The Lost 1848 Cottage Row -- 7th Avenue between 12th and 13th Street

On March 30, 1936 famed photograph Berenice Abbot captured Rhinelander Row, known popularly as "Cottage Row." -- photo Library of Congress

As Greenwich Village transitioned from a sleepy rural hamlet to a thriving extension of New York City in the first half of the 19^th century, William C. Rhinelander purchased vast tracts of real estate for development.   The Rhinelander family amassed enormous fortunes by recognizing northward growth of the city, purchasing land and developing blocks of rental properties that it would hold for decades.

Epidemics of cholera and yellow fever epidemics of the 1820s forced panicked New Yorkers to flee northward.  But before that, in the gently rolling hills to the east of the village were the sprawling country estates of landed gentry.  Here were the country mansions of Sir Peter Warren, “The Manse,” and “Richmond Hill,” the estate of British Major Abraham Mortimer, later to be home to John Adams and Aaron Burr.

But by the middle of the century things had changed.  Avenues and streets were laid out and row houses lined blocks that checker-boarded former pasture land.  Around 1842 7^th Avenue was extended to just above 13^th Street, in land owned by William Rhinelander.

Looking back, in 1904, an old-time Greenwich Villager would recall that “it was all farms, with cornfields and other crops, with which it was laid out.  There was one very large frame mansion that I remember, and the avenue cut directly through it, so that two large houses were made of it.”

Around 1848 Rhinelander filled the 7^th Avenue block between 12^th and 13^th Streets with eleven three-story homes above English basements.  The simple, straightforward residences were intended for middle-class families and their design took into consideration the tenants’ comfort.

The homes sat more than twenty feet back from the street, providing grassy lawns and garden space.  In a time when summer heat was not only stifling but sometimes lethal, each floor of the had deep verandas that provided shade and caught the cooling breezes.  Mattresses could be pulled out onto the upper balconies for sleeping in the most oppressive nights.

Floor-to-ceiling windows and long, louvered shutters guaranteed air flow through the houses in hot weather -- photo Library of Congress.

Called “Rhinelander Row,” the eleven houses became familiarly known by locals as “Cottage Row” toward the end of the century.  Families stayed on in the homes for generations in some cases and the Rhinelander records showed that the homes were constantly occupied from 1848 through 1914.  The New York Times reminisced in 1937 that “the front gardens were fragrant with flowers from early Spring until late in the Fall.”

But then things changed.

Seventh Avenue, the southern end of which was 11^th Street, was extended down to Varick Street in 1914 and the Seventh Avenue subway line opened in 1918.  With these two factors, “a marked change in the character of the neighborhood took place and the popularity of the houses began to decline,” reported The Times.

In 1936, with their simple balconies and wooden porch stairs, the old houses looked oddly out of place.  The 7th Avenue subway entrance is at the left. -- photo Library of Congress

By 1927 occupancy had dropped to about half and a realty syndicate took a long lease from the Rhinelander estate “with the intention of building a large apartment house.”   But the Great Depression came along and Cottage Row received a brief reprieve.  In 1930 the Rhinelander estate took back the property.

Finally, in May of 1936, the few remaining tenants were requested by Rhinelander agents to vacate the premises.  A year later demolition of the buildings began.

Politician John Byrnes took advantage of the vacant dwellings to display campaign posters where once tenants relaxed in the shade of the porches -- photo Library of Congress

With a sigh of regret, The New York Times said that “these houses constitute the most characteristic landmark surviving to the present day of the upper Greenwich Village section.  With their wide piazzas and ample balconies on the upper floors they have been for many years refreshing reminders of the simple but comfortable residential days in that interesting part of the city.”

In 1937 the WPA was busy demolishing Cottage Row.  Already the top floor is gone.  -- photo Library of Congress

The property was turned over to the City Housing Authority with the stipulation that it would remain undeveloped for one year.  The Authority said the empty plot might be used as a temporary playground for children.

On December 16, 1938 the Rhinelander estate had made its decision.  The announcement was made that “the property has been vacant and now will be used for a gasoline station and lot for the selling of used cars.”  The 20^th century had arrived on 7^th Avenue.

Unlike Cottage Row which had survived nearly a century, the gas station and car lot were gone by 1964.  They were replaced by the masterful Mid Century modern Joseph Curran Building which remains today.

The 1902 Algonquin Hotel -- No. 59 West 44th Street

Windows are boarded up in early 2012 as renovations are being completed -- photo by Alice Lum

The 44^th Street block between 5^th and 6^th Avenues had, by the turn of the century, drastically changed.  The street that had been lined with two-story stables and carriage houses now boasted the exclusive Harvard Club and New York Yacht Club, as well as high-toned residence hotels.

Albert Foster planned another residence hotel at No. 59 West 44^th Street to be called the Puritan.  He commissioned architect Goldwin Starrett to design the structure in an up-to-date design intended to attract well-heeled tenants.     Starrett embellished his basically neo-Renaissance façade with trendy Beaux Arts touches.  Above the two-story limestone base, red brick and limestone was broken by soaring, continuous cast metal bays nine-stories tall.  The bay windows not only added depth and interest to the otherwise flat façade, they increased air flow to rooms that could be stifling in hot, humid months.

As the hotel was still rising, Foster began hiring his new staff, among which was 31-year old Frank Case.   Having already worked for nearly a decade in the well-known Taylor’s Hotel in Jersey City, Case knew his way around the hotel industry.  One of his first concerns was the name of the hotel.

The clerk realized that the word “puritan” had repressive connotations that could possibly discourage potential tenants.   A particularly American word, he felt, might be more advisable.

