The 1893 Vigilant Lodging House - 370 8th Avenue

 

On a single day in July 1892, Dr. B. Grunhut purchased four properties from the Baker estate, including "No. 370 Eighth avenue with old buildings," according to The Sun on August 1.  Before long he sold those structures, most likely a house-and-store with a rear building, to J. Heller who demolished them and hired the Philadelphia architects Reeves & Son to design a replacement.

The plans, filed in March 1893, called for a five-story "brick and stone lodging house" to cost $16,000 (about $475,000 today).  Completed within the year, the firm's interpretation of the Romanesque Revival style was tasteful and elegant.  Noticeably missing were bulky, medieval carvings and chunky undressed stone blocks so often found in the style.  Reeves & Son faced the upper stories in beige brick trimmed in limestone.  Thin brick formed the subtle voussoirs above the arched openings and rounded bull-nosed brick softened the corners of the piers.  The bulbous wrought iron fire escapes doubled as attractive balconies.

But the handsome façade of the Vigilant Lodging House could not disguise what was inside.  Lodging houses were the lowest form of accommodations.  Unlike rooming houses (which were a step below a boarding house), lodging houses offered no amenities.  Instead, for a much cheaper fee the lodgers received an over-night bed with (hopefully) fresh sheets.  Patrons of lodging houses were commonly low-class petty thieves or down-at-the-heels alcoholics.

At street level was a commercial space.  It was leased in 1894 to the Restaurant F. Company.  Despite the misleading name that he used on the lease, Charles Davis opened a pool room.

At 2:00 a.m. on July 7, 1895 three policemen were passing by when they heard a noise from inside.  Officer Brown entered the hallway and attempted to get in through the side door, when "he was grabbed around the waist by William J. McNanery, a white man, who was the watcher," according to The Sun.  Brown called for his fellow officers, Dale and Maxon, who forced in the door.

The pool room broke into mayhem.  A curtain had been drawn around the pool tables to hide them from prying eyes.  A dozen men were playing craps on the tables and there were about fourteen others, most of them Black according to the article, milling around.  

"When Dale and Maxon got into the pool room and the men in the place saw them, there was a wild scramble to get out."  About half of them jumped through the rear windows, but found themselves trapped by a high fence.  Charles Davis was held on $500 bail for trial, while the other men were fined $3 each--about $95 today.

Michael Flanagan was employed at the Vigilant Lodging House to keep order--not always the easiest job.  His aggressive methods resulted in his being arrested and charged with felonious assault on February 11, 1895.  Andrew Barton had checked in the night before.  According to his complaint, "while he was at the lodging house Friday night some of the men in the sitting-room tried to get him to give them money to buy beer."

When Barton refused, a loud argument ensued.  Hearing the ruckus, Flanagan entered with a club, knocked Barton down and kicked and hit him.

By 1899 the former pool room was a saloon, run by John and Patrick E. Brophy.  At around 2:30 on the morning of February 4, two detectives in disguise entered. The Sunday Telegraph reported, "They were shocked by the sights they saw.  At several tables were women seated in various stages of undress, smoking cigarettes, and there were others sprawling about the floor in drunken stupor."

Patrick E. Brophy, said the article, took the detectives "for a promising pair of Reubens," or dupes.  He told his waiter, Eugene Lindsay to take care of the customers.  Because it was past midnight and technically Sunday, serving alcohol would be a violation of the excise law.

The detectives ordered whiskey and when Lindsay brought it to them, the detectives' "false beards and whiskers were cast aside and Lindsay was arrested, after which they drove all the women out of the place."  

Patrick E. Brophy appeared in court the following day in support of his bartender.  But Lindsay, despite the evidence against him, held his hand on the Bible "and said it was all a lie, that he had not given them a drop to drink."  The magistrate was furious.  "And now I'll make an example of you and teach you the value of an oath," he said.  He ordered the clerk to draw up a complaint of perjury.

Brophy asked how much the bail would be and was told $3,000--nearly $97,000 in today's money.  "When the unusually high figure was named, he shot out of that courtroom at a 2.40 gait and left his unpenitent [sic] waiter to his fate," said the article.

Only close inspection reveals Reeves & Son's delicate brickwork.

The police were back a month later.  On March 17, 1899 The Morning Telegraph reported, "Thirty-seven of 'the girls,' as they are termed in the elite vocabulary of that district" explained just how they happened to be arrested at the Vigilant Hotel--purportedly a male-only lodging house.  Also in the courtroom was Acting Police Captain Devery who "explained to the Magistrate just the sort of a place the Vigilant was," said the article.  "He said it was owned by John Brophy, and that when he and his Chief entered there was a wild scramble among the revelers.  Men and women knocked each other over in their frantic efforts to escape."

Each of the women gave the judge a reason why she was out so late.  One, "with crudely painted cheeks," explained "I'm a journeyman dressmaker and my business keeps me out late at times."  Another said, "I am a trained nurse and I was out attending my patients."  One gave her name as Sophie Van Rensselaer and said she had just come in from the country and, "feeling week, she stopped into the place to get something to strengthen her."

The Magistrate Simms asked her, "How do you spell your name?"

"Well, really, I have never thought of that.  Such a small matter, you know."

Simms eventually discharged all the women, but held the proprietor in $500 bail for trial.  According to The Morning Telegraph, as the females left the courtroom one of them remarked, "I think he's just too lovely to be a judge."

The names of the tenants in the Vigilant Lodging House appeared in newspapers for the wrong reasons.  In the winter of 1905 John Taylor appeared in the West Side Court, charged with attempted armed robbery.  On the night of February 27, Lillie Smith, who lived at 235 West 34th Street, had stepped off a Broadway street car and headed home.  She realized two men--John Taylor and Armand P. Berger--were following her.  She ran to her home, but before she could open the door they overtook her.  While Taylor barred the door, Berger pulled a gun and demanded the woman's cash.

