The 1903 Hotel Somerset - 150 West 47th Street

 

The exuberant gable and handsome portico have recently been removed.  postcard from author's collection

The "apartment hotel" trend swept Manhattan toward the turn of the last century.  The hybrid residential buildings offered the amenities of hotels--like maid and valet service--with the long-term leases of apartments.   In 1902 architect Frederick C. Browne began plans for what the Real Estate Record & Guide would call "a late addition to the list of apartment hotels" at 148-152 West 47th Street for developer Henry L. Felt.  

But Browne's plans would never be executed, at least not completely.  While excavations for the foundation were under way, Felt sold the property to Street, Wykes & Co., which hired architect Clarence Luce to redo the design.  In the opinion of at least one contemporary architectural critic, partners Hunter Wykes and Charles F. Street should have kept the original.

Completed in 1903, the 12-story Beaux Arts style Hotel Somerset was faced in red brick above a two-story rusticated limestone base.  A portico of four free-standing columns with Scamozzi capitals upheld a stone-balustraded balcony.  Stealing the show was the massive, three-story Flemish Revival style gable that all but hid the mansard behind it.  Four full-length engaged columns rose to an overblown, broken pediment.  

Meant to draw attention, the gable did just that.  Writing in The Architectural Record in 1903, the often acerbic critic Montgomery Schuyler called it a "pompous sham" and said the Hotel Somerset was "the most ridiculous" of recent New York City structures.

The newly-completed building in 1903.  The Record & Guide, January 17, 1903 (copyright expired)

Nevertheless, the hotel catered to an upper-crust clientele.  Prospective long-term tenants were required to provide references, and  the names of those who were accepted appeared regularly in society columns.  On January 27, 1904, for instance, The Commercial Advertiser announced, "Mrs. Walter Scott of the Somerset, 150 West Forty-seventh street, gives the last of her January at homes to-day."

The residents of the Hotel Somerset, both long-term and transient, enjoyed amenities like a writing room, an elegant dining room and a rooftop café.   In 1910 the white collar residents had professions like physician, "manager," and broker.  And its proximity to the theater district drew members of the entertainment industry as well.

The trellis-roofed café.  photo by Byron Company, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Jules Von Tilzer and his wife, the former Estella Steinberg, lived here by the summer of 1906.  Von Tilzer was one of the six brothers who made up the Harry Von Tilzer Music Publishing Company on West 28th Street.  The couple had "a domestic spat," according to The Sun, on May 27 that year.

According to Estella, she had gone to see Peter Pan at the Lyric Theatre with friends who were about to sail for Europe.  After the play, they stopped at Sherry's restaurant.  It was around midnight when she got home.  Jealous, Von Tilzer flew into a rage and stormed out.

Cast iron lampposts stand guard, and a lacy iron-and-glass marquee stretches forth from the portico in this early photograph.  photo by Byron Company, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

When he had not returned home four days later, Estella went to his office.  And there, The Sun said, "such lively things happened that the woman, who is young and attractive, was taken by a policeman to the Tenderloin station house."  Their conversation turned heated--to the point that Von Tilzer's white silk shirt was torn from his back.  When a secretary, Daniel Dody, rushed in to intervene, Estella broke her parasol over his head.

Dody called a policeman and asked him to arrest Estella for assault and disorderly conduct.  They traveled to the station house in the hansom cab that had been waiting for her at the curb.  There Dody told of Estella's violence and Estella pooh-poohed it all, exhibiting her parasol and saying, "Look at this little sun umbrella.  You couldn't hurt a fly with it."  And as to ripping her husband's shirt from his body, she explained she never meant to do so.

"It was a little, thin silk thing, too expensive for a music publisher to wear.  My husband struck me when we had some words and I grabbed at him to save myself."  

In the end, Dody dropped the charges on the condition that Estella never enter the office again.  She agreed, saying, "I've promised not to go to the office, but that promise does not prevent my going in the street.  I'll be outside the office sometimes."

The main dining room.  photo by Byron Company, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Actor and playwright Robert Drouet and his wife, the former Mildred Loring. were residents.   Born in 1870, he had joined a theatrical company at the age of 16.  He was as successful as a playwright as an actor.  Among the plays he wrote, the best known which were Fra Diano and Doris. 

Actor-playwright Robert Drouet was just 44 years old when he died. The Players Blue Book, 1901 (copyright expired)

Mildred Drouet and her mother traveled to Chicago in the summer of 1914.  On the night of August 16 Drouet went to bed at about midnight, leaving word at the desk to call him at 8:00.  The next morning, according to The Sun, "A number of telephone calls had been unanswered, and when the manager of the hotel went to Mr. Drouet's room to investigate the actor was found dead in bed."  He had died of heart failure.

The tranquility within the Hotel Somerset for its permanent residents may have been upset in October 1914 when the Boston Braves baseball team checked in.  But if the young men had ever been a bit rowdy, that all changed following their game against the Brooklyn Dodgers on October 6.  The team was almost assured of playing in the World Series that year, but during the game their star "hard-hitting third baseman," J. Caryle "Red" Smith, splintered the bone in his right leg while sliding into second base.

The New-York Tribune reported, "It was a glum, sorrowful group of Boston players who sat down to their dinners at the Hotel Somerset last night.  Where all had been mirth and enthusiasm all was sombre and suppressed."

Taken in 1904, this photograph show elegant draperies, tall ceilings and an Oriental rug.  photograph by Byron Company, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

On April 11, 1919 Edward Van Bode checked into the hotel.  He had no luggage, a fact that should have raised suspicions in the management.  The 60 year old bachelor, who was the son of General Von Bodemer of the British Army, fell to his death from his eighth floor window two days later.  Despite what seemed to be obvious, the New-York Tribune noted, "There was nothing in his room to indicate suicide."

Another playwright to call the Hotel Somerset home was Edward Henry Peple, here by 1920.  Best known for his farces and comedies, among the popular plays he wrote were The Prince Chap, A Pair of Sixes and The Littlest Rebel.

In 1923 actress Beverly Sitgreaves moved in, having returned from Europe.  On December 30 The Morning Telegraph explained, "After an absence of nearly five years, she has returned to her work as actress and teacher.  In 1919 a cable from Sarah Bernhardt called her to Paris and finally resulted in a tour which eventually carried her around the world."

Beverly Sitgreaves as she appeared while living at the Hotel Somerset.  The Morning Telegraph, December 30, 1923 (copyright expired)

After being the houseguest of Sarah Bernhardt for three months, she played in London in a revival of Arms and the Man, "under the personal direction of Bernard Show," and then appeared in Australia.  At the time of The Morning Telegraph's article, she had just finished an engagement with Ethel Barrymore.  In addition to her stage work, Sitgreaves coached thespians.  The article said she preferred one-on-one instruction, which she "practices at her residence, the Somerset Hotel, 150 West Forty-seventh street."

Also living here in 1923 was lecturer and author Mrs. Sophie Almon Hensley.  She published her first collection of poetry in 1889 and went on to write other poetry collections, and books and essays such as Women's Love Letters and Love and the Woman of Tomorrow.  She lectured on literary topics, and was President of the Society for the Study of Life, secretary of the New York State Assembly of Mothers, and founder of the New York City Mother's Club.  She was also the associate editor of Health: A Home Magazine Devoted to Physical Culture and Hygiene.

Sophie and her husband moved to Jersey, England in 1937.  They were forced to relocate to Canada when the Nazis occupied the Channel Islands in 1940.

The Arts & Crafts style Reading Room in 1904, outfitted in oak and leather furniture.  photo by Byron Company, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

In the meantime, the Hotel Somerset continued to attract residents involved in the entertainment industry.  In 1925 vaudevillian actress "Princess" Rajah lived here.  She suffered a major loss that year when she her purse was picked.

Early in the morning of March 23 she was standing in a subway car with two female friends.  Her handbag was suspended over her arm.  The New York Times reported, "She noticed two men standing near her, the car being very crowded, and said that one of them was reading a newspaper which he thrust close to her face."

As the train pulled into 110th Street, she noticed her pocketbook was open and she closed it without much thought.  She and her friends debarked at the Times Square station and went to a restaurant near the Hotel Somerset.  When she opened her purse there, she realized the chamois bag with her jewelry was gone.  The diamonds and other jewelry were valued at $20,000--more than $300,000 in today's money.

Cartoonist Ellison Hoover lived in the Hotel Somerset in the 1930's, as did vaudeville entertainer David Genero (he had won the American cakewalk championship in 1891) and writer Edward Goldbeck and his singer-actress wife Lina Abarbanell.

Soprano Lina Abarbanell, from the collection of the New York Public Library

Goldbeck wrote in both German and English and was a former columnist of the Chicago Tribune.  Lina Abarbanell was a soprano who performed in light and grand opera.  In 1909 she introduced the title character of Madame Sherry at the New Amsterdam Theatre, which ran for 231 performances.

Another author and playwright, Jane Maudlin Feigl, moved into the Hotel Somerset early in 1934, following the death of her husband Colonel Fred Feigl on December 10, 1933.  The New York Times had described her husband as a "former publisher and well known in military circles."  Jane had  already mourned the death of their son Lieutenant Jefferson Feigle for years.  He was the first American artillery officer killed in action in World War I.   The loss of her husband added to her enormous grief.

A relative described Jane as being "very miserable and unhappy," following her husband's death.  The New York Times wrote, "Because of her moodiness, Captain George G. Feigl...her brother-in-law, had been a frequent caller."  Her depression was severe enough to require her being hospitalized in the Fifth Avenue Hospital for several weeks that spring.

On June 5, 1934 Captain Feigl dropped by Jane's 12th-floor apartment.  Unable to get an answer to his knocking, he enlisted the help of manager John Smith, who opened the door with a passkey.  The New York Times reported, "Mrs. Feigl was lying in bed, and along side her was a bottle believed to have contained an acid."

In 1953 the Hotel Somerset was remodeled to a transient hotel.  There were now a restaurant and store on the ground floor, 18 hotel rooms on the second through twelfth floors, and 6 each in the new penthouse, unseen from the street.

photo via cityrealty.com

That configuration lasted until another renovation, completed in 1980, converted the Hotel Somerset to apartments, nine each on floors two through twelve, and four in the penthouse.  In 1997 the details of Clarence Luce's gable were shaved off and the portico was removed, destroying the building's 1903 personality.

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The Hotel Hargrave -- 106-112 West 72nd Street

On January 6, 1903 Walter Stabler delivered an address to the Real Estate Class of the Y.M.C.A. on "The Development of the West Side."  In it he outlined the rather stumbling progress of developers in what was, in the mid-19th century, "one vast stretch of farm land."   It was not until the early 1880s, he pointed out, that real development took hold.   Only a few years after those rows of houses were erected many of them along the avenues and major streets were demolished as a new trend arose: residential hotels.

