decorating the lobby.  A massive carved limestone fireplace stood at northwest corner, its mantel reaching nearly to the ceiling.  That ceiling, designed by Prague, was of aluminum and executed by Tiffany.  The main staircase featured a bronze railing and marble steps.  From the lobby the barber shop, café, and dining room could be accessed.

The private dining room, decorated in white and gold and illuminated by stained glass skylights, was intended originally for residents and their guests.  The Record and Guide deemed the Wilton carpeted room “richly decorated.” 

Various views of the dining room revealed its high-end decor -- Buildings and Building Management, January 1914 (copyright expired)

Connected to this dining room, slightly hidden by portieres, was a restaurant, open to the public who entered on Columbus Avenue. The rooms were designed so that they could be combined into one large space for receptions and other events.  It would seem that Tiffany had its hand in the decoration of the restaurant as well; for the Record and Guide described fixtures as “a jar from which three lilies rise, and from these lilies branch out petals which form the electric lights.”

Tiffany fixtures lit the marble-floored lobby.  The elevator attendant awaits in the paneled cab -- Real Estate Record and Guide, December 20, 1890 (copyright expired)

The Brockholst was technically a residential hotel, rather than flats like the Dakota.  The Real Estate Record and Builders’ Guide explained it as “the latest type of hotel—that wherein the families occupy their suites of apartments—their homes, all the the year round, and are enabled to obtain their board in the building, if they so choose, or obtain it partly or wholly, outside the building.”

Unlike transient hotels, the suites included kitchens, so “occupants can make their own culinary arrangements, if they desire.”  The great attraction of the Brockholst and similar residence hotels was that the household could forego the problem of domestic help.  Maid and cleaning service was provided by the building.

Upstairs, suites ranged from one room and bath, costing $350 a year, to nine rooms and bath, costing $1,500.   The rent on a nine-room apartment would translate to about $3,400 a month today.  The hallways had expensive Wilton carpeting, the building was steam heated and the electric lighting was powered by dynamos in the basement.  (The unreliability of electricity prompted the installation of “combination of gas and electric lights.")

Fanciful lettering announces the building's name.

Less than one year after the Brockholst opened, it was sold.  The first hint appeared in the Record and Guide on October 24, 1891.  “John G. Prague, it is reported, has sold the ‘Brockholst’ apartment hotel…for about $477,000.”  The rumor had truth, although it would be weeks before negotiations were finalized.  Finally on December 13 The New York Times confirmed the completed sale, for $432,000.

“Now that the sale has occurred, dealers feel that the market has been strengthened thereby, and have become more hopeful than ever that the Winter season will be a prosperous one,” said the newspaper.

The buyer was Randolph Guggenheimer, a self-made millionaire and member of the legal firm Guggenheimer & Untermyer.   He continued providing the upscale residents of the Brockholst with superior services and conveniences. 

Among the residents were William J. Hancock, superintendant of the Eastern lines of Wells-Fargo Express Company, his wife and two children.  Their neighbors were all families of affluent businessmen.

The concept of a roadway through Central Park under consideration in 1892 prompted a vociferous backlash from New Yorkers—many of them of course, on the Upper West Side.  Two of these were little girls who lived in the Brockholst.  Mabel and Marion did not sign their surnames when they sent a letter of protest by messenger to the meeting of the Park Commissioners’ meeting on May 21.

“The letter told how they used the west side of the Park to play in every day, what a great blessing it was to them and to all their playmates, and how they hoped they would never be deprived of it,” reported The New York Times the following day.

In 1893 King’s Handbook of New York City called The Brockholst “superior.”  That year resident Thomas Lansing Masson became literary editor of Life magazine.  A poet and humorist, he was a regular contributor of humorous articles to various publications.  On Tuesday October 24 he married Fannie Zulette Goodrich in Hartford, Connecticut.  Newspapers announced that “The bridal couple will reside at 101 West Eighty-fifth Street after Jan. 1.”

