The Oswald Garrison Villard House - 179 East 71st Street

 

In April 1909 the two three-story, wooden houses of Mrs. Gertrude B. Miller and Richard M. Hoe at 177 and 179 East 71st Street respectively were sold.  The real estate firm of Pease & Elliman handled both transactions.   A principal in that firm, Douglas Elliman, and his wife Theodora purchased 177, while developer David Goodrich acquired the other.  The new owners worked closely together on the plans for the properties.

They commissioned architect S. Edson Gage to design two mirror image, upscale homes on the site.  Completed in 1910, the five-story residences were entered just above street level.  Gage designed them in the neo-Federal style, cladding them in Flemish bond brick and adding period appropriate elements like narrow entrance door sidelights, and splayed lintels and keystones.  Three sets of French windows at the second floor opened onto a full-width balcony with Federal style iron railings.  The fifth floor was set back and hidden behind a stone railing.

A street sweeper works on a treeless East 71st Street in 1941.  image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

David Goodrich sold 179 East 71st Street in 1911 to Oswald Garrison Villard and his wife, the former Julia B. Sanford.  The couple was married in 1903 and had three children, Henry Hilgard, Oswald Jr., and Dorothy.

Born in 1872 to journalist Henry Villard and Fanny Garrison, Oswald was an 1893 graduate of Harvard University.  He followed in his father's professional footsteps and when he and Julia moved into 179 East 71st Street he was president and editor of the New York Evening Post.  

He also closely followed his mother's example.  Fannie Garrison Oswald was a pacifist and civil rights activist.  She and Oswald help found the NAACP in 1909.  Villard served as the organization's disbursing treasurer for years.  When Woodrow Wilson initiated segregation within the Federal offices in Washington, Garrison fired off a letter of protest to the President in July 1913.

Osward Garrison Villard, from the collection of the University of Massachusetts Amherst

A vocal pacifist like his mother, Garrison's stance came into question when the United States entered World War I in April 1917.  In May, the Midday Recruiting Committee wrote to him, asking him "to write and tell it whether the statement reported to have been made by him represents his views now."  His staunchly pacifist statement had been made on February 18, two months before the country entered the conflict.  The New York Herald reported, "Mr. Villard was quoted as having said that he would not resist an invasion of this country by a foreign foe and as having refused to reply to a hypothetical question concerning the invasion of American homes."

S. Edson Gage designed 177 and 179 (right) as mirror images of one another.

In 1918 Garrison became editor of The Nation.  He used the editorial page to espouse his views on civil liberties, civil rights, and foreign policy.  The same year he resigned his position as president of the Philharmonic Society.  A reporter from the New-York Tribune went to 179 East 71st Street on the evening of January 4 to confirm the rumor.  Villard told him that he felt "he had accomplished for the Philharmonic all that was in his power."  But there seemed to have been more to the break than that.  "Mr. Villard refused to comment on the report that his attitude toward the war had played a part in his resignation," said the article.

On October 31, 1925, the Record & Guide reported that Julia Villard had sold 179 East 71st Street to Mrs. Vanderbilt Webb.  Aileen Clinton Hoadley Osborn Webb was the wife of Vanderbilt Webb, son of Eliza Osgood Vanderbilt and Dr. William Seward Webb, and a grandson of William Henry Vanderbilt.  Married in 1921, the couple had four children, Derick V., W. Osborn, Richard, and Barbara.

Aileen was the daughter of William Church Osborn, director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Alice Clinton Hoadley Dodge.  Through her mother, she was the granddaughter of millionaire William Earl Dodge Jr.  

Vanderbilt Webb had attended the prestigious Groton School, graduated from Yale University in 1913, and studied at Oxford University in England before earning his law degree from Harvard University in 1916.  He was a member of the law firm Patterson, Belknap & Webb.  His broad interests were reflected in his being a trustee in the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the American University of Beirut, Lebanon; the Groton School; and Colonial Williamsburg, Inc.

Vanderbilt Webb (original source unknown)

With the onslaught of the Depression, Aileen turned her attention to the conditions of the impoverished.  She encouraged the making of handmade goods which women could sell to improve their families' situations.  In 1940 she founded America House to help craftsmen sell their products.

Aileen Osborn Webb, The Craftsman's World, 1959

In the meantime, Barbara Webb was introduced to society in the winter season of 1934.  She had attended the exclusive Chapin School and the Brownmoor School in New Mexico before attending Bennington College.  

In April 1939, a year after graduating, Barbara's engagement to Henry Benson Rockwell was announced.  It gave society columnists an opportunity to recount the couples' social pedigrees.  The New York Times noted the Barbara "is a great-granddaughter of General James Watson Webb, noted journalist, diplomat and soldier, and a great-great-granddaughter of Jacob L. Cram, a leading New York merchant before the Civil War.  Through her father also, Miss Webb is a descendant of Commodore Vanderbilt, and a great-granddaughter of the late William H. Vanderbilt."

The Webbs were still living at 179 East 71st Street in January 1944 when Derick V. Webb became engaged to Elizabeth B. Canfield.  A graduate of Yale, Webb had entered the Army in October 1942 and was on leave.  In reporting on the engagement on January 7, The Putnam County Republican mentioned that his brother, "Pfc. Richard H. Webb [was] recently wounded in Italy."

When Vanderbilt Webb died on June 17, 1956 at the age of 65, he and Aileen were living at 66 East 79th Street.  No. 179 East 71st Street was now home to New Yorker illustrator Saul Steinberg and his artist wife Hedda Sterne.

Born in Romania in 1914, Steinberg was educated at the University of Bucharest and the Polytechnic University of Milan where he studied architecture.  The Fascist anti-Semitic laws forced him to leave Italy in 1938, and he arrived in New York in 1942.  He and Hedda, also born in Romania, were married in 1944.

