The 1928 Belvoir - 470 West End Avenue

 

Known for its lavish private homes in the late 19th century, West End Avenue would, instead, be lined by high-end apartment buildings before the 1930s.  In 1927, the newly formed 470 West End Avenue Corporation demolished the seven houses at the southeast corner of West End Avenue and West 83rd Street and hired architect George F. Pelham to design a 15-story apartment building on the site.

Construction, which was completed in 1928, cost the equivalent of $28.2 million in 2026.  Pelham faced his tripartite, Renaissance Revival design in sandy-colored brick.  Stone quoins and cast stone panels of swags and cartouches decorated the two-story base.  The entrance sat within a handsome, double-height frame that terminated in a broken pediment and urn.

Faux Venetian-style balconies at the eighth and fourteenth floors relieved the otherwise unembellished mid- and top sections.  Rather than a parapet, Pelham capped the brick cornice with brick piers connected with iron railings.

The building filled with a variety of well-to-do residents.  Among the first were Louis W. Herman and his wife, Hortense; orchestra leader Eddie Elkins; and printing executive John L. Schoenfeld.

Born in 1897, violinist Eddie Elkins was the leader of the 10-piece Knickerbocker Grill Orchestra.  He and his jazz band made several dance records.  On December 10, 1929, they were at the Manhattan Studios on Park Avenue and 134th Street where they were to be part of a scene in the motion picture The Black and White Review.  A fire broke out and a disaster reminiscent of the Triangle Shirtwaist blaze followed.  A sub-headline in The Evening Post read, "Actors Killed In Jam At Exit...100 Caught in Flaming 2-Story Brick Building Used to Make Sound Pictures."

Violinist and orchestra leader Eddie Elkins (original source unknown)

A sub-headline in The Staten Island Advance read: "Girls in Blazing Ballet Dresses Leap to Death from Upper Windows." 

Eddie Elkins survived and was interviewed by The Evening Post in his apartment that evening.  He told the reporter that, "a slight crackling sound behind a pile of scenery first made him think something might be amiss.  When he stepped around the obstacle, a heavy drapery was blazing furiously and while he looked, the flames leaped to the rafters of the studio."

Elkins shouted an alarm toward the dressing rooms, but many of the performers thought he was calling them to the stage and finished their costuming.  Elkins ran up the stairs "for the $1,000 violin he had left in his quarters," recounted the article.  He grabbed it, leaving behind his bow, valued at $100.  In rescuing the instrument, he suffered "burns about the body."  In the end, 10 persons lost their lives and 20 were injured.

Louis W. Herman was a "registered stock specialist," as described by The New York Times.  He and Hortense escaped the Manhattan winter in 1930 by going to Palm Beach, Florida.  On February 26, thieves broke into their suite in the Ambassador Hotel.  Part of an underworld gang involved in burglaries, murder and counterfeiting, they escaped with $40,000 in Hortense's jewelry (about $771,000 today).  

Three months later, on May 28, The Sun ran the headline: "Gem Band Linked To Murder; Million In Bad Money Seized."  New York detectives had raided a hotel room, arrested the men, and seized "$300,000 in jewelry," according to the article.  Possible victims were contacted and The Sun reported, "Mrs. L. W. Herman of 470 West End avenue came in her limousine to Police Headquarters, where a dazzling array of jewels...is laid in a strong guarded room for inspection."  Hortense identified 11 of the 27 pieces.

Terra cotta frames pretend to be Venetian balconies.

The Hermans' wealth was reflected the following year when Louis protested his taxes.  On December 15, 1931, The New York Times reported, "An income tax refund of $42,500 for the year 1919 has been awarded to Louis W. Herman of New York as a result of a Federal court decision."  Herman's rebate would equal just under $900,000 today.

Other residents in the 1930s included Max Greenberg, president of the Paramount Hotel Corporation; Herman Kushner, president of the Luckey Style Dress Corp.; Frank Margulies; and Joseph and Bertha Bulova.  

Joseph Bulova was born in 1851 in a village near Prague, Czechoslovakia.  As a boy, he was apprenticed to a jeweler and in 1869, as an 18-year-old, he immigrated to New York City "with fifty cents," according to family lore.  He eventually established a jewelry store on Maiden Lane.  The shop developed into the massive Bulova Watch Company.  By the 1930s, the firm had factories in Queens, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Switzerland.

Joseph Bulova (original source unknown)

Bulova took an active part in the business until August 1935, when he fell ill.  He died in his apartment on November 18 at the age of 84.

Frank Margulies was born in 1898 and started out as a featherweight prize fighter under the name of Frankie Brown.  He fought in the ring until 1918.  By the time he moved into 470 West End Avenue, he was "the shakedown man" for "an extortion ring run by Broadway racketeers," according to The New York Evening Post in 1931.  On November 24 that year, he was arrested and held "in $10,000 bail for a hearing December 1," as reported by The New York Evening Post.

Four victims of the mob had bravely agreed to testify against him.  At the time of the arrest, they were being guarded by detectives.  One of the victims, Alexander A. Rapport, reported that Margulies had come to his office to collect $2,000 in "protection."  Margulies told him, "Unless you kick in, your body will be found in the Hudson.  We've got the police on our pay roll."  Rapport told detectives that Margulies pulled out a knife and "remarked that he usually cut up persons who refused to contribute."

