The Lost United States Hotel -- Fulton and Pearl Streets

Louis Oram illustrated the hotel around 1890 -- from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York, http://collections.mcny.org/Collection/%5bUnited-States-Hotel%5d-2F3XC5UNRA1N.html

In 1832 the only truly fashionable hotel in New York was the City Hotel on the corner of Broadway and Cedar Street.  That was about to change.

Cabinetmaker Stephen Holt had come to New York in 1808 from Salem, Massachusetts.  He believed he could make more money in the hotel business, however, and opened a small inn at the corner on Front Street between Fulton Street and Burling Slip.  His fortunes increased when his hotel became a “select boarding house” for army officers during the War of 1812.

When Holt moved his business to the corner of Water and Fulton Streets, “his cheap eating house was one of the popular resorts of the down-town merchants until about 1830,” according to The New York Times decades later.  Now wealthy, in 1831 Hold endeavored to give the City Hotel competition.

After two years of construction, his Holt’s Hotel on Fulton Street from Pearl to Water Street opened on January 3, 1833.  Amazingly tall for the day at six stories, it was reportedly faced in white marble and set the bar for the large, elegant hotels to come.  Many believed it was Holt’s Hotel that inspired John Jacob Astor to erect his splendid Astor House Hotel three years later.

The artist did not disguise the commercial activity along Fulton Street; but the paved road and sidewalks, the gas street lamp and the well-dressed pedestrians reflect the highly developed area around Holt's Hotel in the 1830s -- NYPL Collection

A nearly square building, it stretched 100 feet along Fulton, Pearl and Water Streets.  Along the roofline was a grand promenade 125 feet above the street where well-dressed couples could enjoy the breezes and views of the city and harbor.  A tall cupola was not only a handsome architectural feature, it was used to receive signals from the watch tower on Governor’s Island announcing arriving vessels.

The hotel was opened with great fanfare, with the mayor, city leaders and court judges being invited.  Lang’s New York Gazette reported the following day, “The hotel is one of the largest and most splendid in the country, containing no less than 220 rooms, calculated to entertain 2,000 persons…The dining hall is 100 feet by 25 feet, and furnished with plain but beautiful and rich furniture.  All the suites of rooms are carpeted.”

Another account said, “The common terms of splendid, spacious, elegant, and the like seem to be lost and unmeaning when applied to such a work.  The first story is occupied with stores, except the barroom, and above is the dining hall extending entirely across the building.”

The newspaper gave Holt’s wife a great deal of the credit.  “Mrs. Holt, wife of the proprietor, a lady over fifty years, within the last six years has made with her own hands 1,500 towels, 400 pairs of sheets, 400 pairs of pillow cases, all ruffled or pointed; 250 bedticks, and 300 patchwork bed quilts of ample dimensions, and several of them entirely composed of pieces not larger than a two-shilling bit.  Surely, a man with such a wife may well build his house of marble and fill it with luxuries.”

Holt, indeed, spared no expense on the amenities.  His hotel cost him $350,000—over $8.5 million today.  At a time when pianos were expensive, a listing of the furnishings included three “grand pianofortes.”  Perhaps most amazing was the steam-driven elevator Holt installed to hoist luggage up the six floors (although a contemporary journal noted that it was used to carry “its owner, too, if he chose”).

A grand promenade ran along the roof, offering breathtaking views of the city and harbor -- NYPL Collection

Within the first week of operation, the first grand entertainment was held here.  On January 10, 250 prominent citizens paid $5 each (a hefty $125 today) to dine in the sumptuous dining room.  Alderman Sharpe presided over the affair and the blessing of the hotel and food was given by Bishop Henry U. Onderdonk.

A newspaper reported, “The viands were of the choicest quality, and the wines of the richest flavor.  Both were abundant, and discontent and care were driven for the time into exile.  A band of music played many excellent national and appropriate airs.  Among the toasts given was ‘The Various Political Parties, All Union Men When a Grand Dinner is Before Them.’”

