The 1917 Central Baptist Church - Amsterdam Avenue and 92nd Street

 

As early as 1898 Central Baptist Church, located on West 42nd Street near Broadway, was closely affiliated with the West Park Baptist Church at 92st Street and Amsterdam Avenue.  That year Central Baptist's Embroidery Class and its Carpentry and Chair Caning Class were held at the uptown location.  The relationship would become even closer a decade later.

Central Baptist was an outgrowth of the 1842 Laight Street Baptist Church.  When the congregation erected its handsome church at 220 West 42nd Street, the Longacre Square district was the center of the carriage making industry, its side streets lined with brownstone homes.  The New-York Times remarked in 1911, "It was one of the first Baptist churches to be built in the upper part of New York, which at that time was considered a suburb of the city."  But at the time of that article, Longacre Square had been renamed Times Square and was the center of Manhattan's theater district.

On March 29, 1910, The New York Times reported that "The changed conditions in the Times Square district led the officers of the Central Baptist Church to contemplate moving to a more residential locality."  The article said that the West Park Baptist Church had been authorized by the State Supreme Court "to transfer the church property on the southeast corner of Amsterdam Avenue and Ninety-second Street to the Central Baptist Church of West Forty-second Street."  The two congregations had merged and "a new Central Baptist Church will be organized."

Services continued in both locations until October 1911 at which time The Sun reported that the theatrical firm of Frazee & Lederer and P. Chauncey Anderson had purchased the vintage 42nd Street church as the site of a theater for $500,000--a substantial $14.7 million today.  The article noted that the old West Park Church was also for sale.  "When this is disposed of a new edifice that will accommodate both congregations will be erected in the neighborhood of the uptown church."

But the Central Baptist Church trustees decided not to sell the Amsterdam Avenue structure, but to replace it.  On March 2, 1912 the New York Globe reported that the congregation intended to build "a splendid new edifice" which would be "one more important, influential church added to the residential section of New York's upper west side."  Architects Walter Cook and Edward F. Pallme were hired to design the structure.

The plans, filed in June 1915, placed the cost of construction at $200,000.  The Real Estate Record & Guide noted it would be 78 feet wide on Amsterdam Avenue, and stretch back 115 feet on 92nd Street.  "The building will contain accommodations for a Sunday school and parish house.  The church auditorium will seat approximately 1,000 people."  (That left little room for increasing membership, which was currently at 700.)

The New-York Tribune reported, "Simplicity is to be the feature of the exterior, and utility of the interior."  The article noted, "So extensive is the Central's new enterprises that it is not expected to complete it before September, 1916."

Demolition of the old church along with a house on 92nd Street began on August 1, 1915.  Nine months later, on May 6, the cornerstone was laid "with a simple service of hymns and Scripture readings by the Rev. Dr. Frank M. Goodchild, the pastor," according to The New York Times.  Inside the box were the church's yearbook and annual report, a history of the Baptist Church, newspapers, 1916 coins, and such.  With World War I raging in Europe, Dr. Goodchild commented, "Let us hope that when this stone is removed and this box taken out a hundred years from today there will be peace on earth and accord of nations."  It was an optimistic wish.

Completed in 1917, Central Baptist Church was designed in "the modified English Gothic order."  Built of Germantown stone (a type of granite) and Indiana limestone, a corner tower,  118-feet high, dominated the design.  

from the collection of the New York Public Library

Although the New-York Tribune had promised that the interior would be designed with utility in mind, the stained glass windows, by Gorham Studios, were by no means utilitarian.  The New York Globe, on October 6, 1917, said "But the glory of the auditorium is the great west window, thirty-eight feet in height by twenty-two feet wide.  It consists of seven panels in three groups...and the whole is of such marvelous depth and splendor of color as is impossible to describe."  Gorham Studios also designed the ten side windows which depicted scenes of the Life of Christ.

The great West Window.

The Rev. Dr. Frank Marsden Goodchild had been pastor of Central Baptist Church since 1895.  It was he who recognized the need to relocate the church immediately upon taking the pulpit.  Seemingly indefatigable, he wrote three religious books, was a "visiting preacher," and was president of the American and Foreign Bible Society, president of the Ministers' Home Society, and vice president of the Baptist Union for Ministerial Education.

