Henderson Place: Homes "For Persons of Moderate Means"

John C. Henderson was a successful businessman in 1880, having made his fortune in the hat, fur,“straw goods” and other businesses. As the neighborhood known as Yorkville began developing he saw an opportunity to increase that fortune.

Yorkville was established in the first half of the 19th Century by German immigrants, later joined by a substantial Hungarian population. Approximately five miles north of the city, it was surrounded in the pre-Civil War period by sprawling, bucolic country estates of wealthy New Yorkers like John Jacob Astor and Archibald Gracie.

By the second half of the century the area was becoming increasingly developed as families sought to escape the congested city. In response, Henderson purchased approximately one half acre of land between 86th Street and 87th Street at East End Avenue where he planned a quaint, dead-end street lined with uniform homes “for persons of moderate means.”

He commissioned the firm of Lamb & Rich to design his houses -- thirty-two in all -- that would comprise a charming mini-village. Completed in 1882, the architects produced two rows of Queen Anne houses of red brick and terra cotta that romantically mix architectural bits of Elizabethan, Flemish and classic styles. Turrets and gables, towers and arches blend to create the feel of a unified, storybook enclave. While each house shares similar details, like the fish-scale slate mansard roofs with dormers; each is distinctly individual.

The houses sat back from the sidewalk just enough to permit tiny yards for shrubs and flowers.

Despite The Real Estate Record & Guide's assertion that the little dead-end street would give residents "the disagreeable feeling of living in what the French call a bag's end," Henderson’s speculative project was a success.  His modest three-story houses were quickly sold or rented (yearly rent being about $650). The quaint charm of Henderson Place, however, soon caused his plan to backfire.  The homes which he intended for families of “modest means” attractived those of far higher incomes.

By the middle of the 20th Century well-to-do families populated Henderson Place. Mr. and Mrs. Samuel Morse Lane lived at No. 6 in 1958 when their daughter, Pamela, made her social debut; while Mr. and Mrs. John Drayton Depew made their home at No. 16 in addition to a home in Rye, New York. Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne lived here, as did the Duchesse de Richelieu and renowned educator and early feminist, Mrs. Millicent McIntosh.


Tragically, eight of the houses were razed in the 1940s to make way for a high rise apartment building. The surviving 24, however, are amazingly intact with very little alteration and an astounding state of preservation and maintenance.

One of the most charming hidden corners of Manhattan, Henderson Place was designated a New York City Landmark in 1969. At that time the New York City Landmarks Commission called the street “an exceptionally attractive group of houses with individual front yard plantings and trees” and “they have remarkable charm and dignity for houses which were built for ‘persons of moderate means.’”

The Neo-Georgian 1896 Charles Rich House -- No. 255 West 91st Street

photo by Alice Lum

By 1895 the architectural design firm of Lamb & Rich was firmly established and Charles Alonzo Rich, who was the designer of the partnership, was busy with incoming commissions.   Rich had established the firm with Hugh Lamb just after 1880 with Lamb apparently mainly handling the business aspects.

Henderson Place—a cohesive group of 24 houses constructed in 1882 at East End Avenue and 86^th Street--was among their earliest large commissions.    Quickly thereafter they were responsible for Harlem’s Mount Morris Bank in 1883, the Astral Apartments in the newly-popular Queen Anne style begun in 1885, and Theodore Roosevelt’s Shingle Style country home, Sagamore Hill.   High-end residences became the firm’s specialty.

Now it was time for Rich to design his own home.  In 1895 Rich purchased two lots on West 91^stStreet—Nos. 255 and 257—in the quickly-developing Upper West Side.  The neighborhood would soon fill with wide mansions and comfortable upper-middle class homes and Rich’s residence would be among the most eye-catching.

Completed in 1896 the two brick homes complemented one another in their similar neo-Georgian designs.  The Rich home, at No. 255 was entered through a marble-arched Federal style doorway at street level with a carved pineapple—the 18^thcentury symbol of welcome—in the keystone.  Dropping below the top level of the entrance arch and nearly abutting the first floor lintel, a multi-paned oriel window vies for attention with the flanking openings.  Dramatic splayed marble lintels contrast vividly with the dark brick and above an overhanging cornice sit two prim dormers.

