The 1861 Pie-Shaped No. 128 East 10th Street

photo by Alice Lum

Peter Stuyvesant, the Director General of the West India Company in New Netherlands, purchased land for his farm, or bouwerij, far to the north of the settlement on March 12, 1651.   The deal included, actually, two properties—Bowery (as the Dutch word became anglicized) #1 on which Stuyvesant constructed his home, and a portion of Bowery #2.  A small lane ran between the two farms that would eventually be known as Stuyvesant Street.

By the time of the American Revolution the land had been handed down to Peter’s great grandson, Petrus.  On November 30, 1787 he commissioned Evert Bancker, Jr. to survey and plot out the still verdant farmland into building plots and streets.  Little Stuyvesant Street ran due east and west and Bancker’s plan continued the alignment, squaring all the plots with the points of the compass.

As the century drew to a close, Stuyvesant Street, still closed and private, became somewhat of a family enclave.  On January 31, 1795 Nicholas William Stuyvesant married Catherine Livingston Reade.  A house was built for them that year at No. 44 Stuyvesant Street.  At the same time, Petrus gave a plot of land facing Stuyvesant Street just to the east along with 800 pounds towards the construction of the elegant St. Mark’s Church. 

A few years later his daughter Elizabeth was engaged to Revolutionary War office Nicholas Fish.  Petrus Stuyvesant constructed a brick-faced Federal-style home for the couple as a wedding present, completed in 1803, at No. 21 Stuyvesant Street.

The large plot abutting Elizabeth’s house to the east—a rectangle measuring 150 by 200 feet—was described in 1808 tax records as “Peter Gerard Stuyvesant’s garden.”  There is little doubt that the entire Stuyvesant family along the street used it.  Stuyvesant Fish would later recall that the garden grew flowers, berry bushes and two horse chestnut trees.  The family maintained a greenhouse on the lot, a stable and Emily, the cow.

Petrus Stuyvesant died in 1805 and for decades the plot would be known as “Elizabeth Fish’s Garden.”  

But change was coming to Stuyvesant Street.

On April 3, 1807 the New York State legislature appointed three Commissioners to lay out a grid plan for the city.  The far-sighted concept would result in the 1811 Commissioners’ Plan that dissected rolling farmland and country estates into streets and avenues—the foundation of the New York City we know today.

Unlike Evert Bancker, the Commissioners’ aligned the streets to the diagonal-position of the island rather than true compass points.  The conflict became evident when the grid was laid over the existing streets on the Stuyvesant land.

Unlike most of the existing streets that failed to comply with the new plan, Stuyvesant Street was allowed to remain.  The powerful sway held by the Stuyvesant family in the decision is evident in the minutes of the Common Council on January 25, 1830.  The Council recorded that the street would remain “both for Public convenience and for the accommodation of a large and respectable Congregation attending St. Mark’s Church as well as the owners and occupants of several large and commodious dwelling houses…all of which would be destroyed, or rendered of little value, if that street were closed.”

The cutting through of the new streets, however, went on as planned and in 1826 East Tenth Street was gouged through behind Elizabeth Fish’s home, obliterating her rear lot.    It created a triangle of land and cut the large garden down to a pointy plot. 

Perhaps out of respect for the aging Elizabeth, the Stuyvesant Family left untouched the odd triangle of land where the Fish House and the garden sat.   Half a century after moving into her home, Elizabeth Stuyvesant died on September 16, 1854.  Four years later the triangular property was sold to Matthias Banta for development.

In 1861 the block was finished.  A uniform row of elegant five-story Italianate homes reflected the up-scale tone of the neighborhood.   The parlor floors, accessed by wide brownstone stoops over English basements, were of rusticated stone.  Four stories of red brick above were trimmed with carved stone.

The row of brick-and-stone homes tapered to a blunted point -- photo by Alice Lum

The architect had to deal with the difficult shape of the plot.  As the houses approached the tip of the triangle, the configuration of the houses—especially No. 128 East 10^th Street at the eastern point—necessarily had to conform.  The problem was resolved by creating a wedge-shaped home, the point of which was abruptly sliced off.   Faced in stone, the narrow eastern elevation was dressed with protruding stone quoins and a wonderful  Italianate two-story bay overlooking the tiny remnant of garden.  The peculiar shape resulted ultimately in No. 128 being the most visually appealing of the row.

