The Julia A. Shaw House - 41 West 74th Street

Architect Max Hensel designed a row of five brownstone-fronted homes on West 74th Street, between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue, for developer William H. Jacobs in  1889.  The A-B-A-B-A configuration meant, in fact, that he had to come up with only two designs.  

The 20-foot wide, four-story residences were completed in 1890.  The easternmost, No. 41 (an "A" design), featured a muscular box stoop that changed directions three times before reaching the entrance.   The doorway was flanked by two engaged columns, their stylized Corinthian capitals slightly different--one in the form of blooming flowers, the other of ferns.  They upheld a foliate-carved arched.  A rounded, three-window bay dominated the second floor.  A wide carved band ran between the third and fourth floors.

The house was originally identical to No. 45, seen here.

Jacob was certain he had sold No. 41 in June 1890.  The Real Record & Builders' Guide reported that Joseph Hammerslough and his wife Helen had paid $45,000 for the property.  But something went wrong.  On October 1 the Hammersloughs transferred the title back to William H. Jacobs.  The developer immediately sold it, however, to Julia A. Shaw.  She got a bit of a discount, paying $500 less than the Hammersloughs.  It was nevertheless a pricey transaction--equaling about $1.27 million today.

Julia A. Shaw was the widow of Samuel P. Shaw who had opened the block-engulfing Grand Union Hotel in 1869 with Simeon Ford.   Their business relationship expanded to a family relationship when Ford married the Shaws' daughter, Julia, in 1883.   The Shaws had two other children, Samuel T. and Joan B. Shaw.  Julia maintained a summer residence near Rye, New York on the Long Island Sound and a farm in Peekskill.

Two years after purchasing No. 41 Julia initiated a significant alteration.  In July 1892 she commissioned architect Francis H. Kimball to add an extension to the rear, rearrange the interior walls, and raise the upper floor  Unmentioned in the plans was the addition of a dramatic copper balcony.  The alterations cost Julia the equivalent of more than $85,000 today.  

Kimball's copper balcony may not have been architecturally congruous, but it was most definitely striking.

An astute business woman, she had managed the Grand Union Hotel following the death of her husband.  Like so many upscale hotels at the time, it welcomed both transient and permanent guests.  

In 1882 Carolan O'Brien Bryant had checked in with his two daughters.  A year earlier the girls had received $180,000 in the will of their grandfather, John Anderson--a hefty $4.56 million today.

While the family lived her, according to The Evening World, Julia "advanced money for the medical attendance of the daughters."  Most likely because she was aware of the fortunes coming to the girls, Julia also did not press for the rent on the suite of rooms.  But after the Bryants checked out in 1885 and dodged Julia's attempt for payment for nearly a decade, she took them to court.

On November 8, 1894 The Evening World entitled an article "Mrs. Shaw Wins" and reported that not only did Julia recover the $19,298.80 in rent and the loan; but Justice Barrett threw in another $1,108.51 for good measure.  Julia's judgment would equal nearly $670,000 today.

Julia's sister, Ann (known as "Annie") Twybill Allen was also a widow.  The two women summered together at Julia's Rye-on-the-Sound home.  As the summer of 1897 drew to a close Annie fell ill.  She was too sick to travel and as the other summer homes were closed up, the two women stayed on.  Then, on November 15 the 65-year-old Annie died.  Her funeral was held in the summer home; Julia arranging for carriages to meet mourners arriving from Grand Central Station.

Julia died at the Rye-on-the-Sound house on November 6, 1901.  Two days later carriages once again waited at the Rye train station for mourners arriving from Manhattan.

Julia's estate equaled about $15.8 million in today's dollars.  
She was generous to her servants in death, giving, for instance, $300 and $200 to maids Annie Darby and Kate O'Connor, respectively; and $100 to Maggie O'Neill, her dressmaker.  Annie's windfall was a little more than $9,000 by today's standards.

Joan received $25,000 and her sister, Julia, inherited the Rye residence.  Julia's husband, Simeon Ford, received $50,000.  Samuel was given the Peekskill farm and the West 74th Street house.  Julia was specific in her will about the fate of the Grand Union Hotel.