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

John L. Schoenfeld and his family were still living in 470 West End Avenue in May 1934 when he was appointed a member of the State Commission of Corrections.  In reporting on the appointment, The New York Sun remarked that the 51-year-old "is a close friend of Warden Lewis E. Laws of Sing Sing and is a life member of the American prison Association and a member of the League to Abolish Capital Punishment."

In the early 1960s, the FBI began collection information on writer and activist James Baldwin.  The bureau was not concerned about his brilliant novels, of course, but with his activism within the civil rights movement.  He took part in the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and in the voting rights march from Selma to Montgomery in 1965.  FBI agents tracked him down to 470 West End Avenue in 1963.  His extensive file at the Federal Bureau of Investigation included the notations:

On December 10, 1963, [redacted] Security Supervisor, New York Telephone Company, New York City, advised that JAMES BALDWIN resides in Apartment 6A, at 470 West End Avenue, New York City, and has unlisted telephone number TA 7-7773.

On December 10, 1963 [redacted] 470 West End Avenue, New York City, advised that the subject has resided in Apartment 6A at that address for the past three months.

In 1965, Baldwin's extended family purchased the house-turned-apartments at 137 West 71st Street.  He moved into an apartment in that building.  He was still living there where he died in France on December 1, 1987.

In 1970, the building, now known as The Belvoir, was converted into a cooperative.  Often misattributed as being the work of Emery Roth, the exterior of George F. Pelham's reserved Italian Renaissance Revival style building is nearly unchanged in nearly a century.  

photographs by the author

The 1891 Alberta Apartments - 202 West 81st Street

 

Born in Funchal, Portugal in 1838 and a veteran of the Civil War, George W. Da Cunha lived with his wife, Rosina, in New Jersey in the last quarter of the 19th century.  But that did not stop him from designing and erecting some of the most notable Manhattan buildings of the period.  Looking back at his early career in 1917, The Montclair Times recalled that he "built a number of buildings which at that time attracted considerable attention for originality of design and style of construction."

In 1891, Da Cunha acquired the lots at 202 and 204 West 81st Street and filed plans for "two five-story and stone flats" on the site.  Each of them was projected to cost $40,000 to construct, or about $1.46 million in 2026 terms.  The project was a husband-and-wife effort, with Rosina W. Da Cunha listed as the owner of record.

Completed within the year, the two buildings--The Alberta and The Madria--were distinctly different.  The Alberta at 202 West 81st Street was designed in the Romanesque Revival style with light-hearted touches of Queen Anne.  Its double-doored entrance sat within a yawning maw above a four-step stoop.  It was flanked by large gas lanterns supported by ornate cast iron brackets.  The first and second floors were faced in rough cut brownstone.  The paired windows of the first floor were fronted with half-bowls carved with Romanesque designs.  Small Queen Anne-style panes outlined the upper half of the second floor openings.

Impressive gas lanterns flank the arched entrance.  The transoms of the first-floor windows most likely held stained glass.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

The upper three floors were faced in red brick and trimmed in brownstone.  Queen Anne and Romanesque Revival coexisted at the top floor.  Here the stone corner ornament and the arched eyebrows that rested on an intricately carved bandcourse were purely Romanesque Revival.  The small window panes, the offset gable, and the terra cotta fans within the tympanums were Queen Anne.

via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

An advertisement offered, "seven and eight rooms to a suite; all improvements; decorated, steam heat, hot water; furnished and hall attendance."  It boasted that the parlors were finished "in white and gold."  Rents ranged from $55 to $75 (nearly $3,000 per month in today's terms for the most expensive).

Among the early tenants were Dr. Rollin B. Gray and his wife, the former Lydia Dutcher Whitney.  Born in Randolph, Pennsylvania in 1840, Gray received his medical degree from the Homoeopathic College of New York in 1871.  He and Lydia had two children, Anita and Marian.  (Two other daughters, Lillian and Elizabeth had died at the ages of five and one, respectively.)

Dr. Rolling B. Gray, from Gray Genealogy, 1887 (copyright expired)

Several years after moving into The Alberta, Dr. Gray caused panic among mothers and nannies throughout the Upper East and West Sides.  On June 30, 1901, the New-York Tribune began an article saying, "Dr. Rollin B. Gray, who for years has had a practice among people on the west side of Central Park, says that Manhattan's great breathing space is a bad place to take young children, because of malaria."  Gray had convened reporters to his office here to sound the alarm.  He told them that in the past few days he had treated two babies who "were stricken with malaria while being wheeled through the park."  Gray explained that mosquitoes, which carried the disease, were breeding in the stagnant pools and decayed vegetation of the park.

He quickly faced vehement opposition.  One park policeman told a reporter from the New-York Tribune, "This is the greatest place for babies that ever was.  They thrive on the fresh air and enjoy the shade just as much as older people.  Thousands of babies are brought here every day.  Do you suppose that we would not have heard of it before if the park was reeking with malaria?"  A more authoritative opinion came from the Board of Health.  While admitting that there were mosquitoes in the park, an official said that "Central Park mosquitoes are not the malaria carrying kind."  The article added, "the officers say that Manhattan is remarkably free from the disease."

