NEW YORK CITY’S IRISH HOUSE OF LORDS (1912)
******************************************************************************************************************************** Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes. The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations. Do you know the history of YOUR house? ******************************************************************************************************************************** “(New York City) is never the same city for a dozen years together. A man born in New York forty years ago finds nothing, absolutely nothing, of the New York he knew. If he chance to stumble upon a few old houses not yet leveled, he is fortunate. But the landmarks, the objects which marked the city to him, as a city, are gone.” – Harper’s Monthly, 1856 ******************************************************************************************************************************** It was an unassuming ancient wood-frame house – said to be one of the last of its kind in Yorkville – and it was entering its final Fenian days. The building, which had been purchased half a century before in 1860, at the princely sum of $10K, by the then-current owner, John Sheehy, had, through the death of said owner, been forced in 1912 upon the chopping block for sale to the highest bidder. The history of the structure, though, had been more known, in some ways, to the British War Department of the past half century than it had been, generally, to many of the locals of Yorkville where it had stood for more than most could remember. For, it had taken on the fantastical aura of the gathering place of patriots, as well as the auspicious mantel of the “Irish […]
HOUSE HISTORY RULE No. 23 – PARAPETS (1910)
******************************************************************************************************************************** Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes. The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations. Do you know the history of YOUR house? ******************************************************************************************************************************** House History Rule No. 23: “The more elaborate a house’s parapet, the less likely it will survive.” When you look up to the top of any brownstone, rowhouse, or townhouse, you sometimes see a parapet, an extension of sorts above the cornice which adds a certain grandeur or majesty to any building. The problem with many of these parapets, though, was their susceptibility to the elements. Over time, they wore, rotted, and simply fell apart. Eventually, these ornate elements of design were removed to prevent further damage to the structural integrity of the houses they graced. Built by Otto Singer in 1909, these 1-Family brick houses, exist on West 8th St. & King’s Hwy., in Bensonhurst. Follow @BrownstoneDetec Share ———————————————————————————————————————– The Brownstone Detectives Brownstone Detectives is an historic property research agency. Our mission is to document and save the histories of our clients’ homes. From our research, we produce our celebrated House History Books and House History Reports. Contact us today to begin discovering the history of your home.
BEECHER’S BROWNSTONE GETS A RENO (1940)
******************************************************************************************************************************** Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes. The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations. Do you know the history of YOUR house? ******************************************************************************************************************************** In 1940, Nora Sullivan embarked upon a renovation of 66 Cranberry Street. It was an historic brownstone built in the mid-1800s, at some point being occupied by the Joel Osteen of his day, the great abolitionist preacher Henry Ward Beecher. Beecher probably selected the house to be close to his job next door, as the phenomenally popular preacher at Plymouth Church. Before the house had been built, like many other structures in old Brooklyn Heights, two wood frame buildings had graced the spot. These particular structures had been used as a school for boys. Later in the 1840s, though, a “foundling,” deposited on the building’s stoop “in a basket,” was “discovered in the front yard of Mr. Henry Ruggle,” the owner at the time of 66 Cranberry in its previous iteration. The scandal, though, lay in the fact that, upon the baby’s arrival at the mayor’s office – where abandoned babies were apparently brought back then – it was discovered that when the “habilments” were examined, they were “found to be of fine quality and of elaborate workmanship” which were indicative that “its late possessors are an unworthy portion of the ‘upper ten.’” Amongst the other discoveries in the baby’s basket was a “fine cambric handkerchief marked ‘E,’” which was “the […]
BODY-BUILDING IN THE GOWANUS (1911)
******************************************************************************************************************************** Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes. The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations. Do you know the history of YOUR house? ******************************************************************************************************************************** Brooklyn’s Third Avenue was always just a bit gritty – even before the city decided it needed a motorway there to help ease congestion. That was when it started construction on the Gowanus Expressway in 1939. Traffic, though, had always been a large part of the avenue’s make-up. Even before the motorized vehicles, there were the horse-driven vehicles – cars, vans, streetcars, &c. But it was not just the vehicles that motored along the road that gave Third Avenue its rep – it was also those that parked alongside it – on lots, motor pools, parts yards, and other commercial properties. DONIGAN & NEILSON: BODY-BUILDERS One company that fit perfectly into its surroundings was Donigan & Neilson at 743-747 Third Avenue. This partnership’s firm catered to those commercial companies that operated using a variety of vehicles – to deliver, to haul, to move, &c. Donigan & Neilson built the bodies for those commercial vehicles – designing, building and assembling the bodies for hacks, trucks, vans, delivery wagons, and the like. This, of course, was before the assembly-line manufactured truck, when it made sense to have a commercial truck body made to order. According to their advertising, Donigan & Neilson began operations in 1875, when only horses propelled vehicles, and they were […]
MR. DINKINS’ BULGING FACADE (1977)
******************************************************************************************************************************** Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes. The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations. Do you know the history of YOUR house? ******************************************************************************************************************************** Have you ever wondered what once filled those large lots at the corners of Halsey Street and Ralph Avenue? Every house has a history. You know it is there, but the clouds of the past work to obfuscate the present. Uncovering that history takes some detective work, but with a little time and some gumshoe sleuthing, the answers can be discovered. With regard to 774 Halsey Street – what do we know happened? A fire? Decay? Gas explosion? What do we know about the life of the building? What was it used for? Who owned the building and who lived there? We looked to clues from newspaper archives, fire insurance maps, and physical evidence to unravel that history. This is our report: WHAT HAPPENED to 774? A 4-story brick apartment building – 774 Halsey Street – sat on the southeast corner of the Halsey/Ralph intersection. It had a commercial space on the ground floor facing Halsey Street and one at the rear of the building at 153 Ralph Avenue. The building housed a number of apartments the addresses/entrances of which were on the Ralph side of the building at 149 Ralph Avenue. The apartments of the Ralph-facing side of the building had stacked bay windows, one on each floor. South of […]
HITLER’S BROOKLYN BROWNSTONE (1940)
******************************************************************************************************************************** Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes. The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations. Do you know the history of YOUR house? ******************************************************************************************************************************** I know. I know. So dramatic, right? You must be thinking that we’re using a figure of speech in a misguided attempt to characterize a Brooklyn slumlord, right? I mean, he’d have to be a really nasty landlord to get the Hitler comparison. Takes your deposit and keeps the heat off in the winter? Goes into your place when you’re not there? Charges you part of the common area bill? What a dictator! But hold on, because there’s actually a story behind this. A good one… WHAT TO DO WITH A “CRUMMY BUILDING”? Once upon a time, in the City of Churches, two Manhattan attorneys – who had allowed the mortgage payments to lapse on a certain “crummy building” they owned – were discussing legal strategy. These two gentlemen, Julius Freilicher and Martin Auslander of 1 Park Place, had a $3,300 mortgage on their tenement – 541 Clinton Street in Carroll Gardens – with the Dime Savings Bank. The two advocates had determined that it was not in their best interests to pay the mortgage, but they also did not like the idea of losing. They were attorneys, you know. So, they opted for a scheme that would be the next best thing. One day when the bank was about to […]