In George L. Felt commissioned architect Frederick C. Browne to design a 12-story hotel at Nos. 106 through 112 West 72nd Street.  The property ran through the block where four brownstones, completed in 1884, faced 71st Street.  Most likely inspired by the Parisian-type structures that had earlier begun arising along Broadway, Browne turned to the popular Beaux Arts style.

West 72nd Street retained its residential nature when the Hotel Hargrave was completed.  On Columbus Avenue the elevated railroad can be seen.  from the collection of the New York Historical Society.

Completed in 1902, the Hotel Hargrave was a bit more restrained than its larger and grander Broadway counterparts--there were no heroic sculptures nor fruit-burdened garlands, for instance.  Its brick and stone facade, however, did not disappoint.  The rusticated stone base rose three stories to an iron-railed stone balcony supported by pairs of ambitious stone brackets.  The six-story central section featured two curved copper-clad bays that culminated in frothy, carved cartouches.  Another full-width balcony introduced the upper section, dominated by a double-height copper mansard.

The Hotel Hargrave extended, partly, through to 71st Street.  When Henry L. Felt leased the new building to the Hargrave Hotel Company in March 1902, the paperwork noted that it included "the 16-foot house in the rear."  The management company, which agreed to pay $730,000 in total during its 21-year lease, had been organized specifically to run the hotel.  The New-York Tribune noted the group "is controlled by a number of wealthy club men and one of the largest wholesale manufacturers of furniture in the city.  It is to be fitted up elaborate, and will be rented as a high grade hotel.  It will be managed by a man who at present runs one of the most prominent clubs in New-York."

That manager was George Brown, who advertised the Hotel Hargrave as "New York's most accessible hotel," boasting the "six lines of transit, including Elevated and Subway express stations" nearby.  Unlike the residential hotels which were essentially high-end apartment houses without individual kitchens, the Hargrave was a "modern, high class family and transient hotel with superior appointments."  The distinction made it clear that travelers were welcomed as well.

The least expensive accommodations cost $2 per day--about $57 in today's dollars.  Brown marketed the hotel's amenities saying it offered "superior appointments," the restaurant service was "excellent," and "fine music a feature."

Thefts in turn of the century hotels were a constant problem and Brown apparently tried diligently to screen his potential employees.  When 18-year old Louis Messier applied for a bellboy position early in 1903, he seemed the perfect fit.  The young man came from a good Massachusetts family and he had graduated from a college in Montreal.  The New-York Tribune noted that he "presented good recommendations."

It was not long before police were searching for a hotel thief.  Among the guests robbed was George H. Pursur, who discovered $1,050 in jewelry missing from his room.  On February 23, 1903 two detectives entered Messier's rooms at No. 248 West 45th Street.  With Messier was 22-year old telephone operator John Cullen.  The officers found $3,400 in stolen jewelry in Messier's pockets and dresser drawer along with pawn tickets for almost that much more.

With Cullen's arrest his telephone operator position became available.  It may have been Rene Depierre, working in that position the following year, who filled the spot.  It was a job that nearly took Depierre's life on August 26, 1904.

At around 3:00 that afternoon, after connecting two rooms, he placed his hand on the metal portion of the transmitter.  According to the New-York Tribune, he "instantly fell to the floor, writhing in pain."  George Brown rushed to aid him, while bellboys ran for doctors. 

The Sun reported that Brown and other employees "saw that his arms were burned and swollen and that his face was purple."   The New-York Tribune added, "While waiting for the ambulance Depierre had an acute nervous attack, in which he constantly bit his finger nails, and the combined strength of the manager and a guest could not keep him from doing so."

All the while he was unable to speak and contorted his body as if in great pain.  His condition became more exaggerated at the hospital.  After a long period of continuous "massage treatment" he finally returned to normal.  Depierre remembered that after making the connection he felt a "terrific shock" and felt "as if red hot irons" were being thrust through his body.  After that he remembered nothing.

The hotel electrician searched for the cause, but could find nothing wrong with the switchboard.  His theory was a bit bizarre.  He told a reporter that "the telephone wires, which run underground to the hotel, may have become crossed with the Columbus avenue trolley wires, also underground."

An early postcard shows the original glass marquee and shallow stoop.  To the west, four-story brownstone homes still stand.

The Hotel Hargrave contributed in part to the women's movement in 1905 when it was the scene of the organization of the Women's Eastern Golf Association on December 13.  The club continued to meet in the hotel for years.

The success of the Hotel Hargrave prompted Frederick C. Browne to be called back in 1905 to enlarge the building.  The extension, completed in 1907, filled the entire 71st Street property.  There were now 300 guest rooms, 200 baths, a restaurant, four electric elevators and its own electric and ice making plants.


Burglaries continued to be a problem; but one guest handled an incident with amazing calm.  Samuel Fessenden was State Attorney of Connecticut and his family home was in Stamford.   The family closed the house for the winter of 1906-07 and moved into the Hargrave. 

While the family was at dinner on the evening of Saturday, February 16, the telephone rang.  Fessenden's daughter, Helen ("well known in Connecticut society," according to the New-York Tribune) left the table to answer it.  Just as she entered the darkened room a dark figure holding a revolver stepped out of a corner and ordered her not to make a noise.  He demanded that she turn over her jewelry.

