Arthur Paul Hess's 1930 200 East 16th Street

 

Arthur Paul Hess was a busy man during the late 1920s.  He was not only an architect, but a builder and developer, president of the Middleton Estates, Inc.  As the decade waned, the firm acquired the properties at 200 through 204 East 16th Street, and 157 through 165 Third Avenue.  On April 27, 1929 (just six months before the Wall Street Crash), the Evening Post announced, "The Stuyvesant Park section is to have a new apartment house." The article said the building, "with terraced roof apartments...is to go up at 200 East Sixteenth Street, overlooking St. George's Church."  It ended saying, "Middleton Estates, Inc. are the owners and Arthur Paul Hess is the architect."

The 19-story and penthouse building was completed the following year at a cost of $850,000--about $16 million in 2025 terms.  Faced in reddish-brown brick, Hess's Art Deco design featured bold, contrasting brick bands above the first through third floors, and at the 16th floor, where setbacks began.  Above the entrance, which was framed in cast stone, were two striking terra cotta faux balconies with banded, curved telescoping edges.  The front sections of the balconies were decorated with bold sangria and white panels of stylized fountains or cornstalks.

The brick bands are laid with projecting corners, creating an angular, three-dimensional effect.

Prospective tenants could choose from one- through four-room apartments.  There were also five "studio garden apartments" in the penthouse level.  The units filled with a wide variety of residents.

Among the first was Philip A. Parke, a salesman.  The 45-year-old added his name to the growing list of Depression suicides on February 11, 1932.  The New York Times said he killed himself "by jumping to the elevated tracks at Forty-seventh Street, before a Third Avenue local."

Police Detective Charles F. Kane and his family lived here at the time.  In January 1933, he read a heart wrenching story in the newspapers about the death of Anna Mortimer.  The woman's husband, John, was 60 years old and had been out of work since the previous summer.  On the night of January 18, he telephoned the Polyclinic Hospital saying that he feared Anna was having a heart attack.  According to The New York Times, the clerk "refused to send a physician out to see her."  John and Anna tried to make it on foot, but she died on the sidewalk outside the hospital.

On January 21, The New York Times reported, "Saved from a pauper's grave by the generosity of Detective Charles F. Kane, Mrs. Anna Mortimer will be buried today in Calvary Cemetery.  The funeral expenses will be paid by the detective."  Kane told reporters he did not know the couple, but was moved by the story he read in the newspapers.

Among the Kanes' neighbors in the building were journalist Dudley Siddall and his wife, Dr. Dorothy Bocker.  The couple was married in 1926.  Born in Kalamazoo, Michigan in 1891, Siddall was on the staff of The Sun.  In addition to his journalist abilities (he had worked for newspapers in Michigan, Ohio and New York), he was educated at the Cleveland School of Art.  He was editor of The Sun's Saturday "fishing pages," and wrote the newspaper's boating guides for 1931 through 1933.

The couple was invited for Thanksgiving at the home of S. G. Stern in Grantwood, New Jersey in 1934.  What had started as a warm gathering turned tragic when Dudley Siddall suffered a fatal heart attack at the Sterns' home.

A colorful resident was 31-year-old Natalie Colby, who had a clever, if illicit, means of augmenting her income during the Depression years.  Colby (also known as Natalie Chadwick, Natalie Cohen, and Natalie Rosenbaum) was a former Ziegfeld Follies chorus girl and lived in what The Sun described as "an attractive three-room apartment."  She moved into that apartment in 1932.  Her neighbors and landlord, most likely, did not realize that she had just been released from Auburn Prison after a two year stint for burglary.

Colby would go to the race tracks and strike up conversations with well-to-do persons, "learn the addresses of these acquaintances and then rob their houses," explained The New York Sun on June 25, 1935.  Among her victims was Mrs. Simone Brooks of 400 East 57th Street.  She burglarized that apartment on March 30 and again three weeks later, making off with a total of $4,400 in "furs, jewelry and other personal property," according to The New York Times.  She was careless during the second heist and left a fingerprint on a mirror.

Natalie Colby's fingerprints were readily available.  The Sun said, "Mrs. Colby has a record of four arrests."  The newspaper reported, "From inquiries made in night clubs and among stage folk the police learned that Mrs. Colby was living at 200 East Sixteenth street."  When officers arrived at her apartment on the night of June 24, 1935, she "slammed the door in their faces."  She relented when they threatened to break down the door.

Describing Natalie Colby as "a comely young woman in a green dress," on June 26, The New York Times said that she "became the star of the daily police line-up yesterday."  Not only was Mrs. Simone Brooke there to pick her out, she identified some of the stolen property discovered in Colby's apartment.

Several of the residents of 200 East 16th Street were connected professionally with Tammany Hall.  Living here at the time of Colby's arrest were Joseph H. Morris and his wife, the former Helen McAuliff.  Since 1905 he had been a Democratic county committeeman and a member of the Tammany's Anawanda Club.  Among his close associates was Tammany Hall leader, Charles F. Murphy.  Another political ally was Joseph Hamerman, a lawyer.  He would be nominated as the Tammany candidate for Alderman from the Eighth District in October 1937.

A terrifying incident occurred here on November 28, 1935.  Abraham Simmers and his wife occupied a one-room apartment.  That afternoon Simmers's sister, Mayne Spilberg, was visiting.  As they chatted, Mrs. Simmers cleaned a dress with dry cleaning fluid.  Suddenly, at around 2:30, the fluid violently exploded.  The New York Times reported that it "forced forty other residents of the twenty-story building to the lobby.  Fire resulting from the explosion poured smoke through the building and wrecked the apartment where it started."

Firefighters quickly extinguished the fire, which was confined to the Simmers apartment.  Amazingly, while the apartment was devastated, all three of its occupants at the time survived.  They were taken to Columbus Hospital with "severe burns," according to the article.

