The George Gershwin House - 316 West 103rd Street

 

photograph by Alice Lum

Born New York City in 1857, Mark Ash graduated from Columbia University Law School and co-founded Alexander & Ash in 1878.  He and his wife, Rose, had three children, Edward, Alma and Jennie.

In 1898, Ash hired architect Henri Fouchaux to design a four-story and basement house at 316 West 103rd Street.  A marriage of Beaux Arts and Renaissance Revival styles, the 25-foot wide residence was faced in limestone and parged brick.  The rusticated parlor level sat above a dog-legged stoop protected by French-inspired iron railings.  The transoms of the arched parlor openings wore handsome metal screens of wreaths and stylized vines.  The spandrels of underside of the two-story, faceted oriel directly above was intricately carved with sprays of full blown roses.  The fourth floor sat back from the blustraded cornice, nearly unseen from the street.

photograph by Alice Lum

The Ash family was highly involved in Jewish causes.  Ash was a member of the Judaeans and a supporter of the Jewish Protectory and Aid Society, and Rose was a member of the National Council of Jewish Women.  

Construction was completed in 1899 and a search for domestic help began.  On November 9, a succinct advertisement in the New York Journal and Advertiser read, "Nurse--Competent.  Call between 10 and 2, 316 West 103d st.," and six days later an advertisement sought, "Young man to care for furnace; sleep home."

Also living in the house was William Ash, Mark's unmarried brother.  William was born in 1871 and graduated from New York University and the New York Law School.  He, too, was a member of Alexander & Ash.  The brothers co-authored technical books like the 1899 The Building Code of the City of New York; and Ash's Annotated Greater New York Charter, published in 1906 and updated in 1912 and 1913.

Edward Ash graduated from the Ethical Culture School in 1909 and received his law degree from Fordham University in 1913.  Not surprisingly, he joined Alexander & Ash.  

In the meantime, his father had delved into real estate development, as well.  In 1910, for instance, he and Sonn Brothers erected The Riviera, at 790 Riverside Drive, described by the Real Estate Record & Guide as, "one of the largest and most magnificently constructed and equipped apartment houses in the city."

Alma Ash graduated from Barnard College.  The parlor was the scene of her wedding to landscape artist Alonzo Klaw on November 12, 1912.  The New York Times reported, "It was a quiet home wedding, only the relatives and a few intimate friends being present."

William Ash died of Bright's Disease on January 14, 1915.  The attorney was 43 years old.

The following year, Edward enlisted in the U.S. Army.  He trained at Plattsburg, New York.  It is unclear whether he actively served in the war, but he was back at 316 West 103rd Street on July 12, 1917 when he married Jeannette Albert in the bride's Brooklyn home.

On July 28, 1923, the Record & Guide reported that Mark Ash had sold the house to Mary E. Lane.  Two years later, on September 11, 1925, The New York Evening Post reported that Mary Lane sold the house, "to George Gershwin, the music composer."  Gershwin was just 28 years old.

Now home to the entire Gershwin family, it was creatively compartmentalized to accommodate the living arrangements of the all-adult members.  George's parents, Rose and Morris Gershwin (born in Russia as Roza Bruskina and Moishe Gershwin) took the parlor floor; George's siblings, Arthur and Frances, were on the third; brother Ira moved into the fourth floor (and a year later his bride, Leonore would be there); and George took the top floor.

George Gershwin had recently returned from Paris.  He was just seeing the glint of success in the music world, yet fame and real fortune were still a few years away.  

Part of the English basement was turned into a table tennis room and two grand pianos were lugged into the house for George.  Howard Pollack, in his George Gershwin: His Life and Work, writes, 

Observers painted a picturesque portrait of this residence, with Morris riding the elevator, Rose cooking borscht in the kitchen, Frances on her way to dance lessons, and George making occasional retreats to the nearby Whitehall Hotel to get some work done—a scene that might have sprung from the pages of the play You Can’t Take it with You (1936) by two friends of the Gershwins, George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart.  Years later, Frances remembered with some amazement how she would sometimes return home and find groups of people independently socializing on each floor of the house.

George used the top floor as living quarters, office and studio.  Shortly after moving in, he landed a $35-a-week job as a rehearsal pianist for the Bolton-Wodehouse-Kern musical Miss 1917.  Bored with playing the same tunes over and over, he gradually slipped in his own subtle versions.  The creative variations caught the attention of management and he was soon elevated to accompanist for the Century Sunday Concerts—a popular show featuring the likes of Fanny Brice, Bert Williams, Ann Pennington and Eddie Cantor.

This portrait of George Gershwin was made in 1937. from the collection of the Library of Congress

George and his brother Ira would not be staying in the 103^rd Street house with their family for long.  In 1927, flushed with success and with their plays Strike up the Band and Funny Face opening on Broadway, the brothers moved to adjoining penthouses at 33 Riverside Drive.

On November 3, 1930, The New York Sun reported on the marriage of Frances Gershwin, who was now 22 years old, to Leopold Godowsky, Jr., "son of the pianist and composer."  The wedding was held in Ira Gershwin's Riverside Drive penthouse.

The following year, on September 19, 1931, The New York Times reported, "George Gershwin, the composer, sold his brownstone [sic] residence at 316 West 103d after an ownership of many years."  Only two months later, the buyer, Mary S. Drain resold it to Isidor and Rose Becker "for alteration into small suites," as reported by The Times on December 24.  "This is a four-story house containing sixteen rooms, four baths and an electric elevator," said the article.

