The 1890 Lincoln Building -- No. 1 Union Square West

photo by Alice Lum

As Union Square transformed from a fashionable residential neighborhood to a bustling commercial district, many of the new structures were being built by firms for their own use – Tiffany & Company, Lord & Taylor Dry Goods and Decker Piano Co. for instance.

But the nine-story Lincoln Building that began rising at the corner of 14th Street and Union Square West in 1889 was purely speculative. Jacob D. Butler recognized the potential of the site which had originally been part of Henry Springler’s farm and was still owned by that family. Butler gambled that a new office building would quickly become a lucrative investment.

Architect Robert Henderson Robertson was given the commission to design the structure.  It would replace four small buildings on what was considered the most desirable corner on the Square. The Philadelphia-born architect had already established his reputation and was now working heavily in the popular Romanesque Revival style.

Robertson’s design was a marriage of the traditional and the up-and-coming. He utilized modern engineering in the interior steel skeleton – an innovation that would result in later soaring skyscrapers—but also incorporated load-bearing masonry walls. He successfully adapted the medieval Romanesque prototype into a modern multi-storied office building.

Heavy arches and piers, thickset columns and stone carvings drawing from Byzantine, Norman and Celtic designs covered the façade. Robertson combined rock-faced Indiana limestone and brick, granite and terra cotta to create his visually interesting building. His most eye-catching ornament was a large carved griffin serving as a flag pole base that wrapped the corner at the seventh floor.

A profusion of lion-headed brackets support an elaborate cornice, while a flag pole base in the form of a  fearsome griffin wraps the corner - photo by Alice Lum

The Lincoln Building – possibly so named because of the statue of Abraham Lincoln directly in front of it on the Square – was completed in 1890. Critical reaction was, on the whole, positive. The often-irascible architecture critic Montgomery Schuyler praised “the picturesque features” of the carvings and detailing; however he complained about the numerous horizontal divisions that “confuse the principal division.” Engineering Magazine disapproved of the use of brick and limestone saying the difference in materials resulted in a “lack of unity essential in all good designs.”

The Abraham Lincoln statue sits squarely in front of the building as horse-drawn drays and trolley cars pass by -- NYPL Collection

Despite architectural criticisms, the building filled quickly. Among the first tenants were the architects Field & Snelling, Van Campen Taylor, and William H. Holden. In 1891 F. M. Pirsson & Company also moved in. The firm was general agents for architectural materials companies supplying, for instance, sliding blinds, screen doors, slate work, and stone.

While the building was home to ordinary, expected tenants – Raymond & Whitcomb travel agents and William Price Jones “stationers’ specialties” company, for instance – it had more than its fair share of peculiar leasers as well.

One was the Order of the Old Colony which established its offices here in 1892. The firm offered insurance “against the evils of matrimony.” For an $8 initiation fee, $1 dues per month and a 50 cent assessment upon marriage, the member was guaranteed a payout of $500 as a marriage dowry.

The founder, Ernest V. Marschall , insisted that no discrimination was made against engaged persons although only non-married persons could join.

Equally unusual was the scheme of tenant Charles M. Coen who, in 1894, began plans for a luxury hotel to be built 11 miles into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Long Island. Coen hosted an excursion on June 15 that took a party of engineers, newspapermen and potential investors to the site. Here he threw overboard a buoy flying the flag of Atlantis, broke a bottle of champagne and announced “There being no legal obstacles in the way, we take possession of the Cholera Banks in the name of Atlantis and raise her flag over this shoal.”

Coen intended to raise “a number of palatial iron structures, connected with each other by bridges on iron pillars 30 feet in diameter.” He estimated the cost of the foundation for the hotel would cost about $2 million and said that “the first building will be finished by October.”

It wasn’t.

Three years later tenant George J. Mersick got himself into legal problems by advertising his “Artograph” for mail order. The Artograph, Mersick promised, would reproduce and enlarge pictures for the minimal price of $7 ($6 in advance) and $1 on delivery – satisfaction guaranteed.

The Postmaster General, however, received numerous complaints from women who had purchased the product and found it “of no value.” Despite the guarantee they were unable to get a refund.

Post Office Inspector Schopp found that Mersick’s visits to his office “were very irregular.”

photo by Alice Lum

On October 26, 1900 Jacob D. Butler sold the Lincoln Bulding to William Crawford for “$200,000 over a mortgage of $150,000.” Interestingly the original building application listed “Mr. Crawford” as “owner” in 1889.

On May 17, 1912 four partners, Carl Laemmle, W. H. Swanson, P. A. Powers and David Horsley, brought four desks into an office here and started their new business: Universal Film Manufacturing Company. The company, known today as Universal Pictures, grew so quickly that before the summer was ended new, larger offices were taken at 1600 Broadway.

The Lincoln Building, often known as 1 Union Square West, still commands attention at the corner of 14th Street and the park. An important example of the transitional phase in the development of the modern skyscraper, it is also a handsome illustration of the architect’s ability to meld historic styles – in this case medieval Romanesque – with modern requirements.

The 1895 American Tract Society Bldg -- 144-152 Nassau Street

photo by Alice Lum

There was little religious literature in America, other than the Bible, in the early years of the 19^th Century and that troubled Reverend William Allen Hallock.  Like many others, the austerely religious Protestant minister saw the rapidly developing cities with their the waves of unwashed immigrants as fertile breeding grounds for sin and corruption.  One weapon in combating the wickedness was the distribution of tracts—religious pamphlets and fliers aimed at putting wayward citizens back on the path of righteousness. 

Hallock was the agent for the New England Tract Society in Andover, Massachusetts, which was founded in 1814.  The organization changed its name in 1823 to the American Tract Society, hoping to broaden its influence and distribution.  A year later a similar organization, the New York Religious Tract Society, sought to join forces.  And they did.

Reverend Hallock, believing that the society should be headquartered where it was most needed, “the great wicked city of New York,” helped arrange for its move there in May 1825.    Three wealthy New Yorkers, silk jobber Arthur Tappan, merchant Anson Green Phelps and banker Moses Allen spent $15,000 on the land at the southeast corner of Nassau and Spruce Streets for the Society’s new home.  Within a year the four-story Tract House designed by City Hall architect John McComb Jr. was completed at a cost of $26,000.   The first year of operation the Society printed almost 700,000 pamphlets and fliers.

