A guide to the places Bob Dylan worked, played and created in New York's Greenwich Village.

High pressure water system trench at Christopher and Washington Streets; undated photo. At left, the storefront at No. 163 Christopher Street (today known as 649 Washington Street) is occupied by druggist M.B. McAvoy. At right is the Christopher Street station of the Ninth Avenue Elevated line, above Greenwich Street. Between the two is the Church of St. Veronica.

251 West 13th Street, unknown date. 251 West 13th Street was originally the Jackson Square Branch of the New York Free Circulating Library. It was built in 1877 by the legendary Beaux-Arts architect, Richard Morris Hunt, who also designed the main entrance of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The library opened in one year later with a gift of over 6,000 books from the collector and philanthropist George W. Vanderbilt At the height of the library's popularity, it attracted over a hundred visitors every day and circulated about 126,000 volumes annually. The library closed in 1908 when presented with the challenge of disinfecting books that could transfer communicable diseases. In 1967, the performance artist Robert Delford Brown acquired the former library, which he dubbed "the Great Building Crack-Up." During Brown's tenure, the venue hosted various art events and performances and became the international headquarters of Brown's "Orthodox Pagan" First National Church of Exquisite Panic, Inc. Since 1995, television producer Tom Fontana has lived and had his offices here.

New York County National Bank ARCHITECT: DeLemos & Cordes; Rudolph L. Daus DATE: 1906-07 STYLE: Neo-Classical The Manufacturers Hanover Trust Company Building, built in 1907, is an exceptionally fine and well-conceived example of the neo-Classical bank type; that the overall design, though small in scale, employs the monumental classical type in a unified and structurally expressive manner. The well-proportioned composition superimposes two classical architectural systems, a trabeated and an arcuated order. The design is enhanced by fine stone carving, ‘Which incorporates Beaux-Arts ornamental motifs, classical symbols, and naturalistic elements. Among the noteworthy ornamental details are the entrance and window aedicules, the foliated spandrels, the classical balustrade and the imposing eagle in the pediment.

Whittemore House, October 21, 1935. President Abraham Lincoln, after saving the Union and winning the Civil War, was shot by actor John Wilkes Booth at the Ford Theater in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865, finally succumbing to his wounds the next morning on April 15th. Lincoln was the first U.S. President ever assassinated, and his death led to a protracted period of national mourning and political tumult, including the first impeachment of a U.S. President, Lincoln’s successor Andrew Johnson. But this event which changed the course of history might never have happened were it not for events connected to one of the most unusual houses in Greenwich Village, constructed by one of Greenwich Village’s most prolific builders, which thanks to landmark protections still stands. 45 Grove Street, just west of Bleecker Street, was originally a free-standing home built in 1830. According to the Greenwich Village Historic District designation report “it was undoubtedly one of the finest and largest Federal residences in Greenwich Village,” often referred to ask the Whittemore Mansion. It was built for Samuel Whittemore one of the major property owners in the area, and who was largely responsible for the early development of this part of the Village. Whittemore was the senior member of the firm of S. Whittemore & Company, manufacturers of steam-propelled carding equipment used in textile manufacturing. One of his factories was located nearby on Waverly Place, then known as Factory Street. When 45 Grove Street was originally built it was just two stories, and many of its original details including Flemish bond brickwork, arched doorway, and Federal lintels at the windows are still intact (the two upper stories were added in 1871). But by 1851, the neighborhood was becoming increasingly crowded with immigrants and industry, and the Whittemore Family sold it. Not long after the sale, the home was operating as a boarding house. One of the boarders was a man named Samuel K. Chester. Chester was an actor and associate of fellow actor John Wilkes Booth. Around the beginning of 1865, Booth came to 45 Grove Street to meet Chester at his home and try to persuade him to participate in a “conspiracy to take over the government” including kidnapping President Lincoln. Booth was a strong supporter of the Confederate cause, and wildly opposed to Lincoln’s war to save the Union and his move to free the slaves. After Chester turned Booth down the offer to assist with the kidnapping of the President, Booth changed his plan, deciding to murder the President. Had Chester either agreed to participate in the plan to kidnap the President, or reported Booth’s plot, Lincoln’s life might have been spared, and the course of history quite different. But he did neither. Just days after Lee’s surrender at Appamatox and the collapse of the Confederacy, Booth shot Lincoln as he watched a performance of ‘Our American Cousin’ at Ford’s Theater, shouting (by various accounts) “Sic semper tyrannis” (“Thus always to tyrants,” the state motto of Virginia) or “The South is avenged!” as he leaped from Lincoln’s box and onto the stage. He escaped, but after the largest manhunt in American history up to that time, he was shot and killed. Lincoln was replaced as President by Andrew Johnson, a Southern Democrat who was significantly more sympathetic to the Confederate cause than Lincoln, who refused to adopt or enforce many of the Republican party’s Reconstructionist programs granting rights to freed slaves. By another twist of fate, shortly after the Civil War, 45 Grove became known as the “Lincoln Home” for destitute soldiers and sailors. Early 20th century residents included the poet Hart Crane, who lived at this address when he wrote "The Bridge," a paean to the Brooklyn Bridge and New York.

The Gansevoort Market Historic District was landmarked in 2003 thanks to efforts by Village Preservation. In 2002 Village Preservation wrote: "Gansevoort Market is one of Manhattan's defining neighborhoods - gritty, hard-working, low-rise, with its own special character, and a rich collection of buildings and history that cannot be replaced." Since 2002 much of the grittiness has been replaced with luxury. The High Line has transformed from abandoned to desirable. The world-renowned Whitney Museum of American Art has replaced blue-collar meatpackers. But thanks to landmarking, the rich collection of buildings still define the area and remain (mostly) low-rise. The architecture of the district tells the story of an important era in New York City’s history when it became the financial center of the country and when its markets were expanding to serve the metropolitan region and beyond.

224 Waverly Place ca. 1933 St John’s in the Village suffered a catastrophic fire in the 1970s, destroying the previous church building on this site. The congregation decided to build a new church along with diverse performance and exhibition spaces to conform with its newly created mission statement which committed St John’s “to facilitate a continuing dialogue between the Christian faith and the artistic professions, acknowledging in this encounter that we share in common the enterprise of interpreting life, of advancing the quest for truth, and of reaching a fresh vision of reality.” The theater space at 224 Waverly Place has been home to Rattlestick Playwright’s Theater since 1994. Founded by Gary Bonasorte and Davis van Asselt, Rattlestick is an Obie-Award winning theatre that has developed and produced over 100 World Premieres in the past 23 seasons, including St. Vincent’s Project: Novenas for a Lost Hospital, an immersive play which Village Preservation is very proud to be a partner in creating. It will have its premiere on September 5th, 2019.

