William Jose's 1873 5 Spring Street

 

image via apartments.com

On June 17, 1873, the "brick house in front and small brick building in rear" at 5 Spring Street were auctioned.  Their sale would doom the two buildings, which, like nearly all the vintage structures in the neighborhood, were falling victim to the drastically changing demographics in what a century later would be called Nolita.

On month later, architect William Jose filed plans for a 25-foot-wide, "five-story brown stone store and tenement" for developer F. Herlein.  His Italianate design was typical of the ubiquitous tenement buildings being erected throughout the Lower East Side.  Sheet metal lintels with molded cornices sat atop the upper floor windows and an arched pediment crowned with a Greek-inspired antefix sat atop the building's pressed metal terminal cornice. 

photograph by Ted Leather

What was not typical was the cast iron storefront.  Between two entrances--one accessing the upper floors and the other the store--was a triple arcade.  The paneled piers between the windows contributed to a handsome presence, but restricted the ability to display wares.  The lack of a vast show window did not deter Joseph Hugo to open his bakery in the space.

The 1873 storefront survived in 1940.  via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services.

No. 5 Spring Street filled with blue collar and middle-class tenants.  Living here in 1877 were three clerks, two carpenters, a shoemaker, a hatter, a laborer, a cigarmaker, a butcher, a maker of awnings, two widows, and an ostler (or stable worker). 

Many of the tenants were Irish-born, like Michael J. Riley, who worked as a letter carrier, and his wife and five children.  One afternoon in October 1884 he delivered mail to a Bond Street machine shop.  He placed a package of 125 letters on the counter.  They were addressed to Bond Street businesses that had already closed for the day.  The New York Herald explained, "In such cases the mail is taken back to the station and stamped with an explanation of its non-delivery."  Riley, perhaps distracted, "picked up his pouch and went out of the shop, leaving the package."

On October 8, the New York Herald reported that Michael Riley had been arrested, "on a charge of unlawfully detaining the mails."  Riley stressed that he "forgot all about it."  Perhaps coming to his defense, the article concluded, "Riley had a sunstroke last summer."

Sam Erwin Ryan, born in 1828, was described by the New York Herald as "one of the oldest Irish comedians on the American stage."  The widowed entertained died here on November 15, 1891 at the age of 63.  In reporting his death, the New York Herald remarked, "He had been forty years on the stage, and had been a conspicuous actor in his day."

Unthinkable today, working class parents often sent their small children on errands, even at night.  On Saturday night January 9, 1897, Detectives Summers and Lynch noticed five-year-old Lee Collins, whose family lived at 5 Spring Street, "walking along that thoroughfare...with a can."  They asked the boy where he was going and he said he was off to get some beer.

The policeman followed him to Henry Barr's saloon at 14 Spring Street, "and saw the bartender, Clement Kirschner, sell him a pint of beer."  Although Kirschner was arrested, Lee Collins' parents were not accused of any wrongdoing (and apparently Lee Collins went on his way home unaccompanied with the pail of beer).  When the bartender faced Magistrate Deuel in the Centre Street Police Court, he received "a severe lecture."  Deuel "told him he ought to be ashamed of himself to sell beer to a child" and placed his bail at $1,000 (a stunning $40,000 in 2026 terms).

The Commerford family lived here in 1898.  The New York Journal and Advertiser said that Patrick Commerford "is accustomed to putting a little whiskey in his black coffee at breakfast."  On September 4, however, there was no whiskey in the apartment, so Maggie Commerford was sent to the apartment of her aunt, Kate White, at 239 Mulberry Street to get some.  The New York Journal and Advertiser said Maggie was three-and-a-half years old.  The New York Herald placed her age at nine.  Either way, the newspapers' reporting on the events that followed, however, were consistent.

Maggie went to her aunt's home and, according to Kate White, she filled Maggie's pint bottle with whiskey "and told the little girl to carry it home to her father," as reported by the New York Herald.  On the way, "Little Maggie evidently became thirsty," said the newspaper.  The girl drank the entire pint bottle of whiskey.  The New York Herald said she "was picked up from the sidewalk in Mulberry street yesterday in an unconscious state and carried to St. Vincent's Hospital."

