The Bush Terminal Sales Building - 130 West 42nd Street

 

photograph by Epicgenius

In 1895, Irving T. Bush conceived a solution to shipping, storage and distribution costs.  His Bush Company organized a complex of six warehouses and a steamship pier on the South Brooklyn waterfront as a freight-handling terminal.  The firm's name was changed to the Bush Terminal Company in 1902.  By then, the complex included a railroad, factory lofts and warehouses.  The Bush Terminal Company moved into its newly-built headquarters at 100 Broad Street in 1905.

In 1916, at the age of 47, Irving T. Bush envisioned another ground-breaking project: a centralized market in which wholesalers world-wide could display their goods.  The architectural firm of Helmle & Corbett, composed of Frank J. Helmle and Harvey Wiley Corbett, was commissioned to design a 30-story structure on the narrow, 50-foot-wide plot at 130-132 West 42nd Street.  Corbett took the reins of the project, designing the skyscraper in the neo-Gothic style.

Irving Bush's original name for the building--The Bush Terminal International Exhibit Building and Buyers' Club--did not easily roll off the tongue.  It was quickly abbreviated to the Bush Terminal Sales Building.  In its July 1917 issue, Dry Goods described it as "a World's Fair in a skyscraper."  The article said, "The Bush Terminal Company is constructing the building at a cost of $2,000,000, and, war or no war, is going to have it open by October 1st."  (The construction cost would translate to $50.2 million in 2026.)  Dry Goods noted that it would be "the tallest building in Times Square."

Corbett's streamlined Gothic elements emphasized the building's narrow verticality, carrying certain vertical lines from the base to the crown.  Corbett explained to The American Architect years later, "The whole mass of the building [was], of course, vertical, and everything possible in designing was done to accentuate this verticality."

The American Architect, October 17, 1917 (copyright expired)

The soaring tower dwarfed the neighboring low-rise buildings.  However, Corbett realized that  the situation might not last forever.  In order to avoid blank side walls, he created full-height, trompe l'oeil piers by the use of colored brick.  Although the Bush Terminal Sales Building is often touted as the first example of the newly enacted New York Zoning Law, Corbet corrected that idea in The American Architect in 1926, saying, "Plans for the building were drawn before the law went into effect.  The set-backs were conceived purely for architectural and aesthetic reasons."

The American Architect, October 17, 1917 (copyright expired)

Dry Goods explained the "double purpose of the new skyscraper."  The Buyers' Club occupied the first floor and mezzanine and included a men's lounge, "reading rooms with library reference books, catalogs, out of town and foreign newspapers and magazines, bar, buffet lunch, etc."  The article laid out the various services available to visiting buyers in the Buyer's Club:

There will be 'information about plays and the sailing of steamships, telephone booths, theatre tickets, retail shopping news, a stenographic department, ticker tape service, trade and credit information and a register of doctors, dentists, nurses.

The typical upper floors held display units of 10 by 10 feet.  On the highest floors were offices, including those of Irving T. Bush (on the topmost floor) and Helmle & Corbett.

The lobby carried on the Gothic motif.  The Bush Magazine 1921 (copyright expired)

In its October 1919 issue, The American Magazine noted, "at present over one thousand manufacturers have engaged space and service for their products.  Elene Foster, writing in the New-York Tribune on February 2 that year, lauded the convenience of one-stop shopping for the out-of-town buyers.  "Before the erection of the Bush Terminal Sales Building, which by the by, is the first of its kind in the world, the woman buyer...who makes a semi-annual pilgrimage for the purpose of replenishing her stock was obliged to trudge from one dingy downtown building to another."  

Dry Goods, July 1917 (copyright expired)

Now, she said, "she wends her way toward the great Gothic building on Forty-second Street."  Buyers would find manufacturers were arranged by floors--toys, childrenswear, or housewares, for instance, on their own dedicated floor.

The Notions and Fancy Goods division (top) and the Perfumery and Toilet Articles floor.  The Bush Magazine, 1921 (copyright expired)

There was an exhibition space in the building, as well.  On February 6, 1919, the New-York Tribune reported, "The first children's fashion show took place last night at the Bush Terminal Building under auspices of the International Buyers' Club," and nine months later, on November 24, The New York Times announced, "Four thousand examples of Persian art will be placed on exhibition and sale today at the Bush Terminal, 130 West Forty-second Street."  Among the "miniatures, lacquers, potteries, brocades" and other items was a 16-foot-square tapestry, "representing the work of 100 women for ten years," said the article.  It was valued at $100,000

About two weeks later, that exhibition escaped what could have been a disaster.  On December 13, The New York Times reported, "Candles used for lighting when electric lights were turned off in accordance with the fuel conservation order were said to have been the cause of a fire on the eighth floor of the Bush Terminal Sales building."  The fire was confined to that floor and the article said, "The fire and water proof construction of the building prevented any damage being caused by water to the collection of Persian art exhibited on the third floor."  The article noted that the 4,000 specimens were the property "of the Persian throne" and included "illuminated manuscripts, rugs, jewelry, and lacquer work which date back as far as the twelfth century."