In the first years of operation, New Yorkers referred to the hotel as “Holt’s marble palace.”  They would change their tune before long.

The height of the hotel was a drawback for patrons who had to climb six floors.  The minimum price for a room was $1.50 (over $35 now).  Holt’s lavish expenditures would be his downfall.  It was perhaps his last attempt at innovations that caused his failure.  Using the steam engine that powered his elevator, Holt bore a well under the hotel in an attempt to provide an in-house water source.  “A hole over 500 feet deep was sunk at large expense and with scant returns of water, and the expense incident upon this well-boring hastened the coming failure of the proprietor,” reported The New York Times.

The citizens who had called the hotel “Holt’s marble palace” now deemed it “Holt’s Folly.”

The Sun later said, “The very extravagance which advertised the hotel wrecked it.  The manager failed, and his house was renamed the United States Hotel.”

Even without Holt, the hotel continued with its innovations.  At just past 1:00 in the morning on Sunday, October 6, 1839, fire broke out in the fur store of Stephen A. Halsey on Water Street, opposite the hotel.  Before long, the conflagration was out of control, terrifying citizens who well remembered the disastrous holocaust of four years earlier.  That fire had destroyed blocks of the city's business district.

Hazard’s United States Commercial and Statistical Register reported, “It is much the greatest fire that has occurred here since the memorable conflagration of December 1835.  The entire square bounded by Water, Fulton, Front and Burling streets is a heap of ruins, except five or six stores on Fulton street.”

The publication made note of the hotel’s ingenious method of saving itself.  “The preservation of the Hotel (an immense building six stories high above the basement) is attributable chiefly to the use on the roof of a small fire engine belonging to the establishment, and the covering of the windows externally with blankets.”

The hotel vied with the Astor House as the chief venue for glittering gatherings.  On January 22, 1844, the New-York Daily Tribune reported on the upcoming “Unprecedented Entertainment”  on January 25.

The Ladies of the Nassau street Congregation will commence their Annual Festival in the spacious Saloons of the United States Hotel.  The windows on Pearl and Water-streets will be brilliantly illuminated.

The newspaper reported that Professor Bronson would speak.  “At suitable intervals he will deliver several of his most entertaining and instructive Recitations.  He will also give an exposition and exemplification of Ventriloquism.”  There would also be musical entertainment.  “Professor Nash, whose vocal powers will bear comparison with any musical performer in the United States, has also consented to be present.  Several Duets, Solos, and other pieces may be expected during the evening.”  In describing another singer, the New-York Tribune promised, “The sweet and unaffected vocal musical performances of Miss Dobson would alone enrich any entertainment.”

Not unlike today, the male audience paid more for its tickets.  Men paid 50 cents admission, women 25.



stereoscope view courtesy of Allen Kaufman

Two decades after the hotel’s opening, it still held its own among the newer establishments.  The 1853 A New and Complete Gazetteer of the United States of America called it, “the first of the mammoth hotels.”  It prompted the writer to add, “Hotel-keeping, as practiced in New York by the best houses, is brought nearer perfection than in any city in the world.”

Although at the time of its opening the hotel was touted as being constructed of white marble, a later advertisement mentioned it was "in imitation of Italian Marble."   The ad noted, "The Dining and Coffee Rooms are spacious and pleasantly situated; the Sleeping Rooms airy and comfortable."

An advertisement called the exterior stonework "in imitation of Italian Marble." -- NYPL Collection

In 1864, New York City was struck by war-time terrorism when a group of Confederate conspirators checked one-by-one into the best hotels of the city.  Their intention was to simultaneously set fires in the hotels then, while firefighters were scattered at the various blazes, set fire to the piers, theaters, hay barges, and other buildings. 

