The 1892 Henry A. Maurer House - 110 West 75th Street

 

Gilbert A. Schellenger was in his mid-30's when he opened his architectural office in New York City around 1880.  He became a favorite of developers on the Upper West Side, eventually becoming the second most prolific architect in the district.  Among the 45 rows of townhouses he designed on the Upper West Side was a group of four for Julius Gottlieb in 1891.

The brownstone-fronted, high-stoop homes stretched from 106 through 112 West 75th Street.  Designed in the Renaissance Revival style, the openings of the parlor floor created a long arcade along the row.  The mirror-image center houses presented an imposing appearance with their shared dog-legged stoops and the pseudo-balconies that connected the angled bays of the second floor.  Double-height fluted pilasters at the second and third floors, and delicate Renaissance-inspired carved panels gave the four-story homes an imperious presence.

The row was completed in 1892, and Gottlieb leased 110 West 75th Street to Henry Arthur Mauer.  He and his wife, the former Laura L. Yuengling, had two children, Linda Louise, who was six years old in 1892, and Henry, Jr., who was two.  

Born in New York City on July 19, 1860, Henry was a partner with his father in the Henry Maurer & Son brickworks.  According to an annual report of the General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen, the firm was "considered one of the oldest manufactories of firebrick in the United States."  The factory was located in a New Jersey town not coincidentally named Maurer.

Two small children did not prevent Laura from entertaining in a high style.  On February 19, 1896, for instance, The Press reported, "Mrs. Henry A. Maurer of No. 110 West Seventy-fifth street gave the first reception of her series of three yesterday afternoon.  Mrs. Maurer was handsomely gowned in pink and lavender brocade and was assisted in receiving by Mrs. G. C. Claussen and Mrs. Thomas Noland Pell, who wore white satin and brocade."

On January 19, 1902, the New York Herald announced, "A social affair of much importance to take place a week from Thursday next will be the reception and entertainment given by Mrs. Henry A. Maurer, of No. 110 West Seventy-fifth street, to the members of the Auxiliary Committee of the Riverside Day Nursery, which, by the way, has materially enlarged its sphere of usefulness during the present season."

The Maurer family was faced with possible upheaval when, ten months later the "choice and valuable" houses making up Julius Gottlieb's 1892 row were sold at auction.  Happily for them, Henry Maurer placed the winning bid on the house his family had called home for a decade.  

Upon the death of Henry's father in 1904, he became president of Henry Maurer & Son.  Brick and Clay Record said of him, "He was a self-made man, leaving school in his sixteenth year, thru necessity, and commencing work in a brick plant with his father."

Linda's engagement to Edwin J. Beinecke was announced in December 1907.  The wedding took place in the Church of the Divine Paternity on Central Park West and 76th Street on April 22, 1909.  (Beinecke would become president of the Sperry & Hutchinson Company, a trading stamp firm.  His collection of Robert Lewis Stevenson materials would become the largest in the world.)

While the Mauers did not own a country home, they were annual visitors to fashionable resort hotels.  On August 26, 1910, for instance, The New York Times reported the the family had arrived at the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire "by automobile" today.

Laura was forced to make a difficult and no doubt disturbing decision in 1911.  Her widowed sister, Emma A. Hewes, was suffering from dementia.  Laura and her other sister, Mrs. S. E. Clausen, had her committed to a sanatorium on January 6.  The New York Times reported, "they said Mrs. Hewes suffers from delusions, one being that her husband still is alive, and she is traveling abroad with him."

Henry A. Maurer fell ill in January 1921 and died in the 75th Street house shortly afterward, on January 25 at the age of 61.  Laura and Henry, Jr. remained in the house.  The next year, after the end of the mourning period, Henry's engagement to Stewart Anway was announced.   They were married in 1923.

A renovation completed in 1949 resulted in an apartment on the top floor.  The configuration remains today.  Although the brownstone has been painted and the windows replaced, the 1892 residence otherwise is little changed.

photographs by the author

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The 1890 Henry S Day House - 128 West 75th Street

 

Between 1889 and 1892 architect Gilbert A. Schellenger designed nearly all of the rowhouses along the south side of West 75th Street between Columbus Avenue and Amsterdam Avenue.  Interestingly, he did the work for several different developers, among them George C. Edgar's Sons.   

Having just completed a row of five Schelender-designed homes designed, in 1890 George C. Edgar's Sons called him back to design five more--Nos. 124 through 132.  Completed before the end of the year, the 20-foot wide homes were designed in the Renaissance Revival style with touches of Queen Anne, and arranged in an A-B-A-B-A configuration.