In the meantime, the residents of The Alberta were, like the Grays, upper-middle class.  Each of the families had at least one servant.  On September 24, 1899, for instance, one resident advertised for a "competent and reliable German governess."

The Alberta was purchased in 1901 by the wife of James Daniel.  Daniel was described by the New York Herald as "a traveling salesman for a stove company," and his wife, said The New York Times, "is said to be wealthy."  The couple, who had a rocky relationship, moved into an apartment here.

According to Mrs. Daniel, her husband "was a hard drinker and went on sprees two or three times a month," recounted The New York Times.  She said, "when in this condition he usually went to stay with his friend [William H.] Messenger.  He was never violent when drunk, but simply had the good taste to stay away from home until sober."  

And so, when James did not return home on the night of August 17, 1903 and was still absent five days later, Mrs. Daniel was not especially concerned.  And, indeed, during that period James Daniel was staying with William Messenger on East 138th Street.  On August 21, the two went to Coney Island, where they continued their week-long bender.  When they returned to Manhattan, reported the New York Herald, "they decided not to go directly to Messenger's room, but to rest at the pier at the foot of East 132nd Street."  The drunken men were "skylarking," according to witnesses.  Suddenly, the 36-year-old Daniel jumped into the water "clothes and all."

After swimming around for a few minutes, Daniel was not able to climb out of the water.  The New York Herald said he "tried to cling to the piles supporting the piers."  By the time policemen jumped in to rescue him, it was too late.  James Daniel was pulled from the water unconscious and died shortly afterward.  (Messenger was arrested for intoxication.)

Police went to The Alberta apartment to notify his wife.  (The New York Times parenthetically said it "is a handsome four-story [sic] structure built for private apartments and the property of Mrs. Daniel).  The newspaper said she "didn't seem much surprised."

Typical of the residents at the time of Daniel's death was financier Edward R. Holden, the head of E. R. Holden & Co., and an owner of a mine and a smeltery. 

The building continued to attract upper-middle-class residents.  On January 29, 1911, for instance, The New York Times reported, "The Misses McCarthy, 202 West Eighty-first Street, gave a musicale on Thursday evening at their home."  

Among the sisters' neighbors in the building at the time was Brigadier General Franclyn Elbert Davis.  Born in Brooklyn in 1858, he received a bachelor's degree from St. John's College, a Ph.G. from the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy, and a medical degree from the University of Victoria Medical College.  His astounding resume included military surgeon, pharmacist, director of the National Volunteer Emergency Services, and author.  The 1916 One Thousand American Men of Mark Today said, "He has traveled all over the world, and was the first man to introduce into this country serums from the Institut Pasteur, Paris, and to introduce oxygen apparatus for the life saving of the miners."

Around 1912, the building was renamed The Maryland.  The residents continued to be respectable and upstanding.  Living here by 1918 were clergyman and poet James Benjamin Kenyon and his wife, the former Margaret Jane Taylor.  Born in 1858 in Frankfort, New York, he entered the Methodist Episcopal ministry in 1878.  Among his books of poetry were the 1887 In Realms of Gold; At the Gate of Dreams, published in 1892; and the 1895 An Oaten Pipe.

The post-World War I years brought a more working class tenant list.  Living here in 1921 were Robert Ryan, a "night worker," as described by The Evening World, and his wife.  The couple had a serious scare that year.  On the morning of November 15, Ryan returned from work to find his wife in convulsions.  She told him that she "had taken bichloride of mercury by mistake."  The Evening World reported, "She was taken to the Knickerbocker Hospital and is expected to recover."

The once sprawling apartments were dissected into rented rooms as early as 1923.  On September 12 that year, Detectives Martin Owens, Thomas Horan and John Cronin followed Irving Cohan and Joseph Levine, who were suspected in an armed robbery, to a third floor apartment.  When no one answered their knock, Horan and Cronin waited in the hallway while Owens went to the roof, climbed down the rear fire escape and entered through a window.  He opened the door for his partners.  The New York Times reported, "The air was acrid with fumes from a quantity of opium simmering on a gas burner.  A complete opium layout was found on a table."

The detectives arrested Esther Kaplan, a.k.a. Newberg, and five men.  In addition to the opium and equipment, they discovered two firearms.  "Both were fully loaded, and the lead bullets in the revolver were criss-crossed with lines to cause them to mushroom upon impact," said the article.

The following year, resident Benedict Radus, who listed his profession as a real estate agent, was arrested with three other men in a conspiracy to rob wealthy Dr. Hugo J. Loebinger.  Radus told the doctor he could acquire $43,000 worth of stolen Liberty bonds and a large sum of Russian gold rubles "which could be obtained at about one-quarter their value," explained The New York Times on August 26, 1924.  When Loebinger arrive at Radus's apartment with $7,000, the other two conspirators had a satchel containing magazines and newspapers "arranged in bundles in the shape and size of Liberty bonds."  The trio was prepared "with coils of rope and a pistol," said police.  The plan fell apart when Loebinger escaped.

Wilfred Lillback rented rooms here in 1927.  The son of a Brooklyn clergyman, he had been arrested in 1924 for a hold-up.  His lawyer at that time pleaded for clemency because "an accident to his head when a child had made a criminal of him."