Maggie told officials, "It felt just like I had played too much 'ring-around-a-rosy.'"  And asked why she drank it, she replied, "Oh, I just tasted it, and it seemed to taste good, and I tasted it all up."  Mrs. Commerford took the girl home and Patrick Commerford was arrested.

By the turn of the century, Mary Seibert ran the bakery.  The workspace and ovens were in the basement and Mary lived in an apartment above the bakery.  The business was apparently successful, because Mary could afford a live-in servant.  

The neighborhood was, by now, greatly filled with Italian immigrants.  In 1899 Paolo Lecestra arrived from Italy, "leaving his wife, Luigia, behind until he could get money enough to buy her passage with," explained The New York Sun.  He was not here very long before he found a job as a pressor in a tailor shop.  Just as quickly, he fell in love with a co-worker, Rosina Ignelia.  

Lecestra married Rosina in November 1899 and they moved into 5 Spring Street.  In the meantime, Luigia Lecestra was also working towards her passage.  On April 4, 1901, The Sun reported, "Six months ago Luigia, the first wife, scraped together enough money to come to this country."  Paolo Lecestra met Luigia at the pier, "but gave her an angry reception," reported The Sun.  What followed was remarkable.  The article recounted:

Then he took her to his home at 5 Spring street and introduced her to Rosina, who he said was his lawful wife under the laws of the United States.  Lecestra told Luigia that she might remain if she did as she was told.  Her duties were to keep house for her husband and Rosina, who worked together in the tailor shop.

Luigia later described the arrangement.  The Sun recounted, "Lecestra maintained wifely relations only with Rosina who is younger and prettier than Luigia," adding, "Luigia was the household drudge."  The heartbroken Luigia spilled out her woeful condition in a letter to her uncle in Italy, who was an attorney.  He forwarded it to the Italian Consul, which turned it over to the New York District Attorney.  On April 3, 1901, Paolo Lecestra was arrested for bigamy.  The New York Sun reported, "Rosina kissed him and wept when Lecestra was taken away."

The Pavone and Versa families lived here in 1906 when their mischievous sons went on a rampage.  On August 29, they and three other Italian boys boarded a subway "loaded down with apples," as worded by the New-York Tribune.  The article said they "amused themselves by throwing apples at everybody in the rear car."  The motorman stopped the train "and blew the train whistle repeatedly."  Two officers responded and the "boys resisted arrest, but were subdued."  The five were "locked up charged with disorderly conduct," said the article.

Joseph Marino, who lived here in 1935, was doing well enough financially to afford an automobile.  In September that year, the car was stolen and the thieves removed the license plates.  Although the vehicle was not readily recovered, the plates showed up the following month as part of a grisly discovery.  

On September 30, gangster Joseph "Pretty" Amberg and his chauffeur, Morris Kessler "were lined up against the wall in a Brownsville garage, after the fashion of  the celebrated St. Valentine's Day massacres in Chicago, and were riddled with bullets," reported The New York Times.  On October 24, the newspaper revealed, "'Pretty' Amberg's body was found early yesterday morning in a blazing automobile which had been left in front of 131 North Elliot Place, Brooklyn."  The plates on the car belonged to Joseph Marino.

image via the NYC Dept of Records & Information Services

Joseph Bianco was discharged from the Army in October 1945.  The veteran returned to New York, got a job driving a milk wagon, and moved into 5 Spring Street.  His heroism ended at the end of the war.  

In March 1946, five teenaged boys were arrested "as juvenile delinquents," explained The New York Times.  The boys confessed in a string of tenement building burglaries and arsons.  One of the fires nearly resulted in the death of a sleeping girl.  In interrogating the teens, police discovered that 22-year-old Joseph Bianco was a modern day Fagan.

On March 11, 1946, The New York Times reported that he "looked defiantly yesterday in Felony Court as the prosecutor related...that Bianco trained five boys, all under 16 years old, not alone to be burglars but to set fire to three lower East Side tenement apartments to conceal their crimes."  Bianco pleaded ignorance of the crimes, saying he had accepted the loot from the youths, but insisted, "I didn't know they had stolen that stuff."