The New York Sun journalist Gerry Fitch wrote a descriptive article about "A Polite Neighborhood" (Stuyvesant Square) on November 7, 1936.  After strolling through the "gentle English atmosphere of the place," he said, "I felt a bit of a shock upon noting the smart modernistic apartment building across the way at 200 East Sixteenth Street."  He described:

This terraced structure has chromium marquees under which stands a doorman as gorgeously uniformed as the King's guard.  With a white-gloved hand he imperiously disposed of me in the elevator that whisked me to the thirteenth floor on which was a three-room apartment available at $135 a month.  French doors open upon two terraces with east and south exposure.  An extra maid's bath and a little half-room off the kitchenette add to its individuality.

The monthly rent for the three-room apartment he described would translate to $3,000 today.

Born in 1882 and never married, Virginia Schwarte, who lived on the 13th floor, started teaching in New York City public schools in 1904.  In 1936, she taught far uptown in Public School 57 on East 115th Street.  In January 1937, she called in sick and was out that entire week.  Then she disappeared.  The New York Times said, "friends became alarmed and reported her missing to the police."  She re-emerged on March 19, saying she had gone to Boston, but offered no explanation of the trip.

Concerned about that Virginia was suffering a nervous breakdown, a friend, Dr. Agnes Smith, who lived in Newark, offered to stay with her for a few days.  Two days later, on March 21, Virginia "seemed in better spirits," said Dr. Smith.

But Virginia Schwarte was decidedly not in better spirits.  That morning Agnes Smith spoke to her from another room and got no reply.  She telephoned another teacher in the building, Mary Deming, who lived in the apartment directly below.  "Miss Deming looked out, and saw the body on an extension roof," reported The New York Times on March 22.  The 55-year-old teacher had jumped from the 13th floor window.

An interesting resident was Mrs. Elizabeth Beach, the mother of celebrated sculptor Chester Beach, and the widow of Chilion Beach, "who started the first book store in San Francisco," according to The New York Times on June 6, 1946.  Elizabeth shared the apartment with her unmarried daughter, Jean.  Elizabeth Beach's birthday celebration in their apartment the previous day had been a momentous one--her 100th.  Born in Bedford, New York in 1846, she "remembers rolling bandages at the age of 15 in New York for the Civil War fighters," said the article.  It added, "She wears no glasses and reads her newspaper without difficulty."

Another Tammany-related resident was former city official and newspaper writer William R. Peer, who lived here with his wife, Lucille and their two children, Roderick Johnson and Nancy.  Born in Brooklyn in 1906, he had been on the staff of The New York Post and the New York Daily Mirror.  On August 23, 1948, The New York Times reported that he had been named by Tammany leader Hugo E. Rogers as director of press and public relations for the New York County Democratic Committee.

In the summer of 1953, William and Lucille Peer allowed Roderick, who was 11, to go on vacation to Killawog, New York with family friends.  On July 9, Roderick and his friend, Wayne Davidson, who was also 11, went fishing off a train trestle of the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad.  Suddenly, a northbound train appeared.  The boys raced to get off the bridge and the Davidson boy made it to safety.  Roderick Peer did not.  He was instantly killed when the locomotive struck him.

Three months later, on November 20, newly-elected Mayor Robert F. Wagner appointed William Peer his press secretary.  In reporting the appointment, The New York Times said, "Mr. Peer will bring to his new post long experience in political and general public relations."  

The building was converted to cooperatives in 1987.  Although the doorman no longer wears the white gloves that so impressed a journalist in 1936, the residents enjoy amenities those tenants could not have dreamed off--a "fitness room with Peloton bike" and a "recreation room with a massive TV," according to StreetEasy.

The windows have been replaced and some unsympathetic brick repairs to the upper floors done, but Arthur Paul Hess's unusual Art Deco design survives generally intact.

photographs by the author

The Altered Charles Canda Mansion - 236 Second Avenue

 

image via loopnet.com

Charles and Adele Canda lived at 17 Lafayette Place in the mid-1850s.  Born in 1792 and 1804 respectively, their elegant neighborhood was populated with wealthy families like the Schermerhorns and Astors.  Charlotte's father had been an officer in Napoleon's army, as had been Charles's brother, Louis-Joseph-Florimond Canda.  (The familial connections with the French army prompted stories that it was Charles who served under Napoleon.)  The couple had one daughter, Charlotte, born on February 3, 1828.  (Some accounts purport that she was adopted, but there seems to be no evidence to support that.)  Also living with the family was Charles's much younger sister, Clemence, born in 1816.

The Candas' handsome Lafayette Place (later Lafayette Street) mansion is at the far left above.  The Evening World April 25, 1893 (copyright expired)

Charles Canda was a landscape artist.  As early as September 1831, he and Adele operated a school for young women at 46 Lispenard Street.  

Charles Canda painted this romantic landscape in 1822.  image via Sotheby's New York, May 2000

Charlotte was highly educated and, almost assuredly trained by her father, showed artistic talent.  The New York Evening Post described her by saying, "She was the familiar mistress of six languages besides being an accomplished musician and proficient of much...skill in drawing."

Clemence Canda died on November 23, 1844.  Moved by grief, Charlotte sketched a grand, complex memorial for her young aunt.  At the time, Charlotte was engaged to Charles-Albert Jarret de la Marie.  Ten years older than she, his family was French nobility.

Three months after Clemence's death, on February 3, 1845, Charlotte was invited to a party on Eleventh Street (that day was her 17th birthday).  Reportedly her parents refused to let her go.  The Morning Post later explained, "every one of her birthdays had been marked by some cross or mishap, frustrating the ordinary pleasant celebration of the day."  But then young friends came to the door, saying that the party was "nothing without her," and her parents relented.