A pineapple, the symbol of hospitality and welcome, adorns the marble keystone of the entrance --photo by Alice Lum

Rich opted for an English basement for the companion house at No. 257, and a Ionic portico.  Two bays wider than his own home, the house featured similar window and roof treatments.

Five years later Rich was at the drawing board again, tweaking his plans.  Alterations were made on both buildings in 1901.  

Rich simultaneously designed a harmonious home next door at No. 257.  Unfortunately its one-time fanlight over the eastern window is lost -- photo by Alice Lum

Three years later the Rich family would awaken to a shock.  Just before dawn on February 19, 1904 a 36-inch heavy-pressure water main burst at Broadway and 92^ndStreet, one block away.   “The main let go with an explosion like a battle-ship gun,” reported The Evening World.   J. M. Bourcy, the janitor of the Annette Apartments at No. 294 West 92^nd Street, his wife, her mother and their daughter, all awoke to find their beds floating in water in the basement apartment.   “The firemen from a hook and ladder truck dived down through the icy water on a ladder and brought the distressed family to the street, all of them wet, and freezing and none of them wearing more than a night robe.”

Six hours later the water was still rushing in a river down the streets, flooding the basements of mansions to the ceilings and finally caving in sidewalks.  Milk trucks acted as ferries to transport families from their homes to the safety of the opposite side of the street.

Charles Rich, as much an engineer as architect, was furious; blaming the flood on the newly constructed subway with improper drainage.  The newspaper said that Rich’s property was worth over $100,000.

“When the city allows men to build an underground tunnel without a pipe gallery,” he complained, “you may expect such disasters as this to be of common occurrence.  In every civilized city where subways have been constructed they are properly equipped with pipe galleries, and I consider it an outrage that the same was not done in our subway.”

The multi-paned upper sashes survive in most openings beneath dramatic splayed lintels -- photo by Alice Lum

The house was the scene of a wedding breakfast in May 1910 after Margaret Bradbury Rich married Air Force Lieutenant William Hampden Sage, Jr. in Bellport, Long Island at what The Times called “a pretty country wedding.”    The house was decorated in purple and white lilacs.

In 1919 Charles Rich decided to move on and filed his own plans for the conversion of his residence to an apartment building.   The renovation cost approximately $12,000 and Rich retained ownership of what was now an income-producing property.

Apparently never satisfied, Rich was back at the drawing board again and on December 31, 1929 the house had been converted, once again, to ten “non-housekeeping apartments.” 

The once-grand home is in dire need of maintenance, including the precariously-leaning brick entrance post -- photo by Alice Lum

Today Charles Rich’s upscale residence remains a multi-family building and is frightenly worse for wear.  But the architect’s elegant designs of this and its companion house at No. 257 still shine through the soot and peeling paint.

Lamb & Rich's Intriguing 1891 No. 341 West End Avenue

The massive home at the southwest corner of 76th Street and West End Avenue was one of a row of 14 designed by Lamb & Rich in 1890 -- photo by Alice Lum

In 1861 18-year old Frederick Halsey Man graduated from City College.  The ambitious and determined young man entered the Columbia Law School, intent on a career as an attorney.  But the Civil War interrupted his plans.

In 1862 he left school to volunteer for three months’ service for the Union.  Upon his discharge in September 1862 he had risen to the rank of corporal of the 22^nd New York Militia.  His three-month stint would become three years, however; for he was immediately commissioned a captain in the 79^thUnited States Colored Infantry.  Two years later, in August 1864, he was transferred to the 84^th United States Colored Infantry. 

When the war finally ended, he was brevetted a major “for faithful and meritorious service.”  Frederick H. Man resumed his studies at Columbia, receiving his legal degree in 1865.   As the century drew to a close, he was a well-known and respected lawyer, a partner in the legal firm of Anderson & Man and a member of several clubs.

In 1890, while Frederick Man was growing successful, architects Lamb & Rich were commissioned to design a fanciful row of fourteen houses along West End Avenue in the burgeoning Upper West Side.  Stretching from West 76^th Street to 77^th Street, they were an eclectic mix of styles; but the architects craftily repeated details and motifs to ensure that they blended as a unified string.