When Bianco got out of prison, he remained friends with a resident of 5 Spring Street, Joseph Trulio.  On December 26, 1950, The New York Times reported that the two men confessed to "holding up thirty hotels in the last two weeks, nine of them on Christmas morning."  In court, Magistrate Brenner asked Bianco, "Why pick hotels?"  He replied, "Hotels are easier.  They have big lobbies and you can make a quick getaway."

photograph by Ted Leather

Changes in the neighborhood were reflected by Sweet and Vicious, a night club, occupying the ground floor space in the early 2000s.  A renovation completed in 2016 modernized the storefront, home to The Tavern today.  Although the paneled piers remain, the arched openings are either squared off or covered by signage today.

many thanks to reader Ted Leather for suggesting this post

The Conrad Stein Brewery - 514-516 West 57th Street

The large arched pediment once held a cast iron panel which announced the firm's name.

By the mid-1870's the Schwaner & Amend Brewery operated from several buildings at the southeast corner of 10th Avenue and 57th Street.  In 1878 the company renovated the structure at Nos. 514-516 as an ice house.  But only four years later the entire complex of buildings was sold at auction.

Another brewer, Conrad Stein, purchased the ice house and lot behind that ran through the block to West 56th Street.   Stein had come to the United States with his parents in 1835.  He had partnered with Philip Schaefer in 1864 to form the Stein & Schaefer Brewery; but it was a short-lived venture, ending in 1867.  That same year Stein opened the Conrad Stein Brewery.

On November 4, 1882 the New-York Tribune reported "A six-story brick malt house is to be built by Conrad Stein at Nos. 514 and 516 West Fifty-seventh-st., at a cost of $60,000."  That amount would top $1.5 million today.

The Real Estate Record & Builders' Guide reported that Stein had hired William Jose to design the structure.   Born in Germany and essentially forgotten today, Jose had little formal architectural training.  But he produced an imposing free-standing brewery faced in red brick.

He broke up the cube-like proportions with a tripartite design; the sections separated by a stone cornice above the first floor and a limestone course below the sixth.  Four full-length brick piers created three vertical sections, further alleviating the visual weight.

Jose turned for the most part to the neo-Grec style.  The ground floor openings--two windows on either side of the double-doored entrance--were linked by a continuous band of stone which rose and fell to form the lintels.  The motif was carried on at the upper floors in brick.  A brick corbel table upheld the ambitious metal cornice which rose at the center as an overblown arched pediment.  It embraced a cast iron panel that announced the firm's name.

In August 1884 Stein filed plans for "the erection of a stable at No. 517 West Fifty-seventy-st. to cost $25,000," as reported by the New-York Tribune.   (That would be about $660,000 today.)  Directly across the street from the brewery, it would have housed the teams of horses and delivery trucks necessary to delivery barrels of beer not only within Manhattan, but to Brooklyn and New Jersey.

The Hell's Kitchen neighborhood in which the Stein Brewery stood was populated mostly by immigrants, many of them German.  A popular means of spending one's evenings in the late 19th century for German-born residents was the biergarten, an open air space with entertainment, light food and much beer.  The Conrad Stein Brewery operated its own biergarten in the rear property.  The entire venue could, as well, be rented by groups or for special occasions.  Such was the case when an announcement appeared in The Evening World on May 8, 1893:

Glendale Club Reception

Six months anniversary of the Glendale Pleasure Club will be held at Conrad Stein's Garden, Fifty-seventh street, next Friday Evening.

The following year, on October 24, 1894, the space was used by the Conrad Stein personally, in celebration of the marriage of one of his sons.  The Evening World reported "Brewer Stein's son was married last night and the employees were given a banquet at the Summer garden of the brewery, at Tenth avenue and Fifth-seventh street."  Among those enjoying their employer's generosity was 60-year old Charles Small.  He had been Stein's bookkeeper for twenty years.

At around 11:30 that night Small headed home "perfectly sober," according to co-workers.  But he never made it there.  Just after midnight he was found between the street car tracks only a few blocks away, at Ninth Avenue and 59th Street, nearly opposite Roosevelt Hospital.  Passersby carried him to the sidewalk while someone notified hospital personnel.