The New-York Tribune reported "the remainder of the estate, including the Grand Union Hotel, is left to Mrs. Shaw's children, and they are to run it.  The trustees named are Simeon Ford, Mrs. Julia E. Ford and Samuel T. Shaw.  They are to manage the hotel."

Julia and her husband had been well known as art connoisseurs and collectors.  Following her death the Julia A. Shaw Memorial Prize was established by the Society of American Artists.  It was annually presented "for the best work of art by an American woman."

Samuel Shaw did renovations to his mother's former home, and then leased it.  The first tenant was Louis B. Fleischmann and his family.  On July 24, 1902 The New York Times wrote "The Fleischmann home on Seventy-fourth Street has just been completed, and the family moved in some time ago."

In fact, the work was not totally completed.  On the day before the Times article there was a crew of a dozen "painters, carpenters, and frescoers" at work.  At the time all the family except son Charles were at their summer home in the Catskills.  The servants had accompanied the family, leaving only the housekeeper back to take care of things.  

Charles's mother and sister, Annie, came home briefly on the evening of July 23, so he hurried home from his Broadway office.  They all arrived at the house around 6:00.  When Charles went to his rooms on the third floor later that night he found that his door had been had jimmied open.

The Times reported "He said that he found that no great search had been made to the rooms, but that the thief had opened a drawer in a chiffoniere and secured a morocco case."  In that case were gold jewelry, diamond and pearl stickpins, a seal ring, and oddly enough, "a woman's ring, two pearls surrounded by diamonds."  Charles explained the ring "belonged to a friend, and he was rather at a loss as to how to explain its disappearance."

Samuel Shaw moved his family into No. 41 following the Fleischmanns' departure.  Their impressive summer estate was in Centre Island near Oyster Bay, Long Island, described by the New York Herald as "being "situated near the Seawanhaka Yacht club House, and just across the bay from President Roosevelt's residence."  The family was still there in October 1903--rather late in the season--when disturbing incidents began occurring.

One of the cows was "thrown and her legs tied up in a cruel manner" and then, according to the Herald, "one of Mr. Shaw's valuable dogs has been crippled by the same miscreant, it is believed.  The animal was either kicked or beaten."

The vandalism climaxed on the stormy night of October 11.  The Herald reported "The members of the family, comprising besides Mr. Shaw, Mrs. Shaw, four sons and an infant child, were asleep in the second story when Mrs. Shaw was awakened by a noise.  She aroused her husband."  The couple hurried downstairs to find one of the porches on fire.  Shaw ran through the house waking the servants and getting the family out of the burning house.

Because the season had ended, the district was "practically deserted," according to the newspaper, "and but little assistance could be had."  The house was destroyed, along with Mrs. Shaw's jewelry, rare rugs and paintings.  The personal loss (not including the house) was estimated at around $206,000 in today's money.

A reporter arrived at No. 41 West 74th Street a few days later.  Shaw told him "I am completely exhausted with the excitement and loss of sleep which I suffered on Saturday night."  He was asked if he thought the fire had been started by "some enemy."  Shaw replied "Any man who did what was done to my fox terrier would not stop at anything."

In 1905 Shaw was again leasing the house, now to the family of wealthy sand paper manufacturer Herman Behr.  The house was the scene of daughter Margaret's introduction to society at an afternoon reception on December 21 that year.

The following year Max Howell Behr was married to Evelyn B. Schley in mansion of the bride's parents at No. 845 Fifth Avenue.  Herman Hall Behr was his brother's best man.  

The family was still leasing the house when another son, Frederic, was married to Alice Cramer Vernam on December 4, 1907.  Like's his brother's wedding it took place in the bride's home, this time in Morristown, New Jersey.

The family's social status was evidenced when invitations arrived to the wedding of Beatrice Kobbe and Remond Demorest Little.  On January 9, 1907 the New-York Tribune listed the guests, including not only the Behrs, but socially-elite names like the August Belmonts, the Hamilton Fishes, Roosevelts, Livingstons, Whitneys and Frelinghuysens.

