Michael Bernstein's 1900 330 East 4th Street

photograph by Carole Teller

The neighborhood of East 4th Street between Avenues C and D in the first half of the 19th century earned the name the Dry Dock District for the shipbuilding industry centered along the East River from about Grand Street to East 12th Street.  In the late 1830s, the 4th Street block was lined with handsome Greek Revival homes.

As the century drew to a close, however, those once private residences were being converted to rooming houses or razed to be replaced with tenements.  The 22-foot-wide house at 330 East 4th Street was purchased by developer John Katzman in 1899.  He hired architect Michael Bernstein to design a tenement building on the site.  Completed the following year, the structure cost Katzman $20,000 to erect, or about $771,000 in 2026 terms.

Michael Bernstein was well-known to developers for his tenement designs--often blending incongruous historical styles with conspicuous results.  (Tenement buildings designs, in general, were often over the top, their facades splashed with extravagant ornamentation that disguised the bare bones accommodations inside.)  

The five-story structure was faced in yellow brick and trimmed in stone.  Whimsical wrought iron railings that protected the areaway and and stoop led to the tall entrance.  The doorway frame and the arched first-floor window lintels were intricately carved with Renaissance Revival-style designs.

The first floor openings were originally adorned with Renaissance inspired carvings (painted in 1940).  Light-hearted hand-wrought ironwork ran along the stoop and areaway.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Bernstein blended several styles for the upper floors--triangular Renaissance pediments, Queen Anne-style spandrels of dog-tooth brickwork, and neo-Classical swags along the fascia below the cornice.

No. 330 East 4th Street was a double-flat, meaning there were two apartments per floor.  The ten original tenants were middle class, like the Weiner family, whose young adult son was looking for work in 1901.  His advertisement in the New-York Tribune on April 4 read:  "Young Man, 22, of neat appearance, with 3 years' experience as office salesman, where there is chance of advancement.  J. Weiner, 330 East 4th-st."

The unmarried Susie Hachfelder exemplified progressive young female of the early 20th century.  Even though women did not yet have the right to vote, Hachfelder was highly involved in politics.  She was a member of the Progressive Party and on September 3, 1912, The New York Times reported that she would be attending the Progressive Party Convention in Syracuse.

Gynecologist Dr. Herman Lorber's apartment and medical office was in the building as early as 1913.  Born in Austria in 1880, he was educated at the Gymnasium in Austria and at City College.  He graduated from the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University in 1903 and did graduate work in Vienna and Berlin.  (Lillian Wald, of the Henry Street Settlement house, "loaned him money to get to Vienna for medical study," recalled The New York Times decades later.  "He repaid her by accepting some of her poverty-stricken protégés without fee.")

Since 1906, Lorber had been on the visiting staff of Beth Israel Hospital.  He treated East Village residents from his office here for years.  But he would not remain.  When he died on January 30, 1958, he was living at 77 Park Avenue.  He did not survive to see the release of Adam Barnett's book, Doctor Harry: The Story of Dr. Herman Lorber four months later.  In reviewing the book, Meyer Berger began, "This little volume tells the story of Herman Lorber, an immigrant boy who rose out of East Side poverty to wide practice in surgery.  It follows his steady climb from an East Fourth Street tenement to the quiet dignity of Gramercy Park."

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

As Susie Hachfelder had been, resident Isidor Wagner was driven and dynamic.  In July 1914, the private bank of Adolph Mandel was closed by the State Superintendent of Banks.  The depositors, many of the German immigrants, lost their savings.  On August 25, The Evening World reported that protestors marched from the shuttered bank to the Criminal Courts Building.  "A majority of the marchers were woman carrying or leading babies and children."  In front of the group was Isidor Wagner holding a banner that read:

We, the depositors of Mandel's bank, are marching to District-Attorney Whitman.  He should help us obtain our money.

At the Criminal Courts Building, five protestors, led by Wagner and Sarah Kritz, a widow, were admitted inside.  They were taken by a policeman to the District Attorney's office.  The Evening World reported, "After hearing that most of the depositors were in actual need of their money," District Attorney Groehl telephoned to the State Superintendent "who said that arrangements are being made by which the partial payments to depositors will be made next Monday."  The article said that the news placated the committee "and the parade moved back to the east side and disbanded."

The Turbin family lived here in 1931 when law school graduate Joseph G. Turbin applied for admission to the bar.  His extended family would be in the sights of the Federal Government within a few years.  In 1941, the Special Committee on Un-American Activities compiled a list of voters who registered as Communists.  Among them were Marion, Molly, Pauline and Sam Turbin, all living at 330 East 4th Street.  Two years later, Pauline Turbin's name was filed with the office of the Board of Elections as a nominee for the position as County Committeeman.

In November 1952, the Children's Aid Society's Sloane Center on East 6th Street held a contest for neighborhood children.  In connection with Cat Week, prizes were awarded in seven categories: longest tail, loudest meow, best trained, cleanest, most unusual, sleepiest looking, and the longest whiskers.  Eight-year-old resident Gloria Zaretz took away the prize for cleanest cat "for her short-haired brown tabby named 'Rory,'" reported The New York Times.

Living and working here at early as 1961 were artist and sculptor Claes Oldenburg and his artist wife Coosje van Bruggen.  Born in Sweden in 1929, Oldenburg was known for his public art installations of oversized common objects.  He married Coosje in 1977.  The two often collaborated on works.

