Martin Beck Theater ARCHITECT: C. Albert Lansburgh DATE: 1923-24 STYLE: Byzantine The Martin Beck Theater survives today as one of the historic theaters that symbolize American theater for both New York and the nation. It was designed for Martin Beck, one of America’s great vaudeville producers, by G. Albert Lansburgh, a prominent theater designer who considered it his finest work. Beck and Lansburgh created an unusual and exotic design based on Byzantine motifs, making the Beck architecturally unique among the Broadway theaters. Among its outstanding characteristics is its double-height stone-faced arcade with elaborately carved capitals. For over half a century the Martin Beck has served as home to countless numbers of the plays through which the Broadway theater has come to personify American theater. Its presence helps visually to define the Broadway theater district, the largest and most famous concentration of legitimate stage theaters in the world.

The West 47th Street Police Station was built in 1860. The station was nestled in Hell's Kitchen and in proximity to the Theater District, which meant the station was always busy. One rumor claims that after a risque play titled "Sex," actress and playwright Mae West was arrested and brought in to the station. The station was known as the 26th, 9th, 18th, and then 16th precinct, exchanging titles as Manhattan's landscape changed around it. In 1933, the station became the target of a lively protest. In summer months, children living in tenement apartments across the city sought relief from heatwaves by prying open fire hydrants. At the expense of instant relief, streets, gutters, and cellars were flooded. Soon the fire department claimed that so many hydrants left open might deplete their supply of water if an actual fire broke out. In response, the police closed every hydrant. Outraged a crowd of "400 youngsters, most of them clad in bathing suits and other scanty attire, staged a noisy demonstration outside the West 47th street station." The demonstration, which lasted less than an hour, was reported in the New York Times on June 10th, 1933. By the 1960s, the station, then known as Traffic Station D, was slated for demolition. After the building was razed, the city-owned plot was given to the FDNY as a potential site for developing a new firehouse, though it remained empty for a number of years. Seeking the empty lot as a space for community growth and development, a coalition of local activists, led by Ramon Aponte, garnered the support of a local developer to buy the plot for public use. Hell's Kitchen was riddled with crime from the 1970s through the 1980s, and Aponte recognized creating public spaces was key to reinstilling a sense of safety in the area. The land was turned into a park with a playground and was maintained by the 47th Street Block Association, Community Board #4, Fountain House, and the Green Guerillas for the decade after it was purchased by the community. The park was eventually made an official New York City Park and is named after Aponte.

Port Authority Bus Terminal and the McGraw-Hill Building, ca. 1994.

Port Authority ca. 1950 Spanning two blocks on 8th Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets, the Port Authority Bus Terminal, depicted here before subsequent renovations, was the largest mass-transit center of its kind in the world when it opened in December 1950. It offered such amenities as heated on- and off-ramps to melt snow, air-conditioned telephone booths, redcap service, and telephones on walls near terminal entrances which allowed customers immediate access to "information girls" who could give departure, fare, tax, and routing information almost instantaneously.

Church of Sts. Cyril & Methodius and St. Raphael, ca. 1977. This French Gothic church was constructed between 1901 and 1903 as St. Raphael. Designed by George H. Streeton, the parish of St. Raphael served the poor Irish community of Hell's Kitchen. That Irish parish dated to 1886. In the late 19th and early 20th century Catholic Croatian immigrants were also moving into the west side neighborhood. Many worked on the docks, rail yards, and factories near the waterfront. They had no Croatian language church, though in the early 20th century a Croatian priest began celebrating marriages and christenings in an Italian parish nearby. In 1913 the parish of Sts. Cyril & Methodius was established in a small disused church at 552 West 50th Street. They remained there until the 1970s when they purchased a back back building to St. Raphael. Soon though they were given permission to take over use of the whole church building. The church was renovated after the transfer of parishes. In the 1990s it was a center of relief assistance during the Bosnian War. Today it continues to have massed said in both English and Croatian.