The center house, No. 128, was like its neighbors stood four stories high above an English basement.  Fluted Corinthian pilasters separated the arched parlor windows.  The elaborate carving at the this level included chubby, nude children on the curved portico supports, and foliate Renaissance-style decorations along the frieze.  Nestled among the leafy swirls was an American shield.  The patriotic motif was repeated in the panel above the second floor windows where an American eagle and a pair of waving American flags took center stage.  

Corinthian pilasters reappeared at the fourth floor.  The molded fans over the paired windows at this level were part of the elaborate three-part cornice.

The house became home to the family of Rev. Henry S. Day.  Born in England, Day had come to America at an early age and for years had been pastor of the Melrose Baptist Church.  By now he was the president of the New York Medical College and the Hospital for Women, and the treasurer of the American Bible Union.  He and his wife Mary had a daughter, Isabel Marie, and a son, Frank T.

Rev. Day's high standing among society had been evidenced on his daughter Isabel Marie's wedding day in 1888.  The ceremony had taken place in the Days' home only a block to the east, at No. 57 East 75th Street.  Among the guests were the John D. Rockefellers.

Isabel's maid of honor was her cousin, Nellie Day Sugden.  Four years later, on November 29, 1892, her wedding took place in the Days' new home.   The ceremony had a decided military flavor.  Nellie's groom, Irving Longking Wiltsie, was a member of Troop A of the New York National Guard and all the uniformed ushers were members of the unit. 

Henry Day's health began to fail in 1894.  Finally, "after a lingering illness," according to the New York Herald, he died in the house on April 6, 1895 at the age of 65.

Before too long Mary shared the house either with a single boarder or companion.  Whichever she was, Barbara MacGahan was a fascinating figure.  The widow of the well-known journalist and war correspondent Janarius Aloysius MacGahan, she "came from the old Russian family of Elagine, whose members were landed proprietors in the government of Tula, Russia," according to The Globe and Commercial Adviser.  In 1876 she became the Russian correspondent to the New York Herald, and in 1880 joined the staff of The New York Times.  Over the next decade or so her articles appeared in many newspapers throughout the United States and Russia.  She also translated works by Mark Twain, Edgar Allan Poe and Bret Harte into Russian.

Mary was once again alone in the house following MacGahan's death on February 28, 1904.  She died the following year and two years later, on March 19, 1906, Frank Day sold the house to Ferdinand and Hattie Myers Hess.  The couple paid $25,000, or about $733,000 in today's money.

Pudgy naked children decorate the sides of the portico supports.

The Hesses, who had married in 1890, had a daughter, Alma, and son, Monroe F.   Ferdinand Hess was a partner with George W. Drucker in Hess, Goldsmith & Co., leather merchants on Duane Street.  He was also a director in the New Jersey-based real estate firm, the Norwood Park Co. with high-ranking Jewish businessmen like Leopold Stern, August Oppenheimer and Lionel Straus.

Alma and her mother often appeared in society columns together.  On February 2, 1913, for instance, The New York Times noted, "Mrs. Ferdinand Hess and Miss Alma Hess of 128 West Seventy-fifth Street have gone to Saranac for a short visit."

The family's summer home was in Long Branch, New Jersey.  Alma was married to attorney Theodore Richter in the house there on June 15, 1915.

Ferdinand and Hattie lived on in No. 128 West 75th Street until Ferdinand's death at the age of 66 on December 14, 1923.  His funeral was held in the house two days later.  Only a month later, on January 23, 1924, the New York Evening Post reported that his estate had sold the house to the Eastern College of Chiropractic.

After having been the home of wealthy businessmen and their families for three decades, No. 128 now became a rooming house.  Among the tenants in 1937 was Nicholas Bilos, who made his living as a waiter in a Childs Restaurant at No. 323 Columbus Avenue.

For weeks the neighborhood had been plagued by an armed robber known as The Woman In Black.  At around 2:00 on the morning of February 14, 1937 Norma Parker entered the Childs Restaurant and ordered a cup of coffee.  There were several other customers, and Parker drank her coffee and left.  But she loitered nearby.  The manager, Thomas Hasapas, said later he noticed her pacing the sidewalk across the street.  At 4:55 a.m. the last of the patrons left and Parker reentered, ordering another cup of coffee.

When the manager brought her change, she pulled a pistol from her purse and ordered the manager "Give me the money."  He was passing the $14 from the cash drawer to her when the front door opened.  Parker turned her head and Hasapas lunged and called for Bilos.  As the two men struggled with her, the customer who had walked in joined in the fight.  In the frenzy, her pistol discharged, sounding a benign "pop."  It was a child's cap gun.

Bilos and the customer held her as Hasapas called the police.  The New York Sun reported she pleaded, "Please let me go, you're hurting my wrist."  Bilos answered, "Nuts."

The men had succeeding in ending the criminal career of The Woman in Black.  She explained her motive in the station house saying "housemaids' work bored her."