The Evening Post reported that Charles engaged a cab to escort her to the party.  He returned to the Eleventh Street house at 11 p.m. to bring her home.  Riding with them was a friend.  They reached the young lady's house at 11:30.  Canda escorted her to the door, the driver waited next to the cab, and Charlotte sat alone inside.  Suddenly, the horses bolted, galloping to Broadway and then to Fourth Street and finally to their stable.  Charlotte was no longer in the carriage.  Canda and the cabbie found her unconscious in a snowbank.  Having jumped or been thrown from the vehicle, she had struck her head on the pavement.  She died that night.  

Canda discovered Charlotte's sketch for Clemence's monument.  He modified it to include personal symbols of his daughter and had sculptors Robert Launitz and John Franzee transform it into marble.  It marks her grave in Brooklyn's Green-Wood cemetery.

A 19th century stereoscope slide depicts Charlotte's self-designed memorial.

In 1857, Charles and Adele Canda began construction of a mansion at 244 Second Avenue, just north of East 14th Street and half a block south of the elegant Stuyvesant Square.  (The address would later be renumbered 236 Second Avenue).  Completed in 1858, the brownstone-fronted residence rose three floors.  Its formal Italianate design included floor-to-ceiling windows at the second floor, which were fronted by stone balconies and crowned with classical pediments.  Most likely, the first floor included a projecting parlor window and balcony, and a porticoed entrance.  The Evening World superfluously deemed it, "the most elegantly appointed mansion in the city."

The Candas had two live-in servants in 1860--most likely the cook and butler.  But they would have had several others who arrived daily, like the laundress, chambermaid, lady's maid and such.

Late on the night of April 29, 1863, a neighbor, John Graham, heard a noise.  Looking out his rear window, he realized that burglars had pried opened and entered one of the Candas' rear windows.  In a loud voice he hollered for his wife to bring him his pistols.  The ploy worked and the two thieves fled the mansion and clambered over the rear fence.  At the same moment, a policeman arrived and, after a chase and a significant hand-to-hand battle, apprehended one of them.  

Charles Canda praised his neighbor for saving "$500 worth of property," saying "but for the fact that Mr. Graham called aloud for his pistol [it] would have been in the possession of these burglars."  The property was silverplate and the valuation would translate to about $12,900 in 2025.

Canda died in the Second Avenue mansion on September 27, 1866 at the age of 73.  His funeral was held in the drawing room the following afternoon followed by a service at the Church of the Nativity.  

Adele sold the house to Richard Sager that year.  A condition of the transaction apparently allowed Adele to remain in the house with the Sager family.  She was still listed here when she died at Boulogne-sur-Mer, France on May 16, 1871.

A widower, Sager was a prominent pork and provisions packer.  The New York Times said he "had large dealings in the [Produce] Exchange."  The Sagers hosted glittering entertainments in the mansion.  On January 30, 1876, for instance, the New York Dispatch reported that the members of the Irving Amateur Club "held a most pleasant and brilliant social reception at the residence of Mr. Richard Sager, No. 236 Second avenue.  After recitations, a piano solo, and readings, "the remainder of the evening was devoted to dancing in the elegant parlors of the genial host, who with his affable sons and charming daughters did everything to make his guests happy."  The dancing was followed by "an elegant repast" and yet more dancing.

And on February 17, 1878, the New York Dispatch reported, "The Misses Marie and Mattie Sager, daughters of Mr. Richard Sager, of No. 236 Second avenue, formerly the Canda mansion, held a brilliant reception at their parlors on Friday evening in honor of the coming [of] age of Mr. Thomas Sager their eldest brother."  The article mentioned, "the company was large and fashionable, and the parlors, which are among the most elegant in New York city, presented a singularly brilliant and handsome appearance."

On June 2, 1885, The New York Times reported, "Richard Sager, an old citizen of New York, and a well-known member of the Produce Exchange, died very suddenly of heart disease at his residence in Second-avenue...on Sunday."  

The mansion was purchased around two years later by Charles Lindner.  In June 1889, he hired architects Rentz & Lange to "cut window openings in the north wall."  Interestingly, although there had always been an easement, or passageway, between the mansion and the property next door, the original architect had not included windows.  Lindner apparently did work on the mansion again in the summer of 1899.  The New York Journal and Advertiser succinctly reported on June 17, "A workman known only as 'Pat' fell from the roof of No. 236 Second avenue, and was instantly killed."

On November 9, 1900, The New York Times reported that Charles Linder "is about to leave this country to make his home in Germany."  The article said that he had placed his home for sale at $30,000 (about $1.16 million today) and described:

This house...is a fine, old fashioned place, which dates back to the time when Second Avenue was a fashionable quarter of the city.  It is the old Canda house, occupied by the family now best remembered by the monument to the young girl, Charlotte Canda, which is one of the sights of Greenwood Cemetery.

The house was purchased in December by the Little Mothers' Aid Society.  Organized the previous year, it provided day care for children of working mothers, offered homemaking classes, and hosted summer outings that afforded tenement children a brief respite from the city.  The New York Times deemed the house "in perfect condition, and is conveniently arranged for the work of the Little Mothers."  Before moving in, alterations were made for the organization's purposes, and remodeled the exterior of the ground floor.

The ground floor alterations were not especially attractive.  image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

The Times explained, "On the upper floor of the building are ten rooms, which the association...will use for the lodgings of its girls.  The remainder will be used for the club meetings, cooking and sewing classes, kindergarten and day nursery, and other branches of its work."  The former mansion became the headquarters of the Little Mothers' Aid Association (there were several branches in the city), and was called Happy Day House.

The Kindergarten Magazine and Pedagogical Digest, January 1907 (copyright expired)

An annual event at Happy Day House was the Better Babies Contest.  In 1913, 400 babies between three months to five years old--divided into three age groups--were entered.  A board of physicians examined each carefully and the parents of the winners in each category won $15.  This was not a beauty contest.  Its purpose was to engender nutrition, hygiene and pediatric care within the tenements.

