The 1929 Master Building - 310-312 Riverside Drive

photo by Deansfa

In 1920 Nicholas Roerich and his wife, Helena, arrived in New York City.  The Russian-born mystic and artist promoted himself as a master in the theosophist belief in ancients who could transmit messages and knowledge to believers.  He mesmerized wealthy Americans who formed a near-cult.  (Reportedly, the spiritualist urged follower Henry Wallace, Secretary of Agriculture under Franklin Roosevelt, to persuade the Treasury Department to add the mystic pyramid of the Great Seal to the dollar bill—a changed that was enacted in 1935.)

Among his ardent followers were Louis L. Horch, a specialist in international finance, and his wife, Nettie.  The couple were major financial backers of Roerich's Master Institute of United Arts and the Roerich Museum, founded in 1923.  Louis Horch was president of the museum and the couple owned hundreds of the artist's paintings.  

The Horches had established the museum in an apartment building they owned at No. 310 Riverside Drive.  They took their dedication a step further in 1928 by purchasing the abutting properties at Nos. 311 and 312 and securing a bond to fund construction of a skyscraper on the site.

On August 2, 1928 the Ballston Spa Daily Journal announced "A 24-story 'skyscraper museum' to cost in excess of $2,ooo,ooo is to be erected in Riverside Drive to house the Roerich Museum and two other art organizations.  It will supplant the residential building at 310 Riverside Drive, at present occupied by the Roerich Museum, which is devoted to 750 paintings by Nicholas Roerich."  The article explained that the along with space for other organizations to be housed in the lower floors, a "number of small apartments, an auditorium, conference rooms and lecture halls, are embraced in the plans to be drawn by Helmle, Corbett & Harrison, and Sugarman and Berger."

Harvey Wiley Corbett, a specialist in skyscraper design, took the reins in designing what would be called the Master Building--named after Roerich's "Invisible Teacher, Master Morya."  His Art Deco design recalled his One Fifth Avenue, completed a year earlier, in its overall massing and series of setbacks.  He used color to emphasize the verticality of the structure--the brick morphing from dark purple at the base to light gray at the top.  He told a reporter from The New York Times his purpose in doing so was "to create the effect of a growing thing."  The wrap-around corner windows were the first in New York.  

Completed in 1929, the Master Building was described by The New York Times as "A formidable venture in combining living space and culture."  The lower three floors held the Roerich Museum, the Master Institute of United Arts, Corona Mundi Art Center, Urusvati Institute and other related institutions.  The upper floors held 344 apartments--from one to three rooms in size--for artists.  Because it was an apartment hotel, tenants had minimal kitchen facilities (called pantries), and ate for the most part in a large common restaurant.

Roerich reportedly was very pleased with the stepped black cornerstone with the Master's logo.  photo by Deansfa

On May 10, 1929 The Highland Democrat reported that the Master Institute of United Arts was "soon to move into new quarters in its twenty-four story Master Building."  The article explained that the institute "is organized in harmony with the teachings of its founder, Nicholas Roerich, the internationally renowned artist and philosopher, who believes that art in all its branches should be made easily accessible to all people.  In accordance with this believe the Master Institute unites under one roof classes in music, painting, sculpture, architecture, opera, ballet and drama."

The Roerich Museum opened five months later, on October 17, with Nicholas Roerich as guest of honor.  The exhibition consisted of about 1,000 of Roerich's paintings.  The Horschs continued to be deeply involved.  Nellie later told a reporter "We worked hard, day and night, but that was no sacrifice, it was our pleasure.  We had no self-interest--we simply wanted to help artists and derived great satisfaction from their creative endeavors."

The Depression years caused financial problems; but it was private tension between Roerich and Horsch (The New York Times described the problem saying "the two men had a falling out").  Court battles ensued over who had control of the building.  Louis Horsch was awarded control by the courts in 1932, and the Roerich Museum was evicted in 1938.  

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

On June 4 that year The New York Sun reported on the opening of the "recently organized Riverside Museum."  The article said "The Roerich paintings which once clogged the walls, have been taken down and store elsewhere in the building, leaving seven spacious galleries on the second floor for the display of works of more varied and general interest."  The opening exhibition featured works of 60 American painters and 22 sculptures.  Over the coming decades, according to The New York Times later, the museum would show works by "American and international artists, including Rockwell, Kent, Alfred Maurer, John Sloan, Jean Liberte, Stuart Davis, Franklin Watkins and Aaron Goodleman."

The other spaces in the lower floors became home to the groups like State Federation of Women's and the Irish Foundation headquarters.  

While the drama had played out below, the many of the apartments continued to house tenants involved in the arts.  Violinist Miriam Solovieff lived here with her mother, Elizabeth, and younger sister, Vivienne, in 1939.  She was described by the Albany newspaper The Times-Union, as an "18-year old genius."  Their "richly furnished apartment" was the scene of unspeakable tragedy on December 29 that year.

Miriam's parents were estranged, her father, Cantor Aaron Solovieff, having had lived in San Francisco for five years.  He showed up at the apartment that day, pleading with Elizabeth, to take him back.  While they argued, Miriam continued practicing on her Stradivarius violin.