Pingpank Barber Shop ca. 1938 When Abbott photographed this shop window, August Pingpank was 87 years old, in business for more than 50 years, and said to be the oldest barber in New York City. On the verge of retirement, Pingpank remarked that “it’s different now with the men shaving themselves every morning at home.” Abbott’s photograph presents a distilled image of Pingpank’s world. Set up against a mirror are his customers’ personalized shaving mugs on a makeshift display stand. Given the place of honor on the stand are a Chinese porcelain jardiniere, a cut glass disinfectant jar, and a can of Jergen’s talcum powder. Attached to the mirror is a photograph of the shop’s interior, and on the left wall is a Victorian cigar advertisement. A horse-drawn cart is reflected in the window, a fitting accompaniment to this relic of a bygone era. Pingpank’s store, which falls within boundaries of the Greenwich Village Historic District, is currently occupied by an antique shop.

Sheridan Theatre, 1926. The theatre seen here is at the southern tip of the triangle formed by Seventh Avenue, Greenwich Avenue, and West 11th Street. The Sheridan Theatre opened in 1921 and was taken over by Loew's in 1926. The house sat 2,342 patrons. The building was demolished by St. Vincent's Hospital in 1969 for a proposed nurses residences (which never came to be).

51: 1843; 53: 1846; 1930, combined façade: William Bayard Willis) NYC IL, NYC HD, NR-P, NHL The Stonewall Inn was the starting point of the Stonewall Rebellion of June 28-July 2, 1969, which began when customers at the bar refused to leave during a police raid — in the 1960’s, it was illegal for a gay bar to obtain a liquor license and police routinely raided them. The uprising became a catalyst for the formation of organizations and groups across the country devoted to LGBTQ civil rights, and it’s commemorated nationwide and around the world with Pride marches and the celebration of LGBTQ Pride Month. In 2015, the Stonewall Inn became the city’s first Individual Landmark commemorating an LGBTQ site, designated entirely on the basis of its cultural, rather than architectural, significance. The area was designated as the Stonewall National Monument in 2016, the country’s first U.S. National Monument dedicated to LGBTQ civil rights history. Further State and National designations have made it one of the most decorated and protected sites in the city. Photo by Diana Davies/NYPL.

West 13th Street looking west to Pier 54, Master Purveyor, and the High Line, ca. 1990. For 44 years Master Purveyors was on 13th Street near Washington Street. The company relocated to Hunts Point Terminal Market, a 60-acre site in the Bronx, in spring 2001 when the landlord refused to renew the lease. Sam Solasz, the owner, describes his customer base as ''the finest hotels and restaurants in New York.'' Along with his two sons with whom he co-owns the business, Sam Solasz sells cuts to top-chop houses in the city like Peter Luger Steak House, Wolfgang's Steakhouse, '21' Club and the Hilton Hotel chain. Before starting Master Purveyors, Sam worked for Hygrade Food Corporation. It was the third largest meat business in the U.S. at the time, selling frankfurters to Nathan’s Famous Hot Dogs. Sam came up with the original blend of Nathan's while at Hygrade. "They loved it," he said. One week after his first blend, Nathan's started buying 2,000–3,000lbs of Sam's frankfurters weekly!

“A new warehouse is being built over and including the elevated roadbed in the block from Horatio to Gansevoort Streets. April 9, 1934.” The nine-story brick and limestone warehouse was designed by architects John B. Snook Sons for the New York State Realty & Terminal Company (owners of the elevated railroad right of way), built between 1931-35 and leased to the Manhattan Refrigerating Company, who bought the building outright in 1941. Construction on lower segment West Side Line elevated tracks was completed in 1934, eliminating all grade crossings of the former freight line along West Street and “Death Avenue,” as Tenth Avenue was nicknamed.

Wedged between the West Street portion of the West Side Highway and bustling 9th Avenue, the history of this site tells us about the many lives of this particular swath of Downtown Manhattan. This area was first largely industrial, then a hub of slaughterhouses and packing plants, and now an area densely populated with galleries as well as the latest home to the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Grocery store at the corner of Christopher and Bleecker Streets, June, 1925. This tiny corner store was built between 1802 and 1808 by a grocer named William Patterson, in what was then a rural village. In 1807, the house at the corner of Herring (Bleecker) and Christopher Streets served as a meeting place for the commission charged with designing Manhattan’s street grid. Lead surveyor John Randel spent ten years staking out and marking intersections from 1st Street to 155th Street. Recognized as a work of genius today, Randel and his surveyors were pelted with cabbages and artichokes by landowners furious at the prospect of streets being plowed through their properties.

Built as the New York headquarters for the Bell Telephone Laboratories, this industrial complex was one of the largest in the country when completed. As a telecommunication facility between 1898 and 1966, a number of major inventions took place here including the first transistor, first experimental talking movies, first vacuum tube, and early television. In 1966 Bell abandoned the massive complex. In 1968, under the direction of developer Dixon Bain and with funding from the J.M. Kaplan Fund and the National Council for the Arts (later the NEA), the buildings were converted into low-income live-work spaces for artists and their families. Westbeth Artists Housing was one of the first instances of adaptive reuse of industrial buildings for artistic and residential use in the country. The buildings opened to resident artists, including dancers, musicians, actors, writers, visual artists, and filmmakers in 1970. The building also became home to a number of large cultural organizations such as Martha Graham Center of Contemporary Dance and Congregation Beit Simchat Torah, the first LGBT synagogue in New York. Today the buildings are on the National Register and are a designated NYC landmark. They also remain the home and workplace of dozens of working artists.

The White Horse Tavern, ca. 1975. In addition to its literary bona fides, the White Horse served as a meeting place for leftists, labor organizations, and journalists, including writers associated with the Village Voice, whose 1960s headquarters at Sheridan Square was a short walk away.

Collapsed section of the West Side Elevated Highway, just north of 525 West Street, ca. 1975. On December 15, 1973 a section of the West Side Elevated Highway collapsed. 80 feet of the roadway fell to the street level below, along with a sedan and a dump truck. It is believed that the weight of the dump truck (more than 30 tons), which was carrying asphalt for highway roadwork, caused the collapse. (The truck was severely overloaded, with nearly 10 more tons than it should have been carrying.) Neither driver was seriously injured. This incident led to an investigation of the soundness of the elevated roadway. It was found to be serious defective and the road south of 46th Street was closed permanently.

A tour of the architectural and cultural gems of Bleecker Street. From Bob Dylan to Dylan Thomas, from Federal style rowhouses to new law tenements, Bleecker Street represents a wonderful cross-section of New York City’s diverse history.

