The 1877 Gerken Saloon Building - 385 Sixth Avenue

 

photograph by Carole Teller

Carsten Gerken purchased the vintage building at 77 Sixth Avenue on the northwest corner of Waverley Place from George Hillen on April 14, 1873 for $38,000.  (The address would be changed to 385 in 1925, and the second "e" in Waverley would be officially dropped around 1900.)  Four years later he hired architects D. & J. Jardine to design a replacement store-and-flat building on the site.

Brothers John and David Jardine produced a four-story structure in the neo-Grec style.  Above a rusticated stone base, the red brick facade was trimmed with brownstone.  Banded stone piers that ran up the corners supported the largest of the corbels of the pressed metal cornice.  The windows sat within prim stone architraves with prominent, bracketed cornices.  The residential entrance was placed to the rear, at 135 Waverly Place.  Facing the avenue was Carsten Gerken's saloon, and a second entrance on the side street accessed its back room.

Born in Germany in 1837, Gerken ran the saloon with his brother, Johannes (who Anglicized his name to John).  They had a brother who was not involved with the business.  (The Sun said, "The brothers were sedate, rather corpulent Germans and looked enough alike to be triplets.")

Carsten and his wife, Ella, lived upstairs with one Irish servant.  Several of their initial tenants in the building were from the theater community.  Among them in 1879 were actor William Gray; Anthony J. Cannon, whose stage name was Tony Hart; and John E. Cannon, treasurer of the Theatre Comique at 514 Broadway.  (Tony Hart was half of the popular comedy team of Harrigan & Hart.  Perhaps not coincidentally, at the time they were appearing at the Theatre Comique.) 

Unlike other saloon owners throughout the city, the Gerken brothers ran their business with strict Victorian propriety and within the letter of the law.  No females were permitted into the back room and, according to The Sun, a sign in the vestibule of the rear door admonished that "no goods were sold to women to be drunk on the premises."   The newspaper added:

As a matter of fact only such women as were known to the Gerkens as respectable residents of the neighborhood could get their "growlers" filled while they waited in that little vestibule.  The sending of a child or even of a full-grown girl of doubtful discretion to the side door on a growler-filling errand was greeted with a stern rebuke from one of the brothers, and an intimation that if the family could not send better messengers for its dinner supply of beer it had better seek some other source than Gerken's.

(A "growler" was a tin bucket or pitcher used to transport beer from a saloon to one's home or work site.)

According to the newspaper, Gerken's saloon was, as well, "something of an employment agency."  If a neighbor needed help in moving a piece of heavy furniture or other such errand, he went to Gerken's.  The bootblack would be sent to a lodging house or tenement to find someone down on his luck who needed the money.  The Sun said, "That man could not get a drink in Gerken's, because they would not take the money of such a man across their bar, but they were always ready to show their good will by finding work for him."

Amazingly, the Gerken brothers would not serve alcoholics, or "drunkards," as they were called.  Once a wife appeared "with tears in her eyes asking for him," a patron was cut off forever.  "He might sit in the back room and read the newspapers or discuss affairs of State if he pleased, but if he asked for beer or whiskey he was treated as if he had put a deadly insult on the proprietors."

German saloon proprietors often operated a bier garten in the rear in the summer months.  The Gerken brothers had no backyard, so they improvised.  The Sun recalled later:

Then all the chairs in the backroom and pretty much all those in the apartments above were moved down to the sidewalk under the tree by the side door on Waverley place.  From sundown until 1 o'clock the brothers sat out there with the substantial folk of the neighborhood sipping beer and Rhine wine at the rate of about one drink an hour and getting far more out of life than do the members of some of the finest clubs.

There was never scandal surrounding the Gersten saloon, no raids on Sundays (because it was never opened after midnight on Saturday), no gambling and no unescorted or questionable women.

By the turn of the century, according to The Evening World, "The Gerkins [sic] had amassed a fortune in the liquor business and had invested most of their profits in real estate." 

February 1902 was a devastating time for the extended Gersten family.  Around February 7, the third brother was committed to a sanitarium.  The following week, on the morning of February 13, Carsten left home telling Ella he had to attend business downtown.  She said later that he "seemed in a cheerful mood."  That evening his body was found floating off Bedloe's Island.  John Gerken identified his body at the morgue.  While Ella said that his fall from the Staten Island Ferry had to have been an accident, the police called his death a suicide. 

The very next day, John Gerken "fell dead on a Second avenue car," as reported by The Sun.  The newspaper said that the shock of his brother's death "is believed to have indirectly led to John's death."  On February 14, 1902, The Evening World reported, "The bodies of the brothers now lay side by side" in a Bleecker Street funeral home.  Two days later, The Sun remarked that the third brother, "probably does not know to-day of the ends of the lives of John and Carsten."

Ella Gerken leased the saloon to Charles Neubaur.  Its sterling reputation was quickly tarnished.  On August 18, 1905, The New York Evening Post reported that a "crowd of roughs, supposed to be members of the notorious 'Paul Kelly Gang,'" had been ousted from the bar.  They returned later that night and a "free-for-all fight followed."  Policeman Francis J. Upton arrived just as the "roughs" were being put out again.  One of the gang turned his fury to the officer.  He struck Upton several times with a "brass knob."  After what The New York Evening Post described as "a hard fight," Upton subdued the tough, "using his night stick freely in doing so."

