The Lost Queen Insurance Building - 37-39 Wall Street

 

Real Estate Record & Guide "Office Building Supplement" June 25, 1898 (copyright expired)

The Queen Insurance Company was chartered in Liverpool, England in 1857.  It had a branch in London in 1877 when it broke ground for a New York office at 37-39 Wall Street.  The firm had commissioned Clinton & Pirsson (composed of Charles W. Clinton and James W. Pirrson) to design the New York headquarters.  It was the first commission of up-and-coming contractor David H. King, Jr., who would go on to erect iconic structures like the Statue of Liberty and the Washington Square Arch.

Clinton & Pirsson designed a striking six-story, Ruskinian Gothic structure faced in red brick.  The top floor took the form an elaborate mansard with a pyramid-capped tower with paired arches supported by polished granite columns, and a somewhat Egyptian-shaped gable fronted by an ornate dormer.

On May 16, 1878, The New York Times applauded, "One of the most attractive buildings in Wall-street, or in the City, for that matter, is the handsome ornamented structure just completed and in part occupied by the Queen Insurance Company...Built of brick, stone, and iron, it rises six stories above a basement, and is at once substantial and ornamental."  

The Record & Guide, on the same day, called the building "well deserving of special notice."  The article described the colorful materials in detail, saying the granite basement was "elaborately carved" and that the:

...first story windows are of polished red granite, supported by piers of Wyoming blue stone and columns of black granite with richly carved capitals and bases of Wyoming blue stone, over which an arch is extending, covering the windows of the first story front, composed again of Wyoming blue stone and New Jersey brown stone.

Inset into the tympanum of the arch over the entrance was a bronze bust of Queen Victoria.  The third through fifth floors were clad in red brick, which contrasted with the various colored stone.  "The openings are arched with alternate brown and gray stone, and the jambs are finished with black and red polished granite," reported The New York Times.  "The facade is elaborately carved."

The Queen Insurance Company offices occupied the bottom two floors as well as the top floor.  Its offices were finished in mahogany, while the upper floors were done in maple and cherry.  "The first story hall including the first flight of stairs, are wainscoted with two and three different kinds of foreign and domestic marble," said the Record & Guide.  The New York Times described the fireplace in the Queen Insurance Company's Director's Room saying, "The mantel is an art study."

The top floor was used partly for document files.  There were also the Queen Insurance executives' dining room, and an apartment for the janitor and his family.  The New York Times commented, "From the dining-room, a superb view is obtained of the City and Bay."

The Record & Guide assured that the building was fireproof, and even the stairs were of iron.  But, said the article, "in such a building very little use is made of the stairs, one of Otis's finest elevators has been provided; with a handsomely ornamented car."  It ended its article saying, "The architects may well be proud of the work they have placed before the business community of New York."

An advertisement in The Evening Post in November 1880 listed the Queen Insurance Company's United States assets at $1,635,027 (about $50.3 million in 2024).  The firm leased offices on the third through fifth floors to various tenants, like the banking firm of Kelley & Little; the Commercial Union Insurance Company; and law offices, like those of Hathaway & Montgomery.

The cover of a brochure featured a depiction of the building.  from the collection of the New York Public Library.

Working for the Queen Insurance Company in 1887 was W. B. Schuyler.  The Sun described him as "about 28 years old, well built, and of a fine appearance."  Schuyler got into some sort of trouble in the early part of 1887--serious enough to make him desperate.  At 1:00 on the morning of March 4, Schuyler (who lived on Lexington Avenue) checked into the Harlem Hotel on Third Avenue at 115th Street with no bags.  He did not go to work that day, but remained in the room.  The Sun reported, "The maid heard him snoring, and gave up trying to wake him."

The next day, when she knocked on the door there was no answer.  She informed the proprietor, who used his pass key.  Schuyler was dead on the bed.  On the table were two one-ounce vials labelled laudanum, an opiate popular at the time with those intending to kill themselves.  A unsent letter was found addressed to Horace Maillard, which said he was in trouble, "but hoped to pull through," according to The Sun.

Three months after that tragedy, on June 18, 1887, the Record & Guide reported that the Queen Insurance Company had sold its building to the Metropolitan Trust Company for $450,000 (just under $15 million today).  