Claes Oldenburg working in his 330 East 4th Street studio in 1961.  photograph by Robert R. McElroy, from the collection of the Smithsonian Archives of American Art.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Northeast Neighborhood Association had its offices here.  The Staten Island Advance explained on November 29, 1971 that the organization was "one of the first health projects in the United States," saying it "provides health services on the lower East Side, and is owned and operated by the community which it serves."

 

A renovation completed in 1993 resulted in a single-room-occupancy residence for the aged.  There are about seven rooms per floor in the facility.  It was likely during that remodeling that the stoop was removed and the entrance lowered to sidewalk level.  The Renaissance Revival carvings of the first floor were shaved off and the cornice replaced with a brick parapet wall.

many thanks to artist Carole Teller for suggesting this post.

The 1911 Riverside Mansions Apts. - 410 Riverside Drive

image via apartments.com

In 1888, the mansion of George Noakes was erected at the northeast corner of Riverside Drive and 113th Street.  The lavish private homes facing Riverside Park were being replaced by luxury apartment buildings by the first years of the 20th century, however, and on January 1, 1910, just 22 years after the Noakes family moved into their mansion, the Real Estate Record & Guide reported, "The Einsworth Construction Co. will soon begin work on the new 12-story elevator apartment house on the north corner of Riverside drive and 113th st."  The article noted that construction, "is estimated to cost $750,000."  The figure would translate to $25.5 million in 2026.

Two months later, on March 6, the New York Herald said The Riverside Mansions building "will be ready for occupancy, according to the builders, next October."  Interestingly, the article explained that of the 35 apartments, 14 would be cooperative.  They would be priced from $16,000 to $20,000, or approximately $545,000 to $680,000 today.  The remaining 21 apartments would be rentals.

Architects Neville & Bagge designed the 13-story-and-attic structure in the Chateauesque style.  The three-story base was clad in undressed granite.  The seven-story midsection, which sat between scalloped intermediate cornices, was clad in beige Roman brick.  Stone-and-iron balconies at the fourth, sixth and eleventh floors sat on corbel tables that matched the intermediate cornices.  Neville & Bagge embellished the top floor and attic with Loire Valley inspired gables and crockets and a steep mansard.

The World's New York Apartment House Album, 1910 (copyright expired)

There were three apartments per floor with either eight or nine rooms with three baths.  The well-heeled residents would enjoy "uniformed hall and elevator service day and night," according to The World's New York Apartment House Album, and there were a "separate entrance and elevator for service."

The irregular footprint presented the architects a challenge in laying out the apartments.  The World's New York Apartment House Album, 1910 (copyright expired)

Among the initial residents were the families of Henry Field, Edward A. Mays, Hugo Schweitzer, and Harry McDonald.  The Mays' and McDonalds' apartments were on the ground floor and only months after moving in that caused a problem.

On the evening of February 25, 1911, Edward A. Mays and his wife were hosting a dinner party.  The guests' coats and purses were placed in a bedroom.  While the group was at dinner, a burglar entered a window in that room.  He fled with a $300 fur overcoat and a silver toilet set.  The New York Times reported, "The thief overlooked a wallet containing $1,500 in cash, which was in one of the bureau drawers."

About the time that Mays and his guests discovered the theft, Harry McDonald arrived home.  His wife and daughter had been out all afternoon.  He told a reporter from The New York Times, "his apartment had been stripped."  Among the items stolen were "$600 worth of clothing, silverware, and decorations."

Henry and Mary Fields had two daughters, Rosalynd and Sylvia.  All the residents of The Riverside Mansions employed at least one servant and the Fields family employed 23-year-old Lydia Johnson, whom they said had "long been a faithful employee."  On August 31, 1911, The Evening World said, "For several days the servant had been acting queerly."  But the family "decided to humor her and kept her at her usual duties."

In fact, Lydia Johnson was having a mental breakdown.  On the afternoon of August 30, when Mary Field entered the kitchen, Lydia attacked her.  Mary screamed and her 18-year-old daughter, Rosalynd, rushed in.  "She pulled her mother from the servant's grasp, blocked several wild rushes and succeeded in getting Mrs. Fields into the hallway," reported The Evening World.  Then Rosalynd grappled with Lydia until she could get safely into the hallway and slammed the door.

The women's loud commotion had attracted "two painters at work in the building, two bellboys, two expressmen and the superintendent."  Policeman Best also ran into the building and "all made a rush for the raving negress," as worded by the article.  Lydia Johnson had been worked up into a frenzy, and she took Best's night stick from him and tore his uniform.  The painters came to Johnson's aid, but "the combined strength of the three was no match for that of the woman."  She was overpowered only when all eight men "made a concerted rush and dragged her to the floor."

Lydia Johnson was placed in an improvised straitjacket and taken to J. Hood Wright Hospital.  The day after the incident, The Evening World reported that Mary Fields, "is under the care of a physician to-day from the shock."

More typical of events within The Riverside Mansions were glittering dinner parties, teas and receptions.  On the evening of September 6, 1912, for instance, Dr. and Mrs. Hugo Schweitzer hosted a dinner "for forty, in honor of the official delegates of Germany, France, and Great Britain," as reported by The New York Times.  (The men were attending the Eighth International Congress of Applied Chemistry.)  

Dr. Hugo Schweitzer was born in Pitschen, Silesia in 1861 and  came to America around 1885.  He married Adela Hammerslough in 1892 and the couple had one son, Edward Stephen.  Hugo Schweitzer studied chemistry in four German universities and was a member of the Society for Chemical Industry, the American Chemical Society, Engineers' Club of Boston, Cosmos Club of Washington and was president of the Chemists' Club of New York.