A celebrated resident by 1941 was Russian-born ballet dancer Xenia Petrovna Makletzova.  She had been trained at the Bolshoi Ballet School, graduating in 1908.  Now retired from the stage, she gave private dancing lessons in her studio on East 34th Street.

A renovation completed in 1957 resulted in six apartments, including one duplex, along with four furnished rooms on the top floor.  A subsequent and architecturally regrettable project in 1989 carved a garage into the basement.  It was possibly at this time that the stoop railings were replaced with modern versions and the brownstone painted gray.

photographs by the author

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The Grace E. Lynes House - 158 West 75th Street

 

In its January 16, 1886 issue, The Record & Guide commented on the work of architect James Brown Lord, saying his groups of town houses "seem to diversify the monotonous architecture of the city street."  Some of those rows had been designed for developer Charles T. Barney.  The men worked together several times and the following year embarked on two more projects.

One of those involved four 20-foot wide houses on the south side of West 75th Street, between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenues.  Lord designed the playful Queen Anne row in an A-B-A-B configuration to create a visual feast of angles, shapes, and colors.

No. 158 was one of the "B" houses.  The basement and parlor levels were faced in undressed brownstone.  Its straight stone stoop led to the single-doored entrance below a whimsical triangular pediment.  A three-story angled bay provided added dimension and a prominent gable rose above the roof line.

The house became home to the unmarried Grace Elizabeth Lynes.  Born in 1859 to Benjamin and Elizabeth Gemmel Lynes, she brought little attention to herself or her home.  A member of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, she seems to have busied herself more with cultural and philanthropic works than with social events.  Her life was not without social interaction, of course.  She traveled, for instance, to Maine in 1904 with a group of five friends.  On September 9, the Maine Woods reported, "if you want to meet a jolly crowd you want to visit Camp Maloma.  They are here for their first visit.  They are having a nice time and know how to have it."  

Shortly after that Grace's widowed sister, Katharine Gemmel Bailey moved in.  Katherine's husband, Aaron Turner Bailey, had died in 1877 at just 27-years-old.  Their only child, Helense, had died two years earlier at the age of 3.

The sisters were members of the Daughters of the Revolution and worked in tandem in some of their charity works; each giving two chairs to the The Seamen's Church Institute of New York in 1914, for instance.  They seem to have entrusted their finances to the same agent, as well, as both were both stockholders in the Standard Oil Corporation.

In 1914 Grace offered the house for sale at $55,000--around $1.45 million in today's money.   She either changed her mind or simply could not find a buyer.  In either case, she converted her home to a rooming house.  She and Katharine continued to live here, while now sharing it with other families.

Her tenants all came from the arts.  Violinist Enrique Madriguera lived on the top floor and Teresa Carreño, daughter of the famed pianist of the same name, was in the basement.  On the parlor level was Rosa Culmell Nin and her three children, Angela Anaïs, Thorvald and Joaquín.  

Rosa Nin was a classically trained Cuban singer who was separated from her husband, Cuban pianist and composer Joaquín Nin.  Angela, who went by Anaïs, was 12-years-old at the time.  She had started writing detailed journals about a year before they moved into their new home and would go on to write novels, short stories and erotica.  It was her journals, however, for which she would be best known.

She documented No. 158 in great detail, saying that her family lived on the first floor, "in what was once a parlor and dining room."  She noted that the home's original owners 

...had lived sumptuously, with a kitchen in the basement, a pantry for the butler, maids' rooms on the top floor, a formal dining room overlooking a garden, a parlor full of mirrors, bedrooms with dressing rooms and luxurious bathrooms on the second floor.  Past bourgeois comfort was still visible in the elaborate lamps, rugs, and mirrors...My mother and my two brothers and I all slept in what was once the dining room.  We washed our faces in what was once the pantry, and used what was once the servants' shower next to the kitchen in the basement.

The Nins slept on Murphy beds which "became sedate bureaus by day," according to Anaïs's journal.  She recalled, "The house was full of gaiety, music, distinguished visitors.  José Mardones came to sing, Miguel Jovet played the guitar, my mother sang, my brother Joaquin studied his piano, Enrique practiced his violin."

Anais Nin (original source unknown)

In The Nin family left No. 158 around 1918.  That year voice coach Margharita Hamill moved in.  On October 24 the Musical Courier reported, "Margharita Hamill, soprano, is teaching at her studio at 158 West Seventy-fifth street, New York, and already has a long list of pupils."

In 1920 Grace Lynes sold the house to Teresa G. Healy.  It was the beginning of a rapid turnover of owners.  Healy sold it in 1922 to Ida S. Primoff who sold it in 1925 to an investor.

James Brown Lord used clustered chimneys to provide a romantic, historic feel.