By 1846 the building was insufficient to house modern steam-powered printing presses and the American Tract Society razed the old Tract House, replacing it with a five story structure completed in 1847.  The Society used the top three floors and rented out the lower floors to tenants such as the highly successful print-making company of Currier & Ives.   By now the Society was printing over 5 million tracts.

The American Tract Society, which for decades had grown more successful, was suddenly hit hard by the Financial Panic of 1873.   The financial problems became such that in 1886 there was serious talk about selling the Tract House building.  The Society plodded along until another financial recession came about in 1893.  The Executive Committee realized that “a bold course of action” needed to be taken.

That course of action was to abandon the Tract House for more affordable space further uptown, and build a modern skyscraper on the site.  The valuable property sat in the midst of the New York publishing district and the rental income would, at least theoretically, rescue the Society.

On May 13, 1894 The Sun reported that “The new building of the American Tract Society to be erected on the site of the old one at the corner of Nassau and Spruce streets will be one of the tallest sky scrapers in the city…The building will include twenty stories in the main, and the additional structure will add two of three stories more.”

The Sun provided readers a sketch of the proposed building on May 13, 1894 (copyright expired)

The newspaper predicted the cost of the completed structure to be a staggering $900,000—an incredible amount of money for a cash-strapped religious organization.  It was to be “as nearly fireproof as possible” and in a clever marketing scheme to take full advantage of the soaring height of the building and its resulting views, the entire top floor would be a restaurant.

Architect Robert Henderson Robertson was commissioned to design the building.  He was already well-known for his own version of the Romanesque Revival style that used chunky blocks of rough-cut stone blended with terra cotta.  But for the towering American Tract Society Building he tempered the heavy style with the more refined Renaissance Revival.

The Sun reported “For the first five stories the front wall will be built of Indiana limestone or granite so as to make it as light in color as possible, because of the narrowness of Nassau street.  The rest will be of brick with terra-cotta ornamentation.”

Plans had already been filed when The Sun’s article appeared; but there was a problem.  Corrupt building inspectors who received kick-backs from contractors held up approvals.  On January 24, 1896 The New York Times exposed the bribery.  Augustus Paule, an architect working in Roberson’s firm “was told that there was something wrong about the plans and was advised to see Inspector Reilly, who referred him to Inspector Fryer.  The latter told him that the wall was not right, and appeared offended because the American Tract Society had gone out of the city to give the contract for the iron work.  It was intimated to him that if the contract was given to Warren Conover the plans would speedily be approved.  The plans were not approved until seven months later.”

Construction—which included the largest derrick ever built in New York City for building purposes--finally preceded.   But almost immediately an incident occurred that ended in devastatingly negative public opinion.   Before long The American Tract Society would wonder if its decision to build a grand skyscraper had been a good one.

On the afternoon of May 16, 1895 a young plasterer’s assistant, Michael Melvin, was working high above Nassau Street.  The laborer earned $2.75 a day to support his wife and three children.   Melvin slipped and fell through a hoistway, falling fourteen stories to his death.

The man’s body was taken to his home at No. 318 East 99^thStreet.  The Times noted that “The Melvins occupy three rooms, which are poorly furnished, because the family cannot afford anything better.”  The reporter was told by Melvin’s sister-in-law “Mrs. Melvin hasn’t a cent in the house and we don’t know how she is going to live. “

New Yorkers, knowing that the building under construction belonged to a Christian benevolent society, understandably wondered if the American Tract Society would come to the aid of the family.   It didn’t.

In an astonishingly appalling  public relations move, the Reverend George L. Shearer, Financial Secretary of the Society told The Times “I don’t know anything about Melvin.  He was not employed by the American Tract society, but by a contractor, and there is an explicit stipulation in our contract with all contractors that the society shall not be held in any wise responsible for accidents to the workmen.  If we were to assume such responsibility we would not be able to put up any building.”

The reporter pushed the minister.  “But might not the society stretch a point in a case of this kind and do something for Melvin’s family; or is the society not a benevolent institution?”

“The American Tract Society,” answered Shearer, “was organized for the purpose of disseminating the gospel and literature of the Lord Jesus Christ by such means as Christians may approve.  Another thing about Melvin.  He was not killed while at work, but during the noon hour.  I cannot see why the society should be called upon in such a case.  It is presumed that the workmen in the building are protected by proper safeguards.”

New Yorkers were offended that the Society, whose new building was now estimated to cost $1.05 million, would not offer a small sum to the widow and her small children.  But they were about to become even more offended.

Referring to Shearer’s comments, The New York Times reported that “Melvin’s comrades did not stop to consider whether or not they were legally or morally responsible for his death, but at once thought of doing what they could out of their scanty wages for his widow and children.”  The men soldered a zinc box to a pipe and affixed a crudely lettered sign:  “Drop in contributions here in aid of the family of Michael Melvin who was killed on this job Thursday, May 16, 1895.”

By the end of the day on Friday May 17 the workmen themselves had contributed $106, just about enough money to pay for Melvin’s grave.  Passersby dropped coins and bills into the box on their way to and from work.   Then, in yet one more callous move, The Tract Society ordered the box removed.

“The box was taken down yesterday morning,” reported The Times, “not because sufficient money had been received, but because some one reported to those who had the matter in charge that the Tract Society objected to the box’s being there.”

Feelings of compassion towards the workers and Michael Melvin’s family swelled and resentment towards the American Tract Society festered.  As a direct result, rumors started circulating that charitable donations to the Society had been diverted for the construction of the new skyscraper.

Publishing Secretary The Reverend William W. Rand denied the charges, but they would not go away easily.   A year later, with the building completed, Alexander Jay Bruen borrowed the Society’s idea of dissemination of information through pamphlets and published one entitled “Our Charities and How They Are Managed.”  In it he assailed the new Tract Society Building.

“Most charitable societies treat the money they receive as if it were their own, to use as any caprice may dictate.  Too often it is hoarded up, put away in so-called safe investments, or used in erecting some sky-scraper in the shape of a million-dollar building…This is notably the case with the American Tract Society.”



When The New York Tribune published this sketch on January 30, 1897, the building was having major elevator problems (copyright expired)

The American Tract Society Building’s bad luck and bad press continued with repeated elevator accidents the first year.  Between the building’s opening and November 16, 1896, three elevators fell several floors, injuring passengers.  
 

Then on September 10, 1897 yet another elevator car dropped 19 floors killing engineer Richard Neilson and Isaac Bachrach, the 18-year old elevator boy.  The Times reported “In some manner, as yet not comprehensively explained, the car was released from all of the cables, wires, and safety attachments at the nineteenth floor and was plunged into a tangled mass of iron and woodwork with its human freight in the basement.”

