High Service Pumping Station, March 5, 1938.

The origins of this building date to 1901 when the new consolidated city's Department of Water Supply laid the foundation for a pumping station near the planned East Basin of the Jerome Park Reservoir. The "high service" facility was meant to provide increased water pressure to new taller buildings. While the East Basin was never constructed, the 1906-completed building did find a use as a pumping station, with underground pipes attaching it to the West Basin of the reservoir.

The red brick, Romanesque Revival building is low and long with 42 uniform two-story arch-topped windows on its facade. The long and steeply pitched roof once had a tall brick water-tower jutting out from the middle of the building (seen here). The tower has since been dramatically shortened, though the facility still functions in its original purpose.

Interestingly this pumping station differs stylistically from other, earlier waterway infrastructure. The early work, rendered in stone and often completed in Renaissance Revival and Italianate styles, was completed by the Aqueduct Commission, a state-appointed panel. This building was designed by George W. Birdsall, of the city's Department of Water. In the case of new aqueduct infrastructure, the city and state agencies often clashed in the early years after consolidation. The red brick Romanesque look of this building "can be interpreted as defiant or hostile," according to architectural historian Robert Kornfeld.