Instead, Lillie screamed.  The thugs turned to flee, but "ran into the arms of Detective Grant," as reported by The Sun.  "He pulled his gun and kept them at bay until Miss Smith arrived with another cop and identified them."  Lillie had had a narrow escape.  A bottle of chloral hydrate, used to knock out his victims, was found in Berger's possession.

Tenant Charles Curtis was described by The Star as "a well-known second story man."  The term referred to burglars who climbed through second-story windows.  Because of his reputation, police wanted to question him regarding a series of recent burglaries in 1908.  On the afternoon of February 14, Detective Sergeant Patrick J. Ryan spotted Curtis on Broad Street and approached him.

The Star wrote, "Conscience stricken, the hardened burglar had no sooner been tapped on the shoulder by Ryan, than he turned white and hoarsely cried out, to the astonishment of passersby: 'Al right, Ryan.  You have got me with the goods on me.'"

The detective was as shocked as anyone else.  Curtis was searched on the spot by Ryan and two other detectives.  The Star said, "Excited women passing by saw the sleuths extract two ugly looking revolvers and a jimmy from the burglar's overcoat pockets."  At the station house he confessed to multiple burglaries.  In his pockets were found part of his plunder, including diamond rings, gold mounted eye glasses, and a "silver net purse."

Another burglar living here was Albert Anderson.  The 28-year-old appeared in court on November 29, 1914.  He had already been convicted of first-degree burglary three times and third-degree burglary twice.  If he were convicted a fourth time he could be sent to Sing Sing for life.  In order to avoid that possibility, he pleaded guilty to third-degree burglary and was sentenced to ten years.

The enactment of Prohibition outlawed the sale of alcohol.  An unintended side effect was the increase of drug use.  On September 9, 1922 The Evening Telegram reported, "George Kline, fifty-eight years old, who said he lived at No. 370 Eighth avenue, was arrested at Forty-fourth street and Broadway charged with selling a packing of heroin to Charles Martin...who said he was a vaudeville actor."  Each was held in $1,000 bail, nearly $15,500 today.

The Depression years saw the Rio Grande Club in the ground floor space.  It might have seemed that the meager accommodations in Vigilant were as low as possible.  But then  a renovation completed in until 1950 resulted in 28 to 30 "cubicles" on each floor.  The no-ceiling spaces allowed noises and smells to waft from one cell to another.

By 1971 the Britania Cafe operated in the first floor space.  On October 12, 1971 an advertisement touted a "2 in 1 Spectacular! The Sam 'Houston' Hawkins Show" and the "Exotic Dancers of the Middle East."  The following year, on September 11, 1972, New York Magazine wrote, "Eighth Avenue is not exactly Greece (or even Turkey, for that matter), but after a few glasses of retsina, it might as well be."  The Britania, said the article, was one of the "best spots for watching belly dancing."

Until recently the building was covered in gray paint.

In 2012 journalist Gus Lubin went undercover and spent $40 for a night's stay.  Writing in Insider on March 12, he said the man behind the desk handed him a "big spray bottle with 'BUGS' written on the side in marker.  'Spray it if you see a bug.  You can spray it on yourself, your clothes, your bed."

Still called the Vigilant Hotel, the flaking coat of gray paint that had disguised Reeves & Son's brick façade has recently been removed.  A discount store occupies the ground floor space with its colorful history.  Operated by Interfaith Retreats, the upper floors are described as a hostel and "a space for spiritual retreat" in its website, which says "The pod-style rooms...come with a shared bathroom."

photograph by the author

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A Real West Side Story - the 1896 Flats at 347 West 37th Street

 

In the 1890's architect Louis Korn was busy designing numerous office and loft buildings in the Lower Fifth Avenue district.  But early in 1895 he took on a much different project.

The crime-ridden Hell's Kitchen neighborhood stretched approximately from 34th to 59th Street, and from Eighth Avenue to the Hudson River.  The New York Times called the area “one of the most miserable and crime-polluted neighborhoods in this City” and said “there is more disease, crime, squalor, and vice to the square inch in this part of New-York.”  

For years a three-story tenement had stood at 347 West 37th Street, between Eighth and Ninth Avenues.  Its tenants, like everyone else on the block, were Black.  Racial tensions among the impoverished residents of Hell's Kitchen ran high and Blacks were unofficially restricted from passing west of Ninth Avenue.  The 25-foot-wide tenement was sold in February 1895 and within a month developer John D. Karst, Jr., had hired Louis Korn to design a replacement.  

Korn's plans called for a five-story "brick and stone flat."  The cost of construction would be more than $635,000 today, but Karst most likely felt it was a solid investment.   Following a violent conflict between Black and white gangs in September 1897, a property owner told a reporter "The negroes pay their rents regularly, and many of the whites do not."

The completed building was designed in a quirky take on  the Renaissance Revival style.  The stone newels of the solid stone wing walls of the short stoop held squat cast iron lampposts.  The double-doored entrance was framed by paneled pilasters and an entablature upheld by graceful scrolled brackets.  Panels of undressed stone separated the openings of the upper floors.  The heavy lentils were decorated with delicate carvings and small, leafy brackets.  A pressed copper cornice ran along the roofline.

The apartments had either three or four rooms.  The modern building, however, did not necessarily improve the conduct of its tenants.  Among the first to move in was Maggie Faulks, who lived on the top floor.  Wilhelmina Henricks, the building's housekeeper, lived downstairs.  The women devised a means to make extra money.

