Abingdon Court - 75 Bank Street

 

The Abingdon Square Hotel opened in 1892.  It engulfed the Bleecker Street blockfront from Abingdon Square to Bank Street.  (The block-long portions of Eighth Avenue and Hudson Street on either side of Abingdon Square were named for the park.)  The eight-story hotel offered rooms at "$2 and up."

The main entrance of the hotel faced the park, opening onto Abingdon Square.

In 1929 real estate operators Bing & Bing purchased the old hotel and several abutting houses as the site of a modern apartment building.  But, perhaps because of the onslaught of the Great Depression, after the structures were demolished, the project stalled.  

The corner sat vacant for nearly a decade when, in December 1938, A. A. Silberberg purchased the property from the Guaranty Trust Company.  His architect, Irving Margon, filed plans for a six-story, $200,000 apartment house.  Called the Abingdon Court, its construction was completed the following year in September.

Margon's Art Moderne design was executed entirely in brick.  Bold orange brick courses, belted with dark brown brick, stood out against the beige facade.  Streamlined fire escapes that closely matched the rooftop railings were designed as part of the architecture.  To make them less obtrusive and to provide dimension, on the Bleecker Street side Margon set the fire escapes within a recess, and dramatized the chamfered corners with faceted windows.

The entrance, on Bank Street, sat within a deep "garden court."  Above the door within a banded, black-veined stone frame was etched the name Abingdon Court.  

The entrance was featured on the cover of an 1939 brochure.  from the collection of the Columbia University Library.

The building offered 87 apartments of from two to four rooms.  Despite the Depression, on November 14, 1939, A. A. Silberberg told a reporter from The New York Sun, "It is not only completely occupied, it has a waiting list."  He added, "Incidentally, I think you will find the trees outside the building very attractive.  And our garden too."

A brochure published that year listed amenities like sunken living rooms, separate dressing rooms, Westinghouse refrigerators, "chromium fixtures," and "room size foyers."  Atop the building was a roof garden for residents.  

from the collection of Columbia University Library.

Rents for a two-room apartment started at $50, and for three-room apartments at $70--about $975 per month for the least expensive by 2022 terms.

In 1941 Natalie Bacal moved into Abingdon Court with her 17-year-old daughter, Betty Joan Perske.  Following her divorce from William Perske in 1929, Natalie had legally changed her surname to Bacal, a version of her birth name, Weinstein-Bacal.  Their move from Brooklyn may have been to make Betty Joan's studies at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts more convenient.

While studying at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, she began dating a fellow student, Kirk Douglas.  She helped with household finances by working as an usher in the St. James Theatre, and as a model in department stores.  A year after moving into the building, she was crowned Miss Greenwich Village and the same year landed a walk-on part in the Broadway show Johnny 2 x 4, which opened at the Longacre Theatre on March 16.

Betty Joan's face appeared on the March 1943 cover of Harper's Bazaar.  It caught the attention of the wife of director Howard Hawks, who urged him to screen test the young model for his upcoming film To Have and Have Not.  Betty Joan boarded a train to California on April 3, 1943.  She not only got the part, but a seven-year contract with a weekly salary of $100 (about $1,570 today).  Hawks changed her first name to Lauren, and Betty Joan chose a variation of her mother's name, Bacall, as her stage surname.

Lauren wrote to her mother about the filming, telling her that her co-star, Humphrey Bogart "is very, very fond of me."  Natalie visited her daughter in California and was incensed to discover that the fondness had evolved into a relationship.  Bogart was not only married, but was 25 years older than Lauren.  

The 19-year-old Lauren Bacall in a scene from To Have and Have Not.  from the Sight and Sound Magazine archives.

Soon afterward, Natalie Bacal moved out of Abington Court and rented a small furnished apartment in Beverly Hills for herself and Lauren.  Her ongoing protests (and those of Howard Hawks) over the romantic affair were to no avail.  On May 21, 1945 the now-divorced Bogart and Bacall were married.