Apparently Upton's free use of his baton was severe.  The newspaper said, "The prisoner was not able to appear in court this morning."  His confederates were not happy.  Officer Upton showed Magistrate Whitman a letter he had received that morning from the Paul Kelly Gang that said, "We will lay for you."

In March 1908, Ella Gerken sold the building.  The New-York Tribune remarked, "The corner store has been occupied as a saloon for the last thirty-five years."

In 1924, during the first years of Prohibition, the Ellen A. O'Reilly estate sold the property to Sadie Goldman.  The former saloon space was transformed into a penny arcade.

On August 13, 1926, The New York Times began an article saying, "Death, injury, fire, flood and general transportation and radio paralysis were caused by a rapid succession of thunderstorms and rainstorms which swept over the metropolitan district yesterday afternoon."  Among the many incidents, said the article, was a lighting bolt that "struck in a penny arcade at 385 Sixth Avenue and caused so much excitement that some one turned in a fire alarm.  No damage was caused."

By 1935, the ground floor was home to a James Butler Grocery store.  (The James Butler Grocery Company was the second-largest grocery chain in New York.)  It was replaced by a restaurant as early as 1937.

In 1937, the facade was painted and a restaurant occupied the store space.  The Sixth Avenue elevated was in the process of being demolished.  from the collection of the New-York Historical Society.

Following the repeal of Prohibition, the space returned to selling alcohol as the Waverly Liquor Shoppe.  On the evening of April 16, 1954, the eve of Passover, Sophie Brady dropped in "to buy some wine for the holidays."  Her timing could not have been worse and she interrupted an armed robbery.  

The gunman demanded Sophie's purse, but the feisty 60-year-old fought back.  The New York Times reported, "She screamed and clung to her bag, and during the struggle the pistol was fired."  Sophie Brady was hit in the arm and she suffered a head injury in the fight.  In the meantime, the manager, Victor Cocozziello, had been forced onto the floor behind the counter.  The gunman escaped with $15 from Cocozziello's wallet and $100 from the register.  Sophie was treated at St. Vincent's Hospital.  She had saved her purse, but never got her holiday wine.

The Waverly Liquor Shoppe remained at least through the late 1960s, replaced by the Waverly Restaurant, a fixture on the Greenwich Village corner for years.

many thanks to artist Carole Teller for suggesting this post

The Juan Pablo Duarte Statue - Duarte Square

 

In 1945, Sixth Avenue, at the prompting of Mayor Fiorello H. LaGuardia, was renamed the "Avenue of the Americas" to honor Pan-American ideals.  The renaming ceremony in October that year included a parade of 4,000 World War II veterans.  Colorful medallions--300 of them--depicting the coats of arms of Latin American countries were hung from the avenue's lampposts.

Within a few years two statues of Latin American  heroes--liberator Simon Bolivar and Argentine General José de San Martin--were moved to the entrance of Central Park at the head of the Avenue of the Americas.  Eventually, seven monuments to Latin American figures would line the route.  

At the time of the renaming, the construction of the Holland Tunnel, completed in 1927, had left the trapezoidal plot at Canal Street, Sullivan Street, Grand Street and the Avenue of the Americas little more than a barren parking lot.  A triangular portion along Sixth Avenue was named Juan Pablo Duarte Square in 1945.

The plot as it appeared in 1932.  The western section, to the left, is owned by Trinity Church.  The coming statue would be placed approximately where the wooden shack stands.  from the collection of the New York Public Library.

The square honored Juan Pablo Duarte, who attempted to liberate the Spanish speaking inhabitants on the eastern portion of Hispaniola Island from Haitian rule in 1843.  He failed, but when a subsequent revolution won independence in 1844, he was installed as the president of the new republic of the Dominican Republic.  Unfortunately he would later be ousted by a military dictator and die in exile; however, his ideals of democracy and self-government within Pan-American culture continued to be celebrated.

The naming of the plot had little meaning without a monument to draw attention to it and the hero.  Nevertheless, it would be more than three decades before the Club Juan Pablo Duarte, Inc. prompted a movement to erect a statue.  The Dominican Republic commissioned Italian artist Nicola Arrighini to sculpt a larger-than-life bronze statue of Duarte as a gift to the City of New York.

The statue was installed on the anniversary of Duarte's birthday, January 26, 1978.  There was no ceremony and no formal dedication, and there was no mention of the installment in any newspapers.  

Arrighini depicts the hero in a dignified pose, his left hand resting on a cane and his right hand holding a scroll.  The front of the pedestal identifies Duarte as "Founder Of The Dominican Republic."  The following year, the triangle around the statue was designated a park.  On March 27, 1979, The Villager succinctly reported that Community Board 2 "passed without objection to the remapping of Duarte Square, a small portion of 6th Avenue between Canal and Grand Sts., as a public place." 

Decades after the fact, New York City's Dominican community was offended by the statue's being relegated to a spot where it could get little attention.  On May 5, 1987, Newsday reported, "The statue of Juan Pablo Duarte, the father of the Dominican Republic, stands in an obscure square in downtown Manhattan, far from monuments to other Latin American heroes at the top of the Avenue of the Americas and in Central Park.  Its location has long irritated Dominicans in New York."