On December 31, 1896 the New York Journal ran a front page article about a "school for thieves" being run by Black women.  A 14-year-old boy, Jacob Poore, had been caught trying to carry a rocking chair from the store of McClain, Simpson & Co. on 37th Street.  Furniture dealers often displayed samples on the sidewalk and for weeks Poore had loitered around stores, waiting for a chance to walk off with "chairs of all kinds, foot stools, pictures, and house ornaments," according to The Evening Telegram.

The women paid the boy for his plunder.  He told investigators, for instance, that Wilhelmina had paid him 60 cents for a $7 rocking chair and Maggie paid 50 cents for a $4 rug.  The women were arrested on charges of receiving stolen property.  Both insisted they had no idea the goods were stolen.

Another of the initial tenants was Charles N. Gloucester.  The young man was attempting to improve his lot.  While almost all of the other male residents were laborers, he was working as a law clerk.  But on March 15, 1896 he was sentenced to six months in the penitentiary for petty larceny.  "The crime charged against Gloucester," said The Evening Post, "was that on December 4, he called at the residence of Mrs. Emily Griswall...and stole a water pitcher."

There was one tenant who was not Black--"a little, undersized Mexican, rejoicing in the name of Carlos Castrono," as described by The New York Times on July 6, 1896.  He had a good reason to move onto the block.  The article said "The detectives say he is a man for whom they have been looking for some time, and that he has been swindling the colored people in this vicinity by claiming that he is a magic, or Voodoo, doctor."

Aware that his targets were ill-educated, too poor to seek quality medical attention, and often desperate, Castrono would promise to cure diseases.  His downfall came when he told Mahalla Jefferson that he was "a magic Mexican doctor."  He promised to cure her 10-year-old son, Leonard, who was dying from consumption (known today as tuberculosis).  

The $15 cure--a crippling $475 for the family--came in the form of a sealed envelope and a magic belt.  Under no circumstances was Mrs. Jefferson to open the packet, or the spell would not work.  But later, according to The New York Times, "Mrs. Jefferson chanced to meet some colored people, and they told her not to use the packet as directed, as Castrono was evidently a 'Voodoo' doctor, and if the medicine was used the boy would go to the infernal regions when he died."

Now suspicious, Mahalla opened the pack to find it was filled with folded tissue paper.  She and her daughter went out to track down the bogus doctor and get their money back.  They found him on Ninth Avenue, and he invited them to his rooms.  After walking about a block, he bolted.  "The women screamed and a crowd pursued Castrono and caught him after a run of several blocks," reported The New York Times.  It spelled the end of the voodoo doctor's Hell's Kitchen career.

The residents' names continued to appear in newspapers for all the wrong reasons.  On March 12, 1897 Eliza Johnson was arrested in a raid on a brothel.  Five days later the New York Herald announced the Emma Randolph had been arrested "on the charge of cutting John Eve, also colored, of No. 347 West Thirty-seventh street, with a razor."

William Price seems to have successfully avoided crime and violence.  The 29-year-old was described by The Sun as "a colored laborer."  He returned to his third floor apartment at around 11:00 on the night of May 15, 1897 and, according to the newspaper, "Feeling rather warm, he sat on the window sill."  After awhile he fell asleep and tumbled to the rear courtyard, striking his head.  Although he was taken to Roosevelt Hospital, he was not seriously injured.

In 1904 construction started on the "Pennsylvania Tunnel" under the Hudson River.  It would provide direct rail access from New Jersey to Pennsylvania Station.  Frederick James worked on the project as a driller.  He shared his apartment at 347 West 37th Street with "Winifred de Fosta, his common law wife," as described by The Sun.

On Saturday night, May 25, 1907, there was a birthday party in the building.  Also in attendance was another driller, named Jesus.  The Sun reported, "There was plenty to drink and Jesus soon began to talk of some trouble that he had had with a foreman on the tunnel job.  He pulled out a revolver and declared that he was going to kill to the foreman.  James took the revolver away and kicked Jesus out into the street."

Later that evening, James saw Jesus "lurking in a hallway across the street," and told Winifred he "reckoned [Jesus] meant trouble."  James had no idea how much trouble the other driller had in mind.  When the couple left their apartment not long afterward, Jesus was waiting in ambush in the hallway.  He shot James through the stomach.  As Frederick James died on the hallway floor, Jesus fled.

The Sun reported, "The 'black block' between Eighth and Ninth avenues on Thirty-seventh street hummed like an angry beehive after the shooting, and the reserves had to be called out to preserve order."

Tenants at the time of the murder were paying rents from $16 to $20 a month.  The higher amount would equal about $568 per month today.  Landlords, almost all of whom were white, could charge the high rates simply because their Black tenants had little choice of where they could live.

A highly-publicized incident occurred on July 1, 1911.  John W. Collins, who had no job, lived with Georgianna Anderson, a wash woman.  Collins was known in the building and the neighborhood in general as a worthless drunk, "who has been living on the money a woman earned over the washtub," according to The Sun.

Around daylight on July 1, he came home drunk looking for more money.  "Tumbling into his own flat on the second floor rear, he shook Georgianna's shoulder, hit her in the face when she was slow to awake and threatened to kill her if she didn't give him money," said the newspaper.  She gave him all she had, the $4 she had been holding for the rent.

On the way out of the building, Collins bumped into Maggie Jones, "a little yellow woman with a temper.  She slapped his face."  Collins responded to the insult by pulling out a pistol and shooting at her.  "Maggie Jones scudded into the street and shook Hell's Kitchen with her screams," said The Sun.  Collins returned to the apartment.  Georgianna hid in the kitchen where she could hear him "mumbling to himself and gurgling gin as he lay on the bed."

Before long Collins took out his pistol and began firing at the pictures Georgianna had hung on the wall.  She cracked the bedroom door and asked him to be quiet.  "A bullet smashed through the door a foot above her head.  The woman dropped flat on the floor frightened half to death," reported The Sun.  Collins went to the window and began shooting wildly into the street.