Although he was best known for his New Yorker drawings, and for others in publications like Fortune, Vogue, Harper's Bazaar, and Mademoiselle, his artworks were routinely exhibited in galleries and museums.  He would eventually have more than 80 one-man artist shows throughout the United States, South America and Europe.

Like her husband, Hedda Sterne had attended the University of Bucharest.  During World War II she and her family suffered under the Bucharest pogrom before she was finally able to sail for New York on October 17, 1941, where she quickly achieved success with her art.  She became friends with Peggy Guggenheim and became reconnected with painters she had known in Europe, including Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, and André Breton.  By 1943 her artworks were being shown regularly in New York galleries, particularly Peggy Guggenheim's.

Hedda Sterne and Poussin in the rear yard of 179 East 71st Street.  Artful Cats, 2019

According to the Mary Savig's Artful Cats: Discoveries from the Archives of American Art, while living at 179 East 71st Street Steinberg painted a portrait of Hedda's cat Poussin "inside the cabinet under their kitchen sink; the idea was to keep away mice."

The couple separated in 1960, although they remained married until Steinberg's death in 1999.  Hedda died on April 8, 2011 at the age of 100.  

No. 179 East 71st Street, having had only a handful of owners, has seen almost no outward change since its completion in 1910.

photographs by the author

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The Douglas Ludlow Elliman House - 177 East 71st Street

 

image via streeteasy.com

Born in Flushing, Queens on May 24, 1882, Douglas Ludlow Elliman's early education was at the exclusive Berkeley and Cutler private schools.  But the Financial Panic of 1893 seriously affected his stockbroker father's finances, and he forewent college to take a job as a runner on Wall Street.  Elliman was just 18 years old when he married Theodora Polhemus Trowbridge on October 20, 1900.  His bride was the daughter of well-known architect Samuel Breck Parkman Trowbridge.

Three years later he accepted a job with his older brother Lawrence in the real estate firm of Pease & Elliman.  It was a pivotal move.

On April 14, 1909, The New York Times reported the Pease & Elliman had sold the two wooden houses at 177 and 179 East 71st Street for Mrs. Gertrude B. Miller and Richard M. Hoe, respectively.  "On the entire plot the buyer will erect two five-story American basement houses, each 20 feet front," said the article.

By the time of the transaction, Elliman had done well for himself.  He and Theodora purchased 177 East 71st Street, and worked with Donald Goodrich, the buyer of 179, in developing the site.  They commissioned architect S. Edson Gage to design mirror-image, neo-Federal homes.

Completed in 1910, the American basement residences were faced in red brick and trimmed in stone.  Their first floor windows matched in proportion the Federal style doorways.  Above, a full-width iron-railed balcony fronted three sets of French windows.  The splayed window lintels carried on the Federal motif, and finely dentiled cornices crowned the homes.

Douglas and Theodora had three sons when they moved into 177 East 71st Street.  Douglas Trowbridge was 9 years old, George Trowbridge was 5, and Ludlow was only a few months old.  Also living with the family was Douglas's 20-year-old sister, Rosalie Southgate Elliman.

Douglas Ludlow Elliman (original source unknown)

The Ellimans were affluent enough to not only afford a fine town residence, but a country home.  Shore Acres was in Noroton, Connecticut.  The family was there on May 9, 1911, when, back in the city, a man notified a police officer that he "had seen men going into the basement of the house at 177 East Seventy-first street, which belongs to Douglas C. [sic] Elliman, a real estate man," reported The Sun.  The policeman called for back-up from the East 67th Street station house, and soon the house was surrounded.  One officer shimmied in through a window, then opened the door from inside.

The Sun said, "A search was made of all the twenty-five or thirty rooms of the house, but no one was found, nor had anything been taken.  In the cellar they found that a window had been forced."  While Lieutenant Gloster and Detective McGee hashed out the mystery, policeman Jerry McMahon idly "toyed with the open door of the heater."  He felt cloth, and in feeling closer, realized he was touching a human arm.

Officer McMahon stuck his head into the dark interior of the furnace and demanded, "Come out of that, now!"  His command was answered by a youthful voice that cried, "We can't.  He won't let us."

When McMahon ordered again, more sternly, "Come on now!" he was answered with, "Aw, shut up and come in an' get us!"  The savvy policeman set fire to a newspaper and threatened to light the furnace.  The Sun reported, '"We'll come out!" shrilled the voices, and a head was poked out the door."

The policemen pulled 13-year-old William Callahan out of the furnace.  The next sooty burglar to appear was 14-year-old George Volk.  The leader of the youthful gang, 16-year-old John Ranfino, was more difficult to extract.  "His head came all right," said The Sun, "but his shoulders were broad, and as the door is about a foot in circumference they stuck.  With persuasion and much twisting the shoulders were worried out, but a long tangle of legs followed."

Ranfino was locked up in the 67th Street station, charged with attempted burglary.  The younger boys were turned over to the Gerry Society.  There they explained that Ranfino had pushed them into the cellar window, and then they pulled him in.  They had been on the first floor of the house when they heard police sirens, and hid out in the furnace.  "The police can't yet see how they did it," reported The Sun, "and why they failed to suffocate."

The year of the near-burglary, Douglas Elliman struck out on his own professionally.  He formed Douglas L. Elliman & Co. and began to focus on apartment living.  Years later The New York Times would call him "a leader in arranging the gradual migration of the city's wealthiest residents from the private mansions that lined Fifth and Madison Avenues to the luxury apartment houses that sprang up on Park Avenue and points east, such as Sutton Place.

On June 3, 1913, The New York Press noted, "Mr. and Mrs. Douglas L. Elliman and Miss Rosalie Elliman have closed their house, No. 177 East Seventy-fist street, and have gone to Shore Acres, their summer home in Noroton, Conn."  It would be Rosalie's last season at Shore Acres.