On January 20, 1927, Policeman Sullivan noticed three trunks and three automobiles at the curb of 202 West 81st Street.  When he questioned them, one of the men explained they were moving.  Unconvinced, Sullivan "forced the man to take him to the apartment."  Inside, he found Lillback and another man in "a room full of stolen clothing."  Lillback and his accomplices, Charles Hayes and Will Abramson were arrested and charged of committing nine burglaries in Brooklyn.

via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

James J. Barrett and Joseph Robert Sylvester, who were 23 and 19 years old respectively, shared a furnished room here in 1950.  Sylvester, despite his age, had three felony convictions.  On the afternoon of April 29, they and another man, Robert Adelman, attempted to stick-up the Jewel Chest on Sixth Avenue.  The jewelry store had been purchased only a month earlier by Jacob Wasserman, a survivor from the Nazi concentration camp where his parents were killed.  The trio botched the robbery and Wasserman was shot.  The perpetrators fled in separate directions.

Barrett did not get far.  He was seized by a patrolman nearby.  At the 47th Street police station, he gave up the names and addresses of his accomplices.  Their legal troubles worsened when Jacob Wasserman died from his injuries on May 2.

Later that year, on November 18, 1950, another resident, 30-year-old Carlos Villasnov, was captured as he ran from the Macy's Department store in Jamaica, Queens.  He and two others had just slipped three men's suits from a rack and into a cardboard box.

Renting a room here in 1963 was ex-convict Alberto Gomez.   He had been released from Rikers Island in June 1962.  On July 25, he attempted to cash stolen travelers checks in a Chemical Bank branch in midtown.  The teller recognized the check numbers from a bulletin reporting the thefts.  When he summoned a manager, Gomez bolted.  He was arrested minutes later and charged for "receiving stolen money orders, felonious assault and forgery."

Renovations completed in the late 20th century resulted in five apartments per floor.  In the remodeling, the entrance doors and windows were modernized (sadly with loss of the Queen Anne panes), and the first floor windows shortened.  The entrance lanterns were removed, the gable chopped off, and the terra cotta shells of the top floor removed and replaced with sheet metal.  The masonry was painted as well.

photographs by the author

The Lost Woman's Hospital - 113-141 West 109th Street

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

J. Marion Sims was born in South Carolina in 1813.  In the 1840s, he focused on women's conditions and in 1849 successfully developed a procedure to close vesicovaginal fistulas.  In 1853, Sims moved his family to New York City where he hoped to establish a hospital to treat women patients.  An announcement in The New York Herald on May 18, 1854 noted he would speak at a "Lecture on the necessity of organizing a great hospital in this city for the diseases peculiar to females."

Sims faced an uphill battle.  Although respected physicians like Valentine Mott endorsed his cause, wealthy donors "of the sterner sex," as described by The New York Times, balked.  Sims wrote, "I was called a quack and a humbug, and the hospital was pronounced a fraud."

But the millionaires' wives rallied behind The Woman's Hospital, as did The New York Times.  Pointing out on February 7, 1855 that there was no such facility in the nation, the newspaper stressed, "There are hundreds in our midst of poor women, who, for the lack of a few weeks' skillful surgical treatment, are day by day sinking into incurable state of disease...For the sake of science, such an institution is demanded here.  This class of diseases is little known, for it is little studied, and hence comes a great amount of suffering which ought to be avoided."  The first American hospital dedicated to women was opened in New York later that same year.

Originally functioning from a former rowhouse, in 1858 the City of New York offered Sims the block between Lexington and Park Avenues and from 49th to 50th Streets as the site for a proper hospital.  The first section was opened in 1867 and the second, doubling the size, was completed in 1877.  The facility proved inadequate by the turn of the century, and in 1900 the architectural firm of Allen & Vance was commissioned to design a replacement structure.

Allen & Vance released this rendering in 1900.  Real Estate Record & Guide, June 2, 1900 (copyright expired)

The Lexington Avenue site, however, was often wet and was deemed unsatisfactory for the proposed structure.  Allen & Vance's plans were shelved for two years.  Then, on February 15, 1902, the Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide reported that the Woman's Hospital had purchased 24 lots on the Upper West Side--midway between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenues and running through the block from 109th to 110th Street.  (The hospital had sold the East Side property for $450,000, a significant $17.4 million in 2026 terms.)  The article noted, "A new hospital building will be erected from plans by Francis R. Allen, of Allen & Vance, of Boston, on the new site."

The massive structure took four years to complete at a cost equal to $22.5 million today.  Francis R. Allen's original 1900 design was followed.  The architect created a striking French Renaissance Revival-style structure inspired by Loire Valley chateaux.  Faced in two colors of brick above a granite basement level, it rose six stories to a delightful assemblage of mansards and elaborate dormers.  Three slightly projecting sections gave the West 109th Street elevation dimension.  Two prominent wings distinguished the 110th Street side.

The hospital's chapel is seen on the ground floor of the eastern wing on the 110th Street side. 

In 1905, as construction progressed, the New York Charities Directory described: "This Hospital is for the treatment of diseases particular to women, and the new building will have a capacity of 100 beds, of which 25 are free."

