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128 East 93rd Street
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128 East 93rd Street, 1932. Just after the Civil War, Henry W. Shaw, a manufacturer of artificial limbs who dabbled in real estate, hired architect Edmund Waring to design a simple wood-frame home. The resulting home was rendered in the Italianate stye, with the Second Empire mansard roof with three dormers and the bracketed cornice, added later in the 19th century. Created as a speculative development, it was soon purchased by a series of owners, as the city, once decidedly to the south of this area, crept north and surrounded the once sparse neighborhood. In 1920 the home was purchased by wealthy Yorkville brewer George Ehret and operated as a rental property. The original configuration of the home included steep stoop, creating the entrance at a parlor level. Alas, in 1922, the widening of 93rd Street necessitated the removal of the stoop. In 1966, just after the passage of the Landmarks Law, the home was considered for landmark status. At the time the owner was opposed the designation and the process never moved forward. This house was later included in the Carnegie Hill Historic District Extension, designated in 1993. (The original Carnegie Hill Historic District was so named in 1974.)
The Marion
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Storefronts at The Marion, a Lexington Avenue Apartment building. November 8, 1911.
Our Lady of Good Counsel
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Our Lady of Good Counsel, ca. 1975. This late 19th century Roman Catholic Church stood across from the Ruppert & Company brewery in Yorkville for more than 70 years. Our Lady of Good Counsel was part of a wave of new churches built by the Archdiocese of New York to serve Yorkville’s growing population, including the German immigrant communities who made up Ruppert’s workforce. The brewery complex closed in 1965 and was later razed, opening new sightlines architect Thomas Poole’s Gothic facade — described in the AIA Guide to New York as “robust, undisciplined, deeply three-dimensional.”
1035 Park Avenue
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Park Avenue scene at 96th Street, March 22, 1927. Across Park Avenue is a large apartment building, completed in 1926, and the Park Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church. Note the diversity of vehicular traffic: bus, streetcar (blurred, at left), and horse-and-carriage vehicles are all pictured — and the New York and Harlem Railroad tracks run beneath the Park Avenue median.
Artists in Residence
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As every New Yorker who spots a celebrity at Duane Reade knows, thousands of art and pop culture luminaries have called the city home. From Whitman to Warhol, this is a quick guide to the places notable New Yorkers have lived and worked.
Immanuel Lutheran Church
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The Immanuel Lutheran Church was founded by German immigrants in Yorkville in 1863. The congregation initially settled on East 87th Street near Lexington Avenue. Its current building at 122 East 88th Street, seen in this 1937 photo, was designed in 1886 in a Gothic Revival style by Arthur Crooks. Its 200-foot granite tower houses bells given to the church as a gift from the Empress of Germany in the later nineteenth century. By the turn of the twentieth century, the church was one of the largest Lutheran churches in New York City and was devoted exclusively to German-language services.
Immanuel Lutheran Church
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Immanuel Lutheran Church, April, 1961. The Immanuel Lutheran Church, a Gothic edifice designed by Arthur Crooks, features a 200-foot bell tower at the corner of 88th Street and Lexington Avenue. The tower houses three bells, presented as a gift from Empress Auguste Victoria of Germany at the church’s 1886 dedication, in recognition of the German heritage of many Immanuel congregants. In June 1969, blasting for the construction of a new Gimbel’s department store one block south caused Immanuel’s vaulted plaster ceiling to collapse, damaging the church interior and stained glass windows. Luckily, the altar and hand-carved Black Forest reredos (the carved, wooden decoration behind the altar area) were unharmed.
1080-1082 Park Avenue
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Park Avenue storefronts at East 88th Street, 1938. At left, businesses No. 1080 include Boghen Pharmacy and Park Avenue Jeweler. At right, at No. 1082 are an unlikely pair: The Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co., at street level; and the J.P. Linahan Casket Display showroom one store above.
1646 Second Avenue
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German Delicatessen, ca. 1930. A German deli when pictured in 1930, this storefront was later the home of the Old Dutch Delicatessen, whose specialty was smoked eel. The building was razed sometime at the start of the 21st century and a new glassy structure completed in 2009.
92nd Street Y
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92nd Street Young Men's and Young Women's Hebrew Association, June 3, 1928. Founded in 1874 as the Young Men's Hebrew Association, the 92nd Street Y (as it is more commonly known) is a social institution whose mission was originally, "to promote a better feeling and a higher culture among young men and to unite them into a liberal organization, which shall tend to their moral, intellectual, and social improvement.” First housed in a rented building on West 21st Street that included parlors, a reading and a gym, the Y moved to larger quarters on 42nd Street a few years later. During the 1880s and 1890s the Y slowly continued its move uptown at various location along Lexington Avenue. In 1899 Jewish-American banker, businessman, and philanthropist, Jacob H. Schiff donated $150,00 for the construction of a new building at 92nd Street. The new building (seen here) opens in 1900 and provides educational, religious, and recreational programs for young Jewish men. The building has an annex with pool and dormitories added in 1911. The first Jewish Boys Scout troop is organized at the Y in 1913. In the late 1920s, the original build is razed and by 1930 the new Art Deco building opens, with a dormitory for 235 men, two gymnasiums, a 25-yard pool, the wood-paneled, 917-seat auditorium, kosher cafeteria, billiard room, and Art Center facilities. The 1920s and 1930s marked a major expansion of the programming under visionary leadership. The Y's place as a hub of music, arts, and community service is solidified, as they also open their educational and arts programming to the general public. Today the 92nd Street Y remains a preeminent and busy New York cultural institution, nearly 150 years after its founding.
