The 1915 Burton Building - 267 Fifth Avenue

 

image via 267fifthave.com

The exclusive Calumet Club moved into the two brick-and-brownstone mansions at the northeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 29th Street in 1886.  The relentless expansion of the commercial district had forced the club's members to migrate northward and necessitated its relocation to 12 West 56th Street in 1914.  The following year, on April 17, 1915, the Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide reported that the combined Fifth Avenue mansions had been sold.  "The new owners will erect an eleven-story structure for their own occupancy," explained the article.

The owners were Frank V., John H. and Crawford Burton, and Howard F. Clark, partners in Burton Brothers & Co., "one of the largest cotton goods manufacturers in the country," as described by The New York Times.  Two months later, the architectural firm of Starrett & Van Vleck filed plans for a "fire-proof warehouse" to cost $350,000 (about $11.6 million in 2026 terms).  

Frank V. and John H. Burton were the heads of Burton Brothers & Co. and it is likely that they gave Starrett & Van Vleck significant input.  On July 4, 1915, The New York Times remarked that they "have long been prominent in the realty world for their partiality to high-class Fifth Avenue property."  

Despite the plan's initial description, the Burton Building was decidedly not a warehouse.  Completed in 1915, the architects designed it in a commercial take on Colonial architecture.  (The New York Times would later comment, "The architecture is a careful adaptation of the American Colonial to the requirements of a building of that type.")  Its three-story limestone base featured a double-height level arcade, the upper windows of which mimicked elegant fan lights.  The mid- and upper sections were clad in gray brick and two-story arches at the 10th- and 11th-floors echoed the base.  Most eye-catching was the brick crown of piers that supported a pergola.  That roof garden was almost assuredly the idea of the Burtons.  The New York Times described it on February 13, 1916:

One of its most attractive features is the main roof tiled throughout and inclosed [sic] on side and overhead with iron screens filled in with heavy wire mesh, affording all employes [sic] in the building a splendid recreation space for their noon hour.

from the collection of the New-York Historical Society

The Burtons did not forget themselves in planning the building.  The article said:

In addition to the roof garden an attractive parlor or rest room for the members of the firm has been provided in lieu of the usual pent house, to which a sleeping room is connected with baths, for the convenience of those who may be forced to work overtime in the rush period and thereby miss the customary train to the suburban homestead and family dinner.

Because the Church of the Transfiguration (known as the Little Church Around the Corner) sat directly behind the Burton Building, Starrett & Van Vleck was able to place "generous window space on all sides," as reported by The New York Times, "making it as attractive on the rear as on the street sides."

As The Times had pointed out, John H. Burton was, indeed, highly active in the protection of the district.  He was the chairman of the Save New York Committee in 1916, the goal of which was "to preserve the heart of the City, from 33rd to 59th Streets and from Third to Seventh Avenues, from destruction by factories and to rehabilitate the lower and deserted part of New York City."  (Five years later, the Save New York Committee would move its headquarters into the Burton Building.)

Burton Brothers & Co. did not occupy the entire building, and quickly tenants moved in.  Among them in the first years of the 1920s were the New York office of the Pennsylvania-based Eddystone Manufacturing, "finishers of fine fabric;" the Mohawk Glove Corporation, which occupied the entire top floor; the Waite Grass Carpet Company; and the Philadelphia-based Colonial Knitting Mills.

A Mohawk Glove Corporation ad included a depiction of the Burton Building.  The Glovers' Review, December 1921 (copyright expired)

Frank Vincent Burton, a founder of Burton Brothers & Co., was a widower with five children.  On November 20, 1919, at the age of 65, he married Claire Louise Hyllsted.  Less than three years later, on March 12, 1922, he died leaving an estate equal to $24 million today.  (Claire estimated it as being closer to $10 million, or $186 million today.)  Burton excluded Claire from his will and a long-fought and ugly legal battle soon began as Claire sued her five step-children. 

from the collection of the New York Public Library

In the spring of 1923, a branch of the Chemical National Bank opened in part of the ground floor.  At the time, the offices of the Silk Publishing Company were on the third floor; and S. Craig Preston & Company, dealers in "gift and art wares;" and the New York Office of Thos. L. Leedom Co., makers of rugs, were also in the building.