After combing through manuscripts at the public library, he came up with the native American term "Algonquin" and convinced his boss to change the name.

The hotel opened on November 22, 1902 with already three-fourths of the apartments occupied.  The New York Tribune was highly impressed, calling it “the last step in excellence in this class of structure.”  The critic praised “The elegance of the structure, the perfection of its embodied details, combined with the letter-perfect house service of this new family hotel, bid fair to make it lead all of its class.”

The Tribune felt that the new hotel was the solution to “this vexatious servant problem.”  Even if, said the paper, “you are a householder, with ever and ever so nice a home in the exclusive upper East and West Side districts of Manhattan” you would have troubles with live-in staff.  “It is these fold who keep one’s house in a wild confusion and bring wrinkles and worries to its managers,” it said.

According to the Tribune, “This house gives you your home always heated at seasonable temperatures, always well lighted and spickly clean, and your servants, always quiet, thoroughly trained, respectful and efficient.”

Residents could either order meals served in their apartments from a “menu card” or take meals in the large restaurant on the main floor.   The board for private servants was an additional $7 a week.   Each apartment had a telephone that connected it with the hotel offices as well as the city telephone service.  Hotel staff was available to summon a carriage or order theater or train tickets.   An in-house physician, barber, hairdresser or manicurist would make calls to rooms; the house valet attended to everyone’s shoes and made sure newspapers and magazines were delivered promptly.

The apartments were outfitted with waxed, oak floors, mahogany woodwork that included mantels and built-in bookcases.  Every bedroom had its own bathroom, “a wonderfully complete affair in white enamel with all the latest kinds of plumbing and toilet appliances,” said the Tribune—a remarkable luxury of the day.  Annual rates for the apartments ranged from $420 for a one-bedroom and bath to $2,520 for a luxurious suite of three bedrooms, private dining room, parlor, library, three bathrooms and private hallway.

Although Albert Foster owned the hotel, it was Frank Case who embraced it as his own.  Although the hotel was just a block from fashionable 5^th Avenue, it sat an equal distance from the Times Square theater district.  Case, who as a teenager had worked as an usher in a Buffalo vaudeville theater was intent on luring the theatrical crowd.  Actor Douglas Fairbanks became a close friend of Case and was one of the first to haunt the Algonquin, along with stage idol of the time, John Drew.

In 1904 the 6^th Avenue Railroad Depot that stretched from 43^rd to 44^th street was demolished and in its place rose the gargantuan New York Hippodrome, a 5,600-seat theater, directly across 44^th Street from the Algonquin.  Frank Case later remarked that the theater’s opening was, for the hotel, “an important event for us.”

Soon the hotel was home to theatrical legends like Booth Tarkington, Sinclair Lewis and John and Ethel Barrymore, laying the groundwork for theatrical and literary history.

By 1908 the guests of the hotel were mainly transient.  An advertisement that year noted that “The Algonquin desires to increase its family patronage.  Less than twenty percent of the Algonquin is occupied by permanent guests.”  Case stressed the advantage of the hotel to permanent residents, “it affords better service than the regular apartment hotel, while the orderly hum of industry, the coming and going of prominent people, makes hotel life interesting and disturbs not at all the home like atmosphere of refinement.”

The atmosphere of refinement was dashed on October 13, 1912 when screams emanated from the rooms of Charlotte Walker.  The actress had awakened to find a man in her room and when Frank Case flung open the door to her room, he saw the shadowy figure on the fire escape.  Hotel staff captured the burglar and he was arrested.

He was later found to be the 37-year old Frenchman, Paul Renaud, who had appeared in the lobby earlier that day.  When he was told the rate of a room, he admitted he could not afford the price and it was assumed he left.

Magistrate McQuade, on hearing the testimony of all parties, was about to release the prisoner, saying there was no evidence that he intended burglary.  But at the last minute Case told the judge that “indecent postal cards had been found in the possession of the man.”  Sergeant McNierney of the East 52st Street Station confirmed this and the prisoner was held on $500 bail.

Having racy French postcards was, it seems, a greater offense than breaking and entering.

The continuous rows of bay windows improved ventilation and increased daylight in the rooms -- photo by Alice Lum

In 1917, years ahead of Prohibition, Case closed the hotel bar because he feared the presence of a saloon in his establishment might despoil the atmosphere of refinement he cultivated. 

Although he aggressively wooed writers and actors, Case found they were not always ideal guests.  When one playwright accumulated a hotel bill of $2,200 Case tossed him out.  In an attempt at payment the writer gave him a manuscript which turned out to be a stage play.  Case made an agreement with another playwright living in the Algonquin to edit it on a 50/50 basis.  The resulting play, Fine Feather, ran a full season on Broadway, netting Case $5,500 in royalties.

Case’s daughter, Margaret, was born in room 1206 in 1904 and as she grew, she became the darling of the famous guests.   Years later she would remember the time that John Barrymore reacted to a rumor that she had a crush on a theater cad.  The actor whisked the young girl away in a carriage and, while driving through Central Park demanded that she “dismiss the young man immediately.”

The astonished Margaret explained that she had never met the actor in question and had only seen him once on stage.  Barrymore, realizing that he had been duped by a braggart, responded, “Oh, that ham!”

In 1919 a short, chubby newspaperman with wire-rimmed glasses was given an innocuous assignment of writing a critique on the Algonquin Hotel for a Sunday edition.  It was a job that would make the Algonquin a household word across the nation.

Alexander Woollcott did not gush on about the Algonquin.  He called it “a little, unpretentious hotel, tucked away on a side street.”   While he mentioned some of the celebrities who lived here, it was the kitchen’s apple pie that caught his attention.

