William Minifie

GRACE CHURCH AND IT'S REALM:  

A Study of the South Side of Union Square

Here are three views of The Academy of Music which is a little far afield from our focus, but which has such a fascinating history that it begged to be mentioned. It was on the north east corner of 14th Street and Irving Place. Built in 1854 it was designed by Alexander Saeltzer (who also was the architect for the Astor Library---now the Public Theater). When the Academy was built it was this country’s first successful house dedicated to opera. It was huge: it could seat 4,600 souls and was the largest opera venue in the world. The auditorium was painted in white and gold and had 100 gas burners to light the place. Il Trovatore, Semiramide, La Traviata, Aida, Carmen, Lohengrin,and Die Walkure all had their American debuts here--as did Adelina Patti whose appearance at the Academy propelled her to international stardom. Jenny Lind sang here, Edwin Booth (ill- starred brother of John Wilkes Booth), James O’Neill and all the luminaries of New York acted here, when opera was not on the bill. When the ground floor was cleared of seats it was transformed into New York’s largest ballroom. Probably the most famous ball, in 1860, occurred when the Prince of Wales visited the city, and the floor collapsed---or at least sank several feet. Fortuitously the great, rotund Sexton of Grace Church (Isaac Hull Brown) was in charge of the ‘social event of the decade’ and having foreseen such a possibility had stationed the stagehands in the basement and they manually raised the floor and braced it in place---and saved the day. In the 1880’s New York’s newly minted rich wanted private boxes and the Academy demurred which brought about the birth of the Metropolitan Opera and the ultimate demise of the Academy. Beginning in August 1888 the Old Homestead played for three seasons. The backdrop for the final scene is Grace Church Rectory. In 1912 William Fox, later of Fox Film fame leased the theater and it was a cinema until it was demolished in 1926.

When you gaze at the Consolidated Edison tower it is hard imagine what was.

Here are two paintings and a drawing of our special place. The banner on the right notes a balloon race and the DSMB is mentioned as the sponsor, which can be seen on the right. Were balloons made by sewing them back then? Oh the ghastly days before plastic---how did people manage? Notice the balconies on the left on what was then The Morton House--the south east corner of Broadway and 14th Street.

Above, much the same--but such a crisp, wonderful image. Great view of the DSMB. Note Henry Kirke Browns’s statue of Washington which, erected in 1856, was the first statue in NYC after that of George III which had been put up in 1770. Brown’s student, J.Q.A. Ward, worked on it, and Ward went on, in my humble opinion, to become the finest American sculptor of the 19th Century. The statue was later moved to Lafayette’s spot on the southern (14th Street) end of Union Square.

Note ‘Morton House’ signage above the Union Square Theatre and just visible above Washington’s head.

This picture below really got the old juices flowing. This is shot from the southern edge of Union Square, looking south. You can see Grace Church down the opening in the street (that opening is Broadway) and Grace is about an inch down Broadway on the left. The statue is Lafayette who has his back to us (how French) but he was later moved to the west side of the park for his impertinence. He was sculpted by Bartholdi of Statue of Liberty fame. Our buildings are right smack in front. Roosevelt’s house site (extreme right) is the DSMB. New York looks like Victorian London.

This picture to the left gives a good general shot of the eastern edge of Union Square. Taken from 17th Street and Park Avenue South we are looking south over Union Square and our area of interest--center---covers all but the steeple of Grace Church. Notice how slimmed down Union Square is today: no bulge into Union Square East like that today. The automobile, as usual, would took precedent over pedestrian.

To the right, this is an 1874 St. Patrick’s Day Parade. If you can’t identify our buildings call me. On the right behind the trees is the DSMB. Is that great bust St Patrick heading west through Union Square? Who else could it be?

Do you recall Wallack’s, many pages back, whose front door was on Broadway just north of the north east corner of Broadway and 13th Street? Morton House is to the left in these two pictures above, and in fact you can see ’Morton House’ inscribed in the image above right just to the left of the theater. Upper left was James William Wallack’s theater built in 1861 by architect Thomas R. Jackson, who worked under Richard Upjohn on the design of Trinity Church, Wall Street. Under J.W. Wallack’s son, Lester, the theater company became one of the best in the world. In 1882 a German Opera Co. occupied the premises and Adeline Patti sang many roles there. In 1883, after a huge renovation, it became the Star Theatre (above right) and had a ten year run which starred many of that era’s greatest performers. Henry Irving had his American debut here; Edwin Booth was in several Shakespearian roles, Ellen Terry appeared in 1884 with Irving. The incomparable Sarah Bernhardt performed here often. At the end it slipped from its pre-eminence and was booking burlesque shows and even the Lilliputians, a troupe composed entirely of midgets. 