The Evening World reported "His skull was fractured, his right arm broken, nose broken, he had two scalp wounds and a number of contusions about the body.  He was covered with mud, and his clothes were wet through.  The house surgeon thought the man must have been lying in the street for full half an hour."

Missing were Small's gold watch and the $25 in cash he had had.  Hell's Kitchen was not a safe place for respectable men with gold watches after nightfall.  The Sun printed the possibility that Small "was struck by a passing car or vehicle" and The Evening World elaborated on that theory.  It wrote that police felt "that the man had been knocked down and trampled by a horse; that he had lain there in the street for a long time, until some members of the rough gang that hangs out in the neighborhood came along and found him; that they had rifled his pockets and left him in the street to be found later."

Small did not recover.  Shortly after his death witness reports came in that turned the story around--creating an even more chilling scenario.  A neighborhood hoodlum had attacked Small, beating him and robbing him of his valuables.  He then dragged his victim to the street car tracks where he knew the horses' hooves would most likely fatally wound his victim.  On October 27 the New-York Tribune wrote "The neighborhood is infested by a crowd of ruffians known as 'The Slaughter-house Gang,' one of whom is believed by the friends of Mr. Small to have robbed and murdered him."

New-York Tribune, January 30, 1897 (copyright expired)

On April 10, 1900 the New-York Tribune reported that "Conrad Stein, a wealthy brewer, died on Friday at his home, No. 327 West Fifty-seventh-st., from heart disease, from which he had suffered for several months...Mr. Stein took a prominent place among the Germans in this city."  It added "A widow and eight children survive him."

Stein's estate was valued at about $5 million, more than 30 times that much in today's dollars.  His wife, Josephine, received the house, "the furniture, statuary, bric-à-brac, pictures, and horses and carriages owned by him, together with the contents of a safe in the house."  The safe contained $400,000 in securities.  

Sons Conrad and Alexander inherited the brewery "on the condition that they pay their mother $20 a week during her lifetime," reported the New-York Tribune.  The rest of the estate, after various bequests, was to be divided among the children--"but none of it was to be distributed until the youngest came of age."  So the Stein heirs would have to wait for their inheritances.

In December 1901 the brewery was re-incorporated as Conrad Stein's Sons.  The directors were Alexander, Conrad and their mother.

By the end of 1903 the youngest of the Stein children seems to have reached legal adulthood.  On January 31, 1904 the New-York Tribune reported "The brewery, which was established many years ago by Conrad Stein, has been conducted by his sons, Alexander and Conrad, who have now sold the business to the managers of the Lion Brewery."  Another newspaper said they intended to retire on "their large personal fortunes."

Josephine Schmidt, the wealthy owner of the Lion Brewery, was not interested in the immense stock of beer still housed in the 57th Street building.  The Wine and Spirit Bulletin reported "As the business at the old Stein Brewery was to be discontinued, and a renewal of a $5,000 bond to the Government for storage of beer being imminent within a few days, it was decided to turn the beer into the river by way of [a] private sewer connected with the brewery."

The bulletin sighed, "Just think of 11,000 kegs of good, fresh beer turned loose into the river, gone to regale the finny tribes that people the North river.  Not a drop for poor humanity."  The Wine and Spirit Bulletin was not alone in its laments.

The Stein brothers had tried to keep the beer dumping secret.  But word got out and hundreds of Hell's Kitchen men gathered outside while Government men carefully oversaw the "wild rush of beer dashing itself against waste pipes and sewer walls," as worded by the New-York Tribune.  On January 31, 1904 the newspaper reported "The beer stood in a flood seven and eight inches deep over the cement floors of the eighteen cellars."  It described a "$25,000 flood of three million beers."

The scent of fresh-brewed beer wafted onto the streets and the men could hear the liquid flowing into the sewers.  They pointlessly begged for just a taste.  One man moaned, "Ach!  It's a funeral."

In December that year the property was purchased by Gustav Schock.  Although not a brewer, he was heavily involved in the industry, manufacturing brewers' equipment.   He installed his office in the building and seems to have used just one floor for his own factory (he had been in business since 1870 and temporarily continued at his existing manufacturing locations).