German-born Samuel Van Praag was emblematic of the prosperous Brockholst residents.  He had been with the steamship agents Phelps Bros. & Co. for 16 years in January 1894, was a member of the Produce Exchange, and served on several committees.  The Evening World said he “was regarded as a remarkable well-informed man on marine matters.”

But for several years the 46-year old bachelor had suffered from a variety of medical problems.  Finally his illnesses forced him to resign.   His condition became too much for him and on the morning of June 1, 1894 he fired a shot from a 32-calibre revolver into his heart.  “Despondency, due to illness, is assigned as the cause,” said The Evening World that afternoon.

In 1899 Floyd B. Wilson moved from Brooklyn into the Brockholst.  Born in Watervliet, New York in 1845 his extensive education included studies at the Jonesville Academy, the University of Michigan and the Ohio Law School.   Wilson and his wife, the former Esther M. Cleveland, had two daughters—Pearl Cleveland Wilson, who was away at Vassar, and 10-year old Beryl Madeline.

The prosperous Floyd B. Wilson would live here for decades.  The Successful American, January 1900 (copyright expired)

Aside from his corporation law practice, which “has earned for him a reputation all over this country,” according to The Successful American in 1899, Wilson had had a wide-flung career.  He had been principal of the Euclid Avenue Seminary in Cleveland, lecturer on elocution and English literature at Racine College, poet of the University of Michigan, the author of the novel Uphill, and had translated the Spanish comedy La Coja y el Encojido.  Wilson had also written several articles for Harper’s and other magazines on travel “and metaphysical subjects.”

He was also president of the mining firms Santa Barbara Gold Placer Company and the Arizona Gold and Copper Company; vice-president of the Copper Hill Mining Company; and a director of the Santa Fe and Grand Canon Railway Company.

The precocious 15-year old Walter Jones lived in the building in 1902.  He joined a new organization connected with Public School No. 166 that year.  It was formed to encourage “self-activity” among its all-boy membership.  In October that year a journalist from The New York Times was taken with the model race car Walter had fashioned.

“Master Jones’s little toy is fashioned after such as the ‘White Ghost’ and other fliers, and there is nothing in the visible mechanism missing”

Walter may have been offended at the reporter’s calling his model a “little toy.”  He insisted “he was not yet satisfied with the interior mechanism, and was at work at home on a half-horse power machine that would really run when he got through with it.”

Another tragic death in the Brockholst occurred in 1904.  The young wife of 24-year old real estate dealer Frank T. Pressman had died the year before.   He brooded over his loss for a year.

In the apartment next door lived Pressman’s mother, a Mrs. Adams.  On March 31, 1904, he sold all his furniture explaining that he was about to embark on an extended trip o California.   Four days later he did not appear in the dining room for breakfast.  Concerned, his mother notified the superintendent.

“The skylight was broken open, and James Dillon, a hallboy, was lowered into the room,” reported The New York Times on April 3.  “He was almost overcome with the illuminating gas, but managed to open the windows and doors.”

Frank T.Pressman had committed suicide by inhaling gas.  Dr. A. Richard Stern deduced he had been dead “for several hours.”

There was apparently a glut of vacant apartments that year.  An advertisement in The Sun on November 8 offered “apartments of three, four, five and eight rooms and bath; maid service included; elevator attendance night and day; caterer in building; inspection invited.”

In 1914 Buildings and Buildings Management outlined the operation of the dining room which, while run by an independent restaurateur who provided his own linens and silverware, was closely supervised by the Brockholst management.  “Care is taken by the house that no cause for complaints as to menus, cuisine, or service crops up among the tenants and general supervision over the quality and nature of food supplies according to the season of the year is the rule.”

Residents were charged a flat rate of 40 cents for breakfast and luncheon and 75 cents for dinner.  Or, if the resident preferred, a weekly charge of $10 covered three meals a day.

The magazine mentioned the current rental rates.  “The Brockholst contains a great number of housekeeping apartments of six to eight rooms and kitchen, renting from $900 to $1000 a year.  There are some non-housekeeping apartments of three and four rooms, also, renting at $40 to $60 a month apiece.”