This upper left view is the most usual one of Wallack’s and though it looks big and certainly impressive--it doesn’t look massive. Even remodeled as the Star Theatre, appearing dark and somehow oppressive it gives the same impression.

This unusual view (to the right) is looking south from the corner of 4th Avenue and 14th Street. The Cafe Leo/Nedick’s site is on the right and the Star Theatre, formerly Wallack’s is beyond---in other words Wallack’s/Star ran all the way from Broadway to 4th Avenue, for this is the rear end of of the theater. The German Saving Bank can be seen on the left. Some sort of banner-led march in progress.

Here is the same view, only here it is Wallack’s again and it is a lesson that one might be mistaken to judge a theater’s size without seeing the barn sometimes lurking behind. Just look at the picture above. It is taken from 13th Street (on the left) and Fourth Avenue (on the right)-looking north west. Broadway fronts the tan building down 13th Street on the left. Look at the size of the massive shed behind the Broadway facade. The rear of the Union Square Theatre backed into Wallack’s. Henry Irving, playing at Wallack’s stood on the roof in 1888 and watched the Union Square Theater burn. Only the ardent bravery of the firemen kept Wallack’s from a similar fate. The intense fire, with all the theater world watching in horror, must have seemed Shakespearian. You can see the back side of our buildings up on the right, and in fact at the north end of the rear of Wallack’s was an alley-way whereby one could enter the back of the Union Square Theatre.

A look at the interior on the right confirms the huge size of the place. It could seat 1605 persons. It’s not Carnegie Hall (which seats 2804) but not too bad for a place you never heard of. When I was a kid the building that had replaced Wallace’s in 1902 was a handsome, understated affair (see page 27). That, in turn, was replaced in the 1990’s by the banal monstrosity that now takes up the whole block----see next page. But in some odd and karmic twist of fate, mysteriously begat by tens of thousands of actors, performers and theatre lovers a cinema was conjured up on Wallack’s old site; it undoubtedly shows some of Fox’s movies. (See next page).

Here we are back in the present---well 2011 anyway---and here is the cinema that replaced Wallack’s, north east corner of 13th Street and Broadway. This current incarnation is part of a massive structure taking up the entire block. What would Sarah Bernhardt (possibly the most famous actress of the 19th Century) have to say about this state of affairs?

It is 1926 in this view and we are looking up 4th Avenue from just south of 12th Street. The German Saving Bank is way up on the right, and the Mansard Roofed building on the left has replaced Wallack’s and the Star Theatre. That replacement, when I was a boy, housed Berkey Photo, where I took my first pictures to be developed: wonderful place. Can you see painted on the building on the right the ad for Hammacher and Schlemmer. Who knew they were ever in this ‘hood?

It is again today, looking at what was once the rear end of Wallack’s and the Star Theaters. 4th Avenue runs up to the right and 13th Street is off to the left. This glib sided full block insipid high rise employs every known architectural trick to disguise the mediocrity of the red brick money maker that rises in the middle of it all. Normally I wouldn’t care so much---but just to think what it replaced, leaving not a trace behind.

I just had to include some more images of Wallack’s before leaving it behind. This is a slightly different view of the theater shot from just south of 13th Street looking north or up Broadway. The glassed in corner bay window is striking. Did you know that in Edith Wharton’s novel The Age of Innocence, the protagonist, Newland Archer, attends a performance at Wallack’s and is married at Grace Church (where Edith Wharton was baptized). This view must be the 1860’s; the white house on the south east corner of 13th Street and Broadway looks that old.

This view was shot in 1891; from just below 13th Street, looking north up Broadway. Telegraph poles have come down and wires are all over the place. Where it says ‘Wards’ (north east corner of Broadway and 13th Street) was a clothing store that had frontage on what was by then the Star Theatre (formerly Wallack’s). There is a fascinating movie of the demolition (in 1901)of this latter building on the Library of Congress Web site. DSMB is up on the left where the sign reads “Pennsylvania Railroad Post Office.”