The new facility had been opened only a short time before its policy of treating female patients only caused an uproar.  On December 20, 1906, six-year-old Isidor Heller was struck by a truck.  The driver, Robert Boyd, drove the severely injured boy to the nearest facility: the Woman's Hospital.  According to Boyd, when he carried the boy through the door, he was met with a physician who said, "You may leave him here until an ambulance comes, but this is a private hospital and we cannot have such cases brought here."

According to Boyd, "nothing was done" and he put little Isidor Heller back into his truck and drove to St. Luke's Hospital where he died.  On January 5, 1907, The Sun reported that a jury in Coroner George F. Shrady's court the previous day had "censured the management and physicians of the Woman's Hospital" for its "brutal and inhuman" refusal to treat the boy.

photograph by Thaddeus Wilkerson, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Despite the early unflattering press, the Woman's Hospital was highly respected.  It democratically treated women from high society--like Margaret Mary Emerson Vanderbilt, Katherine S. C. Hoyt, and Helen Gould Finley--to theatrical figures, like Irene Castle (wife and dancing partner of Vernon Castle), and actress Edna May Oliver.

Madeline Morando was a dancer in Eddie Foy's vaudeville company.  (Born Edwin Fitzgerald, Foy was an extremely popular actor, comedian, dancer and vaudevillian.)  The couple were married in 1896.  Madeline was admitted to the Woman's Hospital in December 1908.  Upon hearing the news, her husband jumped into his automobile and sped off toward the hospital.  He would get a police escort, but not before getting a traffic ticket.

On December 11, the New-York Tribune reported, "Edward [sic] Foy Fitzgerald, known on the stage as 'Eddie Foy,' was arraigned...yesterday afternoon, charged with driving a motor car without a number."  He explained to the magistrate that "he was on his way to the Woman's Hospital...to see his wife, who is at the point of death."  He said that in his hurry he did not look at the car and "thought that perhaps his children had taken off the tag."  After hearing his story (which was corroborated by the policeman), the magistrate dropped the charges.  The article noted parenthetically, "At the hospital last night it was said that Mrs. Fitzgerald was resting comfortably."

Mary Craig Kimbrough married author Upton Sinclair in 1913.  On the voyage home from their honeymoon in August, "Mrs. Sinclair slipped on the deck of the steamer...and the fall affected her spine," as reported by The New York Times.  After three months of various treatments, on November 19 the newspaper reported, "it was decided some days ago that permanent relief from her injury could be obtained only by an operation."  Mary Sinclair underwent spinal surgery here on November 18.  The New York Times reported, "It was said last night at the hospital that the operation was a complete success."

from the collection of Columbia University Libraries

Like Mary Sinclair, traditional treatments for Christine Schnell's condition had not resulted in relief by March 1916.  She was admitted to the Woman's Hospital and scheduled to have an examination "to determine whether an operation was necessary," according The New York Times.  Her nurse divulged that the 40-year-old was apprehensive at the idea of surgery and "could not sleep Friday night because of worry over her approaching trial [i.e., examination]."  Christine Schnell's solution to avoid the dreaded operation was drastic.  On March 11, the nurse left the ward for a moment.  In her absence, Schnell jumped from the fifth-floor window.  The article said, "Looking from the window the nurse saw a crumpled body lying in an areaway separating the hospital and the adjoining building."  Christine Schnell had died instantly.

Margaret Vanderbilt was the widow of millionaire Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt, lost in the sinking of the RMS Lusitania in May 1915.  She was admitted to the Woman's Hospital in March 1917 with appendicitis.  A week later, on March 19, the New York Herald reported, "she is recovering rapidly, and it is expected that she will be able to return to her home within a short time."

The Woman's Hospital received unflattering press in January 1922.  Nellie Harris filed a $5,000 suit in State Supreme Court "for the alleged refusal to admit her to the post graduate course for nurses because the plaintiff is a negro," reported the New-York Tribune on January 5.   Nellie Harris had admirable credentials.  A graduate of Freeman's Hospital in Washington, she took charge of the surgical ward in Lincoln Hospital in New York in 1920.  Later she was a nurse in charge of a sanatorium in Harlem.

A 1925 advertisement detailed the courses available.  from the collection of the University of Wisconsin-Madison

When she applied to the post graduate course here in August 1921, she was told the class was full.  When she tried again on December 1, "she was informed that she could not be admitted because of her color," reported the New-York Tribune.  The stalwart nurse's stance was successful.  In its March 1922 issue, The Crisis reported, "Nellie Harris, a colored nurse, has won admittance to the Post-Graduate course at the Woman's Hospital, New York City."  The article noted, "The case was settled out of court."

Mr. and Mrs. Leon Dukas "delayed the trip to the hospital too long" on February 18, 1928, according to officials.  The couple's baby "arrived at the very moment Mrs. Dukas entered the main hall of the hospital," reported The New York Times.  Because the seven-pound girl was not born in their taxi or outside the hospital doors, the infant was honored as "Miss Fourteen Thousand."  The 14,000th baby delivered within the building was celebrated a few days later with a "birthday party" in the maternity ward.  She was crowned and given a gift.