The charming eastern end of No. 128 faced the tiny remnant of Elizabeth's garden -- photo by Alice Lum

Visually-appealing or not, the shape perhaps made living in the house unappealing.   In 1873 the house was purchased by the Deborah Sinclair.  And while the neighborhood continued to be upscale, by 1878 No. 128 had become a boarding house run by William A. Boylston. 

Henry C. Denning was boarding here on July 8 of that year.   The heat of the summer night necessitated leaving windows open and around 3:00 in the morning a burglar slipped into the house.  The daring thief entered Denning’s room and stealthily began bundling up the man’s clothing.  The burglar was more daring than quiet, however, and Denning woke up.

He sprang from the bed and attempted to seize the intruder.  “The burglar drew a revolver and threatened to kill Denning if he raised an alarm or made an outcry,” reported The New York Times the following morning.  The gun made Denning rethink his actions.

“The appearance of the revolver quieted Denning and the burglar thereupon ordered him to return to his bed quietly.  Denning complied with the request of the burglar, and the latter then left the house without any plunder.”

The offset entrance was placed on East 10th Street -- photo by Alice Lum

Wealthy Victorian women gave time and money to charitable causes, often involving social reform and outreach.  The New York City Mission and Tract Society offered aid to various Christian charities, including the missions that sought to fight alcohol, depravity among women and other social sins.  In 1885 Mrs. W. H. Osborn leased No. 128 to house the students of the Society’s Training School for Christian Workers.

The Training School sought to elevate impoverished young women by providing them with skills to earn a living.  They were provided board here and given classroom instruction.  While contemporary institutions were teaching the sewing and domestic skills needed to go out into the world, the Training School seems, by a 21^stcentury perspective, to have been a bit less practical.  In 1898 the curriculum included Mission Study Class, Personal Worker’s Class, Blackboard Drawing and Physical Training, Lectures on the Reformation, and Synthetical Study of the Bible.

“The Better New York” described the object of the School.  “Not only is there thoroughly training in Bible study, but practical contact with the ignorant and superstitious people from foreign countries is afforded the students of the school.  Some of the best missionaries have been prepared through this study for work in the far South and West.”

Vermiculated quoins run up the corners --photo by Alice Lum

The “Baby Fold” was also housed here.  The object of the out-of-home nursery “to care for well babies under two years of age, in cases of emergency among sick or poor families where mothers are sick or dead.”

In 1900 a donation of $125 would provide tuition and board for one student for a full year.   The hefty contribution would amount to about $3,000 today.

By now Deborah Sinclair had died and her estate continued to lease the house to the Training School for Christian Workers for several years.  Then, on December 7, 1916, The Sun reported that “for the first time in more than forty years,” the “small, irregular shaped building at the junction of East Tenth and Stuyvesant streets, known as 128 East Tenth Street, has been sold.”

The buyer was St. Mark’s Church.  The church was aggressively buying neighborhood properties and along with No. 128 now owned No. 127, 129 and the Stuyvesant Apartments at the north east corner of Second Avenue and Tenth Street.   The church renovated the old house “in keeping with the plan of the Gramercy Neighborhood Association for the betterment of the section, “ reported the New-York Tribune on February 5, 1919.

photo by Alice Lum

By1922 it was home to John S. Block and his wife, the former Anita G. Cain.  Block was an esteemed attorney who had several times been candidate for Justice of the New York Supreme Court.   An active socialist, he was a member of the League for Industrial Democracy, the American Association for Labor Legislation, the Civic Club of New York, and  the New York County Lawyers Association.

Block was also the president of the Workman’s Co-operative Publishing Company that owned and published the New York Call.  The daily newspaper was the second of three that were affiliated with the Socialist Party of America.

The pie-shaped house was home to Ann Hemenway through in the 1970s.  A graduate of Barnard College, she was Superintendent of the Manuscript Department of Doubleday and Company.  The company called her in 1974 “one of the best chief readers in publishing.”  She died in 1976.

The structure's fifteen minutes of fame came in 2005 when it was used as the apartment of character Sylvia Broome (played by Nicole Kidman) in the political thriller movie "The Interpreter."

The remarkable wedge-shaped Victorian house sitting on what was the Stuyvesant garden where Emily the Cow grazed still attracts well-deserved attention.  The prow of the elegant group of Italianate homes, it is a central element in an architecturally superb neighborhood.

photo by Alice Lum

St. Mark's Church-in-the-Bowery

Peter Stuyvesant purchased his farm, or bouwerie, from the Dutch West India Company in 1651. By 1660 he had built a family chapel on the grounds where, when he died in 1672, he was buried in a vault below.