The newspaper recounted "The cantor's final plea was to Miriam...When she refused, her father produced [a] gun and fired twice at his unusually-talented daughter.  The bullets went wide and, still clutching her priceless instrument, she ran to a neighbor's apartment."  Miriam had been struck in the neck, but not seriously wounded.  

When police arrived they found a gruesome scene.  Solovieff first shot his wife, then his 12-year old daughter who was in bed with a cold.  "Then, returning to his unconscious wife's sprawling figure, he sat in a chair and raising the revolver to his temple, pulled the trigger."

Not all of the residents, of course, were artists or musicians.  Ella de Winter, a refugee from Germany, lived here at the time.  The Master Building provided safe deposit boxes for residents' valuables, one of which was used by Ella for her jewelry and cash.

In August 1940 the management hired a new night clerk, 26-year old James H. Smith.  Only two months later, on Friday night, October 25, he used a master key to access Ella de Winter's safe deposit box.  He and a friend, unemployed hotel clerk Raymond Hyde, divided the $10,540 in cash (about $192,000 in today's money), pocketed the $11,000 worth of jewelry, and fled.  Following their arrest, police said "the men bought an automobile for $150 and toured night clubs in various parts of the city."

Beginning around 1942 the Manhattan Camera Club held its exhibitions in the Riverside Museum.  The annual show in 1946 was deemed by journalist Norris Harkness of The New York Sun "unusual, if not unique."  As always, the show included the best work of the year, but much of this exhibition "is given over to a pictorial history of the growth of the club."

A most peculiar and horrific incident occurred on November 8, 1964.  Alice Miller, who lived in Huntington, Long Island, was visiting her aunt here.  During the night she either jumped or fell from the 18th floor window.  The Times Record of Troy, New York reported "The body, in night clothes, was found on a third-floor balcony."

On March 17, 1952 The New York Times reported "A spectacular fire broke out last night in an eleventh-floor apartment of the Master Hotel."  The fire had started in the apartment of Elizabeth Clark, who was not at home.  The article said "for a time flames flashed from the windows."

Elizabeth Clark's elderly neighbor, Isaac Rosenstrater, was confined to his bed with a heart condition.  He was carried to the lobby by Fire Lieutenant Sanford Tice and removed to a hospital.  Also hospitalized were Albert Levy and his wife Erma.  They suffered from burns and smoke inhalation.  The blaze was luckily confined to the 11th floor and was extinguished within an hour. 

By 1971 the Horches were living in Florida.  Their son, Frank, took over management of the apartments and their daughter, Oriole Farb, became the museum's director.  On June 17 that year The New York Times announced "The Riverside Museum...is leaving the city in defeat at the end of the month to merge into Brandeis University at Waltham, Mass."  The changing demographics of the neighborhood made it impossible to support the staff of 30 required to maintain the museum.

In 1975, according to one account, "many of the building's 344 apartments are still occupied by artists."  Frank Horch lived on the 17th floor of the building, by now known as the Master Apartments, with his photographer wife, Nancy, and their two young sons.  At around 6:00 on the morning of February 21, 1975, Horch was found dead in the basement of the building.  The New York Times reported "Mr. Horch, 45 years old, was shot three times."  His wallet was missing, causing detectives to say that robbery was not ruled out as a motive.

The 274-seat theater had been home to the Equity Library Theater since 1961.  Eric Pace of The New York Times described it as "where ambitious, unpaid actors display their talents in revivals."  In November 1978 it was looking for a new home.  Pace wrote "The nonprofit theater's management still hopes the landlords, Louis and Netti Horch, will change their minds, and it has asked audiences to sign a petition for that."

The Horches (whom the theater's managing director said were "quite lovely people") were concerned about the building's security and the safety of the residents should fire break out in the theater.  As it turned out, the "quite lovely people" agreed to allow the Equity Library Theater to remain for another 12 years.  It closed because of financial problems during the 1989-90 season.

Peter Glebo, an artist, photographer, choreographer and director, was a resident in 2016.  The president of Tommy Tune, Inc., he devised a way to connect his neighbors that year.  James Barron, writing in The New York Times on May 8, 2016 described his scheme.  "He would photograph them and display the images in gallery space in the lobby." 

Tommy Tune stopped by when the exhibition opened in May.  He said "Peter wasn't content to just do pictures and put them up.  He said 'How can I make it site-specific?'"    Glebo photographed the residents within the building.  Tune called the concept "a genius idea."

phtograph by Deansfa

Harvey Wiley Corbett's Art Deco design was deemed an individual landmark on December 5, 1989.  

Rosario Candela's 1930 740 Park Avenue

 
In 1928, a year before the Stock Market crash, George Stephenson Brewster and his wife, the former Eleanor Grant Bosher, lived in a handsome mansion on the northwest corner of Park Avenue and 71st Street.  The massively wealthy Brewster was among the largest stockholders of the Standard Oil Company.  That year, the Brewsters' next door neighbor, real estate operator James T. Lee, proposed that they give up their mansions in favor of opulent apartments in a luxury building on the site.  By March 1929 when ground was broken, Lee had acquired a third mansion on Park Avenue and a nurses' residence on 71st Street.

Lee commissioned architect Rosario Candela, known for his high-end apartment buildings, to design 740 Park Avenue.  Working with him was Arthur Loomis Harmon (who joined the firm of Shreve, Lamb & Harmon later that year).  Construction was completed in October 1930 and, despite the onslaught of the Great Depression, James T. Lee had little trouble filling his opulent building with millionaires.