An article in The Sun on March 6, 1914 reported that Douglas and Theodore "have announced the engagement of their sister, Miss Rosalie Southgate Elliman, to Radcliffe Romeyn...Miss Elliman was introduced to society a year ago."

Just two months later, the Ellimans leased 177 East 71st Street to William Chapman Potter.  Born in Chicago, Potter had graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1897 with a degree in engineering.  He would have a broadly varied career.  Aerial Age Weekly explained, "He started life as a mining engineer, and after many years in that work both in Mexico and this country, he became identified with the production of automobiles, vice-president of the Guaranty Trust Company and president of the Intercontinental Rubber Company."

William Chapman Potter, The Guaranty News, July, 1918 (copyright expired)

Potter had married Caroline Morton in 1902.  Three years after moving into the East 71st Street house, the couple suffered indescribable heartache.  On May 11, 1917, The Evening Post reported that their infant daughter had died.

With America involved in World War I, on June 7, 1918 President Woodrow Wilson nominated William Chapman Potter to be a member of the Aircraft Board.  Organized in 1917 and reporting to the Secretaries of War and the Navy, the board made recommendations regarding the development and procurement of military aircraft.

The Potters left 177 East 71st Street that year, and Theodora Elliman rented the house to newlyweds Merideth and Elizabeth Manning Sage Hare.  The couple had been married in Bermuda on March 2, 1916.

A younger Merideth Hare, Quarter-Century Record, Class of 1894 Yale College, 1922 (copyright expired)

An attorney, Merideth was 47 years old when the couple moved in.  A graduate of Yale and Columbia Universities, he had served in the U.S. Army during the Spanish American War.  Elizabeth was a member of The Society of Independent Artists.  Her family traced its American roots to David Sage, who arrived in Connecticut from Wales in 1652.

The Hares' lease was not renewed.  On February 7, 1920 the Record & Guide reported that the Ellimans had sold 177 East 71st Street, noting, "It will be occupied by the buyer at the expiration of the present lease."

That buyer was another Yale graduate, Dr. John Rogers, and his wife, the former Elizabeth Selden White.  Rogers earned his medical degree at the College of Physicians and Surgeons and was, according to Herringshaw's American Blue Book of Biography in 1926, a specialist "on diseases of thyroid gland."  When the couple moved into 177 East 71st Street, he was a consulting surgeon at several New York City hospitals.

The former Elliman house is to the left.  photograph by the author

The Rogers remained here until 1945, selling it in April that year.  In 1989 a "recreation room" penthouse was added.  Never converted to apartments, the eight-bedroom Elliman house was sold in 2014 for $14.8 million.  

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The Remodeled Frederick W. Rhinelander House - 12 West 28th Street

 

In 1866 Miller's Stranger's Guide to New York described the area around Madison Square, saying "The houses surrounding this park include some of the most elegant of this city."  Around seven years earlier a handsome, high-stooped residence had been erected at 12 West 28th Street, between Fifth Avenue and Broadway.

The owner advertised in September 1859:  "Wanted--A first rate waitress; must be neat looking and have the best of city references.  Scotch or Welsh preferred."  Waitresses were more polished than servants like chamber maids.  Among their duties was the serving of meals in the dining room and tea in the parlor.

By 1867 the house was home to the Frederick William Rhinelander family.  Born in 1828, Rhinelander was married to the former Frances Davenport Skinner.  The socially-prominent couple, who had eight children, maintained a villa in Newport, Rhode Island. 

Frederick Rhinelander's sister, Mary Elizabeth, had married Thomas Haines Newbold in 1846.   The Newbold family was as prominent as the Rhinelander family.  Both traced their ancestry in America to the 17th century.   The Newbolds' country estate, Fern Tor, sat on the banks of the Hudson River above Poughkeepsie.  

Thomas Newbold died on March 12, 1869.  Frederick Rhinelander and his family were still listed at 12 West 28th Street in 1870, but before long Mary Newbold and her children, Thomas, Frederick, Catherine and Edith, moved in.

By the 1880's affluent families were moving northward as commerce inched into the neighborhood.  In March 1890 Mary Newbold leased the house to the Actors' Fund, and then hired architect G. P. Graves make renovations totaling about $59,000 in today's money.  The plans called for altering walls, "internal alterations," and a new front.

The Actors' Fund of America had been founded in 1882 to "foster and benefit the physical, as well as advance the intellectual, welfare of the actors of America."  On the parlor floor of its new home on West 28th Street were the reception room and reading room, and in the rear two offices.    The New York Amusement Gazette reported, "The remainder of the building will be rented out as offices to different branches of the profession."  Offices on the second floor were leased to the Dramatic Exchange, and to the Horace Wall American Amusement Agency.  Years later, in 1913, The New York Clipper would recall, "These offices were handsomely fitted up.  The walls were papered in gold."  On the third floor was the Actors' Fund committee room, "and no one was admitted to it but the trustees," said the newspaper.

The former English basement level was home to Carl Wernicke's "bric-a-brac shop" by 1891.  The "art room" where paintings and statuary were displayed was behind the main shop.  On January 24 that year Mr. and Mrs. De Ford picked out a jardinière and asked that it be converted to a jewel case at a cost of $35 (more than $1,000 today).  

A few days later the returned, and said that rather than have it delivered they would take it themselves.  They paid for the piece and took along two statuettes for wedding presents, "if they were deemed suitable."  On February 16 they returned again, saying the statuettes would not do, and began browsing for something else.  De Ford wandered into the art room, while his wife waited.  