The Beckers leased rooms to a variety of tenants including conductor Jasha Horenstein, who entertained visitors like Artur Rubenstein here.  It was a frightening time for German Americans and, especially, German Jews.  Across the street from 316 West 103rd Street, at the corner of Riverside Drive, was the Masters Apartments where Congressman Sol Bloom lived.  The Jewish chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Relations opposed isolationism and on Sunday afternoons for two years—between 1939 and 1941—the sidewalk outside saw pro-Nazi demonstrators.

No. 316 West 103^rd was not immune to political intrigue.  One resident, a waiter at the Astor Hotel, was blatant about his pro-Nazi sympathies.  One day in 1940, five FBI agents came to the house and arrested him as a member of an espionage ring centered at the Astor Hotel.  He was soon deported.

The unusual stoop can be seen in this 1941 photograph.   The original fourth floor can been glimpsed behind the balustrade above the cornice.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

In 1947, the house was converted to apartments, two per floor.  The stoop was shaved off and the entrance moved to the former English basement.  The original railings were reinstalled as the areaway fencing.   

A fascinating tenant in 1952 was Gordon Langley Hall.  Born in England in 1922, Hall was society editor of the Port Chester Daily Item.  On March 15 that year, The New York Age reported, "A reception honoring the baritone [John Fleming] followed his recital and was given at the home of Gordon Langley Hall, 316 West 103rd Street."  Hall would later live as a female, changing her name to Dawn Langley Pepita Hall.  She claimed to have been born with an unusual medical condition that swelled her genitals and caused the misidentification of her sex.  And, indeed, she married John-Paul Simmons in 1969 and had a daughter.

photograph by Alice Lum

In 1998, the top floor was raised and given a grossly architecturally incompatible facade.  Despite that and the unfortunate loss of the stoop, Henri Fouchaux's handsome and unusual design stands out along the block.

The Dr. F. W. Lilienthal House - 408 West 154th Street

Despite his decidedly French-sounding name, Henri Fouchaux was American, born in Coytesville, New Jersey in 1856.  By the turn of the century he was the most prolific architect in Washington Heights and Harlem, responsible for scores of homes and business buildings.

Among them were the eight upscale residences he designed for developer William H. Lake in 1898--three on West 154th Street and two around the corner on St. Nicholas Avenue.  His plans, filed in August that year, estimated the cost of the 20-foot wide homes at $15,000 each; or around $468,000 today.

Completed the following year, Fouchaux had turned to the popular Beaux Arts style for the project.  The three 154th Street homes were designed in an A-B-A configuration.  The two matching end houses were a restrained example of the often flamboyant style.  Like its identical twin, No. 408 was three stories tall above an English basement, it was clad in limestone and featured an angled bay at the second floor, supported by ornate stone brackets.

Fouchaux stepped away from the French motif by embellishing the newels of the dog-legged stoop and the spandrel panels of the second floor bay with Renaissance-inspired carvings.  Above the understated third floor was a bracketed pressed metal cornice.

No. 408 is at the left.  The steep incline of West 154th Street necessitated a higher stoop than that of its twin at No. 412.

In 1900 Lake sold all eight of the completed houses to Charles Hibbard.   The ambitious real estate operator seems to have been overly-optimistic, for he lost six of the houses in foreclosure in 1902.   At the time of the auction on March 29 he owed the bank $16,690 and back taxes of $600--or about $550,000 today.

At the time Dr. F. W. Lilienthal and his wife, Auguste, were well-known among the German community.  He emigrated from Germany in 1861 and was one of the founders of the German Dispensary that served the often impoverished population of the East Village, known as Kleindeutschland, or Little Germany.  But the couple was also known for their fearless support of the working class Germans and Dr. Lilienthal was described by The New York Times later as "one of the pioneers of the Socialist Party in this city."

The devastating economic depression known as Financial Panic of 1873 lasted for several years.  It put thousands of New Yorkers out of work, including the tenement dwellers in the German district.  With no civic funded relief available, the people grew desperate.  Committees and organizations were formed to meet with the city government in hopes to organize public works programs to provide jobs.  But they were rebuffed.

On January 13, 1874 about 7,000 unemployed workers gathered in Tompkins Square Park.  A force of about 1,600 police officers entered the park wielding clubs to disperse the crowd.  When the workers fought back, mounted police charged the crowd.  A witness, Samuel Gompers described them "riding them down and attacking men, women and children without discrimination.  It was an orgy of brutality."

Two weeks later, on January 30, what The New York Herald described as a "German mass meeting" was held at Cooper Square.  The newspaper reported "the approaches to the Great Hall were blocked by a motley crown of Germans."

Presiding over the meeting and giving the first speech to the "boisterous and demonstrative audience" was the outraged Dr. Lilienthal.   He stressed the importance of protecting "the rights of citizens in this crisis" and to "protest against this flagrant violation of the right of free assemblage."

Among the strong male voices that night was one that was perhaps unexpected by the press covering the event.  Auguste Lilienthal stepped to the dais as one of the last speakers.  The Herald described her as "a tall, stout lady."  Her impassioned speech accused the police of a "felonious outrage perpetrated upon working-men in Tompkins Square."  She said they had robbed the people of the right of free speech guaranteed by the Constitution.  "Would the police have disturbed Messrs. Astor, Stewart, Vanderbilt, &c., in a meeting of theirs?  Oh, no, they would have taken great care to secure them a peaceable and quiet gathering."

"Who were the men clubbed in Tompkins Square?" she asked.  "They were the real citizens, the real workers, the real taxpayers."  Auguste's speech was repeatedly met with a chorus of "Bravos!"

