The Robt. L. Livingston Mansion - No. 12 East 96th Street

A sidewalk shed testifies to interior work in late 2016.

Robert Linlithgow Livingston’s family was among the oldest and most respected in New York.  His first ancestor in America, Robert Livingston the Elder, arrived in Albany in 1674.  The family estate, Livingston Manor along the Hudson River, was expanded until it was larger than the state of Rhode Island.

In 1892, at the age of 18, Livingston entered the banking firm of Kountze Brothers as a clerk.  His position there was bolstered when he married Helen Kountze in Grace Church on December 12, 1902.   In January 1904 he was admitted as a general partner.  Tragically, just one month later Helen died.

The young widower moved into the mansion of his aunt, the Countess Henri de Longier-Villars at No. 311 Fifth Avenue.  Following the expected period of mourning, he resumed the life of a bachelor millionaire.  On one trip to Europe very old money would meet the very new.

Massive fortunes from silver, gold and copper were being made in the Far West.  The wives and daughters of these new millionaires struggled for acceptance by East Coast socialites who most often viewed them as nouveau riche and uncultured.  And so the wife of Dennis Sheedy, Director of the International Smelting Company in Denver, had their two daughters, Marie and Florence, educated in a convent school and took them on extensive trips to Europe.

It was on one such trip and Robert L. Livingston met Marie Sheedy, known by newspaper readers as “the richest girl in Denver.”  A romance bloomed and Marie’s mother seems to have grasped the opportunity.  A telegram to The New York Times from Denver in 1911 noted “Although the Sheedy home is in Denver, the family have spent a great part of the Winter season at the Plaza, in New York, during the past few years.”

After Robert and Marie were “seen frequently” at social affairs and despite the difference in their ages (Livingston was now 34 and Marie was “in her early twenties”), their engagement was announced in December 1910.  The Times mentioned that she “is popular among the younger set in New York” and “attended nearly all of the dances and entertainments given by the younger society girls in New York.”

The couple was married in the Sheedy mansion in Denver on February 15, 1911; a local newspaper calling it “one of the most fashionable ever held in Denver.”  The article noted “The wedding gifts were magnificent, including a residence in New York and a rope of pearls to the bride from her father, who is a mining man.”

Livingston’s remarriage seems to have caused tensions at Kountze Brothers, and he resigned upon his return from the honeymoon.  In 1912 he became general partner in the newly-organized brokerage house of Adams, Livingston and Davis.

The Manhattan house presented by Dennis Sheedy was a vintage brownstone at No. 41 East 75^th Street.  But by the spring of 1916 the couple anticipated a modern home.  On May 27 that year the Record & Guide noted that Livingston had purchased property on the south side of East 96^th Street, near Central Park, “and contemplates the erection of a handsome five-story residence.”

Seven months later, in December 1916, Odgen Codman, Jr. filed plans for the $60,000 mansion.  The architect and designer had completed his own Parisian-styled mansion almost directly across the street, at No. 7 East 96^th Street, in 1913.  His vision for the block was an enclave of picturesque French residences; and when Livingston purchased his lots, the Codman-designed mansion of Lucy Dahlgren was just being completed at No. 15.   The project led the Record & Guide to note “the addition of Robert L. Livingston to the 96^th street colony,” on September 30, 1916.

Delicate floral festoons drape from bracket to keystone to bracket along the ground floor.

Completed in 1917 the limestone-clad Beaux Arts-style house at No. 12 East 96^th Street sat on a rusticated granite base.  The expected French-style mansard roof brought the 96^th Street elevation to five full floors.  But to the rear, unseen from the street, the mansion was seven stories high.

The Livingston mansion was completed just in time for an addition to the family.  In October 1917 newspapers made note that the Livingstons had closed “The Ledges,” their summer estate in Magnolia, Massachusetts and were at 96^th Street for the winter.   A few weeks later, on November 19, The Sun reported that the couple “are receiving congratulations on the birth of a daughter yesterday at their home, 12 East Ninety-sixth street.  It is their third daughter.”