120 East 92nd Street
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120 East 92nd Street ARCHITECT: Unknown DATE: 1871 STYLE: Italianate This house has a front yard with iron railing and stands three stories above a high brick basement. A steep flight of wood steps leads to a porch with open-work columns. The handsome paneled double front door with rope moldings is at the right and a pair of French doors at the left. The shuttered windows at all floors have handsome wood frames surmounted by cornices with modillions and this theme is repeated at the prominent cornice of the porch roof. The clapboard front wall is surmounted by an Italianate cornice carried on evenly spaced brackets with panels in between.
1342 Lexington Avenue
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Northern Renaissance Revival row houses on Lexington Avenue, now part of the Hardenbergh/Rhinelander Historic District; August 13, 1937. In the late 19th century, the family of William C. Rhinelander set about developing their parcels of land on Manhattan's Upper East Side. The four row houses pictured, part of a set of six at the northwest corner of Lexington Avenue at East 89th Street, were designed by architect Henry J. Hardenbergh and completed in 1889. Andy Warhol purchased No. 1342 Lexington (second from left) in 1960. Warhol lived in the building, as did his mother, until her death in 1972, after which point it was leased to an associate.
1293 Lexington Avenue
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Northeast corner of 87th Street and Lexington Avenue, October 13, 1911.
160 East 92nd Street
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160 East 92nd Street ARCHITECT: Unknown DATE: 1852-53 STYLE: Greek Revival, Italianate A rare surviving remnant of the early years of the village of Yorkville, the 160 East 92nd street House (1852-53) is a two-and-a-half story vernacular clapboard dwelling which displays elements of the Greek Revival and Italianate styles. One of the oldest of the few intact nineteenth-century wooden houses which remain in Manhattan north of Greenwich Village, it dates from a period in which many of the houses on the outskirts of the city were of frame construction (prior to the implementation of an overall ban in Manhattan, due to fire hazards). It was probably built by Albro Howell, a carpenter and builder who lived next door and was active in developing the block.
210 East 86th Street
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Musical Protective Union Building, Yorkville Casino, ca. 1912. The Yorkville Casino was a social club and community gathering space for the German community on the Upper East Side. The building was constructed in 1904 by the Musician’s Mutual Protective Union (the precursor organization to the American Federation of Musicians). One of the two large ballrooms in the Casino had a 15,000 square foot floor and was a popular nightclub. The building also functioned as a catering hall for personal and political events. The in house caterers were known for their excellent German fare and, of course, authentic German beer. The Casino, being so connected with the German-American community, was supposedly watched closely by the government during the Second World War. In the years after the war, as the neighborhood diversified ethnically, the Casino floundered and eventually closed in 1965.
1340 Lexington Avenue
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1340 Lexington Avenue, 1913. Nos. 1340 through 1350 Lexington Avenue are a row of three-story houses built in 1888 by Henry Hardenbergh. The architect created charming Renaissance Revival buildings of red brick, brownstone, and terra cotta. The LPC designation report for the Hardenbergh/Rhinelander Historic District describes them as "form\[ing] a picturesque yet symmetrical composition." They maintain their original "lively" roofline of alternating pointy pediments and flat, but detailed, cornices. Though they were built with stoops (as can be seen in this image), renovations over time have moved all of the entrances to the street level.
Night Presence IV
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Night Presence IV, 1972. Night Presence IV is a 22.5-foot tall free-standing sculpture by Louise Nevelson. The sculpture was originally located at the southeast corner of Central Park but was moved after the original location was decided as "a showcase in which sculptures were changed from time to time," according to an article of the New York Times in 1973. This entrance would later be dedicated to Doris C. Freedman for rotating works of public art. Nevelson's piece now sits at the intersection of 92nd Street and Park Avenue on part of the Park Avenue Mall. Nevelson was a Russian-born New Yorker who gifted this sculpture to the city in her 50th year living in New York. Of the gesture, she said: "New York represents the whole of my conscious life and I thought it fitting that I should give it something of myself."
1021 Park Avenue
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1021 Park Avenue ca. 1942 The L shaped plan of 1021 Park Avenue stems from the days when the Upper East Side real estate was dominated by mansions. The Pinchot family, having built themselves a lavish abode, sold some of the lots surrounding their mansion to other families, requiring them to be used as private homes. Eventually, they sold their home to Edward Stettinus, who continued to purchase land, but (due to the Pinchot's earlier sales) had to wrap around some lots, creating the curious L shape. In 1928, the developer Anthony Campagna bought Stettinus' land and planned to erect an apartment tower, bringing in his frequent partner: Rosario Candela. Candela, created a neo-gothic design for the building's street faced that was atypical of his normal style, incorporating features like the shields and gargoyles. For the non street facing facades, he used light brick an irregular window pattern due to the interior combination of duplex and simplex apartments. The building was a massive success with the majority of the apartments selling in almost a month.