The building’s superintendent, William Featherstone, reiterated the attraction of the Brockholst since its inception. “The servant problem is such a mighty one nowadays that every family pays pretty close attention when you offer them a feature making them wholly independent of the maid, cook or serving-man.”

The airy fire escapes, emblazoned with the Brockholst "B" and panels of feathery design, were as much sculpture as necessity.

Perhaps the Brockholst’s most celebrated resident was the ousted Governor of the State of Yucatan, Mexico, Abel Ortiz Argumendo, and his family.   When he fled the revolution in 1915 he came to New York and took an apartment in the Brockholst in April.

Almost immediately the circumstances of his fleeing and the amount of cash he brought with him were an issue.  He explained that the “revolution” was actually “bandits and other parties” set on taking over the Yucatan.  So “I decided to remove the Governorship to Havana, Cuba, until there was a legal President in Mexico.”

He told Supreme Court Justice Shearn on August 27, 1915 that he left the country with “State funds amounting to about $300,000 in United States gold.”  (The Government of Mexico put the amount closer to $450,000.)  But that was only for the good of the country, he insisted.  “I was responsible for these funds, and I did not intend to leave them behind for the robbers.”

In 1918 Arnold Krakauer lived in the Brockhorst with his wife, Minnie Jacobs Krakauer.   The couple had been married since 1892 and Krakauer worked for Harry S. Stevens at the Polo Grounds.

Stevens was, as described by the New-York Tribune, “the well known purveyor of double-jointed peanuts and hot frankfurters at the Polo Grounds and caterer to the metropolitan racetracks.”    Stevens’ company would continue to serve hot dogs and peanuts at Shea Stadium, Churchill Downs, Fenway Park and other sports venues until 1994 when it was taken over by Aramark Concessions.

The happy home life of the Krakauers began to fall apart in October 1918 when, according to Arnold, Harry M. Stevens and Minnie were intimate in the Brockholst apartment.  The affair continued for a full year—always in the Krakauer’s bedroom--and then in May 1920 there was an encounter at No. 302 Central Park West. 

The wronged Arnold Krakauer sued his wife for divorce in September 1920; then sued his boss for alienation of affections.  The New-York Tribune’s headline on September 5 announced “Harry Stevens Sued As Home Wrecker.”

At the time of the Krauaker-Stevens scandal, Henry H. Lloyd was still in residence and would stay on for some time.   Also in the building were Harriet Beecher, the daughter of Henry Ward Beecher, and her daughter Margaret Beecher White who taught Christian Science.

In 1932 78-year old Amelie von Ende died.  The Polish-born concern pianist and writer had been well known in musical circles.  She contributed to several magazines on German and French literature and on music, and often shared the concert stage with her German violinist husband.

By the time of Amelie’s death the Brockholst had been eclipsed by modern apartment buildings.  When it was sold to an investing syndicate headed by Milton R. Leader in 1950 there were 41 apartments and six stores in the building.  Within six years the number of apartments had risen to 52 as the sprawling larger apartments were broken up.

In 2009 an ambitious renovation and restoration effort was initiated which upgraded the apartments and turned attention to the careworn façade.   Artist Sergio Rossetti Morosini was commissioned to restore the endangered brownstone sculptures. 

Carvings, like this crouching winged lioness, were given careful attention.

The Brockholst emerged with its wonderful carvings and fanciful elements intact; allowing us to imagine the well-heeled residents of the 1890s who passed through the oaken double doors.

Some of the stained glass transoms survive.

photographs by the author

The Lost Harriet Douglas Cruger Mansion -- No. 128 West 14th Street

When the Metropolitan Museum of Art moved into the Cruger mansion, the carriage drive at left still led to the stable behind; and the wall garden to the right survived.  A History of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1913

Harriet Douglas was a wealthy spinster in the 1820s, living with her widowed mother in the family mansion at No. 55 Broadway.  Her unmarried status had everything to do with her strong will and determination to maintain control of the immense fortune that would befall her.