By 1921 the Livingstons had purchased a new summer estate, Balleylock, in Beverley Farms, Massachusetts.  The family continued to expand.  On May 16 that year The New York Herald reported that the Livingstons “are receiving congratulations on the birth of a son on Saturday evening.  The boy, who will be named after his father, is the seventh descendant in direct line from Robert Livingston of Livingston Manor.”

Exactly one week later The New York Times reported “Robert L. Livingston of 12 East Ninety-sixth Street has taken his three elder children to Balleylock.”   There the estate staff would care for the girls while the dutiful Robert rushed back to Marie.  “Mr. Livingston will return, but, with Mrs. Livingston and their baby, now a week old, he will rejoin the other children late in June.”

In the spring of 1925 Robert L. Livingston caught a cold which progressed to pneumonia.  He died in the 96^th Street mansion on Sunday morning, April 12, at the age of 49.  Marie lived on in the house with the children; however she spent less time here.

On December 3, 1930 The Times reported that Marie, who had been in Pau, France for about a year, “will return here next Summer and go to Callender House, her place in Bar Harbor.  She will occupy her old home at 12 East Ninety-sixth Street next Winter, when she will introduce her daughter [Denise] to society.”

By now, however, Ogden Codman, Jr.’s exclusive French enclave was all but a memory.  Only three private homes survived on a street of modern apartment buildings.  In 1934 the family of Samuel Friedman was occupying the Livingston mansion.  They were still here in December that year when the engagement of daughter Eleanor to Robert Strasser was announced.

But the end of the line for No. 12 as a grand residence was near.  In 1939 it was sold and converted for us by a succession of upscale private schools.  The Emerson School was in the building in the last half of the century.  The exclusive school accepted only 55 students, ages three through five.  The 1971 tuition for five-year olds (about $7,000 in 2016) required an additional $225 for lunch.  The school promised the parents of potential students a “rich reading readiness” program, including lessons in French.

By 1983 the former mansion was home to the Carnegie Hill School; and in 1988 was converted to the All Children’s House, an institution for homeless children.  It was a short-lived experiment and by the turn of the century La Scuola d’Italia “G. Marconi” was using the house—offering bilingual instruction from nursery school through high school age.

In 2015 the school put the property on the market for $21,750,000.  The realtor’s listing noted “The townhouse contains stunning original details, including intricate moldings, multiple fireplaces, a grand staircase, a wood-paneled ballroom, and a wrought-iron balcony.”

Neighbors and preservationists will wait to find out the fate of the remarkably-surviving mansion.

photographs by the author

The J. Woodward Haven Mansion -- No. 18 East 79th Street

Most American architects in the years surrounding the turn of the last century considered themselves the inheritors of all that had gone before.  A Renaissance-inspired house designed by prolific architect Clarence True, for instance, might sprout Flemish stepped gables; or another architect might create a hybrid mansion from as many as three disparate styles.  The same could not be said of Ogden Codman, Jr.

Codman was born into privilege in Boston; but in 1875, at the age of 12, moved to Dinard, an American resort colony in France, where he remained until 1884.  He greatly admired French architecture of the 16^th through 18^th centuries; and so when he designed the homes of American millionaires, he did not adulterate the architecture he loved.

In the spring of 1908 banker J. Woodward Haven and his family were living at No. 100 East 79^th Street, at the southeast corner of Park Avenue.  When his father, financier and railroad tycoon George Griswold Haven, died in March that year, Haven received a substantial inheritance (his widowed step-mother received nothing because of her personal fortune estimated at $20 million).  Haven now looked to upgrade his living conditions.

He commissioned Ogden Codman, Jr. to design a mansion two blocks east at No. 18 East 79^th Street; closer to Central Park and ultra-fashionable Fifth Avenue. Codman filed plans that summer.  They called for a five-story, 30-foot wide residence to cost $150,000—in the neighborhood of $4 million today.  The Sun described the proposed mansion saying “It is to be of Colonial design, with a façade of limestone and a mansard story finished in terra cotta with an ornamental balcony.  The dining room and reception parlor will be on the main floor, reached through a vestibule hall paved with marble.  The second story will contain the drawing room and picture gallery, and the fourth floor will be fitted with children’s rooms and a playroom.”