A group of policemen nearby rushed to the scene.   A young boy told them he thought "Johnny Collins was killing his wife" and directed them to the apartment.  Officer Michael Lynch was the first to enter.  He knew Collins well and had several times in the past tried to help him.  He told his fellow officers, "when he sees me I am sure he will quiet down."

Lynch took one step into the apartment and Collins fired his pistol.  The bullet entered Lynch's head just over the eye.  "Lynch collapsed in the doorway, dead by the time his head met the floor," said the article.

Collins bolted past the stunned policemen and up the stairs to the roof.  Twenty minutes after Lynch's murder there were 100 policemen ringing the block, making a house-to-house search.  Collins was finally found under a bed in a third-floor room at 306 West 37th Street.  The Sun reported, "The street was solidly packed with negroes and whites, who broke over the police lines and pressed noisily against the policemen and their prisoner."  

The mob tried to seize Collins from the police, but they were able to keep them back by using their clubs all the way to the station house.   The newspaper said, "Feelings were at a fever height and, recalling the many clashes which had taken place in the past between the white and Negro residents of this neighborhood, it was feared that when the news of Lynch's death was learned a terrible race riot would result."

At the station house, according to police, Collins "appeared to be stupidly drunk" and told investigators that he could not remember what had happened.  And that was Collins's defense during this trial--that he remembered nothing.  He was found guilty and on August 16, 1911 The Evening Telegram ran the headline, "Negro Who Shot Policeman Must Pay With Life."

Over the years there were numerous complaints from residents about startling and sometimes violent police abuse.  The abuse seems to have gone both ways, however.

On March 18, 1910 Violet Brown, a resident of 347 West 37th Street, was loitering on 26th Street.  Patrolman Michael Gavegan ordered her to "move on."  Enraged, Violet rushed up the stoop of a house to get a strategic, elevated vantage point, then kicked the officer several times in the head, breaking his jaw.  Two passersby "overpowered the woman," and took her to the police station.

Patrolman James McGinnis was on his post at 37th Street and Eighth Avenue early in the morning of April 22, 1926.  A woman rushed up saying that the restaurant at 331 West 37th Street was being robbed.  As McGinnis approached the restaurant, 25-year-old Dominick Marolli, another resident of 347 West 37th Street, ran out followed closely by its owner, Peter Makey.

Although Marolli put up a fight, he "was subdued with the policeman's nightstick," according to The New York Sun.  But on the way to the station house, the prisoner's father, John Marolli, and a teenaged boy appeared.  "The elder Marolli drew a knife, according to the patrolman, and then the two newcomers and his prisoner turned upon him," said the article.   The tense situation for the policeman eventually ended with all three being arrested on charges of felonious assault.

By mid-century the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood saw fewer Blacks and more Hispanic residents.  But the violence and racial tensions continued, with Puerto Rican gangs, like the Vampires, waging war with Italian and Irish gangs.  The conditions were vividly portrayed in Leonard Bernstein's play West Side Story in which teenaged boys carried deadly weapons and fought hand-to-hand combat in pre-determined "rumbles."

But the West 37th Street block was, as well, being engulfed by the expanding Garment District.  Closer to Eighth Avenue loft buildings replaced the old tenement houses.  In 1999 347 West 37th Street was converted to Fountain House, a non-profit rehabilitation "clubhouse" for people with serious mental illness.  An architecturally bland sixth floor was added at the same time, while surprisingly preserving the copper cornice.

Other than the penthouse and replacement windows, Louis Korn's 125-year-old tenement is remarkably unchanged.  One of only a few relics on the block from a time of violence, poverty and misery.

photographs by the author

many thanks to reader Ted Leather for suggesting this post

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The Much-Altered John Just House - 34 West 37th Street

 

In 1846 John Just's home was among the few fine residences north of 23rd Street.  A description of the property a few years later hinted that it originally resembled a country home, saying the "well-built four-story brick house" sat within an "inclosed piazza."  Just's carriage driver would have paused to drop the family off under the porte cochere (noted in another ad) before continuing to the stable in the rear.   The house was plumbed for gas, but there was no mention of "Croton water," or indoor plumbing.

A decade later the area was seeing development--enough that 34 West 37th Street was not too remote for boarders.  On September 12, 1859 an advertisement in the New York Herald read:

A private family, residing at No. 34 West Thirty-seventh street, can accommodate one or two young gentlemen desirous of having a comfortable residence for the fall and winter months.  Breakfast and tea if desired.  They can also have the use of a carriage house and stable.

John A. McLean was apparently one of the Just family's servants.  Born in Scotland, the 36-year-old died on October 29, 1860.  An announcement in The New York Times  the following day said, "His friends are invited to attend his funeral, from the residence of John Just, No. 34 West 37th-st., this afternoon."

The Justs remained in the house until February 1863, when it was sold to Joseph A. Levy.  He was a broker with offices at 8 Pine Street.  

Levy seems to have soon leased the stable to Ellis Gotthold for his business.  On June 6, 1867 The Evening Post reported, "This morning, at half-past one o'clock, a fire was discovered in the rectifying distillery of Ellis Gotthold."  Investigators suspected spontaneous combustion.  "In his efforts to extinguish the fire, Mr. Gotthold was severely burned about the neck and hands."

By 1874 the neighborhood had greatly changed as houses increasingly lined the blocks between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.   That year 34 West 37th Street was offered for sale or lease.  The advertisement highlighted the amenity of a private stable, saying the house was "suitable for a physician or a persons desirous of having their horse under their own supervision."