The AIA Guide to New York City wrote  of the bulding "Fascination is at the roof." -- photo by Alice Lum

In the meantime, the building had filled with various tenants, including publishing firms like Illustrated Record and Ladies’ World.  In 1897 the Internal Revenue Collector’s office was here and would remain until the new Custom House building was opened in 1902.  Mapes-Reeve Construction Company was on the 11^th floor, the Gold Point Mining Company was on the 18^th, and lawyer Benjamin Levy had his offices in the building.

On February 14, 1898 there was considerable commotion on the 20^th floor around 7:45 at night.  The Sun reported that “The sounds were emphatic—a fall as of a man’s body, a woman’s loud, clear voice, men’s ejaculations, and the rattling of light furniture.  The door flew open and two men flew out and chased down the twenty flights of stairs around and around the elevators, their feet ringing on the iron steps.”

Policeman Crane of the Oak Street station was at the bottom of the stairs to take everyone to jail to sort things out.  The Sun, rather callously said “The incident was the most exciting that has occurred in the American Tract Society building since the last time the elevators gave their safety appliances something to do.”

The battle, it turned out, was the result of an on-going feud between two publishers.

Elegant winged terra cotta caryatids, this one heavily strapped in to prevent falling, ornamented the corners -- photo by Alice Lum

On May 7, 1900 The Intercollegiate Association of American moved in.  The organization was formed “for the purpose of transacting its business in connection with the coming athletic championships.”  It was the same year that the American Tract Society again faced serious money problems.  The Times reported that the Society “is now passing through a financial crisis.  The great office building at Nassau and Spruce Streets, erected six years ago at an enormous cost, necessitated the placing of a mortgage upon it of about $1,250,000, created a deficit which last year amounted to $35,000.  This led to a great deal of criticism of the management of the society.”

Yet the building remained filled and the Society struggled on.  In 1902 the six elevators, which had earned a dark reputation, were carrying 14,204 passengers between 8 am and 6 pm daily.  On May 17 that year George Shearer, who had offended so many with his comments about Michael Melvin, hosted a luncheon here for 600 of the commissioners of the Presbyterian General Assembly.   He then took the group to the roof “where they got a bird’s-eye view of the city,” reported The New York Tribune.

The luncheon was not nearly as interesting to newspaper readers as was the dinner held at the rooftop Eyrie restaurant a month later.  The Thirteen Club joined the Vegetarian Society on June 13 in a curious ceremony.   Members of the Thirteen Club, whose purpose was to deride superstitions, walked under a ladder, shared a cake in the shape of a coffin, and broke a mirror.   Thirteen shards of the glass were distributed to members.

The New York Tribune was more interested, however, in the fare—there was no meat served.  The reported noted that one vegetarian, Mr. Scott, “says he gets along well on a banana or two and two ounces of nuts a day…Mr. Scott must weigh fully as much as some beef eaters.”

The building continued to attract a variety of tenants.  In 1904 the Globe Security Company issued loans from its offices here and John Craven-Burleigh was selling his “True Hair Grower” two years later.  Craven-Burleigh promised “This is not a patent medicine, but a compound following minutely the original private formula given me by a learned Swiss Savant, while I was traveling in Switzerland a few years ago.  I was bald myself then, but by using this compound in forty days my hair grew out again, thick, silken and strong.”

In 1914 the Tract Society left the building, moving to offices at No. 101 Park Avenue.  On August 1 it was announced that the New York Sun would make “extensive alterations” to several floors of the building.  “While the alterations will be extensive in character, they will not alter the exterior of the building materially,” said The Times, “the chief part of the work being to prepare the basement for the presses.  About five floors in addition to the basement, it is learned, will be occupied for the offices of The Sun, and the changes probably will be completed by the end of the year.”

Shortly after The Sun moved in, the building was sold at foreclosure to The New York Life Insurance Company for $1 million.  With the newspaper here, the building became known as “The Sun Buildling.” 

In 1919, however, the newspaper opted to move on to the Stewart Building on Chambers Street and, simultaneously, New York Life sold the property to Frank A. Munsey.  Munsey had purchased the Stewart Building two years earlier.

A noticable patch marked the spot of a missing caryatid -- photo by Alice Lum

Throughout the 20^th century the American Tract Society Building survived nearly intact.  Recognized as one of the earliest extant steel-framed skyscrapers in the city, it represents the bridge between traditional masonry architecture and the soaring high-rise buildings that were soon to come.

And today the elevators operate much more safely.

The Lost Yerkes Mansion - No. 864 Fifth Avenue

photo from the Auction Catalogue of Collection of Charles T. Yerkes, New York, 1910 (copyright expired)

When Charles Tyson Yerkes decided to leave Chicago for New York City in 1895 he had everything he wanted—a staggering fortune and successful career as a financier and street railroad titan.  Three years earlier he had donated nearly $300,000 to the University of Chicago to build the Yerkes Observatory in Wisconsin which included the world’s largest telescope.  The only thing he could not achieve was acceptance into high society.

Charles Tyson Yerkes -- Catalogue of paintings and sculpture in the collection of Charles T. Yerkes, New York, 1904 (copyright expired)

Yerkes had started out in the brokerage business in Philadelphia, where he also began developing traction and street railways.  As his fortune increased, the married Yerkes noticed the 16-year old Mary Adelaide Moore.  Mary, called Mollie by her friends, was one of nine children of a chemist and before long was Yerkes’ mistress.

Charles Yerkes was more ambitious than scrupulous and in 1871 was sent to prison for embezzling $400,000 in city money.   His teen-aged mistress faithfully visited him there, earning her the nickname “prison angel” by the prison officials.  Yerkes discovered upon his release that both his and Mary’s reputations among society were irreparably ruined—he was seen as a scoundrel, she as a home wrecker.

He divorced his wife and in 1880 took Mary to Chicago where they married.   Mary failed utterly as a hostess, partly because of Yerkes’ merciless business tactics.  By 1896 when the Yerkes New York mansion was nearing completion at No. 864 Fifth Avenue the robber baron had taken a new teenaged sweetheart.  Emilie Grigsby was exactly the age that Mary had been when he met her—just sixteen.  When Yerkes and his wife moved to New York, Emilie would not be far behind.