Suddenly, she told a clerk that she was going shopping at Macy's and left.  Five minutes later De Ford came out of the back.  The Sun later said, "De Ford wore a bulky, shaggy overcoat, closely buttoned, and Mr. Wernicke noticed that it bulged."  The bulge was the result of "jewels and silverware, valued at over $7,000" stuffed in his pockets.

As it turned out, Mr. De Ford was Robert Howe, "otherwise Ralph Hamberg, otherwise De Ford," and his wife was Nettie Hamburg, "otherwise Nettie Kirby, the reputed wife of Howe."  And Wernicke was only one of their victims.  When they were tracked down and arrested, the "plunder" found in their rooms was brought to court as evidence.  The Sun reported on September 29, 1891, "Jewels in almost every conceivable form for woman's wear flashed upon the prosecutor's table yesterday...A hamper full of antique silverware stood at one end of the table.  Near the table were three trunks filled with fine clothes."

In the meantime, the Actors' Fund assisted down-at-the-heels thespians, often paying their medical or funeral expenses.  On April 23, 1894 The Evening World reported, "Only a dozen people were present at the obsequies over the body of Adele Waters, the young actress who died at the Bellevue Hospital...The services were held at noon yesterday at the Actors' Fund rooms, 12 West Twenty-eighth street."

Around 1899 George Busse moved his shop into the former Wernicke space.  A publisher of art reproductions, he also used the shop to stage exhibitions of contemporary artists.

The Evening Post, October 27, 1900 (copyright expired)

On October 1, 1903 The Dowling-Sutton Music Publishing Company moved into an upper floor office.   In announcing the move, the firm noted, "Our latest Song Success are: 'In Those Happy Autumn Days,' 'You'll Always Be The Only Girl For Me,' 'My Mabel of Mulberry Bend,' 'The Sun Shines On No Sweeter Girl Than Mine, " Yo' Am De Best Soap Bubble Dat I Knows,' etc."

In December 1916 the Corn Exchange Bank signed a 21-year lease on the property.  The Evening Post reported, "A marble front and other changes made to meet the needs of the new tenant will be made from plans by S. Edson Gage.  

Gage's plans, filed in January 1917, would completely transform the old brownstone residence into a modern bank building at a cost of about $535,000 today.  The stoop and front were removed and a gleaming white marble façade installed.  A grand, three-story arch dominated the design.  Below the intermediate cornice below the fourth floor, delicately carved festoons draped above the keystone and trailed down the sides.  Two-story fluted pilasters separated the openings of the third and forth floors.

Architecture magazine, November 1917 (copyright expired)

The 28th Street Branch of the Corn Exchange remained in the building until 1925, when it became home to the Gramercy Finance Corp.  

The main floor banking room.  Architecture magazine, November 1917 (copyright expired)

Starting in 1928 and lasting well into the Depression years, the bank housed the Modern Investment and Loan Company.  In 1936 the structure was altered and it was most likely at this time that the arch, which so closely identified the building as a bank, was removed and replaced by square-headed openings.  

A recent renovation replaced the bottom two floors.  Happily, the neo-Classical swags of S. Edson Gage's 1917 design and his regal upper floors survive.

photographs by the author

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The Corn Exchange Bank Building - 204 West 4th Street

Founded in 1853, Corn Exchange Bank had gobbled up other banking institutions like the Astor Place Bank, the Home Bank and the Washington Trust Company by 1919 when it looked to Greenwich Village as the site of a new branch.   On March 19 that year The Sun reported that the bank had purchased "the property at 76 Grove street, and 7, 8, and 9 Sheridan Square" as the site of its 42nd branch.  The plot, it said, "faces the new subway station of the Seventh avenue subway, and the modern and attractive Greenwich Village Theatre."

The bank building would replace the three brick buildings to the right, behind the street car in this photo.  photo by Jessie Tarbox Beals, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

By the time of the newspaper's article The Corn Exchange bank had hired architect S. Edson Gage to design the structure.  He worked with an oddly-shaped plot, more than 91-feet long on Sheridan Square (later West 4th Street) and just 15-feet on Grove Street.

Gage's post-war take on neo-Georgian  gave a nod to the city's early architectural history.  Faced in variegated red and gray brick laid in Flemish bond, it was trimmed in marble.   The entrances were capped by bold arched pediments and the massive arched openings of the second floor wore scrolled keystones.  A marble frieze and cornice separated the third story, where especially handsome carved and paneled window lintels graced the windows.  Gage joined the pitched roofs of both sides, creating the illusion of a hip roof.

Originally the narrow Grove Street side was just wide enough to accommodate the side entrance.  photo by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Until the second half of the 20th century firms would pay their employees in cash.  Workers received a pay envelope each week.  It was a practice that allowed employers to coldly let a worker know he had been fired by inserting a pink slip into his pay.   It also required at least one officer worker to make a bank run every week to withdrawal the large amounts of cash--making him a target for thieves.

Such was the case just before noon on August 11, 1928 when the cashier of the Arthur R. Purdy Iron and Metal Work Company on Greenwich Street walked out of the Sheridan Square branch with the company's payroll.  The routine of A. E. Gleason had most likely been watched for weeks, and as he entered the hallway of the firm's building, he was attacked by two men, one armed with a pistol.  Although it was not an enormous payroll, the bandits nevertheless made off with the equivalent of $8,800 today.

In 1929 S. Edson Gage was called back to enlarge the bank by slightly doubling its width on Grove Street.  His nearly seamless addition was separated from the original building at the roof level by a tall chimney and wall.  Their purpose was most likely to disguise the additional full fourth floor of the new structure, slightly higher than the original.  Behind its two copper clad dormers were two "non-housekeeping apartments."  The term meant that they had no kitchens.