The Little Mothers' Aid Association operated from 236 Second Avenue for decades, finally selling the building early in 1949 to the Jewish Ministers Cantors Association of America.  Founded in 1890, it was a fraternal organization of cantors.

The funeral of cantor Rev. Jacob Schwartz of Temple B'nai Jeshurun on June 9, 1953 was attended by "more than 1,000 persons," according to The New York Times.  The article said, "Later a service was held on the steps of the home of the Cantors Association at 236 Second Avenue, with hundreds watching in the street."

The Canda mansion was returned to a single family home--sort of--after real estate broker Gregg Marsh purchased it in 1979.  It was "restored and furnished with his own period furniture," according to The New York Times on April 25, 1981, noting that he "lives there but also rents it out, complete with caterer."  He named it Rutherford House, as a nod to the prestigious family who lived in the district in the early 19th century.  On the night before that article, Burt Bacharach and Carole Bayer Sager had hosted a "soiree musicale" here for 300 persons to introduce their first collaboration.

In the summer of 1984, developer Peter Sudarsky purchased the house and started a $1 million renovation.  On August 8, The New York Times reported it "will include a greenhouse addition to the ground-floor ballroom.  Mark Fahrer, a professional chef, has signed a long-term lease on the property and plans to reopen it in the fall as a catering and party facility."

Rutherford House became the venue of various benefits and other events.  In September 1986, for instance, it was the scene of "Murder at Rutherford House," a murder mystery and dining event.

Two years later came another renovation.  Completed by the New York Health and Racquet Club in September 1988, "River Club" included, "ornate game rooms, ballroom dancing and 10 kinds of bottled water at dinner," according to The Times.

There would be more changes to come.  In 2000, the building was converted to Gateway School.  The renovations to alter a former mansion into an educational facility with classrooms, a gymnasium, library and auditorium necessitated a two-story addition that starkly clashes architecturally with the original structure.

photograph by Carole Teller

Gateway School sold the building in 2009.  It is still listed as a commercial structure.

many thanks to reader Carole Teller for suggesting this post

The 1902 The Rutherford - 206-208 East 17th Street

 

At the turn of the last century, residents in the Stuyvesant Park neighborhood saw the beginnings of a transformation, as private homes were being replaced with upscale apartment buildings.  On March 8, 1902, the Real Estate Record & Guide reported that two more residences, 206 and 208 East 17th Street, had been purchased by Isidor Mishkind and "a six-story flat will be erected."

Mishkind and his partner William Feinberg hired the architectural firm of Sass & Smallheiser to design the 44-foot-wide building.  The plans, filed in September, projected the cost of construction at $65,000, or about $2.37 million in 2025.  Completed the following year, The Rutherford was faced in beige brick above a rusticated limestone base.  The entrance was sheltered by a handsome portico supported by Ionic columns and pilasters.  The architects gave the building dimension by gently rounding the end bays.  They splashed the Renaissance Revival design with touches of Beaux Arts, like the richly carved oval windows on either side of the entrance.

Apartments in The Rutherford ranged from three to five rooms with a bath.  An advertisement stressed that it sat within a "refined residential section" and boasted an elevator.  A five-room apartment cost $42, an affordable $1,500 per month by today's conversion.

Among the early residents was Benjamin Thackara and his wife.  He was the "outside superintendent" of the Tiffany Studios Building and was in charge of its physical maintenance.  

The Thackaras were already here when Jean N. McIlwraith and Imogen Harding moved into the building in 1904.  According to Eva-Marie Kröller's Writing the Empire, The McIlwraiths, 1853-1948, McIlwraith had to share the apartment because she "had to count her pennies."  

Jean N. McIlwraith, Canadian Magazine, June 1901 (copyright expired)

Imogene was a music student and the women's apartment had a piano.  According to Kröller, both joined the choir at nearby St. George's Church on Stuyvesant Square.  McIlwraith worked for publishing companies, eventually becoming head reader at Doubleday, Page and Co.  She would write children's books, an opera, and historical romance novels.

Edward B. Schmalholz, was presumably living here alone when McIlwraith and Harding moved in.  He was described by The New York Times as "a well-to-do butcher" whose shop was at 73 Third Avenue.  The previous year, his wife, Margaret, left with their two children, ten-year-0ld Theodore and eight-year-old Edith.  She and the children moved into the home of her sister and brother-in-law on West 83rd Street.

Schmalholz devised a dastardly scheme to end the monthly support he gave his wife.  In the winter of 1904, Margaret attended an affair at the Waldorf-Astoria.  She met a dashing young man, "who said he was Capt. Phillip K. Stone" of the U.S. Army, reported The New York Times.  In fact, the soldier was Philip K. Sweet, a private detective.

Schmalholz visited the children every Wednesday, and during a visit the following summer, he said that Theodore looked sickly and offered Margaret $100 to take the children to Lake Placid.  She was surprised to run into Captain Stone there.  At one point Margaret sprained her ankle and Stone offered to help.  The New York Times reported, "He was in the act of applying the ice, the children being in another room, when the door was broken in and Mrs. Schmalholz's husband and several other men rushed in."  

Edward Schmalholz filed divorce papers, naming Stone as her lover.  Margaret charged him for conspiracy, exposing Stone and Sweet as the same person and alleging, "her husband wants to get out of paying further alimony and desires to be free to marry a woman who is now living at 206 West Seventeenth Street."  (The woman who answered a reporter's call to Schmalholz's apartment identified herself as the housekeeper.)

Joseph J. Evans and his wife had a remarkable houseguest in 1906--Evans's mother-in-law Hepsa Daggett Cottle.  Born in 1809, Cottle lived on Nob Hill in San Francisco.  When the earthquake and subsequent fires destroyed her house "almost around my ears," as she described the disaster, she found herself homeless.  And so, the 97-year-old (who had never been in an automobile) drove cross-country to visit the Evanses.  The Sun said, "After trying a short ride about town she motored to Boston and back and enjoyed the trip hugely."