The Behrs remained at No. 41 until 1909, when Samuel T. Shaw offered the house to The Society of American Fakirs as its clubhouse.   An organization of students of the Art Student's League, "its principal function" according to The Evening Post, "is an exhibition caricaturing paintings hung in the annual spring exhibition of The National Academy."

The students, in other words, produced fakes of serious paintings.  An earlier catalog explained "A fake is a cold, cruel, remorseless, ridiculous swipe on the hard labor of an American artist.  It may be an intelligent criticism, or it may be flamdoolery."

Since its founding, the club had been loosely organized.  Shaw wanted to create officers, committees and an elective membership system.  On December 1, 1909 The Evening Post said he "gives his home for a term of three years, a sufficient time, he thinks, to test the practicability of the scheme.  The house is decorated by F. S. Church and C. C. Curran, and has a great many large rooms, which can be used for exhibitions or for clubrooms."

The club's housewarming took place on December 22.  The New-York Tribune reported "The feature of the evening was the presentation to Samuel T. Shaw, the founder of the club and the owner of the house, of a silver loving cup mounted on a square ebony base."

The Fakirs remained in the house for nearly two years, after which Shaw sold it to George Randolph Chester and his wife, Lillian E. Chester in September 1912 for $57,500 (just over $1.5 million today).   The title was put in Lillian's name.

Born in Cincinnati on January 27, 1869 Chester was an author, some of whose popular works were made into silent films.  His success in selling stories to The Saturday Evening Post had led him to relocate to New York.  A year before buying the 74th Street house, Chester's first wife, Elizabeth, discovered that he was living in London with American writer and widow Lillian Josephine Hauser DeRimo.  She filed for divorce and when Chester and Lillian received word that the divorce had been granted, they married.  The pair worked on collaborative stories and plays in No. 41, as well as individual works.    

The Chesters remained only two years.  In 1914 George leased the house to Echlin P. Gayer who was self-described as "the famous English actor and playwright."  He operated the home as what he described as "a novel and charming idea in metropolitan living," the Kenilworth House.  "Neither a hotel nor a boarding house, a most unique furnished private residence for the connoisseur of luxury."   Those renting suites would enjoy "sumptuous furnishings and appointments automatic electric elevator...instantaneous hot water service day and night."  He listed electric lights, steam head, phones in every suite, and four English servants as amenities.

But it appears that the Chesters were not pleased with their property being used as a de facto hotel.  A multi-day auction was held within the house in December that year.  The announcement touted the "artistic and exquisite furniture, art treasures and appointments contained in the palatial residence of Echlin Gayer, Esq."

The residence continued to house wealthy families.  In 1928 it was home to Grace Tumbridge Mason, whose ex-husband, millionaire John W. Tumbridge was the former owner of the Hotel St. George in Brooklyn.  The former Grace Goudie, once a Brooklyn debutante, she lived here with her 13-year-old daughter, also named Grace.  That year Grace took her former husband to court in an attempt to have the amount of her daughter's support increased.

"She wanted the girl to live amid the comfort and advantages that generally are the lot of a millionaire's child," explained the Brooklyn, Standard Union on October 27, 1928.   But the stress of appearing in court, not to mention seeing her husband's new wife there, was too much for Grace.

The Standard Union began its article dramatically, saying "A mother's life, snuffed out amid tragic and dramatic circumstances, is the toll chalked up to-day in her futile battle against her Brooklyn millionaire ex-husband to win ease and luxury for her poor-little-rich-girl daughter."  As charges "flew back and forth," Grace had become enraged at Tumbridge "and leaped from the witness stand and lunged at him, swooning to the floor as she did so."  Grace never regained consciousness."

Two more families would live in the house while it was still a private home.  Mary E. Gould, widow of Arthur Gould, lived here until her death at the age of 74 in August 1941.  She was followed by Roger Andrews and his wife, Eleanor.  