In the meantime, the Abingdon Court filled with financially-comfortable, albeit significantly less glamorous, families.  Among the Bacal's neighbors was the spinster former school teacher Ellen A. Leo.  A graduate of Hunter College, she had worked as a teacher in the public schools until her retirement at the age of 68 in 1936.

Nathan and Shirley Spitzer moved into Abingdon Court in the mid-1930's.  Nat, as he was known, had an easy commute to work.  He operated the St. Vincent's Chemists pharmacy at 2 Bank Street, at the corner of Greenwich Avenue.   Their son, Dr. Richard Alan Spitzer, who was born here in 1945, recalls, "The pharmacy was something of a neighborhood institution and my Dad highly regarded by the locals. Not infrequently he had customers who had appeared at the [Village] Vanguard, and once in a while Joe Gould would make an appearance."  Nathan Spitzer sold the pharmacy and the family moved to Queens around 1951.

The United State's entry into World War II caused changes in the lives of Americans, including residents of Abingdon Court.  Textile manufacturer Harry Rosenfeld was stopped by a Port Authority policeman on February 23, 1942 and was unable to provide his draft card.  The 41-year-old "said he had registered, but had left his card at home," reported The New York Sun.  Unfortunately for Rosenfeld, forgetting his card was not an acceptable excuse.  The article explained, "The law provides a maximum penalty of five years in jail and $10,000 fine for men of draft age who do not carry their cards."   Rosenfeld was jailed in lieu of $1,000 bail.

War restrictions affected American's vacation plans, as well.  Gas rationing meant that in order to use one's vehicle for leisure travel required a Government-issued "vacation permit."  The first to apply in the summer of 1943 was Abingdon Square resident Julius Lowenthal.  The Sun explained the certificates "will permit [holders] to use their A gasoline ration coupons to drive their cars on vacation trips."  Lowenthal's application was approved, allowing him "to use his car to get to Lake Kauneonga, N.Y, where he will stay from July 17 to August 1," said the article.

On March 24, 1946 resident C. R. Lehigh encountered a terrifying intruder in the building.  Having recently returned from four years of service in the Pacific during World War II, Lehigh was now the automobile and yachting editor of the Newark News.  Early that morning he returned to Abingdon Court.  The New York Sun reported, "As Lehigh entered a self-operated elevator he faced a man with a drawn revolver.  The thief ordered him to hand over his valuables, and Lehigh, looking into the muzzle of the unwavering gun, produced $41."  After the robber fled, a no-doubt shaken Lehigh called police.

When America entered the war, lawyer Harry H. Rifkin was appointed an official in the Office of Price Administration.  He first served as enforcement attorney, and then as director for the price agency for meat and poultry.  He returned to his private law practice following the war.  He lived in Abingdon Court with his wife, Shirley, where he wrote several short stories for various magazines about life during the Depression years in the 1960's.

Living in the building by 1970 was photographer Leo Stashin and his anatomist wife, Dr. Judith Hardy Stashin.  Leo's passion was the collecting of 19th century photographs and daguerreotypes.  The New York Times said his collection included "American statesmen, actors, inventors and businessmen."  In rummaging through a Greenwich Village art shop, he came across an 1849 daguerreotype "which he identified as one of Abraham Lincoln," said The New York Times.  (Experts tended to disagree.)  Confirmed images in his collection were of Presidents John Tyler, Zachary Taylor, Millard Fillmore and Franklin Pierce.  Stashin was working on a book about the Abraham Lincoln daguerreotype in 1973, when he died of cancer at the age of 54.

Irving Margon's confident Art Moderne building, sitting conspicuously at an intersection of three parks, is nearly unchanged in its more than eight decades.

photograph by the author

many thanks to reader Dr. Richard A. Spitzer for requesting this post

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The Unexpected House at 2 East 78th Street

 

In the first years of the 20th century the the marble palazzo of James Buchanan Duke, at the northeast corner of Fifth Avenue and 78th Street, faced the brick and brownstone mansion built by William Van Duzer Lawrence.  The Edward Lauterbach residence, a delightful blend of Queen Anne and Second Empire styles, abutted the Lawrence mansion to the east at 2 East 78th Street.