Codman may well have been offended by the newspaper’s description of the townhouse as “of Colonial design.”  He had meticulously made scale drawings of an 18^th century house in Bordeaux, which he then adapted for the Haven mansion.   A historical purist, the resulting house was essentially a recreation; a French period piece set on a Manhattan block.

The Haven family, or perhaps merely New York society columnists, were a bit over-eager for the house to be completed.  On October 25, 1908, only a few months after the plans were filed, The New York Times lamented “Mr. and Mrs. J. Woodward Haven are to pass the Winter at 100 East Seventy-ninth Street.  They will not be able to get into their new house, 18 East Seventy-ninth Street, this Winter.”

By the following winter season, however, they family would be in the completed mansion.  The New York Times would later mention that the 22-room home “contains outstanding examples of oak paneling and rare marbles, with walls constructed of Caen stone.”

The drawn window coverings suggest the Havens are gone for the summer.  Another hint of summer is the painter at work on the second floor of No. 16 next door.  Interior renovations were normally done when families were gone for the season. from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Despite Haven’s good family name and social standing (The Granite Monthly said of his father “He acquired great wealth and had residences at Newport and Lenox, as well as in New York."), the suspicious circumstances surrounding his marriage to Henrietta Cram 12 years earlier had no doubt prompted drawing room whispers throughout Manhattan.

On January 17, 1897 the New-York Tribune published a single-line article that provoked questions.  “The engagement of Miss Henrietta Cram, daughter of the late Henry A. Cram, and sister of J. Sergeant Cram, to J. Woodward Haven, youngest son of George Griswold Haven, was somewhat of a surprise.” 

The following week, on January 28, the New-York Tribune again gave the pairing a one-sentence notice, saying the wedding “will take place in Trinity Chapel on Saturday, February 6.”  But a fashionable Trinity Chapel wedding would not be.

Just three days later, in reporting that the Bradley Martins had “cards out for a large dinner on the 6^th” of February, The Sun slipped in “On the same day Miss Henrietta Cram and J. Woodward Haven will be quietly married at Mrs. Cram’s house in East Thirty-eighty street.”

But vast wealth had a way of eradicating scandal—hinted or real—and by now the Havens were important players in New York and Lenox society.

Henrietta Haven poured her efforts into various charitable causes and the 79^th Street house was regularly the scene of benefit sales, receptions and other events.  On November 16, 1913, for instance, The Sun noted that she had opened the mansion for the “sale of hats and fancy articles for the benefit of St. Mary’s Free Hospital for Children.”

When the United States entered World War I, Henrietta joined other socialites in helping with war relief.  As American citizens tilled their backyards to plant vegetables, she converted part of the Lenox estate’s gardens into a Victory Garden.  We can most likely assume that Henrietta was not on her hands and knees in the dirt; but her nevertheless commendable efforts resulted in a second place for produce in the Stockbridge Grange annual fair.

The following year on June 7 the 79^th Street mansion was the scene of daughter Katharine Sergeant Haven's wedding to Johnston Livingston Redmond.  Katharine’s little sister, Edith, was one of the two flower girls.  The Sun noted that “Immediately after the ceremony there was an informal reception followed by a seated, wedding breakfast.”

With the Redmonds on their honeymoon, the Haven family apparently took an extended trip as well.  On August 30 it was announced that Joseph P. Grade “of the banking firm” had leased the mansion for the winter season.

Once the family was back, things returned to normal.  Katharine followed in her mother’s footsteps; and on November 22, 1922 the New-York Tribune noted that she would host a sale of “linen, Christmas presents and needlework” for the St. Sylvia’s Cottage Industries of Tivoli-on-Hudson.

1924 was Ethel’s debutante year.  The house was opened for a dinner and dance to introduce her on December 20.