Bromley Manufacturing Company leased the second floor, engulfing 5,000 square feet, in 1925.  The Carpet and Upholstery Trade Review described the firm as "manufacturers of fringed lace curtains, fringed Lever and fringed silk curtains, novelty lace edge curtains, drapery nets, etc."  Another curtain firm, the newly formed Cooper & De Luna Corporation moved in in 1926.  The Decorative Furnisher explained that the firm distributed "ruffled and novelty curtains and damasks and light weight silks."

On September 4, 1930, The New York Times reported that architect C. B. French had been hired to make $7,000 in renovations.  It was most likely at this time that the roof garden and pergola were demolished.

As early as 1940, the rooftop structure had been removed.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

A minor tenant here in 1931 was Abraham Holtz, a wholesale jeweler who occupied an office on the eighth floor.  Holtz was alone in the office just before noon on August 22 that year when two young men barged in.  The New York Times reported that, "using their fists as their only weapons," the thugs "gagged him, tied his coat over his head and then collected eight watches, a bracelet, a platinum wedding ring and three unset diamonds."  The youths escaped with about $1,500 worth of jewelry.  

Burton Brothers, Inc. faced charges by the Federal Trade Commission in 1943.  The firm marketed its "Burton's Irish Poplin" to shirt manufacturers with a picture of a shamrock.  The FTC charged that the material "is represented to be made in Ireland or of Irish goods" while, in fact, "it is an American product."

The Burton Building continued to house, mostly, dry goods related tenants through the 1940s.  Among them were the Nassau Textile Company, the American Soil Sponge Selling Group, and the National Association of Bedding Manufacturers.

The second half of the century saw more corporate offices moving in.  In the 1950s and '60s, the law firms Levin, Rosmarin & Schwartz and Rothenberg, Levin, Cohen and Schwartz operated here, as did the consulting firms of Arthur Deutz, Inc. and Francis Wadsworth James.

In September 1980, the Burton Building was sold "to a foreign investment group headed by Dr. B. Bastiyali of Dusseldorf, West Germany, for $2.35 million," according to The New York Times.  A renovation completed in 1983 resulted in a "dry goods store" in the lower five floors and a "wholesale establishment" in the upper portion, including the new penthouse level, according to the Department of Buildings.

A recent photograph reveals the remodeled base and the glass-enclosed penthouse. image via 267fifthave.com 

A subsequent two-year renovation initiated in 2017 included  the remodeling of the ground floor.  Starrett & Van Vleck's arched openings were enlarged and squared off.  

many thanks to reader Doug Wheeler for prompting this post

The Lost Hoffstatter & Revillon Frères Bldg - 668-670 Fifth Avenue

To the left of the new building is the William K. Vanderbilt Jr mansion.  The Brickbuilder, November 11, 1916 (copyright expired)

On March 23, 1913, The New York Times began an article saying, "The business invasion of Fifth Avenue north of Forty-second Street goes on ruthlessly."  Sumptuous mansions were rapidly being replaced by commercial buildings.  The article reported, "Workmen last week began tearing down the big Gallatin house on the southwest corner of Fifty-third Street, purchased a short time ago by Michael Dreicer for over $1,000,000.  Two six-story business buildings are to be erected on the 50-foot Fifth Avenue frontage."  

Michael Dreicer was the son of Jacob Dreicer, who opened his jewelry business in 1868.  They are credited for bringing cut gems into fashion, surpassing pearls.  The younger Dreicer had now branched into real estate development with the Dreicer Realty Company.   He hired Henry Otis Chapman to design the side-by-side buildings.  Construction would cost $130,000 to erect, or about $4.4 million in 2026 terms.