The square did receive attention in November 2011, but it had nothing to do with the Dominican figure.  The western portion of the block--from Varick to Sullivan Street (the latter no longer open at this point) and from Canal to Grand Street--is owned by Trinity Church.  Since the Holland Tunnel project, it had been kept vacant and, often, fenced.  

On September 17, a movement called Occupy Wall Street began in Zuccotti Park in the Financial District.  Protestors took over the park and camped out in tents.  The decades-long vacant lot next to Duarte Square caught dissenters' attention.  A month after Occupy Wall Street began, on November 26 The New York Times reported, "The midday arrests at the Canal Street lot unfolded next to a triangular space known as Duarte Square, for the first president of the Dominican Republic, Juan Pablo Duarte." Protestors created a hole in the fencing and "held a general-assembly-style discussion on whether to 'liberate another piece of property.'"

The incident was, perhaps, the Duarte statue's only brief time in the spotlight.  Nicola Arrighini's stately representation of Juan Pablo Duarte is greatly overlooked in the little park that few New Yorkers know exists.

photographs by the author

The Transformed 1847 684 Sixth Avenue

 

In the mid-1840s, as sumptuous Greek Revival and Italianate-style mansions crept up Fifth Avenue, a block to the west much humbler residences were being erected.  In 1847, a three-story house at 350 Sixth Avenue (renumbered 684 in 1925) was completed.  Although they were separated by just a block, the proletarian inhabitants of the house--like the building itself--were a world away from Fifth Avenue's high society.

It seems that the house always had a store at street level.  The working-class residents in 1850 were almost all in the construction business.  They included Michael Dowling, a mason; carpenter William Custis; and John Alexander, a plasterer.  The one tenant not involved in building was Philip Kenney, a bootmaker.  It is possible he also occupied the store.

Around 1853, 33-year-old Michael Ronan installed his tailor shop in the store and lived with his family upstairs.   They shared the space that year with Denis Broderick, a stonecutter.

In February 1861, the Ronans welcomed a baby boy, Augustus M.  Sadly, the toddler died on July 24, 1863.  His funeral was held in the second floor of 350 Sixth Avenue the next day.

The couple shared the upper floors with George and Mary Le Caitel and John McCreery in 1867.  Le Caitel was a hairdresser and McCreery was in the shoe business.  The following year, Michael Rowan (whose name was confusingly similar to Michael Ronan) and Richard New opened their M. Rowan & Co. "ice cream depot" (i.e., ice cream parlor) in the store space.  It is unclear to where Michael Ronan temporarily moved his tailoring shop.

The ice cream parlor moved a block south to 334 Sixth Avenue the following year, and Ronan regained his shop.  Before long, Michael Ronan's health began to decline.  By the spring of 1872, he was no longer able to operate his business.  On April 19, an auction was held of: 

...the selected Stock of the long established Tailor Store 350 Sixth avenue, between Twenty-first and Twenty-second streets: Cloths, Cassimeres, Vestings, &c.; also custom made Pants, Coats and Vests, together with Counters, Fixtures and large size Singer Sewing Machine.  The attention of the trade invited.

Michael Ronan died on August 16, 1872 at the age of 50, "after a long illness," according to the New York Herald.  Unlike his son's funeral, Michael's was held in St. Francis Xavier's Church the following day.

Ronan may have held out hope that he would recover.  Not everything had been sold at the auction.  On September 8, an advertisement in the New York Herald offered, "For Sale, Cheap--A lot of new French Cloths and a Singer's Sewing Machine; almost new.  Apply at hall door 350 Sixth avenue, New York."

Mary and George Le Caitel still lived here.  George died "after a long and painful illness," as reported by the New York Herald, on December 17, 1873.  He was 42 years old.

Stephen E. England installed his "variety store" in the shop in 1875.  Among those living upstairs were Mary Maccarran, who made caps; William Powell, a stove dealer; Jacob W. Aeppli, whose barber shop was on Fourth Avenue; and tailor Christopher Postera.  (Mary Maccarran and William Powell would remain at least through 1880.)

Sisters Elizabeth M. Ritter and Agnes J. Ritter each owned 50 percent of the property in 1888.  When Agnes married Edward T. McCoy, she divided her portion with her new husband.

A Mrs. Bacon ran a domestic employment agency here in the early 1890s.  She and other agencies faced a crisis when the Chicago World's Columbian Exposition opened in 1893.  On April 29, The Evening World began an article saying, "Housekeepers and the proprietors of New York employment agencies are becoming not a little alarmed at the unusual scarcity of servant girls just now prevalent in the metropolis."  In anticipation of the throngs of visitors to the fair, Chicago hotel managers were depleting Manhattan's workforce with seductive offers.  The article said, "Mrs. Bacon, of 350 Sixth avenue, has many applications for Chicago situations, but has sent no servants there and invariably discouraged such applicants."

Robert T. Dowling occupied the store by 1899.  The following year, architect David P. Miller remodeled the storefront.  On February 4, 1902, Edward T. McCoy and Elizabeth M. Ritter renewed Dowling's lease for 10 years at $6,000.  (The rent would translate to about $1,675 per month in 2025.)

Dowling's residency would not last through the term of the lease.  In 1905, the architectural firm of Buchman & Fox was hired to convert the building to commercial use and remodel the facade.  Any trace of the 1847 house was eliminated in the architects' vaguely commercial take on neo-Classical architecture.  