In 1926 Vincent Astor leased the Haven house “for the winter season.”  Whether the Haven family decided to extend their travels; or they simply had trouble getting rid of their tenant is unclear.  In either event, Astor and his wife, Helen Dinsmore Huntington, would stay on far past “the season.”

William "Vincent" Astor was called "the richest boy in the world" when he inherited $69 million following his father's death on the RMS Titanic in 1912.  While living in the Haven mansion, he was Commodore of the New York Yacht Club.  photo from the collection of the Library of Congress.

In the Havens’ absence, entertainments in the mansion were glittering affairs.  On November 12, 1926 The New York Times reported that “Prince and Princess Serge Obolensky gave a tea yesterday afternoon at the home of Mrs. Vincent Astor, 18 East Seventy-ninth Street.”  The limited guest list was impressive.  “Among those present were Princess Xenia, Mrs. Edmund L. Baylies, Mrs. Haley Fiske, William B. Leeds, Miss Claire Birge, Miss Mary Hoyt Wiborg, Prince and Princess Gagarine, and Miss Phyllis Byrne.”

The following spring Astor was hospitalized for more than a week.  When he was released on April 8, 1927, newspapers noted that he had been taken “to his home” at 18 East 79^th.  But the Havens got their home back later that year.  On November 20 The New York Times reported that the Astors had signed a lease on a 12-room apartment at No. 1 Sutton Place for the winter.

Henrietta Cram Haven died at Katharine’s summer estate, Callendar House, in Tivoli, New York, on August 14, 1934.  J. Woodward Haven retained possession of the 79^th Street mansion until October 1937 when he sold it to Stanley Grafton Mortimer and his wife, the former Katharine H. Tilford.

The 44-year old was the son of financier Richard Mortimer and was a direct descendant of John Jay, first Chief Justice of the United States.   He had retired from the stock brokerage firm of Russell, Miller & Carey five years earlier, in 1932. But it was not finance for which Mortimer was nationally-famous, but sports.

The New York Times said of him “He was one of the leading amateur racquets players developed in the United States.  With Clarence C. Pell of Westbury, L.I., he stood in the vanguard of the game from 1915 until 1931.”  He had won the national championship four times, and with Pell the national doubles crown nine times.  “Possessor of a magnificent physique and fast on his feet, Mr. Mortimer put on one of the most blinding attacks the game has known,” said The Times.

Richard and Katharine had two daughters and four sons.  They maintained a summer estate in Tuxedo Park.   Shockingly, on the morning of April 5, 1947 the 56-year old athlete suffered a fatal heart attack in the 79^th Street mansion.

Katharine sold the No. 18 in August 1951 to fine arts dealers Duveen Brothers.  Founded in 1877 on Maiden Lane by Sir Joseph and Henry Duveen of Hull, England, the firm had furnished Manhattan’s finest homes with Old Masters, 18^th century French sculpture, and antique European furniture.  The client list included the foremost art collectors in America, with names like Mellon, Huntington, Frick, Bache, Kress and Altman.

 In reporting the sale, The New York Times said “One of the world’s most famous and influential art firms, Duveen Brothers, is moving its paintings by da Vinci, Rubens and other immortals into a celebrated town house at 18 East Seventy-ninth Street in the heart of the elite residential section.” 

Duveen Brothers had been located for years at No. 720 Fifth Avenue, at 56^th Street; but now felt the area was becoming “too commercial.”

In 1955 the original Duveen brothers were dead and the gallery was owned wholly by a former employee, Edward Fowles.  That year a new patron entered the shop, California industrialist and collector Norton Simon. He became a regular visitor, stopping in several times a year when he was on the East Coast.  It was here that he purchased Rembrandt’s Portrait of Hendrickje Stoeffels in 1957.