This photograph of the house shortly after completion was published in American Architect and Building News (copyright expired)

The anchor of the block was the massive limestone chateau at the corner of West End Avenue and 76^th Street.   Spiky carved French Renaissance panels with semi-attached finials adorned the windows, copper clad dormers with conical tiled roofs jutted from the 76^thStreet side, while a Gothic-inspired copper cornice echoed that of the next door neighbor on West End Avenue.  Perhaps most surprising and amusing were the small, rectangular columns on either side of the bay windows.  Chubby cherubs uphold the columns on which ferocious lions sit.

photo by Alice Lum

Because the entrance door atop the side-hugging stoop was quite definitely on West 76^th Street, the house had the confusing distinction of having two addresses:  No. 301 West 76^th Street and No. 341 West End Avenue—no doubt a nightmare to letter carriers and visitors alike.

The row was completed in 1891 and Frederick Man purchased the imposing house on the corner.  By now the attorney could afford a country retreat in Budd’s Lake, New Jersey as well.    His idyllic road would get bumpy when he met Clara Barton Hunter, an actress, in 1897.

The woman was a member of the Empire Theatre stock company and sought Man’s advice regarding property she owned.  After visiting his office a few times, the attorney asked for the privilege of calling on her at her home.  “After that there followed numerous dinners and entertainments,” according to The New York Times, and “This continued for two years, when Mrs. Hunter was not on the road playing.” 

Neither party seemed to mind that Man was married at the time.

In August 1899 the actress (who had been divorced from Francis Dill Hunter, Jr. in 1896) spent a week at Man’s country house.   His sister-in-law, Mrs. Josephine Fuller Krotel was there as well, maintaining propriety.  According to Hunter, it was during this stay that the attorney proposed to her, saying he was in the process of divorcing his wife.

She told Man she “desired a sufficient time to elapse between the granting of the decree to him and his remarriage, so that gossips would have no chance to talk.”

Apparently that worked for Man, for when she finally pressed him to marry her he said he was not financially able to support a wife and “thought that he ought to remain single.”  Clara Hunter sued the attorney for $50,000 saying “Mr. Man has acted contemptibly, and has put me in a false position with my friends.”

Man sold the house to Louis G. H. Murphy.  An insurance agent, Murphy was killed when he left the Metropole Café on East 42^nd Street with a friend on the evening of October 7, 1899.  Across the street the new Pabst Building was being constructed and the elevator shaft to the sub-basement was open, guarded by an iron bar.  As the pair tried to pass by, Murphy fell into the opening, plunging 35 feet to his death.

Orlando Porter Dorman lived here next.  Dorman was a warden of the Church of the Holy Spirit on 57^th Street who traced his family through New England colonists to English and Norman French families.  His father’s family first arrived in America in 1631 and his mother’s family came in 1621 on the next ship after the Mayflower.

Dorman began his business career as salesman in a Hartford, Connecticut store and three years later, after he “became of age,” he was taken in as a partner.  Eventually he moved to New York, opened his own brokerage firm O. P. Dorman & Co., and other businesses, finally organizing the Gilbert Manufacturing Company that made dress goods and linings.  The company grew to one of the most prominent in the world and increased Dorman’s fortune.

In March 1901 he married the wealthy widow Mrs. Emma Underhill Harper and the newlyweds announced to well-wishers through The New York Times that they “will be ‘at home’ on Thursday evening, April 18.”

The hulking house at No. 341 West End Avenue continued to pass quickly through new hands as Dorman transferred title on January 10, 1902 to Frank Moyan, with a hefty mortgage of $80,000.  The next year in June Colonel Robert C. Clowry purchased the house.   At the time Clowry was the President and General Manager of the Western Union Telegraph Company.

Western Electrician magazine said of him that same year “He is a man of keen intellect, progressive and broad-minded, with fine executive ability and wide experience with men and affairs.”  The magazine nearly ran out of glowing adjectives.  “Withall, he is a cultured, high-minded, kindly gentleman with a horizon broad enough to embrace a sympathetic interest in all things that tend to make life better worth living.”

Clowry lived here for nearly a decade, selling the house in December 1910 to Eberhard Faber “the pencil king.”   Faber stayed on for twenty years, eventually leasing the house on December 4, 1930.

Before long, like so many of the grand homes of the Upper West Side, No. 341 was divided into apartments.  