Candela and Harmon had produced an aloof, 17-story structure with little outward flair.  Its style has been called by one architectural historian, "Classicizing Art Deco."  Faced in limestone, the building's minimal decoration included a dignified, monolithic entrance flanked by fluted shafts topped with foliate, cabbage-like finials.  A bracketed cornice above the second floor introduced the upper section.  The topmost floors were decorated with carved panels, urns, and rosettes; and the balconies given decorative iron railings.

It was not the exterior, but the cooperative apartments that were meant to astound.  The New York Times said the building was "literally twelve mansions built one on top of another."  (In fact, there were 30 apartments.)   On September 6, 1930, a month before the building opened, The New York Sun had described the duplex apartments as being designed around "a spacious central gallery opening on separate corridors, which definitely set apart the servant, master and guest quarters."  The article said in part,

The main gallery has a marble floor and base and the second floor gallery is teakwood, as are the floors of the principal master room throughout the quarters.  The typical duplex floor plan has six master bed chambers with private baths and dressing rooms surrounding two sides of the gallery.  The guest suite has a private corridor.  On the opposite side of the gallery is the corridor leading to the servants' quarters, containing four maids' rooms and baths. 

  

On the main floor the gallery has the sweeping brass stair rail and alcove taking the space opposite to the living room and the library entrances.  Also opening off the gallery are a large reception room and a dining room...Numerous wood-burning fireplaces are provided in every large apartment.

Along with the Lees and the Brewsters, according to The New York Times, residents included Bayard C. Hoppins, Frances W. Scoville, James Watson Webb, G. Beekman Hoppin, and Langdon K. Thorne.  (The Thorne apartment consisted of sixteen rooms and seven baths.)

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

On October 14, The New York Times reported that James T. Lee's daughter and son-in-law, Janet and John Vernou Bouvier 3d, had purchased "an apartment of eighteen rooms and six baths."  Despite the building's being brand new, the article said, "The purchaser...will occupy the suite upon completion of alterations."  At the time, the Bouviers' daughter, Jacqueline, was just two months old.  She would, of course, go on to become First Lady of the United States as Jacqueline Kennedy, and subsequently wife to millionaire Aristotle Onassis.

Among the of the first social events was the wedding of Electra Webb.  Her pedigree was sterling.  Her father, James Watson Webb, was the son of William Seward Webb and Elizabeth Osgood Vanderbilt; and her mother, Electra Havemeyer, was the daughter of Henry Osborne Havemeyer, whose family had made its extensive fortune in the sugar industry.  The Webbs' country estate was Shelbourne Farm, in Shelbourne, Vermont.

The Webbs announced Electra's engagement to Dunbar Wright Bostwick on December 21, 1931.  The groom held his own in regard to familial prestige.  The Evening Post said, "Mr. Bostwick is a grandson of the late J. A. Bostwick, and on his mother's side he is a grandson of the late Mr. and Mrs. Henry B. Stokes and a nephew of Mr. and Mrs. F. Ambrose Clark."

The Brewster apartment was the scene of a burglary around the same time.  Just over three weeks later, The New York Age reported that five detectives had been presented a $4,000 reward "for the recovery of $80,000 jewelry stolen from the home of Mrs. Eleanor Brewster at 740 Park avenue."  (The heist would equal about $1.78 million in 2024.)

On July 26, 1937, The New York Sun reported that plans had been filed "for alterations to be made in the apartment to be occupied by John D. Rockefeller, Jr."  The millionaire and his wife Abby Greene Aldrich were combining apartments 15B and 16B on the 15th and 16th floors.  "They are to be connected by private elevator and a new private stairway," said the article, noting, "Other changes also are to be made."

When completed, the Rockefeller apartment engulfed 20,000 square feet with 37 rooms and 14 bathrooms.

Two views of the Rockefeller apartment.  images via Vanity Fair, October 30, 2003.

Among the residents as mid-century approached were Marshall Field III and his wife Ruth Pruyn Phipps.  Like all socialites, Ruth involved herself in worthy causes.  On June 5, 1948, for instance, The New York Age reported, "Mrs. Marshall Field and Miss Lillian Hellman were co-hostesses at a tea for the benefit of the Wiltwyck School for Boys on Thursday, in Mrs. Field's apartment, 740 Park avenue."  That day, two judges spoke on the "problem of juvenile delinquency" in the city and the work of the school, which, the newspaper explained, "is interracial and non-sectarian, [and] cares for delinquent boys between the ages of 8 and 12 years."

On August 3, 1952, The Sunday Press of Binghamton, New York, reported that Webb & Knapp, Inc., headed by William Zeckendorf, had purchased 740 Park Avenue.  The article noted, "Among those who have apartments in the building are John D. Rockefeller, Jr., R. T. Vanderbilt, Jack F. Chrysler, Countess Allene de Kotzebue, Mrs. S. R. Guggenheim, Mrs. Langborne Williams, Col. William Schiff and Mrs. Janet Auchincloss.   

Abby Green Aldrich Rockefeller died in 1948.  Three years later Rockefeller married former concert pianist Martha Baird.  The ceremony was held at Martha's Providence, Rhode Island home. 