The mansion on Fifth Avenue was called by a Chicago newspaper “a palace.”  Designed by R. H. Robertson, the brownstone pile rose five stories and stretched 100 feet along Fifth Avenue—four times the width of an average rowhouse—and 153 feet along 68^thStreet.   The Yerkes mansion announced that he and Mary had arrived.   The house was called “not only one of the handsomest in New York, but it is one of the most extensive.”

The house next door and the lot behind the mansion would become art galleries--photograph by Byron Company, from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York -- http://collections.mcny.org/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult_VPage&VBID=24UP1GG3PPFF&SMLS=1&RW=1366&RH=603

The outer entrance doors were framed in bronze and the inner doors were platinum-plated bronze.   Upon entering the vestibule, the visitor was surrounded in marble of various shades and colors.  The walls were clad in polished red marble.  Pilasters separated panels of different colored marble, the floor was inlaid black and sienna marble and even the ceiling was marble in “a richly coffered design.”

The two-story entrance hall, like the vestibule, was completely constructed of marble.  “Just beyond the door are two columns with pilasters of rich purple marble, with Ionic capitals of white marble and bases of Istrian marble,” as described by Barr Ferre later.   Yerkes apparently felt that marble was reflective of success and taste and even the Drawing Room was clad in the stone.  “The walls, from floor to ceiling, are wholly encased in Cipollino marble,” said Ferre.

The entrance hall.  Mary Yerkes would address reporters from the second floor here in 1905 --Auction Catalogue of Collection of Charles T. Yerkes, New York, 1910 (copyright expired)

The grand marble staircase rose to the second floor loggia and “serves as a monumental approach to the Italian Palm Garden,” wrote Ferre.  “It is a spacious and delightful place, having the true character of an indoor, or winter garden…All of this interior is of white marble, save the cornice, which is copper.”

As with most lavish homes of the 1890s the Yerkes mansion had period rooms.  The Music Room was Louis XV in style with frescos by Will H. Low.  The Dining Room was Elizabethan with highly-carved quartered oak walls and a vaulted ceiling.  There was an East Indian Room, an Empire Room, and a Japanese Room—a near requirement of the time.  The Library was finished with antique 16^thcentury paneling.  

The main bedrooms, dressing rooms and bathrooms on the second floor were sumptuous.   The fireplace of the Charles’ bedroom was black onyx and the “adjoining Dressing-Room is trimmed with rosewood and has a gold-leaf frieze and ceiling.  His bed had once belonged to King Ludwig of Bavaria and sat upon a dais with two steps covered in green velvet.  The Bathroom has a polished marble floor and wainscot, above which is a gold frieze and ceiling with a silver cornice.  The bathtub and basin are of marble and a shower is enclosed within a marble screen.” 

Mary’s oval boudoir was pronounced “one of the most charming [rooms] in the Mansion.”   Her bed had belonged to King Leopold of Belgium.

Below ground were the billiard room, a bathroom for guests, and the wine cellar.  The walls of the billiard room were covered in leather with patterns formed by brass-headed nails.

Although he had failed in Philadelphia and Chicago, Yerkes attempted to push his way into New York society.  He dressed Mary in the most expensive fashions and jewels.  But again she fell short.   Wealthy New Yorkers already knew of their reputations and Mary’s heavy drinking and clumsy manners added to the problem.   She made public scenes, once interrupting a play by loudly announcing that the “Lady Teazle” on stage was incorrect—the actress was wearing pink whereas a portrait in her husband’s collection proved that Lady Teazle wore yellow.

Mary’s fury over her husband’s flagrant affair with Emilie Grigsby intensified when he built her a magnificent Park Avenue mansion not far away.   The younger woman was banned from the Fifth Avenue house where Mary more-and-more lived in isolation.  According to The Evening World, “Mrs. Yerkes barred her doors to Miss Grigsby the moment she discovered the truth, and the estrangement of husband and wife dated from that moment, although to the outer world they continued to appear as before.”

While Mary drank and sulked, her husband collected.   The house filled with irreplaceable artwork and statuary as he spent freely at the auction houses of Europe.  The valuable items in the mansion were tempting targets for accomplished sneak thieves.   One of them was the cultured and educated Elijah C. Harvey.

The New York Times described Harvey on May 12, 1899 as “a mulatto, thirty years old, who is a graduate of an educational institute at Andover, Mass., and who afterward studied for the ministry.”    As spring weather that year induced housekeepers to open mansion windows, Harvey took advantage of the opportunity.  He would brazenly climb the brownstone stoops and enter the homes through the windows.  On the morning of May 3 it was the Yerkes parlor he entered.

For months the East 67^th Street Police Station had been receiving complaints from residents of “a burglar who was making extensive depredations,” said The Times.  Just two days before the Yerkes break-in, the night watchman at the George Crocker mansion at 64^th Street and 5^th Avenue had nearly captured the crook.

Now this morning housekeeper Mrs. Margaret Fitzpatrick walked into the Yerkes parlor just in time to see Harvey slipping out the window with a silver basket valued at $1,000.  The openwork basket was easily identifiable; on one side was Mary’s monogram and on the bottom her full name: Mary Adelaide Yerkes.

Two days later when Harvey was detained by Policeman Cornelius Glynn, the burglar put on his best cultured act.  “Is it not possible for you to be mistaken in your identification?  I never committed a felonious act in my life,” he said.  “I protest against this outrage.  You must have something more than mere surmise on which to take me into custody.”

When that tactic did not seem to be working, Harvey pulled a razor and lunged at the officer.  He was arrested and among the pawn tickets in his pockets was one for the silver basket which he pawned for $30.  “Nearly all the articles were pawned in the name of Yerkes,” reported The
Times.

Even though Charles and Mary were essentially estranged—he spent most of his time in hotels—he kept her in high style.  When Emily Grigsby acquired a new Columbia Hanson automobile in 1903, Mary got a custom vehicle.  “One of the handsomest of the electrics ever built is the special Victoria, owned by Mrs. Charles T. Yerkes, of No. 864 Fifth Avenue,” said Automobile Topics.

By 1904 Yerkes’ art collection had become so great that it required a separate building.    The millionaire purchased the mansion next door at No. 860 Fifth Avenue and filed plans to convert it to a gallery.  On April 21 The New York Times reported that “The house will be converted into a one-story building, 40 feet front, 100 feet deep, and 41-1/2 feet high, with a façade of carved brownstone and brick.  The interior is to be finished in carved marble, decorated with ornamental columns to harmonize with the Winter garden which it will adjoin.  It is to have ornamental doorway opening into the present picture gallery.”