Dr. Lilienthal's practice provided him the income to afford his upscale home in what had become a stylish suburban neighborhood.  After Charles S. Hibbard sold No. 408 in 1901 it became home to the Lilienthals.  The couple maintained a country estate in the Catskills near Tannersville, New York, as well.

Auguste was helped by a small staff of domestic servants.  An advertisement in The New York Herald read, "Two German girls, a cook and a chambermaid by small family in private home.  Two sisters or mother and daughter preferred."  Auguste's preference was most likely well-founded.  A family member, especially a mother, might keep the other from dawdling.

She needed domestic help because she was no mere housewife.  Auguste was the editor of the woman's section of the Sunday magazine of The New York Volkszeitung.  (The Lilienthal's adult daughter, Meta L. Stern, incidentally, was a popular German-language author who wrote under the pseudonym of Hebe.)

Dr. Lilienthal's booming practice may have been boosted by his generous dispensing of medications.  Medical Leaves: A Review of the Jewish Medical World later commented, "A good physician with a great following was Dr. F. W. Lilienthal.  Patients were obliged to wait in line for hours at his office.  Dr. Lilienthal usually prescribed pills in large quantities; one hundred pills was his usual prescription."

The Lilienthals were at their summer estate on July 28, 1910 when the 77-year-old doctor died.  The New York Times, while noting that he was "one of the leading German physicians" in the city, focused on his political and social stances.  "He was also a founder of the Free Thinkers' Society, and a member of the various organizations which joined to form the present Socialist Party in this country.  He was a member of the International Socialist Union."

Within the year Lilienthal's estate sold No. 408 to Martin E. Roache.  He was the vice-president and the second-largest stockholder in James Butler, Inc., grocers.  The firm, which was started by James Butler, now operated 171 retail grocery stores in connection with its wholesale business.

The Roache family leased the house to Harry C. Hequembourg, purchasing agent for the American Locomotive Company in 1917; and in 1919 sold it.  By now the neighborhood had noticeably changed.  Subway service reached the area in 1904, making it more accessible to middle class New Yorkers.  Apartment buildings began sprouting along the avenues and the exclusivity of the neighborhood disappeared.

By the Depression years 408 West 154th Street was being operated as a rooming house.  At least one tenant, William J. Garvey, was financially comfortable enough to own an automobile.  On January 30, 1930 he was driving along South Broadway in Yonkers when a 19-year-old boy, Henry Offerman, stepped in the path of his car.   Garvey was unable to react and he hit Offerman, injuring the teen enough to require his treatment at St. Joseph's Hospital.  Garvey was held innocent of any negligence.

Mrs. Odette Kelly took the building manager to court in 1935, claiming he was pocketing her rent money.  On November 15, according to The New York Age, she complained that she had given Samuel J. Cottman (a "well-known realtor") her $67.50 rent on October 2.  She was later informed by the building's owner, Emanuel & Shure, that she was behind in her rent.  When she confronted Cottman he "kept making excuses to her about the money," she said.

The New York Age reported "Cottman was hauled into Heights Court."  The hearing was held on November 22 where Cottman's defense convinced the judge of his innocence.  "The realtor told the court that he had held the money up at the request of the woman's husband," reported The New York Age.  "The court agreed with him...and dismissed the charge."

By the last decade of the 20th century the neighborhood around No. 408 had revived.  Today there are four apartments in the Lilienthal house; but from the outside little has changed after more than 110 years.

photographs by the author

The Luther Halsey Smith House - 412 West 154th Street

By the time developer William H. Lake began construction of three homes on West 154th Street and five more around the corner on St. Nicholas Avenue, the neighborhood was quickly filling with upscale residences.   His architect, Henri Fouchaux, filed plans in August 1898 for the 20-foot wide homes, each estimated to cost $15,000, or about $468,000 today.

Fouchaux designed all eight of the houses in the popular Beaux Arts style.  The three 154th Street homes were designed in an A-B-A configuration.  No. 412, the western most, was like its neighbors a restrained example of the often gushy style.  Three stories tall above an English basement, it was clad in limestone and featured an angled bay at the second floor, supported by ornate stone brackets.

Fouchaux stepped away from the French motif by embellishing the newels of the dog-legged stoop and the spandrel panels of the second floor bay with Renaissance-inspired carvings.  Above the understated third floor was a bracketed pressed metal cornice.

In 1900 Lake sold all eight of the completed houses to Charles Hibbard.   The ambitious real estate operator seems to have been over-optimistic, for he lost six of the houses in foreclosure in 1902.   At the time of the auction on March 29 he owed the bank $16,690 and back taxes of $600--or about $550,000 today.

No. 412 soon became home to Luther Halsey Smith.  Born in Pittsburgh in 1842, he had run a "plate manufacturing" business there before moving to New York in 1900.  He and his wife, the former Anna Mitchell Gardner, had five children, all adults by now.

In May 1909 the 67-year-old suffered "an attack of paralysis," as worded by The New York Herald--what would be called a stroke today.   On November 4, 1910 he died in the house of a second, massive stroke.

No. 412 changed hands several times over the next decade.  In the years following World War I it was owned by Joseph Fleischman, who was leasing it to Mary Gardner Smith.  In May 1921 he hired architect Charles Sheres to make $7,000 in interior alterations.  The plans were vague and may have been merely updating to the plumbing and other modernization.

