Public School 64, 1920. Constructed between 1904 and 1906 to the designs of BOE architect C.B.J. Snyder, the French Renaissance Revival style building adheres to Snyder's usual H shaped design. When opened the school could hold 2,500 students and later had an annex constructed to accommodate a larger student body. As the populations of the East Village and Lower East Side declined in the 1970s and in the midst of the city's financial crisis, the school was closed in 1977. Soon after closing the building became the home of a number of non-profits, including Adopt-A-Building (which trained and empowered residents of blighted neighborhoods to improve their own buildings) and CHARAS (a neighborhood center that fostered community-based urban ecology, arts and culture). After two decades of successful reactivation of the school space, the building was sold by the Giuliani administration to a developer in 1998. The groups were evicted in 2001. For the last 15 years, the building has continued to deteriorate. The school was landmarked in 2006 and various plans have been suggested for its redevelopment, including as dormitories, which most of the local community vehemently opposes. In the fall of 2017 current mayor De Blasio stated that the city wished to buy back the property, but the future of the building is unknown.

746 East 9th Street. Service Builders Supply is visible.

93 Avenue D; 283 East 7th Street Building Date : 1903 Original Use : Residential/Commercial Original Owner : Samuel Greenstein Original Architect : Alfred E. Badh Description & Building Alterations This six story New Law tenement building was designed by Alfred E. Badh and was erected in 1902 to house 20 families for $45,000. The building is light brick with red brick detailing brick belt courses along the second story and windows feature pediment and broken pediment lintels, arches, and decorative keystones. Stores were located on the ground floor, which is still true today. The building was originally owned by Samuel Greenstein of 123 Orchard Street. Two earlier buildings were demolished to make way for this building.

The Eagle Pencil Company was one of the largest producers of No. 2 pencils in the early 20th century, employing thousands in New York City. In mid-1938 the company announced a 10% pay cut for all existing employees with an increased working schedule to 44 hours a week. On June 16th, 1938, 850 Eagle Pencil Workers walked out to demand a contract and restoration of the recent pay cut. The strike was recorded extensively by the Edwin Levick Studio, the leaders in the emerging spot news photography. The studio sold these photos to local newspapers around the city. The strike became well known and was even covered in the local Marxist paper, 'The Socialist Appeal,' arguing for public support for the union workers. The strike lasted seven weeks, ending on August 8th when the company agreed to welcome back all the striking employees and promised to reinstate their original pay.

636 East 6th Street | Block : 387 | Lot #127 Building Date : 1846 Original Use : Residential Original Owner : John Pheilan Original Architect : Unknown Description & Building Alterations No. 636 East 6th Street was erected in 1846 as a row house. It was altered for the United Brethren Mission of the Moravian Church in 1889 by architects Calvert Vaux and George K. Radford. In 1906, the building became a synagogue. On the 1853 map it is a brick dwelling. On the 1868 map, the house has been extended at the rear and it is labeled “Moravian Chapel,” and by 1893 it is labeled “P.E. Church.” The first architect associated with the building, in 1889, is George Kent Radford, who worked with Calvert Vaux on the building adjacent in the same year. Originally a Moravian Chapel, the building also served as a German Church and a synagogue at one time. A rose window was once above the door where there is now a cross in a recessed circle. There was also a cornice at the top of the building, similar in design to its neighbor at 638 East 6th Street. Based on alteration permits from 1909, it appears that the front of the building underwent significant changes. The bricks at the top of the facade are set at forty five degree angles, creating an interesting pattern and texture. Terra cotta tiles cover the window openings. The openings are capped by decorative brick work and are arched at the tops; the center opening features a pointed arch.

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This image was gifted to the National Art Gallery by Gary S. David.

Public School 36, 1920. Constructed in 1876 as Grammar School No. 36 and designed by David I. Stagg (whose career as a builder of schools lasted half a century), the school building on East 9th Street replaced a previous Board of Education school on the site (Ward School 21). The four-story structure with a five-story central entrance bay, Grammar School 36, later P.S. 36, remained in service to the neighborhood children until the 1970s. For three decades at the end of the 20th century it was the home of the Henry Street Settlement Day Care and Loisaida, a Latino neighborhood revitalization organization. In 2011 the former school underwent a massive interior and exterior renovation. The building had a a full fifth floor added on either side of the historic top floor bay. Today it functions as a residence for homeless young adults and youth that have aged out of the foster system, as well as a community center for the Loisaida organization.

Construction on the BMT Canarsie Line (L) at Avenue D, November 28, 1916.

No. 206 East 7th Street, an Old Law Tenement, was constructed in 1900 and designed by architect Michael Bernstein, one year after its architecturally similar neighbor at 204 East 7th Street, by the same architect. Allen Ginsberg lived in the building from 1952 to 1953 after his institutionalization at Columbia Presbyterian Psychiatric Institute. Ginsberg befriended a fellow patient named Carl Solomon, nephew of A. A. Wyn of Ace Books. Solomon helped publish Junkie: Confessions of an Unredeemed Drug Addict, written by beat generation writer William S. Burroughs as a confessional novel. Ginsberg and Burroughs lived together on the third floor of this building, after Burroughs accidentally shot and killed his wife in Mexico and sought refuge. The six-story building is four bays wide and clad in buff brick. The windows at the first and fifth floors are arched with decorative keystones and the windows at the second floor have segmental arches also with decorative keystones. The windows at the third and fourth floors are capped by ornate lintels and the entire facade features recessed bands of contrasting red brick. The first floor is three bays with the entry at the center and all of the openings are arched. The metal cornice is intact and It originally housed twenty-four families with stores on the ground floor. The architectural features of the building’s upper stories remain intact, however, the above-ground basement appears to have undergone some changes since its construction. This image is from Village Preservation's East Village Building Blocks map. You can explore the map and more buildings in the East Village by clicking here.