The nation was captivated by the sensational kidnapping of the 20-month-old son of aviator Charles Lindbergh in March 1933.  Before the ransom was paid, the F.B.I. recorded the serial numbers of the bills.  One of them would turn up in the Corn Exchange Bank's Sheridan Square branch and provide critical evidence.

Cecelia M. Barr was a cashier in the Loew's Sheridan movie theatre on Seventh Avenue at West 12th Street.  At 9:30 on the night of Sunday, November 26, 1933 Richard Hauptmann stepped up to her window and threw a folded $5 bill at her.  The next morning the assistant manager of the theater took the night's receipts to the bank.  

Teller William Cody--along with employees of grocery stores, insurance agencies, gas stations, airports and such--had been given a pamphlet warning to watch for the ransom bills, along with a listing of the serial numbers.  The sharp-eyed teller discovered that the $5  bill Barr had received from Hauptmann was one of those marked by the FBI. 

The collection of circumstances led Cecelia Barr to distinctly remember the man among the 1,500 patrons that night, and to describe him to Federal authorities.  She later recounted “He took the bill out of his watch pocket and threw it at me.  That naturally made me look up—the way he did it.”  Other factors made her take notice of Hauptmann.  He was late for the screening—she was even counting her receipts, not expecting anymore patrons—and although it was a cold night, he wore no overcoat.  The third reason, other than the tossing of the bill, was the way it was folded.  “The bill was folded in eight parts as if it had been taken from a watch pocket.  I had to unfold it myself,” she later testified.

The evidence and Barr's testimony partly let to Haupmann's conviction and execution.  She received a $1,000 reward in January 1938.

The second floor housed doctors' offices in 1943.  The Grove Street side has three entrances--the main doorway, a service door to the basement, and what was probably an employees' entrance.  from the collection of the Library of Congress

In 1954 the Corn Exchange Bank & Trust Company merged with Chemical Bank, taking the latter's name.  Another name change would come about in 1995 when Chemical Bank merged with Chase Manhattan.

Long before that a teller was terrified by a bank robber on April 1, 1974.   The tall, thin man who wore a brown raincoat and ski mask told the teller he had a bomb.  He made off with $700 in cash; over $3,500 in today's money.

Crime was not restricted to the banking floor.  Upstairs were the offices of Ragwomen Distributors, founded to supply newsstands with feminist periodicals, like the  women's bi-weekly newspaper, the Majority Report.  In February 1975 criminals broke in, and stole typesetting equipment and financial records.  It was more than a case of burglary, however.  An employee, Nancy Borman, told reporters that "bright orange paint was sprayed on the walls."

The wall that separates the top floors of the original building and addition necessitated the lopping off of the ear of one of the marble lintels.

While the neighborhood around it has seen significant change since 1919, S. Edson Gage's dignified bank building has survived virtually untouched; a striking presence on the high-profile corner.

photographs by the author

The Lost Edward H. Raynolds House - 22 East 79th Street

The Madison Avenue elevation of the residence was somewhat surprisingly undecorated.  photograph by Wurts Bros, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

On June 17, 1911 The Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide reported that S. Edson Gage had filed plans for a five-story "brick and stone dwelling" at the southwest corner of 77th Street and Madison Avenue.  The anticipated construction costs were $30,000--or just under $820,000 today.  Simultaneously Gage had filed plans for two abutting residences; at No. 1020 Madison Avenue and No. 20 East 77th Street.

The developer, Charles Buek Construction Company, had purchased the last undeveloped plots on the block with the intention of erecting an apartment house.  But this was the Cook Block and all the deeds came with restrictive covenants that allowed only deluxe private homes to be built. 

As No. 22 neared completion in the spring of 1911, the Record & Guide said "the exterior is in the Spanish style."  In fact, only the elaborate stone enframement of the entrance was Spanish Baroque in style.  Elsewhere the spartan ornamentation--reserved for the third floor openings--was based on Renaissance and neo-Tudor designs.  

S. Edson Gage's rendering included an automobile.  Record & Guide, April 27, 1912 (copyright expired)

Two floors of planar limestone supported three floors of buff brick.  A hefty stone parapet sat above the cornice.  What the house lacked in width, it made up for in depth.  A single-story extension to the rear separated it from the Madison Avenue residence.  It may have been that extension that prompted the Record & Guide to write on April 27, 1912, "It is suited for a physician's use, but will be found also to be as well suited for the use of an ordinary family."

On January 12, 1913 an advertisement in the New-York Tribune described No. 22 as "very superior" and assured that its "substantial semi-fireproof construction insures against settling and cracking."  But there were no takers and ten months later Charles Buek leased the house to Richard Hudnut "for a term of years."  In reporting on the lease the Record & Guide noted "This is the last of three that were erected on a plot sold to Charles Buek, the well-known builder, about two years ago.  Of the remaining two houses, the one on 79th street was purchased by Dudley Olcott, Jr., and the other on Madison av was rented to Richard Trimble."

Hudnut, a wealthy perfumer, and his wife had been leasing the marble Abby Thompson mansion on Madison Avenue and 41st Street.  They were forced to find new accommodations when that house was purchased.   Two years after moving into No. 22 they faced the same problem.

On March 15, 1915 the New York Herald reported "Edward H. Raynolds of the paint manufacturing firm...has selected the one-time Cook estate block on Lenox Hill to be the site of his future home."  The article went on to explain that Raynolds had purchased No 22 East 79th Street from the Charles Buek Construction Company and had sold his former home on West 72nd Street the week before.

Edward Hidden Raynolds was the president and chairman of the board of the F. W. DeVoe & C. T. Raynolds Company, one of the largest paint and varnish manufacturers in the nation.  (It was later renamed the Devoe & Reynolds Company, Inc.)  He was first employed by the firm when he was 17-years old.