102 Bedford Street. 102 Bedford Street began its life around 1830 as a 2 1/2 story wood-frame Federal style house — the kind of simple structure one sees throughout Greenwich Village and Lower Manhattan. It seemed to live a pretty unremarkable life until 1925 when Clifford Daily purchased the building. According to NY Times Streetscapes columnist Christopher Gray, records show Daily, 39 years old at the time, was unmarried, lived in an old house on Sheridan Square, and was the decorator of “The Little House,” a tea room located next door at 100 Bedford Street in the tiny former back shed of 17 Grove Street. The 1910s and 1920s saw a lot of new interest in Greenwich Village from artists and those who simply wanted to live around artists. Like today, real estate developers were quick to try to capitalize on this trend, and rundown buildings in the neighborhood were often given makeovers intended to project an artistic image. Few, however, were as complete, or as fanciful, in their transformation as 102 Bedford Street. The two and a half story building was raised to five stories and given a sort of Tudor/Medieval/Swiss Chalet facade, including the twin-peaked roofs, from which its name is derived. The building was specifically intended to attract artists, with 10 one-room studios with casement windows, similar to the “artists’ studios” which had been popping up on the top of houses throughout the Village during this time. Again according to Gray (citing the NY Herald Tribune) the building was originally painted black, green, orange, and blue — a color scheme which has long since been replaced with the more conventional brown and beige we see today, and of which there seems to be little or no photographic record. Perhaps most notable, however, was the building’s dedication ceremony: On May 21, 1926…the actress Mabel Normand stood on a platform on top of one of the gables and shattered a bottle of Champagne over the roof. Next to her, Princess Amelie Troubetskoy (an American novelist who had married a Russian prince in czarist days) burned acorns in a charcoal brazier in honor of the Greek god Pan. Holy water, flowers, and other rites also inaugurated the building. The studio apartments in the building are all tiny, approximately 20 by 18 feet. However, many maintain original details, and the interiors of the building literally ooze Village bohemian charm. Despite the incredible appeal of the apartment’s unique charms, their modest dimensions have given rise to some skepticism about claims that Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Walt Disney, Cary Grant, and Miles Davis each lived there for a time

The West Street facade of 6 Weehawken Street.

53-55 Little West 12th Street ca. 1970 On the other side of the High Line, just outside the Gansevoort Market Historic District, sits two old three-story rowhouses at 53 and 55 Little West 12th Street. Now home to the Brass Monkey, a popular restaurant and bar, the two little buildings sit by themselves. Looming in the background is the soaring Standard Hotel, designed by the Polshek Partnership (now Ennead Architects), and built in 2009. The contrast of these historic load-bearing brick rowhouses and the “floating” curtain-wall glass of the posh Standard Hotel speaks to the ever-changing character of this neighborhood. By going back in time a mere 25 years through the 1989 “then” photograph, we can see how this little section of the Meatpacking District has changed. I am particularly drawn to the “ghost town” quality of this photograph. Anything but abandoned, however, the district thrived not as a trendy club scene, but as a neighborhood full of vendors transporting goods in and out of warehouses. While a good portion of the area is now protected through the landmark designation of the Gansevoort Market Historic District we successfully fought for in 2003, the buildings on Little West 12th Street featured in the “then” photograph were not included. Of the four (built in 1888), only nos. 53 and 55 remain today. Their neighbors at nos. 51 and 57, oddly enough, were the more intact of the group with their pressed metal cornices still present in 1989 (the surviving middle buildings once had similar cornices). At the time, 51-55 Little West 12th Street operated as a meat processing plant with offices and cold storage facilities; no. 57 was part of the wholesale meat market at 20 Tenth Avenue around the corner. The surviving buildings at 53 and 55 have lost their metal canopy, and the triangular parapet of no. 55 has since been leveled. Although these parapets were not original to either building, it is likely they were added in 1930 when major alterations occurred inside each building (replacing cornices with stepped parapets was common in this era). These two little survivors have faced a lot of change over the years, but, even still, they continue to play a part in the neighborhood’s evolution. Be sure to look their way on your next walk along the High Line.

Charles Lane looking east, September 20, 1938. Named for the same man for whom Christopher Street is named, Charles Christopher Amos, Charles Lane is a narrow street with no sidewalks and a unique brick paving. The pavers, seen prominently in the photograph, are laid out horizontally with 3 rows of vertically paved bricks in the middle. This configuration, which created a sort of gutter in the middle, was likely constructed to assist in the drainage of water from the street into the gutter on nearby West Street. Like many of the small hidden Manhattan alleys, Charles Lane saw debris, garbage, and likely its share of illicit activity in the 20th century. Today it is a quiet, quaint street, lined with brick buildings, some of which were originally stables.

Formerly the Bell Telephone Laboratories Complex, the Westbeth Arts Complex is a group of buildings that takes up an entire city block. Westbeth is significant not only as the former home to one of the world’s most prestigious telecommunications research organizations but also as the first and largest publicly- and privately-funded artists’ housing project in the United States. Westbeth is a pioneer of large-scale industrial rehabilitation and adaptive reuse.

The Napolitana Kitchen, photographed by Berenice Abbott in 1947, in the ground floor space of no. 228, a 1900 Romanesque Revival tenement designed by Peter J. Herter.

High pressure water system trench crosses Jackson Square; undated photo. The city acquired the parcel at the intersection of Greenwich and Eighth Avenues and Horatio Street in 1826. While it's unclear exactly when or how this triangular park became known as Jackson Square, it is likely the name is in some way connected to President Andrew Jackson. Through the mid-19th century, Jackson Square served as a de facto meeting place for rallies and celebratory gatherings. In 1872, the Parks Commission officially recognized Jackson Square as parkland, and installed features including lamps, ironwork, and sidewalks. In the background, West 13th Street continues toward the Hudson River.

132 Bank Street This charming row of three brick residences was built in 1833 for William E. Fink, a grocer. These houses, early Greek Revival in style are three stories in height with basements. Nos. 132 and 134 have fronts of Flemish bond. The corner house, No. 136, is constructed of running bond, and the top floor attic windows have been replaced by larger ones. The original wrought iron hand railing of the stoops has been retained at all three houses. At Nos. 132 and 136, the horizontal band beneath the handrail proper is designed with a very graceful scrollwork pattern. The iron spindles are enhanced by a delicate ball design at mid-height. The handrailings, resting on very simple newels with urnlike bases, terminate in a curved volute. A simple wrought iron areaway railing, and wrought iron uprights, topped by small acorn finials may be seen at all three residences.; At. Nos. 132 and 136, the charming Greek Revival doorways have columns and transoms. These doorways consist of a handsome three-paneled door which is flanked on both sides by well proportioned, fluted Doric columns. The two handsome columns support a low entablature which is surmounted by a five-paned transom. A simple lintel, enhanced by a delicate cornice, is seen over the transom. The lintels above the muntined windows of the first and second floors of all three houses have had cornices added. In all three houses, the original sills remain unchanged. The facades may have originally been crowned by a deep fascia board with waterproofed surface seen at No. 134, with small windows cut into it. No. 136 has a shallow cornice set above the lengthened windows, while No. 132 was remodeled to provide a double window located on center with casements, above which a dormer has been added to obtain north light. Philip Evergood, a well-known painter, lived at No. 132 Bank Street from 1940-47.

Trowmart Inn ca. 1906 While the Martha Washington Hotel established a model for housing business women, a 1907 housing exposé titled: “The Problem of Living for 97,000 Girls,” emphasized the “Absurd Restrictions and Poor Housing Conditions” working-class women continued to suffer. The article mentions one innovative solution, however: the Trowmart Inn. Completed in 1906, the Trowmart picked up on the ideas put into practice at the Martha Washington and, for the first time, provided accommodation for the working-class girl without the strict rules of a “Moral Home.” Like its inspiration, the Trowmart highlighted this fact in its promotional brochures. Compared to the Martha Washington, the inn’s interior spaces and furnishings were plain and even utilitarian, but the Trowmart provided similar amenities: a dining room and cafeteria, “beau parlors” (small parlors where the residents could entertain their gentlemen friends), a large parlor with a piano, a library, and doctor’s office. In addition, the Trowmart provided a sewing room, full laundry, and a drying room, essential spaces for the shop, millinery, and factory girls for whom the Inn was planned. Living expenses ran to $4.50 to $5 per work week, with breakfast and dinner included. The Trowmart Inn was an immediate success: a 1908 newspaper article reported the hotel, which housed 250 women, had been full since its 1906 opening. The Trowmart was the exception however. The majority of women’s hotels constructed during the first few decades of the 20th century were for professional women.