Helen calmly explained that the family was in mourning and there were no jewels.  But she walked to a dresser and took two dollars from her purse, saying she was sorry that was all she had.

"Confound it, that's just my luck!" growled the burglar in hushed tones.  "This place looked good to me, and just because I am up against it and need the money there's nothing doing.  I won't fall for two bones, so here's your money back, and now, show me the way out."

Helen led him to the fire escape but before he left she "remonstrated with him on the error of his ways," according to the New-York Tribune.  When she was sure he was gone, she returned to the dining room and informed the family.  With the danger behind her, the reality of what had just transpired hit the feisty socialite.  "Miss Fessenden was much unnerved by the incident, but soon regained her composure," said the newspaper.

To the east of the hotel was Park & Tilford's high-end grocery building.  photo by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Living in the Hargrave at the time was Gustav J. Fleischmann, president of the Fleischmann Realty and Construction Company.  Their mansion at No. 18 West 86th Street, which the would share his Gustav's partner and brother and their parents, was being completed.

Only a month after Helen Fessenden's incident, on March 25, Mrs. Fleischmann noticed that a blue velvet jewelry box in her dresser had been tampered with.   Missing were two diamond festoons valued at $6,000--more than $155,000 today.

The couple had hosted a dinner party for 12 guests the evening before.  Mrs. Fleischmann became indignant when police asked about them.  "Please do not refer to that.  They were all friends, just a little party of friends, and they enter in no way into this affair.  So say no more about them."

Police knew for sure that whoever the thief was, he was in a hurry.  He left behind $20,000 worth of diamonds pearls and other gems in the same drawer; including a $15,000 diamond necklace which had been only a few inches away from the lost festoons.

Suspicion fell on the Fleishmanns' two maids and the three hotel servants who had been in the apartment to clean.  The police were confident it was "an inside job," and noted that Mrs. J. Floyd Jones had recently been robbed of a $500 pearl necklace.

Annie Cronin, a 25-year old Hotel Hargrove maid, who had been hired in October, was arrested on what today would be considered rather flimsy grounds.  One of the Fleischmann maids told Detective Price "she saw the Cronin woman standing near Mrs. Fleischmann's dressing table Sunday morning."  The New York Times admitted "This is the only evidence so far against Annie."

If indeed Annie Cronin was responsible for the robbery, she was far less professional than the burglar who made off with $5,000 worth of Martha H. Armitage's jewelry in January 6, 1908.  Called by police the Rope Ladder Hotel Thief, 21-year old James Lakin was arrested on February 24.  The daring robber was wanted for robberies and burglaries both in New York and Boston for his four-month crime spree.  He entered hotel rooms by dropping a rope ladder from the roofs.

Lakin confessed to the Armitage theft.  In reporting on the arrest, The Sun mentioned "Mrs. Robert Tainer of the Hotel Hargrave was robbed of a quantity of valuables on February 16, but Lakin said he had no hand in it."

Terror filled the hotel on November 22, 1911 when a massive explosion occurred on the corner of 72nd Street and Columbus Avenue, just feet away.  A shanty had been erected there by sewer workers to hold dynamite.  Because the sticks had become partially frozen, they were being "toasted" to thaw them out.  The resultant explosion rocked the neighborhood, killed one man and injured several more.

The New York Times reported that the Hargrave "was the scene of intense excitement...Manager McGrath was in the lobby when he saw his windows go to pieces."  Almost all of the windows were blown out.

The telephone operator, Agnes Costello, "plugged every room in the house and gave a hasty assurance...that no one in the building was in danger," wrote The Evening World.  But guests were nonetheless shaken.  Rubber manufacturer E. L. Goodlove was shaving at the time.  "The shock threw his razor blade against his throat and inflicted a slight cut," the World said.

And John A. McCarthy, here from Albany, was blown into his bathtub by the force of the blast.  The New York Times lightened the mood by reporting "He was not hurt and showed his appreciation of the help accorded him by turning on the water and finishing his bath.  It was the first time, it was said in the hotel, that a guest had been assisted at his bath by an explosion of dynamite."

Perhaps the most infamous guest of the Hotel Hargrave was the former President of Nicaragua, General Jose Santos Zelaya.  In November 1913 when he arrived in New York he was wanted by the Nicaraguan government for the murders of Sixto Pineda and Domingo Toribio.

According to officials, Zelaya was "plotting to return to power in Nicaragua."  He and his son, Macias, went to the Hotel Victoria, then slipped away to the Waldorf-Astoria.  Discovering that he was being followed, he quietly checked into the Hotel Hargrave on November 20.

The New-York Tribune reported on November 25 "The Secret Service men followed the party to the Hotel Hargrave, and it was thought that the former dictator was trapped.  But Zelaya has friends in New York."

After staking out the hotel for some time, officials saw no trace of the fugitive.  The Tribune reported "At the hotel desk it was learned that General Zelaya had not been seen about the hotel since Saturday night.  It was though that he might have left the place on Sunday.  The baggage, the clerk said, was still in the house, but the hotel was being closely watched by Secret Service agents."

It was later discovered that Zelaya had been spirited out of the hotel in a trunk.  He was finally arrested in a friend's apartment on West End Avenue.   The Nicaraguan Government dropped its charges and allowed him to be released from The Tombs as long as he went to Spain.

In the years just prior to World War I the Hotel Hargrave was still upscale.  An advertisement in October 1916 noted that it catered "only to a Discriminating Clientele."   A two-person suite of parlor, bath and bedroom cost $3.00 per night, or about $67 today.  The same size apartment, rented full time in 1922, cost the equivalent of $2,475 per month today.