When the Metropolitan Trust Company was formed in 1881, "it occupied a single room at 41 Pine street, with a force of four people," according to Trust Companies in July 1921.  Within only five months its growth forced it to move to larger quarters, and in 1884 had to move again, to 35 Wall Street, next door to the Queens Insurance Company.

Although the Metropolitan Trust Company purchased 37-39 Wall Street in June 1887, the Queen Insurance Company did not vacate for nearly a year.  And the timing could not have been worse for the new owners.  Trust Companies recalled, "During the great blizzard of 1888, the company transferred its business to its own building next door, at 37-39 Wall street."

As its predecessor had done, the Metropolitan Trust Company leased offices in the building.  Among the tenants in the 1890s were attorney Henry Daily, Jr., and the newly formed Corporation Trust Company, incorporated in 1893. 

from the collection of the Ryerson and Burnham Art and Architecture Archive of the Art Institute Chicago.

On June 17, 1905, the Record & Guide printed a one-line article saying that the Metropolitan Trust Company had sold its building to William H. Chesebrough.  The New York Times was more detailed, saying that the price was said to have been about $1,000,000," and that the true purchasers were "probably...Charles W. Morse and his associates."  The article noted that the building, "is not likely to be disturbed for the present, but with the control of this property, it is pointed out, Mr. Morse and his associates will be in a position to erect at any time a new building."

Less than a year later, on May 20, 1906, the New-York Tribune reported that 37-39 Wall Street and its neighbor at 41 and 43 Wall Street were "being torn down to make way for a new twenty-five story skyscraper."  Francis Kimball's 37 Wall Street, completed the following year, survives.

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The Frederick Zittel House - 222 East 62nd Street

When Adam Tredwell (sometimes spelled Treadwell) died in 1852 his estate was valued at more than $400,000--about $12.8 million today.  Among his real estate holdings were about 24 acres of former farmland on the still undeveloped Upper East Side.  His heirs wasted no time in dividing the land into building plots and by 1854 were selling off the lots.

Construction and development ground to a near halt in New York City during the Civil War; but almost immediately afterward developers bought up tracts within the "Treadwell Farm."   In order to protect the value of their projected properties, 20 real estate operators came together and agreed on protective covenants.   They included standards for construction quality, height and width requirements, and the prohibition of undesirable businesses like saloons or factories.

Among the developers were brothers John and George Ruddell.  Between 1868 and 1870 they constructed 19 rowhouses on the south side of 62nd Street, between Second and Third Avenue.  Rather surprisingly, they used two architects--F. S. Barns designing nine of them, and James W. Pirrson responsible for two groups of five.

One of the Pirrson groups included Nos. 222 through 230.   The stone-faced Italianate houses were three stories high above an English basement.  The handsome arched entrances were capped with pediments supported by foliate brackets.  The architrave moldings of the windows were distinguished with prominent lintels, and cast modillioned cornices completed their dignified appearance.  At a cost to construct of $16,000 each--nearly $280,000 today--they were intended for upper middle class owners.

No. 222 was purchased by real estate broker Frederick Zittel.  With his partner, Walter B. Waldron, he did business from No. 1026 Third Avenue.   Zittel was married to the former Hattie J. Bodge.  Her widowed mother, Mary, moved in with the couple.

But the family had barely settled in before misfortune occurred.  Mary Bodge died on October 23, 1869 at the age of 77.  Her funeral was held in the house two days later.

On October 19, 1872 Zittel and Waldron dissolved their partnership.  A notice in The New York Herald assured clients "The real estate business heretofore existing under the name of Waldron & Zittel will be continued by Frederick Zittel, at the old stand."

The East 62nd Street house was the victim of a mysterious sneak thief in November 1874.   Zittel placed a notice in The New York Herald that offered "$20 reward and no questions asked--For return of Overcoat and Memorandum Book taken from 222 East Sixty-second street.  By returning the above to the house or to 1,026 Third avenue the above reward will be paid."

As was customary, the title to No. 222 was in Hattie's name.  After more than a decade in the house the Zittels sold it to Andrew B. Yetter on June 29, 1880 for $14,000.   Yetter and his wife, the former Elizabeth Wack, had two children, 12-year old Charles and his 17-year old sister, Nellie.