Above the cast iron storefront, two-story paneled brick piers flanked the metal infill.  Double-height fluted Ionic pilasters created three bays, the floors separated by paneled spandrels.  Vast show windows flooded the interior with natural light.  A molded cornice and low parapet finished the design.

via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

The new tenants were Daniel J. Healy, maker of skirts and patterns; the Singer Sewing Machine Company; and a branch of J. Ehrlich & Sons.  

A 1905 advertisement announced the store's opening.  The World, June 12, 1905 (copyright expired)

J. Ehrlich & Sons' optical business was founded in 1862.  The firm operated its own glasses factory.  In the summer of 1908, an advertisement cautioned New Yorkers, "Don't risk your vacation pleasure without extra glasses."  The ad promised, "Bring your glasses to us NOW.  We can duplicate them EXACTLY without the original prescription and at a very moderate cost."

J. Ehrlich & Sons remained here until 1912, when McCoy and Ritter made interior renovations.  Architects Schwartz & Gross designed the reconfiguration of walls.  At the same time, toilets were installed.  In 1914, S. Miller & Sons, a women's apparel store, moved into the ground floor shop.

In the 1940s, L. Radin's occupied the space, offering female shoppers "corsets, brassieres, and blouses."

Today there are apartments on the third floor of the venerable building.  Buchman & Fox's 1905 storefront was obliterated in the second half of the 20th century, but, overall, the building's appearance has not changed.

photographs by the author

The Enigmatic 359 Sixth Avenue

 

photo by Jason Kessler

In 1832, Henry Bayard erected a Federal-style, brick faced style house at 55 Sixth Avenue (renumbered 359 in 1925), just south of Barrow Street.  (That spur of Barrow would be renamed West Washington Place the following year.)  Bayard offered it for sale in 1833, describing it as, "the two story Brick House, with slate roof."  It either did not sell or the buyer defaulted and on January 8, 1834 it was sold at auction.  The announcement gives us a detailed description:

The substantial and convenient modern built 2 story brick house and lot, no, 55 Sixth Avenue, one door below Barrow St.— The house is nearly new, covered with slate, and has accommodations for a large family.  In the rear of, and adjoining the house, there is a 2 story brick building, forming convenient apartments opening from each story; besides a subcellar under the principal building, and a spacious and airy kitchen.  There are 11 rooms, six of which are furnished with grates.

(The term "grates" was interchangeable with "fireplaces" at the time.)  The house became home to the Thomas Hardy family.  A merchant, he would not remain here especially long.  An advertisement in The Evening Post on January 16, 1839 offered the house for sale, "in excellent order."  It was purchased by Peter A. Hegeman, who had been living next door at 53 Sixth Avenue for several years.

The family nearly lost their home on June 1, 1848.  The Evening Post reported, "The roof of the dwelling of Peter A. Hegaman [sic], No. 55 Sixth Avenue, took fire about 1 o'clock yesterday, from a spark from an adjoining chimney, which was burning.  Damage about $50."

By 1860, Martha Covert, the widow of Daniel H. Covert, ran a boarding house here.  The few tenants were white collar, like William E. Blakeney, a dentist; and milliner William J. Demarest, who lived here in 1858 and 1859.

Around 1863, the ground floor was converted to a commercial space.  It may have been at this time that the attic was raised to a full floor and pressed metal lintels were installed over the windows.  A handsome Italianate cornice with scrolled brackets completed the make-over.  The removal of the stoop and lowering the first floor to ground level cut the windows of the former parlor level in half.  The remainders were bricked in, resulting in what has been described as a "half-story" above the storefront.

The shop became home to Frederick J. Lindeman's toy store.  It was replaced in 1867 by the Jeitles Brothers "segar" shop, run by Arnold and James Jeitles.

An advertisement appeared in the New York Herald on April 1, 1869, that read, "$700--Partner wanted in a money making business.  $5,000 can be made yearly and no risk.  Inquire of Mr. Smith, 55 Sixth avenue, in the store."  The required investment would translate to more than $16,000 in 2024.  But "Mr. Smith" may well have been a scammer.  The ad appeared in September, signed "Mr. Felton," and again in November, signed "Mr. Wilson."

Mr. Smith, alias Mr. Felton, alias Mr. Wilson, was almost assuredly William H. Brandon, who had taken over the cigar store from Jeitles Brothers.  The Evening Telegram said he was "better known as handsome Billy Brandon, who has figured so often in the police courts of the city that his career is pretty well known to the public."  The newspaper added, "So admirably are his plans concocted that he has never once been convicted."

But Brandon's luck changed in the fall of 1870.  The Evening Telegram described his place of operation, saying, "No. 55 is a cigar store with a sample room back of it."  Late in October, Louis Aguero, a cigarmaker who lived on Bleecker Street, made a sales call.  "Brandon told Aguero that he would take $200 worth of the cigars, and directed him to bring them round," reported The Evening Telegram.  He returned on November 1 and had just laid the goods on the counter when two men barged in brandishing firearms.  The gunmen identified themselves as United States marshals and took Brandon and Aguero into custody.  One took the pair away while the other took charge of the supposedly contraband cigars.