Two art gallery annexes, one to the rear on 68th Street, and one replacing the mansion next door at No. 860 held Yerkes' massive collection -- photo Library of Congress

Architect Henry Ives Cobb designed the annex which cost $20,000—or about $425,000.  Shortly thereafter a second gallery was added to the rear of the mansion on 68^thStreet, also designed by Cobb.

The gallery was a virtual museum -- Auction Catalogue of Collection of Charles T. Yerkes, New York, 1910 (copyright expired)

Yerkes would not enjoy his new art galleries for long.   Before the 68-year old traveled to London in 1905 with Emilie Grigsby he discovered that Mary had found a paramour—a 29-year old fortune hunter named Wilson Mizner.  Prior to his voyage, Yerkes pressured Mary for a divorce and tried to get her to leave the mansion, threatening to leave her out of his will.  She refused but was left seriously concerned about her security.

While in London Yerkes became seriously ill.  Emilie nursed him for five weeks until he was well enough to sail home.  In the meantime, Mary did some snooping.   Later, in 1909, “The Federal Reporter” would say “In October, 1905, when Mr. Yerkes was in London, Mrs. Yerkes had his safe in 864 Fifth avenue, the combination of which was known only to Mr. Yerkes…drilled open, and she found in it, among other things…a bill of sale dated Mary 24, 1896, assigning to her ‘her executors, administrators and assigns, all and singular the furniture and household goods together with each and every painting and picture now contained in the house, No. 864 Fifth avenue.”

As long as Charles Yerkes died before he had a chance to change the will, Mary was in good shape.

Yerkes arrived in New York in November and went directly from the steamer to the Waldorf-Astoria.   Had he gone home, he would have found that Wilson Mizner was living in his mansion.  Instead, doctors and nurses crowded into his suite in the hotel and tried to save him.  Rather than asking to see Mary, he repeatedly called for Emilie.  The beautiful young mistress stayed by his side, in obvious despair, while doctors advised “against the visit of Mrs. Yerkes,” according to newspapers.

He died on December 29, 1905 with Mary and her sister in an adjoining room.  Mary briefly considered going into the room to reconcile; then told her sister “It is too late now,” and after his death commented “I think I did right.  He treated me shamefully.”

Charles T. Yerkes’ body was removed from the Waldorf-Astoria in a wicker basket and taken to the mansion on Fifth Avenue where it was transferred into a rich wooden casket.  Mary had the house protected by a team of detectives to keep unwanted interlopers—presumably including Emilie Grigsby—away from the funeral.   Roundsman Sheehan told reporters “We have orders to shoot any one who tries to go up those steps.  And we’ll carry out orders.”

Yerkes coffin, draped in black velvet and dripping with purple orchids, was carried down the brownstone steps to the hearse by six detectives.  The Evening World reported “Only six carriages followed the hearse, and neither Miss Emilie Grigsby nor any member of her family was in the cortege.”

New York society waited to hear if Emilie would be beneficiary to any of Yerkes’ millions.   But Yerkes had died before he had time to change his will and on January 3, 1906 the terms were publicized.

The will, according to The Ottawa Free Trader on January 5, “leaves practically all the vast estate, estimated at $15,000,000, to Mrs. Yerkes and the two children for their life use…After the death of Mrs. Yerkes the family home and its magnificent art collection, supported by an endowment of $750,000, becomes a public gallery.”

The newspaper added “Whatever provision was made for Miss Grigsby…if any, evidently was made by gift before the magnate’s death.  It is reported that Mr. Yerkes, only a few days before his death, gave Miss Grigsby a check for something like $250,000, which was dated ahead, and therefore is worthless, as the magnate died before the date of the check.”

Emilie Grigsby, however, had nothing to worry about financially.  Charles T. Yerkes had left her quite well taken care of.

If Mary Yerkes still had any aspirations of social climbing, they were dashed when the newspapers reported of her marriage to Wilson Mizner less than a month after her husband’s death.    On February 1, 1906 The New York Times said “Mrs. Mary Adelaide Yerkes, the widow of Charles T. Yerkes, and Wilson Mizner were married at the home of Mrs. Yerkes at 864 Fifth Avenue, at 8:30 o’clock on Tuesday evening.”  The newspaper added “Mrs. Mizner is 45 years old.  Mr. Mizner is not yet 30.”

The Times shocked proper readers by saying “Wilson Mizner has been in town for several weeks.  He has bene stopping at the Hotel Astor, and has received many telephone messages from Mrs. Yerkes.  Immediately after the receipt of every message Mr. Mizner went in a cab to the Yerkes residence.”

Mary quickly denied the story until it was no longer of any use.  On February 3 The Sun said “Mrs. Mary Adelaide Yerkes-Mizner owned up yesterday.  Yodled to on the white marble balcony of her house at 864 Fifth avenue by young Wilson Mizner of California, Alaska and elsewhere, she admitted she had fibbed from dread of premature and unpleasant publicity.”

Mizner had promised reporters that morning that his wife would see them.  “In front of the Yerkes mansion at 864 Fifth avenue there were more reporters,” said The Sun.  “The newcomers piled out of their rigs and banked up around the bridegroom, who towered above them.”

Mizner spoke in a street dialect normally unheard on refined Fifth Avenue.  “I am going in to see my wife.  You’ll hear something in fifteen minutes.  That’s on the square.  You can take it from me.”

When the butler begrudgingly admitted the horde of reporters into the Japanese Room, Wilson addressed them.  “Mrs. Mizner doesn’t exactly care to make a formal statement about our marriage, but she does want to let all her fiends know that the marriage took place just as I have said…Now, fellows, just step this way and Mrs. Yerkes herself will appear and confirm the marriage.”

Mary finally appeared on the marble balcony above the reporters.  She wore a silk kimono, apologized for the “miscommunication,” and said she was happy she had married.  “I hope you will all get married, too, if you are not already,” she said.  And then she excused herself.

Mizner told reporters “I suppose some of Mrs. Mizner’s relatives are sore, but you can bet your last dollar Mrs. Mizner is happy.”

Before long it was Mary, more than her relatives, who was sore.  She realized that Mizner was only after her millions and shortly after the wedding she told a reporter “Just another idol shattered.  That’s what all this money has done for me.  Robbed me of all my real friends, made me doubt them all, suspect and fear them.”  She divorced Wilson Mizner in May 1907 and arranged to take back the name Yerkes.