The international harmony seen at the Schweitzer's dinner table that September evening in 1912 was about to be shattered world-wide.  Following the outbreak of world war in 1914 and several years before America became involved, Schweitzer ardently sided with Germany.  He was a delegate of the German-American Alliance meeting in Utica in 1915, and that autumn announced that he would publish "a New-York daily newspaper of pro-German proclivities, to be used in propaganda," according to The Evening Post.

Dr. Schweitzer died of pneumonia in the apartment on December 22, 1917 at the age of 56.  In reporting his death, The Evening Post commented that in the early days of the war he "had been the centre of much attention because of his pro-German sympathies."

In the meantime, the Fields family appeared in society columns.  On June 22, 1914, for instance, The New York Times announced that Mary and Rosalynd "who sailed on the Vaterland last Tuesday, are to visit Germany France, Switzerland, Italy, and Holland."  The article added, "Mr. Fields, who is a brother of Lew Fields, with his youngest daughter, Miss Sylvia Fields, will join his family abroad in August."

The following year, on October 21, 1915, Mary and Henry announced the engagements of both of their daughters.  More surprising was that the sisters would be marrying brothers.  The New York Times reported that Rosalynd and Sylvia were engaged to Meyer and Jacques Ginsberg, respectively.

On January 21, 1916, the newspaper reported on Rosalynd's and Meyer's wedding in The Riverside Mansions apartment.  The article said the newlyweds left for their honeymoon, "but will return on Sunday to act as attendants at the wedding of Miss Sylvia Fields and Jacques Ginsberg."

In the meantime, the family of Farron S. Betts occupied an apartment here.  He was the president of F. L. Schafuss Co., maker of greeting cards and postcards.  Living with the family was Betts' widowed mother-in-law, Alma E. Byxbee.  

When Betts sailed to Europe on business in July 1914, he took along his chauffeur, Ernst Theodor Edward Fischer.  The young man was the son of Brigadier General Carl Heinz Fischer of the German Army.  They were in England when war was declared and Fischer "was promptly taken into custody by agents of the British Secret Service," reported The New York Times.  He was held in prison for several weeks before Betts could get him released.  The article said the chauffeur pledged, "not to try to get back to Germany, but to return to the United States."  Betts and Fischer returned to New York.  However, like Hugo Schweitzer, the chauffeur "admits that he is anxious for the kaiser to win," reported The New York Times.

Nine months after the Fields sisters' weddings, on October 19, 1916 Jenesse Alma Betts was married to Ernst Theodor Eduard Fischer.  Alma E. Byxbee died in the  Betts apartment at the age of 89 on February 18, 1918.  Her funeral was held in the parlor the following afternoon.

Once America entered World War I, Ernst Fischer's outspoken favoritism to the German cause could not be ignored.   On July 4, 1918, The New York Times reported that he had been arrested by agents of the Department of Justice.  Although he had not committed a crime, the Department said his family "is one of the best known fighting families in Germany."  Ernst Fischer was imprisoned as an enemy alien, "for the period of the war," said the article.

A war of a different type was playing out in the apartment of Edwin Clifford and Louise McCullough.  McCullough was the head of E. C. McCullough & Co., which imported cigars and tobacco from the Philippines.  He had a personal fortune of $2 million according to Louise (or about $23.7 million today).  Louise was, according to the New York Herald, "a musician of ability and a linguist, speaking German, French and Spanish, as well as English."

Clifford met Louise at her dancing school when she was 15 years old and he was 25.  They eloped on April 23, 1893 and had a son and daughter.  According to Louise, their marriage was happy until McCullough "began to tell her of his affairs with other women, wives of his social and business friends."  When he began coming home early in the morning three or four days at week, according to Louise, he said "he was entitled to live his life in his own way."

On June 27, 1920, Louise, her 15-year-old daughter, also named Louise, and a cousin, Edwin Elser, were riding in the McCullough's large touring car in Westchester County, driven by their chauffeur, Pietro Holanda.  The teen badgered her mother to allow her to drive and finally, after luncheon, she let Louise get behind the wheel.  The girl slammed the car into a tree on Pelham Parkway.  The crash killed the young driver and severely injured her mother and the other occupants.

Ten days after the accident, Louise was back home, incapacitated with two broken legs and other injuries.  Edwin walked out, telling her that she "could communicate with his stenographer."  He took their son with him.

The following year, on March 26, 1921, Louise began separation proceedings, charging Edwin with abandonment and "poisoning her son's mind" against her.  Edwin denied the charges, saying that his wife was "temperamental."  Louise was awarded alimony the following year.

On Christmas Eve 1921, Farron S. Betts was in his automobile in the Bronx (driven by his new chauffeur).  The New York Herald reported that Betts "felt a bump in the West Drive, and getting out to investigate found an unconscious man."  The victim was Edward McConnell, who lived at 54 West 98th Street.  Betts and his chauffeur lifted him into the automobile and took him to Reconstruction Hospital, "where it was said he had a fractured skull."  Both Betts and his driver insisted that they had not originally struck McCullough, but merely ran over him.

At the time, rents at 410 Riverside Drive ranged from $3,100 and $3,500 a year--equal to $4,000 to $4,500 per month today.

Among the residents during the Depression years were prominent attorney and railroad man Walter J. Bartnett and his wife, the former Frances G. Vaux.  Married in 1895, they had three daughters, one of whom, Joanne, who was unmarried, lived with them.  Born in California, Bartnett received his law degree from Hastings College of Law in 1890.  

Walter J. Bartnett in his younger years.  from the collection of the Western Pacific Railroad.