Lured by the siren song of the pie, he suggested to his every-Saturday-lunch partners, Franklin Pierce Adams and Heywood Broun that they meet at the hotel.  Before long the group grew to include Robert Benchley, Brock Pemberton and Harold Ross.  It was the beginning of the legendary Algonquin Round Table.

Frank Case recognized the importance of the group’s patronage and assigned it a private corner of the Oak Room.  As the group outgrew its private niche, Case moved them to a large, round table in the Rose Room.  By the 1920s The Round Table included the acerbic Dorothy Parker, S. J. Perelman, Ruth Gordon, Tallulah Bankhead, Irving Berlin, Russel Crouse and a score of other luminaries.

The Round Table blistered with literary debates and poker games; the second most popular diversion.  Upstairs Case provided a room for poker parties that often extended from Saturday nights through Sunday afternoons.

With the onset of the Great Depression the Round Table quietly disintegrated.  Many of the writers and critics were forced to leave New York City for Los Angeles.  The personal toll of the economic situation was vividly expressed in 1929 when a dapper-dressed man ordered a meal in the dining room.  Wearing a morning coat and grey vest, with spats and a bowler hat, he ate in silence.  When he had finished his coffee and pie, he removed a small pearl-handled handgun from his pocket and put a bullet into his head.

Frank Case purchased the hotel for $717,000 in 1932, making official what everyone already knew:  he owned the Algonquin.

In 1943 the locally-famous Francois was the sommelier.  After years of serving and choosing the correct wines for discriminating patrons, his health failed and he necessarily left his position.   Waitress Elizabeth Bird wanted the job, although her only training in wines was the reading a book.

Case gave her the job, insisting that she be called “Francine.”

The concept of a woman performing the job of a sommelier was a bit shocking.  The New York Times called Francine “probably the only woman in New York with the privilege of telling fastidious men which wines to drink.”  The newspaper could not resist the opportunity to drop a sexist remark, however.  “A native New Yorker, she speaks in restrained tones and has learned the knack—the envy of many a wife—of being respectful yet not obsequious; of getting her way without offending male vanity.”

Frank Case died in 1946 at the age of 76.  In addition to an Algonquin Hotel cookbook, he had written two books, the 1938 “Tales of a Wayward Inn,” that documented anecdotes of famous and not-famous guests; and “Do Not Disturb,” written two years later as a sequel.

Ben B. and Mary Bodne purchased the hotel and would run it for years.  Sir Laurence Olivier reportedly adored Mary’s chicken soup.  The Bodnes carefully preserved the traditions of the Algonquin.  Harry Connick, Jr. made his New York debut here and, as the hotel became a bit dowdy, it retained its fabled atmosphere.

The dining room, in the 1960s, retained its turn-of-the-century atmosphere

New York Magazine, on February 7, 1977 wrote “If Mo Udall, Tom Stoppard, Kyle Rote and Ellen Burstyn are all in the same room, the room must be in New York.  If your college roommate’s first husband and the person you’re thinking might be right to back your next project and a woman you mistake for your Great-aunt Martha are also in the room, then the room is the lobby of the Algonquin Hotel.”

As the 21^st century dawned, performing in the Oak Room was a great distinction for cabaret and nightclub singers.  In February of 2012 it was still one of Manhattan’s three major cabaret supper clubs.

The Algonquin Hotel is a New York City landmark.  Perhaps less so for its architecture than because of its astoundingly rich literary and theatrical history -- photo by Alice Lum

That month the Oak Room closed as part of the renovation of the entire hotel.   New Yorkers familiar with the 32-year old supper club were dismayed at the announcement that upon the hotel’s scheduled reopening in May 2012 the Oak Room would a “lounge.”  Yet, few structures in Manhattan—or perhaps the nation—have a theatrical and literary history as rich as that of the Algonquin Hotel.

The 1912 20th Street Police Station -- 230 West 20th Street

By 1908, conditions at the outdated 17^th Precinct station house at 230 West 20^th Street had become deplorable.   The official inspection report presented to the New York State Commission of Prisons that year was scathing.

The 10 cells are underground and air is very bad.  In rear of cells is policemen’s toilet room, (also underground) with opening into cell-room.  Only means of ventilation seemed to be small ducts.  The smell was bad.

The officers’ quarters upstairs are inadequate.  One lieutenant’s room has substantially no ventilation except into another bed-room.

The following year an investigator noted that the precinct (now numbered the 18^th) was in dire need of modernization or replacement.  “The complement of officers is 88, with four dormitories containing sixty beds.  Their wash room has iron troughs for lavatory purposes, which should be changed for those of enameled iron.”

Finally, on May 9, 1912 the Police Commissioner submitted plans for the construction of a new station house, prison and garage to the Sinking Fund Commissioners. 

Architects Hoppin & Koen had designed the new Police Headquarters building at 240 Centre Street, completed just three years earlier.  The monumental Beaux Arts palace for cops took four years to construct and earned the architects a firm footing when the issue of civic commissions arose thereafter.

As their 4^th Precinct Station House (later to become the 1^st Precinct) was being completed—looking more like a Medici palazzo than a police precinct—they received the commission for the 20^th Street building.

Like the 4^th Precinct, the architects drew on the Italian Renaissance for inspiration.  The 18^th Precinct house in the working class Chelsea area, however, would be much scaled down.  The directions in the Police Commissioner’s plans called for nothing elaborate or overly-costly.

“The interior trim is to be of oak, simple and plain.  The plumbing fixtures are to be of a standard manufacture.  The building is to be wired and piped for electricity and gas, the lighting fixtures are to be of a standard manufacture easily replaced.”

