The Claremont Riding Academy - 175 West 89th Street

By 1892 houses and apartment buildings were quickly rising on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Central Park, completed in 1873, lured developers who built rows of comfortable brownstone residences and luxurious apartments like The Dakota on Central Park West and 72nd Street. The newly established residents all needed adequate stable facilities for their horses and carriages.

On 89th Street, a block and a half from the Park, Edward Bedell erected a handsome brick and stone livery stable. Designed by Frank A. Rooke, whose reputation was made designing stables, the Claremont was five stories tall and boasted an ingenious system of ramps that connected the floors–allowing horses and vehicles to be housed in the basement and on the second floor.  Large elevators hoisted more carriages to the upper floors.  There were 135 stalls for boarding horses.

The unpretentious buff brick building used limestone trim to accent its restrained Romanesque Revival style.  A stepped stone arch with a carved horseshoe framed the main entrance. Inside Rooke provided a small riding ring which proved to be somewhat unrealistic.

When completed, Bedell sold the Claremont to millionaire Charles F. Havermeyer, who in turn leased it to the Tallman brothers, Lee and Darius. The brothers had operated another livery stables built by Bedell, the Cedarhurst.

Within a decade more automobiles and fewer horses populated New York’s streets.  One-by-one the boarding stables were either closed or converted into garages, as happened to the Cedarhurst in 1908.  The Claremont hung on, however.

On January 6, 1928, the then-current owner Emil Wellner made an eyebrow-raising announcement.  The Claremont was to become a riding academy.  Aspiring equestrians were given both private or group lessons in dressage and jumping by a staff of between 15 to 20 instructors.  Veteran riders could rent horses for an afternoon ride on Central Park’s bridle path after navigating Manhattan traffic from the academy to the park.

Despite the comfortable success of the Claremont Riding Academy, Wellner had bigger plans.  Nine years later, in 1937, he filed plans with the city to raze the building and erect a garage.  The plans were rejected because the proposed garage was too close to a public school. And so the Academy lived on.

Wellner sold the Academy to his bookkeeper, Irwin Novogard, in 1943.  The building was threatened again when, in 1956, the city proposed a major urban renewal project that would replace the existing buildings in the area with a large public housing project.  Within the decade, dozens of buildings had been acquired through condemnation, including the Claremont, and many razed.  The Academy clung on, existing on a by month-to-month lease.

The fiscal crisis of 1977 forced the city to abandon its public housing designs.  Novogard’s son Paul quickly sought landmark status from the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission in an effort to prevent any further threats to the building.

All the while young riders were still taking their lessons at the Academy and stalwart horsemen and women braved New York streets to ride in Central Park.

Landmark status came in 1990 and, finally, the city sold the building back to Novogard in 1998, 37 years after having condemned the structure.  A $2 million restoration followed which unfortunately resulted in heavy costs to the Academy in increased real estate taxes and property insurance.  And yet the Claremont Riding Academy, the oldest stables in Manhattan, plodded on.

The death blow came for the Academy unexpectedly--not from the threat of the wrecker’s ball but from the Commissioners of Central Park.  The deep cinder bridle paths had historically been maintained solely for the use of horses.  But shortly after 2000, the park allowed bicyclists, joggers and pedestrians on the paths and, worse yet, discontinued maintenance.  With the new congestion–what Paul Novogard termed “a fearful running of the gauntlet”--coupled with the lack of maintenance, riders could no longer canter along the trails. Patronage at the Claremont fell off.

On April 29, 2007, after operating for 115 years, the Claremont closed its doors forever.

The New York Times commented, “At the very least, the closing of the Claremont stables means that Manhattan is a less surprising place…And so we will never again walk along West 89th Street and be overcome by the deeply nostalgic smell of horses, and may never again have the surprising pleasure of coming upon a horse and rider in the park…New York is certainly a human city, filled as it is with humans. But the loss of this stable makes us wonder whether the city wasn’t more human still when we shared so much more of it with horses.”