On Friday November 25, a room on the fifth floor of the United States Hotel was given to a rather peculiar guest.  The New York Times said the “appearance of this young man excited somewhat the suspicions of the man in the office, but not sufficiently, it would seem, to put the proprietor on his guard.  It is believed that he was disguised with a wig and false whiskers, as well as otherwise, and that it will therefore be very difficult, if not impossible, to identify him.”

The man, “carpet-bag in hand,” requested a lower room but “when told that the house was pretty full and he could have a room on the upper floor, he consented to occupy it, though apparently with great reluctance.”

The following night, as fires broke out in the St. Nicholas Hotel, Lafarge House, Astor House, Metropolitan Hotel, St. James Hotel, Belmont Hotel, Howard Hotel and others, flames were discovered coming from the room of the suspicious guest.

The New York Times said on November 27 that had they been successful, “the best portion of the city would have been laid in ashes.”  But what the rebels failed to anticipate was the efficient fire-fighting capabilities of the hotels themselves.    The newspaper reported that in the case of the United States Hotel, “The fire was promptly extinguished.”  The New York Times commended the hotels and the Fire Department on their quick and efficient action, and called the terrorists “villains” and “cowardly wretches.”

All hotels had their share of larceny and crime, however the United States Hotel was nearly immune from this type of bad press.  The string of good luck was broken when John Murphy, “a porter or call-boy,” entered the room of John A. McGough in September 1868 after McGough had called for a drink.  The following morning when the guest awoke, he noticed that he was missing $358 in jewelry including his gold watch, a pair of sleeve buttons, a “seal ring,” as well as $85 in cash.

When Detective Haggerty of the 2^nd Precinct suggested that Murphy be sent on an errand to the Metropolitan Hotel, the call-boy was tailed.  Aware that he was under suspicion, he ran in the opposite direction.  According to The New York Times, “He was a once overhauled and arrested, when all of the plunder was found on his person.”

Murphy’s crime paled in comparison to that of Winifred Price the following year.  Price was “an under servant” and not the easiest to work with.  The New York Times said she, “has for some time been rather quarrelsome and antagonistic in her intercourse with the upper servants, whose table she tended and arranged.”

Winifred Price finally had enough of the haughty attitudes of her superiors and on July 6, 1869 she, “developed an unusual degree of spleen, and sought to gratify it by administering a wholesale dose of poison to the other servants,” said The Times.

That night the servants’ menu ended with “an appetizing pudding,” but when Winifred brought it from the kitchen “she seized a convenient opportunity to pour over the pudding a quantity of laudanum.  The deadly sauce was duly partaken of by the servants, and the consequence was that they were nearly all made quite ill.”

Fortunately, none of the “upper servants” was killed.  Winifred, however, was quickly arrested and sent to the Tombs physician “for examination as to her sanity.”

The relative lack of theft in the hotel was obvious when The New York Times reported on its most frequent crime on February 25, 1887.  “The chief grievance of the proprietor of the United States Hotel, at Fulton and Pearl streets, has hitherto been blanket thieves.  These are the meanest sort of thieves known, because there appears to be so little profit in their business.  They pay a dollar in advance for their room and then wind the blankets and bed linen around their bodies, putting their clothes on over all, and thus leaving the hotel in the dead of night are made richer by a very trifling profit.”

Distasteful publicity came in 1891 with nearly back-to-back suicides here.  The first, on April 15, involved the former Republican Senator John Birdsall of Glen Cove, Long Island.   The popular politician had run into financial problems of late and was found on his bed when a chambermaid noticed a strong smell of gas coming from his room.

A messier suicide occurred three months later when Charles S. Thompson, “a member of a well-known family” in Connecticut put two bullets in his head on July 20.  The New York Times described him as “a handsome fellow, about six feet in height, and appeared to be a sea-faring man from the fact that his luggage consisted of a chest and a canvass bag, such as are commonly used by officers aboard a ship.”