Among the residents at the time were real estate developer George Dorfman, who owned a row of summer cottages in Rockaway Beach, and Earl Youst, who made his money in a less upstanding way.  On November 15, 1926 he was arrested as one of three men who attempted to burglarize the A. Hammer, Inc. fur shop on Broad Street.  After beating and tying up the watchman, Winfield Doran, the trio packed up $30,000 worth of furs, but Doran wrenched free and called for help, scaring them off before they were successful.

Two other residents found themselves on the wrong side of the law in 1935.  Charles Barton rented an office on West 34th Street and then placed "a misleading advertisement" in a newspaper, according to police.  He promised men jobs as clerks in a grocery store chain, then invited them to a congratulatory opening banquet, tickets to which cost $3.  When the men did not hear back about either the job or the dinner, they became suspicious.

On June 5 police went to Barton's office.  The 29-year old tried to escape, smashing Detective Thomas J. Coleman over the head with a blackjack and bolting down the stairs.  His escape was halted when Coleman shot him in the leg.  At the hospital he was charged with felonious assault and fraud.

At the same time 23-year-old entertainer William West rented rooms in the house.   He was part of an all-male nightclub show that summer, one which did not get the stamp of approval of Long Island authorities.

On August 23, 1935 The Suffolk County News reported that authorities, "determined to put a stop to entertainments of a questionable nature in road houses and resorts in the county, swooped down on the Wonder Bar Dance Hall at Lindenhurst early on Sunday morning and made eight arrests.  "Three officers were sent into the place and when the floor show had concluded their fellow officers were summoned," said the article.  Among those arrested was William West.  "The group was taken to Babylon Court in costume."

Marcus T. Monk did not help improve the reputation of the tenant list.  On May 21, 1937 he was arrested for issuing fake checks.   It was not hard to track him down, since the fraudulent checks were "in payment of room rent."

A renovation completed in 1991 resulted in two apartments per floor.  The Lynes house is the only one of James Brown Lord's row to retain its stoop.  Other than a gruesome replacement door and the loss of the stained glass transoms, it is remarkably intact.

photographs by the author

The Walther Luttgen House - 51 West 75th Street

In 1891 prolific developer James T. Hall began construction of four brownstone-fronted homes on the north side of West 75th Street, between Central Park West and Columbus Avenue.  Designed by George H. Budlong, they were a creative blend of Renaissance Revival and Romanesque Revival architecture.

No. 51 stands out among the row because of its intact condition and later-added mansard.

The homes were completed in 1891.  Four stories tall above English basements, their 23-foot width and proximity to the park reflected the comfortable financial status of their intended owners.  No. 51, overall, featured the elements of the Renaissance Revival style, but it owed its rough-cut brownstone face to Romanesque Revival.  A robust box stoop led the the double-doored entrance, framed in Renaissance-inspired pilasters.  The handsome three-sided oriel at the second floor, supported by a swagged bracket, provided a balcony to the third floor.  Above it all, originally, a modest modillioned pressed metal cornice matched those of its neighbors.

A delicate carved ribbon goes nearly unnoticed within the rough brownstone blocks.

When the original owner of the house lost it in foreclosure in 1894, it was purchased by Walther (sometimes anglicized as Walter) Luttgen for $34,500--just over $1 million today.   Born in Germany in 1839, he was a partner with August Belmont in the banking firm August Belmont & Company.  Luttgen and his wife, the former Amelia Victoria Bremeyer, had two daughters, Florence Amelia, born in 1868, and Gertrude Marion, born in 1880.

Walther Luttgen - Columbia Yacht Club, 1917

Walter was active in the yachting community and was a member of the Seawanhaka Corinthian Yacht Club and the Columbia Yacht Club.  When his yacht, the Linta, was launched in July 1892, The Evening World mentioned "The Linta is 85 feet long, handsomely fitted up and one of the largest steam yachts ever built here."

Fashionable New Yorkers filed into the 75th Street house on January 39, 1901 for Gertrude's wedding reception following she her marriage to Oliver Hildreth Keep, Jr. in All Angels' Church.  (Sadly, Gertrude died seven years later at the age of 28.)

Luttgen's business interests went beyond banking.  In January 1900 he and August Belmont had purchased an entire block of Harlem real estate; and he was a director of the Illinois Central Railroad Company, the Rapid Transit Construction Company, the Consolidated Railway Electric Lighting and Equipment Company, and the Transatlantic Trust Company.  

In March 1902 the Luttgens sold No. 51 to Rev. John Henry Watson and his wife, the former Susan Matilda Hoffman.  The couple had two sons, Henry and Eugene, and a daughter, Mary Elmendorf, all of whom were grown by now.  Mary and Eugene, both unmarried, moved into the house with their parents.