West 40th Street Carnegie Library Branch, 1914. Completed in 1913 (relatively late for a Manhattan Carnegie) the West 40th Street Branch was designed by Cook & Welch. The architects had designed a number of other Carnegie libraries, including the Seward Park Branch. The neighborhood that surrounds is drastically different from when the building was constructed. Once flanked by four and five-story tenements, today the building is surrounded by the ramps and infrastructure of the Lincoln Tunnel, constructed in the mid 1930s. The library was decommissioned at some point in the late 20th century and was attached to a newer structure that was part of Covenant House, a charity that combats teenage homelessness. In 2020, the library was demolished to make way for redevelopment of the block.

631 West 46th Street, November 14, 1947.

Film Center Building, ca. 1948 The Film Center was built in 1928 and was used for various functions of film productions during the late 1920s and 1930s when New York City was the center of filmmaking. The building housed sets, editing, and production facilities, as well as a distribution center. The Film Center Building was designed by Eli Jaques Kahn in an Art Deco style. Kahn was a prominent architect in the first half of the 20th century, known for his modernist designs. The building has one of the most detailed surviving interiors from that period in New York City. Both the exterior of the building and a portion of the interior were landmarked in 1982.

Entrance to Film Center, ca. 1995.

328 West 48th Street, south side between Eighth and Ninth Avenues showing Public School 17, ca. 1920. Originally constructed as Public School 17 in 1908, the facility is also known as the Midtown West School. Designed by C.B.J Snyder, the school survived through the 20th century, and at some point had its designation changed to Public School 212. In 1990 the building became home to the Professional Performing Arts School. This small, specialized school focuses on the development and showcasing of students in dance, drama, and vocal music, along with traditional subjects. Famous alum of the school include actress Claire Danes, actor Jesse Eisenberg, and singer Alicia Keys.

United Parcel Service Building, seen at the corner of 12th Avenue and West 43rd Street, July 1, 1965. Rendered in glass and a light brown brick, the UPS Building is a modernist structure built in 1961-1962 The firm that designed this building, Leon & Lionel Levy, were best known for the New York Coliseum, a convention center on Columbus Circle erected in 1956 through the influence of master planner Robert Moses.

Eagle Brewery, ca. 1892. This 19th century west side brewery has a history intertwined with the oldest brewery in the United States, Yuengling. Eagle Brewery was founded in by John Frederick Betz, a young man who had apprenticed at Yuengling in Pottsville, Pennsylvania. After a trip to Europe to learn from master brewers in Germany and Austria, he returned to America and opened his business in 1853. Betz began a brewing empire, with operations in Philadelphia and Jersey City. In 1890 the name was changed to Lembeck and Betz Eagle Brewery. The NJ and PA breweries closed in 1920 during Prohibition, so likely this one did as well. It is unknown when the buildings were demolished.

41st Street Public Paths, ca. 1905. Built in 1904, this bath house was possibly one of the first to be demolished, according to NYC Bath House expert Michael Minn. Its address places it adjacent to or perhaps within the footprint of the 1931-built McGraw-Hill skyscraper. Though a 1956 seems to depict at least a section of the building in place and noted as a bath house.

McGraw-Hill Building. Up shot from 42nd Street, October 4, 1931. The McGraw-Hill Building is an Art Deco structure completed in 1931. Designed by Raymond Hood, it was the second building for publishing company in the city (the first was located at 469 Tenth Avenue). The facade of the 33-story building is covered in blue-green terra-cotta ceramic tiles, alternating with green-metal-framed windows. Starting in 1939 the building housed the headquarters of Timely Comics, which would later become Marvel Comics. In the Captain America #1, creator Jack Kirby gave the building address as the mailing address to which fans could write to the superhero.

In 1908 publishing magnate Charles Scribner built a printing plant and headquarters. The 14-story building was designed with 13 1/2 foot ceilings and wide set interior columns for the placement of large printing machinery. The windows also were built floor to ceiling. Today the building has been converted to a modern office building, with tenants such as the coworking company, WeWork.