The Woman's Hospital was significantly enlarged in 1929.  Wings were erected at the east and west ends of the building.  They included a new "out-patient clinic building" that opened on March 13, 1929.  The wings were design in sympathy to Francis R. Allen's 1900 design.

from the collection of the  Museum of the City of New York

.

A disturbing incident occurred on February 6, 1945.  Catherine Keagen was a 20-year-old white nurse and her supervisor was Emma Miles, a 36-year-old black nurse.  Emma was in charge of the entire fifth floor.  Catherine Keagen, according to Emma Miles, refused to recognize her as her superior.  At 6:00 that morning, Emma snapped.  The New York Times reported that Catherine was in critical condition "with a fractured skull after having been struck on the head with a fire axe wielded by Emma Miles."  

Emma had fled the hospital, but was arrested that afternoon.  She admitted to the attack, explaining that Keagen, "refused to obey instructions."

The hospital instituted an innovation in 1949--a beauty salon.  It opened in February and physicians told reporters that "they had found the beauty service an excellent device for transferring the patient's attention from the discomfort of illness and improving morale."  The New York Times reported, "It humanizes hospitals and helps eliminate tension and anxieties created by unfamiliar and sometimes terrifying surroundings, the physicians said."

In 1952, the Woman's Hospital merged with St. Luke's Hospital.  Thirteen years later, on June 5, 1965, the N. Y. Amsterdam News reported on the dedication "of the new Woman's Hospital at Amsterdam Avenue and 114th Street."  The article reminded readers that the Woman's Hospital was "now a part of St. Luke's Hospital Center."

The immense 1906 Woman's Hospital building was demolished, replaced with the Cathedral Parkway Towers apartment building, completed in 1974.

image via apartments.com

The 1900 Abner C. Thomas House - 315 West 84th Street

 

James Ross and Charles R. McNeill established their architectural practice in 1898.  Among their first commissions was the designing of six upscale rowhouses on the north side of West 84th Street between Riverside Drive and West End Avenue for Matthews & Eppenstein.  Completed in 1900, the five-story homes were designed, overall, in the Beaux Arts style.  Ross & McNeil created an off-balanced row in an ABBBAA configuration.  The flat-faced "A" models were clad in red brick.  The B models, which included 315 West 84th Street, were faced in brown brick above their rusticated limestone bases.  The upper three floors were bowed, terminating in a dignified stone balustrade that fronted the tiled mansard.  Its prominent dormer wore an arched pediment.

The houses form a dignified row.  315 West 84th Street is hiding behind the tree in the foreground.

Matthews & Eppenstein had purchased the property from Henry Oppenheimer in November 1899.  The transaction did not come without a problem.  A house already existed at 315 West 84th Street and it was being leased to attorney Abner C. Thomas and his family.  The developers apparently negotiated with family, because when the row was completed, the Thomas family moved into 315 West 84th Street.

Abner C. Thomas was born in Brooklyn in 1844.  He received a civil engineering degree from the Polytechnic College of Pennsylvania.  At the age of 21, he changed course, studying law in Bridgeport, Connecticut.  He relocated to New York City in 1866 and opened his law office.  

Thomas and his wife, the former Lucy Carnahan, had four children: Ethel Cary, Rhoda Cary, Lucy Cary and Abel Cary.  Lucy had a long American pedigree.  She was the first president of the Daughters of Ohio, and a member of the Daughters of the Revolution, and the Daughters of the War of 1812.  She was, as well, a member of Sorosis, the first professional women's club in America.

The Thomas family had lived in the previous house as early as 1895.  The last social event in that residence took place on December 5, 1899.  That evening Rhoda Cary Thomas was married to Cornelius W. Luyster Jr. at the Church of All Angels on West End Avenue.  The New-York Tribune remarked, "a supper and dance for the members of the bridal party will follow at the home of the bride's parents, No. 315 West Eighty-fourth-st."

In addition to his law practice, Abner C. Thomas was an author.  He wrote, according to The Evening World, "many text books on law," most of which dealt with real estate law.  In 1899, he was appointed surrogate justice by the Tammany organization.

In March 1903, F. W. Drury and his wife, Josephine, purchased 315 West 84th Street.  Their residency would be relatively short and in May 1907, they sold the house to Corinne Roche.

A graduate of the Convent of the Sacred Heart, Corinne was highly involved in real estate, buying and selling properties in Manhattan.  Her parents, Walter and Mary Amelia Doherty Roche, were both dead and moving into 315 West 84th Street were Corinne's sisters, Beatrice, Marie and Amelia.  The Roches' summer home was in Deal Beach, New Jersey.  At the time, Beatrice was still a student in the Convent of the Sacred Heart.

On September 24, 1907, Marie was married to Joseph Thomas Ryan in Deal, New Jersey.  Her brother, John Doherty Roche, gave her away.  The New York Times noted, "A reception followed the wedding at the Roche Summer home."

The Asbury Park Press began an article on September 11, 1909, "While on a vacation from the Convent of the Sacred Heart at Manhattanville, N. Y., several years ago, Miss Beatrice Roche gave a birthday party...and it was there that she first met Dr. William Vincent Pascual of Brooklyn, then a student at Columbia university."  The article said a "rather romantic courtship" followed.  Beatrice and Pascual were married in Deal on the morning of that article.  Corinne was Beatrice's maid of honor and John gave her away.  The reception was held in Marie and Joseph Ryan's summer home.

