250 West 57th Street, 1938.

Alvin Theatre, September 1935. Built in 1927 as the Alvin Theatre, the Broadway house was designed by architect Herbert J. Krapp for the developer and real estate mogul Alexander Pincus. The name Alvin was a portmanteau of the names of producers Alex Aarons and Vinton Freedley. The theatre opened with a premiere of George and Ira Gershwin's 'Funny Face' with Fred and Adele Astaire. Gershwin also had his best known musical 'Porgy and Bess' premiere here in 1935. The theatre was renamed for playwright Neil Simon in 1977, after the Nederlander Organization bought the building. In the 1980s the Landmarks Preservation Commission designated a number of Broadway Theatres, including this one (in 1985).

Stella Tower, 425-437 West 50th Street, ca. 1980. Ralph Thomas Walker, lauded as the "architect of the century" by the New York Times upon his receipt, in 1957, of the American Institute of Architects Centennial Medal of Honor, designed this Art Deco gem in 1927 for the New York Telephone Company. In 2014, the top half of Walker's 18-story tower was transformed into fifty-one luxury residences. Verizon, the successor to New York Telephone Company, now operates out of the building's lower floors. Upon its redevelopment, the building was rechristened the "Stella Tower," after Walker's wife Stella Forbes.

Catholic Apostolic Church ARCHITECT: Francis H. Kimball DATE: 1885-86 STYLE: Terra-cotta The Catholic Apostolic Church, built in 1885-86, was one of architect Francis H. Kimball’s earliest independent commissions in New York City. Kimball had previously worked mostly in Hartford, Connecticut, where he supervised the construction of the Collegiate Gothic style buildings at Trinity College designed by English architect-theorist William Burges, and where the foremost leaders of the Church were residents and would have known his work. Kimball was in the forefront of architects in using exterior architectural terra0cotta in New York during this period, and the Catholic Apostolic Church is significant in the history of American terra-cotta. The facade of the church is dominated by a central rose window within a pointed-arched surround, one of the most complex elements yet attempted in terra-cotta in the United States, and the sculptural ornament also incorporates iconography referring to Apostle-Evangelists and angels.

My Archive Summer 2019 "In 1996 we got married at the now-demolished Roseland Ballroom off Times Square.. the first and last time our names were on a Marquis. We finally found a place to host 600 people at an affordable rate. This old dance hall had seen better days but we all fit in. It was a hoot." —Brocha Metzger @gothamfairytales

Columbus Branch, 1909. Though the Columbus library building was created using the funds from the 1901 Carnegie bequest, the bulk of the original library collection was transferred from the reading room of the Columbus Catholic Club, a social and educational club for young men. The building was designed by Babb, Cook & Willard and completed in 1909. The building included a roof garden with a glass canopy, called an open-air reading room for the summer months. The Italian Renaissance Revival style facade was considerable altered during the 20th century. The third floor was removed in 1960 (and with it the roof-top garden). The small set of steps and original entrance were also removed and replaced by a ground level entrance and a non-historic door.

Alvin Theater ARCHITECT: Herbert J. Krapp DATE: 1926-27 STYLE: Neo-Georgian, Adamesque The Alvin Theater survives today as one of the historic theaters that symbolize American theater for both New York and the nation. It was designed for Alex Aarons and Vinton Freedley, producers of some of Broadway’s most successful musical comedies. The facade designed for the Alvin by Herbert J. Krapp, the most prolific designer of Broadway theaters, is an exceptionally handsome neo-Georgian design. This facade, based on elegant proportions and Adamesque detailing, distinguished the theater headquarters of Aarons and Freedley, and as such represents a special aspect of the nation’s theatrical history. The Alvin Theater Interior was designed in Adamesque style. The elegant Adamesque detailing distinguished the theater headquarters of Aarons and Freedley, a company that produced some of Broadway’s most successful musical comedies. It represents a special aspect of the nation’s theatrical history.

Stryker's Lane Community Center, ca. 1940. In 1918 Linda Holt and Isabel Merritt established the Stryker's Lane Community Center (Stryker Lane was the nickname for 53rd Street). The organization was a community center that focused on social and athletic activities. The pictured structure on 52nd Street was a recreation hall, a gymnasium created from an abandoned garage in 1921.

Workers inspect the site of the Ninth Avenue El derailment on September 11, 1905. At upper right is the 53rd Street spur, leading to the Sixth Avenue El, where the derailed train was mistakenly switched.