On the way to the stationhouse, the marshal took his captives into a saloon, where Brandon offered him a $30 bribe to be let off.  The marshal accepted and demanded the same amount from Aguero.  "This the Spaniard refused, saying that he wanted to be arrested, in order that he might learn what all this was about," said the article.  He insisted that his cigars had the requisite government stamp and there was no reason for his arrest.  

With that, Brandon and the fake marshal fled.  Aguero saw the "marshal" board a Sixth Avenue streetcar.  He returned to 55 Sixth Avenue, where Brandon told him the other marshal had taken the cigars--worth just under $5,000 today--as evidence.  Aguero's next stop was the office of attorney Abraham Webb.  On November 3, The Evening Telegram reported, "A summons was issued for Brandon, and the case will come for examination at Jefferson Market, when it is to be hoped that Brandon will meet with his just deserts."  The cigar shop was soon taken over by Louis Xigues.

In 1872, the furnishings of the upper floors were auctioned and, it appears, the storefront renovated.  On March 29, 1873, an ad appeared in the New York Herald offering, "To Let or Lease--Three story brick building, with new store and cellar, 55 Sixth avenue, for some respectable business; terms reasonable."  The building was valued at the time by real estate appraiser Nelson S. Flock at $18,000 (about $473,000 today).

The ground floor became home to an "eatinghouse" run by William F. Smallwood and John W. Hill.  The two lived nearby on Sullivan and Thompson Streets, respectively.  Living above the restaurant in 1876 were James H. Mathews, an undertaker, and his wife Caroline.  She ran a laundry in the basement of the building.  The couple would remain at least through 1880.  Also living here that year was Cornelius A. Chrisstoffels, a cigar merchant; machinist Charles Baker; and Michael Doyle, who was a janitor.

 

In 1883, the ground floor of 55 Sixth Avenue was home to A. Freudenhammer's grocery store.  Described by the New York Herald as "a stout, good natured German," he complained to the reporter about scam artists who preyed on small businessmen.  On November 14, 1883, the newspaper quoted him saying, 

I have been in business here three years and I handle everything in the grocery line.  My trade is mostly with poor people and small boarding houses.  Oh, those boarding house people!  What trouble and loss they cause small storekeepers.  I have lost a good deal of money through them.  One landlady skipped off owing me $200.  Another disappeared leaving an unpaid bill of $100.  They play their little game very well, for they move into a neighborhood, run up bills, and then in a few months suddenly cross to New Jersey, where they are out of reach of their grocer, baker and butcher.

 

Freudenhammer was gone by 1893, when the shop was home to George H. Rozelle's butcher shop, the Sixth Avenue Meat Market.  In the meantime, residents came and went upstairs.  Among the most colorful, perhaps, was Elizabeth Bourke, who lived here in 1909.

On June 20, 1909, Mrs. Bourke read a notice in a newspaper that read, "Healthy blonde boy; can't keep; for adoption.  Call afternoons 414 West 19th St."  She answered the ad, telling Alma Williams, who was a widow, that she was "a woman of means, and that her husband was in the West," according to The New York Times, which added, "She told Mrs. Williams she lived at 223 West Seventh-fourth Street."  Elizabeth Bourke took a liking to Charles Williams, described by the newspaper as "a bright, curly headed youngster."  The two women agreed that Mrs. Bourke would adopt him, and Elizabeth promised to bring him around to see his mother every Wednesday.

Later, Alma Williams went to the West 74th Street address and discovered there was no one there named Bourke.  She notified police and a search was begun for Elizabeth Bourke and the kidnapped boy.  A few days later, Detective John McSherry saw a woman matching Elizabeth's description and a curly headed boy walking along Charles Street.  He followed them to the St. Agnes Nursery, where the woman dropped off the boy and left.

The nursery's matron told the detective that the boy's name was Charles Bourke, although she added, "The lady who left him sometimes called the boy, Mary."  She gave him Elizabeth's true address on Sixth Avenue, where she was arrested for kidnapping.

In the Jefferson Market Court, Elizabeth explained she gave the fictitious address to prevent the mother from bothering her.  She still intended to bring the boy around to his mother weekly.  And she also disclosed, "I had a little girl, Mary, who died.  The boy reminds me of her.  I put her clothing on him and at times called him Mary."  The magistrate ruled there was no intention of wrongdoing and the case was dismissed.  The New York Times reported, "Both women left court smiling, and the boy, it was said, would remain with Mrs. Bourke."

In 1919, two college students, Jack Kriendler and Charlie Berns, opened a "cup joint" called the Red Head at 359 Sixth Avenue.  The term referred to a speakeasy in which liquor was served in coffee cups.  Because the renumbering of Sixth Avenue six years later changed 55 Sixth Avenue's address to 359 Sixth Avenue, legend persists that this building was the original home to the speakeasy that would later become the 21 Club.

The ground floor was home to Emma's Rotisserie in 1941.  image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

The ground floor of 359 Sixth Avenue would be a restaurant for the rest of the century.  At mid-century it was Ernesta's, described by Eleanor Early in the 1950 New York Holiday as "a humble place where I have had good food."  It as replaced by Bravissimo.  The 1962 The Mademoiselle Career Girl's Guide to New York described, "Italian specialties, as you might guess, but also Spanish, Indian and international dishes at this crowded, casual Greenwich Village hangout."