Abraham Levi was the partner of Isaac Picker in their importing business at 12 Union Square.  The two men were arrested early in 1912 for receiving stolen goods after a bizarre investigation.  Fifteen reels of silent films had been stolen during a break-in at the General Film Company on Sixth Avenue.  Detectives suspected 20-year-old Victor Weiss and trailed him as he repeatedly visited Levi and Picker.  But he never carried anything into the shop.

Finally, detectives detained Weiss at 14th Street and Sixth Avenue as he neared Levi and Picker's office.  In its March 1912 issue, Moving Picture News reported, "After a cursory search, they found no stolen property on him and were about to release him when one of the detectives opened the youth's vest."  Weiss had spirited the movies one-by-one by winding the film around his body.  The article said, "An end of the film dropped down.  After removing Weiss' overcoat and coat the detectives spun him around like a top until the film was unrolled."  

The occupants of The Rutherford continued to be professional.  Living here in the years before World War I were pharmacist Eugene C. Osborn, whose drugstore was at 131 Third Avenue; pathologist Dr. James G. Callison; and artist William Grimm.  Dr. Callison would still be here in the mid-1920s when Dr. Sandor Roth occupied an apartment.

Living here six months a year in the early 1930s was Amandus Hochman, who had served in the Prussian Army during the War of 1870.  He came to America in 1873 and had worked as a bank guard.  Now he divided his time between his daughter's family here in The Rutherford and his other daughter's farm in Hopewell, New Jersey.

On January 7, 1935, the superintendent of the building told The New York Post that Amandus Hochman, was "taken back to New Jersey yesterday by State troopers, who came here for him in a car."  The 87-year-old Hochman was not in trouble.  He was being escorted to testify in the trial of the Charles Lindbergh baby kidnapping.  The New York Post said Hochman, who was "quite feeble," was "prepared to take the witness stand and identify Bruno Richard Hauptmann as a man he talked with on the night of the Lindbergh kidnapping."

Amandus Hochman (original source unknown)

Hochman testified that on the afternoon of the kidnapping, he witnessed Hauptmann stall his sedan by the road to his family's farm in Hopewell.  He claimed he noticed a ladder in the car, presumably the one used to climb into the Lindbergh baby's window.

Grace Avery and her daughter, Elizabeth Harrison Avery, were residents in the early 1940s.  Grace's husband, Commander Harrison Avery of the U.S. Navy, had died of a heart attack on board his patrol vessel in 1934.  Grace's son, Harrison, Jr. was a cadet in the Army Air Force in Greensboro, North Carolina.  As a child of a military family, Elizabeth had not only attended the Brooklyn Friends School and the Katharine Gibbs School, but the Shanghai American School in China.  The military tradition continued within the family when Elizabeth married Ensign Adam A. Smyser in St. George's Church on Christmas Day 1943.

A renovation completed in 1974 resulted in four apartments per floor.  Happily, the exterior of Sass & Smallheiser's "delightful, rather playful design," as worded by the Landmark Preservation Commission the following year, is almost totally intact.

photographs by the author

The 1851 Henry P. Marshall Residence - 214 East 17th Street

 

Developer James Foster erected five upscale, high-stooped residences in 1850-51 on the southern blockfront of East 17th Street between Rutherford Place and Third Avenue.  The Greek Revival-style homes were three stories tall above English basements.  Faced in red brick and trimmed in brownstone, they originally exhibited the distinctive entrances of the style, with sturdy pilasters upholding a heavy entablature.

Foster originally leased 115 East 17th Street (renumbered 214 in 1867).  The De Marcarty (sometimes spelled Demacarty) family were the first occupants.  Gustave de Marcarty was a teller with the Bank of New York.  The family of Ebenezer R. Duplignac, Jr., who operated a varnish business on Peck Slip, lived here in 1855 and 1856.

Henry Perry Marshall next leased the house, finally buying it from Foster in 1859.  Born in Woodbury, Connecticut in 1814, he married Cornelia E. Conrad on November 28, 1840.  The couple had five small children--Julia Perry, Blandina Tappan, Frederic Panet, Henry Rutgers and Cornelia Ellsworth.  They ranged from 3 to 14 years old in 1859.  (The couple's first child, John Henry, had died in 1850 at the age of nine.)  The family's country homes were in Hastings-on-Hudson, New York and Woodbury, Vermont.

Henry P. Marshall started out in the importing business.  In 1840, he was appointed American Consul in Muscat, remaining there until 1843 when he joined the Seamen's Bank for Savings.  As the cashier of the bank, his highly responsible position tasked him with tracking its transactions and balancing its books.  

Henry Perry Marshall.  (original source unknown)

The two Marshall boys attended Columbia College.  By 1879, Frederic was an attorney and Henry was an architect and author.  Henry married Julia Robbins Gillman in 1881.  Among his designs would be Rudyard Kipling's home, Naulakha, in Vermont, and the original Brearley School in New York City.

Frederic Panet Marshall was in Thomasville, Georgia in the winter of 1886.  He died there from Bright's Disease on December 30.  Marshall's body was brought back to New York for his funeral in the nearby St. George's Church on January 2, 1887.  (Henry P. Marshall, incidentally, had been treasurer of the St. George Episcopal Church Society for years.)  

There would be two more Marshall funerals within a short period.  The family was at Hastings-on-Hudson on September 7, 1887, when Cornelia died at the age of 72 "after a lingering illness," according to The New York Times.  