Completed later that year, the precinct house rose five stories over an American basement, invisible from the street.  The high, symmetrical first floor was clad in rusticated granite with three large arched openings—a centered entrance, a garage door for the single motorized vehicle assigned to the precinct, and a large window.

A terra cotta flagpole base in the shape of the New York City seal provided the sole decorative element of the mid-section of the structure.  Two carved cartouches that announced the precinct number flanked the fifth floor, and a handsome, bracketed cornice sat above a tidy row of dentil molding. 

For its budget of $174,825 including architectural fees, the Commission got a dignified stone-faced police station worthy of more affluent neighborhoods.

Hoppin & Koen provided for up-to-the-minute amenities.  An elevator shaft with sliding doors was provided (although the elevator never materialized) and in the basement the foundation for a garage turntable was installed that would allow the police vehicle to be garaged head-first, turned around, and driven out head-first as well.  That, too, never materialized.

The new station house could accommodate both male and female prisoners, unlike the former structure for men-only.    The first floor was double-height in the common areas where the desk and visitor areas were located.  To the rear it was split into two levels to accommodate the two tiers of cells, as well as the muster room, Matron’s quarters on the mezzanine, and sitting room.

The second floor contained the accommodations for the supervisors:  the Captain’s bedroom and bath, three lieutenant’s rooms for the six lieutenants, six sergeant’s rooms for the twelve sergeants, detectives’ rooms and lavatories.

The top three floors contained two dormitories each, with lavatories and showers.  Each dorm could sleep twenty officers.

Although conditions for the officers of the 18^th Precinct drastically improved with their new station house, things continued to be hard for many of the citizens they protected.   While there were still middle-class homes along the side streets, the vast western portions of the precinct along the Hudson River were inhabited by miserably poor immigrant families.

When two officers were alerted of a “mother and children suffering from the gross neglect and abuse of a drunken husband and father” in 1912, they proceeded to 439 West 19^th Street to investigate.  Here, in a single furnished room in the basement, the Michael Kearens family lived.   The Irish immigrant laborer had been out of work for a year and his wife, Bridget, had attempted to support the family until her health failed.

The police report noted that the officers “found a most awful condition of affairs; the room was in a vile and wretched condition; litter of all kinds scattered about the floor, and heaps of rubbish in the corners.  There was but one bed in the room, and this in an indescribable condition of filth, and upon it Mrs. Kearens was lying with her infant son, six months of age.  She was emaciated and so weak that she could scarcely raise herself in bed.  The infant was suffering from convulsions.”  There were three other children in the house—John, Mary and Michael, 11, 9 and 6 years old.

As the officers waited for an ambulance to arrive, Michael Kearens returned home.  “He was in a beastly state of intoxication,” said the report, “and in the most profane and abusive language demanded to know what officers were doing in his room.”  Kearens was eventually arrested and taken to the 18^th Precinct station house, charged with intoxication and disorderly conduct “he being too drunk to be sent to the Night Court.”  Doctors at Bellevue Hospital diagnosed Bridget with tuberculosis and the infant with spinal meningitis.

Later investigation revealed that the Kearens were $35 behind on their rent, but were allowed to stay on “only because of the condition of the mother and sympathy for her.”  Neighbors deemed Kearens a “confirmed drunkard,” and he received a sentence of six months in the workhouse.  Bridget Kearnes survived less than a month after being admitted to the hospital.

Along with the problems associated with the impoverished residents, police had to deal with gangsters.  In 1914 the precinct was riddled with several gangs, among them the Hudson Dusters, the Owney Maddens and the Marginals.  

One such outlaw was “Big Jim” Redmond, president of the Hudson Dusters, a gang referred to by The New York Times as “notorious West Side hoodlums.”    On December 9, 1914, “Big Jim” met his match in Police Officer Sindt.

The previous night a Belgian sailor of the Red Star Liner Kroonsland was passing Redmond’s residence at 405 West 18^th Street.  A woman in the doorway enticed the sailor to come up and as he did, Big Jim jumped out, pushed a gun into the pit of the sailor's stomach and demanded all his money.

Redmond got the Belgian’s entire $4.50.

Hearing the complaint, Officer Sindt went to Redmond’s door, putting other policemen on guard, and burst in.  He trust his revolver against the gangster’s side, grabbed up the gun lying at the bedside, and marched the prisoner off to the station house.

Heroism was another part of life at the 20^th Street Station House.  On February 10, 1916 Officer Fisher noticed smoke rising from the doorway of Spiegel Brothers’ "3, 9 and 19-cent store" at 183-187 8^th Avenue.  By the time Officer Odell joined him, they realized that eight children, ten women and several men were trapped on the roof of the burning building.

The officers rushed to the top floor of the adjacent building and used their nightsticks to force apart the iron window bars of the rear offices, breaking their sticks in the process.  They then spanned the space between the two buildings with a plank and one-by-one “led a terror-stricken group from the roof to safety,” as reported by The Evening World.

On October 12, 1917, Chief Inspector George McLaughlin paid a visit to the station house.  He noted that there was an average of four prisoners in the cell area every day with sometimes as many as 10 or 12 being held over for morning court.  That year so far the 18^th Precinct had made 2,516 arrests and summonses.

McLaughlin was more impressed with the physical conditions.  “Each cell has a toilet, wash basin and one bunk.  The toilets are flushed with push buttons.  There are steam heat and electric light throughout and the cell rooms are equipped with a fan ventilator.  “The jail was clean, showing excellent care,” he reported.