In 1823 a Southern lawyer, Henry Cruger, courted Harriet, who was significantly older than he.  When he proposed marriage, she presented him with a list of prenuptial agreements which would be seen as remarkable today and were astounding in the 1820s.  According to Hendrik Hartog in his Man and Wife in America, “In order to become her husband, a man had to agree that she would retain full control over all of the money she had inherited.  This she demanded ‘in obedience to, and conformity with the opinions and precepts of her parents.'  Furthermore, he had to change his name to Douglas.  He had to give up his profession so that he could devote his full attention to her and her family’s properties.  He had to be willing to live where she wished them to live.  Implicitly, she required that her husband become her wife.”

Henry refused; but three years later he was back.  But when he refused to give up his “present independence” Harriet rebuffed him again.  She sailed off to Europe where she lived six years and repeatedly received offers of marriage.  In 1829 Henry Cruger arrived in London, pledging his love once again and begging Harriet to marry him.  Finally in 1830 the pair came to a compromise.  Harriet retained control of her money; but Henry would not have to change his name.  Nevertheless, Harriet insisted that she would be known as “Mrs. Douglas Cruger,” rather than Mrs. Henry Cruger.  They were married in June 1833.  The bride was 44 years old.

Eventually, Henry Cruger would rue the day he married the headstrong woman.   Years later, in 1876, John Proffatt would write of Harriett “Belonging to a family of wealth and standing, possessed of a large private fortune, and endowed by education and training with rare personal and mental accomplishments, she married…and met with disappointment and misfortune; for it was soon followed by a separation.”  She controlled Henry’s money, complained about his expenses, and the two lived apart as much as together.  But without any income other than that provided by his wife, Cruger was trapped.

An example of Cruger’s frustration was expressed in his letter to Harriet on July 29, 1836 which said in part “God in his mercy forgive you for the agony and humiliation it is inflicting on one, whose bosom was fraught with the kindliest thoughts and purposes towards you.  Not for three times your whole fortune, dedicated to the best and wisest of uses, would I have made even a stranger suffer so much as I am now undergoing.”

James Monroe, the nephew and adopted son of the former President, was the husband of Harriet’s sister, Elizabeth.  He and Henry became friends and James repeatedly used his influence to attempt to create peace between the Crugers.  At one point he wrote Harriet a letter gently pressuring her to relieve Henry “from a state of dependence” and telling her that her husband was living in “an unnatural state.”  Betsy Monroe tried to step in, as well, telling her sister that people would attribute her actions to “the love of accumulation.”

Harriet’s mother died on June 29, 1840; but Harriet she kept the Broadway house intact as it had been when her mother died.  A staff was maintained for decades to preserve it exactly as when Margaret was there.

The last straw in the shaky marriage came in 1843 when Henry attempted to regain his dignity (and partial control of Harriet’s money).  He sued his wife and won.   Enraged, Harriet appealed and 18 months later Henry received a settlement of $20,000 “to be paid immediately.”  It was the last time the couple would ever set eyes on one another.  Reportedly, Harriet enjoyed playing the organ for guests and would repeatedly play—in reference to her estranged husband—the tune “For Love of Gold He Has Left Me.”

                                                                                                                    

The family owned a plot of land on West 14^th Street, 90 by 70 feet, stretching through to 13^th Street, between what is now Sixth and Seventh Avenues.  In 1844 Harriet laid plans for her uptown home. According to Ewing Galloway decades later, it was "originally built as a reproduction of Boscobel House, the Douglas family seat in Scotland."

Harriett Douglas Cruger's free-standing brownstone residence at No. 128 West 14th Street was apparently designed by architect James Renwick, Jr.  George Templeton Strong spoke of it in his diary saying:

It is a most stately house, the finest I've ever seen, with its grand hall and staircase and ample suite of rooms. Amplitude and absence of ginger bread made it imposing though I dare say (being built by Jemmy Renwick) it is bad enough in many particulars.

Brentano’s 1907 Old Buildings of New York described it.  “The house, having a frontage of seventy-five feet, stood in the middle of a courtyard extending on either side about one hundred feet, separated from the street by a high wall.”  A villa, it was accessed by an elegant split staircase that rose to a deep-set entrance behind Corinthian columns.   Inside, the entrance hall was 25-feet wide and extended 85 feet through the house.  Harriet’s conservatory, a necessity in upscale Victorian homes, extended the entire rear width of the residence.  A grand staircase was centered toward the rear of the entrance hall.  It split at the landing, allowing sunlight to pour in from vast windows.