Simon’s appearance in the gallery late in 1963 would change everything—for Duveen Brothers, for Edward Fowles, for No. 18 East 79^th Street, and even for Norton Simon.  According to Suzanne Muchnic, in her 1998 biography Odd Man In, Norton Simon and the Pursuit of Culture, “he told Fowles that he was interested in buying a group of paintings from him, including "Bernardo Daddi’s early fourteenth-century painting, Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints John Gualbertus, John the Baptist, Francis, and Nicholas, valued at $40,000, an Italian Renaissance painting, Botticelli’s Madonna and Child with Saint John, priced at $100,000, and The Princess of Orange, by Sir Anthony van Dyck, a seventeenth-century Flemish work with a price tag of $50,000.”

Fowles hesitated.  It was a hefty sale; but it would also heavily deplete his impressive stock.  According to Muchnic, Simon came up with an even more attractive offer.  “Why don’t I buy the whole thing, lock, stock and barrel, including the building?”

Norton Simon kept Fowles on as an occasional consultant.  His purchase included, of course, the mansion, the $14 million worth of art and a 12,000-volumne library valued at $250,000.

Duveen Brothers operated until Friday April 18, 1964 when its nearly century-long tradition of  selling fine artworks came to an end.  According to Suzanne Muchnic, Simon originally agreed to sell the Haven mansion to Acquavella Galleries for $425,000; but decided to trade it for two paintings—Henri Fantin-Latour’s 1895 White and Pink Mallows in a Vase, and Renoir’s Woman with a Rose, painted in 1916.

Acquavella Galleries is still in Ogden Codman, Jr.’s stunning French neo-Classical tour de force today.  

photograph by the author

The Lost Leila Howard Codman House -- No. 15 East 51st Street

The F. K. Sturgis mansion, to the right of No. 15, was also designed by Ogden Codman, Jr.  To the left is the granite mansion of John Peirce.  photographer unknown, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/Collection/Mrs.%20B.%20G.%20Work's%20Residence,%2015%20East%2051st%20St.%20N.Y.C.-

 

When Dr. William Seward Webb married Florence Adele Vanderbilt, the daughter of William H. Vanderbilt, in a lavish ceremony in St. Bartholomew’s Church on November 21^st, 1877, things would change for the doctor.  The groom was persuaded to give up his medical practice and to take up finance.  He established the Wall Street firm of W. S. Webb & Co. in 1883.  That same year William Vanderbilt asked him to take control of the Wagner Palace Car Company, a manufacturer of railroad cars of which Vanderbilt owned the controlling interest. 

The following year Webb’s brother, Henry Walter Webb, married Leila Howard Griswold.  He quickly found that being a brother-in-law of the Vanderbilt family could be advantageous.   In 1886 his brother offered him the position of Vice President of the Wagner Palace Car Company.  By the time of H. Walter Webb’s untimely death in 1900, he was vice president of the New York Central Railroad under Cornelius Vanderbilt.

Leila Webb was 44 years old when died her husband died.  She was suddenly the single mother of two young sons: 10-year old John Griswold Webb (who would go on to become a state senator), and 15-year old Henry Walter Webb, Jr.   The burden was lessened by her personal wealth (she was the daughter of millionaire John Augustus Griswold who, among his varied career had personally paid for the construction of the USS Monitor during the Civil War) and the $3 million she inherited from her husband.

While Leila Howard Webb mourned, the Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum. which encompassed the entire block between 50^th and 51^st Streets, from Fifth Avenue to Madison, was being demolished.  The immense plot of land sat squarely amid Manhattan’s most exclusive residential neighborhood, and across the avenue from “Vanderbilt Row”—so called because of the string of magnificent mansions built by Leila’s in-laws.

The Vanderbilts—spearheaded by George--scurried to prevent commercial interests from buying any of the Asylum properties and constructing hotels or similar structures that would threaten their neighborhood.   Soon the block was filling with handsome residences.

On the Fifth Avenue frontage Morton Plant purchased the corner plot at 52^nd Street from George Vanderbilt where he erected his massive mansion; and on the southern corner the exclusive Union Club was built.  Between them George Vanderbilt erected two matching marble rowhouses.   On 51^st street, stretching to Madison Avenue, construction of lavish homes would continue for the next few years.  Among these was the new mansion of Leila Howard Webb.