World War I brought a new type of tenant to the building.  In 1919, the League to Enforce Peace, the League of Free Nations Association, the Vacation War Relief Committee of the Vacation Association, and the City Government Committee of Citizens' Union signed leases.

On May 22, 1921, The New York Times reported, "Extensive alterations are being made to the lower floors of the Bush Terminal Sales Building...to accommodate a novel feature to be known as the Old Town Tavern."  The article explained that the tavern proper "will be equipped with the furniture and fittings characteristic of some of the famous old inns and taverns of New York a hundred years ago."  The motif was carried on throughout the first three floors.  Irving T. Bush, said the article,  intended to remind visitors "of the great historic interest of New York which is so often overlooked or forgotten."  

The three floors, therefore, "are furnished with the quaint old furniture and fittings of the old English manor houses."  Heavy ceiling beams, blocks of travertine imported from Italy and "Old English tile" for the floors were installed.  Irving Bush loaned antiques from his personal collection, including a 16th century banquet table.

The American Architect, October 17, 1917 (copyright expired)

Another change came the following year when the newly organized Hamilton Bank moved into the ground floor in December 1922.  Other new tenants that year were the Technical Book Co. and the Newspaper Club, composed of journalists.

The world-wide esteem of the Bush Terminal Sales Building was exemplified in July 1922 when English novelist Hugh Walpole and the Maharajah of Rajpipla visited the United States.  The New-York Tribune opined on July 10 that the two distinguished visitors had made a mistake.  "No man can see America in two weeks."  The article presumed that the Maharajah would have time only to see one landmark in each of the cities he would be visited.  The newspaper chose the Bush Terminal Sales Building as New York City's point of interest.

The offices of architects Robert P. Rodgers and Alfred E. Poor were located in the building in 1930.  That year, on February 18, Rodgers & Poor's design for the Wright Memorial at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, was selected among 35 submitted designs.

In March 1931, the Childs Restaurant chain leased the two-story space formerly occupied by the Hamilton Bank.  (The bank had recently merged with Chase National Bank.)  The New York Times reported that the space "will be extensively remodeled in old London style by the architects, Pruitt & Brown."

By the outbreak of World War II, the building that Bush Magazine of Factory and Shipping Economy had called "A Modern Temple of Trade" in 1917 was no longer a wholesale shopper's mecca.  Now filled with offices, on March 28, 1941, The New York Times reported that six new tenants had signed leases the previous day.  They included the Commercial Capital Corporation; the accounting firm of Edwin J. Fluss Company; the ABC-Mutual Cleaning Contractors; Leo J. Margolin, an attorney; Stuart Robson, a novelty company; and William Rutter, the New York representative of the Angell Manufacturing Company of Dayton, Ohio.

The headquarters of the Red Cross War Fund of Greater New York opened here in January 1943.  Its sole purpose was to raise money for the Red Cross's work in war-ravaged Europe and on the battlefronts.  By 1946, the name was tweaked to the Red Cross Fund Headquarters.  Among its fund-raising methods was an annual benefit Broadway variety show, and in March 1946 two days of tennis matches at the Seventh Regiment Armory were held.  On March 6, The New York Times announced, "Donald Budge, the king of the courts, heads a cast of professional tennis players who will appear in New York for the benefit of the American Red Cross."

The 1960s saw a wide variety of tenants.  Among them were the Doric Training Center, which promised, "If you're interested in a glamorous, high fashion, high profit cosmetics business of your own, this is it!"; the American School, which advertised, "Do you have leadership potential? Supervisory training at home in your spare time;" and attorney Hyman Abrams, who specialized in immigration law.  He was convicted in August 1969 for "obstructing justice and causing false statements to be made to the Immigration and Naturalization Service," as reported by the New York Amsterdam News.

