[Nassau Street: BMT Nassau St./Jamaica Line]
Survey photograph taken during construction of the BMT Nassau Street Line at the intersection of Nassau Street and Spruce Street. Camera is positioned at the center line looking south, showing Nassau Street. View was taken between 10:30 AM to 12:00 PM.
New York Transit MuseumAmerican Tract Society Building ARCHITECT: R. H. Robertson DATE: 1894-95 STYLE: Romanesque, Renaissance Revival
The American Tract Society Building was commissioned as a speculative venture by the American Tract Society, founded in 1825 to publish and distribute religious tracts and literature, which emerged as one of the largest American publishers prior to the Civil War. It is one of the earliest, as well as one of the earliest extant, steel skeletal-frame skyscrapers in New York, partially of curtain-wall construction. It was also one of the tallest and largest skyscrapers in the city upon its completion.
The design combines elements of the Romanesque and Renaissance Revival styles, with two similar principal facades arranged with an overall tripartite vertical scheme, and the building is clad in rusticated gray Westerly granite, gray Haverstraw Roman brick, and buff-colored terra cotta.
Historic Districts Council