The Lauterbach house with its mansard and pointed tower can be seen to the left of the sliver-like Lawrence mansion at the corner.  from the collection of the New York Public Library

Edward Lauterbach was an attorney who specialized in the reorganization of corporations.  Interior photographs of the mansion show rooms overstuffed with late Victorian furnishings and decorations.

By the Depression years the days of tiger skin rugs, costly oil paintings and French furniture within the Lauterbach mansion were over.   It was now owned by banker Jacob H. Schiff who leased it to Theresa Pearson as a rooming house.  Because of that use, in 1937 the city ordered Schiff to install fire escapes, a sprinkler system and to "fire proof" the basement.  When he got the $6,000 estimate for the work--about $107,000 today--he refused.  Therefore City Marshall James J. Larkin issued eviction notices on the 28 residents, the last of which vacated  the "one-time mansion," as worded by The New York Sun, on February 2, 1937.  

There may have been more to Schiff's refusal, however.  At the time the Kensington Estates, Inc. had demolished the Lawrence mansion to make way for a luxury apartment building designed by Irving Margon.   The New York Sun reported "The two top floors, seventeen rooms with surrounding terraces, have been rented to John M. Schiff, grandson of Jacob Schiff."

Schiff sold the former Lauterbach mansion to the developers who demolished it and had Margon design a low-rise  replacement structure.  The following year The New York Sun explained, "As a light-protector for the [apartment] building a private dwelling of three stories has been built at 2 East Seventy-eighth street."  The practice of erecting short buildings to prevent subsequent property owners from cut off the light and ventilation to a large house or apartment building was common.

Compared with the magnificent marble and limestone palaces that lined the block, the new house was unexpectedly Plain Jane.  Faced in Flemish bond red brick and sparsely trimmed in limestone, it strained to bring no attention to itself.  Two shallow brick arches framed the paired windows of the top floors.  An understated stone cornice ran along the roofline.

The sole purpose of the house was provide light and ventilation to the hulking apartment house on 5th Av.

On July 23, 1938 The New York Sun reported that the house "has been leased by Dr. Henry Templeton Smith for his residence.  Dr. Smith, whose wife is the actress, Helen Menkin, will have professional offices in the larger building his home 'protects.'"

Born in Waxahachie, Texas in 1891, Smith had served in the Medical Corps during World War I.  He was now "a famous eye specialist," according to the Daily News.

Dr. Henry Templeton Smith in his Army uniform.  (original source unknown.)

Helen Menkin was well-known to New Yorkers as a Broadway star.  Smith was her second husband.  She had married actor Humphrey Bogart in the Gramercy Park Hotel on May 20, 1926.  It was a short-lived marriage.  Helen left Bogart in May 1928 and obtained a divorce in Chicago that November.

On April 8, 1938 the Daily News profiled Helen, saying, "Her most beautiful features are her large, warm brown eyes and her slim, sensitive hands.  Her hair is a natural red, and her skin not so pale as the makeup she usually affects in the theatre.  She leans to black or white in dress, and is intensely feminine in the manner of style."  The article hinted at differences between the physician husband and entertainer wife.  "Helen loves to dance, but as her husband doesn't, she frequently attends dancing classes incognito.  She is, she says, much too shy to go to the nite clubs."

Helen Menken early in her career.  from the collection of the New York Public Library

Shortly after moving into the new house Helen encountered tax problems.  On her 1935 Income Tax filings she declared $8,041 on "wigs, dresses, etc.," related to her leading role in the play The Old Maid.  It was a significant deduction, equal to about $150,000 today, and the Internal Revenue auditors balked.  They reduced the figure to $797.

On June 10, 1938 the Daily News reported, "Miss Menkin protested.  She said she played the part a full year on Broadway and several months on the road--that the production department furnished only two original costumes and she had to pay for replacements herself."  She scoffed at the implication that she had used the period clothing for her personal use.  "None of the costumes, consisting of hoop skirts, petticoats and pantalets, has been used in private life."