The building was acquired by Vanke US in 2015 and the lobby was remodeled by Fogarty Finger Architects.  The sleek, white space was inspired "by art gallery spaces," according to Vanke's website.  

image via vanke.us.com

The upper floors were gutted into industrial loft-style spaces.  In May 29, 2026, Bisnow reported that the Bush Terminal Sales Building "is now in the hands of a bank."

many thanks to reader Andrew Porter for suggesting this post

The 1926 Barclay Hotel - 111 East 48th Street

 

photograph by Ajay Suresh

The renovation of Grand Central Depot to Grand Central Terminal sparked a burst of development in the neighborhood, known as Terminal City.  A second wave that erupted in the 1920s included a 14-story "stores and apartment hotel," as described in the plans.  Fred Bielsaski was president of the Barclay Park Corporation.  In 1925, the syndicate hired the architectural firm of Cross & Cross to design the $3 million project at the northwest corner of 48th Street and Lexington Avenue.  (Millionaire architect Eliot Cross not only designed the building, but he sat on the hotel's board of directors with highly-visible moguls like W. Seward Webb Jr., John R. Todd and James M. Todd, and Weld M. Stevens.)

The U-shaped, Renaissance Revival-style structure was completed the following year.  Its midsection atop a three-story stone base was clad in brown brick.  The single-story, stone-faced top section sat upon a molded cornice and was decorated with massive full-relief rosettes and Renaissance-inspired panels.

photograph by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

On April 10, 1926, The New York Times reported, "The new Barclay Hotel at 111 East Forty-eighth Street will be formally opened at a dinner and dance on Oct. 21."  But on the day of that article, the first residents were already moving in.  The Barclay Hotel was a residential hotel--meaning that residents had long-term leases, like apartment dwellers, but enjoyed the amenities of transient hotels, like maid service.

New York Evening Post, September 25, 1926 (copyright expired)

Among the initial residents were Morgan Belmont and his wife, the former Margaret Frances Andrews.  Belmont was born in 1892, the son of millionaire August Belmont Jr. and Bessie Hamilton Morgan.  The couple's daughter, Margaret Andrews Morgan Belmont, was born in 1917.  The family's country home was in Westbury, Long Island.

Morgan Belmont in his World War I Army uniform.  War Records of the Knickerbocker Club 1914-1918 (1922 - copyright expired)

Alice Wheelock and Erwin Hoy Watts moved in following their wedding on October 1, 1927.  Alice was the granddaughter of Dr. and Mrs. Morgan Dix on her maternal side and Dr. and Mrs. George G. Wheelock on her father's.  Born in 1903, the young groom was the son of cotton goods magnate Ridley Watts and was a member of the Chemical National Bank.

Radio stations were often installed in upscale hotels and on October 11, 1927, The New York Times reported, "An hour of luncheon music will be broadcast at 1 o'clock daily except Sunday over WABC direct from the Barclay Hotel."

Andrew H. Nutting, another initial resident, was the son of Andrew Jackson Nutting, founder of A. J. Nutting & Co.  The senior Nutting died on September 4, 1924 and his estate was divided equally among Andrew and his two sisters.  Like the Morgan Belmonts, residents of the Barclay Hotel spent their summers in their country homes or fashionable resorts.  On March 13, 1928, The New York Times reported that Andrew H. Nutting had purchased "the Hanna property at Boar's Head, Rye Beach, N. H., and will erect a residence there this Spring."

A postcard depicted the Nutting country home.

Resident Robert J. Upson graduated from Princeton University in 1921.  He joined the National Bank of Commerce in 1923 and became its assistant trust officer in 1927.  The unmarried 29-year-old went to Flushing, New York on March 29, 1928 to visit Charles G. Muller.  The next night at around 11:00, he left in a taxicab heading for the train station to return to Manhattan.

The following morning, his body was found on the elevated railroad crossing about 200 yards from the Flushing station.  Mysteriously, The New York Times reported, "he had been run over by a train at about 11:30 o'clock Thursday evening."

The Barclay Hotel reserved a number of suites for well-heeled transient guests.  Arthur Morgan Smith was described by The New York Times as a "Harvard graduate and wealthy Clevelander."  On April 10, 1929, he attended a bridge party held by socialite Florence Schuette in the Hotel Marguery.   Smith was smitten by another guest, Mrs. Robert L. Brown, who was staying in the Plaza Hotel.  The party broke up at just before 2:30 a.m.  A guest offered Smith a ride, "but he refused, saying it was just a short distance to his hotel, and he would walk," reported The New York Times.  In fact, Smith was intent on escorting Mrs. Brown to her hotel.

Equally intent on accompanying Mrs. Brown was another guest, Samuel E. Bell, a "well-to-do oil producer."  Bell won the argument, but not before shoving Smith to the pavement as he climbed into a taxi with Mrs. Brown.  Smith was arrested for intoxication a few minutes later on Park Avenue.  Later it became clear that he was not drunk--he had suffered a fractured skull in the fall to the curb.  He died the following afternoon.