Chapman's Francois I Revival design was intended to harmoniously co-exist on the block with the magnificent Petite Chateau, erected for William K. and Alva Vanderbilt, and 666 Fifth Avenue, the Willie K. and "Birdie" Oelrichs Vanderbilt mansion.  The Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide approved, calling 668-670 Fifth Avenue "one of the most attractive on the avenue, built in the Francois Premier style of architecture."

Like the two surviving mansions on the block, the buildings were faced in limestone.  The first and second floors of 668 Fifth Avenue were dominated by a vast, double-height show window capped by a French Gothic header and crocket.  Grouped windows at the third and fourth floors sat below square-headed drip moldings.  The steep mansard was fronted by a French Gothic dormer and crowned with lacy cast iron cresting.

The corner building continued many of those motifs--the double-height show window and the grouped openings at the third and fourth floors, for instance.  A row of ornate dormers lined the mansard on the 53rd Street side, and identical  rooftop cresting visually unified the structures.

No. 668 had been leased before the first shovel broke ground.  Nearly two weeks before The New York Times article, on March 10, 1913, The Furniture Trade Review reported that Theodore Hofstatter & Co. had "closed negotiations" for leasing the building "for a term of twenty-one years."  The article noted, "Hofstatter & Co., are in the interior decorating and furniture business, are now located at 589 Fifth avenue."

The buildings were completed in 1914 and very quickly the Hofstatter Building was the center of excitement.  On May 19, 1914, an alarm "brought the firemen to the home of Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt, Jr., at 666 Fifth Avenue," reported The New York Times.  The Vanderbilts were at their summer estate and heavy smoke was seen pouring out of one of the chimneys.

The Vanderbilts' caretaker notified the responding firefighters that there was no fire.  "About ten minutes later the blaze was discovered in the building occupied by Hofstatter & Co.," said the article.  "Decorators had been working on the fifth floor, and in some manner, a curtain became ignited."  Happily, the fire was extinguished before it could spread.  The New York Times said, "More than $500,000 worth of art treasures are in the building."

It would be nearly a year before the corner building was leased.  On February 6, 1915, the Record & Guide reported that Revillon Frères had leased "the new six-story building" for 21 years.  Revillon Brothers established its fur company in 1723.  Now known as Revillon Frères, it was a leading retailer and manufacturer of luxury furs and accessories.

The New York Times, September 26, 1915 (copyright expired)

Both firms sublet space in their buildings, with most of the tenants being in the arts or decorating business.  One notable exception was the Sonora Phonograph Corp.  On July 25, 1915, the New York Herald reported that the firm "has leased salons at 668 Fifth Avenue adjoining the Vanderbilt residence, for demonstration rooms."  

A Sonora Phonograph ad in December 1915 depicted the entire blockfront. The Pharmaceutical Era (copyright expired)

Also in 668 Fifth Avenue at the time was the Kent-Shmayon Galleries.  The firm dealt in imported art and antiques, like Persian faience, rare manuscripts, Chinese porcelains, and Spanish, Italian and English antique furniture.  Not long after its opening, it was the target of two slick thieves.  On December 1, 1914, Joseph Hess and "another well-dressed man" entered the Kent-Shmayon Galleries "to look at some antiques," reported The New York Times, "and carried off jewelry valued at $7,900."  (The heist would equal $261,000 today.)  Hess, who was known to police as "the man with many aliases," was captured in Indianapolis on January 6, 1915.

Unfortunately, the war in Europe disrupted the firm's ability to import goods.  On February 27, 1915, The Evening Post reported, "The Kent-Shmavon Galleries, 668 Fifth Avenue, have been forced by present conditions, due to the war, to close their galleries."  A six-day liquidation auction began on March 1.  The article said, "Altogether there are nearly fourteen hundred items now on exhibition."

via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

On March 2, the New-York Tribune reported on the first day's sales, saying, "Lovers and students of Eastern art filled the large ground floor salon."  The article noted, "Lillian Russell was an interested and liberal buyer.  She obtained, among other things, an Asia Minor silk rug."  Other items that were sold that day was a "Persian carpet of Kerman weave" which sold for the equivalent of $19,500 today, and a "Persian Goerevan carpet with a camel's hair field" that brought nearly the same amount.