In September 1940 Russian composer and pianist Alexandre Gretchaninoff and his wife moved in. Sitting on the sofa here a month later, Mrs. Gretchaninoff told a reporter “We have been through two revolutions and two wars and we have lost two homes.  Our life is too much story for one life.”

Indeed, Gretchaninoff was already an established composer when the revolution of 1917 jolted Moscow.  A student of Rimsky-Korsakoff, he celebrated the government’s overthrow by composing the “Hymn of Free Russia.”  But his delight at the new establishment soon faded.

He refused to compose revolutionary music, saying “it was morally impossible.”  Finally in 1922 the pair left for Paris.  But the Second World War forced them to flee again.  In the house on West End Avenue he followed a new routine.  He worked all morning on his sixth symphony, took a walk after lunch, rested, worked again until dinner then spent the evening “with friends or books.”

The big stone house was perfect for the composer.  “This house is very quiet,” Mrs. Gretchaninoff remarked to The New York Times.  “He can play the piano all the day and nobody says anything.”

Although the red tile roof was removed in 1983, the house with an amazingly interesting list of owners remains virtually unchanged since 1891.

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 liliputian 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. 

Lamb & Rich's 1883 No. 486 Broadway

photo by Nicolas Lemery Nantel / salokin.com

In 1879 the neighborhood of Broadway and Broome Street was a commercial area of light manufacturing and apparel and fabric-related businesses.  At the southeast corner stood No. 486 Broadway, a four-story loft building occupied by just such concerns.

On the first floor of the Broome Street side, at No. 437 was the stationery store of Ernest Renstow and on the Broadway side cloth dealers Adams & Allen operated their store.  The second floor was occupied by Stewart Hartshorn whose company manufactured window shade rollers.  A. Seligman leased the top two floors.  He was a corset manufacturer and importer of cotton and linen goods.

During the last week of March that year Arthur D. Weeks purchased the building in foreclosure and The New York Times reported that he intended “to demolish it to make room for a handsome building.”  Despite his intentions to raze the structure, Weeks insured it for $35,000.  Within a week it was gutted by fire.

On April 3 around 9:30 in the morning, according to The New York Times, fire broke out on the third floor.  “The flames originated from some unknown cause, in the rear of the third floor, among a quantity of manufactured stock ready for shipment.”

Arthur Weeks never got around to replacing the burned building.  Instead the property was transferred to William De Forest by 1882 when he commissioned the architectural firm of Lamb & Rich to design a modern store and loft structure. 

The architects were a busy pair at the time.  The year before they had completed, among other projects, four houses for Anthony Mowbray at Nos. 821 to 827 Madison Avenue, The Strathmore apartment building at No. 1674 Broadway, and 30 architecturally-harmonious houses for John C. Henderson far uptown on Henderson Place and the surrounding blocks.

Lamb & Rich’s finished building, completed in 1883 was the epitome of 1880s design taste.  The hulking orange-red brick structure was, for the most part, Romanesque Revival in style.  But the architects dipped into Moorish Revival and added a touch of Queen Anne as well.  Rough cut brownstone, terra cotta, cast iron and glass highlighted the brick and relieved the mass of the Broome Street façade.

Note the creative cast iron ribbons around the circular motifs in the frieze.  Whimsical bosses adorn the window spandrels.   photo by Nicolas Lemery Nantel / salokin.com

The relatively narrow Broadway elevation was just two bays wide; each arched opening emphasized by brick eyebrows.  The windows of the fifth and sixth floors were grouped together within a cast iron framing.  Here the spandrels were decorated with seemingly-random floral bosses influenced by the Aesthetic Movement.

It was on the wide Broome Street side that Lamb & Rich pulled out the visual stops.  Three stories of cast iron nestled in between what to the eye became brick towers.  In this middle section a steep mansard roof broke the straight planes of the flanking brick sections.  Four bell-shaped caps on the corners of each tower completed the design.

photo by Nicolas Lemery Nantel / salokin.com

The architects were apparently pleased with the completed building.  Among the initial tenants were the offices of Lamb & Rich. 

Another early occupant was the Davis Quilting Frame Company which had offices on the fifth floor.  H. T. Davis was President and Chairman of the firm, owning $65,000 worth of the stock.  Two of the other trustees, Kelly Gavin and Tennis H. Cox held $5,000 in stock each.  Despite Davis’s substantial majority, he struggled for power with the two.  The New York Times said “For some time past Messrs. Girvin and Cox have been running things their own way, outvoting several little proposition of the President.”