There were now just two sisters in the West 84th Street house.  Corinne busied herself with her real estate dealings while remaining highly active in her alumnae association.  On June 15, 1919, for instance, the New York Herald announced, "On the campus at Manhattanville members of the alumnae association of the Convent of the Sacred Heart College held their 'Old Students' Day' Tuesday."  The article noted that Corinne Roche was the chairman of the arrangements.

Amelia was married to John William Kehoe in the Church of the Holy Trinity in September 1920.  She was given away by Joseph Ryan.  (John D. Roche had died on January 29, 1918.)  Corinne attended her sister.  The New York Times reported, "The ceremony was followed by a wedding breakfast at the home of the bride, 315 West Eighty-fourth Street."

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

Corinne was not left alone in the house.  Amelia and John moved in.  Kehoe was a textile executive and Amelia kept busy with charity work.  She was vice president of the Manhattanville Children of Mary, was highly active in the ladies' auxiliary of St. Joseph's Day Nursery, and was treasurer of the Maplehurst Alumnae of the Sacred Heart.  And in 1933, The New York Sun reported that she was chairman of the International Federation of Catholic Alumnae's annual bridge party.

Corinne Roche continued to buy and sell real estate.  On May 9, 1930, for instance, The New York Times reported that she had purchased an apartment building on East 123rd Street, and by the early 1940s she owned a theater on Eighth Avenue.

In August 1944, real estate operator M. C. Berg purchased 315 West 84th Street, sparking a game of real estate hot potato.  He resold it the following month "to an investor," according to The New York Sun on September 28.  In April 1945, G. W. Cane purchased it and resold it the following month to real estate Dorothy Kaliski.  She rented rooms in the house until 1953, when The New York Times reported on June 4 that she sold it to a buyer who would convert it into ten apartments.  But, once again, the purchaser resold 315 West 84th Street the following month.  On July 24, The New York Times reported, "The buyer plans to alter the building and occupy a large part of it."

The once elegant home became a rooming house.  The following year, on December 21, 1954, The New York Times reported that the owner and nine other rooming house owners had been "threatened with forced evacuation of their tenements as firetraps."

A renovation completed in 1956 resulted in one apartment each on the first and second floors, two each on the third and fourth, and two furnished rooms on the fifth floor.  There would be three more renovations to come, each one reducing the number of units.  In 1973 the first and second floors were combined as a duplex, in 1995 that apartment was enlarged to a triplex, and, finally, in 2017 315 West 84th Street was restored to a single-family home.

photographs by the author

Clarence F. True's 1891 161 West 76th Street

 

Clarence Fagan True designed the four upscale rowhouses at 155 through 161 West 76th Street for Duncan C. McKinlay in 1890.  He designed the brownstone-fronted homes in the Renaissance Revival style.  Like the others, the westernmost house, No. 161, was four stories tall above a high English basement.  True was noted for his often eccentric details, and carved onto the dog-legged, box stoop was a fearsome-looking dragon sinking its fangs into a banner.

The stoop detail is patently Clarence F. True.

True striated the parlor level with rough-cut bands upon the otherwise planar surface.  Stylized Corinthian pilasters  carved with vining flowers and a fantastic bird flanked the doorway.  Carved ornaments capped the fully-arched parlor windows and the molded cornice of the entranceway.

The architect treated each of the upper floor openings differently.  The second floor windows wore flush, ornately-carved lintels; those on the third floor sat below large shells; and the fourth-floor windows were embraced by carved panels and lintels.

McKinlay sold 161 West 76th Street to real estate operators Robert P. and Annie G. Martin in 1891.  They advertised:  "To Rent--Handsome new house, No. 161 West 76th st; will be decorated to suit tenant."

Their ownership would be short.  On May 2, 1892 the Martins sold the house to George and Henrietta F. Reid.  It appears that the Reids, like their predecessors, leased it.  

Living here in 1894 was Harriet Hall Valentine Holder, the widow of Charles Hawkes Holder who died in 1892.  Born in 1849, she and Charles had five children.  At least one of them, Suzanne Valentine, lived here.  The parlor was the scene of Suzanne's wedding to Charles Schumacher Jr. on November 28, 1894.

The Reids sold 161 West 76th Street in May 1898.  It became home to the John Paret Jr. family.  Born on September 4, 1835, Paret married Emily Louisa Story in 1859 and the couple had nine children--five sons and four daughters.  The family's country home was in Ellenville, New York.

Paret was the head of the men's clothing firm, John Paret & Co., founded by his father in 1816.

A charming John Paret & Co. trade card.  The reverse would have contained the advertising material.

Rufus Story Paret was the eldest of the sons.  The 35-year-old died here on June 6, 1899 and his funeral was held in the parlor on the 8th.  One month later, on July 27, John Paret died at their summer home.  His body was brought back to Manhattan and his funeral was held in the house on July 29.

At least two sons would continue to live at 161 West 76th Street with their mother.  Walter P. Paret was born in 1872 and was educated at Yale University and Columbia University Law School.  Still unmarried, he was with the law firm of Perkins & Jackson.  His older brother, John, was born in 1867 and graduated from Cornell University in 1893.  He, too, was unmarried.  A banker, he was associated with the Union Trust Company.

