The vacant Singer’s Auto Service Station on West 166th Street, about 1926. The sign at left indicates that Singer's has moved to a new location on 167th Street. The large sign advertises Singer's as an authorized mechanic for Willys-Overland automobiles. Best known for the production of World War II-era Jeeps, Willys-Overland had earlier produced passenger cars. The sign in the photograph advertises the Whippet, a smaller model introduced in 1926.

Washington Heights, the narrow strip of high ground between the Harlem and Hudson Rivers, is named for the Revolutionary War Fort Washington. Fortifications aside, the area was rural, rocky, and sparsely populated until latter half of the 19th century; the extension of rapid transit to Upper Manhattan century helped spur development. Today, Washington Heights is a diverse, densely populated enclave including the massive Columbia University medical campus, historic sites like the Morris-Jumel mansion, and panoramic views of the Bronx, Lower Manhattan, and the New Jersey Palisades.

512 West 167th Street, ca. 1932.

Large wooden houses at the corner of Edgecombe Avenue and Jumel Place, 1932. Today, the site is the NYPD’s 33rd precinct, designed by Dattner Architects and built between 1997-2002.

Riverside Drive, north from 165th Street, ca. 1915. Washington Heights’ wooded, bucolic character would soon be disrupted by development. In 1921, the Harkness family donated a 22-acre plot between 165th and 168th Streets for what would become the campus of the Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center. Today, the Milstein Hospital Building, built in 1988, occupies 165th Street between Riverside Drive and Fort Washington Avenue.

“West 165th Street, north side, west from Fort Washington Ave., across Riverside Drive to the North (Hudson) River and showing across the latter the Jersey highlands and the George Washington Bridge. The property on the right is a part of the Columbia University-Presbyterian Medical Center and partially shown thereon is the Presbyterian Hospital School of Nursing. June 15, 1937.”

Wooden frame houses at 2123 and 2121 Amsterdam Avenue, 1932. The former is set back from the street, behind a picket fence that had likely seen better days. The storefront at no. 2121 is vacant and available for rent.

American League Base Ball Park, ca. 1910. Hilltop Park was the home of the New York Highlanders, as today’s Yankees were then known, between 1903 and 1912. The team moved to the Giants’ Polo Grounds on the Harlem River for the 1913 season and Hilltop Park was demolished in 1914. In 1925, Columbia-Presbyterian Hospital broke ground at this site.

Den Norske Frei Missions Menighed (Norwegian Free Lutheran Brethren Church), 1934. This brick structure replaced a 2-story frame house, still standing as late as 1922.

Though actually triangular, Mitchel Square is a small urban park that features the war memorial seen here. The plot was initially dedicated as a public space in 1911 and named Audubon Square. On February 8, 1919, the square was renamed in honor of John Purroy Mitchel. Mitchel was elected the youngest mayor of New York City (a record which still stands) in 1913. The "Boy Mayor" was known for his idealism and (perhaps uncommon in politics) honesty. Following his mayoral term (he lost a bid for reelection in the primaries), he enlisted in the Army Air Corps. In 1918 while on a training flight in Lousiana, Mitchel fell from his plane and died. The city (and state) mourned and eulogized the former mayor, naming this park after him, erecting a memorial at Fifth Avenue and East 91st Street, and naming a Long Island airfield for him. Theodore Roosevelt wrote of the man, “No stauncher American, no abler and more disinterested public servant, and no finer natural soldier than Purroy Mitchel was to be found in all our country.” Four years after the park's renaming, this World War I memorial sculpture was installed. Dedicated on May 30, 1923, and designed by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, this public arts still stands on the north side of the park, while the south side remains benches and rock outcroppings.

The Roman Catholic Church and Rectory of St. Rose of Lima, viewed from across McKenna Square, 1934. The triangular park site was created in 1917, when the city cleared the ad-hoc cottages of Irish immigrant workers there as part of the widening of 165th Street. The roadway in the foreground had previously been known as Croton Street. In 1924, the square was named after Private William McKenna, a soldier killed in World War I. St. Rose of Lima, in the background was designed by architect Joseph H. McGuire and completed in 1905.

“Fort Washington Avenue, north from West 163rd Street, and showing upon the west side of same, the New York Institution for the Deaf extending to 165th Street. Note the tower of the George Washington Bridge through the trees. June 15, 1937.” The New York Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb was founded in 1818 and moved to its third location, in Washington Heights, in 1856. The school moved to its current campus in White Plains, New York in 1938, shortly after this photo was taken. When the George Washington Bridge (at left) opened in 1931, it was the longest single bridge span in the world. 19 days before this photo was taken, it lost that title to San Francisco’s brand-new Golden Gate Bridge."

563 West 169th Street, ca. 1932.

Storefronts selling “fancy groceries,” tobacco products, stationery, and “premium hams & bacon” along Amsterdam Avenue, 1914. Note the cobblestoned roadway.