Things came to a head at the meeting of trustees in the office on July 7, 1885.  “At yesterday’s meeting,” reported The Times the following day, “[Cox and Girvin] voted an adjournment to prevent Mr. Davis from presenting a motion.  The result was a quarrel, in which Mr. Davis drew a revolver on his opponents.”

When Davis pulled the gun, Cox rushed to the elevator.  On the street he found a policeman who returned to the fifth floor office.  Davis was disarmed and arrested.  His story was radically different from that of his partners, however.

“Mr. Davis claimed that Mr. Girvin had sprung at him with a cane and that Cox had attempted to draw a pistol on him; that he started to flee, but was pursued into the hall, where he drew the revolver in self-defense.”

To prove his story, Davis insisted that Cox be searched.  No weapon was found.  The three were taken to Jefferson Market Police Court where Davis was charged with pointing a pistol at Girvin.  Three days later the men appeared before Justice Ford.  Girvin reiterated that Davis “pointed a revolver at him and made murderous threats.”  Davis held fast to his story, as well.

According to The New York Times on July 10, 1885, “Mr. Davis insisted that he was attacked by Girvin and Tennis H. Cox, the other Trustee, and kept them at bay by putting his hand in his pocket.  Mr. Davis also insisted that Mr. Cox had a Derringer pistol and that he could not draw it because it became entangled in his pocket handkerchief, and that Mr. Girvin menaced him with a hickory cane.  An attempt was made to prove that Messrs. Cox and Girvin had threatened Mr. Davis’s life.”

Unable to untangle the conflicting stories, the judge decided to hold Davis for trial.

photo by Nicolas Lemery Nantel / salokin.com

On November 3, 1888 the Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide reported on a major lease signing.  “The Mechanics’ & Traders’ Bank will remove in January to No. 486 Broadway, corner of Broome Street.”  The bank took the ground floor, becoming the building’s most visible tenant.

In the meantime the upper floors became home to companies that drew less sensational press than the Davis Quilting Frame Co.  Wilson Brothers opened their New York salesroom here in 1889.  The menswear manufacturer had branches in Paris and Chicago as well.  In announcing the move, the firm made “special mention” of its white shirts, negligee shirts and neckwear “because we have added greatly to our facilities for manufacturing in each of them.”  Wilson Brothers imported much of its shirting materials and noted “Many of these fabrics are well adapted for fine Night Shirts and Summer Underwear.”

H. Robitsek & Co. advertised in The American Stationer on March 13, 1890 (copyright expired)

Also in the building at the time was H. Robitsek & Co.  The firm imported leather to be manufactured into purses, chatelaine bags, card cases and other leather accessories.  It had branches in Vienna, Berlin, Paris and London as well.

The Philadelphia department store of Partridge & Richardson had an office in the building in 1894, managed by W. G. Miller who lived in East Orange, New Jersey.  Each morning he took the local train at 8:05 that arrived in New York 35 minutes later.  The morning of January 15 seemed no different other than a thick fog.  Miller later recalled that the fog “did not seem to make any difference, for the train whirled along at its usual rate of speed.”

This morning would definitely be no normal commute.  An Extra Edition of The Evening World hit the streets at 2:00 with the headline “RAILROAD HORROR.  Perhaps 25 Lives Crushed Out on Hackensack Meadows.”  The South Orange express ran into the Dover express in the fog at the Hackensack drawbridge.

Miller, unbelievably, proceeded on to work.  The Evening World said “He walked three miles after the accident, boarded another train at the Delaware junction, and was one of the first passengers to reach the city after the accident.”

Before leaving he assisted in removing two of the dead from the wreckage.  “There had been seven bodies recovered when I left the scene of the accident,” he told a reporter in his office at No. 486 Broadway later. 

The horrific situation makes his walking away to go to work somewhat inexplicable.  “When I left the scene nothing whatever had been done towards sending for relief trains or physicians,” he said.  “I walked several miles to the junction and caught a train to the city.”

In 1898 the N.Y. Sewing Machine Emporium was “Up Stairs” here.  The company leased and sold several makes of the machines to manufacturers.  It was a well-chosen location as the silk, woolen and apparel district clustered around the building.