Two views of the Art Deco cafe.  photographs by Samuel H. Gottscho, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

The ballroom and meeting rooms could be rented by groups or, in some cases, individuals.  Such was the case in February 1937 when Amelia Earhart held a press conference to announce her intentions to fly a Lockheed Electra airplane around the world.  Fred Noonan, a Pan American Airways navigator, she said, would accompany her as navigator.

Ironically, following Earhart's disappearance in July her husband, George P. Putnam, moved into a suite in the Barclay Hotel where he followed the newspaper accounts of the search for his wife.  The New York Times said, "One, bearing the headline 'Sold Down the River,' essentially blamed Putnam for his wife's death, asserting that her failure to find Howland Island was because of inadequate equipment."  According to his assistant, Harold McCracken, "Then he took all the clippings and let them slip out of his hands into a wastepaper basket."

In October 1938, the Cornell Club of New York leased the 30,000-square-foot third floor.  It was accessed by a private entrance at 107 East 48th Street.  On October 17, The New York Times reported that Cross & Cross would remodel the floor "to provide a main dining room and three private rooms, grill, library and lounges, card and billiard rooms and a ladies' department."  There were, as well, 39 bedrooms and suites for resident members.

By midcentury, the Barclay Hotel was increasingly hosting transient guests.  The wealthy visitors, in some instances, became attractive targets for robbers.  On October 11, 1951, The New York Times reported that $10,400 worth of jewelry had "disappeared" from a suite.  Henry Rand, vice president of the International Shoe Company in St. Louis, and his wife and daughter had stepped out.  When they returned around midnight, they discovered the theft. 

Six months later, on April 29, 1952, the newspaper reported, "Jewelry valued at $2,700 was stolen last night from Sheik Asad Al Facih, Saudi-Arabian Ambassador to the United States."  Included in the heist were "an Indian necklace set with rubies and pearls and valued at $2,000, and a man's gold-and-ruby ring valued at $650 and a man's wedding ring valued at $50," said that article.  The total value would translate to about $32,700 today.

At the time of the article, the management offered a unique service to its transient guests.  On November 9, 1955, The New York Times noted, "The Barclay Hotel cares for transient's canaries; boards them in the lobby cage with its own yellow birds and finches."  That cage had become an attraction.  Decades later, architectural critic David W. Dunlap would recall his visit to New York City with his mother at the age of nine in 1962.  They stayed at the Barclay Hotel and Dunlap wrote in his diary, "In the middle of the lobby there is a cage of 9 song birds."

The Barclay Hotel continued to be the permanent home to well-heeled residents over the subsequent decades, among them actress Amy Busby who debuted on the stage in 1889; Municipal Court Justice George L. Genung; and author Norman Beasley.

The Cornell Club moved out in the mid-1960s and the third floor space was next occupied by the Manhattan Club, who moved from its clubhouse, the former Jerome Mansion, on Madison Avenue in November 1966.  

In July 1978, InterContinental Hotels purchased the Barclay Hotel.  The following year, $37 million in financing was acquired "in connection with the purchase and planned renovation," reported The New York Times.  Saying the renovations would be completed in 1981, the article noted, "the company planned to make the Barclay the flagship of its worldwide chain of 80 hotels."

The hotel was renovated again, re-opening in April 2016.  In reporting on the renovations in The New York Times on February 28, David W. Dunlap remembered the cage of canaries and finches, saying, "the song birds are long gone."  The InterContinental designers, however, gave a nod to the beloved fixture.  The new revolving door mimicked the cage with swirling birds.

photo by Pablo Enriquez for The New York Times, April 28, 2016

Two new ballrooms on the second floor necessitated the removal of the lobby's dome.  The exterior of the hotel, "as confident and debonair as Gene Kelly on a dance floor," as described by journalist Christopher Gray, was not touched.

photograph by Jim Henderson

many thanks to reader Kevin Cross for suggesting this post.

The 1891 Hotel Renaissance (Columbia Club) - 4 West 43rd Street

 

photo by Anthony Bellov

Even as he and Bruce Price were designing part of David H. King Jr.'s ambitious "King's Model Houses" in Harlem, Clarence S. Luce was working on another project for the developer--an upscale residential hotel in Midtown.  As the Renaissance Hotel neared completion on August 16, 1891, The New York Times called it, "an ornament to the city" and described it as, "magnificent."

The article began saying, "One of the handsomest and most interesting buildings in the city is the new Hotel Renaissance, in West Forty-third Street, near Fifth Avenue."  The journalist described the style as "a type of the Renaissance with pronounced American interpretations."  Anticipating skyscraper technology, Luce employed an iron skeleton "and hollow terra-cotta brick, strong and light."  The article said the foundations were "like the grave of a tavern keeper's wife, 'both wide and deep.'"  