Yorkville Sidewalk Clock
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Yorkville Sidewalk Clock (at far left), 1932. The Yorkville Clock, formerly in the shadow of the Third Avenue Elevated Railroad, was a community favorite from the day in 1898 when Adolph Stern had it set up in front of his jewelry story at 1508 Third Avenue, the northwest corner of 85th Street. In 1923, Stern’s store, having added a pawn shop, moved across the street to 1501 Third Avenue, between 84th and 85th Streets. The 17-foot cast-iron clock, simulating a giant two-faced pocket watch, was designated an official New York City landmark on August 25, 1981, along with the few other remaining sidewalk clocks in the five boroughs. It was produced by the E. Howard Clock Co., a Massachusetts firm with a New York office at 532 Broadway. The company had manufactured sidewalk clocks since 1870. In the second half of the 19th century similar tall sidewalk clocks became very popular throughout the United States. Merchants used them for advertising, and they served the public by telling the correct time for the many people who could not afford pocket watches. About ninety years after it first appeared on Third Avenue, the Yorkville Clock, by this time owned by Reimann and Bresse Furniture Store, had a quixotic experience. In 1985 a city employee mistakenly sold it as surplus property to a clock devotee named Frank Dorsa, who planned to display it in his family’s collection in Muttontown, Long Island. When Dorsa went to Reimann and Bresse hoping to locate missing clock pieces, he was almost arrested as a thief. Only his bill of sale saved him. Apprised of the unfortunate sale, Herbert Rickman, who was a special assistant to Mayor Edward Koch, arranged for the clock’s return and for reimbursement to the Dorsa family. After these peregrinations, the clock needed significant repair, which was provided by antiques dealer Louis Agrusa. Reerected on the sidewalk in front of the furniture store (next to McDonalds) the clock was ceremoniously unveiled in February, 1989. By early 1998, the need for a complete restoration was evident. The connections between the clock face and its stand were alarmingly weak. It ran sporadically. Often one face told one time, and the other another. The glass on one face was cracked and taped. Its iron pedestal, defaced by graffiti, showed patches of rust where paint had peeled off. FRIENDS worked in collaboration with the Friends of Cast Iron Architecture and Neighbors Restoring the Historic Yorkville Clock to raise $20,000 for the repair. Following an extensive restoration the Yorkville Clock was rededicated on September 14, 1999.
160 East 92nd Street
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1850s wood-frame house on East 92nd Street. 1932. This pre-Civil War wood frame house was built between 1852-3, probably by Albro Howell, a carpenter who owned property owner who was likely the builder of a number of similar frame houses nearby. It is one of seven surviving frame houses on the Upper East Side, as noted by the Landmarks Preservation Commission in its 1988 designation report for No. 160. In 1914, the house was purchased by Fifth Avenue residents Willard D. Straight and his wife Dorothy Payne Whitney, as living quarters for their household’s staff (they also built the adjacent garage). Straight, a diplomat, and Whitney, a philanthropist and member of the prominent Whitney family, founded The New Republic in 1914. After Straight’s death in 1918, Whitney remarried and relocated to England. The house remained a staff residence for the Straight estate until 1942.
Brick Presbyterian Church
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Brick Presbyterian Church 1140-1144 Park Avenue Designed by York & Sawyer, 1938-40 parish house: 1948-49 – NYC HD, NR-D The congregation of Brick Presbyterian Church dates back to 1767. Its original home was the “old Brick Church” at the corner of Beekman and Nassau Streets. After a stay in midtown, the church merged with the Park Avenue Presbyterian Church in the 1930s and constructed this lovely building. In reference to the congregation’s roots, the church was designed in the neo-Georgian style popular during the Colonial period. It features a temple front and a polygonal tower topped by a ball finial. There is a chapel extension on the north façade, and the parish house is around the corner at 62 East 92nd Street. The church interior was fashioned after St. Paul’s Chapel, a contemporary of the original Brick Church.
1770 Second Avenue
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1770 Second Avenue, June 7, 1940. The small two-story building has hosted a number of divergent tenants. In 1904 a Henry D. Hoppe sold milk (and likely other items) here. In the 1920s it was the home of the Lexington Cigar Company. In the mid century, a firm of plumbing and heating contractors worked from here. Since 1990 the building has cycled through a series of restaurant, with its most recent tenant, Manny's (a sports bar) closing in 2017. A fun fact about this building. In 2007 the lot was considered by the MTA as a possible location for a vent plant at the southern end of the planned 96th Street Station on the Second Avenue line. The fact that the building only had a single commercial tenant made the impact of demolition much lower than other options in the neighborhood. In the end, concerns about the structural stability of the neighboring buildings (had this one been razed) caused the MTA to look elsewhere for the vent plant. And this tiny two-story survivor remains!