Few neighborhoods in New York can claim as rich a tradition of social advocacy as Greenwich Village. This collection documents the homes and lives of a few of them.

West Washington Market, August 18, 1936. West Washington Market consisted of ten two-story brick buildings between the piers and West Street, west of the Gansevoort Market Stand, an enormous, open-air produce market. Access lanes ran between the buildings (Loew Avenue is pictured, at left), which were erected in the 1880s to replace an earlier market complex. West Washington Market was demolished in the 1950s and replaced by the Gansevoort Garbage Terminal, where garbage was loaded onto barges to be dumped off-shore. The garbage terminal closed in 1981, but the site is still occupied by the Sanitation Department.

Le Gandarme ca. 1970 The 9th (later 6th) Police Precinct Station House was the first New York City police station house built under the new Police Commissioner Theodore Roosevelt in 1896-97. It became familiarly known as the “Charles Street Police Station,” and also included a prison and a stable wing. The building ceased to function as a police station in January 1971 after the construction of the new station at 229-235 West 10th Street. The old police station was sold at auction and converted to “Le Gendarme” Apartments in 1977. Only eight months after the Stonewall uprising, in the early morning of March 8, 1970, police raided the Snake Pit, a gay-run non-Mafia, the after-hours bar in the basement of a Greenwich Village apartment building at 215 West 10th Street. The raid was led by Seymour Pine, who had also led the ill-fated raid on the Stonewall. Fearing similar rioting from the crowd of patrons, the police arrested 167 people, who were taken nearby to the 6th Police Precinct Station House. Argentinian immigrant Diego Vinales apparently panicked over the possibility of deportation, tried to escape from the second story of the jail, and was impaled on the iron fence below. According to Arthur Bell in Dancing the Gay Lib Blues: A Year in the Homosexual Liberation Movement, one witness later commented, “I was at the window right after he landed on the spikes. The remarks the cops made after this happened were unbelievable. One cop said to a fireman, ‘You don’t have to hurry, he’s dead, and if he’s not, he’s not going to live long.’ I was with three or four kids when one of the kids heard crying and screaming out. Then the other kids started crying. They saw what was happening and they were shaken. But the remarks kept coming from the cops. They probably thought they were justified. Diego was a faggot, they said. They used the word faggot so many times it was unbelievable.” Vinales was cut loose along with part of the fence, taken to St. Vincent’s Hospital and survived, but word spread that he was dead or dying. The Gay Activists Alliance and Gay Liberation Front organized a quick response – an angry protest by a crowd numbering around 500 people, who marched from Christopher Park to the police station.

Felipe Rose of the Village People, Can't Stop the Music Film Set in front of 244 West 4th Street, 1979.

23 West 13th Street, c. 1994 Substation 235, located at 23 West 13th Street on at the intersection of Greenwich Avenue and Horatio Street. The structure was built in 1932 during the construction of the IND Eighth Avenue Line, a project that lasted from 1932 until 1940. A substation is fed power from a central station that is converted from high voltage alternating current (AC) into low voltage direct current (DC) to power the subway. This substation and others constructed for the IND line were the first to be non-manually operated. Greenwich Substation was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2005 as a unique piece of New York City's transit history. The masonry structure's footprint, a chamfered rectangle, reflects the infill lot's geometric condition at this bustling intersection. The facade is adorned with limestone, brick, and aluminum; its loading dock doors are framed by Art Deco motifs and sunburst patterns, not uncommon of substations and telephone buildings of the era. The human-scaled entrance is decorated more modestly and located at the level of the sidewalk.

St. John's Evangelical Lutheran Church, ca. 1978. Built 1821-22 as the Eighth Presbyterian Church, the Federal style church was sold to St. Matthew’s Episcopal in 1842. The church was sold again in 1855, this time to a Lutheran congregation of German immigrants. In 1886, Victorian embellishments were added to the facade, including a new pediment inscription commemorating the church’s German-American heritage: “Deutsche Evangelish-Lutherische St. Johannes Kirche.

Village Preservation places plaques on sites in our neighborhoods to mark the locations of historically significant events, organizations, places, or figures. Click here to learn more about our plaque program, including upcoming unveiling.

Saint John's in the Village ca. 1970 The Greek Revival made several modifications in the conventional Greek temple form. Where the width of a building might have required six columns (hexastyle) and the cost of erecting them was prohibitive, the scheme of bringing the sidewalls forward (in antis) and using two columns (distyle) was followed; the balance of the width was met by widening as much as required on each side of the portico, with flush walls parallel to the street. These walls were the unusual feature, resulting in an exceedingly handsome innovation. This church is distyle in antis, combined with prostyle tetrastyle (having four columns).

53 Gansevoort Street, 1936. This triangular building (seen at its most narrow near Ninth Avenue) was constructed in 1887 for Robert and Ogden Goelet. Designed by Joseph M. Dunn, the five-story, store and loft building, housed dozens of food and meat manufacturers and purveyors through the 19th and 20th century. The Goelet family (whose ownership of the property began prior to this building in 1847) held onto the building until 1942. Today the food history of building remains seen in the faded painted logos of its facade which note "BURNHAM'S CLAM CHOWDER" and "NEW ENGLAND BISCUIT WORK."

St. Bernard's Roman Catholic Church ca. 1930 St. Bernard’s, at 328-332 West 14th Street and now known as Our Lady of Guadalupe at St. Bernard’s, was originally founded by Irish immigrants during the wave of immigration resulting from the 1840’s famine. This church served relatively middle class “Lace Curtain Irish” (opposed to the lower classes known as “Shanty Irish”), who worked as longshoreman, janitors, mechanics, and teamsters, and owned saloons, stables, blacksmith shops, and the other types of businesses needed to support the industries of the time.

“Looking down a narrow lane at children on the porch of 9 ½ Jane Street, 1915.” The three-story house is accessed by an alley to the west of no. 9 Jane Street, a four-story brick townhouse built in 1844 for tinsmith Walter H. Mead. The rear house was built in 1854.

St. Luke’s Chapel (Church of St. Luke in the Fields), ca. 1912. St. Luke’s was established in 1820 as a chapel of Trinity Church. Clement C. Moore, the first pastor, was responsible for planning the full-block complex that included a brick church building in the Federal style (1821-2), private burial ground, rectory, and surrounding townhouses. James N. Wells, a prolific builder, was responsible for construction. The popular moniker “St. Luke’s in-the-fields” arose from the character of the surrounding neighborhood at the time the church was built. Greenwich Village, though starting to be developed, still included considerable tracts of farmland. St. Luke’s has long had a reputation for philanthropy and ministry to the poor, including in recent decades, as the West Village community was hard-hit by the AIDS crisis. The AIDS Project of St. Luke’s, founded in 1987, provided food and care to New Yorkers, including many parishioners, affected by the crisis.