The unmarried Mary Gardner Smith was active in clubs and charities.  She sat on the Board of Managers of the Florence Crittenton Home, an organization founded in 1883 "to aid and encourage destitute, homeless, and depraved women who wish to seek reformation," and was a member of the Daughters of Pennsylvania, the Riverside Park Protection League and the New York City Federation of Women's Clubs.  In 1921 she was appointed a delegate to the State Convention of the Daughters of the American Revolution.

Mary had moved on before 1923 when the house was being leased by the Legal Fraternity of Gamma Eta Gamma as the Chapter House of its Fordham University branch.   Some members lived in the chapter house, including William O. Hubertson and Russell H. Corcoran, both of whom passed the bar exams later that year.

By the end of the decade the residence had once again changed hands.  It was home to spiritualist preacher Syrenus Heylieger, who claimed to be a member of the General Assembly of Spiritualists.  The New York Age, saying that "Mr. Heylinger hails from the 'sunny isle' of Bermuda," noted on November 12, 1932, that he "admitted that he conducted spiritualistic seances to augment his unstipulated salary."

Heylieger's unstipulated salary was enough that he could afford a chauffeur and in 1929 he hired Albert Hodge, one of his followers, at a salary of $35 per week.  Hodge's wife had recently died and on February 1 the spiritualist offered to handle the funeral arrangements.  Hodge gave him $147 for the undertaker's fees.  According to him, Heylieger told him shortly thereafter than he needed another $560.  When Mrs. Hodge's $502 insurance benefits arrived, Hodge signed the check over to Heylieger.

Hodge held the chauffeur's job until the summer of 1930.  He was shocked in the summer of 1932 to receive a bill from the undertake for $287.  He had Heylieger arrested for grand larceny.  In court the spiritualist denied ever receiving the $147.  Instead he claimed he had paid Mrs. Hodge's medical bills and the cost of a nurse; and following her death had bought flowers (a bleeding heart), paid for the shroud, dresses for the two children, $65 in rent and bought a new suit for the now-revolting Hodge.  The New York Age said "Heylienger prefaced and concluded all of his statements with 'If I remember well.'"

The once-gracious home continued to see various tenants and uses.  Another minister, William A. Campbell, lived here in April 1936 when he filed for bankruptcy, listing nearly $29,000 in liabilities and no assets.  

And in the mid-1940's Almot Products Company, a wig maker, operated from the house.  An advertisement in the Pittsburgh Courier on March 1, 1947 entitled "Human Hair / Hair is Woman's Glory and Success" offered "hair fascinators," like the popular Page Boy style ("Once you try our Page Boy you will never buy elsewhere"), or the V-Roll.  "New York is the style center of the world.  Nearly every girl in New York wears a V-Roll," said the ad.  The wigs cost $3.50 by mail order, about $40 today.

The house was unofficially divided into apartments by the late 1960's.  Twenty-seven-year-old James Mueller occupied a two-room apartment in the winter of 1971 when on February 6 seven detectives armed with search warrants forced their way in.  They found a "narcotics factory" where Mueller and a 20-year old woman, Cheryl Cherry were "cutting the heroin...and already had packed some of it in 900 glassine bags," according to The New York Times.

An official renovation to apartments came in 1977.  A duplex now engulfed the basement and first floor, with one apartment on the second and four one-room apartments on the third.

The revival of the neighborhood was evidenced when Marie Brown, proprietor of Marie Brown Associates, moved her office here around 1990.  The African-American Writer's Survival Handbook said of her in 1991 "she has been a major force in the publishing industry for more than 20 years."

Henri Fouchaux's limestone-faced row looks much as it did in 1899.

Despite its sometimes rocky history, the 120-year old structure is little changed outwardly from the time when Luther Halsey Smith's carriage waited by the curb.

photographs by the author

The St. Nicholas Court - 746 St. Nicholas Avenue

Although the arrival of subway service to the Sugar Hill district of Harlem was still a few years away, what had been a quiet residential neighborhood of upscale homes was changing at the turn of the last century.  Apartment buildings began making an appearance along the avenues.

One of the first was The St. Nicholas Court, designed by Henri Fouchaux for the Central Building Improvement and Investment Co. in 1901.  Fouchaux would be among the most prolific architects in the district and this particular project would be one of his most memorable.

Completed in 1902 the narrow St. Nicholas Avenue elevation was deceptive.  The building stretched back to Edgecombe Avenue where it spread out in the T shape at Nos. 313 through 317.  The three-bay wide St. Nicholas Avenue facade was an exuberant celebration of the Beaux Arts style.  

Rusticated stone piers with stylized Ionic capitals flanked the yawning arched entrance with its Baroque cartouche.  Every inch of the spandrel panels was carved with frothy ornamentation.  The grouped windows of the second floor were flanked by intricately carved panels.  Directly above the windows an assemblage of French cartouches closely followed the example of the first floor.  The same motif was carried out in the frieze of the elaborate pressed metal cornice.

Most likely the balcony was originally fronted by a decorative stone balustrade or cast iron railing.

The St. Nicholas Court boasted the modern amenities of elevator service and steam heat.  The commodious apartments of either four, six or seven rooms filled with white collar tenants.

Among the first was William R. Patterson, a member of the American Economic Association who was imported from the University of Iowa in 1901 by the city to serve as the Register of Statistics in the Tenement House Commission.  The New-York Tribune explained in February 1902 that "A competitive examination was held for the place" and "on account of the high degree of technical knowledge required it is assumed that Dr. Patterson received the highest marks."  It was always understood to be a temporary position, however, and by 1905 Patterson was back teaching in Iowa.