Our Lady of Good Counsel
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Our Lady of Good Counsel, 1931. By the 1880 and 1890s, Yorkville was a booming area with a large influx of German and Irish immigrant families. During this time the only major Catholic church in the neighborhood was St. Lawrence O'Toole (now St. Ignatius Loyola) on 84th Street. To accommodate this growing community the diocese planned to built a few new churches. The Church of Our Lady of Good Counsel was one of these buildings. It was completed in 1892. The distinctive stone facade includes crenelated coping and turrets, and echos similar architectural details of the nearby Calvary Squadron A Armory (Madison between 94th and 95th Streets).
1185 Park Avenue
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1185 Park Avenue Designed by Schwartz & Gross, 1928-29 – NYC HD, NR-D Occupying the entire blockfront, this enormous Gothic Revival style apartment building is accessed through a grand triple-arched doorway leading into a landscaped interior courtyard and to the building’s six lobbies. The five bays on either end of the building resemble bookends, as their windows are surrounded by cream-colored, ornamental terra-cotta. Across the street, 1192 Park Avenue now stands where the home of prominent brewer George Ehret once stood. The brownstone mansion was built in 1878 (demolished 1928) when the area was largely unoccupied, but its location was convenient to Ehret’s Hell Gate Brewery on the East River. As one of the first “fine” residences on upper Park Avenue, the mansion inspired other prominent families to move here.
Brick Presbyterian Church
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Brick Presbyterian Church, ca. 1939. The Brick Church on Park Avenue is the third location of a congregation founded in 1768. The first and second Brick Churches were located on Beekman Street and East 37th Street, respectively. By the mid-1930s, the congregation had shifted further uptown, and church leadership acted to meet the community’s needs by merging with the Park Avenue Presbyterian Church, and building a new structure (brick, of course) at 91st Street.
1197 Park Avenue
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“View from the roof of George Ehret's home at Park Avenue and 94th Street. Looking northwest, showing High Bridge and water tower in the distance.” At right, the Park Avenue Tunnel at 97th Street. The New York Central and Hudson River Railroad lowered the tracks into what was originally called the Yorkville Tunnel from 59th Street to 96th Street between 1872-1876, at the same time that the final destination of the trains —the original Grand Central Depot— was being built.
185 East 85th Street
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185 East 85th Street ca. 1967 Immortalized in the opening credits of the Jefferson's, 185 East 85th Street was once emblematic of the wave of new 1960s construction on Third Avenue. Erected in 1967, this 35-story apartment tower was striking among its lower-rise neighbors. Though perhaps not so eye-catching today, at the time it was a prime example of a "deluxe apartment in the sky." Designed by architect H. I. Feldman, The Park Lane was known for its rounded balconies and unobstructed views until later construction hemmed in its sightlines.
1197 Park Avenue
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“George Ehret residence and garden, 1197 Park Avenue at S.E. corner of 94th Street. The house, which is at least fifty years old, has just been sold for demolition. 1928.” A German immigrant, Ehret established the Hell Gate Brewery in 1866, overlooking the Hell Gate strait of the East River from a large facility occupying an area bounded by 91-94th Streets and Second-Third Avenues. Built in 1878, Ehret’s Park Avenue mansion was sold in 1928, one year after his death. In 1929, a fifteen-story apartment building was built on its site.
1681 1st Avenue
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My Archive Summer 2019 “I took this picture in the late 1970s. I was fascinated by the woman leaning out the window and didn't notice the other person walking by until later when the roll of film was developed. It was a matter of luck. I was kicking through the neighborhood.” —Joe Raskin
FDNY Hook & Ladder 13
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Hook & Ladder 13, October, 1960. In the 1860s, the cities of New York and Brooklyn moved to professionalize firefighting, combining the volunteer and independent firefighting companies into a single Metropolitan District. The newly-established Hook & Ladder Company No. 13 moved into its East 87th Street firehouse in January, 1868. In 1961, the company moved to a new firehouse on East 85th Street, leaving their former home vacant — but not for long. In 1962, a young, unknown artist named Andy Warhol rented the second floor studio for $150/month.
120-122 East 92nd Street
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Pair of mid-19th century frame houses, East 92nd Street. 1932. No. 120 (right) was built first, in 1859, likely by Albro Howell, the carpenter-builder also responsible for the frame house at No. 160 East 92nd Street, and a number of since-demolished homes from the same period. No. 122 was built twelve years later, in 1871, six years before the construction of wooden homes was banned in Manhattan. Both houses are among the seven surviving wood-frame homes on the Upper East Side.
1185 Park Avenue
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Park Avenue and 95th Street, Looking South, 1936. The fifteen-story apartment building, built in 1929, occupies the former site of the George Ehret mansion.