Thompson had been in the hotel about a month, spending a great deal of time in the reading room.  “In manner he was reserved, but not enough so as to attract particular attention,” said the newspaper.  Then, after having breakfast early on Monday morning July 20 he returned to his room.  The New York Times reported:

A chambermaid went there at 10 o’clock.  She found the door locked and her pass key would not work, as the door was locked from the inside.  Between that hour and 3 o’clock in the afternoon she went to Room 11 several times, and was still unable to gain admittance.  Then, out of mere curiosity, she got a stepladder and looked in over the transom.  She saw Thompson on the bed, partially undressed.  The sheets about his head were deeply stained with blood.

A letter from Thompson’s sister found in his coat ended by “appealing to him to come and see her at once, vaguely hinting that some mutual trouble they had experienced had now passed away, and assuring him that he would always find a home and a welcome at her house.”

A much less tragic incident occurred the following year when Dr. S. A. Brown, who lived in the hotel, was awaked about 3:00 in the morning on December 16 by a “tremendous pounding” on his door.  The New York Times recounted, “He got up, opened the door, and found, standing in the dimly-lighted hall, a man, dressed only in his night shirt, whose hands clutched his throat, whose eyes were a big as saucers, and whose face was purple and greatly puffed up.”

The doctor recognized the man as his old friend, another boarder named Captain William H. Humphrey.  The captain managed to get the words out that he believed he had swallowed his false teeth.  The doctor was unmoved.

“Nonsense, man, get back to your room.  You haven’t swallowed your teeth any more than I have.”

But Humphrey could not be swayed and insisted that his false teeth were down his throat.   To calm the man, Dr. Brown called for an ambulance.  In the meantime, the commotion had aroused other guests who were now rushing about in the hallways trying to help.  The bellboy informed the clerk of the tragedy playing out upstairs and he ran into the street, returning with six big policemen.

“When the ambulance surgeon arrived the Captain’s room was filled with guests, policemen, and hotel employes,” reported The Times.  “The Captain was still grasping his throat, and was sure he felt the teeth.  The surgeon was ready for any operation necessary, even to heroic treatment with a knife.”

After a great deal of persuasion, Humphrey swallowed some water, then a piece of apple.  Both went down with no trouble and the somewhat disappointed crowd slowly dissipated into the hallways.   Finally the patient was convinced that he had, indeed, not swallowed his false teeth and he was left alone in his room.

An hour after Dr. Brown had fallen back asleep he was awakened by another knocking on his door—this time less urgent-sounding.  “There stood the Captain again, but he was not clutching his throat, and his face wore a very meek air.  In his hand he held a glittering object, which he thrust in the doctor’s face.  ‘Here they are, doctor,’ he said.  ‘Found ‘em back of the trunk.  Hadn’t swallowed ‘em at all.’”

The New York Times article followed up on the incident saying “Capt. Humphrey is a salesman for Miles Brothers, 102 Fulton Street.  He was about yesterday, and was obliged to submit to a great deal of chaffing, which he took good-naturedly.”

By then, the days of the United States Hotel were numbered.   On March 15, 1902, The Sun reported, “The United States Hotel in Fulton street is about to close, to be replaced by a big office building; so it was announced yesterday.”  It recalled that the hotel’s opening “was an event of importance to this town, because the scale of magnificence on which the hotel was planned made it easily the palace of its day.  Nothing like it in the hotel line had been constructed previously in New York.”

But progress had finally left the early Victorian hotel in the past.  “Fulton street was left far behind in the upward growth of the city,” explained The Sun, “and in recent years very few New Yorkers have even known that such a hotel existed in this city.”

The old hotel was purchased for $225,000 and The New-York Daily Tribune announced that the buyer “will build a twelve story commercial and office building on the premises.”  The Times lamented, “It means the sacrifice of another landmark of fifty or more years ago in the lower east side of Manhattan Island” and reminisced, “In the days of old its dining room and reading room were the meeting places of merchants, vessel owners, and skippers, who saw the world dimly, in comparison with those of these days of telephone, wireless telegraphy, and other wonderful things that have extended the horizon beyond the limits of human vision.  There stories of the sea, of struggles with wind and waves during long voyages, were told, and there the old-time merchants talked of ventures in trade with far-off lands—ventures that required nerve and foresight.”