It became the home of the Dr. Charles Phelps family.  Born in 1834, Phelps had begun his medical practice in 1859 and was connected with Bellevue Hospital.  He and his wife, the former Isabel Marguerite James, had one son, Luis James Phelps, born in 1864.

Dr. Phelps enjoyed a spotless reputation, but it was nearly ruined by one of his prominent private patients--James Gordon Bennett, Jr.--in 1877.   The wealthy and eccentric publisher of the New York Herald had attended a New Year's Day reception in the home of his fiancée, Caroline May.  The engagement was abruptly ended after Bennett became intoxicated and urinated in the drawing room fireplace.  The following day Caroline's brother, Frederick, struck him with a horsewhip and challenged him to a duel.

Bennett agreed and, as a precaution, brought Dr. Phelps along.   Although duels were long out of fashion (and illegal), the men met at dawn.  Luckily, although May received a minor flesh wound, neither was seriously hurt.  The New York Times said on January 11, "the failure of the combatants to puncture each other more effectually was due to the novelty of their position and the unusual distance--20 paces--between them."

On January 9 Dr. Phelps was called before a grand jury.  He was asked a series of questions like, "Do you know if any hostile meeting has occurred between Mr. Bennett and Mr. May?" and "After leaving New York on Sunday last, when and where did you see Mr. Bennett."  The New York Times reported, "Dr. Phelps declined to answer any of these questions."  Judge Gildersleeve demanded that he answer, while Phelps's attorney said he "should not be compelled to answer any questions that might criminate himself."  Gildersleeve eventually lost patience and committed Phelps for 30 days for contempt of court.

In 1893 Luis James, now an attorney, was made a commissioner of deeds, a position similar to a notary public today.  That year his father was appointed to the Board of Police Surgeons.  It was a role that would once again put him in an unfavorable light in the press.

On May 25, 1894, The Evening World entitled an article "Used Corpses For Targets / Ghastly Experiments Made by Dr. Phelps at the Morgue."  The article explained, "Dr. Phelps is a member of the Anatomical Committee of Bellevue Hospital, and conceived the idea that it would be beneficial from a scientific point of view to test the effects of wounds produced by firearms shot at different distances into the brain and with bullets of varying calibre.  The result was a shooting match in the rear room of the Morgue."

That room was normally used for autopsies, but now was Phelps's text lab where unclaimed bodies were shot.  The article described the procedure:

An unclaimed body, said to be that of a gray-haired old man, was taken from the ice chest and stood up in the corner.  The doctor stood a few feet off, and taking deliberate aim, sent a large bullet crashing through the brain.  Experiments were then made at shorter range.  The second body into which lead was poured is said to have been that of one of the many unfortunate creatures who seek oblivion from trouble in death.

Although the newspaper attempted to rouse public indignation, authorities supported Phelps.  The morgue keeper, A. N. White, said the tests were done "with the consent of Warden O'Rourke, who claimed that the experiments were made for the benefit of science."  Members of the medical staff at Bellevue Hospital told a reporter that they regarded "the affair as perfectly proper."

On March 2, 1901 Brooklyn Life said, "Miss Marie Christina Nichols's engagement...is of especial Brooklyn interest on account of the family's prominent identification with this borough.  Her fiancé is Mr. Luis James Phelps, an attorney, residing at 34 West Thirty-seventh street, Manhattan." 

The following year, in April 1902, Isabel and Charles Phelps sold their home of nearly three decades to another physician, Dr. Daniel H. Smith and his wife Ella.  The price--$70,500--reflected the soaring property values in the neighborhood.  It would equal about $2.16 million today.

Smith and Phelps may have known one another through their mutual positions on the Board of Police Surgeons.  Born on April 12, 1852, Smith had graduated from the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1873 after which he studied further at Glasgow University.

Dr. Smith died on July 10, 1912 at the age of 60.  Ella remained for three more years.  Then, on November 30, 1915 an auction was held of "all the household and personal effects and presentation pieces from the art centres of the world."  Special focus was placed on the "collection of oil paintings."

Ella sold the house the following month to "a buyer who will alter [it] for business purposes," according to the Real Estate Record & Guide.  It seemed, however, that the end was on the horizon for the vintage residence when the Record & Guide reported three months later that architect William H. Gompert "is preparing plans for a 16-story brick and limestone store, office and loft building...for Walters, Inc."

But instead, the property was resold to the Altman Estates, Inc.  The firm hired architect Eugene De Roge to make "alterations and additions" to the former house at a cost of $5,000 (about $120,000 today).

De Roge's renovations were substantial.  A two-story commercial extension as erected at the property line.   The cornice was replaced with a parapet and fanciful Flemish Renaissance Revival stepped gable.  And terra cotta tiles, more in keeping with the Queen Anne trend of a generation earlier, decorated the upper portion of the facade.

Whimsical metal scrollwork, imitating volutes, flanks the stepped gable.

The first and second floors contained separate store spaces, and the upper floors held apartments.  The Altman Estate quickly marketed the second floor in April 1917 saying it had "attractive show windows...suitable [for] retail specialty business or high-class wholesale."

The ground floor was leased to Lewis Hessler.  In its June 1917 edition The Upholsterer and Interior Decorator reported he "has opened a new showroom at 34 West Thirty-seventh Street, and will carry a complete line of period furniture."  The term "period furniture" was a bit misleading.  An advertisement on February 17, 1918 pictured suites of reproduction furniture in 18th century styles.  It was high-end merchandise, a 10-piece "Mahogany William & Mary" dining room suite retailing at the equivalent of $10,200 today.

The second floor was home to B. Paul's hair salon.  

The New York Times, December 23, 1917 (copyright expired)

The apartments were leased to well-to-do tenants.  On March 18, 1919 The Sun reported that "Capt. Lambert of the Lambs Club," had rented and apartment, and two months later Thornton W. Allen moved in.  