The Parets left West 76th Street early in 1902.  As was common at the time, when affluent families relocated they sold everything in their previous home and started over.  An auction of the contents of 161 West 76th Street was held on February 7, 1902.  The announcement listed items like "rich hangings, Gold and Vernis Martin Cabinets, rare and costly Curios."  There were also a "Gold Drawing Room Suite, odd and beautiful Chairs, Turkish Rugs, Oil Paintings by eminent Artists."  A particular Royal Vienna pedestal was valued at $500 and a Royal Dresden vase, described as "one of the largest in the city" was valued at $550.  The combined value of those two items alone would translate to about $40,500 in 2026.

Typical of Clarence True's designs, close inspection of the entrance pilasters reveals a fantastic fowl seemingly plucking at a vine.

The house next became home to Adolph and Sophie Hirsch.  Adolph was a partner in the commodity, fertilizer and chemical commission firm of Heller, Hirsch & Co.  The couple had three children, Herbert Adolph, Ralph Tuska, and Alice M.  

Herbert was attending the Harvard Law School when the family moved in.  He graduated in 1905 and, despite his law degree, he took a job as a clerk with Heller, Hirsch & Company.

Sophie Hirsch died on October 22, 1914.  The following month, on November 27, Adolph transferred title to the house in equal parts to his three children.

The Hirsch family leased 161 West 76th Street to Mary H. Squire in April 1916.  She either shared the house or sub-let it to Florence McMillan, who operated her music studio here.

Musical America September 30, 1916 (copyright expired)

In 1920, Mrs. Lulu Freeth Bosworth occupied the house.  She was active in the Professional Woman's League.

The Hirsch siblings advertised 161 West 76th Street for sale in 1921.  The ad on April 28 in the New York Herald read, "Four story high stoop residence, 15 rooms and 4 baths; 19x100; price $33,000; immediate possession."  Two months later, on June 4, the New-York Tribune reported that the Hirsches had sold it to Thomas S. Keatinge.

Alice Hirsch seems to have had seller's regret.  The 1923 American Art Annual's "Who's Who In Art" section listed Alice as having a studio on Washington Square and living at 161 West 76th Street.  Alice would have been renting rooms in her former home.  Another resident at the time was musician Frederic W. Berryman, who, until 1921, was organist and choirmaster of St. Peter's Church in Chelsea.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

Among the tenants here in 1938 was Harriet Brown Nielson.  The 35-year-old was described by her attorney, Bernard H. Sandler, that year as "a member of a well-to-do California family, a writer, a linguist and a former Olympic swimmer."  Despite her rather illustrious background, Harriet was experiencing personal problems.

Nielson occupied two furnished rooms.  On the afternoon of February 7, 1938, she met William King, a saxophone player who worked for the Workers Progress Administration.  (His name, it turned out, was actually William Loftus.)  They went to dinner and, according to Loftus, "Mrs. Nielson had several drinks."  On the way to her apartment, they picked up a pint of gin.  When they finished it, they "took a walk and bought a quart of liquor," according to Loftus, "most of which they drank."

At one point, Loftus, a.k.a. King, allowed Harriet's two kittens to escape the apartment.  She flew into a rage and hit Loftus with an empty gin bottle, cutting his face.  According to him, he slapped her and, later, she fell several times and each time he picked her up.  He eventually passed out and when he awoke the next morning, Harriet was dead on the floor.

An autopsy revealed that Harriet, "former Pacific Coast diving champion," as described by the Syracuse Journal, had died of a "homicidal assault."  Dr. Milton Helpern said that Harriet's death was caused by abdominal hemorrhage, "following a traumatic laceration of the liver."  He explained that the injury "was caused by a blow and could not have resulted from a fall."

William Loftus was arrested for murder.  The following month, on March 19, 1938, The New York Times reported that a grand jury, "after listening to four witnesses," dismissed the charge.  What actually led to the former Olympic swimmer's death will never be known.

Frank J. Patti rented a room here in 1944.  The 26-year-old bus driver boarded a Staten Island Ferry on August 5 that year.  He was on the lower deck and "became angry when ordered behind ropes that had railed off part of the deck," as reported by the Staten Island Advance.  So angry was he, in fact, that he slugged 46-year-old deckhand Thomas Cochan in the jaw.

When the ferry pulled into the St. George terminal at 6:00 p.m., Patti was removed by police.  He was charged with third degree assault.  The case was scheduled for trial, but when Frank Patti agreed to pay Cochan "for any damage that had been done," according to the Staten Island Advance on September 7, Cochan dropped his complaint.  (The amount that Cochan agreed upon to ameliorate his injuries was not revealed.)

Also occupying a room here at the time was Walter L. Rowe.  On April 30, 1944, the 57-year-old stepped off the curb at Amsterdam Avenue and 76th Street and was killed by a hit-and-run driver.  Whether the offender was ever arrested is unclear.

In 1968, 161 West 76th Street was converted to apartments, two per floor.  Two decades later, a penthouse level, unseen from the street, was added.  In doing so, one of the fourth-floor apartments was raised to a duplex.

photographs by the author