As Peter’s grandson, Petrus, developed the land towards the end of the 18th Century, laying out a network of roads and erecting elegant family homes, he donated the chapel and its grounds to the Episcopal Church. The stipulation of Stuyvesant’s bequest was that a new chapel be built there. In compliance, the Church laid the cornerstone of Saint Mark’s Church-in-the-Bowery on April 25, 1795.

The building, bounded by the present-day 10th Street, Stuyvesant Street and 2nd Avenue, was completed in 1799 and consecrated on May 9 of that year. Alexander Hamilton, the close friend of Stuyvesant’s son-in-law Nicholas Fish, provided legal assistance in incorporating St. Mark's Church, making it the first Episcopal parish independent of Trinity Church in the new world.

The parish of wealthy New York society, it was a graceful Georgian fieldstone building designed by John McComb, Jr., who had six years earlier designed the impressive Georgian home of James Watson at 7 State Street.

In 1828 the wooden Greek Revival steeple was added, following the designs of architects Martin Euclid Thompson and Ithiel Towne. In 1836 Thompson was called back to revamp the interior of the church at which time he removed the chunky square pillars supporting the balcony in favor of the slim, reeded Egyptian Revival pillars which survive today. Two years later the architect designed the heavy wrought-and-cast iron fence that surrounds the property.

For decades after its consecration the church was seemingly a work-in-process and in 1858 the imposing cast iron Italianate portico was added. The porch is attributed to James Bogardus, a pioneer of cast iron architecture who planted the seed for the ornate cast iron facades that would eventually line lower Broadway.

In 1866 James Miller in his Stranger’s Guide for the City of New York said of St Mark’s “The steeple is lofty, but somewhat venerable in appearance, which is indeed the character of the entire structure. The church is venerable also on account of its historic associations; it stands on what was the estate of Petrus Stuyvesant, the last of the Dutch governors and his remains rest in a vault under the church, over which, on the east side, is a table indicating the fact. Here also repose the mortal remains of the English governor, Col. Sloughter and those of the American Governor, Tompkins.”

Photo NYPL Collection

Miller neglected to mention that Daniel Tompkins was also Vice President under James Monroe. Also buried in the churchyard on the east and west sides of the church are Nicholas Fish (Revolutionary War officer, US Senator, New York State Governor and Secretary of State to U.S. Grant), retailer A. T. Stewart (his body was stolen from the graveyard and held for ransom contributing to Mrs. Stewart’s mental breakdown), Abraham Schermerhorn (United States Representative and father of Caroline Astor), Philip Hone (Mayor of New York 1825), Commodore Matthew Perry (who forced Japan to open trade relations with the US), and other famous 19th Century figures.

The church was stuccoed over at some point and 1936 photographs show an interesting Edwardian fresco, much in the style of Maxfield Parrish, in the pediment over the portico. Here animals and birds lounge in an idyllic setting under spreading trees.

Photograph Library of Congress

The 20th Century saw St. Mark’s become increasingly involved with and supportive of the arts. The trend was started by Reverend Dr. W. Norman Guthrie who was Rector from 1910 to 1937. In 1923 Guthrie, who felt that a person’s spirituality could be fostered through the arts, wrote The Relation of The Dance to Religion.  He invited Isadora Duncan to perform at the church and later Martha Graham danced here.  From that start, the church’s Danspace Project is now renowned for promoting new work in dance. Michael Kaiser, President of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts has said “Danspace has played a significant role in the arts ecology of New York and the entire dance world."

When a group of poets lost their meeting spot at the Telegraph Bar in 1966, Allen Ginsberg approached the Rector asking if they could meet in the church. They could.  And with that poetry joined dance at St. Mark’s.  Poetry readings were conducted by Ginsberg as well as W.H. Auden, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Amy Lowell, Carl Sandburg, Kahlil Gibran, and William Carlos Williams. Eventually hundreds of writers and other performers appeared here. Sam Shepard staged his first few plays from St. Mark’s and visitors have been entertained by the likes of Adrienne Rich, Alice Walker, Yoko Ono, John Cage and Patti Smith.