Church of the Holy Trinity
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Many houses of worship on the Upper East Side are devoted to a myriad of individual traditions, which contributed to our neighborhood’s multi-ethnic identity. The Church of the Holy Trinity, at 316 East 88th Street, is somewhat unique because it was not built to support just one of these traditions, but welcomed everyone. Holy Trinity was conceived as a “Settlement Church” by Serena Rhinelander, a member of the prominent Rhinelander family, which held vast land in Yorkville and was known for real estate and philanthropy in the neighborhood. Originally founded in midtown in 1864 as a Protestant Episcopal Church, Holy Trinity was designed as a community complex by the architectural firm Barney and Chapman. Their work on the Holy Trinity includes a French Gothic bell tower, which the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission calls an “outstanding example of the French Gothic spirit adapted to a late Nineteenth Century brick and terra-cotta religious structure,” and a French renaissance Parish house that has served as a community oasis since it opened in 1897. Then as now, the Parish House offers an auditorium, classrooms, and meeting rooms serving the needs of neighbors of all ages. Holy Trinity was designated a New York City landmark in 1966 (so one of the City’s first) and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1979
50 East 87th Street
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Constructed for a German-Jewish Reform congregation, Park Avenue Synagogue, seen here in 1927, the year it was dedicated, was one of the last Moorish-Revival Jewish houses of worship built in the United States. The Moorish style offered an alternative to the Greco-Roman or Gothic-Revival silhouettes that were often used for churches. It was a style that had been used for synagogues in Germany as early as the 1830s and remained widely popular for Jewish sacred spaces until the First World War. With its mix of German language, Jewish religion, and Mediterranean accents, the Park Avenue Synagogue was a uniquely American place: when the Synagogue was dedicated in March 1927, Mayor Jimmy Walker, the Episcopal Bishop of New York City William T. Manning, and New York Supreme Court Justice Thomas C. T. Crain were all in attendance. Congregants, who had originally founded the Synagogue in 1882 in a converted church at 115 East 86th, now had created a dramatic new space for themselves in the city. The Upper East Side’s stunning array of ecclesiastical architecture offers many more instances of immigrant communities announcing their arrival in New York through beautiful houses of worship. In each of these spaces, congregants could come together not only to strengthen the bonds of their communities but also to assert their collective American ambition and success.
Cutting Houses (St. David's School)
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The Cutting Houses, East 89th Street, ca. 1920. This row of three neo-Georgian townhouses was built in 1919-20 for Charles Suydam Cutting, a naturalist, and photographer who accompanied his friend Teddy Roosevelt on his expedition to Southeast Asia, where he became the first Westerner to enter the city of Lhasa, in Tibet. A seven-bay arcade at street-level creates the impression that the adjacent townhouses are part of the same structure, though, at the time of this photograph, the buildings had not been connected. Between 1950-52, No. 12 was converted to St. David’s School. By 1964, all three Cutting townhouses had been absorbed and renovated for classroom use.
1197 Park Avenue
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“View from the roof of George Ehret's home at Park Avenue and 94th Street. Looking west. Shows the Metropolitan Museum of Art (and Cleopatra's Needle) and the 86th Street Station \[on Park Avenue].” Designed by Calvert Vaux, the Met’s original red-brick Victorian Gothic building (center-right) was completed in 1880.
Our Lady of Good Counsel
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Our Lady of Good Counsel, at 230 East 90th Street, was built in 1892 as one of the first churches in Northern Yorkville. It was designed by architect Thomas H. Poole in a melange of styles including Gothic and Tudor elements. The church also features elaborate stained-glass windows by Franz Mayer and Co., a renowned German manufacturer. Our Lady originally served Yorkville’s Irish and German communities, comprised of workers from the nearby breweries and factories. Our Lady overlooked the looming bulk of the breweries that dominated the neighborhood’s streetscape. As the Parish grew, the church expanded in 1905 to include a school and convent, and in 1908 to offer a nursery and parish house. Today Our Lady still serves and reflects our community: In addition to Mass in English, the Church conducts Mass in Spanish and offers a Spanish Youth Group. With the breweries gone, the church now looks over Ruppert Park and its popular children’s playground
1197 Park Avenue
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“View from the roof of George Ehret's home at Park Avenue and 94th Street. Looking east by south. Looking east on 94th Street showing 2nd and 3rd Avenue Els. Also Hell Rock. On the right is Ehret's brewery.”
203 East 94th Street
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“E. 94th Street, north side, east from Third Avenue, as viewed across a clearance at the S.E. corner of this point, September 13, 1938." The Third Avenue El was the last elevated line to operate in Manhattan (apart from sections of the 1 train in Upper Manhattan).
Lt. Abraham Quackenbush House
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Residence of Lieutenant Abraham Quackenbush, ca. 1885. “The house was built in 1851 and demolished in 1890; Lieutenant Quackenbush's great-grandchildren are pictured in the photograph.”
1720 Second Avenue
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This pair of stately Romanesque Revival style brick apartment buildings was constructed at a time when apartment-style living was becoming more socially acceptable for New York’s burgeoning middle class. They exemplified the use of distinctive architecture and evocative naming to elevate the image of the multiple-dwelling building type, which had long been associated with the cramped and squalid quarters of Manhattan’s worst tenement districts. In this case, the choice of the noble-sounding names “Kaiser” and “Rhine” signaled the overwhelmingly German heritage of their presumed occupants, as well as the prominent Rhinelander family’s involvement in their construction and in broader real estate development in Yorkville. Although built as two separate structures joined along a party wall with interior courtyards, the buildings’ Second Avenue façades present a unified, monumental appearance. The decorative iron balcony and pent eave roof anchor the façade’s center bay, while the round arches that are a hallmark of the Romanesque Revival style play across the façade at different scales. The red-orange brick façade is embellished by rich geometric patterning and detailing, including corbels, quoins and window spandrels featuring delicate cartouches with ribbons. The building was recently restored with the removal of white paint obscuring the building’s subtle texture and fine ornament. With luck, the cornices that flanked the pent eave roof in this once-picturesque roofline will also be restored.