With the United States’ entry into World War I, the station house was designated as one of the Air Raid Stations in case of enemy air attack.   An emergency dressing station was set up in the precinct and the commanding officer, a lieutenant, one sergeant and nine patrolmen were trained in emergency procedures should the catastrophe occur.

The house was inspected again on October 19, 1920.  Now eight years old, the building was still in outstanding shape, according to Henry Solomon.  “This is a modern and up-to-date police station…since my last inspection the place has been painted throughout and is now in first-class condition.”

A large terra cotta City Seal serves as the base for the flagpole while two large, carved cartouches beneath the cornice announced the precinct number.

The inspector commented on the female prisoners' accommodations, as well.  “there is a marble lined shower bath and a room for matrons, adjoining which is a toilet room.  The cells are well located having plenty of light and air.”

Solomon was highly impressed with the innovative work of one lieutenant.  The inspector made special note that he “looks after wayward children in the precinct, preventing if possible their arrest and subsequent conviction and incarceration.  I believe it to be a very good and praiseworthy work.”

The lieutenant’s idea perhaps planted the seed for today’s Youth Officer position, common in most NYPD precincts.

By the beginning of 1922, the New York City Police Department recognized a problem.  The rapidly increasing number of motor vehicles was vying for road space with horse-drawn vehicles and motorists often drove recklessly and at high speeds.   To address the situation the Traffic Bureau was organized.

On January 15 of that year the 18^th Precinct was eliminated as the police force did a city-wide realignment of precincts.  The station house at 230 West 20^th Street became headquarters for The 14th Inspection District for traffic purposes, comprising the Boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx.  By July the new bureau had devised a means of controlling traffic violations:  the Traffic Warning Card.

The card, which would eventually become today’s driver’s license, was required for any driver of a horse-drawn or motor vehicle on a “street, parkway, park drive, park street or bridge.”  The card held five blank spaces and whenever an officer stopped the driver for a violation, it was noted in one of the spaces.   When all of the spaces on the driver’s card were filled, he was liable to arrest or summons.

The Traffic Warning Card was the precursor of today's Driver's License.

By 1941 the department had reorganized once again and the 20^th Street Station House was once again a patrol precinct—now the 10^th Precinct.

As times changed, the police force and the 10^th Precinct were forced to change too.  On June 28, 1969 the course of gay history would change forever when the Stonewall riots took place in the 6^th Precinct, just south of the 10^th.   At the time, the Chelsea neighborhood of the 10^th Precinct was still relatively rough-edged, encompassing the meat packing district, blocks of factories, public housing projects and 19^th century brick and brownstone residences long ago converted to tenement housing.  The bulk of Manhattan’s gay population lived in the 6^th Precinct, separated from the 10^th by 14^th Street.

The cops of the 10^th Precinct had an uneasy and sometimes contentious relationship with the gay population and it all came to a head on August 9, 1973 when 200 gays marched from Greenwich Village to the West 20^th Street Police Station to protest alleged harassment.   Newsman and camera crews were there to report the outcome, one which was handled deftly by commanding officer Captain Robert Boetig.

Boetig promised the Gay Activists Alliance that “there have been cases where there has been friction,” but “there is no deliberate policy of harassment.”  The captain acknowledged that “the gay liberation movement is a somewhat new arrival” in his precinct and initiated a procedure whereby various policemen would meet occasionally with leaders of the gay community in the 6^th Precinct.

The 10^th Precinct community today covers a broad range of ethnicities, social-economic levels, religions, and sexual preferences.  The precinct continues to adapt and serve the residents it protects.

In the meantime, while there have been some minor alterations to the exterior—the broad fan lights above the first floor openings are gone and the expansive window has been blocked up—Hoppin & Koen’s handsome Italian Renaissance police station remains essentially unchanged since 1912.

non-credited photographs taken by the author.

The General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen Bldg -- No. 20 West 44th Street

photo by Alice Lum

The trustees of the Berkeley School for Boys gambled, perhaps, on their choice of sites for the new school building in 1890.  The exclusive boys’ preparatory school had already moved once from its original structure on Madison Avenue and now it chose four lots on the stable-filled block of West 44^th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.

Although the site was conveniently near the mansions of Fifth Avenue, the block was still casually referred to as “Stable Street” because of the two- and three-story carriage houses that lined it.  Further down the block was the Sixth Avenue Railroad Depot, making the particular street even more questionable for a respectable prep school.

Yet within only a few years the stables would disappear one by one, replaced by elegant bachelor residence hotels and the most exclusive men’s clubs of the city; among them the New York Yacht Club, the St. Nicholas Club and the Harvard Club.  The gamble paid off.

The Berkeley School was founded by John S. White and opened on September 23, 1880.  The school prepared boys from wealthy families “for the leading universities,” stressing both modern and classical education.  The Sun’s Guide to New York noted “The courses embrace classical and English branches, modern languages, natural philosophy and natural history.”  

White put great emphasis on military protocol and drills, as well, and today we would no doubt refer to the Berkeley as a military academy.  The Sun’s Guide said that “The plan of the school includes military training, gymnastic exercises and out-door sports.  The pupils vary in age between 10 and 20 years and wear a school uniform.”  It assured that “among all the private schools for boys, [it] enjoys the widest reputation and patronage.”

Architects Lamb & Rich, more commonly known for their residential buildings, were commissioned for the project.    The cornerstone was laid on June 30, 1890 “without special ceremonies,” according to The New York Times.  The commander of the school’s battalion, Colonel Frederick R. Franklin, had recently died and celebration seemed “unwise.”    The newspaper predicted that “The building…will be the finest scholastic building in America.” 