Born in 1845 to the Boston minister Rev. John Lee Watson, Watson had an impressive background and traced his ancestors to the Mayflower.  Upon graduating from the Berkeley Divinity School in Middleton, Connecticut, he had immediately become assistant rector at the fashionable Trinity Chapel in Manhattan.  He then moved on to churches in Stamford, Philadelphia, Hartford and New Rochelle.  Returning to New York City, he gave up parish work and devoted himself to the missions in the impoverished areas.

Watson had also provided his services as the chaplain of the Army and Navy Aid Association.  The group provided help to veterans, many of whom had served in the recent Spanish-American War.  In the minutes of a meeting opened by Watson on May 18, 1900, it was noted “Many pathetic letters have been received, the most of them containing requests for work.”

Susan also came from a religious family.  Her father was Rev. Eugene Augustus Hoffman, Dean of the General Theological Seminary.  Newspapers called him "the richest clergyman in the world."  Upon his death on June 17, 1902, three months after the Watsons purchased No. 51, he died leaving an estate of just under $10 million.  It was divided mainly between his widow and four children.  

In March 1904 the Watsons made extension renovations to the 75th Street house.  They hired the well-known architectural firm of John B. Snook & Son to do the equivalent of $87,000 today in work that included adding a mansard level, rearranging the interior walls and closets, and install new windows.  A hefty cornice visually capable of upholding the new level was installed at the time.

The Watson summer estate was Ondawa on Little Moose Lake in Old Forge, New York.  Susan involved herself in social circles there and was a member of the Adirondack League Club.

Essentially retired, Watson filled his time with writing.  In 1911 he published The History of Fra Paolo Sarpi, a biography of the 18th century priest who was openly critical of the Catholic Church.

Watson suffered a fatal heart attack in the 75th Street house on October 31, 1913 at the age of 68.  His funeral was held in Trinity Chapel.  Susan continued to live in the house with Mary and Eugene and to summer at Ondawa.  She busied herself with charities such as the Fifth Avenue Hospital and the Hospital Musical Association.

Susan's mother, Mary C. Hoffman, died in 1914.  Given her massive estate and the individual wealth of her children, it is perhaps a bit surprising that a court battle broke out over jewelry.  Susan's siblings protested when the executors omitted two items from the estate inventory--a pearl necklace and a ruby ring valued at $12,500 (just under $325,000 today).  The Sun reported on July 19 "Mrs. Watson insisted that her mother, who had other jewelry worth $38,605, gave to her the necklace and ruby ring long before death."

The suit against Susan was not the only contention.  Mary's grandchildren separately sued because she had bequeathed her "large retinue of servants" four months salary.  Commenting on that suit, the judge said "It certainly is not the custom among affluent families to turn servants of dead people summarily out of doors."

Susan and Mary traveled together.  On October 23, 1921, for instance, The New York Herald reported that they were pausing at the Maplewood Hotel in Pittsfield, near Lenox, Massachusetts.

Perhaps assuming that Mary would stay forever single, society may have been surprised when Susan announced her engagement to the Rev. Jackson H. Randolph Ray of Dallas, Texas on April 17, 1922.   The wedding took place on July 18 in fashionable St. Thomas's Church on Fifth Avenue.   Ray was Dean of St. Matthew's Cathedral in Dallas.  Two days prior to the ceremony The New York Herald predicted "Late in the season as it is, there will be many notable members of old New York society present."

Two years later, on August 28, 1926, The Sun reported that Susan had sold No. 51 to the Hephzibah House Bible Training School and Home of Rest.  The institution paid $32,000 for the property, or about $469,000 in today's money.

The organization was founded in 1893 as the Hephzibah House and Training School for Christian Workers, a Bible training school for young women.  Its name was changed in 1897 when it began operating a lodging house for missionary workers passing through New York, as well.  

A 1939 renovation resulted in a kitchen and laundry in the basement, a reception room and library on the first floor, and furnished rooms on the floors above.

The Hephzabah House Bible Training School and Home of Rest remains in the Luttgen house, its website noting "It continues to  serve as a guest house for those serving in ministry to be able to visit New York City for meetings, vacation or rest to stay in Manhattan at affordable rates."

photographs by the author

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The 1898 La Rochelle Apartments - 57 West 75th Street

On June 1, 1895 the Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide reported that the architectural firm of Lamb & Rich had filed plans for a "brick flat" to be erected on the northeast corner of Columbus Avenue and 75th Street.  The owner of the projected building, estimated to cost $275,000 (just under $8.5 million today), was listed as Corydon H. Merriman, of Oakdale, Long Island.

That was, in fact, not quite true.  Merriman was the private secretary of millionaire Christopher Rhinelander Robert and it was Robert's money that was behind the project.  Born in 1829, he was taken into his father's business, Robert & Williams, as a young man.  His father, Christopher Sr., had already amassed a large fortune and had founded Robert College in Constantinople.  The younger Robert's first wife had died about three years after their wedding and in 1875 he married the widowed Julia Remington Morgan.