As the church rose, he got into a heated confrontation with U. S. Army General Frederick Funston for the latter's "attitude toward the activities of clergymen in the army."  Goodchild insisted that clergymen be permitted "to preach without restrictions to soldiers," while the general demanded that preachers "must not tell the soldiers that they were lost and were in need of being saved."  He added that he did not "wish the emotions of the soldiers stirred, and wanted no such thing as a revival," said The New York Times on November 21, 1916.  From the pulpit, Dr. Goodchild called Funston a "religious dictator" and demanded that Congress investigate conditions in the army."  The well-publicized feud prompted other Baptist ministers to distance themselves from the fiery pastor.

Goodchild's health began to fail in 1923.  That year he and his wife sailed to France for six months "in the hope that the long vacation would restore his health," said The New York Times.  Instead, upon his return he suffered a stroke.  He preached his farewell sermon on January 6, 1924, during which he dedicated the life of his six-month-old grandson, Robert Mardsden Goodchild, "to the Christian life, and to the Christian ministry, if God so wills."  (He presumably did not consult his infant grandson on the decision.)  In tribute to his long service to the church, the congregation gave him cash equal to a year-and-a-half's salary.  Goodchild died on February 18, 1928.

Dr. Goodchild was replaced by the Rev. Dr. John Falconer Fraser, who, in 1931, also found himself in a heated confrontation.  In his sermon on November 1, he declared that the name of the Central Baptist Church had been dragged "into scandalous notoriety by the reckless villainy operating in the name of the United States Government."  The previous week the church had been named as co-defendant in a "padlock suit" for running a speakeasy disguised as a bird store on West 91st Street.

Falconer told his congregants that he was not used to speaking about political issues from the pulpit, but "It seems incumbent on your minister to make a statement on this unseemly subject."  He insisted the church had no connection with the owners of that building nor the shop and said, "God knows, the speakeasies stoop low enough in their practices in evading the law, but it is doubtful if they an equal the latest publicity stunt of the Federal authorities in New York City."

As the decades passed, the neighborhood, the congregation, and the church's outreach changed.  The youth of the neighborhood caught the attention of Richard "Pee Wee" Kirkland in 1994, who began the School of Skillz basketball camp at Central Baptist Church every Saturday. 

Kirkland was born in Harlem in 1945 and learned basketball on the streets.  A sensation in high school and college, he was drafted by the Chicago Bulls in 1969, but he turned down the offer, presumably because he was making more money as a drug dealer, money launderer and jewel thief on the streets.  He was arrested in 1971 and sent to the Lewisburg Federal Penitentiary in Pennsylvania on a ten-year sentence.

He told The New York Times journalist Vincent M. Mallozzi in January 1997, "Thirty years ago, I was part of the problem.  Thirty years later, I'm part of the solution."  The solution included mentoring young Upper West Side boys through basketball.  He said that while in prison he thought of the people who had wanted to see him go into the N.B.A.  "I knew the only way to repay those people was to one day work with kids, because somewhere out there there's another Pee Wee Kirkland, and until that kid turns his life around, I will always feel his pain."  Kirkland ran his School of Skillz at Central Baptist Church for years.

In the summer of 1997, Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani created a task force to examine the relations between the city residents and the New York City Police Department.  It followed the beating and torture of Abner Louima in a Brooklyn precinct station house.  Among the members was Central Baptist Church minister Rev. Michel Faulkner.  He called the group "the most diverse task force in the history of New York City," saying the members "poured their heart and soul into a process that they truly believed in."

Faulker was crestfallen when, a year later, Giuliani essentially dismissed the task force's findings, saying "the panel had failed to recognize the department's recent success in reducing crime."  Of the task force's recommendations, he said "Some of the things we've already done.  Some of the things I've opposed in the past, I'll continue to oppose them.  And some of the things are unrealistic and make very little sense."

The uneasy relationship between Faulker and Giuliani continued.  In March 2000 an unarmed Black man, Patrick M. Dorismond, was shot dead by police.  Three months later Giuliani had still not expressed condolences to the victim's family.  On June 3, Elisabeth Bumiller, writing in The New York Times, reported, "He has not reached out to Representative Charles B. Rangel of Harlem...or to former allies like the Rev. Calvin O. Butts and the Rev. Michel Faulkner."