In reporting the event, The Times mentioned that the school had just received an impressive honor.  “The highest award given at the Paris Exposition to any boys’ school, outside of France, was a bronze metal awarded to the Berkeley School for its exhibit; consisting of representative work in drawing by the different classes, in modeling and relief-map making, together with photographs of the various classes and rooms.”

The resulting structure, costing $250,000 and completed in 1891, stretched from No. 18 through 24 West 44^th Street.  It was a handsome four-story school above a high basement.   A dramatic, split staircase rose to the rusticated first floor above street level.   Above the central windows of the third floor, a long frieze copied a portion of the Parthenon frieze, taken from casts in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  The architects blended yellow Roman brick, terra cotta and Indiana limestone to create an impressive presence.  It was all capped by an ornate cornice with a central parapet.

On May 30, 1891 The Sun printed a sketch of the new building with its grand split staircase to the first floor and the original cornice and parapet (copyright expired)

Inside were no-nonsense facilities designed for learning and drilling.  The classrooms were identical, 30 by 22 feet “with single desks, having broad aisles on the sides and between each two rows.”  The dining hall and kitchen were on the fourth floor; offices, library and reception rooms were on the first.  The fourth floor also held the dormitories for boarding students, two masters and “the lady resident.”

“The equipment of this school is, beyond all doubt, the best in every department possessed by any private teaching institution in this State,”  said The Sun.  “Excellent laboratories are provided for practical chemical and physical work.”

The terra cotta frieze above the third floor was a copy of the frieze of the Parthenon -- photo by Alice Lum

But it was the armory that stood out.  The Sun reported that it “is walled with plain brick, without ornamentation.  Lockers for the various companies surround the sides.”   Situated on the ground floor, the armory rose “one and a half stories high,” according to the newspaper.  “A span of glass 55 feet wide covers a portion of the armory…This hall is amply lighted by its glass roof by day, and at night is made brilliant by rows of gaslights.”  The New York Times added that the armory was 100 feet wide and 85 feet long, “making a larger armory than that of the Seventy-first Regiment.”

The fifth floor covered only half of the building to accommodate an outdoor area for baseball practice.  Parents of the 300 enrolled students paid annual fees that varied from $350 for the day student to $1000 for the “advanced resident student.”

Leasing the massive armory was a source of extra income for the school.  Immediately the Berkeley Ladies’ Athletic Club developed which held its Winter lawn-tennis tournaments here.  The Evening Badminton Club played here, as well, and the large space was available for other assemblies.  In December 1892 it was the scene of a reception for Columbia, Harvard, Yale and Princeton students before they moved upstairs for a rousing chess tournament.

On Saturday May 13, 1893 scandal arrived in the form of “vile epithets and profanity.”  Berkeley’s chief rival was the Cutler School at 18 West 43^rd Street and on that day the two schools had participated in athletic games at the Berkeley Oval, Berkeley’s athletic field north of the city.  The Evening World reported that “Both institutions are preparatory schools, principally for rich men’s sons, and there has been bitterness between them for several years.”

After the games, John White later told reporters, “the Cutler boys abused his boys and insulted the professors and ladies in the party.”  The next morning passersby were shocked by painted vulgarities in front of the Berkeley School, on the sidewalk in front of Dr. White’s home, and on “fences and posts for a block or two on each side of the avenue.”

To Victorian New Yorkers it was appalling and the thought that well-bred sons of society families had committed the act was unthinkable.   Justice from the hand of Professor Cutler, whose school’s reputation had been sullied, came fast and severe.    On May 16 The Times reported that twelve Cutler boys had been suspended.  “They confessed that they were the perpetrators of the outrage, and further confessed that they had daubed Dr. White’s front stoop at 8 East Forty-fourth Street with paint, and had painted vile and profane expressions over the sidewalk in front of his house, and daubed the front stoops of his neighbors.”

The boys could only say they were caught up in the excitement of their victory over Berkeley.  The Times further detailed their “bad conduct.”  “On their way down from the Oval Saturday afternoon, the Cutler boys became hilarious in the train, it is said, and beat the little boys of the Berkeley School and insulted Dr. White.”

The innocent Cutler students were made to issue a set of resolutions condemning the work of the suspended pupils and expressing their deep regret at the mischief.  The resolution was then presented to John White.  The Cutler boys were instructed to tell no one who the offending parties were because, as Professor Cutler said, “it would not be justice to their parents.”

It was military drill, as much as academic and athletic accomplishment, of which the Berkeley students were proud.  On April 10, 1897 The Sun reported on Berkeley’s participation in the 17^th Annual Price Drill at the Ninth Regiment Armory.  “With their band playing, colors flying, and headed by a youthful drum major who could have put Sousa to sleep, the boys of the Berkeley School Corps, 200 strong, walked right into the hearts of the spectators…The armory floor and galleries were filled to overflowing with the relatives and friends of the youthful soldiers, while a thousand of New York’s sweetest maidens waved their handkerchiefs and showered applause on the lilliputian army as they strode by.”

In 1900, only nine years after building the facility, the Berkeley School moved to Madison Avenue and 49^th Street.  The building was purchased by The General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen from Columbia University in trade for three other properties “at no cash outlay to the Society.”

Carved white marble forms a sweeping staircase -- photo courtesy of C. Russell

The society was founded in 1785, but as The New York Tribune pointed out in 1900, “Among the old New-York institutions there is probably none so little known to the general public as the General Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen.”  The society was founded, according to the act of incorporation in 1792, “for the laudable purpose of protecting and supporting such of their brethren as by sickness or accident may stand in need of assistance, and for the relief of the widows and orphans of those who may die leaving little or no property for their support.”