The following summer, Henry Marshall "suffered an attack of malaria," as reported by The New York Times on November 17, adding that he "had not been the same man since."  On November 16, Marshall was busy at his office until 2:00, when he and William C. Sturges, the bank's president, went to the dining room adjacent to the two men's offices for lunch.  Their food was served and, according to The New York Times, Marshall said to Sturges, "Mr. Blank called this morning," and then "his head fell forward on his breast and he was apparently dead."

In reporting his death, The New York Times said,

Perhaps no bank Cashier in this city was known to more people than Mr. Marshall...Not only did he know most of the New-York financiers of to-day, but through his long banking career had a fund of personal reminiscences of great speculators whose doings on the street are now only a memory.

Just weeks after Marshall's funeral, his sterling reputation was tarnished.  On January 19, 1889, The Sun ran the headline, "Mission Moneys Missing / $20,000 That The Late Henry P. Marshall Held Vanished."  In addition to the St. George's Episcopal Church Society, Marshall had been treasurer of the Protestant Episcopal Church Missionary Society for Seamen.  The Sun explained, "Other church societies came to him with their money, until he cared for the funds of half a dozen of the largest and richest of Bishop Potter's societies."

After Marshall's death, the books of the Missionary Society were audited.  Although they showed a balance of $20,000, there was no money in the society's account.  The following day, The New York Times reported that the deficit had risen to $60,000 (about $1.9 million in 2025 terms).  The article was titled, "A Great Trust Betrayed."

The two unmarried daughters, Julia and Cornelia, continued to live in the East 17th Street house at least through 1891.  That year Julia was a trustee of the New York Infirmary.

At the turn of the century, Dr. David D. Jennings and his wife, who was a nurse, rented 214 East 17th Street.  They remained until April 1903, when Julie Faversham and her mother, Mary Opp, purchased the house.

Julie and William Faversham were well-known to theater audiences.  Born in New York City in 1873, Julie Opp began writing in 1893, focusing on theater journalism.  She traveled to Paris to interview the world famous opera singer Emma Calvé and actress Sarah Bernhardt.  According to Who's Who on The Stage in 1908, "Both urged her to adopt the stage as a profession, offering their advice, influence and support."

Julie Opp made her debut in 1896.  At the turn of the century, she first played opposite English born William Faversham.  The couple was married in 1902.  Julie continued to use her maiden name on the stage.  

Julie Opp, The American Stage of To-Day, 1910 (copyright expired)

William Faversham's matinee idol looks made him a favorite leading man.  At the turn of the century, he was one of the highest paid actors in the country, reportedly earning as much as $5 million a year.

William Faversham in 1907.  from the collection of the New York Public Library

What today would be called a power couple, the Favershams maintained a Long Island residence and a sprawling estate, The Old Manor, in Chiddingfold, England.  The Jacobean-style mansion was built in 1503 and held 14 bedrooms and was surrounded by "25 acres of park land," according to The New York Times.

On May 6, 1908, The Evening Post reported that plans had been filed for adding a fourth story to the East 17th Street house "to be made for Mary Opp as owner."  Designed by Hunt & Hunt, the new floor took the form of a steep mansard punctured by three dormers.  The architects added sheet metal lintels to the lower floor windows, those of the parlor floor including dentils and egg-and-dart moldings.

The parlor floor cornices with their intricate details, are unusual.

Entertainments in the Faversham house included a blend of theater, musical and society figures.  On February 13, 1911, for instance, The New York Times reported on a dinner party the previous evening "in honor of Mr. Faversham's birthday."  Among the guests were conductor and violinist David Mannes and his wife, novelist Princess Troubetzkoy, and socialite Mrs. John Alexander.

Julie and William pose in the Rosemary Open-Air Theatre in Huntington, Long Island in 1917 with sons William and Philip.  from the collection of the Library of Congress.

At some point, Julie took full ownership of the East 17th Street house.  Perhaps revealing the strained relationship between William and his mother-in-law, the couple charged Mary Opp rent--$800 per year.

In 1915, Faversham first appeared in motion pictures.  He continued to accept Broadway roles, and in 1921 was appearing at the Selwyn Theatre in The Prince and the Pauper.  

When he and Julie arrived home on February 13 that year, after being guests of a dinner party for his birthday, "they thought burglars were in the house," according to the New York Herald.  Instead, the parlors were filled with friends throwing a surprise birthday party for William.

It would be the last large entertainment in the house for the Favershams.  In 1915, Julie had appeared with William in The Hawk.  But illness ended her career after that.  Shortly after the party, William traveled to Columbus, Ohio with The Prince and the Pauper.  On April 8, 1921, he received a telegram that Julie had died that day at the Post-Graduate Hospital following an operation.  The New-York Tribune called her, "one of America's stage favorites."

The following month, William advertised Julie's 1918 Cadillac landaulet for sale, saying, "the car is now as good as new; property of the late Mrs. William Faversham."  

The acrimony between Faversham and Mary Opp soon became public.  In August 1922, Faversham sued Opp for $100,000 "for her support [during] twenty years at the East 17th Street home," reported The Evening World.  Mrs. Opp told the court "that she is in dire circumstances as a result of transactions in which the actor was concerned," said the article, explaining that she had loaned the couple $11,000 over the years.  Faversham insisted that the loans, "were actually advanced to his wife, Julie Opp Faversham, and that he made no promises to repay them."

In 1924, the once sumptuous residence was converted to a rooming house by the new owner, B. Leavin.  The Department of Buildings cautioned, "not more than 15 sleeping rooms" in the building.  In the renovation, the stoop was removed, the entrance lowered to the English basement level, and a fire escape attached to the facade.  

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

Leavin advertised in The New York Medical Week in September 26, 1925, "Ground floor in newly altered house.  Will alter floor to suit responsible physician."

That ground floor space would remain a physician's office for decades, first occupied by Dr. Joseph S. Stovin.  In the mid-1930s Dr. Max K. Silverman's office was here.