Andrew Yetter's businesses were diverse.  He was the president of the Atlas Storage Co., of the Globe Storage & Carpet Cleaning Co., and ran one of the several companies that did the city's street sprinkling.

Exactly why 14-year old Charles was out past midnight on May 21, 1882 is unclear.  But he was headed home on the Second Avenue streetcar with two friends that night.  Around 12:30 his friends said good night and disembarked at 59th Street.  Charles fell asleep, waking up suddenly just as the car passed 63rd Street.

When he realized he had just missed his stop, the teen jumped up and sprang from the moving streetcar.  The New York Times reported "He struck head foremost against one of the pillars of the elevated railroad and was thrown to the ground under the car, the wheels of which passed over his legs, severing them from his body."  The boy died in the Presbyterian Hospital later that morning.

The extent of Yetter's businesses was reflected in his constructing a six-story factory on East 61st Street in 1884, and a six-story storage warehouse in 1888.

After Nellie married James L. Hiller the newlyweds moved into the house with her parents.  And Andrew Yetter got a new business partner.  Hiller became an officer in the Globe Storage & Carpet Cleaning Co.

A century before the realty television show Storage Wars Globe Storage & Carpet Cleaning held auctions for abandoned goods.  One, for instance, held on August 28, 1922 included suites of furniture, pianos, Victrolas, phonographs, sewing machines, china, glassware and a profusion of other items.

Andrew Yetter died on February 18, 1925 at the age of 87.  Elizabeth died 10 months later, on December 20, at 81.  Both funerals were held in the 62nd Street house.

In what The New York Times deemed "its first change of ownership in sixty years," the Hillers sold the house in 1944.  The new owner was Major General Anson Conger Goodyear.  Despite his many accomplishments--he was a manufacturer, author, entrepreneur and philanthropist--he was best known as a founder and the first president of the Museum of Modern Art, and for his impressive collection of 20th century American and European art.

Its comparatively stuffy Victorian style made the house a surprising choice for Goodyear.  It stood in stark contrast to his sleek, modern summer estate in Old Westbury, Long Island--emblematic of his taste in art and architecture.  In 1938 Goodyear had commissioned Edward Durell Stone to design the International Style residence.   The completed structure, designed in part to exhibit Goodyear's art, was later described by The New Yorker architecture critic, Paul Goldberger, as "one of the most important houses built in the United States between the two world wars."

The Goodyear house in Old Westbury.  The Journal of the American Institute of Architects.

It was in the Old Westbury home that Goodyear was married to Zaidee C. Bliss in November 1950.  Goodyear was divorced from his first wife, Mary Martha Forman, and Zaidee's husband Cornelius N. Bliss, had died in 1949.  In reporting on the marriage, The New York Times announced "They are making their home here and at 222 East Sixty-second Street."

But the elderly couple (the groom was 73 years old) would spend little time in the city house.  Within the year No. 222 was home to Austrian-born artist Rudolf Anton Bernatschke and his wife, Wynne.   Best known for his portraits of politicians, celebrities and statesmen, including General Douglas MacArthur, and Senators Robert Taft and Joseph McCarty.  His diverse sitters ranged from Gypsy Rose Lee to Cardinal Spellman and Gary Cooper.

Bernatschke died on August 22, 2010.  No. 222 East 62nd Street was almost immediately offered for sale.  By now it was the last of Pirrson's 1868 row that had not been substantially altered; other than new iron railings and and a coat of gray-white paint.

Real estate offering photos in 2010 showed many of the 19th century interior details intact.  The artist's works still adorn the walls.  photos via Curbed New York

It was purchased by the Republic of France as the home of Francois Delattre, the French Ambassador to the United Nations.   In reporting on the $13.9 million sale, The Observer mentioned the house "has five bedrooms and seven and a half bathrooms plus staff quarters" and "an elevator from the basement to the penthouse."

The handful of owners of No. 222 resulted in its escaping modernization; giving us a clear image of what the block looked like in the first years after the Civil War.

photographs by the author

The Tallulah Bankhead House - 230 East 62nd St

Home construction had ground to a near halt during the Civil War years.   But in 1868 brothers John and George Ruddell were making up for lost time.  For the next few years the builders, who operated under the firm name J. & G. Ruddell, would be busy buying up building lots on the Upper East Side and erecting rowhouses.