Valerie Perrine being filmed in Can't Stop the Music in front of Sevilla Restaurant & Bar, 1979.

Spanning over a century of architectural styles from the 1860s to 1960s, with a stellar renovation in the 1970s by Richard Meier, the Bell Laboratories Building Complex is an amazing example of adaptive reuse. The oldest building in the complex was constructed in the vernacular Italianate style circa 1860 to house the Hook’s Steam-Powered Factory. It is one of the last remaining 19th-century industrial buildings on the Hudson Riverfront. From the 1920s to the 1960s, the complex served as the headquarters for Bell Laboratories and bore witness to parts of the Manhattan Project and innovations including the first television broadcast. When Bell Laboratories vacated the property in the early 1960s, the complex fell into disrepair and found itself at the mercy of an aggressive Urban Renewal Program. Jane Jacobs spoke on behalf of the West Village Committee at a townhall discussing the demolition of Bell Laboratories, arguing that the complex suffered only from negligible blight and that it would be unconscionable to demolish it. Thankfully, Bell Laboratories escaped this fate, with an innovative plan to convert the historic structure into a hybrid work/live artists’ studios complex. In 1968, the J.M. Kaplan Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts provided $1 million in seed money to purchase the former Bell Laboratories site for the Westbeth Artists’ Housing project. The adaptive reuse project was designed by Richard Meier, who was inspired by Le Corbusier’s Unite d’Habitation in Marseilles. Meier created 383 single-story and duplex residential units, gallery spaces, dance and theater performing spaces, and common studio spaces in the basement and the Section I (former Hook’s Steam-powered Factory) building. The Bell Laboratories complex showcases the evolution of the West Village from a gritty industrial hub to a hot spot for art and architecture.

James Baldwin Residence ca. 1930 James Baldwin was born in Harlem in 1924 and became a celebrated writer and social critic in his lifetime, exploring complicated issues such as racial, sexual, and class tensions, as a gay African-American man. Baldwin spent some of his most prolific writing years living in Greenwich Village and wrote of his time there in many of his essays, such as "Notes of a Native Son". Many of Baldwin's works address the personal struggles faced by not only black men but of gay and bisexual men, amid a complex social atmosphere. His second novel, Giovanni's Room, focuses on the life of an American man living in Paris and his feelings and frustrations with his relationships with other men. It was published in 1956, well before gay rights were widely supported in America. His residence from 1958 to 1963 was 81 Horatio Street. A historic plaque memorializing his time there was unveiled on October 7, 2015.

New York has always been a great place to enjoy a pint (or three). A rare class of the city’s taverns date to Prohibition days or earlier, and each carries decades of local history: from the Revolutionary War to the gay rights movement. Starting with the Old Town Bar on 18th Street, take a loop through downtown Manhattan, and pay a visit to the dives that have withstood the test of time.

59 Christopher Street, ca. 1909. This Greenwich Village standard, known as Kettle of Fish, was established 1950 as a Wisconsin Sconnie bar. In the early-1960s, when the bar was located at 116 MacDougal Street, it emerged as a major hangout for Beat writers like Jack Kerouac, and musicians and writers, including Gregory Corso, Allen Ginsberg, Joyce Johnson, Bob Dylan, and Andy Warhol among others. Kettle of Fish later moved to Third Street, where the live music venue Fat Black Pussy Cat is now, before relocating to its current Christopher Street location in the late 1990s. While the bar has moved twice since its opening, through the years, Kettle of Fish has proven to be popular with people from all walks of life -- intellects, musicians, writers, and sports fans alike. The owner, who hails from Wisconsin, has made the bar the go-to NYC spot for Packers and Badgers fans!

60-74 Gansevoort Street, ca. 1980. The buildings at 60-68 and 70-74 Gansevoort Street were constructed by the firm of Voorhees, Walker, Foley & Smith in the early 1940s. The one-story building at the corner (nos 70-74) was constructed for the Emigrant Industrial Savings Bank and served as a freight truck depot before becoming a wholesale meat market building in 1950. The two-story building at left (nos. 60-68) is the alteration of a 19th century structure. Constructed in 1881 as a five-story neo-Grec tenement, the building was reduced by three floors and converted into a market building in 1940, complete with metal canopy, a tell-tale feature of the market buildings.

505-507 West Street, ca. 1929. The Jane, formerly known as the American Seamen’s Friend Society Sailors’ Home and Institute, is a landmark building that was originally designed as a hotel for sailors. Constructed in 1907-08, the structure was designed by William A. Boring, also the architect of the immigration station on Ellis Island. His designs for the building include a chapel, concert hall, and a bowling alley. On April 19, 1912, the American Seamen’s Friend Society Sailors’ Home and Institute hosted a memorial service for surviving sailors rescued from the Titanic. The hotel was also used to house survivors while the American inquest into the sinking was held. In 1944, the YMCA took over the building. It has since taken on a number of different uses. During a period in the mid-1980s, the American drag performer RuPaul lived in the tower of the hotel. In 2000, the building was designated a New York City landmark.

Christopher Street Station, June 18, 1936.

Just behind 17 Grove’s wooden workshop lies a building that captures the whimsy, flamboyance, and bohemian spirit of early-20th-century Greenwich Village like no other. This Story is adapted from a blog, which can be viewed here.

The Stonewall Inn, site of the 1969 Stonewall riots, 1969. The buildings at 51-53 Christopher Street were constructed in the 1840s as stables. In 1930 the two buildings were given a unified first floor of an Arts & Crafts style brick and stucco facade. The Stonewall Inn opened in 1967 and became a popular bar for the LGBT community. In the early morning of June 28th, 1969 the police raided the bar (as they often did to gay establishments in the 1960s). The patrons of the bar did not disperse as ordered but instead fought back, angrily remaining on the streets in front of the bar, growing in numbers, and chanting at the rough treatment of those arrested. The Stonewall Riots (sometimes referred to as the Stonewall Uprising) lasted for the next six days and included demonstrations that encompassed the surrounding blocks. This event is considered the beginning of the modern LGBT right movement. The buildings (today only no. 53 is the Stonewall Inn, an iteration that opened in 1993) are a part of the Greenwich Village Historic District, designated in 1969. In 2000 it was the first LGBT-related location to be named to the National Register of Historic Places and in 2015 an individual landmark designation was enacting, marking its cultural importance and making it the first landmark in New York City to be recognized on the basis of its status in LGBT history.

367 Bleecker Street, ca. 1980.

"Southeast on Greenwich Avenue from Horatio Street on southwest side and 13th Street on northeast side to its southeastern terminus at Sixth Avenue, March 10, 1933." Designed by architect George F. Pelham in 1882, the building was constructed as studio apartments. The LPC Designation Report for Greenwich Village notes its "prow-like" shape at the narrow angled point between Greenwich Avenue and West 13th Street.