The Bourgeois Galleries replaced the Kent-Shmavon Galleries in the building.  The art dealers catered to wealthy patrons.  Somewhat ironically, one of its first exhibitions was the private collection of Albert Eugene Gallatin's paintings and graphic art.  Certainly many of the artworks had hung in his family's mansion on the site.

The gallery's firm reputation did not require anything other than a dignified, understated ad.  The Arts, August-September 1921 (copyright expired)

Other tenants in the buildings in the 1920s, along with Hoffstatter and Revillon Frères, of course, were Stair & Andrew and the Kingore art gallery.  Stair & Company, which occupied space on the fourth floor of 668 Fifth Avenue, specialized in old English furniture, paneling, tapestries, and antique mantelpieces. 

By the mid-1920s, John D. Rockefeller Jr. owned 668 and 670 Fifth Avenue.  On February 16, 1928, The New York Times reported that he was erecting a six-story building on the southwest corner of Fifth Avenue and 54th Street and that it "will be occupied under lease by Revillon Frères, furriers."  The firm was replaced by Raymond & Whitcomb, Inc., which made "extensive alterations," according to The New York Times on June 6, 1929.

Raymond & Whitcomb, Inc. was a travel agency.  In 1934, the Museum of the University of Pennsylvania loaned the firm eight items from its collection of Central American relics to display.  It did not end well.  Three items, a gold sacrificial cup, two Zapotec funerary urns, and a solid gold breastplate, were displayed in the show window.  On June 5, The New York Times reported, "A stone hurled through the show window of Raymond-Whitcomb, Inc...at some time early yesterday morning, enabled a thief to obtain a rare Mayan relic worth $5,000."  The stolen relic was the sacrificial gold cup.  The stone that smashed the window also broke one of the urns.

from the collection of the New York Public Library

In October 1938, John D. Rockefeller Jr. filed plans to replace the buildings with "a new nine-story office building," as reported by The New York Times.  Something derailed those plans, however.  Two years later, Theodore Hoffstatter & Co. moved to its own newly built structure at 9 East 56th Street.  Lanz Inc., took over the lease of 668 Fifth Avenue for its clothing store.

In June 1945, Doubleday, Doran, Inc. opened a bookstore in the basement, first and second floors of 670 Fifth Avenue.  The following year, Russell Stover Candies took over the first and second floors next door.  

The Doubleday book shop was the scene of a raid on August 8, 1946.  Responding to a complaint by the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice, four plainclothes detectives entered and "removed 130 copies of Edmund Wilson's book of short stores, 'Memoirs of Hecate County,'" as reported by The New York Times.  Blotter entries at the West 54th and East 51st Street station houses called the books, "salacious and lascivious literature."  While the Society called the book "obscene," The New York Times said, "virtually all reviewers regarded it as a serious literary work."

Just before demolition in 1955, the Russell Stover signage covered the 2nd-floor show window of No. 688 and the iron cresting was gone.  Supreme Court evidence photo May 1957.

In 1955, Russell Stover Candies announced it would be moving into the Gotham Hotel.  The move was no doubt prompted by the sale of 668 and 670 Fifth Avenue for redevelopment.  On February 13, The New York Times reported that a 36-story office building designed by Carson & Lundin would replace the buildings from 52nd to 53rd Street.  Demolition of the structures began that April.  

many thanks to reader Doug Wheeler for prompting this post

Van Wart & Wein's 40 Fifth Avenue

 

image via landmarkbranding.com

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

photograph by Beyond My Ken

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

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

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

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

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

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

Justice Joseph Force Crater (original source unknown)

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

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

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

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

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

photograph by Spencer Means

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

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

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

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

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

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

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

image via cityrealty.com

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

The Lost Gerard W. Morris Mansion - 25 Fifth Avenue

The Morris house is in the center of the frame.  photograph from the collection of the New York Public Library.