A long-term tenant arrived in 1965 when Ida and Ed McLaughlin and Frank Campbell opened McBell's Irish Pub.  Shortly after its opening, on June 17 The Villager columnist Elizabeth Byrd said, "First of all, and very important to me, the restaurant is not self-consciously Irish.  There is no malarkey and there is dignity."  McBell's would become a Village destination, surviving over three decades.

In 2011 Tertulia, a Spanish restaurant, opened.  It was supplanted by a Nikkei restaurant, Llama San in 2019.  

photo by Jason Kessler

In the meantime, the story of a speakeasy in the building was not entirely without foundation.  Long-time Greenwich Village resident Jason Kessler recently told me, "Years ago, you’d go up a flight, and then another short flight.  There was a speakeasy there.  Bookshelf-lined warrens with comfy sofas where you could get credible martinis.  It didn’t last long; I suppose it couldn’t have."

many thanks to Jason Kessler for suggesting this post

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The 1887 Neo-Grec 351 Sixth Avenue

 

Henry W. Hoops arrived in New York from his native Germany in 1851 at the age of 26.  He became a prominent confectioner and ice cream dealer, was active in politics, and dealt in Manhattan and Brooklyn real estate.  In 1877, he completed construction of a four-story store and flat building at 47 Sixth Avenue (renumbered 351 Sixth Avenue in 1925) in Greenwich Village.

The building was faced in stone above a cast iron storefront.  Its French neo-Grec design differed from the garden variety neo-Grec style in its especially beefy lintels.  Carved with incised foliate designs typical of the style, they were supported by geometric brackets.  Matching brackets upheld the sills.  A prominent metal cornice with panels that matched the lintels completed the handsome design.

Hoops went to the additional expense of custom matching the cornice panels with the lintel carvings.

The shop became home to George Quimby, Jr.'s hardware store, while the three apartments upstairs were home to middle-class professionals.  In 1878, they were William Peppler, a baker; Richard Plunkett, a clerk; and the family of Edward Wilkins.  Wilkins was an officer in the Customs House and his son John worked as a clerk.

Richard Plunkett, who "lived in moderate style," according to The New York Times, had worked in the office of W. & J. Sloane & Co. since 1868.  He had most likely gotten his job through the influence of family members, since The New York Times noted "some of his relatives are valued employes [sic] of the firm."  On October 8, 1878, the 32-year-old "disappeared."  The New York Times reported, "the Messrs. Sloane were surprised by the discovery that he had forged their firm name as the indorsement of a check for $1,500."  (It was a substantial amount, equal to about $47,300 in 2024.)  Further examination of the books revealed he had embezzled cash totaling $6,000.

After hiding out for more than a month, Plunkett was arrested in his apartment on the evening of November 23.  His former employers assumed "that he has been corrupted by bad companions," and told a reporter, "he will be treated as leniently as the law will permit."  To that end, Plunkett agreed to a deal.  He pleaded guilty to the forgery and was sentenced to two years in prison.

The Edward Wilkin family was still living here in 1880.  Edward was described by The Sun as being "of portly build and fine appearance."  He left the apartment at around 7:30 on the evening of December 5, that year.  An hour later, Police Officer William Mulcahy drove "four suspicious looking loungers away from the mouth of the alley" at Clinton Place (later East 8th Street) near Fifth Avenue.  After walking his post, he saw the gang had returned.  "It was then that he noticed something lying on the pavement of the alley," reported The Sun.

It was Edward Wilkin.  He was "stripped of most of his clothing, and without his watch and money."  The Sun said "he was unconscious and presented a pitiable sight."  The article continued, "His coat and overcoat were missing, and his vest and shirt were drawn up about the upper part of his body so that his naked back touched the cold stones."  Wilkin's wife said he always carried his gold watch and chain and "probably had not less than $200."  Two of the crooks were quickly arrested.  At midnight Wilkin was still unconscious in the New York Hospital.

In 1890, Henry Hoops leased the building for five years to George Schmidt.  He moved his family into one of the apartments and around the same time he leased the store to Gustav Pietsch.  Pietsch converted it for his bakery business and he and his wife, Dora, lived in the rear.

In November 1892, the Schmidts' child fell ill, "suffering from a scrofulous complaint," according to The Evening World.  They called F. E. Hemscher, a German physician recently arrived in New York.  According to Hemscher, until three months earlier he had been assistant surgeon with the German Army's 17th Regiment Infantry.  He practiced what was known as the "Baunscheidt system."  It involved "pricking the affected or diseased part with needles" and rubbing the raw surfaces with various oils.

The newspaper reported, "The boy rapidly grew worse, and the attention of Henry Loring, agent of the County Medical Society, was called to the matter by the parents."  Hemscher was arrested for practicing medicine without a license.  He told the court that an attorney had advised him "that as long as he did not make his patients worse he could go on practicing."  The Evening World reported, "Hemscher says he did not make them worse, and was surprised to find himself in a police court."

The devastating economic depression known as the Panic of 1893 prompted The Evening World to raise funds for the poor.  An article on January 25, 1894 asked for donations so "those out of work may tide the present storm."  It listed previous donors, including Gustav Pietsch.  His bakery was apparently doing well despite the overall economic conditions.  This $100 donation would equal more than $3,600 today.