The Kaiser and the Rhine
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The Kaiser and the Rhine, August 13, 1941. In 1886 Gertrude Rhinelander, a scion of a well-established and wealthy New York family, purchased a series of lots on the corner of Second Avenue and 89th Street. She commissioned architects Lamb & Rich to design two matching apartment buildings with ground floor commercial spaces. Christened The Rhine (nos. 1716-18) and The Kaiser (nos. 1720-22) by Rhinelander, the buildings were completed in 1887. Rendered in a Romanesque Revival style to look as though a single structure, the building did feature some unexpected architectural details, including an almost Modern style maze-like pattern of brickwork on the second floor facade. A massive and devastating fire in 1904 gutted the building. Gertrude Rhinelander, who still collected the rents herself, rebuilt. It was likely at this time that the Tuscan Revival style roofs were added. In the late 20th century the buildings were painted in muted grey and white tones, but in 2016 the paint was striped off, revealing the rich tones of the original red brick.
Central Christian Church
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Park Avenue Christian Church Bertram Goodhue of Cram, Goodhue & Ferguson 1909-11–NYCHD, NR-D This magnificent French Gothic Revival style church is clad in grey Manhattan schist, and features a pointed arch stained glass window and a 70-foot lead fleche, cast in Birmingham, England, by Henry Hope & Sons to emulate the one at Sainte Chapelle in Paris. Goodhue also designed the adjacent rectory in the same style of the same grey schist. In 2014, the controversy over its demolition led to the designation of the Park Avenue Historic District.
1040 Park Avenue
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1040 Park Avenue Delano & Aldrich, 1923-25 – NYC HD, NR-D 1040 Park Avenue made distinctive with its eclectic ornament includes a frieze with sculpted tortoises and hares. Interestingly, the building does not have a cornice, which is unusual for a Renaissance Revival style building. It did, however, have one of the Avenue’s earliest penthouse apartments, which became fashionable in the 1920s. Though intended as servants’ quarters, the top floor was transformed by famed magazine publisher Condé Nast into a 5,000-square-foot duplex designed by actress and interior decorator Elsie de Wolfe. The building was also briefly home to Jacqueline Kennedy after she left the White House
Photos
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1570 Third Avenue
Manhattan: 3rd Avenue - 88th Street Third Ave., west side, north of East 88th Street and showing at 89th Street, a station of the Third Ave. Elevated Line. November 14, 1937. P. L. Sperr.
1569 Third Avenue
Manhattan: 3rd Avenue - 88th Street Third Avenue, east side, from 88th to 89th Streets, showig 1569 Third Avenue, on the N. E. corner of 88th Street, a threestory frame house with a stone front. 1932\. J. Clarence Davies Collection,Museum of the City of New York, Negative No. 235,
155 East 88th Street
155 East 88th Street. 6th Municipal District Court.
155 East 88th Street
Manhattan: 88th Street (East) - Lexington Avenue 153 to 169 East 88th Street, north side, east from but not including Lexington to Third Aves., showing the Sixth District Court at No. 155-157 (2-story building). August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn.
173-175 East 87th Street
\#169-171 East 87 St. New York City. Looking N.E. at Edge to S.W. Corner of Building at 175 East 87th St., Showing How Front Wall & West Gable Wall Are Not Tied Together 12:57 PM
173-175 East 87th Street
\#169-171 East 87th St. New York City. General View of Front Wall to #173-75 East 87 St. 11:38 AM
165 East 87th Street
87th Street (East) #165-67
165-167 East 87th Street
165-167 East 87th St. New York City. General View of Fronts to #165-167 East 87th Street. Shows Separation in Brickwork on 165 East 87 St. Also Window Sills Chipped Off on Both Buildings 12:18 PM
FDNY Hook & Ladder 13
161 East 87th Street
Manhattan: 87th Street (East) - Lexington Avenue 159-161 East 87th Street, north side, east of Lexington Avenue. No. 159 is the Hook & Ladder Company, No. 13. March 29, 1929. P. L. Sperr. NVEG ~~ E629
The Marion
Loew's Orpheum Theater
Manhattan: 86th Street (East) - 3rd Avenue (1) 165-171 East 86th Street, north side, west of Third Avenue. No. 167 is a three-story frame house with a brick front. No. 169 is the 86th Street entrance of Loew's Orpheum Theatre, which extends through to 87th Street. 1932\. J. Clarence Davies Collection, Museum of the City of New York. Negative No. 233. NEG #4437 (2) The same. August 17, 1936. P. L. Sperr. Nig w~S61
The Marion
Manhattan: Lexington Avenue - 87th Street Lexington Ave., east side, north from East 87th Street. August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn.