That year he began construction of a sprawling country home at Oakdale, Long Island (the same location Merriman listed as his address) that abutted William K. Vanderbilt's Idle Hour estate.  It was not a neighborly relationship and when Vanderbilt's expensive hunting dogs repeatedly trespassed onto Robert's estate, Robert set traps.  It led to a "rather excited" confrontation at the Oakdale train station during which "the talk was warm," said The Sun.  Robert ended the verbal duel saying "The traps are on my land, aren't they?  Well, if you keep your dogs at home they won't get caught in them."  The Sun concluded "No more dogs were caught."

Robert's French Huguenot forebears had come to America from the town of La Rochelle and it appears he gave his Oakdale estate that name.  In 1876 he started construction of another mansion in Newport.   Robert was a man of leisure, having retired around the time of his marriage to Julia.  The Sun said that he "spent much of his time in Paris.  He was very fond of horses, and made several tours through France driving a four-in-hand."

It is unclear why Robert disguised his ownership of the Columbus Avenue project; certainly he owned much property in Manhattan and was well-known.  But it may be explained by his nearly reclusive tendencies.  The Sun said "Mr. Robert was a man of many acquaintances but no intimates.  He was well educated and an agreeable talker when he chose, but reticent and fond of solitude." 

Completed late in 1897, Lamb & Rich had produced an 11-story Renaissance Revival style structure of brick and stone with decorative elements in terra cotta.    Like his Long Island estate, Robert christened the apartment building La Rochelle.  The upscale building turned its shoulder to the avenue; its entrance on West 75th Street recessed behind a sumptuous triple-arched pavilion of fluted, banded engaged columns with elegant Scamozzi capitals.  They upheld an entablature emblazoned with the building's name under an arched pediment.  The two-story columns were repeated on the Columbus Avenue side, only slightly disguising the storefronts.

photo via nynesting.com

The third floor was faced in planar stone, its windows framed in Gibbs-like surrounds.  The restrained ornamentation of the upper floors was confined mostly to brick and terra cotta quoining, and brick voussoirs above the end openings.  A projecting stone cornice partially hid the 11th floor, preserving the structure's proportions.

The elevated train ran up Columbus Avenue in 1910.  The World's New York Apartment House Album (copyright expired)

An ad in the New-York Tribune on April 17, 1897 touted La Rochelle as the "finest and most complete house in the city."  It boasted "three elevators with all-night service; electric light and steam heat free; no extra charges; open on all sides; not a dark room or closet in the house."  It included, as well, a "first-class French Restaurant on premises."

The apartments were spacious, just four to a floor.  They included large parlors and dining rooms, and most had three bedrooms.  Servants rooms, interestingly, were in some cases isolated across the hall from the apartment proper.  The rents, ranging from $1,200 to $1,900 per year, would equal between $3,083 to $4,883 per month today.

The World's New York Apartment House Album (copyright expired)

Among the initial tenants were Christopher Rhinelander Robert and his wife, and Corydon Merriman, who now had a second job as manager of  La Rochelle.   Robert's new lavish apartment did not change his often odd behavior and, in fact, his conduct became even more erratic.

On New Year's Day 1898 he and Julia boarded a steamship headed to Paris to visit her three children by her first marriage.  The Sun reported that he "suddenly changed his mind and insisted on returning to his apartments."  The building's janitor later mentioned that Robert "had been especially dejected and peculiar in his actions for the last week."

At around 9:00 the next morning Julia was in the music room when she heard a noise that she feared was a gunshot.  The Sun reported "she was afraid to investigate alone, and sent a hallboy for C. H. Merriman."  Merriman and the janitor forced open the door of Robert's bedroom.  They found the 68-year-old "sitting in a chair, fully dressed; he had shot himself in the right temple, and a 38-calibre revolver lay beside him on the floor."

Robert's brother, Frederick, demanded a full investigation.  His concern may have had as much to do with the scandal of suicide as with the possibility of foul play.  Frederick's attorney, Thomas C. T. Crain, explained to newspapers "In the case of the death of Mr. Robert it appears that those most familiar with the facts desired to keep as many of them from the public as possible."

Frederick tried to cast doubt on the possibility of suicide by pointing attention to the inexpensive revolver.  His lawyer said "Mr. Robert was a man particularly careful about his personal appearance and about the excellent condition and quality of everything he possessed.  I am told that the pistol found on the floor was a cheap affair, and hardly such a one as a man like Robert would be expected to own."  Nevertheless the coroner's jury unanimously deemed Robert's death self-inflicted.