Even with Wilson Mizner out of the house, Mary’s life did not get easier.    Days after the divorce, Joseph D. Redding appeared.  Redding was the lawyer Mary had hired in 1904 when her financial security seemed tenuous.  The lawyer was retained to “obtain for her a share of the property of Yerkes including a share of his bonds, stocks, and all securities.”  He claimed she agreed to give him twenty percent of whatever she received.  Then, the day following Charles Yerkes’ death, he received a letter from Mary dismissing him.   Redding now brought suit against her for his twenty per-cent commission.

Her troubles continued.  Within a month she was riding down Jerome Avenue in her automobile with two other women “when the party ran foul of Policeman Silverbaur,” reported The Sun on June 10.  Mary’s chauffeur, Edward Roshing, was arrested for speeding despite her protesting that they were indeed not going fast.  In order to get home Mary gave her house as security so her chauffeur could be released.

On June 25, 1908 Mary was once again riding in her car chauffeured by Roshing.  Also in the automobile were Catherine Manack and Mary A. Fitzpatrick and Mary’s footman.  As the car entered Washington Square Park from West 4^th Street, 11-year old Dominick Pasquale ran in front of it.

Little Dominick was struck and the footman, Edward Hurley, grabbed the boy in his arms.  “Mrs. Yerkes threw open the door of the tonneau, and, reaching her arms out to the lad, said to the foorman: ‘Give him to me and then drive to St. Vincent’s Hospital,’” reported The Times.

On the way to the hospital Mary comforted the boy “with promises of baseballs and bats and all sorts of other things if he would only be brave and try not to cry.”

At the hospital it was determined that the boy had severe internal injuries.   Mary asked the physician to “do everything in his power for the boy.”

Once again Edward Roshing found himself under arrest and, once again, Mary Yerkes was without a ride home.  She asked Lt. Noble to send a policeman with her chauffeur so he might drive her home before being arrested.  Despite her pleas, she was compelled to send to a nearby garage to hire a driver to take her home in her car.

Mary’s greatest problems were to come.   The will was contested.  Later The New York Times explained “When a division of the estate was attempted, the widow maintained that the Fifth Avenue house and the art collection was her property under deeds of assignment made by her husband.  This was not upheld by the probate courts of Cook County, Illinois, where Yerkes had his residence.”   Mary was forced to give up the Fifth Avenue mansion and the art collection, all of which was sold at auction.

An advertisement in the New-York Tribune on February 20, 1910 listed part of the “very important collection of exceedingly valuable ancient and modern paintings.”  Included were works of art by Rodin, Houdon, Falconet, Boucher and Van Loo.   Antiques included Renaissance and Flemish tapestries, Persian rugs of the 15^th and 16^th centuries and paintings of the great masters.  There were four Rembrandts, four works by Franz Hals, and paintings by Boucher, Breughel, Holbein, Raphael, Rubens Watteau and many others.

The auction lasted for days and newspapers reported the staggering amounts paid for rare items.   A sword owned by Oliver Cromwell and dated 1650 sold for $1,500.  A life-sized bronze sculpture of Diana by Houdon brought $51,000; two Carrara marble sculptures by Rodin were purchased by an anonymous donor as gifts to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

If Manhattan’s elite never passed through the Yerkes doorways for social functions, they did for the sale.  Among the buyers were Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt, Mrs. Cooper Hewitt, Seth Milliken, Mrs. Harry Payne Whitney, Mrs. Herman Oelrichs, and Mrs. Samuel Untermyer.

Charles T. Yerkes fabulous mansion became home to Louis Terah Haggin.  Haggin had started out life as a lawyer; but with the death of his father in 1914 he took over the presidency of the Cerro de Pasco Copper Corporation.   Of his father’s $20 million estate, Haggin had inherited nearly $4 million, which was quickly increased with the directorships in other companies he took over from his father.

The widowed executive lived alone in the massive mansion with his staff of servants.  His daughter, Eila, who was married to Robert Tittle McKee, lived nearby at No. 136 East 79^th Street.   A tireless worker, he was still going routinely to his office in 1929 at the age of 81.

In the middle of March that year, however, Haggin contracted pneumonia.  He was confined to his bed in the mansion for ten days until he died there on March 26.

Prior to July 1937 the Yerkes mansion and galleries had become a garden to Thomas Fortune Ryan's home -- photo NYPL Collection

On December 13, 1925 The New York Times reported that neighbor Thomas Fortune Ryan had purchased the house and galleries for $1.1 million.  The buildings, it reported, were "to be torn down to enlarge the flower garden of Thomas Fortune Ryan...which will probably be the most valuable garden site in the world."   In July 1937 a modern apartment building was erected on the site.

photo by Alice Lum

R. H. Robertson's 1888 Jan Hus Church - 347 East 74th Street

photo nycago.com

During the second half of the 19th Century, immigrants flowed into New York from Bohemia – the European area that would later become the core of Czechoslavakia. Hungarian-born Presbyterian minister Gustav Albert Alexy pulled together about two dozen Czech-speaking immigrants in 1874 and planted the seed for what would become the Jan Hus Church three years later.

Unfortunately the Bohemians could not understand the Hungarian’s sermons. But it all worked out.

Named after the 15th Century Czech religious reformer and martyr, the congregation had grown large enough by the late 1880s to build its own building.

The Bohemian community was settling heavily in the Upper East Side and it was here, on East 74th Street between 1st and 2nd Avenues, that land was purchased for the new structure. Construction began in 1888 and was completed in 1891 at a cost of $50,000. Designed by R. H. Robertson, the church was on the cutting edge of religious architecture at the time.

Robertson was already known for his Romanesque Revival style – using chunky blocks of rough-cut stone blended with brick and terra cotta – but here he mixed in more traditional Gothic Revival elements. Over a century later the AIA Guide to New York City would muse “Bohemian Gothic Revival?”

The Jan Hus House to the right melded with the original architecture of the church -- photo radio.cz

In 1915 the Church house, known as the Jan Has House, was completed in a remarkably complimentary style – a nearly seamless design. The adjoining land and $5,000 had been donated by an anonymous “American friend of the work.” After $6,500 was contributed by congregants and others, the Church Extension Committee of New York Presbytery appropriated the remaining $28,500 to build the six-story structure.

Inside were classrooms, meeting rooms, “ample facilities for all the clubs,” living quarters for ten people, and the parsonage.

Chldren pose outside the Jan Hus House in 1917 -- photo "The Church and the City" (copyright expired)

A major problem with which the church had to content was the cavelier attitude of Bohemians towards organized religion. Their history of persecution resulted in most Czechs preferring to avoid organized services altogether.