On the site of the 1903 12-story building that replaced the hotel sits a soaring office structure -- photo by Alice Lum

 Many thanks to Allen Kaufman for suggesting this post

The 1807 Jasper Ward House -- No. 45 Peck Slip

photo by Alice Lum

In the first years of the 19^th century, the Ward brothers, Jasper and Bartholomew, grasped the opportunities of real estate development in the burgeoning city of New York.  In 1806 Jasper purchased the Captain William Lowndes estate consisting of half of the island that sat in the Hell’s Gate section of the East River.  The second half was later purchased by Bartholomew, and the land became known as Ward’s Island.

Jasper had already been busy along the Manhattan shoreline, buying potentially valuable lots along the ship slips with hopes of extending the buildable property with landfill.  His “water-grant” gave him the lots that extended 200 feet into the East River from the “low-water mark.”  

While Ward was eager to have the shoreline extended, other property owners were less enthusiastic.   On February 28, 1803 the minutes of the Common Council noted “The Street Commissioner to whom was referred the petition of jasper Ward for filling in the Lots between Pecks Slip and Waltons Wharf to the permanent line reported that the proprietors of the other Lots are averse to the measure, and that it is not expedient at present to grant the prayer of the said Petition Ordered that the said Report be confirmed.”

The landfill was finally granted and Ward judiciously waited about five years before building on the site—allowing the ground to settle and become stable.   Between 1807 and 1808 he erected three brick commercial structures at Nos. 41, 43 and 45 Peck Slip on land which a decade earlier had been under water.   Each had a heavy stone base with expansive, multi-paned windows for retail or office space.  Above, three floors of red brick with brownstone trim provided office space or rented rooms for seafaring sailors.

The mortar had barely set when Jasper Ward advertised No. 45 Peck Slip in the New York Evening Post on February 21, 1807.   Ward described the property as “a large and convenient counting-room on the second story, and one or two floors to let in the four-story brick store, corner of South Street and Peck Slip.”   He used all his marketing skills to tout the dock-front location as “a very excellent situation for a shipping and commission merchant, the store being directly in front of the broad and commodious pier, the east side of the Slip, at which vessels may discharge and take in their cargoes with more convenience than at any other Pier in the city.”

Henry B. Lambert answered the ad, opening his counting-room here on May 1, 1807.  He stayed on for three years.   Around the same time Benjamin Deforest moved in.  Deforest ran an import-export grocery business, Deforest & Smith, here, bringing hard-to-find items to New York consumers from distant lands.    When his partner started his own business and Deforest took in his nephew, the firm became N. Deforest & Co.  The wealthy grocery importer would continued to run his business from No. 45 Peck Slip for 17 years.

Ward’s renters apparently were more interested in profit than in maintaining the properties and on April 18, 1810 the Common Council deemed them a “nuisance.”   They were ordered “forthwith to cause the necessary repairs at their own expence [sic].”

Barnabas Osborn and Philander Hanford, also wholesale grocers, purchased the building in 1824 and twelve years later Osborn bought out his partner.  At the same time N. Hubbard & Co., another wholesale grocer, was doing business in the building.  The extent of Hubbard’s business can be judged by the amount of cargo it received a decade later in March and April alone.  In March the Barge C. Durant arrived in New York with a shipment of 420 boxes of candles for Hubbard.  Within a few weeks the Barge Henry delivered 440 barrels of “provisions” and the Barge Brutus docked with 296 barrels of provisions the same month.

The building continued to change hands throughout the 19^th century.  In 1837 Charles H. Pratt purchased it, running his shipchandler business, Pratt & Burr Chandlery, from the location until 1844.  Importer Elijah Roberts sublet part of the street level store.