By now its purpose had broadened.  As well as providing help, mostly to widows and orphans of tradesmen, it ran a free school.  Originally intended to teach a trade to the children of indigent or deceased members, the school eventually admitted other children who paid a modest tuition.   Which students received free instruction and which ones paid was always a well-kept secret.

A heavy bronze plaque of the Society's logo is affixed to the vermiculated limestone base -- photo by Alice Lum

The Society held its official opening on January 3, 1900.  A substantial financial gift from member Andrew Carnegie paid for the renovations.  The Berkeley School’s cavernous armory had been transformed into the society’s library.  “It is lighted by an immense skylight and an elaborate arrangement of electric lamps,” reported The Times.  On the second floor were an assembly room, executive offices and “members’ apartments.”  The original cornerstone of the first mechanics’ hall was placed in the wall on this level.  The upper floors were dedicated to laboratories, recitation rooms, and studios for classes in “modeling, cabinet decoration, architectural, free hand, and mechanical drawing, and as accommodations for the stenographic and typewriting classes.”

The Society's symbol, an arm and hammer, hang above a staircase -- photo courtesy C. Russell

In 1903 Carnegie, who was impressed by the society’s work with underprivileged boys (he said “It is a wonderful institution, doing more good with a small sum of money than any I know of”), gave another $250,000 to enlarge the building.  Architect Ralph Samuel Townsend was commissioned to design the renovations.

The proud executive committee of the Society poses as the new headquarters is opened -- New York Tribune January 14, 1900 (copyright expired)

Townsend sympathetically worked with Lamb & Rich’s original design, adding two wings to the rear, removing the top floor and adding three new stories.  Elaborate moldings, terra cotta framings and Ionic columns were deftly incorporated into the design so the resulting extension of the structure is seamless.

Young men are instructed in ornamental relief in the newly renovated building -- New York Tribune, January 14, 1900 (copyright expired)

By May 6, 1908 Andrew Carnegie had given a total of $527,000 to the Society and in appreciation a bronze bust by sculptor J. Massey Rhind was placed in the foyer.   At the time of the unveiling 1,655 men were being instructed in the technical trades.  The Directory of Social and Health Agencies of New York City listed the free courses available.  “Freehand Cast, and Ornamental Drawing, Elementary and Advanced, in Mechanical and Architectural Drawing, Mathematics, and Clay Modelling [sic], also classes in Physics and Industrial Electricity, thus materially assisting them in their daily vocations.”

Sadly, in May 1917 44^th Street was widened, necessitating the removal of the grand stone stairs.  The basement level now became the first floor and the six-story building “with basement” was suddenly a seven-story building on official documents.

With the removal of the staircase, the original entrance door became an arched stained glass window above what had been the basement entrance -- photo by Alice Lum

The Society continues on in the building, over a century after moving in.   A small museum, including a rare collection of locks, the extensive library and the evening classes are here in a building little changed since the removal of the outside steps.

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The 1912 Helen Hayes Theater -- 240 West 44th Street

photo by Alice Lum

In the first decade of the 20^th century Manhattan’s theater district had firmly rooted itself in the Times Square neighborhood, having gradually relocated from 23^rd Street.   On the side streets along Broadway rose grand Beaux Arts or Classic-revival theaters with lavish interiors capable of seating large audiences.  Winthrop Ames had other ideas.

Born into a wealthy Massachusetts family in 1871, Ames attended Harvard University where he majored in drama (much to the consternation of his socially-prominent family).    Upon graduation, he was convinced to find a more conventional profession.  He did not join the family business, Ames Shovel & Tool Company, however.  Instead he worked with Bates & Guild, the publishers of The Architectural Review.  Ames had studied architecture in college, as well.

The draw of the stage was too much to resist and six years later, in 1904, he partnered with Loren F. Deland to produce a wide array of entertainments—from light opera to modern drama--as managers of the Castle Square Theater in Boston.  Then, after extensively touring Europe in 1907 to learn about modern technicalities of theater design, Ames moved to New York and managed the large New Theater.  It was an experimental American version of European dramatic arts that soon failed.

Ames felt the problem with the New Theater was not what it offered—non-commercial repertory theater based on the government-subsidized theaters like the Comedie Francaise—but the ponderous problems of running a large house.  What was needed, he felt, was a little theater.

In 1912, he built the Little Theater, paying for it with his own money.  He leased land from the John Jacob Astor Estate on the south side of 44^th Street between Eighth Avenue and Broadway where middle-class brownstone residences still lined the block.  

Architects Ingalls & Hoffman were responsible for the design, which also stepped away from the conventional design of Broadway theaters.  Ames instructed them on what he had seen in Europe:  small auditoriums in which the audience was nearly a part of the play.  And he it all to have a home-like atmosphere.

Theatre Magazine published a drawing of the new theater in 1912--NYPL Collection

The firm produced a neo-Georgian structure of red brick and stone, with shuttered windows and splayed keystones.  Inside, the Adams-like detailing continued, giving the theater patron the feeling of being a guest at the home of a friend, rather than entering a lavish gilded hall.  The lounges had crackling fires in homey fireplaces to enhance the mood.  There was no balcony and the auditorium could seat a mere 299 patrons in an intimate setting with no seat being overly-far from the stage.

One critic wrote, “This is the house of Mr. Winthrop Ames; the patrons are his guests for the nonce, in an old colonial house behind a garden wall…The auditorium is most unusual.   It is as though a high and spacious room in a private house had been converted into a theater, by putting in an inclined floor and cutting a proscenium opening in the further wall.”