On July 8, 1903, The Sun reported that Leila’s architect had filed plans for a $42,000, six-story residence to be built at No. 15 East 51^st Street.  She had chosen Ogden Codman, Jr. for the job.

Although Codman was born in Boston to a prestigious family, he grew up in Paris. Upon his return to the States, he decorated the mansions of New York’s old guard, refusing commissions from the nouveau riche, and wrote the widely-read Decoration of Houses in partnership with Edith Wharton.  Codman’s Parisian background left deep impressions on him and when he began designing houses as well as decorating them, his love for all things French was obvious.

photograph by Arthur Vitols, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UAYW4B54KR&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=623

For Leila he produced a magnificent brick and stone structure that would have been at home on the Champs Elysee.  Codman used the American basement plan, highly popular at the time, which he had vigorously championed.  It did away with the high stoops of a generation earlier.  Instead the entrance within the limestone base was just three steps above the sidewalk.  Above were three stories of brick where tall, multi-paned French windows were accented by painted shutters.  A steep two-story mansard capped the residence and provided additional French flair.

The charm of the exterior belied the elegance inside.  The heavy bronze entrance doors opened into a vaulted foyer where another set of ornate bronze-grilled doors added protection.  Leila’s home had the modern convenience of an elevator and the expected traditional features like a bronze-railed staircase, marble floors, richly paneled rooms and exquisite plasterwork.   In addition to Leila’s and the boys’ bedrooms and dressing rooms, were guest rooms, dining room, ballroom, library, morning room, reception room, and the other areas necessary in the home of a wealthy socialite.

The imposing foyer (above) opened into the marble-floored entrance hall.  Note the address worked into the foyer floor.  photographer unknown from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UAYW4B54KR&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=623

Leila apparently worked very closely with her architect, for on October 8, 1904 she and Codman were married.

While Leila went about her entertaining and charity work; Codman was busy designing mansions—two of them on the 51^st Street block.  In 1905 he designed the $300,000 mansion of E. Rollins Morse; and the following year he started work on No. 17 East 51^st Street for F. K. Sturgis.

Incidental spaces included the Reception Room (above) and the Morning Room.  photographer unknown from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UAYW4B54KR&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=623

Leila was active in the Stony Wold Sanitarium for women and girls afflicted with tuberculosis.  Her interest may have been prompted by her former husband's fight with the disease when he suffered his fatal heart attack.  The mansion was the scene of sanitarium meetings such as the one in January 1907 when officers were elected.

Even the elevator was tastefully decorated in a French motif      photographer unknown from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UAYW4B54KR&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=623

That same year Codman and Leila purchased a building plot at No. 7 East 96^th Street where mansion building was going on at a feverish rate.  The trend had been sparked by Andrew Carnegie’s sumptuous 1903 residence at Fifth Avenue and 91^st Street, built 20 blocks north of other millionaires’ homes at the time.

The purchase of the plot was possibly in reaction to the resolute advance of commerce into their Midtown neighborhood.  But if they considered moving northward, it would not happen—at least not in Leila’s lifetime.

The Codmans suffered excruciating public humiliation in 1909 when they returned from Europe in November on the Lusitania.  They told Customs officials they had nothing to declare; however when the inspector opened their trunks, he found about $1,000 work of new gowns “evidently of foreign make.”

Deputy Surveyor Alexander McKeon sent the trunks to the Appraiser’s Stores.   Leila and Ogden were interrogated.  They insisted that the gowns had, indeed, been purchased abroad, but that they had been shipped to the States by the maker in 1908.

The unwavering McKeon was not intimidated by the high social station of his suspects.  He spent nearly a week investigating the case and searched for 1908 customs records that would substantiate their story.  There were no documents showing any goods arriving at Customs in 1908 for the Codmans.

Instead he found the records of Leila and Ogden returning to New York that year and “swearing off” the expensive gowns and women’s clothing “as having been taken out of the country by them and therefore exempt from duty.”