Faulkner told Bumiller, "I've sent him a couple of messages.  I haven't heard back from him.  I don't know what it means, to be honest with you.  To me it's not good."

The Central Baptist Church continues to serve a noticeably dwindling congregation.  And while the handsome 1917 structure with its stunning stained glass windows is little changed, rumbles on the street speak of a possible sale and demolition of the structure, which has no landmark protection.

 photographs by the author

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The 1907 New York Kindergarten Assoc. No. 522 W. 42nd Street

photo by Alice Lum

The New York City Board of Education, formed in 1853, took its responsibility for educating the city’s children seriously.   What it did not take seriously, however, was the newly-emerging concept of kindergarten.

In his home country of German, educator Friedrich Froebel had seen that children as young as four or five received enormous benefit from organized classes.   By exercising and learning basic colors and shapes and social behavior at this early age, they adjusted and performed better in primary school.  The private schools, begun in the 1850s under Froebel’s lead, were nearly all conducted in German for German immigrants; and were quaintly called “the children’s’ garden.”

Robert Watson Gilder took up the cause in New York City, helping to organize the New York Kindergarten Association on November 22, 1889.   Frustrated with the school officials’ opposition to kindergarten, he made his opinions clear to a reporter from The Critic.

”The kindergarten method of instruction, he said, is no longer an experiment, but a practical and established success.  “Why was it, then, that in the list of fifty cities of the United States that have a least one kindergarten in connection with their system of public instruction, the name of New York did not appear?”

Gilder promoted the Association saying “Plant a free kindergarten in any quarter of this overcrowded metropolis, and you have begun then and there the work of making better lives, better homes, better citizens, and a better city.”

The first kindergarten was opened at No. 351 East 53^rd Street on March 10, 1890 with a second opening on October 27 at 63^rd Street and First Avenue.  The New York Kindergarten Association operated solely on contributions and the first year received $2,334.60 in donations.   The Association’s Secretary, Daniel S. Remsen noted in his first annual report that “nearly three-quarters of New York’s population live in the tenement houses, and when we realize the depth of hardship and demoralization this implies, it will be readily appreciated that the work of saving and educating the children is more important than anything else; for the child will be a man by and by, and experience has proved that unless trained in early life he may be a useless, and even a dangerous, element in society.”

Bessie Locke was an aggressive member of the Association, becoming its financial secretary in 1896.  She was a brilliant organizer and fund-raiser, unafraid to approach the most intimidating and wealthiest industry titans.   One of these would be John D. Archbold, President of Standard Oil of New Jersey.

Archbold was the second most important man in the oil industry after John D. Rockefeller.   He generously contributed to public institutions like the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the American Museum of National History, as well as holding a directorship in the St. Christopher’s Home and Orphanage.  But personal tragedy would change his life and the fate of the New York Kindergarten Association.

On Valentine’s Day 1899 the oilman’s daughter Frances Dana Archbold was married in St. Bartholomew’s Church to Frederick C. Walcott.   It was a significant social event, followed by a large reception at the Archbold mansion at No. 20 East 37^th Street.  The New York Times reported the following day “Mr. and Mrs. Walcott expect to sail on Saturday for Europe.”

Four months later the same newspaper published her obituary.   The young bride died “in Yokohama, Japan, while on her wedding trip,” said The Times.

While the Archbold family was grieving, the New York Kindergarten Association continued to grow.  By January 1901 it was supporting 19 kindergartens with an annual expense of $30,000.   On December 9 of that year The New York Tribune pleaded the Association’s case.

“It touches life at its sources, creates the atmosphere of the home while it does the work of the school, and prevents the appalling moral waste of neglected childhood…Its work ought to be doubled;  it is ready to multiply its facilities and extend its service indefinitely.”

Between 1901 and 1902 John D. Archbold gave the Association $40,000 to maintain a kindergarten serving 50 children at No. 244 Spring Street, renamed the Frances Dana Walcott Kindergarten.  But what was desperately needed was an up-to-date, concentrated headquarters building.