Born on July 11, 1799, Gerard Walton Morris had a sterling American pedigree.  His grandfather was Lewis Morris, a United States Senator, a Founding Father, and the last Lord of Morrisania Manor.  His grandmother was Mary Beekman Walton, who came from two distinguished Colonial families. Gerard's father, Richard Valentine Morris, was Commodore of the U.S. Navy and a member of the New York Assembly.

Gerard W. Morris married Martha Pyne on October 8, 1827.  Within the subsequent decade, mansions began appearing along lower Fifth Avenue, sparked by the construction of the Henry and Laura Brevoort house on the northwest corner of Fifth Avenue and West 9th Street in 1834.  Six years later, the Morris family were living in their new brownstone mansion at 25 Fifth Avenue, across from the Brevoorts.

The Drake Mills mansion next door at 23 Fifth Avenue sat upon two building plots, affording a capacious side garden.  Although less sumptuous than the homes of the Brevoort and the Mills families, the Morris house held its own in fashion and luxury.  Four stories tall above an English basement, its cast iron stoop railings sat atop stepped wing walls.  Typical of the Greek Revival style, the entrance was flanked by stone pilasters that upheld a layered entablature.  Also typical was the squat fourth floor that supplanted the dormered, peaked attic of the Federal style, which was quickly becoming passé.  

When the couple moved into their new home, they had eight children.  A ninth, Arthur Rutherford, would arrive in 1846.  The family's country estate was in Morristown, New Jersey.

Gerard Walton Morris (original source unknown)

Tragically, two of the Morris children died in 1850--Anne Walton died on February 22 at the age of 20, and Richard Valentine died the following month, on the 24th, at the age of 11.  The next year, on August 28, Isabella died at the age of 23.

Honora S. Morris was 21 years old in 1852.  Her wedding to wealthy stockbroker Francis Julius Baretto was held in the Church of the Ascension on May 5 that year.  The newlyweds lived in the Fifth Avenue house and at their summer estate, West Farms, in Westchester County.

Honora Morris Barretto (original source unknown)

The church was the scene of another, more somber Morris ceremony the following month.  On June 9, the New York Evening Express reported that Mary Pyne Morris, "wife of Gerard W. Morris of this city, and daughter of the late John Pyne of South Carolina," had died at the age of 46.  Her funeral was held in the Church of the Ascension on the 10th.

The population of the Fifth Avenue mansion quickly grew.  Gerard Morris Barretto, Annie Barretto and Frances Baretto were born in 1853, 1854 and 1857 respectively.  Sadly, little Annie would die two months before her second birthday on September 28, 1856.

(Unusual for the time, none of the many Morris family's funerals were held in the Fifth Avenue parlor, but at the Church of the Ascension.)

The parlors were the scene of a joyous occasion on December 19, 1854 when Mary Morris (known as Minnie) was married to Jonathan Edwards.  (Gerard W. Morris would attend yet another funeral of one of his children three years later when Minnie died at the age of 22.)

In August 1865, Gerard Walton Morris was at West Farms, the summer home of the Barrettos, when he died on July 19 at the age of 67.  His funeral was held in St. Ann's Church in Morrisania, once the familial estate of his ancestors.

Honora Barretto died at the age of 35 in 1866 and Francis Barretto and his children left 25 Fifth Avenue shortly after.  Still living here were bachelor brothers Gerard Walton Morris Jr., who was a lawyer; Henry Walton Morris, and John Pyne Morris.  Their only other surviving sibling was Reverend Arthur Rutherford Morris.  John Pyne Morris had served in the Civil War, attaining the rank of captain.  He would die in 1868.

from the collection of the New York Public Library

The Morris brothers leased their childhood home to Sophia Dye, the widow of George Dye, in 1871.  She operated it as a high-class boarding house, taking in only a handful of boarders at a time.  Among them that first year was merchant James S. Chappel, who would remain at least through 1874.