Gallo Theatre, 1928. Opened as the Gallo Opera House in 1927, the theatre at West 54th Street has a long, varied, and unique history. Both early opera and straight play productions were commercial flops in the Eugene De Rosa-designed theatre. Sold in foreclosure less than two years after opening, the building became the New Yorker Theatre and a WPA Federal Music Project venue in the 1930s. Renamed Studio 52 in 1943 when purchased by CBS (the number had nothing to do with the street address), the space hosted radio and TV productions through the 1970s, including What's My Line?, The $64,000 Question, and The Jack Benny Show. In 1977 the building entered its most famed period as the nightclub Studio 54, a glitzy, glamorous, celebrity-filled disco. Studio 54 closed in 1986. Occupied by other clubs and concert venues through the late 1980s and 1990s, the theatre was restored to much of its architectural grandeur in 1994 (the nightclub owners had covered or painted black much of the interior). It was leased by the Roundabout Theatre Company in 1998 for a production of Cabaret and was purchased by Roundabout in 2003.

The Hearst Magazine Building was designed by Joseph Urban and George B. Post for William Randolph Hearst between 1926 and 1927. The building would be Hearst's many publication's headquarters in Columbus Circle, what he considered the up-and-coming theater district in Manhattan. The project marks Hearst's ambitions to turn Columbus Circle into an urban center parallel to Times Square. Hearst moved to New York in 1895 after a successful overhaul of his father's publication, the San Francisco Examiner. His techniques of yellow-journalism made the paper sell quickly, and Hearst carried this style of work to his newest purchase in New York, the Morning Journal. He quickly outran his competitor, Joseph Pulitzer, by decreasing the price of his paper and eventually picking up a share of Pulitzer's employees. When he wanted to design a new headquarters for the Journal and his 72 other acquired companies, he hired the architect of Pulitzer's World Building, George B. Post. Hearst had amassed 150 million dollars in profit by 1926 when he set out to build his grand headquarters. Joseph Urban, the other architect of the project, was a Viennese theater designer who had decorated the Abdeen Palace in Cairo when he was just 19 years old before studying under secessionist architect Otto Wagner. Urban had been introduced to Hearst after designing the set of "Follies," which he had seen years prior. George B. Post, the "commercial architect" of the project was to guide it to become the grand and tall structure Hearst had desired for his company. The building is moored with Art Deco, Secessionist, and Baroque tones, as well as Classical allusions. It encompasses an entire city block. Its six "sculpture groups" decorate the fourth floor of the building, and were designed by German immigrant Henry Kreis. The allegorical figures are meant as representations of the disciplines which the building housed: Comedy and Tragedy, Music and Art, Sport and Industry, and Printing and Sciences. The building's auditorium would showcase a variety of musical and theatrical events, as per Hearst's interest. The six-story building had been planned from the beginning as a base to a larger tower. This is reflected in the structure of the building and the fact that it contains six elevator shafts - double what was typical for a building of this height. The tower addition was prepared by George B. Post in 1946, but the plans were never realized. It wouldn't be until 2004 that a tower, designed by Sir Norman Foster, would top off the Hearst Magazine Building.

"Tenth Ave., west side, north from West 58th to 59th Streets, showing occupying this block front, the Haaren High School. This structure formerly housed De Witt Clinton High School, 1937." The ornate building on Tenth Avenue was built by C.B.J Snyder, the BOE Superintendent of Buildings, in 1906. It originally housed DeWitt Clinton High School, which had previously been located in Greenwich Village. The H- shaped school (a Snyder design innovation) was built in the Flemish Renaissance style, with large gables, dormers, high-pitched roofs, and red brick trimmed with limestone. DeWitt Clinton High School moved to the Bronx in 1929 and the building then became Haaren High School, a vocational institution, which lasted through the 1970s. The building underwent a renovation in 1998 which converted the courtyard into a glass atrium. Today it is Haaren Hall on the campus of John Jay College.