In the meantime, La Rochelle continued to fill with socially visible families, like Elbridge Gerry Snow, Jr., his wife, Frances, and their two children.  The Evening Telegram said of them "Both come of excellent families.  The elder Elbridge Gerry Snow is a cousin of Elbridge T. Gerry, and young Mrs. Snow was Frances Pickett, the daughter of a Montana ranch owner."

The couple repeatedly appeared in the society columns.  On January 3, 1901, for instance, The Evening Telegram announced that Frances "has issued 100 invitations for Saturday, January 12, from four to seven o'clock...The afternoon reception will be followed by dancing at night."  And on January 31 the following year The New York Herald reported that the Gerrys "will give a musical this evening at their residence...followed by an informal dance."

Unknown to any of those guests was that storm clouds had been brewing within the Snow apartment for months.  But they and everyone else in New York would soon be very aware.

Elbridge left the La Rochelle apartment on June 4, 1902, moved in with his parents, and sued Frances for a divorce.  In response, she refused to allow him to see their two children, Elbridge, Jr., who was five-years-old, and four-year old Dorothy.  The Snows' domestic break-up changed from a private matter to a very public one when Elbridge tried to force Frances to share the children.

Newspapers followed the drama as Frances barricaded herself and the children within the apartment.  The Evening Telegram reported on June 25 "Mrs. Snow is believed to be shut up in her apartments...away from the detectives and process servers, who are guarding the house and awaiting a chance to serve the writ.  If Mrs. Snow could leave the State with her children she would be safe from the jurisdiction of the court."  The newspaper said Snow declared that he "could show provocation for leaving his home and also why he believed Mrs. Snow was not a competent person to continue as the children's custodian."

Frances managed to escape to her attorney's office on June 24 by wearing the gray cloak of the children's governess and a heavy veil over her face.  "Even the hallboys are said to have failed to recognize her and she reached her counsel's office safely," said The Telegram.  But she narrowly escaped being served on the way home.

"As she was coming out, however, a process server...walked up and remarked, 'Mrs. Snow, I believe.'"  Frances replied "I never saw you before and climbed quickly into her waiting cab.  "The process server threw the paper at the hansom, but his aim was bad and it slipped off the cab doors to the street without touching Mrs. Snow."

Frances would have to make a heart-rending decision the following year in December when the divorce decree was issued.  The New York Press reported the judge "awarded a child to each parent, leaving the choice with Mrs. Snow."

The Snow divorce was not the only high-profile separation going on within La Rochelle.   Prominent opera figures Emil Fischer, who was about 60-years old and his 30-year old soprano wife, Camille Seygard moved in shortly after their marriage in 1900.  The Morning Telegraph called Fischer "one of the best bassos in the world."

On May 7, 1902 The Evening World reported "It may interest a good many persons in New York to know that Emil Fischer, the ponderous basso, and Camille Seygard, the opera company singer...are no longer husband and wife."  

A cabinet card depicted Fischer in the role of Wotan in Das Rheingold

Madame Seygard, whose off-stage name was Amelia Marie Kate Fischer, had quietly moved out of La Rochelle and secretly obtained a divorce on May 3.  She sailed for Europe that same day. 

Their troubles had started in the fall of 1901 when, according to Madame Seygard, her husband had turned his attentions to Paola Wheinig, whom The Evening World brusquely described as "another singer of less renown, but with apparently more charms for the basso."  With her suspicions aroused, Seygard did not inform her husband that she was returning unexpectedly from a concert tour in January 1902.  

Camille Seygard's domestic bliss was short lived.  from the collection of the Library of Congress

When she arrived at the apartment she found the bedroom door locked.  "Her husband's voice called out that she could not come in," said The Evening World.  But Madame Seygard had her own key.  "When she opened the door she found her husband and the woman."

Domestic strife seemed rampant in La Rochelle.  Another well-heeled couple, William Talbot Perry and his wife, the former Grace Wells, seemed to have the ideal relationship and lifestyle.  The had moved into La Rochelle following their fashionable wedding in London's St. George's Church in 1899.  The Evening World said on March 16, 1903, "They had their automobile, their yacht, their summer home.  It looked like a perpetual honeymoon."

But behind closed doors it was anything but that.  Grace filed for divorce in May 1903 saying "only four months after their marriage he had thrown her to the floor and beaten her with a cane; threatened her with a pistol two months later, and that he applied opprobrious epithets to her while proclaiming his admiration for certain actresses whose photographs he kept."

Among the other well-to-do families in the building at the time was that of attorney Charles O. Maas, who lived on the fifth floor.  The couple, who routinely summered in Europe, would remain in La Rochelle at least through 1911.  But it was the socialite's quick thinking and grit that drew press coverage in 1907.