Sophia Dye continued to lease the mansion until 1881, when it was rented by attorney Henry C. Bowers and his wife, the former Estelle Durant.  In September 1884, Estelle's parents, Charles C. and Margaret L. Durant, moved into the mansion with the couple.  Now retired, Charles had been a banker and the president of the Rock Island Railway.  The New York Times said he had "accumulated a large fortune" and was "now estimated to be worth far more than a million dollars."

The Durants, most likely, moved in with their daughter and son-in-law because Charles was exhibiting an "unsound mind," or what today we would recognize as the symptoms of dementia.  Four months after moving in, in December 1884, Margaret L. Durant died in the residence.

In the spring of 1885, a court deemed Durant incompetent to handle his financial affairs.  Two weeks later, on March 24, Estelle's brother, Howard M. Durant, visited.  He told her that he would like to take their father on a drive.  In fact, he essentially kidnapped him.  Charles Durant never returned to 25 Fifth Avenue and he died the following month.  A bitter court battle among the siblings erupted, each word followed closely by the newspapers.

Around 1895, General Daniel Edgar Sickles purchased and moved into the former Drake Mills house with his wife, Carmina.  At the same time, he purchased 25 Fifth Avenue and rented it to Charles Runyon and his wife, the former Isabel Mercein Fitz Randolph.  

from the collection of the New York Public Library

Born on March 4, 1837, Charles Runyon had a long career in the coal business.  He had been secretary and treasurer of the Superior Mountain Coal Company and was instrumental in organizing the Hoboken Coal Company.  He then founded and was president of the Communipaw Coal Company.  He and Isabel were married in 1864 and they had a daughter and three sons, one of whom, Carmen Randolph, moved into the mansion with his wife, Helen O. Wiley.

Charles Runyon died in the house on October 13, 1903.  Isabel remained in the house with her son and daughter-in-law at least through 1908.  

By 1910, the mansion was once again operated as a high-end boarding house.  The names of the select residents, like the O. Webers, here in 1911, appeared in Dau's New York Blue Book of high society.

By then, Daniel E. Sickles was experiencing money problems.  On October 11, 1912, The New York Times said he had "become involved in further financial difficulties," and reported that he was was far behind in his mortgage payments on the two properties and "owed $11,000 for three years' taxes."  Finally, on August 1, 1914, the newspaper reported that both properties had been sold at auction.  The article disclosed that the corner property "brought $104,850," and 25 Fifth Avenue "went for $37,400."  (The price paid for the former Morris mansion would translate to about $1.2 million in 2026.)

In October 1916, Oak Point Corporation purchased the two properties along with 1 East 9th Street and 27 Fifth Avenue.  They were demolished for a 13-story apartment house completed in 1921, which survives.

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

The Lost Rebecca Mason Jones Mansion - 705 Fifth Avenue

 

from the collection of the New York Public Library

John Mason began his career as a dry goods merchant and branched into banking and railroads.  (He was the second president of the Chemical Bank and a founder of New York City's first railroad, the New York & Harlem.)  In 1825, he purchased several acres of rocky terrain north of the city in what would become Midtown Manhattan.  Three of Mason's daughters married into the socially prominent Jones family.  Mary, the eldest, married Isaac Jones; Rebecca married his cousin, Isaac Colford Jones; and Serena married George Jones.

Mason died in 1839 but his will was tied up in court for 15 years.  Heirs, including Mary Mason Jones, charged that as he was dying, unscrupulous relatives (including Rebecca and her husband) propped him into a sitting position, tied him between a chair in the back and a board in front to keep him from slumping over and forced his signature.  Finally, in 1854, the case was settled and the midtown property divvied up.  Mary Mason Jones received the vacant land between Fifth to Park Avenue and 57th to 58th Streets.  Rebecca inherited a like amount--Fifth to Park Avenue between 55th and 56th Streets.