E. H. Coster and his wife, too, were original tenants.  The well-to-do couple appeared in society columns as they came and went from the city.  On November 13, 1902, for instance, The New York Times listed them as arriving home from Europe on the Kronprinz Wilheim along with other wealthy passengers like J. Warren Goddard, Mrs. W. H. Hoyt and the Countess Cassini.  The Costers would remain in the St. Nicholas Court for several years. 

Mabel Boak was living here in 1906.  At a time when the common expectation for young unmarried women was to find a husband and run a household, Mabel had higher goals.  She graduated from Vassar College in 1901, and then earned her masters degree from Columbia University the following year.  She left the St. Nicholas Court by 1908 when she was appointed assistant principal at the Chappaqua Mountain Institute.  Mabel, who never married, would devote her life to education, teaching later at the Low-Heywood School in Stamford, Connecticut, the Chevy Chase School in Maryland, and finally the Northfield School for Girls in Massachusetts.

Residents in 1909 paid between $42.50 and $60 monthly rent.  Based on today's, it seems highly affordable.  The most expensive rent, for a seven-room apartment, would equal about $1,710 per month today.

Dr. George W. Elliott lived here that year.  Among his patients was Methodist Episcopal Bishop Daniel A. Goodsell.  The nationally esteemed clergyman lived nearby at No. 15 St. Nicholas Place.  What seemed to be a minor medical problem resulted in unfavorable publicity for Elliott.  The doctor operated on Goodsell on November 27, 1909 to remove a carbuncle from his neck.  A week later the 69-year old was dead, apparently from infection.  The New-York Tribune reported on December 6, "His condition did not improve, however, and the disease which caused his death set in."

Lottie Hyde Buffington had been living a comfortable life in Philadelphia as the wife of attorney Orr Buffington.  The couple had two grown sons, Sydney and Kenneth, and two daughters, one of which was married.  But as the year 1910 drew to an end her world was upset when her husband sued for separation.

Lottie left Philadelphia and by the end of 1911 was living in a sixth floor apartment in the St. Nicholas Court.  In September that year her son, Sydney, had earned the degree of doctor of medicine.  But depression caused by the separation of his parents outweighed the triumph of the achievement.  On December 5, 1911 he committed suicide.  The New-York Tribune explained "It was believed the separation of his father and mother caused Dr. Buffington to kill himself."

It was a significant blow to Lottie Buffington.  The elevator boys were accustomed to greeting her every afternoon as she left to take her daily walk.  When she did not appear on January 9, 1912, one mentioned it to superintendent John Marshall.  He went to the Buffington apartment where he smelled gas.  Two patrolmen were called and they "burst in the door," according to the New-York Tribune, "and found Mrs. Buffington lying across her bed, clad only in her nightgown, with a revolver in her right hand."  

She had apparently first considered asphyxiation by gas, but then fatally shot herself.  On the table next to her was a photograph of Sydney, a telegram telling of his becoming a doctor, and a newspaper clipping about his suicide.  She left several letters, one of which read:

To all my dear friends: Forgive, if that is necessary.  There is nothing else for me to do.  I only surrender to a God who is more just than man.  Goodby.  God bless you, whom I love dearly.  LOTTIE HYDE BUFFINGTON

A much happier story played out in June 1913.  Newspaper readers closely followed the story of the missing 16-year old Helen McCarthy, daughter of "wealthy newspaper broker" John A. McCarthy.  The girl had disappeared from the family apartment in the Hotel Hargrave on the evening of June 24.

Francis Brophy, who lived in the St. Nicholas Court, and a friend, Joseph Daly, were walking through Fort Washington Park at around 4:00 on the afternoon of June 26 when they noticed a girl who was acting so strangely that they paused to check on her.  The Evening World reported "The girl seemed dazed.  Her clothes were soiled and covered with dirt.  She was unable to answer questions at first."  The men found a policeman who took her to the station house.  There a detective identified her by the ring of her dead sister which she always wore.  It was a fortunate discovery as the girl was sick from exposure, "weakened and starving."

The brick and stone facade of the Edgecome Avenue elevation, broken by two light courts, bears no resemblance to its showier St. Nicholas Avenue front.

Another tragic death occurred in the building on December 20, 1915.  Earlier that year patrolman David Mackrell showed signs of mental fatigue.  The New York Times said he suffered from "nervous prostration and insomnia."  The Police Department gave him a two-month sick leave in October.  Mackrell was placed in the Rivercrest Sanitarium in Queens.

He was temporarily released on December 17 to spend the Christmas holidays with his family.  According to his wife and stepson, on the morning of December 20 he was "unusually cheerful" and "talked and chatted at breakfast."  After breakfast Mrs. Mackrell started her daily chores and Roy West, the step-son, prepared to leave for work.  David Mackrell went into the bathroom.  "A shot was heard and when the mother and son rushed to the bathroom they found the patrolman lying on the floor," reported The Times.  He had shot himself in the right temple with his service revolver.

The shooting of another tenant, John Henderson, on the night of November 29, 1916 was more bizarre.  The 41-year old Henderson made his living as a salesman for a ship chandler on Water Street.  For some time he had been acquainted with a nurse, 35-year old Sarah A. Sheldon, who lived nearby at No. 90 Edgecombe Avenue with a roommate, Anna Balleer.  According to Henderson the two were merely friends.  Events would soon bring that into question.

Henderson became engaged to another nurse, Rachel Jones.  When Sarah heard of it she told him "I'll kill you."   Henderson's wedding took place on November 22, 1916.  According to Henderson, on the 27th, Sarah appeared at Henderson's office and told him she had resigned from her position with a tuberculosis clinic of the Department of Health because she had contracted the disease.  She was leaving for California, she said, and asked him to bring railroad timetables to her apartment.