After plans to convert the building to apartments fell through, it was purchased by the Stephen Gaynor School, a private school for children with learning difficulties.

The 1892 American Fine Arts Society Building -- The Art Students League

In 1889 the Art Students League joined forces with the Society of American Artists, the Society of Painters in Pastel, the New York Art Guild and the Architectural League to form the American Fine Arts Society. The concept of common interests among architects and artists was somewhat novel. “The societies that have now combined,” applauded The New York Times, “contain most of the younger and more energetic artists in architecture, painting and sculpture.”


Almost immediately the group began its search for a building for art education and annual exhibitions. Not wanting to step on any well-established toes, the group stressed that “it is not a rival of the Academy of Design;” yet The New York Times reported that “certain active spirits among the artists of New York have been hard at work on the promotion of a scheme which may bear important results to the fine arts in America. This is the establishment of a body to be called The Fine Arts Society, in a new building devoted to art purposes only.”

Wealthy benefactors like John Jacob Astor, Cornelius and George Vanderbilt, Edwin Booth, Levi Morton and Pierre Lorillard quickly purchased life memberships, creating a financial foundation. On October 3 the trustees met – including esteemed names such as Henry Hardenbergh, Louis Tiffany and Daniel French --to discuss interest in a site on 43rd Street for their new building, which they anticipated would cost about $210,000 including the land.

The plans for the 43rd Street site fell through, but by December of 1890 the Society had purchased for $154,000 the plot of land on 57th Street, running through to 58th Street, next to the new Osborne Apartments and diagonally across from Carnegie Hall, still being constructed. A competition among 38 architects resulted in the commission going to the Society’s Secretary, Henry Hardenberg and his partners, William C. Hunting and John C. Jacobsen.

The building was completed in 1892. Hardenbergh adapted its design from the 16th Century hunting lodge of King Francis I in the forest of Fontainebleau. The architect gave the impression of the 3-story structure by lighting the fourth floor with skylights and no windows. White marble, ornate terra cotta and buff brick combined to produce a rich and stately façade.

The Art Students League Buildling 1929

The interior was divided among exhibition spaces, administrative rooms and teaching space. The Art Students League alone was allocated about 10,000 square feet of floor space including the entire fourth floor which was devoted to “the chase-painting class, the still-life class, the woman’s life class, the men’s life class, and the antique contours class.”

The main hall was said to be the largest of its kind in the country, modeled after the salon of George Petit in Paris. A “supper room” was installed in the basement along with studios for the Department of Sculpture. To the rear, on 58th Street, was the large Vanderbilt Gallery, an exhibition gallery with a glass roof

The New York Times called it “an elaborate structure.”

On December 30th at the Architectural League’s dinner, George W. Vanderbilt presented the Society with a gift of $100,000 to pay off the outstanding debt on the building.

The concept of exhibition space solely for sculpture and not as “a tag-on” for paintings so impressed the art critic for The New York Times that he belittled European venues in comparison. “The great sculpture halls of the Louvre, the Vatican and the Munich Glyptothek, even the delightful little sculpture entrance to the Luxembourg, are not they cold, hard, severe, suggesting with their rows of chiseled marble the show rooms of the stone cutter at the cemetery’s entrance?”

On May 3, 1901, fire erupted on the fourth floor just as men and women in evening wear alighted from their carriages to attend the fancy dress ball of the Society of American Fakirs. Paints, oils, turpentine and students’ tools had all been heaped together in a corner, according to fire fighters. The conflagration bent iron beams and small explosions caused one wall to collapse.

In the meantime, those who arrived for the society ball were disappointed. They walked to the clubhouse of the American Society of Civil Engineers, hoping to be allowed to have their dance. “The superintendant politely told them they would have to go elsewhere for their dance,” reported The Times. “The young women importuned him to no purpose, and at last they all started for their various homes.”

When word of the fire reached the Salmagundi Club, panic set in. Many of the artists had valuable works of art on exhibition. Rumors raged that everything inside the building had been destroyed and club members rushed to the scene. In the Vanderbilt Gallery alone, paintings on exhibition were valued at $400,000.