Then a renovation completed in 1954 resulted in two apartments on each floor.  The stoop was removed and the entrance lowered to the former basement level.  The brownstone facade was painted white.

Even the copper balcony was painted white.  photo via corcoran.com

Things turned around in 2010 when a restoration was initiated.  Brazilian oil executive Paolo Gouveas converted the house to a lavish two-family dwelling--re-fabricating the lost stoop, stripping the paint, and adding a few amenities that would have amazed Julia A. Shaw.  A real estate listing in 2014 noted "The five-bedroom, twelve-room home boasts a garden, courtyard, elevator, roof deck, gym, hot tub, two full-grade chef's kitchens and a wine cellar."

photographs by the author

Max Hensel's 1888 100 West 67th Street

Developer and builder M. Giblin kept architect Max Hensel busy in 1887.  In the eight month period between March and October alone that year Hensel filed plans for at least 11 structures for Giblin, mostly tenement buildings with stores.  Among them was a structure at the southwest corner of Ninth (later Columbus) Avenue and 67th Street.  Hensel's plans, filed on September 16, called for a five-story tenement building with stores to cost $25,000 (in the neighborhood of $712,000 today).  

Essentially forgotten today, the German-born architect was prolific at the time, specializing in tenement buildings.  That would come to an end in 1892 when he was appointed a foreman in the Government's Office of the Supervising Architect, overseeing Federal projects in New York.

No. 100 West 67th Street was completed in 1890.  Hensel had saved his employer money on the crisp-lined building by executing most of the ornamentation in brick.  Robust Greek key bands ran between the second and third floors, recessed panels were adorned with simple cross-hatches, complex geometrical designs, and other decorations.   Chimney backs, which began at the third floor, were cunningly designed to match the fluted brick pilasters between the openings along the fourth floor.  Above these, tympana were filled with honey-comb pattern brick.   The pressed metal cornice repeated the Greek key pattern of the lower section.

Expert bricklayers were required to carry out Hensel's complex decorations.

Giblin sold the building to Louis Bauer, who leased the corner store to William A. Markgraf beginning January 1, 1900.  Markgraf's five-and-a-half-year lease began with a $1,800 per year rent, rising to $2,000.  (He would be paying the equivalent of $5,000 per month today at end the of the lease.)

The apartments, all six-rooms each, were accessed by an impressive limestone entrance above a four-step stoop on 67th Street.  The proportions of its arch mimicked those of the shop windows along side, and it was embraced by fluted columns which morphed into overblown brackets.  These, in turn, upheld an ambitious cornice.  Pretty carved flowers filled the small spandrels of the arch.

Bauer's advertisement in The Evening Post on April 16, 1892 offered:

HANDSOME CORNER FLATS,

One Block from L Station,

100 West 67th st.,

Six light rooms and bath-room, steam heat, in perfect order. 

Rents $37.50, $42.50

The announced rents were annual; and so tenants in the most expensive apartments were paying just over $100 per month in today's money.

Bauer held onto the property only until July 1895 when he sold it for $72,000.

Among the tenants in 1896 was Mamie Jane Atwood, also known as May.  The New York Herald sarcastically described her on September 17 as being "known to herself as 'Miss' and to her friends as 'Mrs.'"  The article went on to say "Miss Atwood is a handsome, lavishly dressed woman.  She is about thirty years old.  She lives alone on the 5th floor of the house."

She had been May Carmen, the widow of a dental surgeon, before her marriage to Frank J. Atwood.  They had known each other only three months before the wedding and the groom soon regretted it.  Three months into the marriage Atwood was convinced his wife was unfaithful.  He left her and went to Norfolk, Virginia.  Mamie had him arrested there "for the theft of $1,600 in promissory notes."

Later, when he found incriminating letters to her from a man who signed them only "H," the pair had a "fierce quarrel," according to The New York Times.  Atwood "threw her out" and initiated divorce proceedings.  