Luce faced the two-story rusticated base with marble, "calculated to reflect the general renaissance style."  It was dominated by the Caen marble entrance, designed as a double-height porch with paired columns.  

photo by Anthony Bellov

The four-story midsection was faced in tan brick and trimmed in limestone.  The windows of the fifth floor imitated Renaissance balconies, with stone balustrades and engaged columns that upheld arched, shell-filled pediments.  Extravagantly decorated terra cotta panels separated the top floor openings, and a stone balustrade sat upon the overhanging cornice.

Guests entered into a "round arched vestibule" wainscoted in "marble in beautiful tints," as described by The New York Times, and the walls were frescoed.  On either side were the reception room and a cafe, "both of them large and handsomely-decorated saloons [i.e., rooms]."  The vestibule led to the "main hall" and the courtyard, around which the principal ground floor rooms were arranged.  The courtyard featured a fountain surrounded with "growing flowers and tropical plants."  The result, said the writer, was "an effect similar to the interiors of the most celebrated structures of this class in Florence, Paris, and Madrid."  Interior balconies at the second floor were available to all residents from which to enjoy the courtyard's afternoon and evening music.

Residential hotels differed from apartment buildings in that the suites did not have kitchens.  Guests, who signed months- or years-long leases, ate in a large communal dining room, similar to an elegant restaurant.  All the amenities of a transient hotel (like maid service, for instances) were provided by the management.

Also on the ground floor were four private dining rooms, two each on either side of the courtyard.  "From the Florentine galleries that separate the private dining rooms from the court yard, the main dining room in the back of the building is reached," said the article.  The reporter deemed it, "one of the handsomest dining halls in the country."  Engulfing the entire 125-foot width of the building, it was visually broken up by "mural arches" that gave the impression of three rooms "thrown into one."  The Times said, "The ornamentation of this room is in the highest form of the frescoer's art."  (The article mentioned that King had hired "one of the best chefs of Paris.")

The walls of the first floor rooms were decorated with hand-decorated Louis XV-style panels.  The private dining room walls, however, were covered in silk and the furnishings were "in the style of the empire."  The motif was carried into the two oval elevators, which were "finished in gold and Vernis Martin, with painted panels and Louis XV decorations."

The New York Times, October 6, 1891 (copyright expired)

Each of the apartments looked onto the courtyard.  The New York Times explained, "Each suite is entered from the hall through a private vestibule, thus insuring perfect privacy for all."

The Hotel Renaissance opened on October 1, 1891.  It was patronized by some of Manhattan's wealthiest citizens, either as their permanent city residence or during the winter season.  Among them were James and Sarah Roosevelt and their son, Franklin.  In her Franklin and Eleanor, An Extraordinary Marriage, Hazel Rowley writes:

Franklin and his parents (accompanied by servants and tutors) spent time in New York City, where they had an apartment at the Renaissance Hotel, on West Forty-third Street.

C. Grayson Martin purchased the Hotel Renaissance following David H. King Jr.'s death in April 1916.  He quickly swapped it with George N. and Julius Black for the X. Y. Ranch in Colorado.  On January 17, 1917, The New York Sun said the 5,000-acre X. Y. Ranch was "one of the best known ranches in the West."  The value of the Hotel Renaissance was estimated at $1 million, or about $24.5 million in 2026.

The Black brothers closed the Hotel Renaissance and leased the property to the Columbia University Club, which had been located at Gramercy Park for more than a decade.  The club hired architects Henry F. Hornbostel, Kenneth MacKenzie Murchison, and Alger C. Gildersleeve to convert the hotel to a clubhouse.  

A year and "more than $100,000" later, almost to the day, The New York Times reported on January 27, 1918 that the renovations were completed and the opening would be celebrated by a dinner on February 7.  It said the architects had "transformed it into one of the best-equipped clubs in the Forty-second Street club centre."  

The New York Herald explained that the upper floors now contained 104 rooms "for members who wish to live at the club."  There were also exercising rooms, baths, and four squash courts on the roof.  The "immense dining room," said the article, which was designed by Hornbostel, "is in simple white stone, with great light brackets in silver and a frieze that includes some paintings of scenes of the Columbia campus as it is to-day and was in the days of Hamilton."  (The frieze was executed by muralist James M. Hewlett.)  Also on the ground floor were "lunch rooms and private dining rooms," according to the New York Herald.  A large library on the second floor could also be used for meetings.

photo by Anthony Bellov

College life throughout America was disrupted by the country's entry into World War I.  On April 5, 1918, a service flag was raised above the clubhouse and on November 10 that year, the university's president, Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler and Major Herbert C. Earnshaw, Commandant of the Students' Army Training Camp, spoke here.  "The war activities of the college will be the subject," announced The New York Times.