Later that year, on April 10, Dora Pietsch hired a servant girl from Theresa Bienhusse's employment agency.  The World reported, "That day the girl went to bed sick, and Mrs. Piepach [sic] went around to Mrs. Bienhusse and asked for another servant."  The meeting did not go well.  

The next day, The Evening World reported that Theresa Bienhusse had been arrested for assault after Dora Pietsch complained to police "that she was thrown downstairs during an altercation with Mrs. Bienhusse yesterday, and that her right ankle was sprained."  Although Theresa Bienhusse pleaded not guilty, saying that Dora "fell down stairs from sheer excitement," the jury found her guilty.

The actual bakery portion of Pietsch's operation was in the basement.  Living on the top floor in 1895 was the family of John A. Walsh, a letter carrier.  He and his wife Mary had two small children, six-year-old Mary and 15-month-old Willie.  The second floor was occupied by the John McDonald family and Mrs. McDonald's brother, Policeman Thomas O'Shea.

At 5:30 on the morning of January 30, Walsh left for work, leaving his wife and children asleep.  In the meantime, Gustav Pietsch was at work in the basement, preparing the morning's baking.  A dumbwaiter shaft ran from the basement to the top floor.  At about 6:30, a fire broke out in the basement and "shot quickly to the top story," according to The Evening World.  

Hearing a roar, Mrs. McDonald opened the dumbwaiter door, causing a backdraft.  The New York Times reported, "the flames shot out and drove her back.  She screamed, and alarmed the people in the house."  Thomas O'Shea rushed down the stairs shouting, "Fire!" and ran onto the street to send in an alarm.

In the meantime, Mary Walsh was awakened by the commotion.  She approached the dumbwaiter just as the build-up of heat and pressure caused it to explode.  "The flames struck Mrs. Walsh in the face, setting her nightdress on fire and burning her badly."  The room was quickly engulfed in flames.  Mary grabbed her children, one under each arm, and headed to the window and the ice-covered fire escape.  To get there, she had to plunge through the flames.  

The Evening World reported that the barefoot mother made it down one floor on the fire escape, then stopped.  Both she and the children were in horrific shape. 

From the children the night clothes had been burned and the flesh peeled from their bodies as the mother stood on the ladder," said the article.  "Her hair had been burned from her head, her face and arms were black from the flames, and there was a deep, ugly mark across her shoulders, where a falling beam struck her as she ran through the fiery room.

Alfred Pitcher, who lived around the corner on West Fourth Street, had heard the explosion.  He made it to the rear yard just as the exhausted woman was about to throw her children to the snowbank below.  Pitcher called out for her to wait, climbed to the top of an outhouse, then yelled, "Now!"  Mary Walsh tossed the infant to Pitcher, who passed him to another neighbor.  He then climbed the fire escape, retrieved the other child, and helped Mary down.

The Evening World reported, "Meanwhile the other families in the house had been aroused and were making a made rush for the street."  The article said, "All of the people, with the exception of Mrs. Pietsch, were out of the house when the firemen arrived."  A fire fighter rescued Dora Pietsch who "was so frightened she stood in her rooms and cried."

An ambulance transported Mary Walsh and her children to the New York Hospital.  The Evening World reported, "The surgeon thought that the two children would die, but the woman might recover."  

The Evening World reported, "The flames were quickly extinguished.  The firemen couldn't say exactly how they started.  It might have been that the baker's ovens had been overheated."  

Twelve days later, on February 11, The Sun reported, "Mary Walsh, 6 years old, who, before being rescued by her mother, Mrs. John A. Walsh, was burned by a fire at her home, at 47 Sixth avenue...died in the New York Hospital yesterday."

Henry Hoops suffered the equivalent of $94,000 damages to his building.  (His tenants, of course, lost nearly everything.)  He made repairs, which were completed within a few months.

Henry Hoops died in 1914, 14 years after the title to the Sixth Avenue building was transferred to his son, Henry Jr.

In the years after World War I, the former bakery was a restaurant/nightclub.  With Prohibition in full swing, at midnight on Saturday December 30, 1923, Mayor John Francis Hyland and his wife made "a tour of Greenwich Village," as reported by The New York Times, which said, "They did not leave their automobile on their inspection of the Village."  Following the "tour," police made four arrests.  Among them was Charles B. Walters who was arrested at 47 Sixth Avenue, "charged with possessing a flask of whisky."

In 1929, four years after the address was changed, 351 Sixth Avenue was renovated by architect Ferdinand Savignano.  There were now seven apartments in the upper floors.  Living here in 1935 was mural artist Herman E. Zimmerman.  He did several Works Progress Administration murals, including the 1938 Chemistry & Industry for the main post office at Wilmington, Delaware; and Construction on the Miami Erie Canal in the Tipp City, Ohio main post office.

The Daniel Reeve store was still in the building in 1941.  image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

The ground floor shop became a Daniel Reeves grocery store.  The extensive chain had 297 stores in the New York City area in the 1920s.  By 1941, when it merged with Safeway, Inc. there were 408 Daniel Reeves grocery stores.

In the late 1950s and into the 1960s, the ground floor was occupied by the Fugazy Travel Bureau, Inc., and in the 1970s by the Pier 16 housewares store.

While the storefront has been gently altered, its 1877 cast iron piers are intact.  And, despite a serious fire in 1895, the upper floors are unchanged after nearly 150 years.

photographs by the author

no permission to reuse the content of this blog has been granted to LaptrinhX.com

The 1895 Solomon Sayles Building -- 434-438 Sixth Avenue

 

Noticeably missing, the cornice was removed in 1961.