But the New York Herald's interest in Mamie had nothing to do with her messy domestic past; but with the fact that a wealthy, married man had been just been found dead in her apartment.  Herman Feilman was "a fire adjuster and a man of wealth," according to The New York Herald.  He lived with his wife and daughter at No. 26 West 86th Street.  The newspaper described him as being 50-years old and "a handsome man in the prime of life.  He was well and tastefully dressed.  He was one of those men who sought to keep young."

Feilman shot himself in the head on the evening of September 16 in the Atwood apartment.  Mamie's version of things placed her away from the scene.  She told authorities that she had just returned home from a walk with a Mrs. Lewis and the two were talking on the low stoop of No. 100.  Feilman came along and, although she "knew him only slightly," he asked "permission to go up to her apartments last evening to rest, for he complained of being very ill and weary."  

Mamie said she gave him the key and remained on the stoop talking with Mrs. Lewis.  Suddenly they heard the report of a gunshot and ran upstairs.  Feilman 's coat and waistcoat were lying on a chair in the parlor and his body was on the bathroom floor.  They immediately summoned police.

The Evening World found her story suspicious.  "Feilman and the Atwood woman had known each other for a year or more," said the article.  (Frank J. Atwood agreed, telling authorities he was positive the love letters signed "H" were from Herman Feilman.)  And it noted "There were many physicians' offices in the neighborhood where he might have gone.  And his own home was not far away."

The Evening Telegram did not have to surmise.  On the same day as the Herald's article, it ran a headline "Why Feilman Died."  The article said that two letters had been left by Feilman, one addressed to his wife and the other his employer, Leo Frank.  Reporters who filed into Frank's office were told that he would make the contents known after reading the letter, "but on reading it his face assumed a very serious look," said The Evening Telegram.  He now said "that out of consideration for Feilman's family he could not tell the full contents of the letter."  The coroner was more forthcoming, saying that the letter indicated "that he killed himself on account of financial difficulties and his love for Mrs. Atwood...and was unable to support Mrs. Atwood any longer."

Both Mamie and Mrs. Lewis were forced to change their stories when police informed them they had also found two photographs in his pocket--one of Mamie and the other of Mrs. Lewis (who had previously insisted she had never seen the man before).   Mamie now admitted that she had known him "a year" (The World preferred to say she knew him "very well") and that "he called on her occasionally."

The World did some investigating and threw more light on Mamie Atwood.  "The majority of her visitors were men.  They were very quiet.  There was never any disturbance."  Mamie took the first opportunity to bolt.  "Police looked for her yesterday," said The World, "but failed to find her.  She left the flat without telling any one she would be gone.  Her only desire was to get away."

James Ford, who lived here in 1898, was friends with Frank A. Keller.  Keller worked for the Paris-based art dealers Goupil & Cie at No. 170 Fifth Avenue.  Early that year it was noticed that paintings and etchings were disappearing and in March the police were called in.  The New York Times reported "Their suspicion was directed to Keller, who for the past eight years has been the stenographer for the firm."

Detectives got a break in the case when Keller and James Ford passed several worthless check on saloon keepers.  When the proprietors confronted them, Ford and Keller offered valuable paintings to make good on the checks.  At 1:30 in the morning on April 15 detectives broke into Ford's apartment and arrested him.

Police said that Keller would use his key to get into the gallery at night.  He and Ford would select artworks which they believed they could sell.  The thieves had little-by-little spirited away $15,000 worth of paintings and etchings--nearly half a million in today's dollars.  Investigators found several of the paintings in Ford's apartment.  Other works were found in saloons, Keller's apartment, and pawnshops.

The entrance has been modernized, but its handsome stone enframement is intact.  The now clownishly-painted ground floor originally matched the brick-and-brownstone facade seen above.

Also living in the building that year was 18-year old Louise Betzer, who shared an apartment with Mrs. Charles Banks.   The teen began visiting fortune tellers who told her the same story: that she would meet a handsome young man.  Louise became preoccupied with the promise, repeatedly visiting the clairvoyants and astrologists.  Later, according to The Newtown Register on September 29, Mrs. Banks said, "This seemed to occupy her mind more than anything else" and she frequently talked about her unknown lover.  The Long Island City newspaper, The Eagle, on September 26 noted "The fortune tellers kept assuring her that she was to meet the young man soon, but finally she lost hope and talked of ending her life."