N.Y. Sewing Machine Emporium offered instructions on the machines "thorough and gratis."  The Sanitary Commission Bulletin, March 1898 (copyright expired)

That same year the Mechanics’ and Traders’ State Bank survived a run on the bank.  Fernando Baltes was President and was asked to resign “because his business transactions outside of the bank were found by the Directors to be such as to create unfavorable comment,” reported The New York Times on October 22.  Unfortunately, the “unfavorable comment” reached the ears of depositors and on October 21 a mob of panicked customers descended on the tellers.

One man tried to cut in line, yelling “But I want my money right away!”  The Times said “When he was reached in the line he handed in a check for $70—his entire account.  He grasped the bills feverishly, stowed them carefully away in a well-worn wallet, and when he reached the street ran as fast as his legs would carry him, evidently fearing that some one would pursue him and take his hoard away.”  The newspaper reported “Many women in the line seemed on the verge of hysteria until they were paid.  The men gallantly gave them the right of way.  When the women got their bills they stowed them away in many queer pockets and receptacles, and seemed happy.”

One man received his savings; but then thought better of it.  “Another depositor presented a check and received $600 in shining twenty-dollar gold pieces.  When he got outside he appeared to be thinking the matter over, and five minutes later was back again handing the gold pieces in to the receiving teller.”

By 3:00 when the doors were closed depositors had withdrawn about $370,000—a significant $10 million by today’s standards.  Yet 126 other customers had faith and deposited $117,000 during the near-riot.  The bank weathered the one-day storm and continued on at No. 486 Broadway until 1901.  That year the bank moved north to the corner of Broadway and Prince Street.

On November 21, 1906 when William Waldorf Astor purchased the building it was filled with apparel companies and fabric dealers.  Narragansett Woolen Co.; E. B. Reynolds & Co., dealers in “cloths and cassimeres;” Thistle Fiber Mesh Underwear; Verdier & Hardy underwear makers; and Peerless Union Underwear Co., were all in the building.

In 1910 a substantial list of raw silk importers and “thrown silk” dealers were here.  Among them were Jardine, Matheson & Co.; L. Jouvard & Co.; and Universal Silk Mills.

The building received bizarre press in 1915 as a result of a teen-aged girl’s active imagination.  Helen Pelkus had been employed by Mrs. Joseph Ormorsky of No. 32 West 24^thStreet to care for her young son.  When Mrs. Ormorsky noticed items missing from the house, she discharged the 14-year old nanny.

Helen went back to the Lincoln School in Bayonne, New Jersey and the Ormorsky household returned to normal—for awhile.  At the time New York was terrorized by the Black Hand, the organization that had assassinated Franz Ferdinand of Austria and was now responsible for bombings and other forms of extortion.  In June 1915 Mrs. Ormorsky opened a letter that read:

I am letting you know I am coming over some day and kill your boy.  If you want to save him, you will have to give me some money.  I took the stamps you missed.

The author had drawn a dagger below which was written “This is what I am going to kill your boy with.”  The back of the envelope read “Return to Jack the Ripper, 486 Broadway.”

Not only Mrs. Ormorsky, who immediately went to the police, but her neighbors were terrified “and they saw that their children did not get out of their sight,” reported The New York Times.  Detectives had a pretty good idea of who Jack the Ripper was, and they did not look for him at No. 486 Broadway.

Helen Pelkus was arrested at her school on June 19 “on a charge of having sent a black hand letter.”  The Times explained “The girl was arrested after detectives had scanned the writing of many of the Lincoln pupils.  She confessed and said she did not think the matter was very serious.”

Terra cotta tiles, creative brickwork and two sets of surviving small-paned windows add charm - photo by Nicolas Lemery Nantel / salokin.com

Lamb & Rich’s wonderfully unconventional building survived through the 20^th century when many of the loft and commercial buildings of the district suffered abuse.  In 2012 the top two floors were converted to “joint living quarters for artists.”  A clothing store occupies the former Mechanics’ and Traders’ Bank space.  An unfortunate but necessary set of complicated fire escapes screens the Broome Street façade like cast iron scaffolding; yet the fantastic design shines through.

many thanks to Joseph Ciolino for suggesting this post