John D. and Martha Rockefeller were vacationing in Tucson, Arizona on May 11, 1960 when the multi-millionaire died at the age of 86.  Although he had given away hundreds of millions of dollars during his lifetime, he left an estate appraised at $160,598,584.  The New York Times reported, "The bulk of his estate was left about equally to his widow, Mrs. Martha Baird Rockefeller of 740 Park Avenue, and to the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Inc. of New York."  Among Martha Baird Rockeller's inheritances was the apartment.  She died of a coronary occlusion in the apartment on January 24, 1971 at the age of 75.

Another prominent resident died two months later.  Flora Ettlinger Whiting had moved into a 14-room duplex in June 1940.  Her husband, Giles Whiting, had died three years earlier.  She maintained a 100-acre summer estate in Scarborough, New York, and a "porticoed Greek Revival mansion," as described by The New York Times, near Tarrytown.  She filled the three residences with early American furnishings and artwork.

When Flora Ettlinger Whiting died on March 8, 1971 at the age of 93, she left an estate "estimated at $20-million to $25-million," according to The New York Times.  On May 1, 1972, an auction of her furnishings and artwork was held at Parke-Bernet.  The array of items ranging from Federal tall case clocks, to an 18th century camelback sofa purchased by the State Department, to Etruscan, Roman and Greek antiquities drew bidders from across the nation.

Retired publisher and philanthropist Enid A. Haupt purchased her duplex penthouse apartment in 1967 for $350,000.  The widow of Ira Haupt, who died in 1963, she maintained a country home in Greenwich, Connecticut.  Intensely interested in horticulture, she donated the Haupt Fountains at the Ellipse between the White House and the Washington Monument, and the four-acre Enid A. Haupt Garden beside the Smithsonian "Castle" in Washington.  She also provided the funding for the American Horticultural Society to purchase River Farm, an 18th century plantation near Mount Vernon.

Enid Haupt died in her Greenwich home on October 26, 2005.  The following year, her 740 Park Avenue apartment with two terraces on the 17th floor and a "very large, rambling terrace on the 18th floor," as described by The New York Times, went on the market for $27.5 million.  It was purchased by John A. Thain, chief executive of the New York Stock Exchange, and his wife Carmen.  Their country home was in Harrison, New York.  The couple put the apartment back on the market in 2018 for $39.5 million.

Two views of the Thain apartment.  photos by Jon Nissenbaum, The New York Times April 27, 2018.

After nearly 100 years, 740 Park Avenue remains one of Manhattan's most prestigious addresses--its placid Candela-Harmon facade belying the sumptuous, house-like apartments inside.

photographs by the author

LaptrinhX.com has no authorization to reuse the content of this blog

George Fred Pelham Jr.'s 1940 1150 Park Avenue

 

photograph by Deansfa

George Fred Pelham, Jr. came from a line of architects.  His grandfather was George Brown Pelham, in whose office George's father learned the trade before opening his own office in 1890.  George Jr. joined that firm in 1910.  

Two years after his father's death, Pelham was hired by the 1150 Park Avenue Corporation to design an apartment house on the southwest corner of Park Avenue and 92nd Street.  The builders had acquired the site from the Brick Presbyterian Church two years earlier.  According to The New York Sun, the church corporation "reserved an easement for light and air over the southern ten feet of the site."  That worked out for both parties--assuring the proposed apartment building sustained views, ventilation and natural light.

Pelham filed the plans on July 17, 1939.  The New York Sun reported that construction of the "eighteen-story and penthouse apartment house" would cost $800,000--just under $17 million in 2024.  "There will be six suites on a floor from the second to ninth stories; five on each floor from the tenth to fifteenth; three each on the sixteenth to eighteenth floors, and two penthouse suites."  The first floor would house four doctors' offices and ten maids' rooms.

from the collection of the Columbia University Libraries New York Real Estate Brochure Collection 

Pelham's Art Moderne design relied on form rather than ornament.  Sitting on a granite base, the red brick structure rose to setbacks that provided terraces to certain upper-floor apartments.  Perhaps the most striking element of Pelham's design was the chamfered corners that allowed for dramatic, triptych windows.

The Great Depression was waning, but was by no means over.  Nonetheless, apartments in 1150 Park Avenue rented quickly.  With construction still ongoing, on May 19, 1940 The New York Times reported that more than four months before renting was to officially start, 60 percent of the apartments had been leased.

An advertisement on August 24, 1940 in The New York Sun called 1150 Park Avenue, "an outstanding example of modern apartment house construction."  Tempting potential residents with snob appeal, it said, "This latest addition to New York City's smartest avenue was designed to please 'particular' people who desire luxurious living...at moderate rentals."  Rents started at $1,400 for a three-bedroom suite--around $2,433 per month by today's conversion.

from the collection of the Columbia University Libraries New York Real Estate Brochure Collection 

The 1940 real estate brochure touted, "Each [apartment] comprises a complete home, whether it be a three room apartment or a five room unit with powder room off the foyer and two master bedrooms each with its private bath."  It concluded, "Altogether, 1150 Park Avenue may be said to express the Apartment Standards of the Future in one of the most perfect locations of To-Day."