On the night of February 24 Charles was not at home and Mrs. Maas was sitting in the parlor when, around midnight, she saw flames in the bathroom area reflected in the parlor mirror.  She tried to call the elevator boy, Fritz Taylor, but he could not be found either by the elevator bell or by telephone.  The Evening World reported "Running down the stairs she took charge of the telephone switchboard and called up every occupant of the big house.  It was only a few moments till they were down to the street and standing about in the snow with their arms full of valuables and the clothing they had not yet got into."

As it turned out Fritz had not abandoned his post, but had run to turn in a fire alarm.  The fire was restricted to the Maas apartment, but unfortunately two "valuable paintings" were destroyed in the blaze.

Adolph e. Wupperman, a "dealer in bitters," was in the building in 1918 when he was the victim of an extortion plot.  Andrew W. Work threatened to expose him of an unspecified "criminal act while engaged in business" unless he paid $18,000--a significant $300,000 in today's dollars.  

After Wupperman gave him $50 in marked bills on August 12, the 76-year old extortionist was arrested.  His defense was simple.  The Sun reported "Work protested vigorously, saying he was too old to stand imprisonment."

Wupperman's name appeared in newspapers four years later for a far different reason.  After attending meetings of the local Ku Klux Klan, Wupperman told reporters "that he was impressed" and hosted a Klan meeting in his La Rochelle apartment in the summer of 1922.   Wuppermann said "The discourse was very interesting.  The speaker disclaimed any purpose to sow discord among people of different religions or races, and altogether it seemed to me that it might be a very useful organization."  He told a reporter from The New York Herald in December, "It was so entertaining and instructive that I repeated it on several occasions."  

Sixteen-year old Robert Garrabrants was a handful for his mother.   In February 1925 she demanded to know how he came to have several radios in his room.  He refused to tell her and she wrestled with the issue for hours, then phoned the police to have him arrested.  The radios were traced to a break-in at the the Ansonia Music Shop on Broadway.  Police said Garrabrants confessed to breaking into other nearby radio shops.

Mrs. Garrabrants refused to post bail for her only son, telling the magistrate "that she had tried hard to make him a good boy.  She believed, she said, it would be better for him to be punished mildly now than grow into a criminal," according to The New York Times.

But after he spent four days in the Tombs, Robert's mother felt he had probably learned his lesson and paid a reduced bail of $1,000 to free him.

Two months later the teen was back in custody, charged with the theft of "several thousand dollars' worth of jewelry from the apartment of Mrs. Sadie Small at 221 West Eighty-second Street," according to The Times.   Detectives suspected he was mentally unbalanced, possibly the result of being struck by an automobile a year earlier.  On April 3 The Times reported they had scheduled "an examination to test the mentality" of the 16-year old.

The lobby of La Rochelle has survived beautifully intact.  photo via city realty

Another teen in the building was Burton Tucker.  He was 16-years-old in 1923, living on a Massachusetts farm when  he "wooed his rich aunt, Susan Oliver Tucker," according to a newspaper.  The couple was married in October 1923.  The bride was 44-years-old and Burton's family, understandably, objected to the romance.  But the fact that Susan was three months pregnant no doubt had forced their eventual approval.  The couple moved into commodious apartment in La Rochelle.

Burton enjoyed his new found wealth.  His bride had, according to newspapers, $300,000 in cash (more than $4.4 million today) as well as real estate.  According to the New York Evening Post later, "He was so smart, [Susan] said, that she entrusted all her money to him immediately, though he was only sixteen.  She even followed his lead in playing the stock market--but with poor luck."

Things did not progress smoothly as the years passed.  On May 2, 1935 The Evening Post reported "Mrs. [Susan] Olive Tucker, fifty-eight, giggled today and reported that her unruly young husband, Burton, twenty-eight, has been a good boy since she had him arrested."  Burton had knocked her down in their La Rochelle apartment.

Susan posted bond and the judge cautioned him against physical abuse.  "You have a sweet wife, be a good husband."  But it would not be the last time they appeared in court.

The Tuckers were still living in La Rochelle on May 10, 1937 when the New York Post ran the headline "Cash Ran Out--So Did Husband."  By now, according to Susan, she had become "merely his housekeeper."  Burton had taken up with a younger woman and abandoned Susan and their three children.  Tragically, he had exhausted her entire fortune.  "Today, I'm penniless," she told the court.  "I haven't enough to fee the children tomorrow."

Throughout the coming years La Rochelle would continue to see well-heeled and celebrated tenants.  William Earl Brown, a vocal instructor and author of Vocal Wisdom, lived here until his death on May 16, 1945, for instance.

In 2015 a renovation resulted in seven apartments per floor.  Other than replacement windows and the regrettable loss of the terminal cornice, the exterior of the building with the astounding past survives little changed.

photographs by the author
many thanks to reader Peter Alsen for suggesting this post