Between 1868 and 1870 they line the south side of the 62nd Street block, between Second and Third Avenue with 19 similar homes.  Rather surprisingly, they used two architects--F. S. Barns designing nine of them, and James W. Pirrson responsible for two groups of five.

Born in New York City, Pirrson was working on his own in 1868 when he started work on Nos. 222 through 230.  About a year and a half later he would partner with Philip Gengembre Hubert to form Hubert, Pirrson & Co.

Although generally the neighborhood east of Park Avenue was, at the time, considered the "wrong" side, Pirrson's completed homes were handsome and comfortable.   At 20 feet wide and costing about $15,000 each to build (a little over a quarter of a million dollars today), they were intended for upper middle class owners.

Like scores of rowhouses appearing throughout the city, the residences were faced in brownstone and included high stoops.  Architrave openings with projecting lintels, arched double-doored entrances beneath showy peaked pediments, and bracketed and paneled cornices made the houses up-to-date if not uncommon.

No. 230 became home to William F. Croft who, too, got into the building boom.  Bradstreet's (the forerunner of Dun & Bradstreet) reported that he began business "in 1877 with very little capital."  Focusing on the rapidly-developing Yorkville neighborhood, he quickly made money.

While the Crofts did not rub shoulders with the millionaires who summered in Newport and Bar Harbor, they joined other well-to-do families in the fashionable resort hotels of Long Beach, New Jersey.

Somewhat astonishingly it was the assassination of President James A. Garfield on July 2, 1881 that brought Croft's finances crashing down.   On August 2 that year The New York Times reported that the builder's bankruptcy "was a surprise to the trade, as he was regarded as doing a flourishing business."   He was currently constructing an apartment building on Seventh Avenue at 57th Street, costing more than $200,000, along with other structures on Madison Avenue.

But, explained the article, he had invested heavily in elevated railroad stocks.  "He held a considerable line of stocks on margin, and when the tumble followed the shooting of the President his brokers sold him out, it is claimed, without notice."  He incurred losses of $75,000--nearly $1.8 million today.

Croft moved his family to No. 555 West 128th Street before 1888.  But his problems seem to have followed him.   In the early morning hours of April 4, 1888 he was arrested for "smashing a window in Philip Milligan's saloon."  The Evening World explained, "He wanted to get in after the place was closed."

At the time of the window smashing, merchant Robert Gordon was living at No. 230 East 62nd Street.  The well-respected businessman owned his own building on Cedar Street and was one of the founders of the esteemed Down Town Association.

In 1895 brothers Ferdinand and Hermann Carri purchased the house and converted it to The New York Institute for Violin Playing and School for Piano and Vocal Culture.  Both men were composers and accomplished musicians.  Large audiences assembled for their concerts in venues like Mendelssohn Hall and Chickering Hall.  Ferdinand played violin and Hermann the piano.

The Institute would remain in the house for decades.  Following the annual recital in April 1907 the music critic from the New-York Tribune opined "The violin students of Ferdinand Carri...showed some fine results of training in a violin recital held at Mendelssohn Hall last Wednesday evening."

New-York Tribune, September 7, 1907

The Carri brothers ran the Institute here until January 1920. Assessed at $11,500, the value of the outmoded Victorian building had dropped to about $136,000 in today's dollars.  Architect Aymar Embury II would change that.

Embury removed the stoop and moved the entrance to a few steps below street level.  The stone window details were shaved flat, slightly projecting bandcourses defined each level, and a parapet with blind panels of balustrades replaced the outdated cornice.

The painted stucco, tiny bas relief urns, pinwheel roundels and false balustrades gave the house a Regency flair.

Embury married Ruth Dean in 1923.  A renowned landscape architect, she was best known for designing the gardens of lavish country homes.  Her wealthy clients included Vincent Astor, Howard Cullman and Arthur Lehman.  She was responsible for the grounds at the famous Grey Gardens estate in East Hampton.