He organized the Western Pacific Railroad Company in 1903 and became its first president.  He organized the Central California Traction Company and built an interurban system between Sacramento and Stockton, California.  He was, as well, a founder of the World Federation League.

In 1941, the roof cresting had been removed.  Cast iron sconces with milk glass globes still illuminated the entrance area and the balconies were intact.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

An interesting resident at the time was Dr. Raphael Constantin, who lived here with his wife, Florence M.  Born in Armenia, Constantin received his medical degree in 1893 from the University of Edinburgh.  He came to America in 1902 and turned his focus from medicine to industry.  He became the president of the Obelisk Waterproofing Company, which waterproofed structures like the obelisk in Central Park, St. Paul's Chapel, and the Soldiers and Sailors Monument in Riverside Park.  He was also highly involved in Armenian-American affairs and was president of the Armenia-American Society and the Constantinople Armenian Relief Society.

Millionaire Ida M. Valentine was a resident in the second half of the century.  Never married, like many wealthy employers, she developed a close connection with her loyal servants.  Upon her death on July 28, 1962, she bequeathed the bulk of her large estate to three charitable institutions.  But she did not forget her chauffeur of 23 years, Louis Reale.  Mr. Reale, who lived on West 191st Street, received "a tax-free bequest of $200,000," according to The New York Times, as well as "jewelry and personal property."  The cash inheritance would equal $2 million today.

image via streeteasy.com

By the mid-1980s, Columbia University had acquired 410 Riverside Drive as apartments for "postdocs, faculty and staff."  In 1999 the school restored the upper portion of the building, including the eye-catching gables.  Nina Siegal, writing in The New York Times on November 21, 1999, said, "The structure had needed repairs badly, and instead of just patching it up, the university hired a respected preservation firm, Wiss, Janney, Elstner Associates."  The architects used extant details to copy missing ornaments "and restore the roof to its original grandeur," according to Siegal.  It may have been during this renovation that the balconies were removed.

The Lost West End Theatre - 362 West 125th Street

image by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

During the 1896 St. Louis Republican National Convention, 34-year-old Meyer R. Bimberg came up with the idea of printing pictures of the candidates on tin buttons.  Hearing that McKinley and Hobart would get the nomination, he had 100,000 buttons made—the first political campaign buttons in history.  Later, his buttons that read "Our Choice for Governor" for candidate Theodore Roosevelt sold "like hot cakes," according to The New York Times.  Bimberg became widely known as "Bim the Button Man."

In 1898, Bimberg invested in real estate, erecting a public hall on the Lower East Side.  He would eventually erect five theaters throughout the city.  In 1902, he turned his focus to the what was then known as the West End, where there was a dearth of theaters.  He acquired the vacant lots at 362 through 370 West 125th Street, just west of Eighth Avenue and hired the architectural firm of Neville & Bagge to design a theater on the site.

Designed in the Spanish Baroque style, the tripartite design included a striated brick-and-terra cotta base dominated by a wide cast-iron-and-glass marquee.  The second and third floors were faced in beige brick.  The openings of the midsection were filled with colorful stained-glass, with the three center windows arranged in a Palladian configuration and crowned with elaborate terra cotta ornaments.  The frieze below the bracketed cornice announced West End Theatre.  A handsome balustrade completed the design.

Meyer R. Bimberg personally opened the theater on November 3, 1902.  The New York Times said it contained, "all the most improved electrical devices, superb interior appointments, and safeguards against fire."  The article continued:

From an artistic standpoint the new theatre will be attractive to the eye, the decorators having made effective use of the color scheme, maroon and green, which has been carried throughout the entire building.  The large, roomy chairs are covered with green velour, and the carpets of a rich maroon blending in pleasing harmony with the other decorations.

On each tier were "reception rooms" and below the lobby was a smoking and lounging room for male patrons.

Tickets ranged from 25 cents to $1 (roughly $10 to $40 in 2026).  Actress Alice Fischer appeared in Mrs. Jack on the theater's opening night.

Bimberg soon ran afoul of the Penal Code that prohibited entertainments on Sunday other than singing and concerts.  The New York Times blatantly said, "A general vaudeville show is usually given here which lasts until half-past 11 o'clock.  There are sketches, burlesques, all sorts of variety acts, including singing and monologues."  But during the week of January 3, 1903, the police warned the management "to comply strictly with the law."

Patrons packed the theater on Sunday January 11, 1903 to see the regular Sunday offering.  Instead, one singer after another came on stage.  The New York Times reported, 

Then some of the people began hissing and catcalls followed, women joining in until the theatre was in an uproar.  "Rank!" "Stale!" "Say, this is New York!" and other cries of derision greeted the singers."

The manager came on stage and explained the situation, saying finally, "Please blame the police and not me."  The entire audience eventually walked out.

The following month, on February 10, 1903, The New York Times reported that Bimberg had sold the West End Theatre to Weber & Fields for $300,000.  The comedy team of Joe Weber and Lew Fields had recently added theater management to their resumes.  The article noted that this was "their third theatre."  The partners said they would "carry out the present engagements" through the current season, but refused to say what the next year's attractions would be.

In fact, Bimberg had partnered with the pair to form the Bin-Web Corporation.  Bimberg still owned a portion of the property, but gave up its management.

image by Byron Company, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York.

A critic on the staff of The Theatre was pleased with the new management.  In its November 1903 issue, he said that under Weber & Fields the theater "is commodious and comfortable, handsomely furnished and decorated, and the attractions being among the best."  The plays, it said, "draws refined, intelligent audiences at Broadway prices."