Shortly after the end of the war another issue--Prohibition--would rock the organization.  On the "first bone-dry prohibition day," as worded by The New York Times, an announcement informed members "that afternoon tea will now be a feature of the club's gayeties."  The article then reported on a serious side effect of the law's enactment.  "Prohibition...has also made it necessary to practically double the annual dues."

Prohibition crippled the finances of hotels, clubs and restaurants.  The condition was no doubt a major factor in the club's decision to alter the ground floor to provide additional income.  On October 1, 1922, the New York Herald reported, "The Columbia University Club will install stores in the club property...All but 25 of the 125 feet of frontage of their building will be changed on the grade floor into business use."  The practical renovation unfortunately greatly decimated Luce's Italian palazzo design.

Over the years, the Columbia University Club was home to distinguished alumni.  Among them were prominent architect Henry Rutgers Marshall; poet, novelist and editor Henry Morton Robinson; and retired Brigadier General Rodney Hamilton Smith.

One of the most colorful residents was William Cullen Bryant Kemp, described on the Columbia campus as the "perpetual student."  As a young man, Kemp was attending Columbia when his uncle left him $2,500 a year "as long as he remained at school."  (The income would equal about $50,000 a year today.)  He took the wording seriously and earned his first degree, a Bachelor of Arts, in 1868.  He continued to matriculate at Columbia, earning a list of degrees that included A.M.,  M.D.,  LL.M., LL.B, Ph.D., C.E., E.E., Mechanical Engineering, Pharmaceutical Engineering, and a B.S.  Kemp was living here on February 3, 1929 when he died at the age of 79.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

In 1922, although Prohibition was still in effect, the Columbia University Club hired Irish-born Michael J. Dunne as its head bartender (presumably dispensing sodas, iced tea and such).  Although his only education was from an Irish primary school, he was a voracious reader.  The New York Times remarked that he, "could converse on a variety of topics with the many men of distinction who patronized his bar."

The members called Dunne "Serjeant," the title bestowed only on the highest class of barristers in England.  In 1960, author Henry Morton Robinson presided over a "large gathering in the club," as described by The New York Times, during which Dunne received the degree of D.D.L.," Doctor of Delectable Libations, and a scroll.

The following year, Dunn visited his birthplace, Engfield, County Meath, Ireland.  On his trip he became ill.  He made it back home before dying at the age of 71 on August 15, 1961.  He had held his position at the club for 39 years.

On February 13, 1973, the club's board of governors voted unanimously to sell the 43rd Street building.  John Reeves, the group's president, explained that the maintenance "had become too expensive for the needs of the 1,500 members."  The club moved into the Princeton Club at 15 West 43rd Street.

The former Columbia University Club building sat vacant for slightly more than two years before a buyer was found.  On May 7, 1975, The New York Times reported, "The Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church has purchased the former Columbia University Club building at 4 West 43d Street for use as its American headquarters."  The church had paid $1.2 million (about $7 million today) for the property.  A spokesperson said, "the upper floors would be used to house about 50 staff members and their families.

photo by Anthony Bellov

The Holy Spirit Association-Unification of World Christianity continues to use the building for its headquarters.  It, additionally, offers rental offices to non-profit organizations, and large spaces for events.

many thanks to historian Anthony Bellov for suggesting this post

The Lost Thomas P. Rossiter Mansion - 11 West 38th Street

 

To the left, a sliver of 13 West 38th Street, remodeled simultaneously by Hunt for Eleazar Parmly, can be glimpsed.  from the collection of the Library of Congress.

Born in New Haven, Connecticut in 1818, Thomas Prichard Rossiter was well established as a painter of portrait and historical scenes by 1851.  In 1838, at the age of 20, he exhibited two paintings at the National Academy of Design and the following year moved to New York City.  He was elected to the National Academy in 1849.

In 1851 he married Anna Ehrick Parmly, the daughter of wealthy dentist and poet, Eleazer Parmly.  The newlyweds sailed to Europe, settling in Paris in 1853.  Rossiter won a gold medal at the Universal Exposition in 1855 for his Venice in the Fifteenth Century.  

In the meantime, in September 1854 a son, Ehrick Kensett, was born.  The following year a daughter, Charlotte C., arrived, and Anna Rosalie was born in March 1856.  Shortly after Anna's birth, Anna Parmly Rossiter died at the age of 26.