In 1959, the building was converted to apartments, two per floor except the top floor, which held one.  Living here in the 1960s was well-known artist and designer Douglass Semonin.  His paintings were shown at the Graham Galleries in New York and the De Young Museum in San Francisco.  In 1964, the American Institute of Decorators awarded him the International Design Award for his "Town and Country" design.  He died in his apartment on October 26, 1971 at the age of 45.

A renovation completed in 1999 resulted in a total of four apartments in the house.  Even without its stoop, the building looks much as it did when two stars of the theater remodeled it in 1908.

photographs by the author

The Margaret Neilson House - 237 East 17th Street

 

Around 1853,  Lewis Morris Rutherford began construction of a handsome, 29-foot-wide home at 126 East 17th Street (renumbered 237 in 1866).  A wide stoop rose to the arched entranced flanked by engaged Doric columns upholding a molded entablature.  The floor-to-ceiling parlor windows were fronted by a full-width cast iron balcony.  The fully-framed openings wore molded cornices and sills.  Although Italianate in style, the house exhibited a carry-over from the waning Greek Revival style in the squat attic windows below the exuberant cornice.

Although defaced with iron fire escapes and rooftop fencing, most of the original architectural elements survived in 1941.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

Rutherford sold the newly completed house in 1856 to Margaret Ann Fish Neilson, a relative of his wife, Margaret Stuyvesant Chandler.  According to her son-in-law, Maitland Armstrong in his 1920 Day Before Yesterday, the house "cost over fifty thousand dollars."  If his memory was correct, Margaret paid the equivalent of about $1.6 million by 2022 standards.

Born on February 11, 1807, Margaret was the daughter of Nicholas Fish and Elizabeth Stuyvesant, both of whom came from old and prominent families.  Nicholas Fish had been appointed Adjutant General of New York State following the Revolution, and Elizabeth Stuyvesant was a direct descendant of the Dutch director-general of New Netherland, Petrus Stuyvesant.  

Margaret's husband, Dr. John Neilson, had died on September 22, 1851 at the age of 52.  The couple had six children, Mary Noel, Nicholas Fish, Margaret A., John Jr., Julia K., and Helen.  The neighborhood was filled with Stuyvesant and Fish families, and Margaret's brother, Hamilton Fish, lived steps away at the corner of East 17th Street and Second Avenue.  

Margaret Ann Fish Neilson (original source unknown)

Moving in with her was son John Jr., a real estate agent, and her unmarried daughters.  (Nicholas Fish Neilson had died in 1855 at the age of 23.)  Julia married Robert Peabody Barry in the parlor in 1865, and Helen's wedding to Maitland Armstrong was held here on December 6 the following year.

The Armstrongs moved elsewhere, but Julia and her husband stayed on in the East 17th Street house.  Little by little the population of Margaret's home increased.  Herbert Barry was born in 1867, and Lewis Peabody came along the following year.  Sadly, the parlor where his parents were married was the scene of Lewis's funeral on August 14, 1870.  The little boy was just 14 months old.  Julia was pregnant at the time, and three months later a third child, John Neilson, was born.

Although she retained possession of it, Margaret and her family left the East 17th Street house around 1874.  It was being leased to a Mrs. Shook in 1875 as a high-end boarding house.  Among the tenants in 1878 were Philo E. Doolittle, a dry goods merchant, his wife, the former Elizabeth Marks, and his mother and step-father, Caroline D. and Charles Wilson.  It was not a peaceful coexistence.

On July 14, 1878, The New York Times reported, "A singular spectacle was witnessed yesterday in the Fifty-seventh-Street Police Court.  At the bar stood a very respectable-looking and well-dressed man, a septuagenarian, and close by him stood his wife, his step-son, and his step-daughter-in-law."  The elderly man was Charles Wilson and he faced charges of having threatened the life of Elizabeth Doolittle.  The article pointed out that all four lived in the same household, but Wilson, "has incurred the enmity of his family and relatives by his extraordinary rash conduct at times."  

Justice Kilbreth pointed to Elizabeth Doolittle and said to Wilson, "This lady says that you were about to strike her with a large iron poker when prevented by her husband, and that you also had in your possession a loaded cane.  What have you to say?"

Wilson said, "All I have to say is that if she says so she lies."

He then explained that on that morning his wife was in the rear yard and called for the servant girl, who was upstairs.  She did not respond.  Caroline Wilson called repeatedly, with no answer.  And so, Wilson stormed upstairs and berated the girl.  "You heard my wife call you, why did you not answer?"  Wilson continued, "She said nothing, and I told her that if she did not answer my wife the next time she was called I would jerk her liver out.  This woman here, Mrs. Doolittle, then interfered, but what she said about me threatening to take her life with a poker is an utter falsehood.  We had a few words but that is all."

Unfortunately for Wilson, his step-son, his wife, and the arresting officer all testified that he had had a poker.  He was sent to Blackwell's Island for six months.  Despite the tensions, the extended family was still here a year later.

Margaret Fish Neilson died on March 3, 1877 at the age of 70.  The East 17th Street house was inherited in equal parts by her children.   (In April 1882, Julia K. Barry, who now lived with her family in Warrentown, Virginia, sold her portion to her sister Margaret, for $5,500, about $150,000 in 2022.)  The siblings continued to lease the house, which was still being operated as a fashionable boarding house.

Among the residents in the mid-1880's were Lt. Butler Coles and his wife.  Born in 1831, he came from a military family.  His grandfather was General Nathaniel Coles, and his father was Major General Nathaniel Coles.  During the Civil War, Butler Coles had served three months at Harper's Ferry, and was later captured, spending seven months at Libby Prison.  There he contracted "infirmities from which he never fully recovered," according to the Huntington Long Islander.  He was now associated with Tweedy & Co., a hat manufacturing firm. 