Raynolds's first wife, the former Mary Stella Fuller, had died around 1898.  The couple had two sons, Edward F., born on August 6, 1889, and Harold, born on October 29, 1894.

In 1900 Raynolds married Madeleine Taylor Taitt.  She reportedly treated her step-sons with a motherly kindness--at least until the birth of her first son, Arthur, in 1902.  Two more sons, Reginald and Lawrence, would soon follow.  According to court papers years later, "shortly after the birth of her first child, the attitude of Madeleine Taitt Raynolds changed.  With the happening of that event, she apparently lost interest in the welfare and happiness of her two step-children, and her affection for them waned."

By the time the family moved into No. 22 East 79th Street, Edward and Harold were young adults, 26 and 21 years old respectively, and had suffered their stepmother's disdain for most of their lives.  Their father, who had been a track star in college and was highly interested in sports, would promise the boys he would be present at their "athletic contests, concerts, military drills, graduations from schools and colleges," according to Superior Court papers later.  Each time, however, he failed to show up.  He would later explain "your stepmother objects and I want to keep peace in the family."

Madeleine's overt discrimination lent new meaning to "evil stepmother."  The court testimonies in 1942 recalled "objections to the children's birthday and Christmas parties, objections to assistance by their father in the preparation of school lessons, failure to give them proper care and attention during illness, and refusals to allow them to accompany their father, stepmother and half-brothers for automobile rides.  The three younger children were permitted a Christmas tree in their mother's room, but the two stepsons were neither permitted to participate in those festivities nor to have a tree of their own in the house."

As a matter of fact, Harold and Edward were not even allowed in the house during Christmastime.  They were sent to their aunt's house to celebrate.  Neither was ever permitted to have a birthday party.

As had been the case with his brother, Harold received a $100,000 inheritance from his mother's estate when he reached 21-years old (about half a million in today's dollars).  That was, coincidentally, the same year the family moved into No. 22 East 79th Street.  Madeleine resented their financial circumstances and reportedly "made frequent references to the wealth of both Harold and Edward, as contrasted with the position of her three sons."  She counter-attacked by charging them each $100 per month for room and board.

Both Edward and Harold served in World War I.  Harold was a First Lieutenant in the American Air Services in France and upon his discharge he came back to the 79th Street house.  But conditions were so unpleasant that he soon moved into the Cornell Club.

On December 3, 1922 Harold's engagement to Dorothy Smith, the daughter of Dean Albert W. Smith of Cornell University, was announced.  The wedding was held in Cornell's Sage Chapel on January 17, 1923.  Madeleine forbade her husband to attend the ceremony.  But this time--reportedly the first time--he defied her and went.

The wedding of Harold's step-brother, Arthur Hidden Raynolds, was less stressful.  His marriage to Mary Jeannette Archibald took place in the fashionable St. Thomas's Church on April 11,  1929.  The Columbia Alumni News announced "Dr. Reynolds and his bride sailed for a six week's trip in Europe.  On their return they will live at 22 East Seventy-ninth street."

Madeleine died on April 25, 1933.  Even in death she snubbed her stepsons, and her obituary in The New York Times said only "she leaves three sons, Arthur H., Reginald M. and Lawrence H. Raynolds."  But one more act went much further than ignoring that they had been a part of her life.

Edward Hidden Raynolds died on March 14, 1940 at the age of 83.  He had been sick with pneumonia only four days.  He was, according to court papers, "a man of considerable wealth."  

But when the will was probated, there was no mention of Edward nor Harold.  Both had been removed with the notation "I am mindful of the fact that my said sons, Edward F. and Harold, were beneficiaries under the wills of their mother and grandmother."  Edward and Harold went to court, contesting the will as having been executed under "undue influence."

There was little doubt that it was true.  On Madeleine's death bed, she made her husband promise he would never change "the elements" of his will.  He later told Edward (whom he fondly called Teddy), "Teddy, you know she led me a dog's life, but after all, she was my wife and I will always respect that promise."

In the end the boys lost the case.  Although the courts recognized that there was almost no doubt that Madeleine had forced her husband's hand, "there is no direct evidence of either undue influence or fraud."

Within two months after the attack on Pearl Harbor and America's entrance into World War II, the Raynolds heirs offered the use of No. 22 East 79th Street for war relief.   On February 9, 1942 The New York Sun reported "A demonstration workroom to show how Bundles for America will turn remnant, sample and scrap material into garments for the families of men in the armed services was opened today at 22 East 79th street."  The article explained that materials would be collected from manufacturers, department stores and jobbers.  "The first garments are expected to be in readiness by the week's end."

Bundles for America operated from the mansion throughout the war.  Along with making clothing for military families, it provided dolls at Christmas time.  Donated dolls received new outfits made by volunteers and if they were damaged or needed "freshening," as The New York Sun worded it on December 11, 1944, they went to "the toy hospital at 22 East 79th street, another enterprise of Bundles for America."  There, said the article "women volunteers act as doll's surgeons and dressmakers, wigmakers and cosmeticians, and repair, disinfect and repaint all sorts of donated toys.  After the dolls have had their faces lifted and the toys are in perfect order and brightly groomed for the Santa Claus pack, they go to the distribution center."

Following the war's end, there was no need for the charity group and the house was vacated.  In 1948 a demolition permit was issued for the property.  The Raynolds house, with its unimaginable history of domestic cruelty and child abuse, was replaced with an architectural aberration.

The Richard Trimble House - 1020 Madison Avenue

Developer Charles Buek acquired the last vacant lots on the famous "Cook Block" around 1910.  He envisioned a high-end apartment house on the site that wrapped the southwest corner of Madison Avenue and 79th Street.  But he quickly encountered a problem.  Restrictions written into the deeds of all the properties on the block by Henry Cook limited construction to only private homes.