Among those who signed leases during construction were Albert W. Barker, of the Transamerican Broadcasting & Television Corporation; and Maurice S. Diamond, curator of Near Eastern Art in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

A year after the first tenants moved in, Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, drawing the country into World War II.  Phillip W. Haberman, Jr., a lawyer, left 1150 Park Avenue to serve in the Intelligence Division of the Eighth Air Force in England.  His wife Helen more than filled her time in his absence.  On March 7, 1943, NY P.M. said, "Mrs. Haberman is an account executive and copywriter for the William Douglas McAdams Advertising Agency, and also handles hotel reservations for the Times Square Service Men's Center."

An astounding "four-way exchange of apartments" took place in 1946.  On September 6, The New York Sun reported on an unbelievably complex coordination of leases and relocations.  Henry L. Harris was with Goldman, Sachs & Co.  He and his wife left their apartment here to move to 145 Central Park West.  That apartment had just been vacated by Jerome Tanenbaum, who moved to 1095 Park Avenue, the former apartment of Leon Spilo, executive vice-president of Clairol, Inc.  The Spilos were moving into the apartment vacated by Arthur Garson of the Lovable Brassiere Company, who had just signed a lease on the Harris apartment at 1150 Park Avenue.

Among the Garsons' new neighbors would be the Frederick Schuyler Krags.  A year before the dizzying exchange of apartments, the Krags' daughter, Joan Patricia, had married William A. Pond Phillips, Jr.  They had a short distance to go for the wedding.  On November 9, 1945, The Rye Chronical reported, "the ceremony was performed quietly Saturday afternoon at the [Brick] Presbyterian Church."  Joan had attended the Rye Country Day School and Penn Hall Junior College in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania.

Throughout the succeeding decades, 1150 Park Avenue would continue to be home to professionals.  Living here by the 1960s was trial lawyer Samuel J. Siegel and his wife Daisy.  Born in 1880, he graduated from City College and New York Law School.  Siegel practice law until his retirement in 1969 at the age of 88.

Another interesting resident at the time was Dr. Joseph Turner who lived here with his wife, the former Henrietta Bythiner.  Born in 1892, during World War I he had served as a captain in the army Medical Corps.  Upon returning to New York, in 1919 he was appointed superintendent of the Eagleville Sanitarium, a tuberculosis institution.  When the Second World War broke out, he served as a consultant on civilian defense.  The well-rounded Turner "had an extensive knowledge of art and often lectured on the subject," according to The New York Times on July 7, 1973.

Also living at 1150 Park Avenue at the time were George W. Phillips and his wife Margaret.  Phillips was a partner in the law firm of Cutting, Phillips & Hall.  Admitted to the bar in 1904, he initially represented several racing associations.  Only a year into his practice, according to The New York Times, he "represented August Belmont Sr. in acquiring the land that is now Belmont Park."

The building was converted to a cooperative in 1973.  

many thanks to reader Lowell Cochran for suggesting this post

no permission to reuse the content of this blog has been granted to LaptrinhX.com

Harperley Hall -- No. 1 West 64th Street

In the first years of the 20^th century residents of the Upper West Side were embracing apartment house living like no other Manhattanites.   Not only were vacant lots being bought filled with large multi-family structures; but mansions and rowhouses—most no more than 20 years old—were rapidly being demolished.  In 1909 plans were laid for Harperley Hall, the first apartment building on the Upper West Side to operate under the cooperative system.

On June 13, 1909 the New-York Tribune reported that Harperley Hall, “a new corporation” had purchased the 100-by-150 foot plot at the northwest corner of Central Park West and 64^th Street.  “On the plot will be erected a twelve story apartment house.  This is a co-operative undertaking, and will represent an investment of about $1,200,000.”

The name of the corporation came from three of its directors—Alfred Wilkinson, John Wilkinson and Henry W. Wilkinson.  Their impressive pedigree extended centuries back into British peerage.  The family’s extensive estate near Lanchester, England included a 17^th century manor house was known as Harperley Hall.  It was described in the 1879 Directory of Durham and Northumberland as “a plain mansion situated in an extensive park, [which] commands a beautiful view of the surrounding country.”

Henry Wilhelm Wilkinson not only lent the name of his family’s estate to the new building, he designed it.   While other apartment houses were being designed in the ebullient Beaux Arts style—dripping with festoons, scrolled keystones and gushing ornamentation—Wilkinson turned to the less expected Arts & Crafts style.

The style represented a rebellion not only against overblown decoration and Victorian excess, but against the loss of craftsmanship caused by the Industrial Revolution.  Harperley Hall would reflect the movement in earthy tiles embedded in the beige brick façade, crisp lines and Stickley-like balconies. 

Arts and Crafts tiles and brick diapering are most evident at the top two floors.

On July 17, 1909 the Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide reported that the estimated cost for the structure was $500,000.  Around the same time the New-York Tribune noted that among the tenant-owners were Mrs. Mary Linton Bookwalter, Loudon Charlton, Professor Wendell T. Bush, Mrs. James Oliphant and Mrs. C. M. Hutchinson.

The architectural style was not the only thing to set Harperley Hall apart from other apartment buildings.  The New York Times announced on May 9, 1909 that it “promises to be unique among structures of that class, in that it will contain no two apartments of exactly the same ‘layout.’”  Each owner consulted with Wilkinson to decide “how he will divide this space, as well as all details as to the arrangement of rooms.”  The newspaper added “There will be no such thing as a ‘typical apartment’ in the building.”