Coloratura soprano Annie Louise Tanner lived here in 1891.  Her husband, Wells B. Tanner had died in 1885.  Said to have a vocal range of three octaves, she had been a member of the Ovide Musin Concert Company since 1888.  The Geneva Advertiser said possessed "so phenomenal a range for a soprano voice to be styled the 'American Nightingale.'"

Annie Louise Tanner-Musin (original source unknown)

The East 17th Street house was the scene of what The Geneva Advertiser called "a wedding of music" on October 7, 1891.  Annie Louise Tanner was married to her employer, violinist Ovide Musin.  The virtuoso groom had been awarded first prize for violin at the Royal Conservatory of Liège, Belgium when he was just 11 years old.  The couple would perform together for years, touring world-wide.

In April 1900, Margaret Neilson's heirs sold 237 East 17th Street.  Again a single-family residence, it became home to Lewis Henry Morgan and his wife, Camilla Leonard.  The couple had two children, Henry Carey, who was eight years old at the time, and Camilla, who was seven.  Shockingly, a year later on October 31, 1901, Morgan died in the house at the age of just 35.

Camilla briefly leased the house to former Nevada Senator John Percival Jones.  He and his wife, the former Georgina Frances Sullivan, had three daughters, Alice, Georgina Frances, and Marion.  

Marion had already made a name for herself outside of society teas and ballrooms.  An accomplished tennis player, she won the women's single's titles at the 1899 and 1902 U. S. Championships.  At the 1900 Summer Olympics, she became the first American woman to win an Olympic medal.

The Joneses announced Marion's engagement to architect and violinist Robert Farquhar in June 18, 1903.  Her wedding in Grace Church took place on September 29.  The Evening Telegram noted, "Several hundred guests were invited to the ceremony, which was followed by a reception at the residence of the bride's parents."

The family of banker and businessman William Fellowes Morgan, the brother of Lewis Henry Morgan, was in the East 17th Street house the following year.  Coincidentally, his wife, the former Emma Leavitt, was also a tennis champion, having won the Women's National Doubles Championship in 1891.  She was an accomplished golfer, as well, and "won many golf trophies," according to The New York Times later.

The couple had three children, Beatrice, William Jr., and Pauline (known as Polly).  The family moved into the house just in time for Beatrice's coming out.  Her debutante entertainments began with a reception at here on December 7, 1904.

Young men were slipped into adult society more quietly.  On the evening of April 7, 1905, the Morgans gave "an entertainment for young girls and boys...in honor of W. Fellowes Morgan Jr.," as reported by The New York Times.

The Morgans' social status was reflected in Beatrice's marriage to Frederick S. Pruyn in St. George's Church on February 4, 1907.  Calling her "the very attractive daughter of Mr. and Mrs. William Fellowes Morgan," The Argus said her wedding "will be a large and fashionable one, and the bridal procession should be one of the prettiest seen there in a long time, for Miss Morgan has chosen ten of the most charming young women of society for her bridesmaids, and her sister, Miss Pauline Morgan, as maid of honor."  The reception was held in the East 17th Street house.

Immense change came in October 1909 when St. Andrew's Convalescent Hospital for Women took title to the mansion.  Founded in June 1886 by the Sisters of St. John Baptist in a "pleasant house" opposite St. George's Church, it originally could accommodate 12 patients.  Since 1889 it had been operating from 213 East 17th Street, and in the 1890's expanded into 211 next door.

In 1908 the facility sought to expand again.  The 1919 History of Medicine in New York explained, "While the question was under consideration, the house, No. 237 East 17th street, on Stuyvesant Square, was offered to the hospital.  The house, a very desirable one, needing very little alteration, the trustees after somewhat protracted negotiation acquired for $47,500."  The renovations began in June 1911 with an elevator, fire escapes and a new "heating plant." 

The St. Andrew's Convalescent Hospital was a sort of recuperation or rehabilitation facility for patients deemed by the Sisters as being morally fit for care.  In 1915 the Directory of Social and Health Agencies described it saying,  "For women, girls, and children of good character, who need care, nursing, and rest, or who are recovering from acute illness, but not ill enough to be admitted to a regular hospital.  It receives promptly, with or without payment, all suitable cases."  The facility could accommodate 35 patients.

The Living Church Annual, 1928

St. Andrew's Convalescent Hospital depended greatly on donations.  Socialites often held benefit events, such as bridge parties, to raise funds.  It appears that by the early 1940's the facility no longer offered free accommodations.  An advertisement in The Living Church on January 14, 1942 noted private rooms cost $10 to $15.

After operating from the former mansion for four decades, in 1957 St. Andrew's Convalescent Hospital closed the East 17th Street facility.  The building was converted to the Gramercy Park Nursing Home that year.  It was most likely at this time that nearly all of the Italianate details were shaved off the facade and the brownstone was either removed or covered with a brick veneer. 

The proprietor of the Gramercy Park Nursing Home, Eugene Hollander, might have been a bit nervous when he received a summons from Congress that read in part:

You are hereby commanded to appear before the Special Committee on Aging of the Senate of the Unites State, on January 21, 1975, at 10 o'clock a.m. at 270 Broadway, New York, New York...The Committee requests your appearance along with all business records relating to the operation of the above named facility from 1969 to the present.

The Committee had good reason to suspect Hollander of misdoings.  On February 3, 1976, The New York Times reported, "Eugene Hollander, a major figure in the nursing-home industry here, pleaded guilty yesterday to state and Federal charges of bilking Medicaid of hundreds of thousands of dollars to pay for such personal items as paintings by Renoir, Utrillo and Mary Cassatt, and furnishing and decorating his apartment at 980 Fifth Avenue."

The scandal put an end to the Gramercy Park Nursing Home.  The following year the building was converted to apartments with doctors' offices in the basement level.

Sadly "modernized," the former Neilson mansion still shows hints of its former grandeur in the surviving stoop and balcony ironwork, and in the partial enframement of the entranceway.

photographs by the author

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