Peter Hoeft ran his liquor business from No. 45 Peck Slip (last building on the row) when this engraving was made in 1850.--NYPL Collection

The widow of G. B. Miller, a Water Street tobacconist, purchased the building in 1844 and leased it to Peter Hoeft, a liquor dealer, who established his store on the ground floor and lived upstairs.   In 1880 Peter W. Hoeft improved the aging building by spending $300 to replace the corner granite post with a 7-inch diameter cast iron column.   The old windows were replaced and pressed metal lintels installed.

The retail space continued as a liquor store when Frank Glover bought 45 Peck Slip at public auction in 1894.   Succession of owners would slow when, in 1918, Mary and Frank Glover purchased the building with Marie and Anna Conlon.  The property would remain in Glover and Conlon hands until 1962.

By the early 20^th century the South Street seaport area was the center of New York’s wholesale fish industry.  Fishing boats docked along the waterfront each morning filled with freshly catches which were quickly bought up by the scores of fish dealers.  Among them was Acme Fish Company at No. 45 Peck Slip doing business on the ground floor while the upper stories served as a rooming house.

The 1920s gained a reputation as a time of rampant organized crime—bootlegging, extortion and strong-armed techniques of gangsters.    The seaport’s profitable fishing industry became rife with mob activity.

In July 1925 a grand jury heard testimonies of more than forty witnesses who told of attempts to force them out of business because they would not join “the combination” of eighteen wholesale fish dealers.  The group, which included Acme Fish Co., controlled over $20 million in fish sales a year; fixing prices paid to the fishermen and paid by the consumer.  Fishermen who did not agree to the prices were left with no one to buy their catch.  Any retail fish market who bought from a non-cooperative wholesaler was boycotted by the group. 

One woman, Laura E. Donsdall, who lived on a small plot of land on Pepin Lake, Wisconsin, thought it would be a good idea to sell lake fish.  She began buying the catch of local fishermen and selling it on the South Street market.   The tiny business was perceived as a threat to the organized dealers who began buying up land surrounding Donsdall “to drive her off her land” and harassing her.

David Finkelstein, owner of Acme Fish Co., was indicted on conspiracy to violate the Sherman Law.   The company survived and remained at No. 45 Peck Slip for at least another decade.

photo by Alice Lum

In the meantime, in 1928 architect Charles M. Straub and contractor Joseph Dembeck initiated a one-year alteration that converted the rooming house portion to offices and replaced the old stairs with new and assumedly safer ones.

As downtown Manhattan sprouted modern skyscrapers the South Street seaport area remained relatively unchanged.  Early 19^th century dock front buildings survived essentially overlooked and generally abused.    In 1962 the Inamly Corporation purchased No. 45 Peck Slip and that year the other two buildings erected by Jasper Ward were demolished.

In the early 1960s No. 45 Peck Slip (also known as 151 South Street) was derelict and vacant -- photo Library of Congress

In 1973 Con Edison announced the construction of a large electrical substation which would wipe out the last of Ward’s 1807 buildings.   Instead, however, the power company agreed to building around the lonely and derelict building.

A side view shows the Con Edison substation that was built around the 1807 building.  The restoration team had its work cut out for them -- photo Library of Congress

Con Edison donated it to South Street Seaport Museum which had been founded only a few years earlier.    In 1983 architect Robert E. Meadows headed an ambitious restoration of the devastated structure.

photo by Alice Lum

Today called the Jasper Ward House, the stranded structure is embraced by a utilitarian power substation that tries its best to fit in to the historic district.  The Jasper Ward House is, perhaps, a bit too restored with cutesy pseudo-Victorian painting on the façade more expected in Disney World than on an historic restoration.  But it is a small price to pay for the building's rescue at the 11^th hour and its subsequent recycling as a viable structure.