In fact, the owners not only consulted with Henry W. Wilkinson, but with another director and owner, Mary Linton Bookwalter.  She had studied art in Europe before returning to New York to study architecture.  The interior designs of the Harperley Hall apartments were done by Bookwalter and she reportedly scrutinized the work of the builders.

The New York Times reported that in addition to six duplexes facing the Park, there were to be five apartments per floor, including one “bachelor suite of living room, bedroom, bathroom, and kitchenette.”  As the building rose in March 1910 The Twentieth Century Magazine wrote “These apartments are to be real homes, for each one is planned with respect to the tastes and characteristics of the individual owner, and from the big entrance court to the last detail of the summer garden on the roof everything in the power of the architect has been done to achieve the simplicity and quiet which the occupants of the homes desire.

“In fact the architect himself, Henry Wilhelm Wilkinson, has an apartment in the building.  The exterior of the building is in a gray and green scheme with windows admitting a flood of sunshine and air, and many of them open on balconies wide enough to be really useful.”

The reporter was taken with the ample closet space.  “And there are closets, huge closets, for every apartment, the largest offering the bliss of fourteen closets, while even the smallest one has a closet like one of our grandmother’s storerooms as well as a basement trunk room.”

As the building neared completion, accolades rolled in.  One critic, however, was a bit more judgmental.  The “Personal News and Trade Gossip” column of the Real Estate Record & Guide on November 19, 1910 pointed out, “A feature of the façade of the great apartment house on Central Park West, called ‘Harperley Hall,’ and one that is noticed by every architectural critic, is the cornice, which is strongly reminiscent of the scaffolds commonly used in the erection of tall buildings.  Doubtless its form was suggested to Mr. H. W. Wilkinson, the architect, by one of the hanging scaffolds used on the Metropolitan Tower or some other high construction.”

Henry Wilkinson took one of the duplex apartments, as did American landscape painter Dwight William Tryon.  The Twentieth Century Magazine pointed out that the artist’s apartment “has for its chief feature the big studio with its great north light.”  Writer Wallace Irwin reduced the size of his living rooms in order to accommodate a large study.   Other modifications were made by impresario Loudon Charlton, who made the music room the central space of his apartment; and by Professor Wendall T. Bush of Columbia University who focused on his library.

The newly-completed building was depicted in Architecture & Building in November 1910 (copyright expired)

Upon Harperley Hall’s completion in 1911 Architecture and Building commented on its amenities.  “Of the housekeeping apartments there are six types, ranging from 6 to 11 rooms in a suite.  The non-housekeeping apartments contain from 2 to 4 rooms, and each has a kitchenette.  Even the electric plate warmer finds a place…On the fifth floor there are 4 guest rooms with baths, which may be rented by the tenants for their guests’ accommodation.”

In the basement was a kitchen run by the building management.  Although all tenants could order meals, it was designed for the convenience of the non-housekeeping, or “bachelor,” apartments.  Also in the basement were “a main laundry, fully equipped, with mechanical dryers, and an open-air drying yard is also provided on the roof.”   Tenants in the large apartments enjoyed a laundry tub in the kitchen, so that small washings could be done within the apartment.

Architecture and Building approved of the fuel-burning fireplaces.  “A thoughtful idea on the part of the designers was the placing of an open fireplace in each apartment, in which coal or wood can actually be burned.  This is a delightful departure from the usual stereotyped form of gas log.”

Certainly Mary Bookwalter did not approve of the inclusive of what were probably family pieces--a Victorian armchair and settee--in the Arts & Crafts interior of the apartment pictured in Architecture & Building in November 1910 (copyright expired)

At least one critic credited Mary Bookwalter for the successful design.  On November 12, 1911 The New York Times wrote “Towering above Central Park and the Century Theatre is Harperley Hall, one of the new studio and apartment buildings in a city which houses itself in such quarters.  It records the latest triumph of a woman who saw in New York her finest opportunity.  Her professional name is Mary Bookwalter.  In private life she is Mrs. Ackerman.”

The writer insisted “To-day Harperly [sic] Hall, which she designed and whose building she practically supervised, is the proof of New York’s approval of the woman who knows how and when to seize an opportunity.”

Harperley Hall would be home to a love-struck couple whose Romeo-and-Juliet story enchanted New Yorkers.  Thomas H. Wells and Stracia Walsh grew up in Ohio.  Wells was the son of a Youngstown steel magnate and he had fallen in love with Stracia while he was still in college.   But his parents disapproved and demanded that the courtship end.

Stracia Walsh moved to New York City “to make her own way in the world,” as reported by The New York Times on December 20, 1910.  She found a job as a manicurist in the Cadillac Hotel.  A few years passed and Thomas Wells finished college and landed a job as a stock broker.  Upon his father’s death he inherited just under $1 million.

Around October 1910 Wells, now 22 years old, wandered into the Cadillac Hotel where he saw his former sweetheart.  The chance meeting “ended in the courting being taken up where Wells’s parents caused it to be dropped several years ago,” said the newspaper.