Those refined and intelligent audiences were enjoying grand opera and concerts by the end of the year.  During the week of December 20, Weber & Fields presented a concert by the New-York Symphony Orchestra, and productions of Otello, La Traviata and Carmen in English.

New Yorkers were thrilled when Weber & Fields announced that Madame Adelina Patti would appear on November 27, 1903.  Arguably the most famous operatic soprano in the world, her appearance would guarantee a full house, but it would also take a huge chunk out of the ticket sales.

Fans waited an hour for the prima-donna to appear on stage.  While they waited, Patti "waited placidly in her apartments at the Savoy Hotel," reported The New York Times.  Her delay, said the article, "cost the audience a large share of its good temper."  The problem was a detail in the contract.  Adelina Patti insisted upon the payment of $5,000 "before she would budge one inch toward the stage of the West End Theatre," explained The Times.  But when the receipts were tallied, they totaled only $3,180.  The diva's agent told the manager, "Mme. Patti could not think of leaving the Savoy with only $3,180 in sight."  (The figure would translate to $117,000 today.)
Lew Fields was contacted and the $2,000 was sent to the theater.  

The concert went on, the audience was mollified, and Weber & Fields took a severe financial blow.  The next morning Adelina Patti headed off to San Francisco.  The New York Times said, "Mr. Fields was not to be seen, but sent out word that he was too overcome to speak."

In its May 1904 issue, The Theatre commented, "The West End Theatre is growing steadily in popularity, due to the astute policy which takes up to Harlem some of the best attractions seen on Broadway."  

Weber & Fields continued to mix grand opera and orchestral concerts with dramas and comedies.  On April 10, 1907, for instance, The New York Times announced that the Van den Berg Opera Company "will begin a Summer engagement at the West End Theatre on Monday, May 6, in grand and comic opera at popular prices."

The next year, Weber & Fields leased the theater to the Shubert brothers, Lee, Sam and Jacob.  They opened with John Mason in The Witching Hour on September 21, 1904.  The New-York Tribune noted, "It is the intention of the Messrs. Shubert to present here only first class productions, and they are to be varied."

Actress Marie Dressler opened here on February 24, 1913 with the Dressler's Players.  The audience might have been impressed with the 45-year-old woman's capabilities.  The playbill listed "The entertainment staged by Miss Dressler, curtains and decorations designed by Miss Dressler, costumes designed by Miss Dressler."  She also, of course, appeared in the troupe's production of Camille.  The New York Times remarked, "Miss Dressler proved that she had not forgotten how to hold an audience."

Renovations to a movie theater included a new marquee, blade sign, and the removal of the balustrade, seen here in 1929.  from the collection of the New York Public Library

On March 15, 1914, The Sun reported that the West End Theatre "will be dedicated from to-morrow on to the film plays."  The venture was short lived.  On February 11, 1915, International Music and Drama reported, "Taking heed of the signs of the times, and noticing that the craze for moving pictures is on the wane, and that there is a distinct interest in the revival of the stock company proposition, the management of the West End Theatre has decided to return to this policy."  The theater opened with Nobody's Widow.

In August 1919, the Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide reported that Bin-Web Corporation had leased the building to Marcus Loew.  As a nod to Meyer R. Bimberg, who died in 1908, he tweaked the named to Bim's West End Theatre.

On the night of November 6, 1921, manager Robert McNaab locked the theater and headed home with the evening's receipts.  The New York Times reported, "In a deserted district, McNaab said, someone struck him over the head."  Three men grabbed the package containing $1,500 and fled in an automobile.  The robbers were never found.

There were more than 800 patrons in the theater on the afternoon of June 20, 1940 watching The Shriek in the Night.  Suddenly, two large sections of the plaster ceiling 75 feet above them collapsed.  The New York Times said they "crashed atop of those in the front rows."  Six movie-goers were injured enough to be hospitalized.

By the early 1970s, the West End theater featured horror and action films.  New York Amsterdam News, September 16, 1972.

The West End movie theater closed in 1975.  It was acquired that year by the La Gree Baptist Church.  

The marquee and stained glass were gone when the church operated from the structure.  (photographer unknown)

Le Gree Baptist church remained in the building for four decades, selling it to a developer in July 2016.  On December that year, the Commercial Observer announced that Haim Nortman had filed plans for a commercial-residential structure on the site.

image via cityrealty.com

The William Sackett Jr. House - 123 East 10th Street

123 East 10th Street (left) is identical to its next door neighbor.

Once part of Director General Peter Stuyvesant's farm, or bouwerij, the block of East 10th Street between Second and Third Avenues saw an explosion of development in the early 185os.  Robert and Franny Carnley moved into a newly built house at 191 Tenth Street and in 1854 Robert erected two matching homes next door at 193 and 195 (they would be renumbered 123 and 125 East 10th Street in 1865).

Four stories tall and two bays wide above a low basement, their rusticated first floors held fully arched openings.  Full-width cast iron balconies fronted the second floor windows.  The red brick-faced upper floors featured elliptically arched openings with molded stone lintels.

Carnley originally rented 193 Tenth Street.  His first tenants were the family of James P. Harper, a grocer, who remained through 1857.  They were replaced by the Kendall family.  Merchant Joseph A. Kendall operated an enterprise at 30 Barclay Street and Rufus W. Kendall ran a dry goods business on Vesey Street.

On January 20, 1864, the Carnleys' daughter, Frances (known as Fanny), married William H. Sackett, Jr.  The couple initially moved into the Carnley house, but by 1866 they owned and occupied 123 East 10th Street next door.  Sackett operated a furniture business at 397 Eighth Avenue.

