Margret Apartment Building, 1921.

William H. Reynolds was a Brooklyn-born real estate developer of Prospect Heights, Borough Park, and Bensonhurst. Not only known for his real estate dealings (he opened a broker's office at age 18), he was also a New York State Senator (the youngest senator at age 24), amusement park (Coney Island's Dreamland) and theatre owner, mayor of Long Beach, Long Island, convicted swindler, athlete, and all around lover of the good life. He built the Margret across from Prospect Park in the 1890s while also developing rowhouses on the surrounding blocks. In 1898 he was involved in a real estate exchange with the Cord Meyer Development Company of Queens. They got the plot the Margret was on and he got a 354 lots in Flushing, Queens. His later real estate projects included Laurelton, Queens and Long Beach, Long Island.

The trolley seen at center is traveling along the Vanderbilt Avenue Line, which began service as a horse-drawn streetcar in 1869 and though a number of owners and name changes survived as a trolley through the middle of the 20th century.