Although Harriet shared her parents’ fortune with her four siblings, her personal worth was immense.  In 1855 her fortune was estimated in the millions.  She spent her summers at Henderson House.  She had constructed the 22-room mansion in 1832 on her 20,000-acre estate near Richfield Springs, New York.  It was built to resemble the Scottish Gelston Castle.

In New York Harriet entertained the cream of society.  When Hungarian patriot Louis Kossuth arrived in New York in 1851, he stayed in the 14th Street mansion.

Harriet’s household accounts of 1869 reflect life at No. 128 West 14^th Street.  On October 9 Peter Wilson was paid $35.75 for “shaking carpets at Fourteenth Street” (apparently a sizable job, that amount equaling about $650 today).  The disparity in servants wages, depending on status, is also evident.  Among the staff was house cleaner Fannie Quinn who earned $27.13 in November; Harriet's butler Leonard Romaine was paid $46.96; and Reuben, “Mrs. Cruger’s negro servant,” earned $5.00.

Following James Monroe’s death in 1870, after a distinguished military and political career, his funeral was held in the 14^th Street house on September 10.  It would be one of the last gatherings in the 14^th Street house, for by now Harriet was descending into dementia.

Harriet had fallen in 1866 at the age of 77.   John Proffatt, ten years later, wrote that the injury “affected her mind, and then, at times, [she] was undoubtedly a raving, excited lunatic.”  Harriet became convinced that the devil was “bodily present” under her bed.  The New York Times later reported “she conceived that there was a fire burning beneath her bed, and that the devil himself was lying in wait there for her soul.  This delusion filled her with terror.”

Her pastor, the Rev. Dr. Paxton, and her physician, Dr Parker, tried their best to allay her fears.  She decided the only way to save her soul was to rewrite her will, bequeathing her immense fortune to religious institutions and charitable societies of the church.  Rev. Paxton insisted that she could not buy her way into heaven and tried to dissuade her from writing the new will.  As anyone could have told him, Harriet was not one to be contradicted and in the fall of 1867 the will was prepared.

Harriet Douglas Cruger died at the age of 83 in 1872.  Immediately her siblings contested the will, “on account of the insane condition of mind.”  The case dragged on for three years.  Finally on July 2, 1875 Judge Robert C. Hutchings announced his decision.  It was, as explained by The New York Times, a “peculiarly delicate” matter.  If he decided for the complainants, he was deeming “Mrs. Cruger, a lady of wealth, and distinguished for many years in New-York society,” insane.

But that was the decision and Harriet Douglas Cruger’s will was rejected and she was legally deemed to have died intestate.

In the meantime, the 14^th Street house did not sit vacant.  The same year that Harriet died the Metropolitan Museum of Art opened at No. 681 Fifth Avenue.  The Museum’s minutes of 1893 noted “We transferred it in 1873 to the more spacious accommodation at 128 West Fourteenth Street.”  The Museum trustees described the house in 1873 as “a large and elegant building surrounded by spacious grounds, upon which grounds new galleries may be built, should they be required.”

The Museum leased the house from the estate on April 25, 1873 for five years at an annual rent of $8,000.  The New York Times reported on October 2, 1873 that “a small fee of twenty-five cents will be charged.”  The newspaper noted “The present location of the Museum is certainly far preferable to its former one, though the accommodations appear to be somewhat restricted, and should additions be made to the present collection it is difficult to see how they could be disposed of.”

On May 1, 1875 the museum offered free days—Mondays and Thursdays.  The Annual Report of 1875 recorded “The public has signified its appreciation of the additional privileges by a constant, large, and ever crowded attendance on those days.  The average daily attendance on free days has been 577.”