Like many families, the Sacketts took in a boarder.  Living with the family in 1868 was Luke Wisely.  He unwisely decided to take a swim in the East River at the foot of East 17th Street on July 2 that year.  The New York Times reported that he "undressed himself to bathe...and on jumping in struck his head on a rock, sustaining severe injuries."  Wisely was taken to Bellevue Hospital and it appears he recovered.

Later that year, in December, William and Fannie welcomed a son, Robert Carnley Sackett.  Tragically, the boy died at the age of one-and-a-half on June 23, 1870.  His funeral was held in the house two days later.  (The couple would have two other children, Emma Carnley and Isabel Thompson Sackett.)

The Sacketts left 123 East 10th Street in 1871, but retained ownership.  The Donoho family occupied it in 1872.  Sisters Mary and Margaret, who were 25 and 28 years old respectively, worked in Archer & Anderson's bookbindery at 81-85 Centre Street.

At 5:20 on the afternoon of Christmas Eve 1872, a fire broke out in the Centre Street building.  On December 26, The New York Times reported, "It was hoped that all had been rescued from the building by the firemen, police, and others, who were soon on the spot, but there now seems no reason to doubt that seven or eight persons lost their lives."  The girls' brother, John Donoho, searched at the Franklin Street Police Station and the Park Hospital for the women with no success.  Four days after the inferno, the New York Herald reported that the Donoho sisters were among the seven bodies still not recovered from the ruins.

The following year, the Barker family rented the house.  William H. Barker worked in City Hall, as did Edward P. Barker, who was a deputy park commissioner.  (Edward was appointed in 1858 with an annual salary of $480, or about $19,000 in 2026.)  William J. Barker listed his profession as a clerk in 1873, but ran a storage business on Washington Street by 1876.

The Barkers remained here at least through 1880.  The house saw a rapid succession of renters until Dr. Richard W. Muller moved in around 1892.  Born in 1860, he was considered a specialist in diseases of the scalp and hair.  

Muller originally rented at least one room in the house and his first tenant was Charles Moehling, described by The New York Times as "a well-educated and highly-cultured German."  Moehling was the head bookkeeper at the banking house of Ladenburg, Thalmann & Co. 

If Dr. Muller was hoping for engaging conversation with his roomer, he was disappointed.  The highly-private Moehling spent his evenings in his room, studying and writing.  He contributed several lengthy articles on finance and literature to local German-language newspapers.  Muller remarked later, "in all the time Mr. Moehling was in my house, I never exchanged five minutes' conversation with him.  He lived entirely to himself, like a hermit, almost."

On the morning of February 22, 1894, Moehling left home unusually early.  Instead of going downtown to his office, he went to Central Park.  Around 11:00 that morning, Park Policeman McKenna found the body of the 50-year-old in a clump of shrubbery.  He had shot himself in the left ear with a 32-calibre pistol.  Next to the dead man was a note that read,

My name is Charles E. Moehling, and I occupy a furnished room in the house of Dr. R. W. Muller, 123 East Tenth Street.  I desire that my body be taken to Charles Diehl’s undertaking shop in Essex Street.

No one could imagine why the bookkeeper had taken his life, although Dr. Muller noted, “The servant in the house said she had noticed him several times feeling his way about the house, as if he were losing his sight, and it may be because of his failing sight and utter friendlessness that led him to take his life.”

Dr. Muller had two roomers in 1895, attorney Reginald H. McMinn and Ellen M. Coe, the head librarian of the New York Free Circulating Library.  The New York Herald described Ellen as "a handsome woman of about 45."  She was appointed head librarian when the Free Library was organized years earlier.  While living here, she met one of Muller's well-respected patients, Dr. Joseph H. Rylance, rector of the nearby St. Mark's Church in the Bowery.

Rev. Rylance's wife died in 1885.  Now, on February 15, 1895, he announced that Ellen M. Coe "would shortly become his wife," as reported in the New York Herald.  The high-profile engagement was covered in several newspapers, resulting in a barrage of reporters rushing to the Free Circulating Library.  Ellen was ready for the onslaught.  When a reporter from The Evening World attempted to interview her, "a bright-eyed, rose-checked young woman" told him, "Miss Coe wishes me to say that she is very much distressed at the publicity given to her name, and she refers inquirers to the Rev. Dr. Rylance."

Ellen Coe's marriage resulted in a vacancy.  On August 16, 1895, an advertisement in the New-York Tribune read, "Cosily furnished rooms; one or two gentlemen; conveniences, private house; reasonable."

By 1899, Dr. Daniel Cook took over the lease of 123 East 10th Street.  An 1867 graduate of the University of New York, he advertised his office hours as 8 to 10 a.m. and 5 to 7 p.m.  Cook's reputation earned him a well-known clientele.  On April 14, 1899, for instance, the New York Journal and Advertiser reported that boxing manager Martin Julian was in "very critical condition with typhoid pneumonia."  The article said, "This famous promoter of pugilistic events is being attended by Dr. Cooke, of No. 123 East Tenth street."

Cook remained here until June 1904 when Frances Sackett sold the house to Bernhard Schneller.  (Schneller simultaneously purchased No. 125 from Henry H. and Harriet W. Holly.)  

Schneller's first tenant was yet another physician, Dr. Alfred H. Stiebeling.  Born in 1866, Stiebeling would create headlines three decades later.  His six-year-old granddaughter would die in 1927 and on July 12, 1937 The Berkshire Eagle would title an article, "Doctor Takes Poison at Grave of Granddaughter."