Amazingly, the fire was extinguished and no artworks were damaged either by fire or water.

Over time the building became the sole property of The Art Students League. What had started out as a small group intent on teaching art was now one of the foremost fine art schools in the world. Early instructors included William Merritt Chase, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, Daniel Chester French, Thomas Eakins, and Childe Hassam. Norman Rockwell fondly recalled his days as a student here in his autobiography.

Later in the century ground-breaking artists such as Louis Nevelson, Roy Lichtenstein and Mark Rothko either taught or lectured here.

The AIA Guide to New York City calls The Art Students League “A stately French Renaissance pile, grand without being grandiloquent…Now a venerable art school, it has the air of the old Parisian Ecole des Beaux Arts, but the spirit of New York now.”

Within the historic building, which was designated a New York City landmark in 1968 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980, the League is run by artists for artists. The League offers no degrees nor diplomas. According to its official website, “One comes purely for the pursuit of art.”

From Gypsy Rose Lee to Spike Lee - 153 East 63rd Street

On June 10, 1916, The New York Times published a rumor.

The day before Mrs. John R. Drexel had sold the family’s private stables at 153 and 155 East 63rd Street for $85,000 to attorney Emory L. Ferris. “It was rumored,” reported The Times, “that while Mr. Ferris appeared as the buyer, the actual purchaser was Mrs. William K. Vanderbilt, who acquired the property as a gift for her daughter, Miss Barbara C. Rutherford, who will soon be married to Cyril Hatch.”

The rumor was true.

Mrs. Vanderbilt gave the land to the newlyweds and her daughter promptly commissioned Frederick J. Sterner to design their new home. Sterner was more well-known for his remodeling of existing townhouses for the wealthy than for designing residences from scratch; but he produced a home that stopped pedestrians in their tracks.

The site itself was a bit unusual; being a little “too far east” of Fifth and Madison Avenues and Sterner’s unconventional Spanish Revival design was startlingly modern for conventional socialites of the period. Standing in stark contrast to the brownstone row houses around it, it prompted the AIA Guide to New York City decades later to call it “a picturesque loner.”

The broad grey stucco-covered façade under a red clay tile roof is relatively undecorated, other than the exuberant doorway and window overhead. The rich, Spanish Colonial balcony and stone entablatures are hallmarks of Sterner who routinely inserted Italian gardens and other romantic, picturesque details into his work. A tall, Spanish iron fence guards the front of the building and adds additional visual appeal.

With this commission, he built the residence around a beautiful central courtyard where the newlyweds could enjoy the open air in total privacy. The quaint details were carried on inside with decorative touches such as electric ceiling fixtures of multicolored glass mimicking clusters of grapes and berries nested on a medallion of plaster grape leaves.

The Hatch’s marriage was not an ideal one and four years later it ended in divorce. The house at 153 East 63rd Street was about to see a remarkable string of memorable owners.

One of the fanciful glass ceiling fixtures in the form of grape clusters

Charles B. Dillingham purchased the home in 1921. One of the most important of Broadway agents and producers at the time, Dillingham owned the Globe Theatre, was in partnership with Florenz Ziefeld and A. L. Erlanger and oversaw the careers of stage stars like Beatrice Lily and Irene Castle. Dillingham and his second wife entertained the cream of New York’s theatre business here until their divorce in 1924.

In 1928 Dillingham sold the house to internationally acclaimed aeronautical engineer Charles Lanier Lawrance.   Lawrance, whose firm Lawrance Aero Engine Company merged with the Wright brothers’ Wright Aeronautical Corporation after World War I, invented the Wright Whirlwind Engine. It was Lawrance’s engine that powered Admiral Byrd’s exploration of the North Pole and carried Amelia Earhart on her widely-publicized flights.