If Sarah intended to go to California at all, it was almost assuredly not tuberculosis, but pregnancy, that prompted the move.  Henderson arrived at the apartment around 6:00.  Anna Balleer was in the kitchen and Sarah told him to "sit down and make yourself comfortable."  Henderson had just taken a seat in a rocking chair when things took a terrifying turn.

According to the New-York Tribune, "Miss Sheldon levelled an automatic pistol of small calibre and fired twice.  Henderson threw up his right hand just in time to get it punctured.  The second bullet went into a bookcase."  Sarah immediately turned the weapon on herself, firing a shot into her abdomen.  It emerged out her back.

Anna came running into the living room.  Sarah gasped, "I shot him and shot myself."  She was still clinging to life when police arrived.  She told them "I loved him."

Above a classical row of columns, the pressed metal cornice echoes the Baroque cartouches of the lower floors.

By 1922 ads for the apartment building no longer used the name St. Nicholas Court; just the address.  By then the demographics of the Harlem neighborhood were changing as  Black residents increasingly replaced whites.  

In 1924 author Arna Bontemps and his wife, the former Alberta Johnson, moved in.  A teacher at the Harlem Academy, he would become a notable literary figure, first publishing his poetry in Crisis in 1924.

On May 8, 1927 The New York Times reported on the annual Holstein literary and art awards.  The conspicuous racial divide that still existed in America was evidenced in the report entitled "Negroes Get Prizes for Literary Work."  The article explained that the awards were given "each year by Opportunity, a negro magazine."  Arna Bontemps was awarded to $100 Alexander Puskin poetry award that night.

God Sends Sunday, written while living here, was Bontemps's first novel.  It was published in March 1931.  Even in giving the book a glowing review, The Times still fell victim to the racism of the period.   "This first novel by a young Louisiana Negro, already known as a poet, plows deeply in the a rich soil of Negro personality...The vivid picturesqueness of expression leaps out with the natural freshness of childish naiveté rather than with the burnt-cork brilliance of a minstrel show."

In 1945 Leonard de Paur took an apartment in the building.  An arranger, conductor and composer, he had graduated from Julliard.   When he moved into the St. Nicholas Court he had recently returned from fighting in World War II, as a lieutenant in the Air Force.  During his military service he had also become part of the 372nd Glee Club.  It inspired him to form the De Paur Infantry Chorus, first composed of 35 men from the group and later from other branches of service.

A 1948 concert announcement pictured Leonard de Paul conducting.

Following a concert on January 8, 1950, Olin Downes of The New York Times wrote "We heard for the first time the de Paur Infantry Chorus, trained and directed by Leonard de Paur, last night in Carnegie Hall.  The reputation of this chorus has spread far and wide in late seasons and there is very good reason for that."

In fact, in 1946 the Chorus had been signed by Columbia Records and for ten years was its top performing group.  De Paur discontinued the chorus in 1957; but continued his impressive career.  In 1968 he became associated director of the Lincoln Center International Choral Festival and would continue heading Lincoln Center events for two decades.  He was still living in his St. Nicholas Court apartment when he died on November 7, 1998.

Another notable resident was attorney Hope R. Stevens, living here in the 1950's.  Born in the British Virgin Islands, he would go on to become First Executive Vice President of the United Mutual Life Insurance Company and Chairman of the Board of the Carver Federal Savings and Loan Association.

No less noteworthy were Garfield Dawson and his wife, Elida Webb Dawson.  In the 1920's Garfield took the stage name George Dawson, Jr. for his dancing career; but was better known as "The Strutter."  

Elida, who was one of the first Black choreographers in America, was a dancer and choreographer at the Cotton Club from 1923 to 1934.   In 1921 she and Josephine Baker joined the cast of Shuffle Along, the first all-Black musical on Broadway.  Two years later she choreographed Runnin' Wild, in which she introduced the dance the Charleston.  According to Elida years later, she had invented the dance after watching "some black children on the streets doing a simple dance." Fred W. Emiston, in his 1930 The Coon-Sanders Nighthawks: The Band That Radio Made Famous, quoted her as saying "There was something fascinating, and it caught me."  The dance caught on and eventually came to identify the personality of the Roaring '20's.

Unbelievably, George Dawson did not retire until 1973 at the age of 81.  The couple was still living here on May 1, 1975 when Elida died at the age of 79.

Henri Fouchaux's ebullient St. Nicholas Court is as much a show-stopper today as it was in 1902.  A bit battered, it nonetheless survives as an exceptional example of Beaux Arts applied to an apartment building.

photographs by the author

The 1896 F. W. Esper's Stable - 457-459 West 150th Street

Richard F. Carman's vast real estate holdings in Upper Manhattan in the first half of the 19th century earned the district the name Carmansville.  A wealthy executive with the City Insurance Company on Wall Street, he was among the subscribers of neighbor John James Audubon's costly The Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America, completed in 1848.

Following Carman's death his son, Richard, Jr., began selling off the estate as building plots.  On March 7, 1874, for instance, he advertised 27 lots on Tenth Avenue (later Amsterdam Avenue) and St. Nicholas Boulevard, between 151st and 152nd Street.  He was still selling off land in 1891 when he sold the 75-foot wide vacant lot at Nos. 457-459 West 150th Street to Frederick Esper.  The price was $18,000, or about $512,000 today.