In the meantime, the respectability of some occupants of 123 East 10th Street had declined.  On June 1, 1914, the New York Press reported that George Borden had been arrested as one of the four men who committed a jewel heist from an Avenue A store.

Charles Kirchman rented a room here in December 1914.  He told the landlady that his name was William Dillon and that he had just lost his job with the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company.  (It is unclear why he disguised his identity.)  Three weeks later, Kirchman was still unable to find employment.  On January 25, 1915, he wrote a letter to his sister, saying in part, "My last prayer is that God will deliver my soul into a better world than the one I am leaving."  The next day, The Evening World reported, "His body was discovered to-day in the gas-filled room."

The following year, Julius Segletti occupied a room here.  On Saturday night, July 15, he took his sweetheart to a dance hall on East 8th Street.  As they prepared to leave, 22-year-old Carrol Marres approached and asked, "May I dance with your lady?"

Segletti replied, "She's too tired."

"But just one dance wouldn't harm.  May I?"

"No," replied Segletti.

Marres walked away.  Fifteen minutes later Segletti and his girlfriend left the hall.  As they walked along Avenue A between 7th and 8th Streets, Marres rushed up from behind.  He drove a knife into Segletti's head.  He died of a fractured skull in Bellevue Hospital.  Marres was captured the following day and Segletti's girlfriend, whose name was withheld, identified him as the murderer.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

Living here at midcentury was life-long bachelor Colonel Julian Fairfax Scott.  Born in Maryland in 1877, he was a member of the New York National Guard.  In 1909, he was appointed Cleaning Commissioner in charge of the Bronx.  He died in the house on November 14, 1953.

Scott was followed at 123 East 10th Street by Dr. Edward Campbell Berger and his wife, Ethel.  An osteopathic physician, Berger graduated from the Philadelphia College of Osteopathy.  During World War II he served with the U.S. Army in North Africa and Italy.  While living here he was with the administrative department of the Outpatient Service of the Osteopathic Hospital and Clinic of Le Roy Hospital.

Both 123 East 10th Street and his architectural twin have survived in remarkably pristine condition.

The venerable house was never converted to apartments and remains a single-family home today.  Its exterior appearance is essentially unchanged since 1854.

photographs by the author

The Evangelical Lutheran Savior (Sts. Kyril & Metodi Bulgarian Cathedral) 552 W. 50th St.

 

 

photograph by Farragutful

On the evening of September 4, 1887, fire broke out on the second floor of the tenement building at 552 West 50th Street.  The following day, the New-York Tribune wrote that the flames had spread throughout the five-story building "and early this morning were still burning fiercely."  Tenements in the Hell's Kitchen district like this one were crammed with indigent families.  The article said that fire department officials predicted "that not less than ten bodies were buried in the burning ruins."

Steinhardt & Son erected a "three-story brick ribbon factory" on the site.  A minor labor problem arose in the summer of 1893.  The Evening World reported that some union members "had been insulted at Steinhardt's factory, 552 West Fiftieth street, for refusing to work on Memorial Day."  

On October 1, 1897, Herman von Hollen purchased the building for $12,000 (about $468,000 in 2026).  The buyer was, more precisely, Reverend Herman von Hollen, rector of the Evangelische Lutheriske Heilands Kirche (Evangelical Lutheran Savior Church).  

Born in Hanover, Germany on December 1, 1852, Von Hollen was ordained in 1878.  He married Matilda Lomberg in 1890 and had seven children, three of whom died in childhood.  The Von Hollens relocated to New York City in 1896.  Rev. Von Hollen organized the congregation in March 1897, just seven months before purchasing the factory building.  He had chosen a hardscrabble neighborhood in which to minister, and his was the first Lutheran church in Hell's Kitchen.

Within a month of the purchase, Von Hollen had commissioned the architectural firm of Kurtzer & Rohl to renovate the factory into "a three story brick dwelling and mission house."  The renovations cost him the equivalent of $117,000 today.  The architects' focus was the interior and little of the building's exterior appearance was altered.  In his 1907 Genealogical and Family History of New York, William S. Pelletreau described the Lutheran church:

It is a brick edifice, neatly furnished, with a seating capacity of about four hundred.  The work of the church is in larger degree among a poor class of the German population.

By 1903, the church was known simply as the German Lutheran Christ Church.  The renovated factory is the light-colored brick structure toward the left.  Federation magazine, June 1903 (copyright expired)

The Von Hollen family, a caretaker, a maid, and a housekeeper occupied the upper floors.  

The ruffians of the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood were noted for their mischievousness, not their piety, as the newly-arrived German minister soon discovered.  On June 28, 1898, The New York Press reported that he defended himself before Magistrate Kudlich when he was accused by "half a dozen women" of abusing their children.  Von Hollen explained, "that he and his congregation were annoyed by children of the neighborhood, who howled around the church and threw stones and tin cans through the windows during services."

The mothers, "accused the minister of running out of the church and pulling the children's ears," said the article.  The magistrate sided with Von Hollen and dismissed the case, "but warned the women to be careful of their children's conduct hereafter."

Despite the magistrate's order, little changed.  Three years later, on May 18, 1901, The Evening World reported that Von Hollen had discovered two boys attempting to break into the church.  When he confronted them, John Ruck and Charles Kaiser, both 12 years old, pelted the minister with rocks.  It was a substantial assault.  The New York Morning Telegraph said that when Von Hollen appeared in court, "His scalp was furrowed by cuts and his clothing was gore [i.e., blood] stained."  But Rev. Herman von Hollen was what the newspaper described as, "One of the so-called 'turn the other cheek folk.'"  He begged Magistrate Zeller to "give the boys another chance," according to The Evening World.  Zeller told the delinquents that "were it not for Dr. Von Hollen's appeal...he would send them both to the House of Refuge."