Bell Telephone Laboratories Complex ARCHITECT: Cyrus L. W. Eidlitz; McKenzie, Voorhees & Gmelin; Warren B. Sanford; Richard Meier DATE: 1860-1903 STYLE: Neo-Classical 45-465 West Street, 137-169 Bank Street, 51-77 Bethune Street, and 734-754 Washington Street, Manhattan. Built c. 1860; 1896-1903, Cyrus L.W. Eidlitz, architect, Marc Eidlitz & Son, builder; 1924-26, McKenzie, Voorhees & Gmelin, architect, Tidewater Building Co., builder; 1929, Warren B. Sanford, engineer, Turner Construction Co., builder; 1931-34 alterations, Voorhees, Gmelin & Walker, architect; and 1968-70 conversion, Richard Meier, architect. The Bell Telephone Laboratories Complex, occupying an entire city block in Manhattan’s Far West Village, is highly significant as the site of one of the world’s most prestigious telecommunications research organizations, where research work that resulted in many significant innovations and inventions was conducted, and later, as the first and largest publicly- and privately-funded artists’ housing project in the United States, as well as a pioneering large-scale industrial rehabilitation project. The Western Electric Co. built an office and factory building for telephone-related equipment (1896-1903) at 455-465 West Street, 149 Bank Street, and 734-742 Washington Street. After 1913, the building ceased as a manufacturing plant and was largely the headquarters of Western Electric’s Engineering Department. In 1925, it became Bell Telephone Laboratories for research and development for both the American Telegraph & Telephone Co. and Western Electric Co. After Bell Labs vacated the property in 1966, Roger L. Stevens, first chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, conceived of the complex as a pilot project of subsidized, affordable studio living quarters for artists, which was substantially supported and inaugurated by the J.M. Kaplan Fund. It was converted in 1968-70 into Westbeth Artists’ Housing, the first major work by architect Richard Meier, with 383 residential and work studio units, as well as gallery, performance, and commercial spaces, and a park.

163 Christopher Street, at the N. W. corner of Washington Street showing "McAvoy's Drug Store" which was operated by a local character lovingly known as "Mother McAvoy." To sailors and truckmen of the neighborhood she was more than a druggist. She was a friendly counsellor, and a 'bank" and "post office" for sailors on their brief stays ashore. From her old-fashioned desk in the store and through her self-acquired knowledge of various foreign languages, and acting as a Notary Public she helped many sailors turn to land lubbering. Proximity to the Federal Building increased her field of operations. She was born in Rome, N. Y. and was graduated from N. Y. C. P. in 1902. After clerking in several drug-stores she bought this little store for $3500. At this time her clientele consisted of many New Jersey people who commuted on the Christopher Street Ferry. She died at the age of 64.

St. Veronica's ca. 1985 St. Veronica’s, located on Christopher Street between Washington and Greenwich Streets, was built to accommodate the growing congregation of St. Joseph’s, as the Irish population of longshoreman who worked along the docks of the Hudson River grew. The parish was formed in 1887 by the Reverend John Fitzharris of St. Joseph’s Church with a collection by local parishes. Services began in a warehouse at the corner of Washington and Barrow Streets. The Irish congregation laid the cornerstone in 1890, but the final dedication would not be until 1903, owing to the limited financial means of the congregation’s working class parishioners. The church is named for named for Veronica, the woman who is credited with wiping the face of Jesus and is depicted on the 6th Station of the Cross.

Herring Building, May 4, 1927. Built in 1849 for Silas Clark Herring, the building served as the headquarters of the Herring Lock and Safe Company. The metal "Salamander" safes sold by this company included innovative plaster-of-Paris lining technology, which purported to be fireproof. The neo-Grec, though more generally vernacular building, is five stories tall and is given its odd shape by the meeting of Ninth Avenue and Hudson Street at 14th Street. The northern section of the building, which gives it the shape that earned the moniker of "Little Flatiron" was actually an addition circa 1860. In the late 19th and early 20th century the building was home to variety of food related businesses, including grocers, saloons, restaurants, and at least one butcher. This address has been best known in the late 20th century, as the location of a series of well-known clubs, the most prominent being the basement BDSM Hellfire Club (1971-2002).

St. Vincent's Triangle, ca, 1976. The plan for a nurses' residence on this plot never came to be. The triangle was used as a community garden and greening-recycling center for many years. Sometime in the late 20th century, St. Vincent's built a low-rise, brick materials receiving center on a section of the plot. The hospital closed in 2010, and a park was planned through community review, and constructed by the development company as part of the hospital to residence conversion work. The park was given to the city in 2017. A year earlier the park was dedicated as the NYC AIDS Memorial Park. (The former hospital was the city's first and largest AIDS ward.) The new park includes an 18-foot steel canopy-shaped public memorial, "to honor New York City's 100,000+ men, women and children who have died from AIDS, and to commemorate and celebrate the efforts of the caregivers and activists."

In 1967, neo-Dada artist Robert Delford Brown performed one of his greatest pieces of all time, which he titled "The Great Building Crack-Up." The performance was meant to evoke a collision of the new and the old. The site of the performance was the elegantly designed brownstone by Beaux-Arts master Richard Morris Hunt. It was a meeting of Avant-garde minds between Brown and the architect Paul Rudolph. This is the story of a building that has lived many lives.

555 Hudson Street, Manhattan (1842, attributed to John Cole) NYC HD From 1947 to 1968, this was the home of author, urban theorist and activist Jane Jacobs (1916-2006). While it is not certain that she wrote her 1961 seminal work “The Death and Life of Great American Cities” here, she did often reference her home in Greenwich Village while extolling the virtues of thriving urban settings with bustling sidewalks and small-scale, mixed-use buildings —like 555 Hudson. She wrote and spoke out against the then-rising practice of slum clearance and urban renewal, and was instrumental in the fight to save the South Village, SoHo and Little Italy from Robert Moses’ Lower Manhattan Expressway. Her work heavily influenced contemporary urban thought, despite urban planners who, at the time, criticized her lack of formal education. Today, her legacy is celebrated every May with Jane’s Walks — volunteer-led walking tours in urban neighborhoods — throughout the country. Photo by NYC Municipal Archives

St. Luke's Chapel, October 21, 1935. The parish of St. Luke's was organized by Greenwich Village community members in the fall of 1820. They named the church after St. Luke, the physician, as a reference to the town's use as refuge from the yellow fever epidemics that plagued New York City during the summers. One of the church's founders was Clement Clark Moore, Oriental and Greek Literature scholar, author of "Twas the Night Before Christmas," and real estate developer of Chelsea. The church building was constructed between 1821 and 1822 on a plot of land donated by Trinity Church. In 1891 St. Luke's would become a chapel of Trinity Church. That relationship lasted through 1976, when St. Luke's once again became an independent parish of the Episcopal Church. A major fire in 1981destroyed much of the church building, but thought fundraising the structure was restored. Throughout the later 20th century the church became very active in community ministries, working with people with AIDS and at-risk LGBTQ youth.

One of New York’s most beloved and iconic landmarks, the Flatiron Building is known for (among other things) its unique shape. But of course, the corner of 23rd Street and Fifth Avenue isn’t the only place in Manhattan where streets intersect at quirky angles. In fact, the Village’s off-the-grid streets are full of them. More information can be found here.