Thomas brought his children back to New York City.  At the time, 30-year-old architect Richard Morris Hunt had relocated to New York from Washington where he had worked on the renovation and expansion of the U.S. Capitol building.  He began work on the design of the Tenth Street Studios Building, the first structure in America designed specifically for living-and-studio spaces for artists.  It was this work, almost assuredly, that brought Rossiter and Hunt together.

Peter Paul Duggan created this black crayon drawing of Thomas P. Rossiter.  from the collection of The Frick

Rossiter and his father-in-law gave Hunt his first domestic commission in New York--two mansions at 11 and 13 West 38th Street.  The neighborhood, just feet from Fifth Avenue, was filling with sumptuous mansions as Manhattan's millionaires inched up the avenue.

Completed in 1857, the Rossiter house at 11 West 38th Street was faced in red brick and trimmed in stone.  The artist's deep interest in history may have influenced Hunt's neo-classical design.  He striated the first floor, above a short stoop, by alternating red brick with stone bands.  The arched entrance sat within a portico supported by banded and fluted columns, and neo-Classical swags decorated the entablature.  The composition was copied at the easternmost window to preserve balance.  

Three grouped floor-to-ceiling windows at the top floor were fronted by a stone balcony and flanked by niches, intended for statues.  Thrown open, the windows flooded Rossiter's studio with natural light.

Richard Morris Hunt's watercolor rendering.  from the collection of the Library of Congress.

Interestingly, Dr. Eleazer Parmly, unlike Rossiter, refused to pay Hunt for the supervisory portion of the project.  Hunt finally sued the dentist and won.  Later, in 1896, Engineering Magazine would credit Hunt's lawsuit for establishing "a uniform system of charges by percentage."

In his new mansion and studio, Rossiter began work on large canvases, including George Washington and Family, Washington and Lafayette at Mount Vernon, and Washington and His First Cabinet.  As part of his research for those works, in June 1858 he traveled to Mount Vernon.

Rossiter completed Washington and Lafayette at Mount Vernon 1784 in his 38th Street studio in 1859.  from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art

The West 38th Street mansion was filled with antiques.  The Springfield Weekly Republican would later recount,

There were large objects of furniture, such as an oak altar-piece, an oaken buffet of the 14th century, and a sarcophagus of the same age, all quaintly carved with elfish heads, figures of animals, flowers and clusters of fruit.  Also a 13th century armoire, or sideboard, ornamented with Byzantine carving.

In 1860, Thomas Rossiter married Mary Sterling, known as Mollie.  The family moved to Cold Spring, New York and Rossiter's brother-in-law, Ehrick Parmly, moved his family into 11 West 38th Street. 

Born in 1830, Ehrick Parmly, like his father and brother, was a dentist.  All three shared an office at 3 Bond Street.  (David R. Parmly lived in New Jersey.)  Ehrick's wife was Lucie Dubois and the couple had a son, George Dubois, when they moved into 11 West 38th Street.  Another son, John Ehrick, was born in 1861 and a third, Dalton, in 1872.

By the time of Dalton's birth, the Parmly family had been gone from the house for about eight years.  It was now home to Israel David Salomon (who went by his middle name) and his wife, the former Henrietta Luna Hendricks.  Salomon was born in 1820 and Henrietta in 1827.  The couple was married in 1864 and moved into 11 West 38th Street.  Two sons would be born in the house, Salomon in 1865 and Sidney Hendricks two years later.

Also living with the family was David's brother, Benjamin Franklin Salomon, who was 35 years old in 1864.  A bachelor, he died on April 12, 1865.  His funeral was held in the drawing room on the 14th.

In 1870, Douw Ditmars Williamson, Jr. and his wife, the former Mary Frances Dodd, moved into the house.  Born in New York City on November 15, 1830, Williamson graduated from Peekskill Academy in 1844.  Although educated in engineering, he entered business as a clerk.  But his mundane business life turned to the stuff of pulp novels starting in 1849 when he traveled to South America.  The 1896 Genealogical Records of the Williamson Family in America recorded:

In 1851 [he] went to Panama and Ecuador; was ten days crossing the Isthmus on a mule; was with Garibaldi in Havana when Crittenden and his filibusters were shot, and was followed by soldiers, day and night, on his return home.

Back in New York, Williamson married Mary Dodd on November 1, 1853.  The couple would adopt George Norman Williamson, the infant son of Douw's brother, Nicholas.  Then, in 1863, they adopted Cornelia Bodwell, the infant daughter of Mary's sister, Abby Lyman Dodd Bodwell.