In 1876 New York as it Was and As it Is noted “A Collection of interesting Works of Art, presented and belonging to the Museum, of the aggregate value of $350,000, are now on exhibition at the Douglas Mansion, 128 West Fourteenth Street.”  At the time of that writing, the museum's permanent home in Central Park was rising. 

Artist Frank Waller depicted the entrance hall of the Cruger Home after the Metropolitan Museum moved in.  http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/13121

After the Museum moved to its permanent home in 1878 the Cruger mansion saw several uses, including The Armory Café by 1899.  Named for the massive 9th Regiment Armory directly across the street, it drew the attention of the New York Society for the Enforcement of the Criminal Law in April that year.   Society agents went undercover and what they discovered going on in her former home would have shocked and enraged Harriet Douglas Cruger.  Their report told of a gambling parlor in the “Armory Café, rear of billiard room.  This room was formerly a bowling alley, and is located on the ground floor; $1 bets.”

The Armory Café was raided on February 16, 1903.  The following day The Sun reported “Two fights which were scheduled to take place before an audience of sporting men in the Armory Café at 128 West Fourteenth street last night, were rudely interrupted by the police of the Charles street station, who appeared on the scene just as the first pair of fighters, stripped to the waist, were about to enter the ring and battle to a finish with five-ounce gloves.”

The patrons flew into panic.  “One hundred and fifty spectators, each of whom paid 50 cents to see the scrapes, were thrown into wild confusion by the sudden appearance of the police, and made desperate efforts to escape by rear doors and windows.  But they found policemen with drawn clubs at every exit, and finally submitted meekly to arrest.”  All 150 men were arrested.

The newspaper commented “The Armory Café is a notorious dive, the various proprietors of which have been in trouble with the police from time to time for many years.”

By 1914 the barroom and gambling hall had been replaced by the Salvation Army.  As America entered World War I, the old mansion was converted to the Salvation Army’s Red Shield Club for Service Men.  On February 27, 1919 the New-York Tribune reported on its opening.  “It was announced that the new club will be open officially until 11 p.m. every day, but the doors will not be closed as long as there is a wandering doughboy or gob in search of a cup of hot coffee.”

A far cry from the “notorious dive” it replaced, the Red Shield Club offered a reading room, cafeteria, offices and a “special room for women visitors.”  Downstairs were an employment office and the supply department “which furnished incoming transports with chocolate and cigarettes.”

When the 27^th Regiment returned to New York on March 25, 1919, the Salvation Army workers were busy in the 14^th Street house.  The New-York Tribune reported on “a small army” of workers who had been wrapping doughnuts in oiled paper to be distributed among the soldiers.  “Last night doughnuts stood in boxes, in barrels, in tubs, in baskets, in every receptacle that could be requisitioned, waiting to be loaded on trucks for today’s distribution.”

With the war’s end, the focus of the Salvation Army was closer to home.  On October 24, 1921 Major Edward Underwood reported on the organization’s work among the homeless, saying it had given out 10,000 discarded suits of clothes, 10,000 old pairs of shoes, 10,000 suits of underclothes and 10,000 overcoats.

Sadly abused, by 1918 the mansion is hemmed in.  It has lost its elegant split staircase, former balconies have become show windows, and fire escapes trail down from the topmost windows  -- from the collection of the New York Public Library

In summing up the history of the Cruger mansion, Ewing Galloway around 1928 said that after being used by the museum, "then it became a saloon, and finally ended its days as the Salvation Army training college, like a tired old man turning to religion at the end of a colorful life."

In 1928 the top floor and some of the windows have been removed.  from the collection of the New York Public Library

In 1928 the Salvation Army contracted architects Voorhees, Gmelin & Walker to replace the old Cruger mansion with an impressive, up-to-date headquarters.  Ralph Walker, whose reputation for creating visually distinctive designs with unusual materials was already firmly established, was put in charge of the project.  The Salvation Army Centennial Memorial Temple replaced the Cruger mansion in 1930.  The Art Deco—sometimes called Ziggurat Moderne--building survives as one of Manhattan’s unique architectural designs.

photo by Edmund V. Gillon, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York 

many thanks to historian Jay Cantor for supplying the George Templeton Strong information.