A prolific arranger and composer, Allen was responsible for several American university alma maters and football fight songs.  He was the managing editor of The Musical Courier and in 1910 had established the music publishing firm, the Thornton W. Allen Company.  Among his songs were "Vanderbilt Forever," "Maryland Victory Song," and "Let's Go Trojan."

Lewis Hessler's furniture store did not last long in the space.  It was home to the Laun-Dry-Ette Co. by the end of 1918.  The firm sold a wide variety of household appliances.  An advertisement in October 1920 pictured a Mermaid Electric Dishwasher, a Capitol Ironer, a Hoover Suction Cleaner, a Ruttenber Electric Range and the Laun-Dry-Ette electric washing machine.  The ad promised:

With these five servants fatigue is a stranger in the house, and the daily tasks are pleasures.  Think of dishwashing and clothes washing without putting your hands in water!  Think of ironing without lifting heavy irons!  Sweeping without dust!  Cooking minus a super-heated kitchen!

A model demonstrates the Mermaid Electric Dishwasher.  New-York Tribune, October 3, 1920 (copyright expired)

By 1925 the Gregory Cafeteria was in the ground floor.  A renovation by architect Richard Shutkind, completed in 1937, converted the former apartments to "offices and showrooms."  Among the tenants in the 1940's were the Paris Feather Factory and Remotrol Co.  

In December 1946 the latter entitled an advertisement "Sail the Seas by Remote Control."  The "seas" were, in fact, a 19" by 10-1/4" tank of "sea blue aluminum" in which toy boats were operated.  The ad said, "By the magic of remote control, the little ships, sail from port to port, past the island lighthouse to enter distant docks.  A simple magnetic control held in the child's hand, under the tank, produces this mysterious motion of ships floating in only 1/2" of water."

A subsequent remodeling to the building was completed in 1970.  It resulted in one apartment each on the two top floors.  John Just's once elegant home is successfully disguised by numerous make-0vers.  Eugene De Roge's eccentric 1916 design, now painted beige and brown, still captures attention above the rather gruesomely-altered two-story storefront.

photographs by the author

many thanks to reader Ted Leather for suggesting this post

no permission to reuse the content of this blog has been granted to LaptrinhX.com

Engine Company No. 26 - 220 West 37th Street

 

The volunteer Protection Engine Company No. 7 occupied the firehouse at 220 West 37th Street until 1865 when the Metropolitan Fire Department was organized.  The house then became home to the Metropolitan Engine Company, No. 26.  In 1870, the Fire Department's Annual Report showed a roster of 10 fire fighters.  Housed within the station was a "steamer second size, built in 1867" and a "two-wheeled tender, improved pattern, with seats."

The city invested invested $4,200 (about $132,000 today) in  1895 to rebuild and modernize the firehouse.  It was at that time that the building acquired most of its present appearance.   It followed the tried-and-true configuration of fire houses--a cast iron base with a centered truck bay supporting, in this case, two stories faced in brick and trimmed in stone.  A tidy Italianate metal cornice--somewhat past its prime in architectural favor--finished the design.

Nineteenth century firefighters faced significant problems--lax building codes, stables filled with combustible materials like hay, and the volatile illuminating gas plumbed into almost every building in the city.   It was the latter that put the members of Engine Company 26 in peril on May 25, 1894.  The men were called to a smoke condition at 217 West 35th Street--a four story tenement with a grocery store at street level.

The tenants all made it out of the building, which had filled with black smoke.  Yet initially there was no other sign of fire.  The Evening World reported, "The members of Engine Company No. 26 finally found a fire smouldering among a lot of coal and wood in the cellar.  They had only been in the cellar two minutes, throwing a stream in the direction the fire seemed to be, when one of the men crept up the stairs on his hands and knees."

That man was Captain Andrew Gaffney.  He made it to the first floor before losing consciousness.   Right behind him was another man who, too, was overcome.  Eventually five fire fighters were carried unconscious to the street.  All were taken back to the station house to recover.

A later investigation found gas had been leaking from a meter in the basement of the baker's shop next door.  The Evening World reported, "In some manner, it is thought, the gas caught fire, and that the combination of gas and smoke was too much for the fire fighters."  That there was not an explosion is nearly miraculous.

Keeping his men in line was not always easy for the foreman of any fire house.  On October 14, 1896 The Evening Post reported, "Patrick J. Brennan of Engine Company No. 26 was fined five days' pay for intoxication, as was also John F. Fitzgerald of the same company, on the same charge."  Simultaneously, James W. Kelly was AWOL.  On October 1 he had been granted a five-day leave of absence, but never returned.  His wife said he went to Boston on October 8, and she had not heard from him since.  "The foreman thought Kelly had debts he was unable to meet," reported The Evening Post.  "The Commissioner decided to dismiss him."

The station got another update in 1906 when the city commissioned architect Alexander Stevens to extend the building to the rear, add skylights, and new toilets.  It was a major interior renovation, amounting to more than a quarter of a million in today's dollars.

It was not lighting gas, but ammonia fumes, which proved dangerous in a fire at the five-story Volunteer Meat Market at 573 Eighth Avenue on February 26, 1907.   The refrigeration plant in the cellar used the gas and when fire broke out there, the lines were broken.  This time the fire fighters were in even greater peril than at the 1895 fire.

Engine Company 26 was the first to arrive at the scene.  Captain Carlocks "broke his way through a huge door into the cellar," reported the New-York Tribune.  "Fireman [Albert] Dann went in after him.  He was overcome at once by ammonia fumes and died a few minutes later in a streetcar which had been turned into a temporary hospital."