The Star Theatre now belongs to the ages and has been replaced by 842 Broadway--- on the north east corner of Broadway and 13th Street; behind the fellow with the wheelbarrow; more on that building below. The Hotel Churchill is beyond on the right, and if you look past Union Square you can see the construction of the Metropolitan Life Building--- again more below.

This is the same view as the one on the previous page, but shot a little north of 13th Street and Broadway, and a few years later. Cars are now on the scene and you can now see the pointed tower of the Metropolitan Life Building (like the Campanile in St.Mark’s Venice) in the distance in the middle of the picture. The sign for the Hotel Churchill is up on the right and it would appear that the hotel occupied the whole group of buildings north of 842 Broadway, with the exception of the small cafe described below. The DSMB is up on the left.

This picture made the pixels in my brain stand up and do the hokey pokey. This is looking up Broadway (northward) and our focus is on the right. But note the absolutely delightful splendor of the Domestic Sewing Machine Building on the left (Splendor in the Cast). The building in the center with the arches is Tiffany and Co. on Union Square West---breakfast anyone?

This is the Rogers Peet Clothing Store at 842 Broadway on the north east corner of Broadway and 13th Street. The Hotel Churchill---formerly Morton House---is to the left. The Rogers Peet store---which (as far as I can tell) extended from Broadway to 4th Avenue was designed by Clinton and Russell and built in 1902--replacing the Star Theatre. Charles W. Clinton worked under Richard Upjohn and William Hamilton Russell’s great uncle was James Renwick, Jr. (architect of Grace Church). Small world eh? The renowned firm of Clinton & Russell also designed the Astor Hotel, New York City Center and the Apthorp--up on Broadway between 78th and 79th Street-- which is my favorite apartment building in NYC. When it was built it was the largest apartment building in the world.

If you look closely, in the view above, you can make out the Churchill Hotel sign on the extreme left. In the same view can you see the little building tucked in between 842 Broadway and the beginning of the Churchill Hotel complex? That is the Wally Wolf Cafe-- about which I can discover nothing. There appears to be a Seltzer bottle depicted in the billboard above the entrance way. The picture on the left is the same building, only, I’m guessing, a little earlier. Notice the awnings on what must have been the Hotel Churchill at this point because 842 Broadway was built in 1902 and Morton House became The Churchill in 1903. (More on the Churchill to follow). But the doorway of the establishment on the left is really remarkable; it seems to feature a curved bay window on each side of the doorway. I have never seen anything quite like it. I can’t make out the signage above the door and cannot discern if it is Wally Wolf’s Cafe in this view.

It’s fascinating to compare the two drawings on this page to the 1865 images that appeared earlier. Here it is 1899, 34 years later. Above is the east side of Broadway from 12th Street on the right up to 14th Street on the left. Our block from 13th Street up to 14th Street is remarkably unaltered, although Wallack’s has morphed into the Star Theatre (looking perhaps too red here) and only has a few years of life left in it. The White Horse Tavern (although the description is almost illegible) which is immediately to the left of The Star looks the same as does Morton House which begins with the white clad buildings just to the left of the sign depicting the white horse.

Below is from the same year and depicts the west side of Broadway from 12th Street on the left to 14th Street on the right. This side of the street, between 13th and 14th Street is completely changed. Cornelius Roosevelt’s house is gone, replaced by the DSMB and the the Roosevelt Building, immediately to the left of the DSMB is still there to this day, having replaced several buildings.

The Roosevelt Building was built in 1893 from designs by Stephen Decatur Hatch who also did the major design work for 346 Broadway--though the building was completed by McKim, Mead and White. 346 Broadway is now a NYC municipal court building and it is where you go to if you are caught going through red lights on your bike---which I was twice last year. UGH! But I wouldn’t have gaped at the lavish interior if I had been law-abiding.

346 Broadway, oddly enough, was originally the site of the NY Life Insurance Co., which was designed by Griffith Thomas, the architect of the DSMB! Small world, eh?