"Larry David, Alicia Keys, and Samuel L. Jackson walk into an elevator. Sounds like the prelude to a bad joke? Actually, that’s just daily routine at Manhattan Plaza, a 1,600-unit affordable housing complex for performing artists in Times Square that has served as the launching pad for thousands of creative careers since it opened in the late 1970s. It was in this anonymous high-rise in Hell’s Kitchen, that Alicia Keys first learned to play the piano. It was here, in a federally subsidized apartment, that Larry David first met Kenny Kramer — the 'real' Kramer — and wrote the pilot for Seinfeld. To this day, Manhattan Plaza continues to serve as affordable 'on-campus housing' for thousands of performers in the nearby Theater District. But despite Manhattan Plaza’s enormous contributions to popular culture — not to mention the local entertainment economy — the project is little known. To most passersby, it’s just another ugly redbrick tower block. That’s about to change with the release of the forthcoming documentary Miracle on 42nd Street, which explores the project’s dramatic history and features countless Manhattan Plaza 'alumni' paying tribute to the project’s transformative impact on their lives and careers. The film also offers fresh insights into familiar moments in the city’s history: the fiscal crisis, the AIDS crisis, and the revitalization of Times Square." For more on Manhattan Plaza, check out this interview with award-nominated filmmaker Alice Elliott in Gotham: A Blog for Scholars of New York City History.

Martin Beck Theater Interior ARCHITECT: C. Albert Lansburgh DATE: 1923-24 STYLE: Byzantine The exotic design of Martin Beck Theater, or Al Hirschfeld Theater, is based on Byzantine motifs, making the Beck architecturally unique among the Broadway theaters. Among the most notable design features of the interior are a triple-domed lobby with murals, and an auditorium with spiral-ribbed proscenium arch and fan vaults. Its exotic painted domed ceiling is the work of Albert Herter, a noted American muralist.

McGraw-Hill Building ca. 1936 The McGraw Hill building located on 330 West 42nd Street, between 8th and 9th Avenues was designed in 1931 by architects Raymond Hood and Andre Fouilhoux to meet the specific needs of the McGraw-Hill publishing company that occupied ¾ of the building. With a series of setbacks on its north and south sides, in accordance with New York City's building and zoning codes and the programmatic needs of a book production factory, the McGraw Hill building from east and west has the appearance of an Art Deco stepped tower. From the north and south it appears as a sleek 33 story Commercial Slab building in the International Style. The shock value of its innovative materials, the first clad with machine made terracotta and glass in a provocative blue green color and Hood's avant-garde formal language sets it apart as one of the gems of the city, fondly called "The Jolly Green Giant."

Film Center Building ARCHITECT: Ely Jacques Kahn DATE: 1928-29 STYLE: Art Deco The Film Center Building interior design is an example of the Art Deco style. The architect, Ely Jacques Kahn, was one of the city’s most prominent architects working in modernistic styles. The interior incorporates a technique of “woven” plaster wall and ceiling surfaces, and a wide-ranging polychromatic program, and it survives largely intact. The building was built to service the motion picture industry then centered in Times Square to the east and still serves the functions for which it was constructed.

McGraw-Hill Building. Entrance detail, October 4, 1931. ARCHITECT: Raymond Hood; Godley & Fouilhoux DATE: 1930-31 STYLE: Art Deco, Skyscraper Among its important qualities, the McGraw-Hill Building is a unique skyscraper, being both one of New York’s major Art Deco monuments and the herald of the newly emerging International Style. It was designed by the distinguished American architect Raymond Hood who achieved fame as a skyscraper designer. Among its outstanding features are the two profiles, one being a stepped tower and the other a slab, the distinctive blue-green terra-cotta facing, the horizontal window bands, and the entrance treatment. It was built to serve a distinguished American publisher. The building has received wide critical praise since its completion. The building is a key element in the revitalization of the west side.

Martin Beck (now Al Hirshfield) Theatre, November 1935. Seen from down the block, the Martin Beck Theatre opened in 1924 and was designed by G. Albert Lansburgh (a San Fransisco-based theatre architect). Constructed for vaudeville promotor Beck, it had the distinction of being the only theatre in New York that was owned outright without a mortgage (and was the only Broadway theatre built west of Eighth Avenue). The Moorish-inspired theatre was particularly lavish in its design and both its exterior and a section of the interior were designated NYC landmarks in 1987. In 2003 the theatre was renamed for famed American caricaturist Al Hirschfeld.