The Smiths divorced in 1947.  Two years later 2 East 78th Street and the 18-story apartment building were sold to 965 Fifth Avenue, Inc.  The little house continued as a private home and by the early 1960's was owned by James R. Frankenberry, vice president of the Cunningham & Walsh advertising agency.

On December 30, 1964 The New York Times announced that Frankenberry had leased space in the house to the Synanoh Foundation, Inc., described by the newspaper as "an organization founded on the West Coast in 1958 to help narcotic addicts."  Frankenberry was chairman of Synanon's National Council.

The article explained that Frankenberry "will maintain quarters in the house, but most of the rooms will be turned over to the foundation staff members, seven of whom will live there."  It added, "Mr. Frankenberry also owns a home in Bronxville."

The 26-foot wide property was recently offered for sale at $7.5 million.  A listing noted that it is "currently used as headquarters of a nonprofit organization" and "has been renovated to a high standard by Keenen/Riley."

photographs by the author

many thanks to reader James Bullock for prompting this post

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Brownstone to 1920's Gothic - 125-127 Fifth Avenue

Almost unbelievably, the neo-Gothic commercial building is the result of the remodeling of two 19th century rowhouses.

By the middle of the 19th century imposing homes of Manhattan's wealthiest citizens were creeping up Fifth Avenue towards 23rd Street.  In 1850 mason Joseph Sanford embarked on an ambitious project of constructing five speculative dwellings on the east side of Fifth Avenue, between 19th and 20th Streets.

Even  before construction was completed in 1851 Sanford had sold No. 127 to commercial banker John B. Murray.  No. 125 was sold later that year to portrait painter and miniaturist Thomas Seir Cummings.  The esteemed artist held the posts of vice-president and treasurer of the National Academy of Design.

Thomas S. Cummings, from the collection of the Smithsonian Archives of American Art

Cummings' wife, Rebecca, was an amateur artist.  The couple had three children, sons Charles and Thomas Augustus--also artists--and daughter Cora.  The population of the house was reduced by one following Cora's fashionable wedding to Lemuel W. Morse in Trinity Chapel on January 7, 1863.

The Cummings' next door neighbors would have an impressive house guest later that year.  Brigadier General Thomas Francis Meagher recruited and led the Irish Brigade and was highly responsible for the large numbers of Irish immigrants who led support to the Union.  When he briefly visited New York in the summer of 1863 he stayed with the Murray family at No. 127.

Dr. James Chilton purchased No. 125 from Cummings in 1857.  Like many physicians, he was also listed as "chemist," or pharmacist.  Chilton died in 1869, but his wife, Mary, continued to live on in the house.

Mary Chilton was no doubt unnerved when an intruder was found hiding in the house in the summer of 1870.  Thomas Harris, whom The New York Times described as "a mulatto lad," pleaded guilty to the charge of grand larceny,  Judge Thomas Harris was not pleased with the charges.  At Harris's sentencing on August 2, he told the prisoner in part:

The Grand Jury, I regret to say, made a mistake in not indicting you for burglary.  Had you been indicted for that offence and convicted, I should sentence you to twenty years in the State Prison.  I wish the lawless portion of this community to understand that hereafter [I] will hold that any man found concealed in a dwelling-house for burglarious purposes...on conviction will be sentenced to twenty years.

Only two months later it was the Murray house that was burglarized in the same manner.  On October 7, 1870 The New York Times reported "On Wednesday night the residence of Mr. John B. Murray...was robbed by a thief who had secreted himself in the house during the day, and left by the front basement door."

What was utterly amazing was the boldness of the thief.  Because Rebecca Murray was seriously ill, "the house was lighted from top to bottom all night," according to the newspaper.  "Every room was occupied and every room door wide open, and the nurses passing from room to room, as in the day-time."  Nevertheless, the thief tried hard to jimmy open the safe containing the silverware (although he finally gave up), and made off with "large sum of money, a chronometer watch...and a quantity of clothing and jewelry."  The Times concluded "The audacity of the thief is remarkable."