Only a few weeks later, at the beginning of December, they were married.  The New York Times reported “It’s all true about the marriage of Thomas H. Wells, stockbroker, and Stracia Walsh, manicurist.  Moreover, it’s really romantic.” The newlyweds started their married life in Harperley Hall.

Among the original tenants was Almuth Cunningham Vandiver, former Assistant District Attorney.  He was married on Saturday, November 30, 1912 to Eleanor M. S. Williams in St. Bartholomew’s Church.  “Miss Williams comes from an old family of Long Island,” mentioned The Sun.

The couple would routinely appear in the society columns of New York newspapers.  The New York Times, for instance, reported on February 5, 1914 that “Mrs. Almuth C. Vandiver of 1 West Sixty-Fourth Street gave a dinner last night for Mrs. George Gordon Battle, and her sisters, Miss Bagby and Mrs. Bolling, of Richmond, Va.  There was dancing afterward.”

The following year Eleanor Vandiver gave birth in the Harperley Hall apartment.  On July 11, 1915 The New York Times reported that the Vandivers “are receiving congratulations on the birth of a son on Friday at their home.”  The newborn was christened Almuth Cunningham Vaniver, 2d.

An advertisement in the New-York Tribune on September 20, 1914 offered available apartments.  A 9-room suite with foyer and three baths could be had for $4000—about $50,000 in 2015.  The ad listed conveniences such as “refrigeration, filtered water, vacuum cleaner, perfectly equipped laundry.”

Other residents in the building at the time included Albert Smith Bickmore, noted educator and a trustee of the American Museum of Natural History.   He had degrees from Dartmouth, Harvard, Hamilton College, and Colgate University.  Bickmore had traveled the world collecting specimens for museums.

The arrival of the Vandiver baby in 1915 was a bright spot in an otherwise blighted year within Harperley Hall.  The first tragedy occurred in May when residents Charles F. Fowles and his wife left Europe to return home.

Fowles was born in England where he became a well-known and respected art dealer.   He moved to New York where he established Scott and Fowles Co. at No. 590 Fifth Avenue, described by American Art News as “handsome galleries.”  The magazine deemed him “most highly esteemed by his friends and associates” and “highly regarded, both for his personal qualities and knowledge of old and modern pictures, especially of the early English, Flemish and Dutch, and the modern Dutch and Barbizon schools.”

On May 1, 1915 the Fowles boarded the luxury steamship the RMS Lusitania for New York.  Because of the ongoing war, the ship had been painted a drab gray to help disguise her from enemy ships.  But six days later the Lusitania was torpedoed by the German U-boat U-20.  It sank within 18 minutes, taking Charles Fowles and his wife to their deaths.

As heartbreaking was the story of the Charles F. Schmidt family, who had moved into Harperley Hall a year earlier.  Schmidt was a wealthy banker and commission broker from Hamburg and the couple had a six-year old son.  They employed a nurse for the boy, Minna L. Flood, referred to by The Evening World as “the little boy’s negro maid.”

No sooner had the family moved in than the war in Europe interrupted Schmidt’s business.  But that was not the only problem they faced.  According to The Evening World on October 5, 1915, “Soon after the Schmidts came to this country they separated.”

Charles, it appears, had found another woman.  He did not expect, however, that his mistress would reveal everything to his wife in a letter.    The letter, dated September 30, 1915, was too much for the abandoned woman to bear.

On October 5 she took her little boy, described by The Evening World as “a very beautiful, perfectly formed blond youngster,” to the Hotel Wellington where she asked not to be disturbed.  The following day their bodies were found.  The Sun reported “The boy clasped in one arm an air rifle.  One arm of the mother was around him as she lay face downward on the bed.  Both were in their night clothes.  Three gas jets were open, leaving no doubt as to the manner in which both had died.”

The letter from Schmidt’s mistress, written in German, was in Mrs. Schmidt’s sachel.  The coroner read the letter then handed it to Schmidt, who had been notified and was sitting on the bed near the bodies.

“When Mr. Schmidt had read it he sat back in his chair and burst into tears,” reported The Sun,  “There was no doubt that the contents of the letter had driven the woman to end her life and that of the boy.”

Coroner Riordan was unmoved by Schmidt’s tears.  “Now you see why this has happened and why she did it.  You see what a lying tongue can do,” he snapped.

Another extra-marital affair caused upheaval in Harperley Hall that year.  Andrew A. Albright was president of the Rubberset Company and lived here with his wife and daughter.  On the night of November 24, 1915, Albright’s limousine pulled up to the curb of the West 68^th Street Police Station and he ran inside.

He told Lt. O’Leary that his wife, his daughter and a maid were in the car; too frightened to go home.  He needed police to drive a gun-wielding woman from his apartment.  According to The New York Times the following day, he told police that two women “had taken possession and driven out his butler and several maids.”

Joseph Kaufman was employed in Albright’s company and he and his wife had become social with the Albrights.  Then Mrs. Albright’s and Joseph Kaufman’s relationship appears to have become more than social.

The Kaufmans had been married only about two years but he had recently left his wife.  Earlier on the night of November 24 Mrs. Kaufman received a telephone call inviting her to the Albright apartment.  Later, one of the Albright servants, Sarah Burke, admitted to authorities that she had been instructed to invite her.