Both women were widows.  In 1867, Mary Mason Jones commissioned Robert Mook to design a striking row of marble-faced mansions on Fifth Avenue between 57th and 58th Streets, anchored by her own home at 1 East 57th Street.  Rebecca Jones followed suit, hiring architect Detlef Lienau in 1869 to fill the blockfront from 55th to 56th Streets with resplendent Second Empire-style mansions. 

Lienau had come to New York from Paris in 1848.  Called by the Columbia Spectator decades later in 1936 as "the first architect with Paris training to practice in the United States after Colonial times" and a "leading architect of the period," he was instrumental in introducing the Second Empire style to America.  By now, he had designed the mansions of millionaires like Hart M. Shiff at 32 Fifth Avenue, William C. Schermerhorn at 49 West 23rd Street, and John Jacob Astor III at 338 Fifth Avenue.

 

Lienau designed the eight, five-story mansions in an A-B-A-B-B-A-B-A configuration, the mansards of the A models rising slightly higher than those of the others.  Unlike Mary Mason Jones's marble row, Lienau faced these with "Ohio stone," a type of sandstone.  The 1881 New York Illustrated said that, rather than the ubiquitous brownstone in New York City, this gave the homes "the happy union of lightness with the ideal of mass and dignity."  It said the mansions had a "genial, homelike aspect."

(Interestingly, Rebecca's niece, author Edith Jones Wharton, did not agree.  In an article in Harper's Weekly in 1938, she called the row, "a block of pale greenish limestone houses (almost uglier than the brownstone ones)."

Rebecca Colford Jones initially lived in 705 Fifth Avenue, at the far right.  from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York.

Like her sister had done, Rebecca retained the southernmost mansion, 705 Fifth Avenue, for herself.  Her country homes were in Saratoga, New York and Newport, Rhode Island.  Rebecca retained possession of the entire row, reserving two of the homes for the use of her children, Helen and Lewis Colford.  Helen and her husband, Woodbury Langdon, moved into the mansion at the far end of the block; and Lewis and his wife Catharine, moved into No. 707. 

Rebecca's townhouse was the scene of the dowager socialite's polite entertainments.  In 1873, for instance, The Daily Graphic reported on her "rose-bud party."  (The term "rose-bud" referred to debutantes.)  The young women would meet "a select company of gentlemen," and each would receive a bunch of rosebuds.

In 1880, The New York Sun described the entertainments within Rebecca's home, saying that "many luxuries and delicacies, as well as many European forms of entertainment, were introduced which had been unknown to the thrift and simplicity of our grandfathers."

Rebecca Mason Jones died in 1879.  On February 15, the New-York Tribune reported that she left Helen Langdon "the east side of Fifth-ave., from Fifth-fifth to Fifth-sixth-sts."  Rebecca had been concerned that her heirs would break up the handsome row.  She wrote in her will:

It has long been a favorite idea with me that this property should be kept together, both because it was so derived by me from my father, and because it is my judgment that is can be more advantageously improved for future uses if held entire than if I were to divide it by my will.

Sydney Colford Jones was Rebecca's grandson, the only son of Lewis Colford Jones and Catherine Berryman.  Soon after his grandmother's death, the 26-year-old applied to the courts to change his name to Sydney Jones Colford.  On May 27, 1879, the New-York Tribune explained, "the reasons for the change assigned by the applicant...were that the surname Jones was too common to properly distinguish any one hearing it."

These interior shots do not identify the particular mansion within the row.  from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York.

While his widowed mother remained at 707 Fifth Avenue, Sidney and his wife, the former Laura Chartrand, moved into No. 705.  In the spring of 1881, The New York Times reported the heart-wrenching story of "Madani, the poor Arab in the New-York Hospital."  The article initiated donations from New Yorkers.  On May 11, the newspaper reported that a donor who signed his name "a New-Yorker" had sent in $2, and "Lately, a lady, who had also read in The Times about the poor refugee, left him $15."  The article continued, "Mr. Sidney [sic] C. Colford, of No. 705 Fifth-avenue, told the hospital authorities that if there was not a sufficient amount of money contributed for paying Madani's passage home he would make up the balance out of his own pocket."