This is a wonderful, no nonsense view of the south side of 14th Street, with Broadway on the right and 4th Avenue on the left. The German Saving Bank is there on the extreme left, east side of 4th Avenue. Morton House has become the Hotel Churchill and the Union Square Theater has been transformed into B.F. Keith’s--so we know it is sometime after 1903. The building with the ‘Hippodrome’ billboard above it was the original Union Place Hotel and opened in 1850. It was in this building where the Maison Doree restaurant was. In 1868 the Morton Brothers took over and not only changed the name to ‘Morton House’ but also added some adjoining buildings. Then in 1881 Sheridan Shook gained control and added what had been Connor’s billiard room and John Reilly’s stable to the east, but also 850, 852, 854, 856 and 858 on Broadway, behind the building with the Hotel Churchill sign affixed. You can see these additions in the top drawing above on the previous page. Morton House increased in size from 75 to over 200 rooms.

I took this picture in October 1962, just north of 12th Street, looking up 4th Ave. The white building lower center left is S. Klein’s. I was on my to Berkey Photo which was on the west side of 4th Avenue, just north of 13th Street---part of the Rogers Peet Building (the mansarded roofed building up on the left). I had one shot left so I took this just to finish off the roll. The Central Savings Bank (formerly the German Saving Bank) is gone---just an empty lot up on the right, just past that two storied building. New York has a beat-up look---and it was---at least around Union Square.

I wish I had taken more pictures of New York City back then, but I seemed to spend my childhood with blinders on---so unaware of my surroundings. I never dreamed that what at the time seemed a totally wasted shot would ever hold any interest for me--- or anyone else.

This view was shot in 1913 and is looking just north from 12th Street and Broadway. Our buildings are up on the right. New York seems kind of gloomy and foreboding. When I was a boy---all the way from Union Square to the Battery was, after working hours and all weekend, like a ghost town; not un-like this picture.

So much to see in this engraving---which is looking east with Union Square on our left. The statue to the right of center is Lincoln---(also by Henry Kirke Brown) later moved to the northern end of Union Square. On the extreme right is the DSMB. To the left of that is our block and to the left of Lincoln is the German Savings Bank. Just beyond it is a good view of the steeple of the second Grace Church Chapel, which I have never seen in a photograph.

I hate it when people flip their negatives--I feel like I am living in an alternate universe--fallen down the rabbit hole--but that is what has happened here. This is looking south from 17th Street and Park Avenue again--but this time our special area has been surmounted with billboards—how would you like to be surmounted by billboards?  Note the car peeking out on the right on East 17th Street, and the cluster of cars beyond.

The above is a rather fanciful rendition of Union Square---looking east. Drawn in 1899 the DSMB is on the right, with the dome and the flag unfurled atop of it. The statue to the right is of Lincoln. Notice below Lincoln it says “Morton House” indicating the white buildings just to the left of the DSMB. But they have drawn the left most of them higher than the other two-- which must be an error: no other image I’ve seen matches the height shown here. To the right is a menu from the Morton House.

This is Leo’s Cafe locale, but Leo’s has gone to that great Beer Garden in the sky. Here it has become an ice cream joint. I’m glad the place is selling pure ice cream because impure ice cream is a real bummer. The guy having his shoes shined looks so completely happy and at ease that I envy him. How dare he!

Left: The workers and ditch look a little too sanitized laying trolley tracks between 17th and 18th Streets and Broadway. This is just north of Union Square looking south. The prominent building just above center is the DSMB: Grace Church’s steeple can be seen to the left of it and our group (partially hidden by trees) can be seen immediately to the left of Grace Church.

Right: Here is 14th Street between Broadway (just to the left of the DSMB) and University Place, on the extreme right. Lincoln is just to the right of center. Gandhi now occupies Lincoln’s former locale.

This shows Union Square looking south east from 17th Street. Lincoln is now situated at the northern end (on the left--below center in this picture above the plague marker inset) of Union Square, at the top of the elaborate stairway. The DSMB replacement is there along with the edge of Ohrbach’s Department Store on the right end edge. That is the S. Klein Annex on the left---the original Klein’s is to the right just before the German Savings Bank. Our group looks dilapidated.