Church of Paulist Fathers, ca. 1910. The history of the Church of St. Paul the Apostle provides a case study of the birth and growth of a missionary parish in the years immediately before and following the Civil War. The parish had its origins in an 1858 agreement with Archbishop John Hughes, in which the new Paulist Fathers community was given the responsibility for a territory initially extending on the west side of Manhattan from 59th Street to 109th Street. Isaac T. Hecker, C.S.P. (1819-1888), a New York-born Catholic convert of German heritage, was both the first pastor of St. Paul's and the first leader of the Paulists. In 1858, Hecker received Papal authorization to found the first male religious community organized within the Archdiocese of New York and the United States, the Congregation of Missionary Priests of St. Paul the Apostle (better known as the Paulist Fathers). Establishing both a community and a parish required immediate fundraising. The Paulists sought pledges toward the erection of a parish church and community house, with an initial contribution from Archbishop John Hughes, and the largest donation coming from Isaac Hecker's brother George, developer of "Hecker's Self-Rising Flour." The Paulist Fathers acquired land at 59th Street, west of Ninth Avenue, which remains the parish center. As the building rose from its foundations using stone recycled from the old Croton Aqueduct, the Greenwich Elevated Railroad reached Ninth Avenue and 59th Street. In 1876, the north boundary of the parish was reduced from 109th to 75th Street. The Catholic population of the neighborhood increased, until it peaked at some 27,000 in the 1890s. In 1890, artist John Lafarge directed the redecoration of the interior of St. Paul the Apostle. New altars were fashioned from rare Numidian marble, Mexican onyx, and porphyry. Derricks, with their blocks and tackle, were used to lift the altars into position. Harper's noted that the church never closed; work proceeded while "service at St. Paul the apostle never ceases." In the early 20th century, the Paulist Fathers' Church was known for its music as well as for its preaching. Its choir of men and boys achieved a national reputation when the Paulist Choristers toured widely and performed regularly on the Paulist radio station WLWL. Seats for festival Masses such as the Christmas Eve Midnight Mass were reserved for ticket holders.

The Wm. Fox Corp. building at 55th Street and 10th Avenue, 1921. Construction on the Fox building, a $2.5 million endeavor supervised personally by founder William Fox, began in 1919. The building was both a film production facility, with fireproof construction specifically designed to accommodate hazards associated with flammable filmmaking materials, and the corporate headquarters of the Fox Film Corporation. The 1929 stock market crash and litigation over an unsuccessful bid to acquire the Loew’s chain of theaters left William Fox bankrupt. He lost control of the Fox Film Corp in a 1930 hostile takeover; even so, 20th Century Fox continues to bear his name. Today, the former Fox building on 10th Avenue is the Independence High School.

Childs Restaurant, 1939. The first Childs Restaurant was opened in 1889 by brothers Samuel S. Childs and William Childs, on the ground level of the Merchants Hotel (current site of One Liberty Plaza, also previously the Singer Building), at 41 Cortlandt Street. By 1932 there were more than 20 Childs Restaurants in the five boroughs. The location at 300 West 59th Street was leased to the Childs Company in 1910 and occupied by the restaurant by September 1911. This location was well-known by the gay community in the early 20th century. The convenient location between the theatre district and Central Park, as well as its reputation for a tolerance of diverse patrons, made it popular among gays who were forced to hide their nature in most public venues. It was also a busy pre-dawn spot for actors, writers, and prizefighters, who toiled late into the evenings nearby. The restaurant closed after 42 years in December of 1953. It was mourned by many of its regulars and long-time employees. The restaurant building and its neighbors were demolished and replaced in 1956 by the New York Coliseum, a Modern style convention center.

Ninth Avenue El derailment at 53rd Street. September 11, 1905. At a few minutes after 7 a.m., a downtown-bound train on the Ninth Avenue El plunged from the tracks at the corner of 53rd Street, ultimately killing 13 and injuring 48, in what was then the worst subway accident in city history. The wreck occurred at the point where downtown-bound Ninth and Sixth Avenue tracks diverged, with Sixth Avenue trains making a 90 degree turn East along 53rd Street. Ordinarily, the approaching downtown train would display a placard indicating to the towerman whether to activate the switch for the curve. In this case a miscommunication between the motorman and the towerman (who may not have been at his post) sent the train into the curve at more than three times its speed limit. The motorman braked, but was unable to prevent two cars from careening over the edge of the trestle. One car slammed into the ground while the other came to rest partially suspended by the second floor window of no. 798 Ninth Avenue. The New York Times described the scene: “The third car of the train, hurled forward by the weight of those behind it, was shoved over the elevated structure and its forward end was forced through the window of the apartment of Mrs. James G. Crowe, who lives above the drug store. The car rocked for a moment and seemed as if about to fall into the street. Then it settled, its forward end held by the sill of the window and the fire escape, and hung suspended like a bridge across the street. The frantic passengers clambered out of the windows and along the roof into the apartments of Mrs. Crowe, and thence to the street.”