Esper, who was the principal in the National Beef Company, soon erected a livery stable on the site.  An 1894 listing described the business simply as "horses."  Well-heeled residents of the Sugar Hill neighborhood boarded their expensive horses here, including trotters bred for sport.  An advertisement in the New York Herald on September 23, 1894 offered Jeanette for sale.  "Will trot a mile, with two in a buggy, in 2:50; can be seen at F. W. Esper's stable."

Business was apparently good, for toward the end of 1895 architect Henri Fouchaux was working on plans for a more substantial structure on the site.  Filed on January 3, 1896, they called for a "four story and basement brick livery stable" to cost $15,000, or about $463,000 in today's dollars.

Completed later that year, Fouchaux's utilitarian structure was both sober and unobtrusive.  Faced entirely in pressed brick, the grouped windows of the upper floors lined up above the three large arched openings at ground level.  Other than the rosette-decorated metal lintels of the second and third floors, the delicate ornamentation was executed in brick.  Above the arched openings of the fourth floor was a pressed metal cornice.

A vivid exception to Esper's frugality in regard to decoration was the pair of exquisitely-sculpted horses' heads on either side of the central carriage bay.  Set within decorative roundels, they identified the structure as a stable.  The unknown sculptor fashioned them as they would appear in full gallop--their manes flowing and nostrils flaring.

The meticulous details of the sculptures included scrupulous veining.

Busy with his meat business, Esper leased the stable to proprietors.  In 1900 Frank J. Hahn signed a five-year, $3,000 lease; and in 1905 Joseph M. Balmford took over the lease at $3,500.  Balmford changed the name of the stable from the F. W. Esper Stable to the Speedway Livery & Boarding Stables.  The name referred to the nearby Harlem River Speedway.

The Harlem River Speedway had been established in 1893 at a time when speedways were cropping up near large cities throughout the East.  Only particular vehicles were allowed to use the roadways—horseback riders and carriages among them.  Small or slow vehicles like sulkies, drays, and bicycles were prohibited.  With no cross streets, they were excellent for carriage races, hence the name.  The Harlem River Speedway ran from West 155^th Street to Dyckman Avenue.  

1906 was both a joyous and disastrous year for Frederick Esper.  He married Dora Eickwort, a graduate of Hunter College and a teacher in the New York public schools, that year.  But then on July 14 The National Provisioner reported "Frederick W. Esper, a butcher at 1703 Third avenue, New York City, N.Y., has filed a petition in bankruptcy."

Esper managed to retain ownership of the 150th Street stables until July 1909 when he sold it to Frederick Dannemann.   As soon as Joseph M. Balmford's lease expired, he was apparently given his walking orders.

On April 27, 1910 auctioneers Van Tassell & Kearney held the "Auction Sale of Livery Stock--Closing Out of the Speedway Stables, Joseph Balmford, Proprietor."  Included in the sale were a dozen "very serviceable" horses, and "several glass front landaus and various other carriages."  Three days earlier the New York Herald reminisced, "The Speedway Stables was at one time headquarter for many horsemen who drove trotters on the Speedway, David Lamar, Charles Welland and others having kept their flyers there."

Frederick Dannemann and his sons had forward-thinking plans for the building.  The same week the auction was held architect Charles Stegmayer filed plans for alterations, including an upgraded elevator shaft.  It was the first step in transforming the stable into a garage.

On June 19, 1912 Motor World reported that the Convent Garage Co. had been incorporated at 457-459 West 150th Street by F. Dannemann & Son.  Its directors were Ernest F., Henry F., and William D. Dannermann.

The Convent Garage not only provided long-term housing for the vehicles of the neighborhood, but repair services and fueling.  In 1915 the Standard Oil Company of New York listed the garage as among those where its Socony Motor Gasoline was sold.  The advertisement insisted that that fact that the garages sold Socony gasoline "is an indication of their appreciation of quality products."

When patrons upgraded their vehicles, the Convent Garage helped to sell their current cars.  An ad in The Evening Telegram on December 16, 1915 offered a "Stearn's Limousine--13-20 h.p., 1910, in excellent condition," and the following April a "30-50 h.p. Renault touring car, in good condition, cheap," could be seen here.

In the 1940's Socony-Vacuum gasoline's Flying Red Horse pennant was displayed above the central bay. (It would later become Mobil.)  Amazingly, Joseph Balmford's Speedway Stables signage still clearly survived on the upper wall.  photo via the NYC Department of Records & Information Services

For decades that practice would continue, even as the neighborhood and the vehicles changed.  On November 14, 1961 an ad in the New York Post listed "Ford '58--Fairlane, 4-door hardtop, fully equipped, snow tires $300" and a "Lincoln '56 Premier, 2-door hardtop" at $700.

By the time CH 150 Holdings, LLC purchased the building for $6.3 million from the West 150 Street Operating LLC in 2018, the facade was painted red and white and the garage was operated by Alliance Parking.  The developers quickly renamed the building "The Carriage House" and laid plans to refit it for residential use.  The garage operator was given a month-to-month lease.

Other than the paint job and the closing off of the western entrance, almost nothing has changed to Frederick Esper's 1896 livery stable.  The building does not have landmark protection.

photographs by the author

The Franklin Inn -- No. 176 Franklin St

In 1892 the area around Franklin Street had seen the rise of loft and warehouse buildings for two decades.  That year candy manufacturer Henry Lillie Pierce constructed a lavish headquarters building at the corner of Hudson and Franklin Streets.  Following Pierce's death, another confectioner, Alexander Powell purchased the seven-story office building in 1903 and named it the Powell Building.