Schock replaced the Stein name in the pediment with his own.  In 1911 he erected the factory next door (right).  photo by Wurts Bros. from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

In October 1907 Schock advertised space available in the newly-renovated lofts.  Taking the liberty to call the building "new," he said it was an "absolutely fireproof factory building."  He was charging 21 to 25 cents per square foot.

Among his first tenants was the Telescope Cot Bed Company, which took space that year.  It would remain at least through 1913.   The firm manufactured folding cots that "can be set up in a minute or two, and as quickly taken down," according to ads.  An advertisement in Outing magazine in 1917 boasted that Theodore Roosevelt had taken a Telescope Cot Bed on his "famous African hunting expedition."

The same year R. Plumacher & Sons, "platers and finishers," moved into the building.  

Schock envisioned a compound of buildings similar to the old Schwaner & Amend Brewery holdings.  By 1908 he had purchased No. 512; in 1911 he began construction of Nos. 518-522; followed by the new building at No. 524 in 1914.

Sharing space in No. 514-516 with Schock in 1910 was the newly-organized Geiszler Starting Device Company, makers of starters for gas engines; the Electric Bank Protection Co., the motto of which was "Burglary Protection That Protects;" and The Safety Sanitary Strainers Co., makers of "A Device That Saves Plumbers' Bills."

A 1910 advertisement illustrated three of Schock's machines for brewers. Brewers and Bottlers Universal Encyclopedia, 1910 (copyright expired) 

That year, on June 6, Patrolman McDonough noticed a man climbing over the iron railing in front of the building at around 3:00 in the morning.  He rapped his nightstick on the pavement, the pre-radio method of calling for assistance.  Patrolman Peter Coyle responded.  By now the would-be burglar had dropped to the basement level.

Coyle looked over the railing into the darkness and estimated the drop to be a few feet.  He jumped down.  But the depth was fully 30 feet.  When Lieutenant Mulligan arrived with back-up he heard Coyle groaning in the dark.  He had fractured his right leg and was taken to Flower Hospital.  In the meantime, the thief, Joseph Bouvear, was captured inside the building.

In 1915 Schock erected two bridges between the upper floors of Nos. 514-516 and Nos. 518-522.   That year there were just 25 men working in the Schork factory at No. 514-516.  The main operation was in the building next door.

The Western Brewer, December 1918 (copyright expired)

Prohibition put an end to Gustav Schock's business.  Following his death in 1921 his son Robert G. Schock continued to lease space the 57th Street building.  That year the Hinman Engineering Company took space and in 1924 Industrial Management magazine reported "The Fay Co., 514-516 West 57th St., New York, announces its recent organization for the manufacture of Fay Floor Machines which are used in factories and shops for scrubbing sandpapering and refinishing."

In 1926 a renovation was done which created a "motor vehicle repair shop" on the first floor with factory space on the upper floors.  The United States Recording Instruments Corporation and the United States Taximeter Corporation moved in immediately afterward.

A much different sort of tenant took space in 1930 when Robert Schock leased a floor to the Universal Pictures Corporation "for storage purposes," as reported in The New York Sun on May 23.

But throughout the 1930's the tenant list was mainly electrical and motor firms.  The Splitdorf Electrical Co. designed and manufactured racing boat motors.  On January 23, 1932 The New York Sun reported that the firm had introduced its three new "New Elto Motors."  The following year the firm was reorganized as Lawrencelle & Adler.

But change was about to come.  In 1941 Audio Devices, Inc. took space, and on August 2, 1946 The New York Sun reported that the Weimet Film Company had purchased the building "for its occupancy."

Weimet scored a coup following World War II when it purchased a large amount of Government surplus photographic supplies.  A page-long advertisement in Popular Photography in May 1949 listed everything from film, lenses, and papers to a "heatless forced-air dryer."

New York Post, June 21, 1951 

The media-related tenor of the occupants continued when in 1978 the building was renovated to include a "sound studio and accessory offices" on the top floor.   It was home to MPCS Video Industries which offered a "full facility" and referred to the address as the "MPCS Video Center Building."

It was joined in 2001 by CBS News which took over the fifth floor.  Workers coming and going today editing the news or recording videos would most likely be stunned to know that their building was once the scene of the dumping of nearly 11,000 kegs of beer, a neighborhood travesty.

photographs by the author