Buek therefore turned to architect S. Edson Gage to design three mansions--two facing 79th Street and the other at No. 1020 Madison Avenue.  As it turned out, No. 1020 would be the last private home erected on Madison Avenue.  The street was already transforming to a thoroughfare of apartment buildings and shops.

On April 27, 1912, as the houses took shape, the Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide mentioned "No. 1020 Madison avenue contains every convenience and perfection of the larger forty-two-foot house, though on a somewhat reduced scale, and is a much more convenient and livable dwelling than the usual twenty-five-foot house."  At 32-feet wide, it was a true mansion.

The architect released this rendering of the three mansions.  No. 1020 is at the left.  Record & Guide, April 27, 1912 (copyright expired)

The article described the facade as "in the Spanish style, with light brick and limestone trimmings."  Two stories of limestone supported three more faced in yellow brick.  Gage's treatment of the entrance and opening directly above was highly unusual.  The entrance above four stone steps was deeply recessed.  Engaged columns on either side supported a dramatic broken pediment which embraced a carved shield.  The configuration upheld an identical, miniature version that enframed the second story window.

The complex framings of the third floor were a marriage of Spanish and Tudor inspiration.  A bracketed stone cornice introduced the two unadorned upper floors.

The Madison Avenue residence cost $40,000 to construct--just over $1 million today.  Inside, as detailed in the sale advertisement, were "five baths, unusually large rooms for entertaining, and open fires."  The mention of wood-burning fireplaces is interesting.  Throughout most of the 19th century rooms were warmed by charcoal fireplaces.  They were no longer needed with the advent of efficient furnaces; and homeowners now returned to the romance of wood fires, used almost exclusively (as today) for ambiance.

Buek sold No. 20 East 79th Street to Dudley Olcott, Jr., and leased No. 22 to Richard Hudnut and No. 1020 Madison to Richard Trimble, the secretary and treasurer of the United States Steel Corporation.

The arrangement most likely had to do with Trimble's purchase of another 32-foot wide plot on East 96th Street, just off Fifth Avenue.  On September 14, 1913 The Sun reported he intended to erect a "fine" home there.  So while they most likely intended to lease No. 1020 until that house was completed; as it turned out, the Trimble family would never leave.

Richard was, as well, the treasurer of the Minnesota Steel Company and a director in railroads, iron mines and other corporations.  He and his wife, the former Cora Randolph, had married on February 14, 1900.  He was 42-years old at the time and his bride was 29.  They would have three children, Mary, Margaret, and Richard, Jr.  

Cora brought an impressive pedigree to the marriage.  She was descended from the Fitz Randolph family which arrived in Massachusetts in the early 17th century.  Her high-level social connections were evidenced in her many benefit involvements.   The year the family moved into No. 1020, for instance, the New-York Tribune noted that she was a patroness of the fifth annual ball to benefit the Nassau Hospital, at Mineola, Long Island.  Other patronesses were Mrs. W. K. Vanderbilt, Jr., Mrs. Henry Payne Whitney, Mrs. James A. Burden, Mrs. August Belmont, Mrs. Ralph Pulitzer, and Mrs. C. Oliver Iselin, among others.

Cora's sister, Mary, was the wife of Francis Egerton Webb.   The same day that the Tribune remarked on Cora's charity event, The Sun announced the engagement of Laura Virginia Webb to Jorge Andre.  Society no doubt anticipated a lavish society wedding for the daughter of one of Manhattan's most prominent families and the cousin of a German baron.

Instead, four months later on January 13, 1914, the couple was quietly married.  The Evening World reported Miss Laura Virginia Webb...chose to have only a few guests at her wedding."  Her only attendants were little Margaret Trimble and her cousin, "little Miss Ellen Randolph."

After leasing No. 1020 for three years, Richard Trimble purchased it in June 1916.  The Record & Guide reported that it was offered at $100,000 "and sold very close to this figure."  The price would translate to about $2.36 million today.

The Trimble family's country estate was in Westbury, Long Island.  There Richard indulged himself in his expensive hobby--polo.   The war in Europe enabled him to acquire a famous thoroughbred in the winter of 1917.  Huon II, a German stallion "of renown," according to the New-York Tribune on February 7, had been sent to England by its owner just before the war.  But when Britain joined the conflict, it confiscated the horse.  That, according to the article, made it "possibly for Richard Trimble to acquire the horse almost at his own terms."  The article was entitled "American Buys Famous German Horse For Song."

In July 1919 Trimble sold five of his polo ponies at auction.  Town & Country said "They have been bred by a genuine sportsman for the love of the thing, and to men like Mr. Trimble polo is deeply indebted."

The Trimble children were growing up by now.  That year Cora began the debutante entertainments for Margaret, including a dinner in the Madison Avenue mansion on December 14.  Like his father, Richard, Jr., too, was making a name for himself with horses.  The following month The New York Herald reported "Richard Trimble, of New York city, a new man on the turf, is the first American to win a race abroad in 1920."  He had raced his bay mare Honey of Roses at Leopardstown, Ireland on New Years Day 1920.

Margaret Trimble at the Mineola Horse Show in September 1921 New-York Tribune, October 2, 1921 (copyright expired)

Richard Trimble, Sr. stepped down from his post of treasurer of the Roosevelt Hospital later that year.  He had held the position since 1891 and his resignation most likely had to do with failing health.  The following year, on March 5, 1921, The New York Herald reported that he "is seriously ill in his home, 1020 Madison avenue.  He was seized with a sudden attack of illness upon returning from his office...a week ago."

Richard's condition did not improve.  In April 1922 he resigned from the United States Steel Corporation, The New York Herald explaining that he "has been incapacitated for the last fifteen months by illness."  In fact, the New York Evening Post later revealed he "was stricken with paralysis."