1293 Lexington Avenue
\[Lexington Avenue and the Corner of 87th Street: IRT East Side Line] Construction at 87th Street and Lexington Avenue, Manhattan on the IRT East Side Line. Survey photograph shows an early phase of the construction on the East Side Line. The view is of the northeast corner on Lexington Avenue. Wood beams are stacked in the street's gutter. The corner building, with a pharmacy at street level and apartments above, is prominently shown. Original logbook notation reads: Camera at Station 334-95, second floor of 1291, 34 feet east of east curb Lexington Avenue looking north. Showing northeast corner of 87th Street and Lexington Avenue, side view on 87th Street.
Loew's Orpheum Theater
Manhattan: 86th Street (East) - 3rd Avenue (1) 165-171 East 86th Street, north side, west of Third Avenue. No. 167 is a three-story frame house with a brick front. No. 169 is the 86th Street entrance of Loew's Orpheum Theatre, which extends through to 87th Street. 1932\. J. Clarence Davies Collection, Museum of the City of New York. Negative No. 233. NEG #4437 (2) The same. August 17, 1936. P. L. Sperr. Nig w~S61
204 East 90th Street
204 E. 90th Street, New York City, November 2, 1915. Photographed for Joseph P. Day.
204 East 90th Street
204 E. 90th Street, New York City, November 2, 1915. Photographed for Joseph P. Day.
Immanuel Lutheran Church
Immanuel Lutheran Church
Manhattan: Lexington Avenue - 87th Street (1) Lexington Ave., west side, south from East 88th to 87th Streets, showing lImmanuel Ltheran Church at the S.W. corner of the former, and a demolition, at the N.W. corner of the latter. August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn. (2) 1290-98 Lexington Ave., at the N.W. corner of East 87th Street, showing a 5-story apartment house, the Columbia, under demolitiom, Thtw site, in conjunction with Nos. 133 to 125 East 87th Street (left) will be improved with a modern structure for the Consolidated Gas and Electric Co., as their Yorkville office. August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn. (3) An extensive view northward on the west side of the Ave. and showing the new 2-story structure that will house the Yorkville office of the Consolidated Gas and Electric Co. November 14, 1937. P. L. Sperr.
Immanuel Lutheran Church
230 East 88th Street
Manhattan: 88th Street (East) - 2nd Avenue 230 East 88th Street, between Second and -hird Avenues showing P.-. 3O. Board of Education, N.Y.C. NRa w 4463 a1taG 4A S 4~.wicEeI AuEMNUi
1340 Lexington Avenue
\[Northwest Corner of Lexington Avenue and East 89th Street] Northwest corner of Lexington Avenue and East 89th Street during subway construction. Wooden boards cover the street and much of the sidewalk. In the distance are several streetcars while in the foreground at left are a handful of children.
1338 Lexington Avenue
Manhattan: Lexington Avenue - 88th Street Lexington Ave., west side, south from East 89th to and including 88th Streets, showing two apartment houses, Nos. 1338-28 and 1326-1324. On the left appears the Immanuel Lutheran Church, located at the S.W. corner of 88th Street. August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn.
165 East 86th Street
Manhattan: 86th Street (East) - Lexington Avenue 165-163 East 86th Street, north side, between Lexington and Third Avenues. No. 165 is the Horn & Hardart Company's Automat Cafeteria for which F. P. Platt Brothers were the architects. 1930\. Albert Rothschild.
1342 Lexington Avenue
1530 Third Avenue
Manhattan: 3rd Avenue - 86th Street Third Avenue, west side, north from 86th Street, showing 1530 Third Avenue, on the N.W. corner of 86th Street, a three-story frame house with a brick front. 1932\. J. Clarence Davies Collection, Museum of the City of New York, Negative No. 240
201 East 86th Street
Manhattan: 86th Street (East) - 3rd Avenue 201-209 East 86th Street, east of and adjoining the N.E. corner of Third Avenue. No. 205-209 will soon be torn down to make way for the National Bank of Yorkville. The Lyceum Theatre, No. 201 is the corner building. August 2, 1927. P. L. Sperr.
201 East 86th Street
Lithograph print depicting a brick building in center, with a tree in front. The house has shuttered windows and panned glass, as well as arched doorway above stairs. Trees are visible in background.
201 East 86th Street
Manhattan: 3rd Avenue - 86th Street Third Avenue, east side, from 86th to 87th Street; The Lyceum, 201 East 86th Street, is at the N.E. corner of 86th Street. March 29, 1929. P.L. Sperr.
125 East 87th Street
Manhattan: 87th Street (East) - Lexington Avenue 125-133 East 87th Street, adjoining and west of the N.W. corner of Lexington Avenue. March 29, 1929. P. L. Sperr.
1294 Lexington Avenue
Manhattan: Lexington Avenue - 87th Street (1) Lexington Ave., west side, south from East 88th to 87th Streets, showing lImmanuel Ltheran Church at the S.W. corner of the former, and a demolition, at the N.W. corner of the latter. August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn. (2) 1290-98 Lexington Ave., at the N.W. corner of East 87th Street, showing a 5-story apartment house, the Columbia, under demolitiom, Thtw site, in conjunction with Nos. 133 to 125 East 87th Street (left) will be improved with a modern structure for the Consolidated Gas and Electric Co., as their Yorkville office. August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn. (3) An extensive view northward on the west side of the Ave. and showing the new 2-story structure that will house the Yorkville office of the Consolidated Gas and Electric Co. November 14, 1937. P. L. Sperr.