In the meantime, Williamson and his brother, Nicholas, founded the Novelty Rubber Co.  Douw Williamson was, as well, an inventor and in 1870 designed an improved traction engine and a steam plow.

Douw Ditmars Williamson, Jr., from the collection of the Century Association.

Despite his swashbuckling past, the Century Association described Douw D. Williamson as "of a retiring, quiet disposition."  Ever expanding his resume, in 1875, he established a chemical works in Long Island City.

The new St. Patrick's Cathedral opened on May 25, 1879.  Its architect, James Renwick, Jr., immediately began designing the archbishop's residence and rectory at the southwest corner of Madison Avenue and 51st Street.  In the meantime, the archdiocese leased the former Williamson mansion.  Four years later, on April 25, 1882, the New York Herald reported, "The new residence of Cardinal McCloskey, which stands back to back with the Cathedral...is very nearly ready to be occupied."  

Cardinal John McCloskey.  from the collection of the New York Public Library

Born in March 1810, Cardinal John McCloskey was appointed the second archbishop of New York by Pope Pius IX on May 6, 1864.  At the time of the New York Herald's article, McCloskey was in ill health.  It explained, "it is said that the Cardinal will not move until his health is better.  His home is at present at 11 West Thirty-eighth street, from which the furniture is now being removed."

Next to occupy the mansion was lace importer Richard Muser and his wife, Cecelia.  On January 4, 1885, The New York Times reported that a defective flue in the basement had started a fire in the house.  It resulted in $500 worth of damages, or about $16,800 in 2026.  On August 13, 1893, The New York Times reported that three days earlier Richard Muser's body had been discovered "at the lodge gate of his Summer home at Suffern, N.Y., with two bullet holes in his head."  The newspaper said there were "divided opinions as to the cause of his death."

The Musers had left West 38th Street several years earlier.  By 1889, No. 11 was home to John O. Donner, his wife, the former Mary Elizabeth Van Arsdale, and their teenaged daughter.  The New York Times described Donner as a "prominent and wealthy man, connected with Havemeyer & Elder in the sugar business."  The family's country estate was in Ramsey, New Jersey.

Mary Donner was experiencing health issues at the time, and on July 17, 1889 she sailed to Europe for treatment.  Accompanying her was her daughter; Mary's physician, Dr. Ruppaner; a nurse; a governess; and the daughter of Marshall T. Davison (apparently as a companion of the Donners' daughter).  The doctor left the party in Vienna and they traveled on to San Remo, Italy.

In February 1890, John O. Donner received a cable informing him that Mary was "in a critical condition," as reported by The New York Times.  He sailed on the steamer Zoller on February 26.  On March 1, The New York Times reported that a cablegram from San Remo announced the death of Mary Elizabeth Van Arsdale Donner.  The article said, "He will not hear of her death, therefore, until he arrives in Europe."

The West 38th Street residence next became home to Elbert Ellery Anderson and his family.  Born in 1833, he was the son of Henry James Anderson, a renowned professor of mathematics and astronomy, the grandson of librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte (who brought Italian opera to America), and a descendant of Founding Father William Ellery, from whom Elbert got his middle name.  As a teen, Elbert accompanied his father on a Dead Sea expedition.  He famously carved his name "E. E. Anderson" onto the wall of the Temple of Abu Simbel, which is visible today.

Elbert Ellery Anderson (original source unknown)

Anderson served in the Civil War, after which he began his law practice.  In 1887, President Grover Cleveland tasked him to investigate the Union Pacific and Central Pacific Railways.  He and his wife, the former Augusta Chauncey, had two children, Henry James and Peter Chauncey.

Peter Chauncey married May Ogden and brought his bride to live in the West 38th Street mansion.  Their daughter, May Ellery, was born in 1891.  The little girl died at the age of 10 on November 9, 1901 and her funeral was held in the house two days later.

On February 24, 1903, The Chicago Tribune reported that Elbert E. Anderson "went to a matinée with his eldest son on Monday afternoon and spent the evening with his family.  About 5:30 this morning Mrs. Anderson heard him call for assistance.  He was almost unconscious when she reached his bedside, and he died in a few minutes."

Anderson's funeral was too large to hold in the house.  It was held in the Church of the Transfiguration on February 27.  Within the church were judges, politicians, and military figures.  The New-York Tribune reported that his estate "would probably be found to be nearly $1,000,000."  (That figure would translate to about $36.8 million today.) 

Peter Chauncey Anderson and his family remained in the house until 1912, when it and the neighborhood mansions were demolished to make way for the Lord & Taylor department store building, completed in 1914.

photograph by Jim Henderson