Prohibition brought frustration to many, if not most, Americans.  One of those was Hotel Hargrave resident Harry Schloss, who attempted to take matters into his own hands.  On July 10, 1924 The New York Times reported "The blockage against rum-runners in the estuary of the Shrewsbury River resulted yesterday in the seizure of 144 bottles of liquor found in a trunk and packing case that were being loaded on a truck from a steamboat, the Mary Patton."  Customs Inspectors told reporters that the trunk was consigned to H. Schloss, Hotel Hargrave."  Harry could not be found when agents followed up at the hotel.

For years the widow Evelyn A. Mossman and her son, John, had lived a secluded life in the Hargrave.  An invalid, she never left the apartment and spent no money.  Reportedly she had no jewelry and only $25 worth of clothing.  But the eccentric recluse was by no means indigent.

After she died in her apartment on November 19, 1925 a counsel for her estate discovered that banks and corporations had been searching for her for years.  "Mrs. Mossman's securities were so widely scattered and so neglected that many stocks had been called in long before her death and dividends on them had ceased," reported The Times.  "Many bonds had unclipped coupons which had matured far back."  Because she never turned in retired stocks or collected interest on bonds, institutions had been trying to find her.

After two years of unraveling Evelyn's tangled affairs, her estate included more than $1.1 million in securities, nearly $200,000 in bank accounts, and almost $67,000 in mortgages.  It was estimated that son John would inherit approximately $1.35 million--about 18 times that much today.

The Great Depression and changing taste negatively affected the Hotel Hargrave.  Fussy Beaux Arts hotels had lost favor to modern Art Deco structures.   Instead of the upscale suites of two decades earlier, a 1937 advertisement touted wicker-furnished rooms as "comfortable living at reasonable rates."

A faded star living here at the time was Helen Lackaye.  Born in 1883, she was known for her roles in such plays as Neal of the Navy in 1915, and The Knife in 1918.  She appeared as late as 1928 in Revolt at the Vanderbilt Theater.

Helen Lackaye -- from the collection of the New York Public Library

Helen was in private life Mrs. Agnes Helene Ridings.  On October 19, 1940 she was returning home from Pennsylvania on a Baltimore & Ohio train.  She became ill and was given first aid from a train attendant; but just as the train approached the Jersey City Terminal Helen died.

Helen Lackaye would not be the last of memorable names from the theater to live in the Hotel Hargrave.    In the fall of 1951 actor James Dean arrived in New York.  According to his biographer Peter Winkler in the 2016 The Real James Dean, "Sometime later after meeting and beginning an intimate relationship with dancer Elizabeth 'Dizzy' Sheridan, they rented a tiny, dilapidated room at the Hargrave Hotel."

By the time of this mid-century postcard, a shop had been carved into the former lobby.

As the Columbus Avenue-72nd Street area underwent a renaissance in the 1970s, the bleak hotel got a make-over.  On October 28, 1973 Robert E. Tomasson, writing for The New York Times, said "West 72d Street, a major commercial thoroughfare that has undergone a marked rejuvenation in the last few years is losing its last major eyesore, the 12-story former Hotel Hargrave near Columbus Avenue."

Purchased a year earlier by Sackman Enterprises, it was undergoing a conversion to 183 apartments, ranging from studios to two bedrooms.  A subsequent renovation, completed in 1989 converted the building to 66 condominiums.

While the ground floor has been somewhat altered and a beauty and hair care shop glaringly insults the once-proud French structure, the intact upper floors of the Hotel Hargrave are reminders of a time when the jewels of monied residents were constant temptations for robbers.

photograph by the author

Cloaks, Underwear and Smuggled Liquor -- Nos. 30-32 West 24th Street

In 1910 the block of 24^th Street just west of Madison Square had seen three major transformations.  A fashionable residential neighborhood in the first decades of the 19^th century, it had declined by the 1880s as part of the notorious, crime-ridden Tenderloin District.  And now its old low-rise buildings were being replaced with modern loft structures as the block was engulfed by the Mercantile District.

The five-story brownstone-fronted house at No. 32 West 24^th Street was once the home of George Washington Kip (whose family name survives in the Kips Bay neighborhood).  Its neighbor at No. 30 had been converted in 1894 for The Pen and Brush club; a group of professional women writers and artists.  The end of the line for both vintage houses was near.

On New Year’s Day 1910 the Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide reported that architects Frederick C. Browne and Randolph H. Almiroty had formed a partnership, Browne & Almiroty.  It noted “Mr. Browne has had a large practice in loft and office buildings…Mr. Almiroty has been for many years with John H. Duncan, the architect of Grant’s Tomb, and has been identified with many of New York’s finest private residence and business buildings.”

Possibly their first commission involved replacing the old brownstone houses at Nos. 30 and 32 West 24^th Street. On March 29 the Marmac Construction Co. purchased the buildings from Mrs. Ruth Livingston and announced intentions to erect “a 12-story mercantile building on the site.”

Construction was completed in January 1911.  The neo-Gothic style had grown in favor for commercial buildings within the past few years and would culminate in 1913 with Cass Gilbert’s Woolworth Building.  Browne & Almiroty turned to the style for Nos. 30-32 West 24^th Street, using limestone, brick and terra cotta to create an impressive yet utilitarian structure.