Her husband enjoyed a similar clientele, designing the country estates of millionaires like James Boyd's Weymouth, at Southern Pines, North Carolina.   The couple had a daughter, Judith, in 1927.  Their own summer home was in East Hampton.

On May 26, 1932 Ruth died suddenly in the house at the age of 43.  Her funeral was held in East Hampton.  For several years Embury would not return to East 62nd Street.

He leased the furnished house to former United States Attorney Emory R. Buckner in October that year.  A year later the Buckners, who were at their summer home in Nantucket, announced the engagement of daughter Betty to Potter Cox.

Following the Buckers, Alexandra Ewing Noyes moved into the house in 1934 with her three sons.  She was divorced from Newbold Noyes, son of the president of The Associated Press early that year.  Alexandra's grandfather, Thomas Ewing, was Secretary of the Interior under Zachary Taylor and Secretary of the Treasury under William Henry Harrison.  Her father, also named Thomas Ewing, had served as Commissioner of Patents during the administration of Woodrow Wilson.

On December 8, 1934, Alexandra married her brother-in-law, Thomas A. Stone.  Stone had been married to her older sister, who died in childbirth a year later.

Another marriage took place that year.  Aymar Embury married Josephine Bound on September 17.  Following their honeymoon to Spain, they moved into No. 230 East 62nd Street.  Along with his domestic life, Embury's professional life changed upon their return.  The newly-appointed Parks Commissioner Robert Moses chose him as the chief or consulting architect in the many civic projects Moses initiated.


Josephine Embury lavished her attention on the rear gardens.  Every year, beginning around 1938, she opened her "ivy garden" for the City Garden Tour.  It would be a regular stop until 1943.

The Emburys remained in the house until 1955 when, in late November, they sold it to internationally famed stage and motion picture actress Tallulah Bankhead.   She was equally well-known for her biting wit, gravelly voice and somewhat shocking lifestyle.   Author Richard Alleman in his 1988 New York Movie Lover's Guide summed it up saying "She drank heavily, smoked six packs of cigarettes a day, went to bed with both men and women, was renowned for her bawdy stories, and yet, throughout it all, Tallulah Bank head was one great lady."

The following year Bankhead appeared on stage as Blanche DuBois in a revival of Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire.  Williams remarked that after a performance "when the play was finished I rushed up to her and fell to my knees at her feet."

But the actress was suffering from serious addictions at the time.   One of her most memorable television appearances was on the Lucille Ball-Desi Arnaz Comedy Hour in 1957 in which she played herself in the episode "The Celebrity Next Door."  Reportedly both Ball and Arnaz were exasperated by her appearing on set seemingly drunk and delaying rehearsals.

A scene from "The Celebrity Next Door."  via papermoonloveslucy

An article in The New York Times on July 24, 1958 reflected a pattern of accidents happening in the 62nd Street house.  "Tallulah Bankhead, an actress, was slightly injured last night in a fall [in her house].  Miss Bankhead tripped and broke a vase.  She fell and cut her left forearm on one of the fragments.  Her doctor took five stitches in her forearm."

Bankhead sold No. 230 on December 29, 1961 to George Huntington Hartford, heir to the A & P supermarket fortune.   She moved to No. 447 East 57th Street and died in St. Luke's Hospital on December 12, 1968 at the age of 66.  Supposedly, her last understandable words were "codeine...bourbon."

Hartfort paid cash for the house.  In reporting on the sale The New York Times noted "it contains twelve rooms, including three bedrooms, three bathrooms and three servants' rooms."   It was only one of his several residences, including a Melody Farm, a 160-acre estate in Mahwah, New Jersey; a Hollywood estate, The Pines; a townhouse in London; a home in France and another on Paradise Island in the Bahamas.

His most lasting legacy would be his art extensive art collection, which became so large that he commissioned architect Edward Durell Stone to design the Gallery of Modern Art at No. 2 Columbus Circle to house it.  The museum opened in 1964.  Included in the collection were works by Salvador Dali, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, Monet, Manet, and Degas.

Other than the removed stoops, the neighboring houses retain their 1868 appearance.

Hartford died in 2008.  No. 230 East 62nd Street remains a single-family home today.   It recently underwent a facade restoration and is little changed since Aymar Embury II gave it a remarkable facelift in the 1920s.

photographs by the author