When Mrs. Kaufman arrived she was told that the Albrights were out of town.  The puzzled woman returned home to find her apartment ransacked and “everything belonging to my husband had been removed.”

She was positive that Mrs. Albright had arranged to get her out of the apartment so her husband could get access.  Taking her maid with her as “a bodyguard” she packed a revolver and a horsewhip and headed back to Harperley Hall.

Policeman Maguire climbed into the Albright limousine next to the chauffeur.  The New York Times reported they “drove to Harperley Hall, where, on the fifth floor, Maguire found the butler and maids gathered in the hall outside the Albright apartment.  Within were Mrs. Joseph Kaufman, a pretty young woman of 23, and a woman of middle age, who brandished something long and slender, wrapped in paper, but looking like a horsewhip.”

Mrs. Kaufman agreed to leave, but she insisted on going with Officer Maguire to the police station to explain herself.  “Mrs. Albright is at the bottom of all my trouble, and I know she caused this action for divorce.  I went right back to her home, but she wasn’t there, and that’s all there is to it,” she said.

Life in Harperley Hall soon returned to normal.  In 1916 Henry W. Wilkinson leased his duplex apartment to widowed millionaire Philip Sidney Dyer.  Dyer had started out in the lumber business, but in 1879 took a position with Thomas A. Edison in his Menlo Park laboratory.  He later spent ten years living in Antwerp as the European representative for the Edison Electric Company.  By now he was not only the head of the American Horse Shoe Company, but Vice President of the Sweet Steel Company and of the West Branch Steel Company; a Director of no fewer than five other firms.

Living in the building at the time was popular stage actor Arnold Daly.  He was performing in The Master at the Bandbox Theatre on Monday night, January 8, 1917 when he complained of violent pains.  He insisted on going on with the performance and the pains eventually abated.

Arnold Daly -- Theatre Magazine vol. 4, 1904 (copyright expired)

But the following night in his apartment the pains returned around dinner time.   Daly was taken to Roosevelt Hospital on orders from Dr. Charles H. Peck who felt an immediate operation was necessary.  The Evening World reported the following day that the operation showed “he was suffering from peritonitis following the bursting of an abscess which had formed on the large intestine.”  The newspaper added, “Little hope is entertained for his recovery.”

In 1919 Philip Dyer was still leasing the Wilkinson apartment when the 62-year old underwent an operation.   Complications developed and a week later, on March 10, he died in the duplex apartment.

A bizarre tragedy occurred at Harperley Hall early on the morning of October 25, 1922.  Resident Lloyd Warren was head of the Institute of Fine Arts and was deemed by the New-York Tribune as “one of the wealthiest and best known of American art patrons and an architect of international distinction.”  Warren’s brother was Whitney Warren, the internationally-recognized architect and partner in Warren & Wetmore.

On the night of October 24 Warren hosted a dinner part for a group of friends in the apartment.  Early the following morning a milkman came across Lloyd Warren’s body, clad in his pajamas, in the delivery alley at the rear of the building.  The body was taken to the Warren apartment where police deemed his death a suicide.  It was not the sort of publicity wealthy families cared to deal with.

Almost immediately the cause of death was revised; explained by highly implausible theories.  Dr. Charles A. Gonzales, deputy medical examiner declared “it plainly due to accident.”  He told reporters that Warren had evidently been sleeping on a couch near the window and “might have rolled out of the window from his couch or have fallen through it while sleep-walking.”

Whitney Warren added his theory.  “My brother suffered injury while motoring near Rome last summer.  Since that he had been subject to fits of vertigo, but these were transient and he treated them as of no great consequence.  I am sure he fell from the window during one of these seizures.”

No matter how he died, architect John Gamble Rogers summed up the loss of the 54-year old saying, “Lloyd Warren did more for the advancement of architecture in this country than any other.  He was generous to a fault and devoted to artistic ideals.  His loss will be felt throughout the world of architecture.”

Dwight W. Tryon’s widow, Alice Beldon Tryon, was 82-years old when she died in her apartment on October 27, 1929, perhaps the last of the original owners.  Throughout the decades the commodious apartments would be home to a list of celebrated residents, including portrait artist Helen Watson Phelps and art expert Gaston Levi.

None, perhaps, would boast more celebrity than Madonna who renovated her 6,000-square foot duplex to include her own beauty parlor and a steam room.  Other amenities, according to The New York Times on June 14, 2013, included “six bedrooms in four bedroom wings, eight bathrooms and five wood-burning fireplaces.   The eat-in kitchen has marble slab counters, and the master bathroom, where the mode is vintage, has twin pedestal sinks, a claw-foot soaking tub and a marble shower.,”

When she moved to a much larger place in 1997 (a 12,000-square foot townhouse), the entertainer listed the Harperley Hall apartment for $6.75 million.  When there were no offers, the price was lowered to $6.25 million.

It was not until 2013 that Madonna’s apartment sold—at more than double her original asking price, $32.5 million.  

Upscale apartment buildings in Manhattan tend to live out their glory days, then fall into disfavor and neglect if, indeed, they are not demolished altogether.  Such is not the case along Central Park West.  The wonderfully-unique Arts & Crafts style Harperley Hall retains the exclusive status its original residents enjoyed when they moved in early in 1911.

photographs by the author

LaptrinhX.com has no authorization to reuse the content of this blog