The two-story stone base featured Gothic elements like quatrefoils, protruding gargoyles and crockets.  The uppermost floors were flanked by hefty faceted piers containing blind Gothic arches. 

Two winged creatures stare defiantly at one another below the heavy tone band where a terrifying spread-winged creature holds a shield.

Marmac Construction immediately leased the store to the Mosaic Tile Company, while the upper floors filled with apparel manufacturers.  Marmac was not interested in being a landlord, however, and in January 1912 sold the new building to Chicago investor Jacques L. Boisse.

Among the tenants in the building in 1913 were Schutzer, Dessau & Luchs, manufacturers of “cloaks and suits.”  The firm employed 20 men and two women.  Also here was Gill & Renther, which made dresses.  Its employees included 10 men, 10 women, and two “children” between 14 and 16 years old.

The firms shared the building with large “costumes and lingerie” manufacturer George, Henry & Rosenbaum Co.  The company employed a workforce of 95—12 men and 83 women.

The building served both as factory space and wholesale showrooms for some tenants.  Such was the case when A. & S. Cohen moved in in 1915.  American Cloak and Suit Review the “firm makes a line of ‘fine suits.’  Their price range is from $10.00 to $20.00.”  The suits were indeed “fine.”  The $20 wholesale price would translate to nearly $500 in 2016 dollars.

The Review added “They are showing their Spring and Summer models in their new quarters, which are very splendidly appointed, both as to factory facilities and equipment, and the well arranged showroom.”

Another new tenant that year was The Victoria Undergarment Company, Inc.  In reporting the move, The Corset and Underwear Review said the “manufacturers of nightgowns and envelope chemises, have joined the uptown movement.”

The Perfect Patent Folding Box Company took over the store and basement in 1916; while the upper floors continued to house apparel firms like the Wear Well Ladies Apparel Co., Hopewell Dress Co., and S. Freiman Bros, Inc., “manufacturing furriers.”

Although garment manufacturers like the Kirschner-Hendler underwear company continued to sign leases into the 1920s; the apparel district was moving northward.  A new type of tenant was emerging, like Albert Guggenheim, importer of olive oil.   Guggenheim was embarrassed when his name appeared in local newspapers upon his return from Europe in May 1928.

Guggenheim had traveled home in a first class cabinet on the Cunard liner Aquitania.  While liquor flowed freely in Paris, London and Rome, such was not the case in Prohibition Era New York.  And when Customs agents searched Guggenheim’s baggage at the New York pier they found three quarts of liquor concealed there.  Certainly to Guggenheim’s dismay, the officials smashed the bottles.  He was fined $15.

In 1933 Morris & Bendien, Inc. was in the building selling wholesale novelties.  That year it offered 60 assorted jigsaw puzzles for $3.00; “each picture a masterpiece.” 

As 1933 drew to an end so did Prohibition.  Albert Guggenheim saw more potential profits in liquor than in olive oil and formed the Kienzler Distilling Corporation on December 17, with himself as president.   Even before the corporation was official, Guggenheim was wasted no time.  On December 4, the day before Prohibition was abolished, the Government auctioned “Scotch, rye, champagne, and cordials now resting in cases, bags and demijohns at the army base in South Brooklyn,” according to The New York Times.  The liquor had been “seized by the government during the last few months of prohibition” from steamers arriving in New York Harbor.

While United States Marshal Raymond J. Mulligan received “half a dozen bids for the liquor,” he dismissed all but two.  One of those came from Kienzler & Co., which bid $19 a case and $7.50 per gallon.

The following year Kienzler & Co. applied for a trademark for its own whiskey and gin.   Perhaps Albert Guggenheim should have stayed in the olive oil importing business.  Not quite four years after he started Kienzler & Co., the firm declared bankruptcy on October 25, 1937.

Like Morris & Bendien, the Elka Toy & Novelty Mfg. Corp. hawked cheap novelties here by 1951.  Among its carnival-type items were “adorable fur kittens and dogs” which it advertised as “made entirely of ‘Ball of Fluff’ genuine rabbit fur.”

By 1958 Nos. 30-32 West 24^th Street was known as “The Army Reserve Building.”  It was here on September 18 that the Interstate Commerce Commission began an inquiry as to the cause of a Jersey Central commuter train’s plunge into Newark Bay, killing 50 passengers.

The building was also used for the Federation Employment and Guidance Service’s “sheltered workshop.”  Here, under the auspices of the Vocational Rehabilitation Program, the Government provided “light factory work” for unemployed disabled job seekers.  Manufacturers were encouraged to use the workshops for simple piece work, like the assembly of costume jewelry.

The neo-Gothic tracery of the eastern entrance survives.  Winged gargoyles stare menacingly while a glimpse of the simulated vaulted foyer ceiling and the Gothic arch beyond had be seen.

Today a café occupies the ground floor where mosaic floor tiles were sold in 1911 and the upper stories continue to be home to light manufacturing and office space.  Although the service entrance at No. 32 has been butchered; the neo-Gothic detail at No. 30 survives. 

photographs by the author

Broadway Textile Bldg -- 366 Broadway

Vermiculated bandcourses and exquisitely-carved keystones distinguish the central portion of the structure -- photo by Alice Lum

When Virginia Stuart Mackay-Smith sold the property at Nos. 364 and 366 Broadway at the northeast corner of Franklin Street to William C. Stuart in December 1901, the area was already a vibrant commercial district.  Stuart paid $350,000 for the corner—more in the neighborhood of $9.25 million in today’s dollars.