David Christie House at 131 Charles Street, next door to the NYPD Sixth Precinct, 1928. Christie, a stonecutter, built this Federal style house in 1834. It retains many of its original features, including Flemish bond brickwork and wooden window frames. Left of the front steps is the alley door, leading to a small outbuilding at the rear of the lot. The photographer Diane Arbus lived in the that carriage house, now known as 131½ between 1957 and 1966.

The White Horse Tavern at Hudson and 11th (formerly Hammond) Streets, 1933. Opened in 1880, the White Horse became known as a hub for literary and “Bohemian” New Yorkers in the 1950s and 1960s. Among its notable patrons was Dylan Thomas, the Welsh poet — and prodigious drinker — who was a frequent visitor right up until his death in 1953 (two days after he is said to have ordered eighteen whiskeys at the White Horse).

1 Little West 12th Street Many people know the restaurant Bagatelle located at 1 Little West 12th Street for their lavish brunch parties, where as one recent brunch reviewer stated “I’ve never seen so many bottles of Dom Perignon ordered in my life”. Bagatelle helped changed the face of NYC brunch in 2008 from a laid back Sunday afternoon meal to a party atmosphere featuring live DJ’s and $15,000 bottles of champagne. 1 Little West 12th Street was built in 1909 and is located in NYC’s Gansevoort Market Historic District. It is also part of the Gansevoort Market National Register Historic District. This building plays a role in several important aspects of NYC history including the famous Astor family, the meatpacking industry, and currently, the tech industry, which according to Bloomberg News is now NYC’s second largest industry, employing almost 300,000 people. According to the designation report, “This Arts and Crafts style building, which is largely intact, contributes to the historically mixed architectural character and varied uses – including market-related functions – of the Gansevoort Market Historic District. Constructed in 1913, during one of the major phases of development of the area when storage- and market-related buildings continued to be constructed in the district, it further contributes to the visual cohesion of the district through its brick facade and metal canopy.” This property has a long and storied history. When built in 1913 by William Vincent Astor, a member of the prominent Astor family, the address was 5 Little West 12th Street, a.k.a. 2 Ninth Avenue. From 1913-1922 it served as a warehouse for the provisions firm of C. Percival, which was established in 1868, and according to the book History and Commerce of New York, published 1891, supplied “hotels, restaurants, and steamers on a large scale, as well as the general public, with pressed larding pork, breaded pig’s feet, sugar cured ham, bacon, pure lard, and provisions of a like description”. 1 Little West 12th was then owned by Ottman & Co. for use as a packaging and processing plant, with storage on one floor, and butchering and packaging on other floors. Ottman & Co. was owend and operated by Jacob “Jack” Ottman, descendant of Phillip of Philipp Ottmann & Company which was founded in 1859 and later renamed William Ottmann & Company (around 1876) of Fulton Market. William Ottmann & Company was sold around 1916 to rival Beinecke & Company, who were originally in the meatpacking business, and were also owners at the time of the Plaza Hotel. Note one of the n’s was dropped from the last name to work around a non-compete clause that was part of the sale of the original company. Ottman & Co., after a brief stint at 446-448 West 13th Street moved into part of the building in 1919, with C. Percival using the rest, and eventually bought the entire building along with the neighboring buildings 1 and 3 Little West 12th street, which Ottman & Co. had used as administrative offices. The former 1 Little West 12th Street was built in 1887 and was also known as the Middendorf building and housed Middendorf & Rohrs grocery company. The former 3 Little West 12th Street was built in 1918 and also housed the Middendorf & Rohrs company for many decades. The three buildings were sold in 1987 to Peter J. and Richard P. Kleinknecht, who ran Kleinknecht Electric Co. Inc. from the space. This company was founded in 1916, and is still “solving all of your electrical needs” from West 37th Street. In 1998 the property was sold to current owner William Gottlieb Real Estate. In 2011, after remaining vacant for over 10 years, once bricked over windows that shielded refrigerated spaces that were devoted to the production and storage of portion controlled frozen meats, were opened up to house new “boutique” office tenants WeWork, a company that leases office space to startups. Bagatelle moved into the ground floor space from a different Meatpacking District location in 2012.

Workers lay pipe in a trench at the corner of West 11th Street and Greenwich Avenue; undated photo. In the early 1900s, the Monahan Express Company, an express mail courier service, operated from the ground floor and stables of No. 61-71 Greenwich Avenue, a former brewery also occupied by an industrial stamping company and a wine importer. In February 1907, a fire caused more that $100,000 of damage to the "old-time brewhouse." The fire-damaged building was eventually demolished ahead of construction for the Seventh Avenue Extension and the IRT Seventh Avenue subway line.

Constructed on a newly laid out street and on land that had most recently been the Newgate State Prison, the wood-frame building at 6 Weehawken Street has a long and varied history. Opened in 1834 by the City as part of an open-air market called the Greenwich Market, its design was purposeful. The deep eaves of the roof protected the produce from the weather. The market lasted just a decade. In 1848 the building was bought and repurposed by a boat builder for his business (and also probably a saloon). The proximity to the water and its related businesses and sea-going, likely hard-drinking populations, made this an ideal location for a tavern. In the late 19th and early 20th century, it served variously as an insurance brokerage, cigar store, and pool hall. By the 1920s it was “Billie’s Original Clam Broth House.” Further tenants in the 20th century included a sort of clothing/accessory shop for dock workers, a trucking company, and a couple of gay bars. In late 2016 the building's owner, Jean-Louis Goldwater Bourgeois, architectural historian and son of the famed sculptor, Louise Bourgeois, announced he was giving the building, and more land it was on back to the original Manhattanites. Having bought it in 2006 for $2.2 million, he was gifting it to a nonprofit controlled by the Lenape tribe. A few years later, it is unclear if the transfer of property went through.

Charles Lane ca. 1938 Abbott called Charles Lane the only genuine back alley she ever found in New York City. The lane was one block long, sandwiched between the New York Central Railroad freight viaduct and the elevated West Side Express Highway. Abbott focused on the south side of the lane, lined with stables and tradesmen shops, as it was in the 19th century. First paved with cobblestone in 1893, the alley is still cobblestoned, but its buildings, both old and new, are now residential. After a successful battle in the late 1960s against a high-rise housing proposal, Charles Lane retains its scale and quaint character.