By now the Bohemian community in New York numbered 30,000 and according to the Presbyterian Church’s 1917 “The Church and the City,” the Jan Hus Church was “The only distinctively Bohemian Protestant Christian work carried on” among them. Yet the church had an active congregation of only 350 members, with over Sunday School 1,000 members.

photo by radio.cz

In 1922 Czech historian Kenneth D. Miller explained that of the then 6,753 Protestant Bohemians in New York City, “fully five thousand people claim the Jan Hus Presbyterian Church as theirs. This means that they were baptized or married there, or have at some time attended Sunday School there.” It did not mean they were weekly worshipers.

Despite this, Jan Hus was one of the few self-supporting foreign language churches in the United States.

On February 6, 1930 Reverend Dr. Vincent Pisek died in the parsonage after serving the church for 46 years; the oldest pastor in the Presbytery in continuous service at the time. Among his many contributions to the church and congregation, Pisek was proud to have married 11,582 couples and claimed that not one of them had divorced.

In 1939 little girls dressed in traditional Czech costumes and the church was festooned in colorful Bohemian decorations when Jan Masaryk, the son of the founder of Czechoslovakia, paid a visit to Jan Hus. Over 700 congregants filled the church to hear Masaryk address the crowd.  Praising Americans, he declared “It is your great country that is giving us the lead.”

In 1952 the Jan Hus House became home to the Jan Hus Theater and the American Savoyards, which remained until 1967.  Throughout the next decades the 150-seat auditorium saw performers like Barbara Streisand in The Insect Comedy, her first New York role in 1960.  Troupes that performed here included LOOM (Light Opera of Manhattan), Chicago City Limits (a improvisation comedy team), The Remarkable Theater Brigade and the Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre Company.  Renowned comedians like Paul Reiser, Brett Butler, Robin Williams and Jerry Seinfeld have hosted the Chicago City Limits Friday night stand-up.

By the end of the 20th Century the masonry of Jan Hus Church was showing the effects of a century of use and weather. Burda Construction Corp. was hired to initiate an exterior restoration of the brownstone as well as reproducing many salvageable decorative stone elements.

The “Little Bohemia” neighborhood has changed. Few Czech-speaking residents still walk the streets or attend Jan Hus Church. But Roberson’s bold, robust building remains a handsome fixture of East 74th Street and an integral page of Manhattan’s multicultural history.

R. H. Robertson's Masterful St. Paul's Methodist Church -- West End Ave. and 86th Street

photo by Alice Lum

Many late Victorian architects rightly felt themselves the heirs to all that had passed before them. That philosophy led to the design of structures described as a “happy marriage of styles.” And so it was with R. H. Robertson’s St. Paul’s Methodist Episcopal Church on West End Avenue at 86th Street.

In 1895 St. Paul’s parish was already sixty-one years old; founded in 1834 in the then-residential Mulberry Street area near Bleecker Street. Progressive from its beginnings, it was only the second “pewed” Methodist church in New York City.  Half a century later a writer for The New York Times would recall that “As such it naturally gained a certain amount of notoriety, ‘pews’ being then considered by the great mass of the Methodists in the light of an innovation, and as such to be resisted to the last extremity.”

Thirty-six years after moving northward to Fourth Avenue and East 22nd Street in 1857, the congregation decided to move one last time—this time to the rapidly-developing Upper West Side.

St. Paul’s white marble church building was “known for many years…as the most expensive Methodist Church edifice in the city,” according to The New York Times. The congregation sold it in 1893 for $304,000 and held services for a time in the chapel of the Methodist Book Concern on Fifth Avenue at 20th Street, along what was called “Pater Noster Row,” while its next move was discussed.

On May 12, 1894 the purchase of seven lots on West End Avenue for $125,000 was announced, along with plans for a “new church, schoolroom, and parsonage.”

Robertson was commissioned to design the new church building. Stepping away from the Romanesque Revival style he had so successfully embraced in the 1880s, he dipped into an array of historic periods to create what was undeniably a “happy marriage of styles.”

Construction on the new church was begun in 1895 and the ambitious project was not completed until two years later. Inside the cornerstone, laid on June 27, 1895, were the old 1857 cornerstone, a piece of the marble from the old church and various contemporary documents.

Working in buff-colored brick and terra cotta, Robertson used the barn-like prototype of an early Christian basilica as his central structure. To it he added a soaring octagonal bell tower, inspired by German Romanesque churches, with Renaissance balconies at the belfry and deeply-framed roundel window.

photo by Alice Lum

At the opposite corner a shorter, square tower sat askew and in between an Italian Renaissance entrance porch with arched openings and magnificent Corinthian pilasters completed the design.  (To add to the mix, The New York Times remarked that “The style is an outgrowth of a study in the Spanish Renaissance.”)

Inside, “the audience room is of octagonal shape with unequal sides,” reported The Times. “There is a gallery on three sides, and the walls above the galleries are supported on a series of arches. The ceiling is an elliptical dome, with panel ornamentation.” The church, finished at a cost of $300,000, was designed to seat 1,200 worshipers.

Dedication services extended throughout the last week of September, 1897. The Times reported that at the October 3 service, “over 800 people sat, closely attentive throughout the long service, which was not concluded until 2 o’clock.”

The imposing church with its tall tower dominated the residential area, causing Bishop Foster to comment in World Wide Missions that it was “without a peer among the church edifices of Methodism.”

photo the New York Tribune, October 3, 1897 (copyright expired)

St. Paul’s was not the only Methodist church in the Upper West Side. Seven years earlier St. Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church had been completed, a hulking Romanesque Revival style building on West 75th Street and as St. Paul’s was being completed, Grace Methodist opened in 1896 on West 104th Street. But while row houses were being built at a phenomenal rate and development of the neighborhood seemed unstoppable, eventually it would become evident that there were not enough Methodists in the area to fill these grand buildings.

photo by Alice Lum

Not everything associated with St. Paul’s would be as progressive as the concept of pews. On April 3, 1927 the Rev. Dr. Clarence True Wilson of Washington D.C. “the leader of the Methodist dry forces,” addressed the congregation. Wilson, who carried the ponderous title of "General Secretary of the Board of Temperance, Prohibition and Public Morals of the Methodist Church," predicted the end of “liquor traffic.”

“There will never be a line dropped from the Eighteenth Amendment or the Volstead act as long as there is a United States of America,” said the reverend. “We have got only about six Senators down there in Washington who are wet. But they make noise enough for sixty…Of the last group of wet Senators that were down there, do you know what became of every one of them? Every one of them was defeated and left at home.”