Adolph Hernman worked as the caretaker of the property and lived in an upstairs room.  The German immigrant sported "a beard of patriarchal dimensions," as described by the New York Herald.  He, too, would become a target of neighborhood hooligans.  On August 15, 1905, he was walking along West 50th Street with a package when four boys "came up to him and asked for a match," as reported by the newspaper.  When he thrust his free hand into his pocket to get the match, "the four boys grabbed him.  Each one got a fistful of whiskers and the four pulled in different directions."

The reporter presumed that the prank was "exceedingly painful to the flesh, but more lacerating to the spirit."  Hernman found a policeman who "offered himself as the hook if Hernman would walk through the block again as bait."  And sure enough, within a few minutes one of the boys, 16-year-old Charles Kabish, attempted to grab the caretaker's beard.  The policeman rushed in and nabbed him.

The New York Herald reported, "Kabish wept a bucketful in court, but Magistrate Finn has seen boys cry before."  The teen was jailed for a day to spend "in meditation upon the evil of pulling whiskers and being caught at it."

In 1907, Rev. Herman von Hollen purchased a one-story brick church on Walton Avenue in the Bronx.  He retained ownership of the East 50th Street structure, and leased it to the Roman Catholic Church of St. Clemens and Mary.  The congregation occupied the building as it collected funds for its own structure.  On November 4, 1911, The New York Times reported that the St. Clemens and Mary congregation had purchased "two old residences" at 408 and 410 West 40th Street.  The article said, "a new edifice for the parish work is to be erected at once."

The new St. Clemens and Mary Church building was completed in 1912.  The consecration ceremony was held on May 26, but it went horribly awry.  The New-York Tribune headlined an article, "Crowded Stand at Church Collapses."  The article said that 3,000 persons panicked as the stands inside the church buckled.  Although 15 people were injured, some enough to be hospitalized, the ceremony went on.

Rev. Herman von Hollen now leased the West 50th Street building to the newly formed Saints Cyrillus and Methodius congregation.  It was founded by Franciscan friars to serve the increasing Croatian immigrant population.  The 1914 The Catholic Church in the United States of America recalled:

On October 16, 1913, this parish was formally established for the Croatians and entrusted to Rev. Ambrose Sirca, O.F.M.  An old church at 552 West 50th Street which was formerly used by St. Clemens' Polish congregation was obtained and dedicated to SS. Cyrillus and Methodius.

On New Year's Day, 1915, The New York Times reported that Von Hollen had sold the property to "St. Cyril and Methodius Catholic Church."  Now that the congregation owned the building, it set out to make it look like a proper church.  In April 1915, it commissioned architect Frederick J. Schwartz to remodel the structure.  The New York Herald reported that his plans  "consist of building an entire new front wall, new stairs to the choir, new vestibule, and an addition to the choir loft for a sanctuary and sacristy."  The renovations cost the equivalent of $483,000 today.

Schartz's neo-Gothic design gave nods to the Croatian congregation's roots.  Faced in beige brick and trimmed in sandstone, the facade was dominated by a two-story, Gothic-arched stained-glass window.  The copper-clad steeple atop a square, featureless base reflected traditional Southeastern European prototypes.

The main stained-glass window depicts Saints Cyril and Methodius.  photograph by Carole Teller

The renovated church was dedicated on September 30, 1915.  The New York Herald reported, "and it will be known henceforth as the Church of Sts. Cyril and Methodius."  The article noted, "This will be the church centre for more than five thousand Catholics who came to the United States from Croatia, in the southern part of Austria-Hungary."

Aloysius Viktor Stepinac was the Archbishop of Zagreb (in Croatia).  Stepinac was imprisoned by the Yugoslav Government in 1946 for accused treason.  Croatian-American citizens protested.  On October 12, 1948, The New York Times reported on the "two young women in Croat peasant costumes" and five young men who picketed the Yugoslav consulate on Fifth Avenue.  The article said, "The young women said they were members of the Stepinac Club of New York, connected with the Church of Sts. Cyril and Methodius of 552 West Fiftieth Street."

In 1974, the congregation of Sts. Cyril and Methodius merged with that of St. Raphael's Church on West 41st Street and moved into that building.  The East 50th Street structure empty sat until 1979, when it was purchased by the Bulgarian Eastern Orthodox Church.  The diocese made renovations, completed in 1984.  It was dedicated on May 12.

The following day, The New York Times reported that dozens of lay volunteers had "worked countless hours transforming a dilapidated church on the West Side of Manhattan into the showpiece of Bulgarian-American life in the New York metropolitan area."

photograph by Carole Teller

The article said that three artists, "who worked more than 70 hours a week on the project for the last two years," headed the group that embellished "nearly every square inch of the interior of the St. Kiril and Metodi Eastern Orthodox Church."  The main force behind the remodeling, including its financing, was 43-year-old Bulgarian immigrant Anton Russev.  The article said the painting was either done directly onto the plaster walls, or on panels in Russev's Lafayette Street studio.  An official of the Bulgarian Eastern Orthodox Church said this was the only structure in the United States "that has been decorated in traditional style with Eastern Orthodox icons."

photograph by Carole Teller

The congregation is still in the building with its riveting history.

many thanks to artist Carole Teller for suggesting this post.