New York City is known for many things: Art Deco skyscrapers, picturesque parks, the world’s greatest theater district, venerable museums and educational institutions, not to mention bagels and pizza! But above all of these, New York is most important as home to some of the world’s most fascinating and significant people and as the site of impactful and significant happenings throughout history. The city’s cultural influence is, perhaps, its greatest contribution to the world, and its built environment stands as a grand scavenger hunt of clues waiting to be uncovered. Lucky for us, the city’s Landmarks Law, passed in 1965, provides the legal framework for protecting the physical reminders of the city’s cultural wealth. In fact, one of the stated purposes of the Landmarks Law is to “safeguard the city’s historic, aesthetic and cultural heritage.” In the first 50 years that landmarks were designated by the City, much emphasis was placed on the historic and aesthetic. In recent years, though, more consideration has been made for the importance of sites associated with people or historical events, rather than just for their architectural or historical value. In 2015, the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) designated the Stonewall Inn as an Individual Landmark solely for its association with the Stonewall Uprising of 1969. In 2018, the Commission designated the Central Harlem—West 130th-132nd Streets Historic District, describing it as “not only representative of Central Harlem’s residential architecture, but the rich social, cultural, and political life of its African American population in the 20th century.” Also, in recent years, Greenwich Village’s Caffe Cino and Julius’ Bar were listed on the National Register of Historic Places as significant and influential sites connected to the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender (LGBTQ) community, The New York Times profiled a historian giving tours of Muslim sites of significance in Harlem, and the City is commemorating some of our most storied and accomplished female citizens with the installation of statues in all five boroughs. Indeed, grassroots preservation activism around the city is also swelling around sites of cultural significance: Tin Pan Alley and Little Syria in Manhattan, Walt Whitman’s house in Brooklyn, Arthur Avenue in The Bronx and a recently-rediscovered African burial ground in Queens, to name a few. In response to this 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, organized thematically and representing all five boroughs. 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.

The wooden house at 17 Grove Street (at Bedford Street) is often assumed to be one of the oldest houses, if not the oldest house, in Greenwich Village. It’s a good guess since wooden house construction was banned in Manhattan starting in the early 19th century in response to fires in these densely-packed precincts. The prohibition was enacted first below Canal Street in 1816, then below 32nd Street in 1849, and finally below 155th Street in 1882. But 17 Grove Street only dates to 1822 (actually, just the first two floors do; the third floor was added in 1870). This makes it a relative youngster compared to some of the houses found in these parts, in spite of its charmingly anachronistic look. But regardless of its date of construction, 17 Grove is one of the most photographed and beloved houses to be found anywhere in the Village. And while there are several wooden houses in the Greenwich Village Historic District (including the 1799 Isaac Hendricks House diagonally across the street at 77 Bedford Street), most of those have been covered in brick. But 17 Grove proudly wears its woodenness on its sleeve. It also improbably maintains the wooden workshop behind it on Bedford Street, built by the original owner William Hyde, a window sash maker. Both the main house and the former workshop are now single-family residences.

American Seamen’s Friend Society Sailors’ Home and Institute ARCHITECT: William A. Boring DATE: 1907-08 STYLE: Neo-Classical This building was constructed in 1907-08 to the handsome neo-Classical style design of architect William A. Boring. The American Seaman’s Friend Society, established in New York City in 1828, was one of a number of nineteenth-century religious organizations concerned with improving the social and moral welfare of seamen throughout the U.S. and abroad. After the luxury liner Titanic sank in 1912, surviving crew members received care here.

79 Eighth Avenue, ca. 1980. One of two landmark banks on this corner, the Manufacturers Hanover Trust Company Building was constructed in 1907 to the designs of De Lemos & Cordes. Created in the model of the "City Beautiful" movement, which postulated that beautiful civic and commercial buildings could promote moral and civic virtue among urban populations, the architects produced a stately, classical building that has enured more than a century.

The Lucille Lortel Theatre, ca. 1984. This landmark theater is the Lucille Lortel Theater, formerly known to many as the Theatre de Lys. The facade of the theater today does not reflect the rich overall history of the site. In fact, who knew the theater was converted from two row houses and rear stables dating back to 1868? Before becoming a motion picture house and theater, the two homes were owned by a rug and carpet merchant named Jeremiah W. Dimick. It is not certain if he and his family lived at this home because Dimick was a bit of a real estate mogul. Shortly before his death in 1896, Dimick was shamed in the New York Times with other property owners for creating unfathomably terrible housing for lower class tenants. His rear stables at 121 and 123 Christopher Street were converted into housing; piling 14 and 10 tenants into each respectively. His son, also named Jeremiah, would take over the property and allow the site, with rear stables and all, to be converted into a motion picture house, called the New Hudson Theater, around 1913. In 1932, the Dimick family no longer owned the property and the theater would change hands several times as the Hudson Playhouse, Theatre de Lys and finally its current owners, the Lucille Lortel Foundation. The theater today is still going strong with a performance almost every day.

The Carey Lithograph Company building, to the west of elevated railroad track construction, 1933. Following the demolition of buildings along Washington Street to make way for elevated tracks, the Carey building was the only structure in the square block bounded by West, Gansevoort, Washington, and Horatio Streets not owned by the Manhattan Refrigerating Company.

299 West 12th Street ca. 1932 Built in 1929-31, this 16-story apartment house is clad in multi-colored brick set in Flemish bond creating an interesting texture to the exterior. Randomly cut and placed stones of varying colors are placed at the window and door openings and at the corners of the building. Along with 59 West 12th Street, this was one of two collaborations between Emery Roth and the development team of Bing & Bing and exemplified the elegant interwar style of New York apartment building for which both came to be known.

Wood-frame house at the corner of Grove and Bedford Streets, May 12, 1936. This house was built by window sash-maker William Hyde in 1822, the year of a yellow fever outbreak which drove New Yorkers to the safety of rural Greenwich Village. Originally a two-story structure in the Federal style, a third floor and new cornice were added in 1870. No. 17 Grove Street is the Village's largest remaining wood-frame structure, predating Manhattan’s 1866 ban on new construction of wooden homes. In addition to the main house, Hyde’s workshop at 100 Bedford Street (rear, at left) has survived to the present day.

“Twin Peaks” house at 102 Bedford Street, 1932. In its first incarnation, 102 Bedford was an 1830s Federal style wood-frame house. In 1925, Clifford Reed Daily — with financial backing from financier Otto Kahn — bought the house and undertook a whimsical renovation, adding its distinctive peaks and subdividing the interior into small and unusual living quarters. Stranger still was the building’s dedication ceremony, originally reported in the Herald Tribune, reproduced in the New York Times in 2003: “The actress Mabel Normand stood on a platform on top of one of the gables and shattered a bottle of Champagne over the roof. Next to her, Princess Amelie Troubetskoy (an American novelist who had married a Russian prince in czarist days) burned acorns in a charcoal brazier in honor of the Greek god Pan. Holy water, flowers and other rites also inaugurated the building.”

Grocery store at the corner of Christopher and Bleecker Streets, June 18, 1936. One of Greenwich Village’s oldest buildings, this corner store was built as a grocery in 1802. Its top floor was reputedly the office of the commission that laid out the 1811 grid plan for the development of Manhattan Island. The structure was itself a victim of urban planning: in 1828, when a bend in Bleecker Street was eliminated to facilitate the smooth flow of traffic across Christopher Street, the store lost 20 feet of its width. Abbott’s photograph shows the brick wall, extending behind and above the old clapboard structure, which marks the building’s truncation. The grocery was run by a single owner for 25 years and remained remarkably unchanged until 1997. It is currently under renovation as a pizza shop.

Throughout the years many artists have called Greenwich Village home. This collection highlights the writers of Greenwich Village.

Music is an integral part of the cultural legacy and impact of our neighborhoods! In March 2019 we explored the iconic music venues and punk meccas of the East Village through East Village Building Blocks. Today we’re venturing west into the Greenwich Village Historic District for another musical tour.