In 1940, the Lawrance family having moved next door, Louise Hovick bought the Hatch House. Better known by her stage name Gypsy Rose Lee, the colorful entertainer had become a darling among the social set and was in the forefront of neighborhood causes. She flamboyantly decorated the 8292 square-foot home, adding gold monograms to all the doors and having frescoes painted on the walls. The New York Times said “Becoming fashionable, she operated a salon in a 26-room house (it had seven baths and a marble living room floor) on East 63rd Street.”

Gypsy Rose Lee in her home at 153 East 63rd Street in the 1940s

Gypsy Rose Lee died in 1970 and for a period the home was owned by Dr. Ferrucio di Cori who carefully retained the interiors intact, much to the approval of the Landmarks Preservation Commission upon designating the house a landmark in 1977.

In the 1980s famed modern artist Jasper Johns, Jr. moved in. Johns’ painting White Flag was sold to the Metropolitan Museum of Art for about $20 million and his False Start sold for $80 million (the most expensive painting by a living artist) in 2006.

Today the remarkable Hatch House is owned by filmmaker Spike Lee. One of the most distinctive townhouses in Manhattan, its list of remarkable owners is unrivaled.  In November 2013 Lee put the house on the market for an eyebrow-raising $32 million.

Socialites, Teepees and Fashion Shows -- No. 25 East 22nd Street

photo wirednewyork.com

Although the majority of New York City’s wealthy gentry crowded into the grand Episcopal Churches in the 19th Century, the Reformed Church was the first organized church in Manhattan, in existence since 1628. While Vanderbilts and Astors worshipped at St. Thomas Church or Trinity Chapel, Van Rensselaers and Rollins attended Marble Collegiate Reformed Church on Fifth Avenue.

Among that congregation were Percy R. Pyne and his wife Albertina Shelton Pyne. The president of City Bank, Pyne amassed a fortune of over $10 million. Around the time of the Civil War he built a broad, 5-story townhouse with sweeping entrance stairs at No. 25 East 22nd Street off Fifth Avenue in the fashionable Murray Hill neighborhood. Here, in their home filled with their collection of paintings and the finest of furnishings, the Pyne's entertained the cream of society.

In the 1892 the Pynes moved north, having built a grand new home in Riverdale. At the same time the Reformed Church was seeking a consolidated headquarters for its administrative work. The Church purchased the mansion for $67,000 and immediately began renovations.

An large assembly room was added to the original structure, “furnished through the liberality of a few laymen.” One room was delegated to the Board of Foreign Missions, in which were displayed “many interesting objects collected by the Church’s missionaries in heathen lands.” Two rooms were used by the Board of Direction, and others were renovated for the Board of Publication, the Women’s Executive Committee, the Board of Domestic Missions, The Board of Education and the Women’s Board of Foreign Missions.

The atmosphere of the elegant home went from glittering dinner parties to sometimes surprising church functions.

In January of 1897 a Secretary of the Japanese Legation at St. Petersburg, Mr. Akiyama, paused at the Sturtevant House Hotel on his way back to Japan. In his room was a Bible. The Secretary read the text, and immediately decided to convert from Shintoism to Christianity.

He summoned the hotel manager who, in turn, sent for the Rev. Mr. Clark of Marble Collegiate Church. The Secretary, after discussing Christianity for some hours, demanded to be baptized at once, despite Clark’s urging for “deliberation.”

Within the day the Japanese diplomat was taken to No. 25 East 22nd Street where he attended a session of the Women’s Board of Foreign Missions and was baptized by Reverend Clark.

Later, on April 9 of that year, a teepee was erected inside the house as part of a fund-raising effort to build a parsonage for the Rev. Frank Hall Wright. Reverend Wright had been living in a teepee for two years while doing missionary work among the Cheyennes and Arapahoes in Oklahoma. An “Indian Tea” was sponsored by the Women’s Executive Committee and the rooms were decorated with Navajo blankets and “many Indian curiosities.”

The New York Times reported that “At the tea table ‘Falling Star,’ a full-blood Indian, proved even more attractive than the delicious tea and cakes which she dispensed.”

