Paramount Theater, ca. 1995. The Paramount Theatre opened in October in 1930 and was second only to the St. George Theatre in grandeur and reputation on Staten Island. The Art Deco theatre, which sat 2,300 patrons, was actually constructed on land that had once been the childhood home of the famed railroad and shipping magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt. A major selling point for the theatre was its double console Wurlitzer theatre organ, one of only ten in the whole country when it was installed. The movie house was extensively renovated in the 1960s but suffered the same loss of patronage as many other movie theaters in the city and closed in 1977. The next decade saw the space serving briefly as a multi-purpose event hall, a nightclub, and, most notably, as a rock venue. Acts who performed here include the B-52’s, Squeeze, and the Ramones. Despite some success, the venue was short-lived and closed sometime in the1980s. The space has been largely abandoned since then, its future uncertain. Various plans have included demolition for high-rise apartments and restoration and creation of an event space and live performance venue. Work towards this type of conversion began in 2009 but was halted in 2010. In recent years, a number of TV productions have been filmed here including Gotham and Marvel’s The Defenders.

360 Bay Street, ca. 1927. At the corner of Bay and Grant Streets once stood the Planters Hotel, a Federal style brick townhouse that dated back to 1821. Built by Georgia businessman Robert Grant, the hotel was a popular resort for Southerner plantation owners who, before the Civil War, visited New York frequently to sell cotton. When the war broke out, many of these clients moved their families to the area surrounding the hotel to live in safety. After the Civil War, one of Staten Island's earliest photographers, H. Hoyer, rented out a studio in the space for a year. While his stay was short, in the years that followed, Hoyer's photography business was taken over by the notable photographer, John Loefflers. The photography business remained in operation for more than 50 years. In 1975, the old hotel building was demolished to make way for a car dealership.

St. Paul's Episcopal Church was erected in 1834. The parish moved to a new building in 1866. The new brick structure was constructed just to the north on St. Pauls Avenue.

Public School 15, September 9, 1937. Completed in 1898 as the Middletown Township District School No. 1, the stately building with prominent clock tower was constructed on a plot occupied by a school since 1855. Designed by Staten Island resident and architect Edward Alfred Sargent, the later named Public School 15 is rendered in a rough-textured red brick with terra cotta and stone trim. Though Sargent is best known for his Queen Anne, Shingle, and Colonial Revival home design, he completed three schools on Staten Island. With two of the other schools lost, Public School 15 remains Sargent's educational legacy in the borough. The school building was designated a New York City landmark in 1996 and after a number of decades as administrative offices (the school functions ceased in 1965) the building has returned to education use as Public School 65.

St. Paul’s Memorial Church and Rectory CLIENT: St. Paul's Memorial Church ARCHITECT: Edward T. Potter DATE: 1866-70 STYLE: High Victorian Gothic St. Paul’s Memorial Church and Rectory, begun in 1866 and designed by architect Edward T. Potter, are outstanding examples of High Victorian Gothic style. In their picturesque design and excellent use of local stone, the two buildings seem especially appropriate to the rural setting of Stapleton, one of the oldest sections of Staten Island.

St. Paul's Protestant Episcopal Church ca. 1954 A small, but a monumental example of the traditional English Gothic Style. The church has good fenestration, proportions, and elegant use of gray trap rock. St. Paul's was built by the Ward family, formerly of New York, but at the time of its building (1866) of Staten Island. It was dedicated as a memorial church to the family and is typical of the American gothic revival movement and style.

Located to the northwest of Harrison Street is the St. Paul’s Avenue–Stapleton Heights Historic District, which was designated by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission in 2004. This district encompasses several lovely churches and 92 freestanding houses, plus smaller ancillary structures, which were largely constructed for prominent local businessmen and politicians. Built as a more wealthy enclave than Harrison Street, the houses are more elaborate in their size, massing and architectural detail. The neighborhood has long been one of Staten Island’s most prestigious places to live. Running through the district is St. Paul’s Avenue, an impressive stretch of residences that links the historic villages of Tompkinsville and Stapleton. Development in the area began in 1826, when Caleb T. Ward purchased 250 acres, including the entirety of the historic district. Ward laid out streets and building lots in 1829. The two earliest houses in the district are 172 and 204 St. Paul’s Avenue, which date to the mid-1830s. The former was originally the rectory for the first St. Paul’s Church (demolished 1870) and the latter was a private home built by James Creighton. Both were designed in the Greek Revival style, which was very fashionable at that time.

In response to the movement of interest in cultural landmarks, the Historic Districts Council undertook an initiative to highlight such places as one of its Six to Celebrate in 2018. The culmination of that effort was a conference in October 2018 entitled “Beyond Bricks and Mortar: Rethinking Sites of Cultural History.” The conference convened preservationists, historians, artists, planners, place-makers and more to work together to clarify what cultural significance is and how it can work, how to document and create compelling narratives around cultural sites, and how to identify the specific challenges of cultural sites from a preservationist perspective. This tour provides just a sample of some of the city’s cultural landmarks. The list includes some sites that are legally protected — in some cases by more than one government body — and some that are unfortunately in danger of being lost. Preserving culturally significant sites that may not possess overtly aesthetic value often requires a particularly active and engaged form of advocacy to achieve protection from the wrecking ball. But, as long as there are interesting people making their mark on New York City and crucial events taking place here, that effort will never be in vain, since those stories are the lifeblood of this vibrant place.

199 St. Pauls Avenue, October 22, 1926. According to the photographer's notes for this photograph, this home was, for a time, the residence of Richard Adams Locke. Locke, a British journalist who wrote for the New York newspaper The Sun, was said to be the author of a newspaper hoax in 1835. Called the "Great Moon Hoax," a series of articles which described the discovery of an animal civilization on the moon by astronomer Sir John Herschel. Herschel supposedly observed bison, goats, unicorns, bipedal tail-less beavers, bat-like winged humanoids, and the structures they had built. Herschal was not involved in the hoax and in fact did not know until longer after the fact that these discoveries were attributed to him. Likely undertaken to boost the circulation of the newspaper, the hoax was an undeniable success, eclipsing a similar hoax story published by Edgar Allan Poe a few months earlier, and launching The Sun into dramatically increased distribution and reputation.

364 Van Duzer Street CLIENT: Robert M. Hazard ARCHITECT: Unknown DATE: 1835 STYLE: Greek Revival This frame house, built in modified Greek Revival style, is one of the last remaining examples in the area. The most striking feature of this house is the stately tetrastyle portico with its Doric columns rising two stories to an entablature below an overhanging spring-eave. The use of a spring-eave on a Greek Revival house, rather than a triangular gable, is unusual and is more characteristic of the so-called Dutch Colonial style.

207 St. Paul’s Avenue, Staten Island 10 (1898, Otto P. Loeffler) NYC IL, NYC HD From 1972 to 1987, acclaimed African- American lesbian writer and activist Audre Lorde (1934-1992) lived in this neo-Classical house with her two children, Elizabeth and Jonathan, and her partner, Frances Clayton. Lorde accomplished a great deal while living here, including the publication of numerous influential books, poems, articles and essays that dealt with the issues of civil rights, feminism and lesbianism; held positions as professor of English at John Jay College and as the Thomas Hunter Chair of Literature at Hunter College; spoke at the 1979 National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights; co-founded Kitchen-Table: Women of Color Press and was bestowed with many honors, including the Borough of Manhattan President’s Award for Literary Excellence in 1987. From 1991 until her death from liver cancer the following year, Lorde was the New York State Poet Laureate. Photo by Sarah Moses, NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission.