Union League Club, ca. 1885. The Union League was an off-shoot of the Union Club, one of New York's oldest and most prestigious social clubs. The Union League was founded by supporters of the Union side during the Civil War. Its original building was in Manhattan on 26th Street, but chapters soon opened in a number of eastern cities. The Brooklyn chapter was founded in 1887 and in 1891 it moved into a brand new Romanesque Revival building on Dean and Bedford Streets. The red brick and brownstone building was imposing with large arched entranceways and a tall tower at the corner (which has since been removed). The large equestrian statue of President Grant that sits across the street from the entrance was commissioned and erected by the League.

Studebaker Building ARCHITECT: Tooker & Marsh DATE: 1920 STYLE: Neo-Gothic Built in 1920, the Studebaker Building is one of the few automobile showrooms remaining on Brooklyn’s once thriving Automobile Row, the stretch of Bedford Avenue running north and south from Fulton Street to Empire Boulevard in Crown Heights. Designed by New York-based architects Tooker and Marsh, the neo-Gothic style building is brick, clad in white terra cotta manufactured by the Atlantic Terra Cotta Works. An excellent example of a commercial terra-cotta clad structure which served as a company icon, the Studebaker Building retains the original terra-cotta design inscribed with the name “Studebaker” in black cursive on a diagonal banner across the wheel emblem, an image that was used by the corporation on buildings throughout the United States.

Loehmann's Department store was founded in this corner building in 1921 by Frieda Loehmann and her son. Frieda's business plan was to buy overstocks, samples, and discontinued products from top New York designers and sell them at affordable prices; she became known as the Grand Dame of Cut-Rate Fashion (long before Marshalls and T.J.Maxx). She would eventually buy this building and live upstairs. Though only one other Loehmann's opened during her lifetime (in the Bronx on Fordham Road). Following the founder's death in 1963, the store here on Bedford closed, but Charles Loehmann went public with the company and expanded nationwide. The company was bought and sold numerous times through the 1980s and at its peak around the turn of the 21st century, there were more than 100 stores in 17 states. The new century saw a number of bankruptcies before all the brick-and-mortar stores finally closed in 2014. For some time after Loehmann's closed at no. 1476, a similar store that used items purchased from Loehmann's closing auction, set up shop. In 1976 the building was sold to New Life Tabernacle Church of God in Christ, which it remains today.

Sterling Place, west from Franklin Avenue, showing the north side of the street, 1941.

Brooklyn Training School for Teachers, ca. 1930. Rendered in a Collegiate Renaissance Revival style, the Brooklyn Training School for Teachers was both a training school for aspiring teachers and the school in which their training was put into practice. This progressive model offered free education with theoretical and real classroom experience to a generation of adults, the children of immigrants, looking to make their way in the city. The building was completed between 1902 and 1907 as the population of New York, and as such, the number of students in its public schools, was booming. The training school model was discontinued in the early 1930s as the success of the program and the Depression resulted in an excess of qualified but out-of-work teachers. The building became a regular public grammar school called P.S. 138.

Troop C Armory 1555 Bedford Avenue Pilcher & Taschau 1903-1906 This massive structure was New York City’s first National Guard cavalry unit armory, and is the only Art Nouveau-inspired armory in Brooklyn. Architect Lewis F. Pilcher designed a unique stable wing within the building that could sanitarily house 117 horses – a major feat in the urban environment of Brooklyn. He utilized various levels and pitches for his floors, a complex drainage system and an abundance of windows and vents, all hidden behind the bays of the President Street exterior. The armory’s enormous drill shed, extra tall for ventilation, was also used for sporting and social events, and more recently, as a stage for movie sets. The administrative wing housed officer’s quarters and meeting rooms. The armory functioned as an active National Guard unit until as recently as 2011. Despite its important history and architectural contribution to the neighborhood and the city, the structure is unfortunately not protected as a designated landmark

The Kings County Savings Bank, date unknown. Designed by Halsey, McCormack & Helmer, the architectural firm that was responsible for the Williamsburg Savings Bank tower at Hanson Place, this Art Deco building was completed in 1930. The facade features sculptural figures of lions, a dog and a number of human representations of scientists, scholars, and inventors. Once the home of the Kings County Savings Bank, it now houses the Banco Popular.

Former Union League Club, General Grant Statue 19 Grant Square Designed by Peter J. Lauritzen, 1890 William Ordway Partridge, 1896 This handsome Romanesque Revival style building was constructed as a social club for the Union League, established in 1863 by Union supporters and members of Brooklyn’s Republican Party. The Grant Square façade abounds in Union iconography, most significantly in the brownstone busts of Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant above the entrance arches and a grand eagle supporting the second floor bay window. The building’s rich terra cotta trim includes a plethora of Byzantine leaf, popular in the 1880s and 1890s. The structure’s roofline suffered major alterations in the 1970s, including the removal of Spanish tiles, a turreted observation tower, and a gabled roof with a large dormer. In the early 20th century, after the boroughs were consolidated, the club merged with the Manhattan branch. In 1914, the building became home to a Jewish organization called the Unity Club until 1943, and was subsequently converted to a Yeshiva. The building currently houses the Bhraggs Grant Square Senior Citizens’ Center. The Union League Club commissioned the bronze statue of Grant that sits within the adjacent square, and donated it to the city in 1896, when it was unveiled on Grant’s birthday. The Former Union League Club of Brooklyn and General Grant statue are located within the Crown Heights North Historic District and State and National Register of Historic Places Crown Heights North Historic District.

Park Place adjoining northeast corner of Franklin Ave, 1941.

Described in the Crown Heights North Historic District designation report as “among Brooklyn’s most architecturally distinguished areas” and a “showcase for the work of architects who played an important role in Brooklyn’s development”, the neighborhood as a feast for the eyes. Its magnificent and varied residential architecture is peppered with grand religious and institutional buildings, and anchored by the picturesque Brower Park. The neighborhood’s northern and southern boundaries are Atlantic Avenue and Eastern Parkway, but its western and eastern boundaries are up for debate, though many consider them to be Washington Avenue and Ralph Avenue, respectively. The area’s three historic districts were designated between 2007 and 2015, and this story highlights some of the treasures found within and nearby those districts. The neighborhood’s transition from farmland to suburban enclave began in 1854 with the auction of land parcels by the area’s principal landowner, the Lefferts family. At that time, this area was known as the village of Bedford, a name it retained for some time. The area’s epic transformation over the ensuing half century was enabled by a series of major transportation improvements. The first was the introduction of stagecoach and horsecar service between Fulton Ferry and Bedford, which inspired the construction of freestanding villas on the Lefferts parcels. With the announcement of the new Brooklyn Bridge, to be completed in 1883, speculative rowhouse construction began as early as the 1870s, but dramatically increased after the Kings County Elevated Railway was completed along Fulton Street in 1888. It is this latter wave of development that most strongly characterizes the neighborhood’s architectural significance today. When the subway reached the area in 1920, apartment building construction increased to accommodate a growing commuter population. Around 1890, the area north of Sterling Place became known as the “St. Marks District”, but the moniker was short-lived, as many of the wealthy residents of St. Marks Avenue had moved away and their mansions demolished by 1920. Grant Square was also one of the most prestigious sections of Brooklyn at the turn of the century, second only to Grand Army Plaza in importance due to the prominent institutions on its borders, including the Union League Club, St. Bartholomew’s Church, and the 23rd Regiment Armory. The name “Crown Heights” was used starting around 1910 to describe the area south of Eastern Parkway. The area north of the parkway was called “Bedford” well into the 20th century, since the area was considered part of Bedford-Stuyvesant. However, “Crown Heights” gained traction with its white population in the mid-20th century as a way to differentiate itself from Bedford-Stuyvesant, which many began to consider a black ghetto. While historians often refer to Crown Heights “North” and “South” due to their demographic, architectural, topographical, and historical differences, most do not make this distinction even today. During its boom years, the population of Crown Heights North was of mainly European descent. By the mid-20th century, African- and Caribbean-Americans began to make up a significant portion of the population due to the 1936 opening of the Independent (IND) subway line, which provided direct access from Harlem, the center of the city’s black population. By the 1960s, Crown Heights had the largest Caribbean-American population in the city, and by the 1990s, was known as a major Caribbean-American hub in the entire country. Today, the neighborhood is changing yet again, with populations shifting as a result of rising rents throughout the city.

(Pilcher & Taschau, 1903-1906) This massive structure was New York City’s first National Guard cavalry unit armory, and is the only Art Nouveau-inspired armory in Brooklyn. Architect Lewis F. Pilcher designed a unique stable wing within the building that could sanitarily house 117 horses – a major feat in the urban environment of Brooklyn. He utilized various levels and pitches for his floors, a complex drainage system and an abundance of windows and vents, all hidden behind the bays of the President Street exterior. The armory’s enormous drill shed, extra tall for ventilation, was also used for sporting and social events, and more recently, as a stage for movie sets. The administrative wing housed officer’s quarters and meeting rooms. The armory functioned as an active National Guard unit until as recently as 2011. Despite its important history and architectural contribution to the neighborhood and the city, the structure is unfortunately not protected as a designated landmark. Many local and citywide activists are concerned that the building could be in danger of becoming the centerpiece of an inappropriate and unsympathetic development project that would destroy the original façade of its signature stable wing, and loom over the surrounding neighborhood.

Grant Square from Bergen Street, ca. 1925. The Union League Club and its statue of Ulysses S. Grant can be seen at right and center, respectively.

Located along the hilly terminal moraine between the prosperous communities of Bedford and Flatbush, Crown Heights South was considered a rocky no-man’s land of scrub farmland for most of the 19th century. During that time, it was home to subsistence farmers whose homes dotted the landscape, as well as poor Irish and black families who settled in shantytowns called “Crow Hill” and “Pigtown” by a derisive press. In 1846, this was where the city of Brooklyn placed the Kings County Penitentiary, as far from downtown Brooklyn as was feasible. By 1874, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux had completed Eastern Parkway as a Parisian-style boulevard to extend the picturesque character of Prospect Park into the expanding residential neighborhoods of Brooklyn. The parkway, which followed the moraine through the neighborhood that was now called Crown Heights, was designed to be lined with fine homes and mansions, though this housing never developed as Olmsted and Vaux envisioned. The thoroughfare did bring attention to the neighborhood, though, and formed the border between Crown Heights North and Crown Heights South in later years. While the northern side of Crown Heights was fully built up by 1900, it wasn’t until after the new century began that large-scale residential development began in southern Crown Heights. The north-south corridors of Nostrand, Bedford, Rogers and Franklin Avenues were already important transportation corridors, leading to the paving of Union, President, Carroll and other cross streets. Several major changes led to the development of Crown Heights South after the turn of the 20th century. These included the 1907 demolition of the infamous Kings County Penitentiary, which was replaced by a Jesuit Prep school and college; the 1913 construction of Ebbets Field, home to the Brooklyn Dodgers baseball team; the development of Brooklyn’s famous Automobile Row, with its showrooms and service centers, which flourished on Bedford Avenue between 1905 and 1945; and the presence of the nearby Brooklyn Museum, which opened in 1897. Encouraged by these developments, as well as the new subways constructed under Eastern Parkway, developers built up entire blocks at a time with new housing. With the exception of certain blocks of single-family mansions, much of what was built was designed for multiple families, as the age of the single-family rowhouse had nearly passed. Crown Heights South displays a fine array of architectural styles of the early 20th century, designed by such prominent Brooklyn architects as Montrose W. Morris, Axel Hedman, J. L. Brush, Arthur Koch and Slee & Bryson in the Revival styles popular at the time: Renaissance, Colonial, Flemish, Tudor and more. Today, the neighborhood retains its vibrant mix of residential architecture, including attached rowhouses, detached mansions and grand apartment buildings, as well as some fine religious buildings and grand institutions. One of its most well-known structures is the Bedford Armory, the city’s first mounted cavalry-unit armory that occupies an entire city block. The armory’s future is a source of controversy, with developers seeking to construct housing on the site and community members vying to preserve the building. Unfortunately, none of Crown Heights South’s architectural gems have been designated as landmarks by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission. Local advocates, including the Crown Heights South Association, formed in 2016, are working to survey and advocate for the neighborhood to ensure that any future changes are sensitive to its rich past.

Cameo Theatre, 1924. In 1924 Harrison Wiseman designed a grand Egyptian influenced Art Deco in Crown Heights. A well-known and sought after theatre architect Wiseman created a fanciful facade rendered in colorful terra cotta. A unique feature of this theatre's design was a 1500 seat roof garden auditorium (the concrete screening wall is still visible on the roof). The theatre, which became a Loew's house the year after it opened (and was renamed the Kameo), survived until 1974. That year the Philadelphian Sabbath Church bought the building. Used for church functions since then, the interior of the theatre has been well maintained, and the exterior ornamentation remains if a little dirty.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Epiphany (now Lutheran Church of the Epiphany) was founded in 1908. The building has an exterior of stone and was designed in the Gothic style. The present structure was built in 1925. It includes a gymnasium, kitchen, 800-seat auditorium, Sunday school, parsonage and sexton's quarters.

802 Park Place, 1925. According to the photographer's notes this small wood-frame structure is the gardener's cottage for the home of George B. Fisk. Fisk was president of the Long Island Rail Road from 1839 to 1847. He presumably had a large home, which by 1925 was no longer standing, somewhere in the vicinity of this cottage.