On July 8, 1939 the Reformed Church headquarters moved to 156 Fifth Avenue. Two years later fire tore through the former Pyne House, seriously damaging the interiors. In 1942 the Serbian Orthodox Church purchased the property with the intention of converting it into a church. Those plans were abandoned when the Church obtained the former Trinity Chapel and the house was sold again a few months after it was purchased.

As the East 22nd Street neighborhood changed, the house became home to fashion companies. For years in the late 20th Century No. 25 West 22nd housed the New York City headquarters of Nike, Inc. In 1997 it was sold for $1 million to Novello, Inc., a fashion company, that intended “to use the property as its New York headquarters” and showrooms.

By the time the house was put on the market again in 2004, Mrs. Pyne would not have recognized her once-ornate interiors; an exhibition space with 40-foot ceilings, for instance, replaced her grand formal parlor. The 13,000 square foot property was purchased by David Chu, founder of Nautica, for $100 million the following year, for use as “an atelier.”

One of the last surviving reminders of the elegant residential period of East 22nd Street, the exterior of the Pyne House is amazingly intact despite the substantial alterations inside.

Delmonico's -- 56 Beaver Street

Photo museumplanet.com

When John and Peter Delmonico opened their first restaurant in New York City in 1827, they were knocking on a well-bolted door.  At a time when wealthy Americans dined and entertained in the privacy of their own opulent dining rooms, public restaurants offered common fare to the working class.  The Delmonico brothers intended to change that.

Opening their café at 23 William Street, instead of tavern food, they served the cakes, fine wines and ices that affluent New Yorkers had grown to expect in Paris and Vienna.  Four years later, the brothers expanded next door, opening a full restaurant that served fine French and Italian cuisine.  Increasingly, New York’s gentry patronized the restaurant.

When the building was destroyed in the infamous Fire of 1835 that ravaged most of the Wall Street area, the Delmonico brothers purchased the triangular lot at Beaver and South William Streets.  Backed by eight years of success, they erected a stylish four-story structure.  Here the name Delmonico’s became synonymous with upper class dining.  It was the place for dignitaries–such as the visiting Prince Louis Napoleon--and the wealthy to be seen.  Four columns, reportedly from the doorway of a Pompeian villa, flanked the marble entrance portico.

The New York Sun later recalled that Delmonico’s had provided a places, “not merely to dine at, but to talk about, to take foreigners to, places to be proud of, which make the city attractive the world over.”  From its kitchens the renowned chef Charles Ranhofer created culinary delicacies such as Lobster Newberg, Delmonico Steak, Eggs Benedict and Baked Alaska.  The menu offered 47 veal dishes, 12 types of boiled beef, and 50 fish dishes.

By 1890, Delmonico’s was the premier eatery in the nation and the Delmonico family had opened no fewer than six other Delmonico’s throughout the city.  More space was necessary in the old Beaver Street location.  Charles Delmonico, grand nephew of the founders, razed their building and commissioned James Brown Lord to design a new, more impressive structure.

Delmonico's in 1895 -- "King's Photographic Views of New York"

The New York Herald reported on the cornerstone laying, which Charles (known as “Charlie”) personally performed.  

It was a copper box about ten inches square, and contained, among other records, a history of the Delmonico firms since 1835, some old copper cents found under the portico of the building which has been torn down, the silver and copper coins of 1890, a copy of the Herald of December 22, 1889, containing a description and an illustration of the new building…specimens of the ‘shin-plaster’ currency issued by the Delmonico house during the war, and a copy of the menu of the Beaver street house, February 24, 1890, the day the restaurant was closed to the public.

The article explained that, while Charlie Delmonico had wished to put the box in the corner stone at the South William Street side, the builder David King refused.  “The coins found in Solomon’s temple were found under the northeast corner,” argued King.  Not wanting to tempt fate nor bad luck, Delmonico placed the box in the northeast corner.

Lord, who had designed only residential buildings to date, produced an eight-story Renaissance Revival style restaurant and office building that brought him immediate professional recognition.  The New York Times described it as, “admirable in its simplicity and elegance.”

Lord emphasized the dramatic rounded corner, making it the focal point of the structure.  He fashioned a rich entrance from a salvaged cornice from the former building, as well as two of the Pompeian columns (touching the columns became a tradition of good luck for knowing patrons).  Brick, stone, terra cotta panels and copper were combined to create a visually stunning edifice on an odd slice of land.

Following Charles Delmonico’s death in 1901, the management of the restaurant changed hands within the family twice until, in the 1910s, family squabbles over expenses and profitability began straining relations.  In 1917, family members agreed to sell the building.  The American Merchant Marine Insurance Company purchased it for $500,000 and, shortly thereafter, the restaurant ceased operation.

The grand dining areas on the first and second floors, once the place of debutante dinners and society wedding breakfasts, was cut up into office space.  Oaken desks and filing cabinets now sat where Andrew Carnegie and Diamond Jim Brady once dined on oysters and brokered deals.  Delmonico’s became “The Merchant Marine House,” home to shipping businesses and related insurance companies.  Three years later, the building was sold again--for a profitable $1,250,000--to the Insurance Company of North America.

With the closing of Delmonico’s, downtown was without a fine restaurant for almost two decades.  George S. Chappell grieved in his New York restaurant guide in 1925 that, “the lower city knows no such excellence now except in some of its princely luncheon clubs.”

Oscar Tucci intended to change that.  Taking advantage of the culinary void and the well-recognized and respected name, he opened Oscar’s Old Delmonico Restaurant in the lower and first floors.  Tucci ran his restaurant as an embodiment of the former restaurant.  It was a success.

In 1935, he expanded to the second floor and into the first floor of 48-54 Beaver Street next door (both buildings were owned by the City Bank Farmers Trust Company by now).  Later, the reincarnation was complete when Tucci changed the name to Delmonico’s Restaurant.

The combined buildings were sold to 56 Beaver-Wall Street Inc. in 1985 (ten years before achieving landmark status), the original windows were replaced and other slight modifications were made.

photo via delmonicosny.com

Time Equities, Inc. purchased the building in foreclosure in November 1995 and within a year had converted the upper floors into 40 residential units.  Today, Delmonico’s is back in business on the lower floors as The Original Delmonico’s Steakhouse Restaurant, serving many of the dishes that made the restaurant famous.

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The 1876 Christ & Saint Stephen's Church -- 122-128 West 69th Street

photo courtesy Landmark West!

In 1880 the Church of the Transfiguration, fondly called The Little Church Around the Corner, commissioned William H. Day in 1880 to design an uptown chapel, to serve the parishioners who moved northward from the Murray Hill area.  Perhaps to make their transition easier, the architect took inspiration from Transfiguration’s charming 1850 building at No. 1 East 29th Street.

That structure, continually added to over the decades, was described by some as “a holy cucumber vine.”  Its low architecture recalled a rural English parish church.  While perhaps not as picturesque, Day’s Transfiguration Chapel, located on West 69th Street near the Boulevard (later Broadway) presented a pastoral image out of place on busy West 69th Street.  The long, low building sat back on a broad lawn.  Its many peaks and gables, its clay tile roof and unassuming bell tower conveyed its connection with the Little Church Around the Corner.

photo courtesy of Landmark West!

Although the chapel was successful, in 1897 the Church of the Transfiguration sought to sell its uptown outpost.  On March 17 The New York Times said “Various reports have been circulated recently as to the future of Transfiguration Chapel, at the Boulevard and Sixty-ninth Street, and Protestant Episcopal church circles in the diocese are wondering what will be the future of this interesting adjust to the up-town work of ‘The Little Church Around the Corner.’”

The article mentioned that St. Stephen’s Church on 46th Street was interested in the property, valued at around $60,000.  (More than $1.9 million today.)  St. Stephen’s congregation had outgrown its building; yet there were obstacles to be overcome. The parishioners of Transfiguration Chapel ardently wished to keep their home and were attempting to raise the money to purchase it from the mother church.  In addition, the neighboring Christ Church, two blocks away, was defiantly opposed to the sale to St. Stephen’s.