In December 1936, the Winter Sports Show and International Ski Meet was held at Madison Square Garden.

Horn & Hardart Automat, February 10, 1936. Horn and Hardart was Philadelphia-founded food service company. They were the first non-Europeans to receive patented vending machines from Max Sielaff's Automat factory in Berlin. The first Automats were opened in Philadelphia and New York City in 1902 and 1912, respectively. The pre-packaged foods were extremely popular, especially during the Depression. By 1950 more than 50 Horn & Hardart restaurants were operating in New York City. Later they branched out to sit-down waitress service restaurants, cafeterias, and bakery shops. The men in this photograph could not only find cakes and pie at the Automat but other staples including macaroni and cheese, baked beans, and creamed spinach.

Bickford's Restaurant, 1936. Samuel Longley Bickford began a career in restaurants just after the turn of the century, but it was not until 1921 that he established his eponymous restaurant chain. In the decade after opening, the chain grew to more than two dozen locations in New York City and Boston. The lunchrooms were self-serve with a limited menu. The goal was quick turn over, while maintaining high quality and moderate cost. Eventually the chain included more than 85 locations. During the 1930s most of the restaurant locations were designed by architect F. Russell Stuckert (whose father had designed Horn & Hardart restaurants). With 42 New York City locations in 1970 and only two in 1980, Bickford's disappeared from the city entirely in 1982.

Hearst Magazine Building ARCHITECT: Joseph Urban; George B. Post & Sons DATE: 1927-28 STYLE: Art Deco Stretching a full block along the west side of Eighth Avenue between 56th and 57th Streets, the building remains the expectant six-story base of an office tower that was not constructed until 2006. It is a stylistic synthesis of Art Deco ornament, Secessionist influence and Baroque theatricality. Further enriched by classical allusions which are both imposing and dramatic, the building survives as a relic of unrealized plans to transform greater Columbus Circle into New York’s new cultural and commercial center as well as the corporate headquarters of Hearst’s vast publishing empire.

Sacred Heart of Jesus Church, 457 West 51st Street, ca. 1980. The Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus is a Roman Catholic parish, founded in 1876 by Reverend Martin J. Brophy. Designed in the Romanesque Revival style to the plans of LeBrun & Sons, the building, according to the AIA Guide to NYC is a "symmetric confection of deep red brick and matching terra cotta frosted with light-colored stone arches, band courses, and copings." Before construction completed in 1901, the congregation worshipped at the Plymouth Baptist Church, also in Manhattan. In 1966, the interior of the church was the first in the Archdiocese of New York to be reconfigured after the Second Vatican Council.

Laren Garage, ca. 1937.

Church of St. Paul the Apostle ARCHITECT: Jeremiah O’Rourke DATE: 1875-85 STYLE: Medieval Revival The Church of St. Paul the Apostle is one of the largest and most monumental religious buildings in Manhattan. It was built for the Missionary Society of St. Paul the Apostle, commonly called the Paulist Fathers, between 1875 and 1885 and is an austere and imposing Medieval Revival style structure, reflecting both Gothic and Romanesque sources.

“Men aboard a coach from the New York Herald City Beautiful Campaign. They are located at 54th Street & 10th Avenue.” April 29, 1900. On Sunday, April 29, 1900, the New York Herald ran a full-page feature (including the above photo) framed as a conversation on the topic “How Can New York Be Made The City Beautiful?” between panelists including the President and Landscape Architect of the Board of Park Commissioners, a member of the Municipal Art Society, and a Danish “Traveller and Sociological xpert.” The headline references City Beautiful, a turn of the century urban planning movement that aimed to improve the living conditions in cities by instituting new aesthetic principles to govern urban architecture, including the promotion of monumental municipal buildings.

Madison Square Garden at Eighth Avenue and 50th Street, ca. 1930, the third structure to bear that name.

Sheffield Farms plant, 1938. Sheffield Farms was a milk company that in the first half of the 20th century became one of the largest dairy companies in the world. They also sold 20% of all of the milk purchased within New York City. Sheffield was established over a few years in the 1880s, as L. B. Halsey got involved in his wife's family butter business and then expanded it a larger scale dairy trade. In 1939 the company erected a plant on the West Side, consisting of a large three story (plus massive basement and sub-basement) plant and a six-story office building. By 1952 the operations at the plant were diminishing as the company moved their processing elsewhere. After a double sale, the complex was purchased by the television network CBS for its broadcast center, which remains in the space today.