Having trained in the architectural firm of Duggin & Crossman, Charles Buek established Charles Buek & Co. in 1880. The development-construction firm doubled as its own architect. Within a decade, Charles Buek & Co. was one of the most well-known firms in the industry. On February 21, 1891, the Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide reported that the firm "will shortly commence the erection of six four-story brick and limestone front dwellings on the south side of 87th street, 100 feet east of Columbus Avenue."
Completed in 1892, Nos. 40 through 50 West 87th Street were designed in a refined version of Romanesque Revival. No. 44 West 87th Street was twenty-three-feet wide, and its basement and parlor levels were clad in rough cut limestone. A dog-legged box stoop mirrored that of its next door at No. 46. The two-story midsection was faced in brick. Grouped windows at the second floor were framed in limestone, distinguished by pilasters with ornate Corinthian capitals. The fourth floor sat atop an intricately carved cornice. Its slightly projecting center section held paired openings. Their limestone frame was anchored by large, swirling volutes. Directly above was a triangular pediment with a charming daisy rondel.
James and Euphemia Russell purchased the mansion from Charles Buek in February 1893 for $44,500, or about $1.4 million in 2026 terms. Born in 1827 and 1841 respectively, the couple had four children, Marguerite, George Dunlap, May Isabelle, and Rachel (known as Ray) MacMaster. The family's country home, Sunny Side, was near Mount Vernon, New York.
George, who had married the previous year, was the only sibling who did not move into the West 87th Street house. May and Ray were single, and Margaruerite was married to her father's business partner, Charles S. Rees. The men composed James Rees & Sons, Co., "boiler, engine and steamboat builders," and Russell & Rees, which operated the Continental Brewery.
Charles S. Rees was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on December 5, 1860. He graduated from Western University of Pennsylvania.
Described by The New York Times later as the Russells' "palatial residence," 44 West 87th Street was filled with valuable artwork and antiques. An inventory held in 1906 described "a valuable collection of Oil Paintings, comprising about one hundred canvases, many by prominent American and Foreign artists." The parlor, or "salon," was furnished in "Marie Antoinette and Louis Seize," and the music room in Louis XVI.
The Russell women were highly involved in the Woman's Wards of the New York Post-Graduate Hospital. Margaruerite Rees was president, Ray MacMaster Russell was secretary and treasurer, and Euphemia was an associate member.
Just two years after purchasing 44 West 87th Street, James Russell died.
Isabelle married Isaac Hallam Jenney in 1898. (The bride was 17 and the groom 26.) The couple moved into the West 87th Street mansion. Isaac Jenney was born in 1871 "in the American consular residence at Bogata, Columbia," as explained by the New York Herald, and graduated from Yale in 1892. When he married May, he was working as an importer. Two years later, on February 24, 1900, Marie Jenney was born.
Society was abuzz in the spring of 1902 when Ray MacMaster Russell's engagement to millionaire Hector H. Havemeyer was announced. The ceremony was to be held in the Madison Avenue Reformed Church and The New York Times said it "will be a large wedding." And, indeed, on April 17 the New York Herald headlined an article, "Miss Ray Russell Becomes A Bride / Throng at Church to See Ceremony Which Made her Mrs. Havemeyer." A who's-who of high society attended the ceremony, including Goulds, Gilseys, Ballards and Mackays.
Before long, Havemeyer, his friend, Peter Gilsey, and Isaac Hallam Jenney formed the real estate company, Gilsey, Havemeyer & Jenney.
The extended family left 44 West 87th Street in 1902, although Euphemia retained possession. She leased the house for the winter social season of 1902 to author and playwright Frances Hodgson Burnett. In her 1927 biography, The Romantick Lady (Frances Hodgson Burnett), Vivian Burnett writes, "Situated in the middle of the block, it was far enough from heavy traffic to give Mrs. Burnett something of the quiet she needed."
Frances Burnett posed for photographer Herbert Rose Barraud in 1886 (copyright expired)
Born in 1848, Burnett had written the children's novel Little Lord Fauntleroy in 1886. She would later produce two other popular children's works, the 1905 A Little Princess and The Secret Garden, released in 1911.
The following year, Euphemia leased 44 West 87th Street to Ernest Benjamin Fahnestock and his wife, the former Abby Caroline Rhodes. Fahnestock was the vice-president and general manager of the Fahnestock Transmitter Co.
Not surprisingly, when Euphemia Russell placed the house for sale in 1906, it was handled by Gilsey, Havemeyer & Jenney. The property was sold to Dr. Abram Richard Stern and his wife, the former Stella Lichtenstein, in May.
Born on July 21, 1874, Stern was a graduate of Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons. He additionally studied in Berlin and Vienna. At the time of the purchase, he was Adjunct Assistant Attending Physician at Mt. Sinai Hospital. He and Stella had two children, Richard and Stella Benita.
Stern's patients ranged from theatrical to society figures. In December 1907, for instance, he was called to the home of actress Julia Sanderson (who was in private life Mrs. Tod Sloan). Sanderson had been appearing in The Dairy Maids even though she was feeling unwell. Finally, she could not continue. On December 3, The New York Times reported that Stern "diagnosed the case as typhoid." And when the young and wealthy socialite Mrs. George A. Oppenheimer committed suicide on October 19, 1913, it was Dr. Stern who was call to the scene.
image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services
Among the Sterns' domestic staff in 1919 was their governess, 60-year-old Clarice Deckwis. She left the house on the evening of October 7 and did not return. At the corner of 106th Street and Fifth Avenue, Clarice had been hit by an automobile and seriously injured. She was still unconscious in Mt. Sinai Hospital the following night when Dr. Stern identified her. She had suffered a fractured skull and three broken ribs.
The Sterns remained at 44 West 87th Street until September 1940, when they sold the house to Joseph Kamert for $40,000 (about $894,000 today).
It appears that Kamert rented rooms in the former mansion, and among his first tenant was Paul Bante. The 44-year-old iron worker was born in Germany, but was a naturalized American citizen. Bante brought nationwide attention to 44 West 87th Street when The New York Times reported on July 1, 1941 that he had been arrested as a member of a German spy ring. He and 32 others were indicted 15 days later, accused "of having acted as agents" for the Nazi Government. The New York Sun reported on January 2, 1942, that he had been sentenced to 18 months in a Federal penitentiary and a fine of $1,000.
A renovation completed in 2011 resulted in an office in the basement level and eight apartments in the upper floors.
photographs by the author
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