The Twenty-first Amendment repealed the Eighteenth Amendment on December 5, 1933.

By 1937 the over-optimistic building of the Methodist churches on the Upper West Side was painfully evident and on November 7 Bishop Francis J. McConnell announced the merger of St. Andrew’s Methodist Episcopal Church with St. Paul’s – resulting in the Church of St. Paul and St. Andrew.  St. Andrew’s building was sold to the West Side Institutional Synagogue.

Graceful angels in bas relief frame the round windows above the entrance -- photo by Alice Lum

Robertson’s exceptional building survives essentially unchanged, what the AIA Guide to New York City calls “a startling work” and the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission calls “masterful.”

In designating the structure a landmark in 1981, the Commission noted that “St. Paul’s is among Robertson’s finest buildings and one of the most powerful and original statements of its period.”

St. James' Episcopal Church -- 865 Madison Avenue

photo by Alice Lum

Following the Revolutionary War, the summer estates of Manhattan’s wealthy citizens on the northern reaches of the island were reopened as a sort of normality returned.   Small churches were erected to serve the seasonal communities, among them St. James’ Church on Hamilton Square at 69^th Street and Lexington Avenue.

What would become Lexington Avenue is unpaved and muddy -- print from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Paid for by Trinity Church and built in 1809 through 1810, the clapboard chapel served the residents with properties along the East River.   Its rector rushed between services here and at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church, a similar wood-frame country church on the opposite side of the island, using the Harsenville Road (what is essentially now 71^st Street).

Within a decade several of the wealthy parishioners made the area their full-time residence.  The little church was opened year-round in the 1820s.  While the neighborhood remained rural for some time (in 1837 the city was renting much of the land as pasture); the city was moving closer.

During the Civil War Hamilton Square was used as a parade ground and in 1867 the city reduced its size to accommodate development.  Two years later, it eliminated the park altogether.   Despite the war raging to the south, development continued.  Engineers leveled Lenox Hill, laying out the cross streets and extending Lexington Avenue northward—necessitating the demolition of St. James’.

Now a heated discussion arose concerning a new building.  The neighborhood, known as Yorkville, had been filling with immigrants fleeing the overcrowded and unsanitary Lower East Side.  The rector pushed for rebuilding near the old site in order to serve this needy community.  The church trustees, however, preferred to retain the congregation’s upper-class tradition and move closer to the new mansions rising along Madison and Fifth Avenues.

Land was procured on East 72^nd Street and in 1869 the new church was dedicated.  The wealth of the congregation is evident in their choice of architects.  James Renwick, Jr. was responsible for the masterful Gothic Revival Grace Church, completed in 1846, and his monumental St. Patrick’s Cathedral was rising on Fifth Avenue when he was approached to design the new St. James’.    Renwick’s design would be less historically pure than the former two churches; its updated Victorian Gothic façade more charming than majestic.

But the Renwick church would not suffice for long.  Development of the Upper East Side boomed during the last quarter of the century and in 1884 construction began on a larger structure at the corner of Madison Avenue and 71^stStreet.  Once again the parish had turned to one of the leading architects of the time—R. H. Robertson.

Horse-drawn street cars go north and south near the Robertson-designed St. James' with its never-completed, stubby corner tower -- photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Robertson embraced the newly-popular Romanesque Revival style, developing his own take with rough-cut stone and contrasting materials.   For the new St. James’ Episcopal Church he played all his cards.  Brownstone, granite, terra cotta and tiled shingles melded together to form connected, arched windows, towers and arcades.  Robertson turned the building around, putting the entrance down the block rather than on Madison Avenue as would be expected.  Now there was no chance that the glorious windows of the chancel would be blacked out by tall construction next door.

The new building was completed in 1885 and services began with a rather stumpy corner tower still uncompleted.  It never would be.

Robertson's church and parsonage were a delicious feast of materials, textures and shapes -- photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Unlike the Gothic Revival style favored by Renwick that became nearly synonymous with ecclesiastical architecture, the Romanesque Revival style faded.  By the 1920s Robertson’s robust design was not yet historical, it was merely old-fashioned.  Perhaps no architect of the day was more well-known for his Gothic designs than Ralph Adams Cram.

In 1924 Cram was the Supervising Architect of Princeton University where his Collegiate Gothic buildings had been going up since 1907.  He had received the commission for the gigantic Cathedral of St. John the Divine in 1911 and was responsible, with Bertram Goodhue, for Saint Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue.  He was now approached by St. James’ to remodel the outdated church.

Cram removed Robertson’s towers and round arches and completely reoriented the sanctuary.   The three entrances openings were positioned on Madison Avenue, affording a grander entry.  Above the central entrance door a large, lacy rose window burst forth.  Robertson’s squat corner tower remained; but now with a more complete-looking Gothic belfry added by Cram in 1926. 

The earlier church was unrecognizable after Cram's redesign.  In 1926 the newly-added belfry is evident in the contrasting color and texture of the stone -- photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Inside the architect embellished the space with exposed polished beams supporting the ceiling, a gilded reredos and soaring stone arches.

Cram designed the breathtaking gilded reredos -- photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Structural problems with the Gothic tower appeared in the 1940s, necessitating its removal.  Architect Richard Kimball was commissioned to design a replacement which was completed in 1950.  By current tastes, the mid-century addition is, at best, incongruous.  The modernistic steeple has been dubbed “the tin can.”

photo from the collection of the Museum of the City of New York

Considering St. James’ somewhat haughty history, its outreach to the homeless in the 1980s might have seemed ironic.   In 1981 the Rev. William E. Smyth became alarmed at the increasing number of homeless bedding down on church doorsteps, including his.   He helped form the Neighborhood Coalition for Shelter with the support of other churches, synagogues and other institutions.  The coalition worked to find shelter for those truly in need.

Somewhat affectionately called the "tin can," Kimball's steeple marches to its own music -- photo by Alice Lum

The church opened a soup kitchen around the same time, offering meals to the homeless.  Well-dressed residents of the neighborhood would often see a line of up to 60 indigent men waiting patiently for a hot lunch.

A restoration of St. James’ was initiated in 1999 by architect Lee Harris Pomeroy.  Now half a century old, the anomalous Kimball steeple had become a familiar if quirky part of the architecture.  Rev. Brenda G. Husson reportedly explained “We all know it doesn’t fit architecturally, but it’s our steeple.”

photo by Alice Lum