When the theater was completed, brownstone residences still lined 44th Street -- photo NYPL Collection

Not every critic agreed, however; some feeling that the new theater tried to be “aristocratic.”  And when Ames set the ticket prices at the surprisingly-high $2.50 for all seats, eyebrows were raised.  The common theater-goer, people complained, could not afford such expense.

But Ames pushed on.  He opened the theater with John Galsworthy’s The Pigeon to the acclaim of drama critic Ward Morehouse who deemed it “thoughtfully written” and said it “brought forth human and delightful characterizations.”

Adams-style decorations adorn the portico and a neo-Georgian entrance smacked of an elegant residence -- photo by Alice Lum

In March that year, he staged Charles Ran Kennedy’s one-act play The Terrible Meek, a historical drama centered around the crucifixion.  The New York Times critic was stunned.  “The effect was remarkable.  The usual applause was omitted, women put on their hats and wraps without a word, and the men in the audience, if they talked at all, did so in whispers and muffled tones.  Not until they had passed from the theatre into the street did most of them attempt to comment on what they had seen.”

Ames' goal, he said, was to stage “the clever, the unusual drama that had a chance of becoming a library classic.”  And, financing the productions with his own money, he continued with new plays like George Bernard Shaw’s The Philanderer in 1913, and Cyril Harcourt’s comedy A Pair of Stockings in 1914.

But by March 11, 1915, Ames was struggling.  The New York Times noted that the producer was in financial difficulty and could lose his theater.  The plays were successful, the audiences and critics gushing with compliments, but the house was too small to support itself.  Ames’ lofty ideal was a victim of its own design.

Ames swallowed those ideals in favor of financial sense and commissioned architect Herbert J. Krapp to enlarge the space.  The three-year renovation began in 1917 and when it was completed in 1920 there was now a larger stage and a balcony that increased the seating capacity to 450.  To augment income Ames began leasing the theater as well to other producers, such as Oliver Morosco and John Golden.

The replacement shutters, which the AIA Guide to New York City called "awful pseudo-shutters that, of course, don't shut," take the place of the green originals -- photo by Alice Lum

Throughout the years, the Little Theater was home to productions by up-and-coming playwrights that included some major hits.  Rachel Crothers directed her own play, A Little Journey, that ran for 252 performances.  Eugene O’Neill’s first full-length play, Beyond the Horizon, was staged here, winning the Pulitzer Prize.  In October 1920, Frank Craven’s The First Year opened and would go on for an astonishing 760 performances.

Despite the successful plays, by 1922 Ames had lost half a million dollars on the Little Theatre.  When he died in 1937, his fortune was gone.  His estate amounted to about $77,000 and his wife left their mansion in humiliation to live in a small bungalow on the grounds.

Nevertheless, the Little Theatre continued on, producing new works by exciting playwrights with both known and upcoming actors.  In 1930, Edward G. Robinson was noticed for his role in Mr. Samuel, and in 1936 Sir Cedric Hardwicke made his American debut here in Promise.  The great Cornelia Otis Skinner put on a one-woman show, Edna His Wife, in here in 1937. 

In 1931, The New York Times now owned the theater building, which abutted its headquarters, and announced plans to demolish it to create a delivery truck entrance to the Times Building.  The negative reaction from the public caused the newspaper to rethink its plans, and it became the unlikely owner and producer of a Broadway theater, now called New York Times Hall.

The Times briefly leased the theater to CBS Studios -- photo NYPL Collection

Then, in 1941 The New York Times closed the doors, using the space only for an occasional lecture or concert.  For a decade the product of Winthrop Ames’ dreams sat dark.   ABC-TV leased the space in 1951 to use as a television studio until 1963.

That year a private corporation purchased the building and re-established it as a legitimate theater.  It opened with a gospel spectacle Tambourines to Glory by Langston Hughes and Jobe Huntley.  The following year Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward and James Costigan appeared in Baby Want a Kiss, an Actors Studio production.  Later in 1964, when the Pulitzer Prize-winning play The Subject Was Roses was staged here, the theater was renamed the Winthrop Ames.

That name did not last long.  Later that year, the theater was leased to Westinghouse Broadcasting to be used, again, as a television studio.  For a decade productions like the David Frost and Merv Griffin shows were aired from here.  Viewers of the Merv Griffin Show heard Arthur Treacher nightly announce, “From the Little Theatre in Times Square, it’s the Merv Griffin Show.”

Finally, in 1974 the Little Theater opened as a legitimate theater once again.  In 1977, a play moved in that would have warmed the heart of Winthrop Ames.  Gemini, by Albert Innaurato, was the “clever and unusual drama” Ames had searched for.  The show ran 1,788 performances, the longest running play in the theater’s history and the fourth-longest running on Broadway.

In 1979, the building was purchased by the Little Theatre Group headed by Donald Tick and Martin Markinson.  Two years later they restored the building and commissioned ADCADESIGN to refurbish the interiors.

Like Gemini, Torch Song Trilogy by Harvey Fierstein and Prelude to a Kiss by Craig Lucas epitomized the original purpose of the Little Theatre–bringing thought-provoking, new works to the New York audience.

In order for the immense Marriott Marquis Hotel to be constructed in Times Square, numerous buildings had to be demolished.  Among these was the Helen Hayes Theatre on West 46^th Street.  It was an awkward moment in 1982 when the beloved actress’s namesake theater was razed while she was still alive.

The original carved plaque announcing the theater's name survives above the entrance -- photo by Alice Lum

To remedy the situation, the Little Theater was renamed the Helen Hayes in July 1983 as a tribute to the veteran actress who had become an icon in the theatrical community.   The delightfully-unique theater is still the smallest theater in the Broadway district and, like Winthrop Ames, its management is decidedly independent.