Solomon Sayles was a successful "meat and provisions dealer" in the last decade of the 19th century.  His operation sat on Sixth Avenue, directly opposite the Jefferson Courthouse complex.  In February 1893 the Record & Guide reported that J. Dalmage Trimble had sold "the old building" at the southeast corner of Sixth Avenue and 10th Street "to Solomon Sayles, the butcher, who occupies adjoining premises."  He had ambitious plans for the site.

Sayles commissioned architect Ralph S. Townsend to design a large commercial building on the site of the combined properties.  Completed in 1894, the six-story brick-and-stone structure was designed in the Italianate Renaissance manner of the Eclectic period.  The ground floor of the two-story stone base provided a store for Solomon Sayles's grocery business.  The windows of the upper floors were grouped in threes.  Those of the third floor were framed in terra cotta and separated by engaged, spiral Scamozzi columns.  Paired, double-height fluted pilasters divided the window groupings of the fourth and fifth floors; while the sixth floor openings, above an intermediate cornice, were also graced with the spiral columns, each group separated by an ornate terra cotta panel.

A Renaissance-inspired hood crowns the entrance to the upper floors.

For awhile it seemed that Solomon Sayles had overextended himself.  In 1899 he was forced to assign his business, often the first step before bankruptcy, and in May 1897 he transferred title to the Sixth Avenue building to Charles A. Hess "for the benefit of creditors," according to the Real Estate Record & Guide.  Hess told reporters that the actions were merely to placate "an overly aggressive creditor."

And that seems to have been true.  Solomon Sayles regained title to his property and his business thrived here for decades.  In the meantime, the upper floors filled with a wide array of tenants.   The early years of the 20th century saw apparel business, like milliner S. Meyer Co., as well as industrial and artistic tenants--the American Self-Lighting Appliances Co., the Pasbach-Voice Lithographic Co., and the Art Designing Works, for instance.

The Illustrated Milliner, January 1902 (copyright expired)

In September 1917, Ralph Townsend, now a partner in the architectural firm of Townsend, Steinle & Haskell, was called back to update the building.  The plans are vague, but most likely the work involved updating electricity and plumbing and such.

Solomon Sayle's business was renamed Sayles, Zahn Company at the end of World War I.  Advertising as "butchers and packers," it did business from the location into the Depression years.  Apparel-related firms were a minority on the upper floors.  By now, the artistic and industrial tenants had taken over.

Occupying space by 1920 was Montague Castle-London.  The firm was, perhaps, best known for stained glass windows, but fabricated "all forms of memorials in glass, mosaic, bronze and marble," as noted in an advertisement in 1920, and "mural decorations of every kind."

The address of 126-130 Sixth Avenue would be renumbered 434-438 in 1925.  Year Book of the Architectural League of New York, 1921 (copyright expired)

In 1925 Montague Castle-London Co. was looking for a self-reliant designer.  Apparently not wanting to waste time with applicants who overestimated their worth, the ad required them to state the salary they expected to earn.

Stained glass designer wanted, one having experience in designing along traditional lines; must essentially be individual, and be willing to come to New York and associate himself with an established firm; state remuneration expected.

Other tenants in the Depression era were the Eagle Water Heater Company, the Farrell Silvering Place Co., and the Century Metalcraft Corporation.

Scarsdale Inquirer, April 8, 1927 (copyright expired)

In 1956 the Robert Joffrey Theater Dancers was formed by six young dancers.  They hoped to spark interest in ballet by performing in school gymnasiums, small town theaters and other far-flung venues.  By 1960 the Joffrey American Ballet Center occupied the third floor of 434 Sixth Avenue.

Founders Gerald Arpino (left) and Robert Joffrey at a third floor window of 434 Sixth Avenue around 1960.  photo by Herbert Migdoll.

Before 1941 the structure's cornice was removed, and in 1961 metal storefronts were installed.  A more comprehensive renovation three years later resulted in stores and a post office on the ground floor, a factory space on the second, the Joffrey school on the third, a plating company (possibly Farrell) on the fourth, and apparel manufacturers on the two two floors.

As the neighborhood changed, so did the tenant list.  Around 1976 the Village Weaving Center occupied the fifth floor.  In addition to its retail shop, it offered classes in weaving.  The architectural firm of Edelman & Salzman moved in around the same time.

By the time this photograph was taken in 1941, the cornice had been removed.  photograph via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

In the meantime, the Joffrey Ballet's official school, the American Ballet Center, thrived in the third floor space, spreading into the fourth floor by 1979--this despite New York Magazine's description of the studio on September 10, 1979.  The article said, "cramped quarters make hallways, dressing rooms, and the waiting room noisy and hectic, and ventilation in the good-size studios is poor."

The article noted, "A large number of gifted children are granted generous scholarships here, and starting at twelve, selected students are given ample opportunity to perform in the Joffrey Ballet's concert group for up-and-coming young dancers."

More than six decades after signing its first lease, the Joffrey Ballet School continues at 434 Sixth Avenue.  Today it is among the foremost dance training institutions in the world.

photographs by the author

no permission to reuse the content of this blog has been granted to LaptrinhX.com