White Tower Hamburger, 1933. White Tower Hamburger was a chain of fast food restaurants created as a copycat or imitator (if we are being generous) of White Castle. Founded in Milwaukee in 1926, they hired away White Castle employees, barely tweaked the chain's slogan, and mimicked the crenellated building design. By the 1950s White Tower had more than 250 locations all across the country., largely in urban areas. Despite the inevitable copyright lawsuit, the last batch of original White Towers remained in business through the 1980s. (A single location is still open in Toledo, Ohio, though it is long divorced from the original owners). New York City was home to at least a half a dozen White Tower Hamburger locations. This castle-like building at Broadway and West 167th Street is no longer extant, but at least one original White Tower building remains in Woodside, Queens.

455 West 164th Street, ca. 1932.

563-565 West 170th Street, 1932. The building at left (no.565) remains, though you might not realize it. Looking at the current structure directly from the sidewalk in front, it looks to be a late 20th century structure: simple, red brick, no style. But, if one walks just slightly down the block to the east and looks back, the wood-frame house, complete with peaked roof, is visible.

The most resplendent of all the theaters designed by Thomas W. Lamb, the Audubon Theatre and Ballroom on the east side of Broadway between West 165th and West 168th Streets was graced with segmented arches made of polychrome glazed terra-cotta. If the entrance's relief of a Viking ship guided through rough seas by a Titan goddess is inexplicable, droll fox-head trophies positioned at the springing of each arch are not. They allude to the builder of the Audubon, William "20th Century" Fox. A venue for Fanny Brice as well as for the Marx Brothers, who lived nearby, the Audubon is now best remembered as the place where Malcolm X was slain in 1965. After becoming the property of New York City, the Audubon deteriorated. Most of the building was demolished to make way for a new building constructed by Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center. The base of the new research center incorporates portions of the Audubon's original facade. Painstakingly restored, the elaborate terra cotta facade serves as a vivid reminder of an important neighborhood landmark, over half of which was destroyed to provide a parking lot.

22nd Regiment Armory, date unknown. The massive brick Classical Revival structure with Romanesque Revival elements served as the headquarters for the 22nd Regimental Armory. Completed in 1911 to the designs of the firm of Richard Walker and Charles Morris. The 22nd Regiment was downsized, merged, and moved around in the mid 20th century. The drill hall became for a time a track-and-field venue for the city's schools (having hosted athletic events even while occupied by the national guard). In the 1980s, the huge building served as a city homeless shelter. In the 1990s Dr. Norbert Sanders (the only New Yorker to ever win the city's marathon) raised $25 million to refurbish the building. Today it houses the National Track & Field Hall of Fame, a large after-school program, and the Millrose Games, the country’s best-known indoor track-and-field event.

Frame houses at 464, 466, 468 West 166th Street, 1932.

A restaurant at the corner of West 163rd Street and Amsterdam Avenue advertises chop suey, 1934.

The New York Preservation Archive Project is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to documenting, preserving, and celebrating the history of historic preservation in New York City. The Archive Project is devoted to celebrating neglected narratives of New York historic preservation using the archives that hold these stories. This collection includes a selection of historic sites that became flashpoints of the city's preservation movement(s). For more information, visit: www.nypap.org/phd-category/places/

Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center, Washington Heights; November 16, 1937.

Audubon Theatre, 1915. Built in 1912 by William Fox, the founder of the Fox Film Corporation, the Audubon was a film and vaudeville theatre with a second floor ballroom, and basement-level meeting rooms often used by political activists, trade unions, and religious groups. In 1950, Congregation Emes Wozedek purchased the building. After Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam in 1964, he founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU), whose weekly meetings were held at the Audubon Ballroom. It was at one of those meetings, on February 21, 1965, that Malcolm X was assassinated as he was giving a speech. Thereafter, the building fell into disrepair. In 1992, the building was slated for demolition and redevelopment by Columbia University. Preservation groups resisted the development, eventually reaching a compromise: Columbia could build at the northern end of the block, but the building and facade closest to Broadway and 165th Street would be preserved.

This is the northwest corner of West 173rd Street and Broadway. The billboard advertises (and requests funds) for a new church called the Broadway Temple. This massive planned structure was the brainchild of Reverend Christian Reisner, the leader of a Washington Heights Methodist congregation. Upon learning in 1923 that their current place of worship was to be demolished for the planned George Washington Bridge, Rev. Reisner decided their next home would be a ”magnificent advertisement for God’s business.” This proposed church by architect Donn Barber was to include two 12-story apartment buildings flanking a soaring central tower, complete with a 75-foot-high rotating cross at the top. The church was to seat more than 2,000 and have a basement space with a gym, bowling alley, and pool. Needing $4 million for his church, the reverend sought funds from New York's wealthiest (John D. Rockefeller, for one) and its regular folks (the billboard urges passers-by to help out with 5% bonds). By the start of the Depression, the two Deco apartment houses had been completed, but the church itself was far from its planned 725 feet. Stalled until the 1940s because of debt, construction on the much more restrained edifice (only three stories as compared to 40) was begun again in 1947 and the temple was completed in 1952 (with no rotating cross). The final design was completed by Shreve, Harmon and Lamb, the firm that designed the Empire State Building.