One-by-one the other fire fighters were overcome.   And yet, the stalwart men managed to extinguish the fire before it could spread above the cellar.   Nine other fire fighters were transported to hospitals gravely ill, one barely clinging to life.  The article said, "At Bellevue Hospital it was said that Baker could not live much longer."

Motorized fire trucks required upgrading station houses across the city.  In March 1908 architect Edward L. Middleton filed plans for improving Engine Company No. 26, "including the installation of steel and concrete floors to support the apparatus and the building of a new hose loft," reported The Sun.

All fire companies, it seems, had a mascot and Engine Company No. 26 had Kid, "a large coach dog," as described by the New-York Tribune, which came along in 1898.  In 1904 the company's engine driver, Samuel Chapman, was the only member of the company to travel to Baltimore to help fight what would be known as the Great Baltimore Fire.  When he was asked to return to lead the city's parade, he took Kid along.

The New-York Tribune reported, "Before the procession ended Kid fled."  Unbelievably, three days later Kid appeared at Chapman's doorstep in the Bronx.  He never returned to the 37th Street station house, the New-York Tribune opining, "The life of a fire mascot evidently became too strenuous for the old monarch."

The void was filled on May 25, 1913.  The newspaper reported, "Another coach dog, younger and smaller, but otherwise much like Kid, walked into the engine company's home yesterday and acted as if he would like to stay.  In a few hours he was unanimously accepted as mascot, being dubbed Deacy, after one of the men to whom he seemed to take a special fancy."

By the 1920's the neighborhood around Engine Company No. 26 was seeing the rise of business buildings, creating another challenge for fighting fires.   On July 6, 1921 fire broke out in the McCall Company building, almost directly across the street at 232-234 West 37th Street.  It took three companies an hour to extinguish the blaze, during which 15 fire fighters were overcome, four of whom were rescued unconscious.

Similarly, when the men of Engine Company 26 rushed to the eighth floor of a West 39th Street building the following  year in September, they discovered 20 fire fighters from Hook and Ladder Company 21 "stretched out on the floor of the room."  They were all carried unconscious to the seventh floor where doctors from Bellevue and New York Hospitals worked on them, despite the burning conditions above.

New York City's Garment District was fully ensconced in the neighborhood by the second half of the 20th century.  The men of Engine Company No. 26 now had a much different problem with which to contend--traffic.  On May 26, 1983 David W. Dunlap, writing in The New York Times, reported on the worrying issue.  "Fire officials said that, for example, it was not unusual for the members of Engine Company 26, 220 West 37th Street, to go out on foot to avoid garment-center traffic."

The July 16, 1990 Empire State Building blaze was the most notable high-rise fire the company responded to to date .  The four-alarm fire broke out around 6:30 that evening.  While it was confined to the 51st floor, smoke and water affected at least 10 others.  Lt. George Lonergan of Engine Company No. 26 told a reporter, "We are very fortunate this was after business house.  It was a very difficult fire and could have been a real tragedy."  Nevertheless, before it was extinguished, 38 people, including 31 firefighters, were injured.

Of course, the World Trade Center attacks on September 11, 2001 were the most significant event the company would respond to.  Among them that morning were Captain Thomas Farino and 29-year-old Firefighter Dana Hannon.  Tragically neither would return.

In the spring of 2011 the Bloomberg administration was trying to find ways to fill a $600 million budget gap.  A list of 20 fire companies "it is considering closing" was published on May 5.  Included was Engine Company 26.  In a statement the Mayor said, "It will be great to have a firehouse or company on every corner, but that's not the real world."

Engine Company 26 squeaked through the elimination process and survives today, a Victorian anachronism among soaring commercial business.

photographs by the author

no permission to reuse the content of this blog has been granted to LaptrinhX.com

The Solomon Strauss House - 221 West 38th Street

 

In 1855 well-dressed ladies and gentlemen strolled through the magnificent Crystal Palace on Reservoir Square (today's Bryant Park).  It had been opened two years earlier for the Exhibition of Industry of All Nations.  Just over a block away to the west, at 221 West 38th Street, Frederick List and his family lived in a handsome brownstone-clad residence.

List was described in directories as a "segarmaker."  Based on his impressive home, he most likely owned a significant cigar-making business.  Four stories tall above a high English basement and three bays wide, its parlor floor featured full-height windows and and an elegant arched entrance.  The segmentally arched openings of the upper floors were fully framed and capped with flat molded cornices.   An ornate pressed metal bracketed cornice completed the design.

In 1857 Solomon Strauss and his wife, Frederica, purchased the house.   A wealthy merchant, he was the principal in the downtown drygoods store of Solomon Strauss & Co.  When the family moved in, Henry Solomon Strauss was attending the Free Academy of the City of New York.  His younger brother, William, would also graduate from the school and later from the Columbia University Law School.

Solomon Strauss died on December 12, 1878 at the age of 55.  His funeral was held in the parlor three days later.  By now Henry was in in the corset business at 79 White Street and William had had his own legal practice since 1872.  He was dabbling in politics, as well.

On October 31, 1880, The New York Times reported that William had been nominated for assemblyman of the 15th District.  The newspaper heartily gave its endorsement, saying "he is a candidate entirely worthy of support.  His father was the late Solomon Strauss, who was an old and respected merchant at the time of his death."

The Strauss family remained in the residence until the mid-1880s'.  In 1886 it was home to the Robinson family.  Robert H. Robinson was in the shoe business and William H. Robinson devoted his private time to breeding and showing pedigree dogs.

Living with the family was another dog breeder, Crump Ormsby.  On November 18, 1887, the New York Herald reported, "The organization of the American Toy Dog Club, for some time past under consideration, has been effected."  Ormsby was elected secretary of the new organization.  The article noted, "Some of the members object to the name and want it changed to Pet Dog Club."