As early as 1887, Margaret A. Oliver was operating 705 Fifth Avenue as an exclusive boarding house.  Also living in the mansion were her son, William B. Oliver, Jr. and his wife, the youngest daughter of multi-millionaire John W. Masury.  The upscale operation was reflected in her testimony in 1889 when she said:

About the 1st of May 1 [1888] I let [rooms] to Prof. Rees...In the family of Prof. Rees were a gentleman, wife, two children, and maid, five persons.  Prof. Rees paid $45 a week for the whole family.

The weekly board would equal $1,530 in 2026. When asked how she would describe her board (i.e, the food she supplied her guests) she replied, "First class.  Better than a hotel, there is nothing better than I would buy.  Yes, it was as good as a first class hotel board, yes."

Among Mrs. Oliver's boarders in 1887 was Rev. Sullivan H. Weston.  The unmarried cleric was born in Bristol, Maine on October 7, 1816 and had been assistant rector of St. John's Chapel since 1852.  In 1886 he developed a tumor, but only his physician was aware of it.  On the morning of October 3, 1887, "he arose before breakfast, left the house at 705 Fifth-avenue, where he was boarding," reported The New York Times, "and went to a private hospital."  That afternoon, he underwent an operation.  The surgery seemed to have been successful and The Sun reported, "He sent word daily to his boarding house at 705 Fifth avenue of his progress toward recovery."

But then, on October 15, the newspaper reported, "Last Tuesday, however, lockjaw set in, with fatal results."  The Sun commented that his friends "were shocked by the news of his death."  Extensive obituaries of the esteemed cleric were published in numerous newspapers.

Helen Jones Langdon died in 1895 and the Fifth Avenue block was inherited by her son, Woodbury Gersdorf Langdon.  On November 24, 1896, The New York Times reported that he was doing $4,000 worth of "alterations" to 705 Fifth Avenue.  He leased his grandmother's former mansion to railroad mogul Edward H. Harriman and his family.  Born in 1848, Harriman married Mary Williamson Averell in 1879 and they had six children (including William Averell Harriman who would become Secretary of Commerce under President Harry S. Truman, Governor of New York, U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union and to Britain.)  The family's country estate, Arden, was near Tuxedo, New York.

On March 19, 1910, The New York Times reported a shocking development.  "The Woodbury G. Langdon house, No. 705 Fifth avenue, was leased...to Eugene Glaenzer & Co., art dealers.  That was the first business invasion of this part of Fifth avenue."  

 

The Evening Post, November 29, 1910 (copyright expired)

In remodeling the mansion for commercial purposes, Langdon created a charming outdoor area with a fountain in his grandmother's rear yard for Glaenzer & Co.

The Air-Scout, January 1911 (copyright expired)

Langdon continued to garner upscale tenants for the property.  In 1912, Bagues Freres Co., a decorative ironwork designer and manufacturer, moved in.

Architecture & Building, November 1912, (copyright expired)

In what most likely would have troubled Rebecca Jones, on December 5, 1912, The New York Times reported that Woodbury G. Langdon had recently erected an apartment house "on the Fifth-sixth Street portion of the block."  Now, said the article, he had sold the entire blockfront to the Number 705 Fifth Avenue Corporation.  (What it did not mention was that Langdon was its president.)

This photograph around 1912 shows Langdon's new buildings on the northern part of the block.  Only a sign for Eugene Glaezner & Co. discreetly placed on the 55th Street side of the Jones house hints that it is no longer a private mansion.  photograph by George P. Hall, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York.

The Rebecca Mason Jones mansion remained, relatively intact, until it and the houses at 707 through 711 Fifth Avenue were demolished for the National Broadcasting Company Building, which survives.

photograph by the author