Real estate operator Louis M. Jones was busy at the time buying up old properties and replacing them with office and loft buildings.  Less than two years earlier Louis M. Jones & Co. had demolished Nos. 127 through 135 Bleecker Street and erected what the Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide called “a seven-story modern business building.”  It was Jones who would be responsible for the massive Croisic Building on Madison Square in 1911, prompting the Record & Guide to say “Slowly but surely old Madison Square, once the center of a residence neighborhood, is being surrounded by the gigantic palisades of commerce.”

But before then he would set his focus on No. 366 Broadway.  In 1908 Louis M. Jones & Co. demolished the old structures on the corner lot and set Frederick C. Browne to work on a modern 12-story office building.  Completed a year later, it was the last word in Edwardian commercial architecture.

 

photo by Alice Lum

Designed in three parts, the uppermost section below the overhanging copper cornice was clad in terra cotta.  Browne ornamented the eight story brick central section with vermiculated limestone bands and vigorous scrolled keystones with carved heads.  It was at the two-story limestone base that the architect let loose.

Hefty fluted and banded piers, some decorated with stylized carved caducei,  supported the cornice.  The first floor retail space featured five handsome, veined stone columns with Doric capitals.  Above each, at the second floor level, were striking near-caryatids—elaborately carved with festoons and laurel-wreathed heads.

A handsome cast iron staircase with stone treads creates a bridge in the lobby -- photo streeteasy.com

The retail store as well as space in the upper floors became home to the Royal Typewriter Company.  The firm had sold its first typewriter in March 1906 and just two years later opened its 250,000 square foot factory in Connecticut.  On March 12, 1909 The New York Times said “The store, 50 by 150, will be used as a salesroom, and the space on the upper floors for the executive offices of the company.”  The newspaper added, “The building will be known in the future as the Royal Typewriter Building.”

Tenants continued to sign leases, including Warner & Co., a “Stock Exchange house,” which opened a branch office here in July.  That fall Royal Typewriter’s rival, the Elliott-Fischer Co. took the entire fifth floor as well as additional space. 

 

Striking carved columns with female faces adorn the second floor.  On the pier to the right, carved snakes entwine to form a stylized caduceus -- photo by Alice Lum

By 1911 the highly regarded law firm of Goldstein & Goldstein opened its offices in the building.  That year the firm took on a new client, a restaurant which wanted to incorporate under the name “Hell.”  The attorneys submitted the papers of incorporation to the Secretary of State and it did not take long to get a response.  No.

Secretary Lazansky refused to allow a corporation to use the word “Hell” saying that it would be against public policy.  The New York Times explained on September 9, 1911 “It was assumed by the State authorities that some enterprising firm desired to secure the benefits of sensational advertising by displaying an electric sign bearing the name of the company.”

While Royal Typewriters held the majority of the retail space; high-end jeweler Eugene H. Tower & Co. moved its store from next door at No. 368 Broadway around 1910.  Before relocating the firm had suffered a loss of about $2000 in a burglary.  Unfortunately, the move would not improve the company’s luck.

When the bookkeeper, Miss M. Junker, opened the store here on Wednesday, August 21, 1912 she noticed saw amiss and went straight to work.  However a few minutes later, head salesman Charles Giegerich arrived and noticed several missing items.  An inventory showed burglars, who had pried open a basement door, had made off with two gross of fountain pen points, “a number of gold and silver pencils, erasers, pocketbooks, safety razors, and knives, in all valued at more than $1,500,” according to The New York Times. 

The store’s owner, Eugene Tower, was understandably upset about the theft, which would amount to about $35,000 today.  He complained to reporters that the police had never found the first thieves and “we never got a single pen point back.”  Now he complained that “the police had asked the firm to keep quiet regarding the burglary,” said The Times.

The textile and apparel industries were centered within the Broadway neighborhood by now.  Broker Morris Perlstein, Inc. was in the building in 1914 and only a few months after World War I erupted in Europe, he distributed contracts to knitwear manufacturers amounting to a significant $2,115,000.  The companies would supply sweaters, gloves, socks and “stomach bands,” to the English and French armies.  Morris Perlstein’s manufacturers were responsible, for instance, for shipping 2,600 dozen sweaters a week.

Along with the need for socks and sweaters, the war brought with it espionage.  On November 28, 1914 The New York Times reported “Suspicion, steadily increasing since the beginning of the war, that dispatches of the Associated Press were being stolen systematically and were redistributed by smaller news agencies, caused the Associated Press officials to set a trap yesterday for persons they thought had a part in the redistribution of news.”

A detective rented an office at No. 366 Broadway and outfitted it with a safe, office furniture and a New York News Bureau ticker.  Working with The Associated Press, the detective carefully watched the dispatches of the New York News Bureau.  Within five minutes of the Associated Press sending out its dispatches, they were repeated on the New York News Bureau ticker.

To set its trap, the Associated Press sent out a false news story.  It said that on November 27 the Russian warship Fliba had been sunk by a mine with all 450 crew members killed.  In fact, there was no such ship and certainly no such disaster.  Only The Globe was the intended recipient of the dispatch and that newspaper was told to “kill” the story.

Ten minutes after the dispatch, it appeared on the New York News Bureau ticker and two hours later The Evening Sun ran the headline “New Russian Battleship is Destroyed by a Mine.”  The New York Times reported on November 28, 1914, “When the trap was sprung Henry L. Linder, an operator employed by the Postal Telegraph Company…was arrested and charged with 'revealing the contents of a telegraphic message to a person other than the one for whom it was intended.'"

In the meantime Jonah J. Goldstein and his partners continued their legal practice.  In April 1916 the firm was diligently trying to serve papers on the wealthy Albert Gallatin Wheeler, Jr.  Wheeler refused to pay his former wife, Claudia Theresa Carlstedt (whom The New York Times reminded readers was “well known on the musical comedy stage before her marriage") the $12,500 alimony she had been awarded.

To prevent being served, Wheeler refused to leave the Union Club.  Goldstein & Goldstein set a “picket guard” outside the club.  Jonah Goldstein told reporters “This Wheeler is harder to ‘get’ than [Pancho] Villa.”

The curious case was still playing out in January.  Goldstein & Goldstein notified Wheeler that it would appropriate and sell his seat on the Stock Exchange to procure Mrs. Wheeler her money.  When he did not respond, the firm sold the seat.  “Mr. Goldstein said the case was without a precedent and was ‘very interesting,’’ said The New York Times on January 5, 1917.

Goldstein & Goldstein would remain in the building for years handling high profile cases.  In 1921 the firm represented Joseph Cohen, convicted in 1917 as the ringleader of the gang that murdered poultry man Barnet Baff on November 24, 1914 “because his methods were ruining rivals in the poultry business.”  Now Jonah J. Goldstein filed for a new trial on the grounds that a witness had committed perjury.

It was not the only murder case that Jonah Goldstein would handle in 1921.  He represented Captain Robert Rosenbluth, charged in the murder of Major Alexander P. Cronkhite in Camp Lewis, Washington in 1919.

The aggressive attorney took the FBI to task for using the grief of the victim's mother to play on public sympathies.  “The Bureau of Investigation is taking a position that is unfair and far from being American and gentlemanly,” he told reporters.  "To make an attempt to hide themselves behind a bereaved and grief-stricken mother is certainly that.”

Another tenant in the building that year, importer M. Weinberg, might have been well served to use Goldberg’s services.  The Weinberg family lived in Chappaqua, New York near the home of actor Conway Tearle.  In December 1921, four-year old Jacques Weinberg was passing by the Tearle home when the actor’s butler called him into the yard to give him an orange.

Tearle’s bull terrier, Happy, attacked the boy and bit him on the scalp.  It was the beginning of a dramatic chain of events.  Little Jacques was taken to the town health officer who directed that the dog be shot so it could be examined.  Tearle would not allow it.  When the boy was removed to the Babies’ Hospital on East 55^th Street, Dr Frederick Bartlett also asked that the dog be shot for examination.

When State Troopers finally were sent to the Tearle home, they were informed that the boy was on the actor’s property at the time of the bite.  They could not take the dog without an order from the Justice of the Peace.

In the meantime, the boy’s wounds were so bad that his condition was deemed critical.  More appeals were sent to Tearle, who continued to refuse to have his dog destroyed.  Weinberg promised reporters “I am going to fight this thing out…That dog should be killed.  Even if my child gets well, the dog is dangerous and may injure other children.”

Three months later the boy was still in the hospital and Weinberg brought suit against him for $25,000 damages and expenses.  The dog was still alive and doing well.

By now No. 366 Broadway had filled almost entirely (other than Goldstein & Goldstein) with apparel and textile firms.  Among those here in 1922 were the New England Cotton Yarn Co.; J. E. Pearl, dealers in “cotton, wool, worsted;” cotton dealers C. M. Plowmad & Co.; Sanford Spinning Co.; underwear manufacturers Edwin Churchman & Co., Hanes Knitting Co., and C. Collier; hosiery firms Cromie & Plunkett and C. G. Culin; and A. G. Campbell makers of knit goods.

The New York offices of Hanes Underwear were in the building in 1920 -- Pacific Rural Press, October 9, 1920 (copyright expired)

When Bernard Semel, Inc., textile jobbers and exporters, moved into the building the firm placed its name in bronze letters between the first and second floors.  Although no longer called the Royal Typewriter Building, and technically known as the Broadway Textile Building; Bernard Semel was making its claim.

Three years after Goldstein & Goldstein had taken on accused murderer Robert Rosenbluth’s case and six years after the crime, the trial date neared.  Opening arguments were set for September 30, 1924 and Jonah J. Goldstein confidently assured “The truth will set him free.”  Characteristic of the high-profile lawyer, his list of character witnesses was impressive, including Herbert Hoover, Secretary of Commerce, and Governor Pinchot of Pennsylvania.

 

photo by Alice Lum

Throughout the 1930s the building was headquarters for the State Labor Relations Board, where collective bargaining meetings were held.  Most of the building’s tenants, however, were still involved in the textile and apparel business.

One of these was Nathaniel Walkof, who had been in the mercantile business for a quarter of a century in 1944.  That year, on November 15, the 61-year-old was found dead on the floor of his office with a revolver clutched in his hand; the victim of an apparent suicide.

By the second half of the 20^th century the Tribeca area was less about manufacturing and apparel companies than it was about trendy restaurants and luxurious lofts-turned-residences.  In 1979 the Beaux-Arts style Broadway Textile Building was converted to 38 cooperative apartments, called the Collect Pond House.

No longer the home of typewriters, underwear manufacturers and go-getter lawyers, it is wonderfully intact.  And, as they have for over a century, its second floor guardians continue to stare imperiously across the street.