There were four dogs in the house.  Ormsby's Pug, "a winner of many prizes in England and one in this country," according to The Sun, and Pug's daughter, Gypsy, which had not yet been shown.  The Robinsons' had a thoroughbred Newfoundland puppy, Raven, and another dog.

The neighbors, too, were dog lovers.  According to William, "all are respectable families, and all but one keep fine dogs."  Nevertheless, someone in the neighborhood had a grudge against the four dogs in the Robinson house.  On January 13, 1888 The Sun reported, "Two valuable dogs were poisoned on Tuesday night in the back yard of 221 West thirty-eighth street, and the whole neighborhood, being a sort of metropolis for fancy dogs, is in a considerable state of excitement."

Gypsy and Raven had been let out into the yard at around 8:00 that night.  "When they were let in through the back parlor window, Gypsy at once went into convulsions and died.  Raven was discovered dead under a chair," said the article."  William Robinson suspected "that a servant in some of these houses has been bribed to kill the dogs by some jealous fancier."

The house was sold at auction on March 7, 1894, after which it became a "theatrical boarding house," as described by The Sun.  Among the earliest residents were actor Henry Maeder Pitt and his wife, actress Margaret Pitt, who lived on the second floor.  Henry had made his first appearance on stage at the age of 14.  

Margaret was not at home on the afternoon of March 7, 1898.  Another boarder, actress Lucky Mackin, heard moaning coming from their rooms and entered.  Pitt was on the bed and a doctor was sent for, but the actor died ten minutes after he arrived.  Policeman Holland put in his report that Pitt had killed himself by drinking carbolic acid.  Coroner Zucca agreed, without doing an examination.

Suicide in the 19th century was a serious and shameful charge.  A journalist from The Sun challenged Zucca, noting that Pitt's lips were not burned.  There was no empty bottle of carbolic acid to be found, but there was a bottle of chlorodyne, an opiate often used as a sleeping aid.  The reporter strongly suggested that "Pitt took an [accidental] overdose in order to induce sleep."  The coroner never changed his report, however, and Pitt's memory was forever tainted by the suggestion of suicide.

Other theatrical figures in the house were Agnes Findlay, vaudeville entertainer B. Frank Bush and his wife, Cora Maud, and William Mack.  

Margaret Pitt was still living here in 1902 when her dramatic death scene in Camille was rudely interrupted.  On March 28, The Morning Telegraph explained, "She was alone and the stage was darkened.  Just as she remarked for the fiftieth time, 'Oh, if Armand were only here,' she cast her bewildered gaze upon the stage just aft the tormenter, and, there, to her horror, saw approaching quietly, but steadily, her sixty dollar feather boa."  When she realized that it was a rat causing the boa to move across the stage, she panicked.

"With a wild, unaffected scream, Margaret Pitt jumped out of the character, sprang upon the table and yelled for help...The audience noted the action of Miss Pitt and cheered wildly.  Being a New Jersey audience, they all thought it belonged to the play."  A stage hand kicked the rat into the orchestra, precipitating a riot.  "Men, women and children crushed each other in the wild scramble for safety, and the house was partially emptied, after which 'Camille' was dropped and the rest of the time filled in with specialties."

The article noted, "Miss Pitt is back in New York.  She could not cure her shattered nerves, and for the time being is indulging in bromides at her apartments, at 221 West Thirty-eighth street.  Her physician says that she is suffering severely from prostration of the nervous system."

For some reason the tenant list changed from actors to chauffeurs around 1904.  The residents over the next decade included John Ryan, Alfred Panier, George Theobold, Leon Lehereux (chauffeur to George Gould), and Eugene F. Aymar, all professional automobile drivers.

One resident not in the chauffeuring profession in 1916 was boxer Jean Constant, the French light-weight champion.  He set up a sort of gym in the basement and on March 23 offered to give a free boxing lesson to Michael Seranti, who worked in the kitchen.

For some reason the 18-year-old was carrying the equivalent of $240,000 today in cash and Panama Canal bonds in the pockets of his waistcoat.  He told a reporter later, "Constant and a friend he had there tried to make me take the waistcoat off, but I would not.  Then Constant knocked me out with a blow on the point of the jaw.  When I recovered consciousness both men were gone and so was my $10,000."

Constant was, of course, arrested.  But three days later he was released "because evidence of theft was lacking," according to The New York Press.  "The man who stole the money, it was said, wrote two letters clearing the fighter and returning $2,000 of the missing property."

John Couldis signed a 21-year lease on the building in August 1920.  The basement level became home to Schiavi's Italian Restaurant.  The change in what had been an elegant residential neighborhood became evident two years later, on August 25, 1922.

The New-York Tribune reported, "Ralph H. Oyler, director of the Government Narcotic Division, and three of his detectives won a hard fight with fifteen men in a spaghetti restaurant at 221 West Thirty-eighth Street early yesterday.  Four men were arrested on charges of selling heroin at $70 an ounce."

On August 29, 1957 The New York Times reported on "plans for modernizing 221 West Thirty-eighth Street, in the heart of the garment district."  The article noted, "It was vacated recently by Schiavi's Italian Restaurant, which had been there for thirty years and is going out of business."

The architectural firm of Sapolsky & Slobodian installed offices in the former parlor floor, and updated the step-down restaurant in the basement.  The Department of Buildings insisted that the upper floors "remain vacant."  That stipulation lasted until 1990 when another restaurant moved into the parlor level and the upper floors were converted to offices.

The bedraggled building--once one of the elegant homes of wealthy merchants along the block--is somewhat of an eyesore today.  And yet its patrician past is easily discerned behind the fire escapes and garish signage.

photographs by the author

many thanks to reader Ted Leather for requesting this post

no permission to reuse the content of this blog has been granted to LaptrinhX.com