Carpathian Russian Orthodox Catholic Church of the Holy Trinity, April 26, 1935. Constructed in 1892, this church first served the Slovak and Hungarian immigrant community. From 1918 1o 1975 it was a Russian Eastern Orthodox Church, and from 1975 until recently was the home of a little-known Catholic sect that practices the Mozarabic rite (possibly the only congregation of its kind in the United States).

638 East 6th Street Building Date : 1846 Original Use : Residential Original Owner : William Shay Original Architect : Unknown Description & Building Alterations This three story, three bay, masonry structure has a symmetrical facade clad in gray brick with red brick at the top floor set at a 45 degree angle creating an interesting pattern. The parapet is peaked at the center and has a bracketed cornice. The windows are double hung with small square panes around a large center pane. There is a large rose window at the third floor flanked by horseshoe arch windows and decorative egg and dart molding around each. At the center of the second floor is a double hung window capped by a Gothic arched window and also surrounded by egg and dart molding. The round arched entry surround has a replacement door but still maintains the egg and dart molding at the top. The 1853 map illustrates a brick dwelling at this location. By 1868 the structure is a two story store or warehouse and by 1893 it is a brick building with an iron front. The first record of this building comes from an alteration permit in 1869, indicating that the building was being used as an office. A decade later, the building was converted into a synagogue for the Congregation Ahawath Yeshurun Shara Torah. In 1900 in addition to other renovations, ritual baths were built in the basement. The building was used as a synagogue until the 1970’s when the 6th Street Block Association which would become the 6th Street Community Center began to use the building. Some architectural features pointing to its past have been retained, including a Hebrew Inscription over the entry door.

This remarkably intact Gothic Revival church’s form, design, details, and history reflect the kaleidoscope of immigrants and ethnic groups which called the Lower East Side home and shaped New York over the last century and a quarter — making it not just architecturally significant but an embodiment of New York City’s and the East Village’s immigrant history. This structure was originally built in 1891-92 and designed by Edward Wenz for the Church of St. Elizabeth of Hungary, serving the surrounding Slovak and Hungarian immigrant community. The church was the first national Slovak parish for the Slovak and Hungarian Catholics of New York and Brooklyn. Later the building was bought by the Russian Greek Orthodox National Association and became the Carpathian Russian Orthodox Church of St. Nicholas. It served the emerging Russian immigrant community in the early and mid-twentieth century, as evidenced by the royal seal of the Russian Czars located on the church’s front gates. After 1975, the church housed San Isidoro y San Leandro Western Orthodox Catholic Church of Hispanic Mozarabic Rite, a highly unusual Western Orthodox Catholic Church – seemingly one of the very few in America, and one of the few or perhaps only to practice the Mozarabic Rite. Two-headed eagle, symbolic of the Russian Empire, at the iron fence in front of the church Edward Wenz was a successful architect well known for his design of many speculative builders’ work, particularly residential structures in upper Manhattan. Born in Germany in 1855, he migrated to the United States and settled in New York City in 1880. It is not clear where Edward Wenz received his architectural education, but it is recorded that he started to practice architectural design as early as 1887. One of his most notable works, the Park View Flats on Central Park West between 103rd and 104th Streets (1893, demolished) was a combination of nine handsome apartment houses that occupied the entire block front facing Central Park. The Real Estate Record and Builders’ Guide of 1893 described it as among the year’s most notable structures along Central Park West. The early years of the Church of St. Elizabeth of Hungary were marked by instability and a constantly changing series of pastors and priests. From 1892 to 1895, in merely three years, three different pastors were appointed to replace the previous one. Conflicts between the Slovaks, who originally founded the church, and an increasing number of Hungarians that later became the majority of the congregation, intensified in 1895, resulting in the withdrawal of the Slovaks. In spite of this instability in its early decades, St. Elizabeth’s eventually became a leading Hungarian church in the city. In 1905, under the direction of the church pastor Francis C. Denes, who replaced the previous Slovak priest, a Hungarian Catholic Club was established, for which the Hungarian Consul-General served as the chairman. Denes’ apartment, which was on the top floor of the church building, hosted the first meeting of the club. As Central Europeans began to move uptown to neighborhoods like Yorkville, the Church of St. Elizabeth also relocated to East 83rd Street. As more Eastern Europeans moved into the neighborhood in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the church was sold to the Russian Greek Orthodox National Association, Inc. in 1918 for $18,500. Eastern Orthodoxy is a form of Christianity that diverged from Roman Catholicism in late antiquity and centered in Eastern Europe and in the Eastern Mediterranean. Separate national churches would evolve and these Eastern Orthodox churches would have a major presence in America with the immigration of the Eastern Europeans in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The see of the Russian Orthodox Church in America was moved from Alaska to San Francisco by 1880, but with the wave of immigration to New York from Eastern Europe at the end of the nineteenth century, the see was moved to New York City in 1905. The Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church sold the property in 1975 and it became the home to San Isidoro y San Leandro Western Orthodox Catholic Church of the Hispanic Mozarabic Rite. Western Rite Orthodoxy, Western Orthodoxy, and Orthodox Western Rite are terms used to describe congregations and groups which are in communion with Eastern Orthodox Churches or Oriental Orthodox Churches, but which use traditional Western liturgies rather than adopting Eastern liturgies such as the Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom.

Even pencil making can be a contentious business- On June 16th, 1938, the Eagle Pencil Workers went on strike!