After living at No. 127 for more than 25 years, Murray lost it in foreclosure in 1878.  It was acquired by millionaire Robert Livingston, who did not live in the house, but leased it.  His first tenant was the newly-wed lawyer Robert C. Fellows, who had married Mrs. Phoebe Robertson on February 28 that year.  The marriage would give the attorney serious headaches.

Phoebe had not only neglected to mention that her former husband was not dead; but that they were not yet divorced.  A complex tangle of legalities followed.  Fellows left Phoebe and filed for annulment; and Phoebe briefly returned to her former husband but when he died in the summer of 1879, she and Fellows remarried.  The two were still in court in 1880, however, when they battled over whether or not to continue the original annulment proceedings.

While they tried to explain it all to a judge, Mary Chilton was in the process of selling No. 125.  By now commercial interests were inching up the avenue and before long the ground floors of both houses were converted for business purposes.  In 1881 the society dressmaker and costumer T. W. Lanouette opened her shop in No. 125 and lived upstairs.

Simultaneously, real estate operator brothers Max and Moses Ottinger purchased No. 127 on March 21, 1881 for $44,500--just over $1 million today.  The ground floor shop became home to Edward Favier's European art gallery.  The upscale nature of his business was evidenced when his gallery was robbed by "two well-dressed young men" in February 1883.  The men admired several paintings, including a small piece by Eugene Fichel which was temporarily out of its frame.  Favier had it priced at over $12,500 in today's money.  After they browsed and promised to come back to buy another painting, the Fichel work was discovered to be missing.

Small businesses eventually took over the upper floors of both houses.  In 1894 Herman Bergdorf and Herman Voight opened their tailoring and fur shop in No. 125.  The building was almost demolished in 1903, after Bergdorf hired Alfred Zucker to design an 11-story store and loft building on the site.  The plans, filed in December 1903, projected the cost at $132,000.  But for some reason Bergdorf changed his mind.  In April 1903 he sold the building, which continued to house shops and offices.

The Evening World  October 4, 1904 (copyright expired)

On February 4, 1921 the Domestic Lunch Corporation signed a lease for both buildings.  The company no doubt intended to remodel the ground floors into a spacious luncheonette.  But, like Benjamin Bergdorf, it quickly changed course.  Three months later The New York Times reported it had sold its lease to the Shapanka Realty Corporation.  "The new lessee will erect a new five-story and basement building with an elevator at a cost of $50,000," the article noted.

Three of the original row remained when this photograph was snapped.  Nos. 125 and 127 are the two at left. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

If, indeed, Shapanka Realty intended to demolish the old converted houses, it never happened.  Instead architect Irving Margon stripped off the facades and rearranged the interiors to create a business building behind a 1920's take on neo-Gothic architecture.

Nestled among tall loft buildings, the joined buildings retained their original height and proportions.  Each address contained a storefront at ground floor, separated by the entrance to the upper floors.  Entire clad in terra cotta, the spandrel panels between each floor featured Gothic quattrefoils.  The parapet, decorated with blind arches and ornamental carvings, sprouted Gothic pinnacles topped with crockets.

The store of No. 125 was home to I. & H. Gold, Inc. men's clothing; followed by the United Balloon Company in 1938.  W. R. Price, Inc., toys and maps, moved into No. 127 in 1922.  The upper floors were leased as offices until 1929, when they were converted to permit light manufacturing.

The ever-changing Fifth Avenue saw The Mask, a children's theater, in the building in the 1960's and early '70's, followed by China Books and Periodicals in 1972.  It remained through the 1980's.

The 21st century brought expected updates, like replacement windows and a remodeled storefront.  But on the whole Irving Margon's 1921-22 makeover is intact.  That the bones of the combined buildings date back to lavish 1850's residences is impossible to detect.

photographs by the author