The original configuration of the lower two floors can be seen in this photograph taken not long after the building's completion.  photo by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

No doubt out of consideration of her sick husband, Cora began entertaining outside of the house.  On August 4, 1922, for instance, the New-York Tribune reported "Mrs. Richard Trimble gave a dinner last night at Sherry's for her son and daughter, Mr. Richard Trimble jr., and Miss Margaret Trimble."  (Little Mary was still too young to participate in such events.)

Around 5:00 on the morning of February 18, 1924 Richard Trimble died, one month before his 66th birthday.  His funeral was held in the Church of the Heavenly Rest on Fifth Avenue. 

Cora and the children remained in the Madison Avenue house.  The first to leave was Richard, whose engagement to Winifred Loew was announced in May 1930.  The bride-to-be was the daughter of millionaire William Goadby Loew and his wife, Florence, and the granddaughter of millionaire banker George F. Baker.

Mary was next and her mother followed the social traditions of her own generation in distributing the invitations.  On September 24, 1935 the New York Post reported "In place of the custom engraved card, the guests attending the reception that follows the marriage this afternoon of Miss Mary Trimble to Mr. Perry Rodgers Pease received their invitations in the form of personally penned notes or by telephone from the bride's mother, Mrs. Richard Trimble."

The article pointed out, "Mrs. Trimble is one of a fast diminishing number of aristocrats who has refused to join the ranks of the cliff dwellers and in order to preserve the internal atmosphere of a private party the small number of relatives and close friends will be received in the familiar setting of the Trimble mansion at 1020 Madison Avenue."  Margaret Randolph Trimble was her sister's attendant in the Church of the Heavenly Rest.  The society wedding earned a long and detailed article in the newspaper.

Then, on March 1, 1938, The New York Times reported that Cora had announced the engagement of Margaret to Count Giovanni Revedin, of the Italian Diplomatic Service.  The article noted "The marriage will take place here in the Spring.  Immediately after the marriage Count Revedin and his bride will sail for Europe and return to his post in Budapest."

The marriage would eventually cause Margaret legal troubles.  Italian law prohibited any member of the Italian diplomatic corps from marrying anyone other than an Italian citizen.  For that reason Revedin traveled to New York for the marriage.  Margaret later said that "to satisfy the Italian authorities," she had signed a statement written in Italian at the Italian consulate.  She unwittingly became an Italian citizen by doing so, and in 1950 her American citizenship was withdrawn.

In the meantime, now alone in her home, Cora continued to entertain for charity purposes.  And Mary took advantage of the "unusually large rooms for entertaining," as the 1913 sale ad had described them, as well.  On February 6, 1940 The Times announced that "Mrs. Perry Rodgers Pease entertained with a tea at the home of her mother, Mrs. Richard Trimble, 1,020 Madison Avenue, for members of the committee of patronesses aiding in the pension fund of the Nightingale-Bamford School."  The following January Cora hosted at tea for the same cause.

Cora and her daughters received a shock on July 17, 1941 after Richard, Jr. was found dead on the floor of the bathroom in his Old Westbury, Long Island home.  The stockbroker was just 37-years old.

Cora Randolph Trimble lived on in the mansion as it became an anachronism on the much-changed Madison Avenue.  She died in the house on New Year's Eve, 1946 at the age of 75.  Her illustrious lineage was reflected in the memberships she still held: the Colonial Daughters of America, the Mayflower Descendants and the Huguenot Society.

The following year Charles Hiland Hall purchased No. 1020.  He converted the mansion for his antiques shop, Charles Hall, Inc., with offices on the upper floors. The high-end store remained in the building after Hall's death in September 1959.  

On September 12, 1971 The New York Times reported that the estate of Charles Hall had sold the property to art dealer Bernard Danenberg "for about $750,000."   The change in Madison Avenue from residential to commercial had not injured its property values.  The sale price would be in the neighborhood of $4.65 million today.

The article said "Mr. Denenberg [sic], who bought the building as a residence but may develop its lower floors as galleries at a later date, operates the Bernard Denenberg [sic] Galleries, Inc...it specializes in 19th and 20th century American and international paintings."  Danenberg retained his gallery at No. 1000 Madison Avenue, opening a second one here before the end of the year.

The Danenberg gallery remained until about 1981, replaced by Noortman & Brod which opened in October that year.  The Times reported "Dutch, French and English art from the 17th century till around 1880 are the specialties of this gallery."

photo by Edmund Vincent Gillon from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

It shared the building with the James Goodman Gallery, dealers in modern art.  On September 23, 1982 The East Hampton Star announced "Photographs by Linda McCartney, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Lee Eastman of Lily Pond Lane, East Hampton, will be on view at the James Goodman Gallery at 1020 Madison Avenue in Manhattan."  The article added as an aside, "Mrs. McCartney's husband, Paul, is a former Beatle."  The James Goodman Gallery, Inc. remained at least through 1985.

The building continued to be home to galleries.  By 1986 E. & J. Frankel, Ltd, dealers in fine antiques, was here.  And in the mid-1990's Rafael Fine Art Gallery leased space.  That gallery was the victim of a brazen burglary in December 1996 when thieves broke in and made off with "rare Persian and Oriental rugs, cash and other items valued at $250,000" according to police.

Today the former gallery spaces are home to the Lilly Pulitzer apparel boutique.  Unbelievably, the distinctive structure is not protected by landmark designation.  In 1977 the Landmarks Preservation Commission established the Metropolitan Museum Historic District which included the entire Cook Block--except No. 1020 and its horribly disfigured neighbor at No. 22 East 79th Street.  That the latter building was snubbed is understandable; but why the Trimble house was excluded is not.  The last house to be erected on Madison Avenue, it retains its architectural integrity despite the commercial renovations of the lower floors.

photographs by the author