Fish, Murder and Gangsters -- No. 251 Water Street (22 Peck Slip)

Sweeping arched openings marked the street level -- photo by Alice Lum

The Civil War made John N. Eitel a prosperous man.   The government was desperate to keep a supply of recruits moving southward to fill the decimated ranks of the army and navy.  A system of “recruitment brokers” was initiated whereby a private citizen, as a broker, would receive $300 for each recruit who was accepted for service.  It was a handsome sum in the 1860s and the practice was a custom-fit for Eitel, who was a partner in the clothing firm John N. Eitel & Co. in the Fulton Street area.  Eitel sold apparel to naval recruits, making between $8 and $9 profit on each recruit.

Expanding the business to include the recruitment itself made sense.  But it soon caused problems.

Despite Eitel’s flawless reputation as a merchant and citizen, widespread corruption and fraud in the system put him under suspicion of the government.  Unscrupulous brokers would sign up false recruits, receive the $300 bounty, then the recruit would run away overnight, sharing the profits with the broker.

Between May 20 and October 9, 1864 1,284 recruits were enlisted by brokers.  Of them only 813 showed up on Governor’s and Hart’s Islands for duty.  The government was defrauded of $141,300 during that period alone—about $1.7 million today.

War Department detective Colonel Lafayette C. Baker was positive that Eitel was defrauding the government and on February 18, 1865 military police arrested him, whisking him away to the Old Capitol prison in Washington DC.  Neither his business partners nor his family was notified of his arrest.

When the details of his disappearance came to light, the War Department was flooded with letters and pleas for his release.  Not only did he have a faultless reputation in the community, his business was suffering from his absence and his wife had become ill from anxiety.

Military Judge Advocate General Joseph Hold refused to set bail or parole, saying the crimes “to which the prisoner is alleged to belong are so atrocious and strike so directly at the life of the military service that it is believe as a general rule the parties should not be paroled.” 

Abraham Lincoln disagreed.

He overruled the judge, writing on March 17, 1865 “Let this man be bailed, Mr. [Assistant Secretary of War Charles A.] Dana fix the amount."  The amount was $10,000 and a Republican placeman, Abram Wakeman of New York, immediately sent off a check in that amount.

Eitel continued in the clothing business and was partner in Lewis, Eitel & Co. at No. 8 Fulton Street in 1879.  By 1888 he owned the building at No. 251 Water Street where he ran his business.

But that year he decided to raze the old structure and put up a store-and-tenement on the site.  He hired architect Carl f. Eisenbach to design it. 

An overhanging cornice originally crowned the structure -- photo by Alice Lum

Despite the decidedly unfashionable area of docks, ships and rowdy sailors, Eisenbach produced a striking five-story amalgam of Romanesque Revival and Italianate styles in red brick with terra cotta trim.   Sweeping, broad arches provided window and entrance openings for the retail space, entered at No. 22 Peck Slip.  An elaborate terra cotta tympanum above the door to the residential space above, at No. 251 Water Street, carried on the arch motif.

A chain of sunflowers, a popular motif in the 1880s, adorns the elaborate tympanum above the entrance to the upper floors -- photo by Alice Lum

Delicate terra cotta bands ran along the second and fourth floors while somber terra cotta faces served as keystones to the fourth floor windows.   Costing Eitel $12,000 to build, it was a handsome and, perhaps, unexpected addition to the neighborhood.

The Historic American Buildings Survey of the National Park Service in 1933 noted that most of the terra cotta heads had been stolen "by vandals."  -- photo by Alice Lum

The upper floors were rented to two families per floor.  Eitel seems to have retired at this point because he did not re-establish his clothing business in the new building.

Among the tenants in 1894 was 63-year old widower August Loeffler.  A Civil War veteran, he lived here with his five children and earned his salary as a night watchman at the candy factory of Henry Heide at No. 179 Franklin Street.   A year earlier a packer in the factory, Bavarian-born Charles Miller, had been fired due to an argument he had with the old man; although from time to time he was brought back when business demanded extra help.