When Bessie Locke approached John D. Archbold  in 1905, he agreed to donate a new building in memory of his daughter.   On November 5 it was announced that “a substantial fireproof building would be erected to serve as headquarters of the association work.”

The five-story Folsom Brothers stables at Nos. 522-524 West 42^nd Street in the impoverished and sometimes dangerous Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood was purchased as the site.  By the time of the annual report the following year, construction had begun. 

“The building now being erected for the association at No. 522 West Forty-second street, by the generosity of Mr. John D. Archbold, is a striking evidence of the hold which this work of education among little children and in their homes has taken upon the minds of far-seeing men of affairs. ..It will provide for two and probably three model kindergartens.”    The planned building included a two-story assembly hall and the integrated headquarters would make explaining the work of the association to potential donors much easier.

 “All the work of the association will be under its roof; every visitor will have a chance to see in one place what the kindergarten does, why it does it, and how it does it, while an attractive assembly room will make it possible for the association to bring its friends together,” said the report.

Designed by architect Walter Cook, the new headquarters was completed in November 1907.   Clad in Flemish-bond red brick with limestone trim, it rose four floors above an ample basement behind a deep light moat.  The Outlook said it “combines in an unusual degree solidity, beauty, and adaptation,” and The School Journal praised it as “probably the most complete kindergarten building in the world.”

Although the cornice has been sheared away and the red brick and limestone are covered in grime, the structure is largely unchanged -- photo by Alice Lum

On the first floor were offices, the assembly room and the “Mothers’ Room.”  Here the parents would drop off their children and pick them up at the close of the day.  On the second floor was a kindergarten of two rooms, the staff lunch room, and two rooms of one hundred staff lockers.  Two kindergartens, including the Frances Dana Archbold Walcott Kindergarten, were housed on the top floor. 

The School Journal noted, “Upon the roof is a garden, where, under the shade of leafy pergolas, the children may enjoy their milk and crackers provided at eleven o’clock.”

The pergolas were, indeed, “leafy” when dedication ceremonies were performed on November 22, 1907.   Walter Cook revealed afterward that he had had the ivy planted when the building was only about halfway completed “so as to get a good start.”

Extra touches include Flemish-bond brickwork, carved limestone details and a handsome iron balcony railing -- photo by Alice Lum

The building at No. 522 West 42^nd Street would be a hub of children’s activity for decades.   In 1911 the Kindergarten Association was experimenting with a new concept.   Journalist Niola Greeley-Smith of The Evening World reported on November 29 that “the new idea in kindergartening is that of usefulness to mothers and children at the same time.”

Mothers and sisters were invited to the kindergartens here “to help them celebrate the Harvest Festival.”   The 2,000 children who attended the 42^nd Street building had spent weeks cutting out and coloring “miniature apples, pumpkins and ears of corn on which they wrote the invitations,” the article said.

The Festival was another means that the Kindergarten Association involved the mothers with their association’s efforts.   By learning the school’s methods the underprivileged women “are led to try some and cooperate with the kindergartner in her efforts to develop the children,” reported Greeley-Smith.

Hefty limestone entrance posts and the cast iron fencing survive.   The doorway was less fortunate.  -- photo by Alice Lum

By the middle of the century, however, kindergarten had become part of the New York City school system structure.   In 1951 the New York Kindergarten Association sold the building to investors Webb & Knapp, Inc.

The following year the New York Hotel Trades Council announced the purchase of No. 522 West 42^nd Street.  Following renovations, the Council and the Hotel Association Insurance Fund planned to occupy the building as union headquarters.

The endeavor was short-lived, however, and early in December 1954 the interdenominational New York Port Society dedicated the building as its new headquarters.   Founded in 1818 “to promote religious living among seamen,” it now also operated its Mariners Church here.

The former kindergarten building would be transformed again in 1988.  That year the New York City Police Department took over the structure to become partial home to the Manhattan South Task Force.   Today it sits grimy and somewhat abused, its cornice shorn off and its rooftop pergolas long discarded.  But Cook’s restrained design still survives in the ornate French railing of the second floor balcony, the handsome cast iron fencing and the monumental limestone entrance posts which, a century ago, saw the comings and goings of untold thousands of impoverished 3- to 6-year olds.