The spiritual and artistic life of St. Mark’s Church-in-the-Bowery was nearly extinguished when, on July 27,1978, a devastating fire tore through the structure, nearly destroying it. New Yorkers formed the Citizens to Save St. Mark’s organization that raised funds for the reconstruction of the building. The church hired architect Harold Edelman to direct the restoration. Edelman also designed the abstract stained glass windows that replaced the 19th Century balcony windows which were destroyed.

Today the historic St. Mark’s Church-in-the-Bowery is perhaps more vital to the neighboring community than it was in the early 19th Century. The oldest site of continuous religious practice in New York City, it continues as a fundamental force in developing arts in America.




Photograph NYPL Collection

The 1860 Friends Meeting House - Stuyvesant Square

Collection of the New York Public Library

On the western edge of Stuyvesant Square, quietly sitting behind a heavy mid-19th Century cast iron fence, are the 1860 Friends Meeting House and Seminary -- two unassuming and particularly unexpected structures in the heart of Manhattan.

The buildings grew out of a schism within the Quaker community.  Having survived two centuries in America, modern Victorian religious ideas cracked what had been The Friend's seamless ideology.

Like the other pilgrims, the Quakers arrived in America in the 17th Century seeking relief from religious persecution.  Instead, like the Jews of around the same time, they were met with discrimination.  Governor Peter Stuyvesant openly reviled both, in 1656 forbidding the citizens of the Village of Flushing "not to admit, lodge or entertain...any one of the heretical and abominable sect called the Quakers."  The Quakers were forced to meet and worship in secret; an act that was quickly outlawed by Stuyvesant.  Nevertheless, their numbers increased and by 1681 were worshipping and convening in the open.

Things continued to get better for the Quakers.  In 1734 they were granted the same civil rights as other British subjects and the Militia Act of 1755 exempted them from serving in the military against their religious beliefs.

But the road became rocky in the first decades of the 19th Century.  The country was overtaken by a religious revival that focused on intense Bible study.  Traditionally, the Quakers relied on direct inspiration from God -- "The Inner Light."  More important than Bible teachings was the personal interaction between the worshipper and the Diety.

While one group of the Society of Friends accepted the new Christian movement, another group led by Elias Hicks of Long Island preferred the traditional Quaker teachings.  Known as the Hicksites they quietly removed themselves from the larger sect.  Rather than disturb the customary peace of yearly meeting of the Society of Friends in 1827 the Hicksites obstained from the proceedings.  The following year in what was to be called the Hicksite Schism, the Society divided itself into the Orthodox and Hicksite branches.

In an ironic twist, the Hicksites acquired a plot of land on the former Peter Stuyvesant Estate where fashionable homes had begun appearing.  Society of Friends member Charles Bunting not only designed but oversaw the construction of the Meeting House and the adjoining Seminary.  His red brick structures, drawing from Federal and Greek Revival designs, are simple and straight-forward. 

The Meeting House sits back from Rutherford Place at the corner of 15th Street.  The Greek Revival-style end returns of the roof cornice mirror the shape of the pediment over the plain porch.  Four white wooden columns support the porch.  Unadorned window lintels and sills speak to the simplicity of the lifestyle of the Society.

Next door the Seminary nearly matches the Meeting House.  Placed closer to the street, its porch is shallower and the corners boast attractive stone quoins.  The T-shaped school has a separate entrance on the 16th Street side.  The resulting complex is architecturally charming and serene.

Photographs by Tom Fletcher

The Society of Friends managed in those Victorian years to harmoniously balance their political views with their religious pacifism.  They rallied against slavery, technology (the construction of the Erie Canal was a major issue for them), and public schools.  As late as 1912 the New York Times reported that "the Quakers to march in suffrage parade...men and women of the Stuyvesant Square body will be side by side in line."  The article went on to remark that "Part of the Quaker doctrine are equal rights for men and women, and the fine housekeeping qualities and gentleness of Quaker women have always been an unspoken answer to the reproach that equal rights would make women either masculine or unwomanly.  The Quakers have practiced their belief, but not have discussed it outside their own society.  They are now coming out to stand for all other women."

A century and a half after being built, the Friends Seminary continues as a vibrant private day school; the oldest continuous coeducational school in the City.  Always progressive the Seminary was the one of the first schools, in 1878, to open a kindergarten.  In 1925 it became the first private school to provide a full-time psychologist.

In 1958 the two branches of the Society of Friends shook hands and reunited.  Their beautiful and uncomplicated red brick buildings on Stuyvesant Square are an integral component in what is now the Stuyvesant Square Historic District.