“It is contended that there is not room in that district for two churches of the same type of churchmanship,” said The New York Times.  “Both are classed as exponents of the Low Church wing, while the present Transfiguration Chapel belongs to the High Church order, and would, naturally, draw to itself only people of its own way of thinking in the neighborhood.”

The bickering between the church groups was closely followed by the press for weeks until, at last, St. Stephen’s won the right to purchase.  The congregation hired architect J. D. Fouquet to carefully remodel the building while respecting Day’s original design.  Their first service was held on October 3, 1897.

Relations between St. Stephen’s Church and its neighbor, Christ Church, remained strained and in 1905 Christ Church sued St. Stephen’s for infringing on parish boundaries.  The suit was dismissed and the two churches continued in their tense coexistence.

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

Ironically, it was hard times that brought the two groups together in the 1960's.  When the city began work on the massive Lincoln Center complex it used eminent domain to demolish seventeen residential blocks, displacing more than 7,000 families.  At the same time maintenance costs for the church buildings had increased.  With decimated congregations, higher overhead and reduced income, the two parishes realized the necessity to merge.  In 1975 they became Christ & Saint Stephen’s Church.  After nearly a century their uneasy truce became a marriage.

Structural deterioration resulted a ceiling collapse in 2004 which necessitated a total replacement of the ceiling. A complete restoration of the interior followed.  In the process, original 19th century stenciling was discovered.  It was restored in sito and replicated elsewhere in the interior.

The quaint little church still sits behind its low stone wall like a slice of English countryside dropped among Manhattan high rises; a picturesque and surprising treasure.

The Magnificent 1909 Cast Iron Street Clock at 200 Fifth Avenue

For decades the elegant Fifth Avenue Hotel at Fifth Avenue and 23rd Street attracted princes and politicians, moguls and millionaires. Directly in front of its entrance a tall sidewalk clock conveniently told the time to passing businessmen and nannies pushing baby carriages to Madison Square across the avenue.

But, as was common practice, when the Fifth Avenue Hotel left in 1908, the clock went too.

The builders of the Fifth Avenue Building that replaced the hotel at 200 Fifth Avenue wasted no time in erecting a new clock. In the busy neighborhood anchored by the relatively new Flatiron Building across 23rd Street to the south, a street clock was considered essential.

The clocks served several purposes. Not only were they a convenience for the neighboring shoppers and businessmen, they drew attention to the store or building and provided excellent advertisement.

Desiring their clock to be in keeping with the high tone of their new office building, the owners commissioned the esteemed Brooklyn firm of Hecla Iron Works to produce their clock case. Hecka (named after an active volcano in Iceland) had produced the 133 cast iron subway kiosks as well as important cast iron building facades like the B. Altman & Co. Department Store on 6th Avenue and the New York Life Insurance Building.

photo by manhattanvirtualoffice.com

Of the many street clocks on the sidewalks of Manhattan, this one stood out. Installed in 1909 it was one of the most ornate in the city. It sits on a rectangular base with classical ornamentation, a fluted Ionic column rising to a capital inspired by the work of 16th Century Venetian architect Vioncenzo Scamozzi. The two large dials which advertised Fifth Avenue Building are encircled by oak leaf wreaths. To make the cast iron clock even more a work of art, it was then gilded.

The clock was wound about every eight days; a weight within the column slowly descending the full length. More recently, the mechanism was replaced with an automatic one.

In 2011 the clock was completely restored by the Electric Time Company, Inc. of Medfield, Massachusetts.  The eight-month restoration was sponsored by Tiffany & Co.

A technician works on the eight-month restoration of the Fifth Avenue street clock in 2011 -- photo courtesy Electric Time Company, Inc.

Throughout the 20th Century Manhattan’s many street clocks fell victim to auto accidents, neglect and sidewalk improvements until now only a handful remain. The well-maintained and magnificent example in front of 200 Fifth Avenue was deemed by the Landmarks Preservation Commission in 1981 “a gilded cast-iron masterpiece.”

Photo Jim Henderson