Three years later the Powell family extended its Franklin Street holdings.  Ida May Powell commissioned architect Henri Fouchaux to replace the three-story brick house (lately used as the Franklin Street Methodist Episcopal Church) directly behind the Powell Building with a three-story store and loft building.  Fouchaux's plans, completed in January 1907, called for a $25,000 structure faced in limestone.  The cost of the dignified Beaux Arts building would equal about $650,000 in 2016.

Somewhat squashed in between taller structures, No. 176 Franklin Street held its own by means of its impressive facade.  Fouchaux gave the little building an imperious presence with a high, paneled parapet, carved lions' heads, and a swagged shield.

At the time of the building's completion it sat squarely within the Produce District.  Hundreds of wholesale grocery merchants worked in the area; but unlike the Financial District, there were few places for the wealthy businessmen to lunch.  George A. Powell rectified the problem when, in 1916, he hired architect George Hof, Jr. to renovated the ground floor as a restaurant.

The cast iron base was infilled with wood, and diamond-paned leaded windows were installed.  The colonial motif was carried on inside where, taking its name from the street's namesake, the Franklin Inn opened.

In the meantime, one of the upper floors was headquarters of the Boosters' Club.  "Boosting" had become popular in large cities around 1906.  Clubs, specific to various industries, were formed to protect its members and to keep business from being wooed away by other metropolises.  On March 30, 1913 The Sun noted "The campaign is now being carried on every more earnestly than before."

The Booster Club at No. 176 Franklin Street was composed of produce merchants.  The city was thrown into near-panic in June 1919 when the teamsters went on strike and refused to pick up fresh vegetables and fruits to be delivered to retail grocers and restaurants.   The 3,700 drivers "employed in the fruit and vegetable trade," as described by the New-York Tribune, demanded shorter hours and higher wages.
 
On June 24 carloads of berries, watermelons and vegetables had to be "dumped" because of spoilage.  That same day the wholesale commissioner merchants met at the Boosters' Club to discuss a solution. The following day The Evening World reported "They voted to open their stores at 6 o'clock to-morrow morning and keep them open until 5 in the afternoon.  Police protection will be asked."

The individual retailers would have to bring their own trucks and wagons, and risk the threats of the strikers.  But the newspapers opined "Many of them are expected to make special efforts to do this because the situation in the outlying districts is described to-day as more serious than at any other moment since the strike."

In the last decades of the 20th century the Franklin Inn's leaded glass openings and the parapet still survived.  photo by Edmund Vincent Gillon, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

As members of the Boosters' Club worked out deals and problems upstairs, the quaint Franklin Inn was not only a favorite spot for lunch, but for group dinners.  On November 6, 1920 the Marine Transportation Association, composed of officials of large steamship companies, held its annual "beefsteak dinner" here.  The Association described it as a time when "officials and employees of the various competing steamship lines get together and forget differences for the time being."

A month later the Rice Journal noted that New York's "rice row" had become split up--"half the operators being found in the Lower Wall street section and the other over on Hudson street."  But, the Journal said, "the Franklin Inn on Franklin street just off Hudson is nearly always certain to have two or three tables of gentlemen who could tell you the differences between blue rose and Jap, talking and incidentally eating every noon hour."

Four "rice men" posed in front of the Franklin Inn in 1920 -- Rice Journal January 1920 (copyright expired)

The popularity and necessity of booster clubs had dwindled by 1922.  After years at No. 176 Franklin Street, the Booster Club shut its doors in March that year.  The Fruit Trade Journal and Produce Record announced that "The furniture and fixtures of the local Booster's Club will be sold at auction here...at the Club rooms, 176 Franklin Street, to meet a deficit of about $1,100."  The article noted "The Club rooms have been closed owing to lack of support."

The Franklin Inn forged on; but on May 6, 1926 it suffered a blow when Prohibition agents put a six-month padlock on the door when liquor was discovered here.  In December 1930 the restaurant expanded into the second floor when a "cabaret" opened.  The third floor was listed as factory space at the time.

But when the Franklin Inn was raided again on February 11, 1932, Prohibition agents had had enough.  They arrested manager John Duffy, bartender Carl Krauss, and waiters Adolphe Forhne, Lorenz Horn and Gallus Dallinger, and seized 157 bottles of liquor.  But more importantly they removed $75,000 worth of fixtures, making it nearly impossible to reopen the illegal tavern.

In 1939 Joseph B. Powell, acting as executor of the estate of Ida May Powell, sold the building to the 176 Franklin St. Realty Corp.  Over the subsequent four decades the former Franklin Inn and the upstairs offices were operated as storage and factory spaces.  Rather surprisingly, the Franklin Inn's cast iron, leaded glass and wooden front survived, as did the parapet, into the last decades of the 20th century.

The Tribeca renaissance brought a different type of tenant.  In the late 1970s the Julian Pretto Gallery was here; in 1982 the former Franklin Inn space became Riverrun, described by The Times as "typical of many restaurant bars springing up in TriBeCa," and in October 2006 Adelle Kelley opened Moulin Bleu, a French-inspired home furnishings shop.  By 2012 Gary Graham's apparel shop had opened here.

Traces of the 1916 Franklin Street facade survive.

Sadly, in remodeling the retail space the original Franklin Inn entrance was lost, as were the lower leaded windows.  At some point the crowning parapet was removed, making No. 176 Franklin Street just a little less regal.  In 2014 the upper floors, where fruit and vegetable wholesalers once wrangled over problems of produce prices and labor strikes, were converted to two loft residences.   

photographs by the author