On November 20, 1909 The New York Times very publically reported “The matter was referred to Harrison Osborne, Solicitor to the Collector, and he sent a request for the Codmans to come to the Custom House.  Mr. and Mrs. Codman were asked to explain why their goods should not be declared forfeited to the Government.”

Rather shockingly, two months later the 54-year old Leila Howard Codman died in the 51^st Street mansion on Friday January 21, 1910.   Each of Leila’s sons received $167,254.50 while Ogden inherited the rest of her estate.   The 51^st Street mansion, at the time, was valued at $160,000 (about $4 million in 2015).

Odgen Codman, Jr. remained in the house; while he almost immediately began laying plans for a new home on the 96th Street plot.   That house, fully completed in 1913, bore remarkable similarities to the 51^st Street home—slightly scaled down.  As his new home neared completion in April 1912, Codman sold No.  15 East 51^st Street to Bertram G. Work.

The entertainment rooms, like the Dining Room (above) and the ballroom were designed to impress.    photographer unknown from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UAYW4B54KR&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=623

In the recent decades titans of industry like John D. Rockefeller and Henry Flagler had relocated from Ohio to New York City.  Now Bertram G. Work and his family joined the trend.  Work was the president of the Akron-based B. F. Goodrich Rubber Company.  With the explosion of the automobile industry, rubber tires were in immense demand.   And the Work fortune increased proportionately.

Marion Sawyer Work updated the décor of No. 15 East 51^st Street and entered the life of a Manhattan socialite.   The Works, including their son Bertram, Jr., spent much time traveling.  They would routinely summer at White Sulphur Springs before purchasing their lavish summer estate in Oyster Bay, Long Island.

Marion Work's bedroom as she redecorated it.    photographer unknown from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UAYW4B54KR&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=623

It was there, on the evening of August 27, 1923, that Marion died at the age of 49.  Despite the much-changed Manhattan neighborhood, Bertram remained in the 51^st Street house; although he spent much time in Oyster Bay, tending to his prize-winning gardens.  On August 30, 1927 he died of a heart attack while traveling in Switzerland.

Bertram Jr. sold the 51^st Street mansion in April 1928 for $325,000; choosing to move into a modern duplex apartment at No. 941 Park Avenue.  Purchased by a “Philadelphia investor,” it was leased to Dr. A. S. W. Rosenbach, who lived in the upper stories and slightly renovated the lower floors as the Rosenbach Galleries. 

Two views of the library, during the Works' residency above, and Rosenberg's below, reflect Dr. Rosenberg's sensitive treatment of the interiors.   Photographer of top photograph unknown.  Bottom photograph by Wurts Bros. Both from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UAYW4B54KR&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=623

Recognized world-wide, Rosenbach’s gallery offered extremely rare documents, artwork and antique furniture.  In 1930 he offered 69 letters written by George Washington that documented events of the Revolution, including the sentencing of Major John Andre, and 36 letters to Cornwallis.  Within the next three years clients could purchase letters from Thomas Jefferson and other signors of the Declaration of Independence; speeches of Abraham Lincoln; original works by Shakespeare; and works by Dutch masters.  In 1940 Dr. Rosenbach displayed manuscripts by Chaucer.

But after nearly two decades in the house, Rosenbach was forced to leave.  In 1947 the Roman Catholic Church bought up the houses from No. 15 to Madison Avenue and around the corner.  The Diocese quickly presented Rosenbach with an eviction notice. 

In October an auction was held of the stock that included “furniture antiques, paintings, color prints, silver, and textiles.”  John Fleming, the gallery’s manager, told reporters that Dr. Rosenberg had tried to buy the house back, but “St. Patrick’s officials” refused to sell.  They asserted they had “plans” for the structure.

Indeed they did.  The following year construction began on the Look Building, designed by Emery Roth & Sons.  The loss of the magnificent turn-of-the-century mansions designed by Codman is tempered by their replacement with an equally masterful mid-20^th century structure.

The Look Building as it appeared on October 26, 1951.  photograph by Wurts Bros, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=24UAYW47RSNO&SMLS=1&RW=1280&RH=623