159 East 90th Street
Manhattan: 90th Street (East) - Lexington Avenue East 90th Street, north side, east from Lexington to Third Aves., showing an 8-story structure, No. 159-163, occupied until recently by the Manhattan General Hospital. In the early part of 1937 they moved into the vacated building, on the west side of Second Ave., between East 17th and 18th Streets, that was formerly the Lying-In Hospital; the latter in turn having become associated in New York Hospital and Cornell Medical College Center. August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn. According to the New York Times of January 3, 1938, Nos. 149 to 157 East 90th Street will be demolished and the site improved by a 6-story structure. This site comprises the buildings between the Hospital and the two corner buildings seen in the foreground.
Y.M.C.A., East 86th Street
Manhattan: 86th Street (East) - Lexington Avenue 153-151 East 38th Street, east of, addition, and at the N.E. corner of Lexington Ave. No. 153 is a branch of the Y, M. C. A. Augst 2, 1927. P. L. Sperr. This shows up on the E 86th st between Park & Lex set of photos.
Y.M.C.A., East 86th Street
153 East 86th Street. Y.M.C.A.
Our Lady of Good Counsel
Our Lady of Good Counsel
\[Church of Our Lady of Good Counsel, 230 East 90th Street.]
Our Lady of Good Counsel
147 East 86th Street
\[Looking east on East 86th Street from Lexington Avenue.]
Our Lady of Good Counsel
151 East 86th Street
151 East 86th Street. New York Edison Company Branch.
Our Lady of Good Counsel
Second Avenue Between 93rd and 92nd Streets: Second Avenue Subway As part of the documentation of the proposed Second Avenue Subway in Manhattan, survey photo shows Second Avenue between 93rd and 92nd Streets, looking south. Also shows buildings, automobiles, truck, fenced vacant lot, and signage.
1360-1354 Lexington Avenue
Manhattan: Lexington Avenue - 90th Street (East) 1360 to 1354 Lexington Ave., (right to left) at, adjoining and south of the S.W. corner of East 90th Street. August 13, 1937. George D. Chinn.
1361 Lexington Avenue
Manhattan: Lexington Avenue - 90th Street (East) 1361-65 and 1377-79 Lexington Ave., east side, north from E. 90th to 91st Streets. Also shown (right) are No's. 145 and 147 East 90th Street, at and adjoining the N.E. corner of Lexington Avenue. The corner house bears No. 145 East 90th Street and 1361-1365 Lexington Avenue. August 13, 1937. Gift of Geo. D. Chinn.
115 East 89th Street
Manhattan: 89th Street (East) - Park Avenue 113-115 East 89th Street, north side, between Park and Lexington Avenues, as seen from the excavation on the south side of the street. March 28, 1929. P. L. Sperr.
Jacob Ruppert's Brewery Bottling
Manhattan: 3rd Avenue - 90th Street 1\)Jacob Ruppert's Brewery; bottling department, one of the oldest buildings, N.E. corner of Third Avenue and 90th Street. Mr. Ruppert, in addition to his brewing activities, is owner of the New York Yankees, a professional baseball club in the American League. June 26, 1931. P.L.Sperr. Photographer. Bottling department, Jacob Ruppert's Brewery, N.E. corner of Third Avenue and 90th Street. June 26, 1931. P.L.Sperr, Photographer.
Jacob Ruppert's Brewery Bottling
Manhattan: 3rd Avenue - 90th Street 1\)Jacob Ruppert's Brewery; bottling department, one of the oldest buildings, N.E. corner of Third Avenue and 90th Street. Mr. Ruppert, in addition to his brewing activities, is owner of the New York Yankees, a professional baseball club in the American League. June 26, 1931. P.L.Sperr. Photographer. Bottling department, Jacob Ruppert's Brewery, N.E. corner of Third Avenue and 90th Street. June 26, 1931. P.L.Sperr, Photographer.
Jacob Ruppert's Brewery Stockhouse
Manhattan: 3rd Avenue - 90th Street (1) Jacob Ruppert's Brewery, showing second oldest sections, and one of the older sections, East side of Third Avenue from 91st to 90th Streets. June 26, 1931. P.L. Sperr,Photographer. (2) Portion of Jacob Ruppert's Brewery, Third Avenue at N. E.corner of 91st Street. June 26, 1931. P.L. Sperr,Photographer. (3) Oldest portion of Jacob Ruppert's Brewery, East side of Third Avenue between 91st and 92nd Streets,. June 26, 1931. P.L. Sperr, Photographer.
242 East 90th Street
242 East 90th Street. Row houses
Public School 237
Manhattan: 87th Street (East) - Park Avenue 113 East 87th Street, north side, between Park and Lexington Avenues, showing P.S. 37. Board of Education. N.Y.C. A438.S
Public School 237
Manhattan: 87th Street (East) - Park Avenue 113 East 87th Street, North side between Park and Lexington Avenues, showing P.S. 237. Board of Education, N.Y.C. ....Life Insurance 1928
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