On Saturday morning, September 17 Louise left No. 100.  Later that afternoon, grave diggers in the Lutheran Cemetery in Middle Village, Queens, "came across the prostrate form of a pretty young women, lying on the grass in [the] rear of Lutheran Church, which is in the cemetery, with an empty bottle that had contained carbolic acid by her side."

The Newtown Register reported "The girl was still alive when found, and the grave-diggers picked her up carefully and took her to the cemetery office."  Doctors felt she would recover "notwithstanding the fact that she swallowed three ounces of carbolic acid."  Louise regained consciousness the following day and confessed to police "that the reason she attempted her life, was that she was despondent."  The Eagle commented "Why she selected the entrance to Lutheran Cemetery as a place to end her life is not known."

By 1908 the Reilly Restaurant was in the corner store.  The proprietor seems to have struck a deal with the owner and doubled as a sort of in-house rental agent.  An advertisement in The Evening Telegram on December 19, 1908 read "Fine corner apartments, six rooms and bath, all improvements, to let...rent reasonable.  Inquire in Reilly Restaurant, 100 West 67th, corner Columbus av."

In the first years following World War I Wilma Gilmore ran her dance studio in the building.  Her ads noted "Modern Dances, Stage and Society Jazz, specialized."

The former Reilly Restaurant space had become the Buckingham restaurant by 1932.  Problems came for the owner that year when U. S. Marshall Raymond J. Mulligan ordered a raid.  An official announcement to the public in the New York Evening Post on March 29 read:

I have seized and hold One Cash Register, a quantity of Intoxicating liquor and a quantity of furniture and equipment found in premises known as Buckingham, designated as 100 West 67th Street, in the Borough of Manhattan...Notice is hereby given that the case is appointed for trial at the U.S. Court and Post Office Building, Manhattan, New York on April 12, 1932...All persons are notified then and there to appear and defense their interest...All not appearing will be defaulted.

We can most likely assume that no one came forward to claim the liquor.

The parents of teen-age John McKeever became concerned when he didn't come home in October 1940.  After receiving missing persons, a Mount Pleasant, New York police officer spotted McKeever and picked him up.  The boy was being held at the police station awaiting the arrival of his parents.  But he had other ideas.

The Yonkers newspaper The Herald Statesmen reported on October 22 that the teen "casually wandered away, stole Chief Joseph Klaus' car and then led police on a chase."   With police vehicles not far behind, McKeever sped down the parkway before losing control and running the Chief's car into the Woodlands' viaduct in White Plains.  "Leaving the car slightly the worse for wear, McKeever proceeded on foot into Scarsdale, where he stole an automobile owned by Joseph Lyon Andrews parked in front of his house."

By now Parkway Police, provided with a description of the Andrews vehicle, had joined the chase.  It was spotted by Patrolman Van Cura who "brought McKeever's short crime fling to an abrupt end."   The teen had managed to elevate his status from one of a non-punishable missing person to being held on grand larceny charges.

In 1983 the new Applause Cinema Books, a bookstore devoted to the theater opened here.  That year journalist Lisa Faye Kaplan wrote "The script for just about every play ever produced in modern times is for sale at Applause...The store, on Manhattan's West Side, has a complete selection of Samuel French scripts, and one of the largest stocks of English plays in the country."

But it was more than that.  Writing in New York Magazine on October 19, 1987 Joanna Molloy called it "the city's largest film bookstore" and added "If this were just a bookstore, it would be interesting.  Because it is also a scriptstore it is positively fascinating."

For years, beginning around 1997, Nick & Toni's Cafe was a familiar eating spot for Upper West Siders.   While the Columbus Avenue store level has been totally modernized, the upper floors are intact; Max Hensel's complex, eye-catching elements giving no hint of the colorful history that played out inside.