Miller was 25-years old and, according to The New York Times, “his habits were disreputable.”  Once a year, at New Year’s, his family would send him $400 from Bavaria to help him make ends meet.

On Tuesday, April 17, 1894 Charles Miller was doing work at the candy factory.  Andrew Lindner, a lozenge maker, left him there when he quit for the night.  August Loeffler never came home to his children the next morning.

At 6:00 am, engineer Frederick Rebmann stumbled over the watchman’s body in the basement of the factory.  The elderly man’s lantern was on the floor, broken, and a handkerchief had been placed over his face.  The coroner noted that Loeffler’s skull was fractured in several places, and his jaw and ribs were broken, giving “every indication that the attack on him had been atrociously brutal,” said The Times.

Investigation revealed that the watchman had caught Miller in the act of robbing the timekeeper’s desk and chased him to the basement.  There the robber grabbed a double-headed hammer and murdered the old man.

In 1897 Edward Weisberger purchased the building and, like Eitel, used it as rental income.  Weisberger’s business, a liquor store, was located at No. 148 Delancey Street.  He would retain possession of No. 251 Water Street until 1908.

As the 20^th century progressed, the area had become the epicenter of the fish trade.  On May 13, Frank Maibach and Rueben Hafter purchased the building.  The two were partners in the Level Fish Company, which ran the Eagle Fish Company out of the first floor space.  In 1922 they commissioned Abraham Farber and contractor Louis Sessler to do minor stair alterations, costing $500; and six years later hired architect Charles M. Straub to convert the second story from apartments to a dental office.

Business dealing in the fish market neighborhood was often corrupt and dangerous.   The South Street Seaport area which now teems with trendy shops and restaurants was rife with mobsters and goons.  In July 1925 the Eagle Fish Company refused to produced its books and papers to a Federal Grand Jury doing an anti-trust investigation.  Before the month was up, Frank Maibach was indicted on price fixing along with 11 others who “combined to control the price of fish” and “agreed to boycott fishermen and others who sold fish to independent dealers.”

Legal problems for Maibach continued and a year later he was convicted and fined $31,000 for violating Sherman Anti-trust laws. 

The fine did not deter him, however, and in June 1933 Maibach and his brother Jack, who was vice president of the Eagle Fish Company, were charged with conspiracy to monopolize and restrain interstate trade in fresh-water fish.  Included in the indictment were the American Federation of Labor, 24 corporations, 53 other individuals and three trade associations.

The same year that Maibach was charged with conspiracy to monopolize, in 1933, the above photograph was taken.  The attractive building was seriously abused.  -- photo Library of Congress

The New York Times noted that “to carry out the scheme [to control prices]…the defendants hired gangsters who assaulted retailers and their families, damaged motor vehicles, dumped fish in transit, threw stench bombs, induced the union to refuse to unload fish handled by independent retails, cut off electric current in stores and committed other acts of terrorism.”

Reuben Hafter died in 1937 and the Maibach family retained possession of the building at No. 251 Water Street until 1961 when it was sold to the Berbor Corporation.  By now the aged structure had been sorely abused.  The cornice had been stripped off and architectural thieves had made away with most of the terra cotta faces.

Prior to the renaissance of the South Street Seaport, the area around No. 22 Peck Slip was dismal at best -- photo Library of Congress

But as the historic buildings of the Fulton Street area were rediscovered, they were one-by-one restored.   No. 251 Water Street was converted to apartments in 1977—one per floor above the street level.  Today a restaurant and bar are housed in the ground floor where racketeers sold wholesale seafood.

photo by Alice Lum

Although the restoration has perhaps left the building a bit too manicured, it is a remarkable survivor.  The exuberant ornamentation over the residential door is exceptional and, luckily, a few of the dour terra cotta faces above the fourth floor windows remain.