This is looking east on 14th Street from just east of Irving Place. We are right in front of the Academy of Music which in this shot has become a movie theater, and was on the northern side of 14th Street. A generation earlier the Academy of Music was like Carnegie Hall and The Metropolitan Opera all rolled into one. Looming on the left is the German Saving Bank and beyond you see our friends. The DSMB can be seen to the left of center in the offing. This shot makes me feel a grim, film noir kind of ominous dread.

Here is the same view--only we have moved a tad west. The German Savings Bank is on the extreme left. Here on the right, when I was a kid, was a Horn and Hardart Automat where all the food was locked behind little glass doors-- doors that were opened when enough nickels were slotted in. We would go there and stare at a woman as she made change profligately sowing nickels into the marble trough in front of her---which was well worn by hungry hands scooping them up.

A postcard c. 1905-Morton House is still recognizable but it is now the Hotel Churchill. Looks like B.F. Keith’s frontage to the left of the hotel. Grace Church can be glimpsed down Broadway. The city has moved uptown and this area is looking a little sad and neglected. Neglect will do that.

A few years later. Cars are making an appearance. The German Saving Bank can be seen way left. The Hotel Churchill was opened in 1903 by Frank and James Churchill--a ‘second rate hostelry’ until it closed in 1923.

B.F. Keith’s has become Family Burlesque at this point.

A winter scene shot from Union square west from about 16th Street.

The view looks south and the opening on the right is University Place--and the opening on the left is Broadway.

Hotel Churchill--our continued area of interest (have you lost total interest??) is on the very left of the image. The statue in the center right, in its own little plaza, is of Lincoln--and is by Henry Kirke Brown the same fellow who did equestrian George. Later moved.

This is the Cafe Leo site-(now Klein’s Beauty Academy) on the south east corner 14th Street and 4th Avenue. The Hotel Churchill is gone and the building to the east of it that had housed the family burlesque theatre is still there but billboarded practically to death. No more non naughty bits---is that a triple negative? You can glimpse a bit of the DSMB replacement in the upper right hand corner.

Left: Better view of the late lamented DSMB replacement is on the right edge of this image. Rupert’s (see billboard above and right) was a huge brewery up in the East 90‘s (close by my present ‘hood). There is a huge housing complex there now called---wait for it: “Rupert Towers!”

Right: This is the south east corner of 14th Street and Broadway. (The genteel Maison Doree seems a distant memory). Also a closer, if incomplete look at the DSMB replacement (seen here across Broadway)---a sort of half hearted attempt at art deco. I can remember the ubiquitous red United Cigar signs from my childhood. Some still survive.

Rupert has given way to Wrigley’s in the billboard department. The German Savings Bank (later the Central Saving Bank) is on the left--east of 4th Avenue) You can see S. Klein’s discount store to the left of the bank--if you wear sunglasses. On the really extreme right (I know that’s a tautology) is the tail of Washington’s mount (have to really look for it)---moved from the east and having taken that feisty Lafayette’s place. Just to the left of the tail is Grace Church which looks a blur down Broadway. (Nothing wrong with being a blur--if you know what I’m saying).

The three views above are all shot on the south side of 14th Street between 4th Avenue and Broadway. You can catch a glimpse (particularly in the one above) of the German Saving Bank in the distance on the right. Probably the 1940’s. The very flavor of the city seems so different than today---don’t you think?

This is the same street, but here we are looking west down 14th Street. The subway entrance is the same today. You can see Ohrbach’s in the distance between Broadway and University Place: Whole Foods is in that space today. In the picture above you can see the woman selling pretzels (the gal on the left behind the big basket) and in the picture on the left, in the lower right hand corner, are the same pretzels. From the looks of them they are not for you folks on sodium restricted diets.

In this view from the 1940‘s--(I am guessing)--we can see on the left Klein’s Beauty Academy which is the site of Leo’s Cafe, (south west corner of 14th Street and Fourth Avenue). The building to its right has become a Chop Suey Place but has remained remarkably unaltered from the 1850’s. You can glimpse the chop suey sign in a couple of the views on the previous page. More of Mr. Rupert’s Beer is advertised for sale on the top floors of what was the Union Square Theater, though this building seems less tall, but maybe the billboards have stunted its growth. Was the space behind the billboards used for anything at this point? It is hard to say.

This is Cafe Leo’s site, (south west corner of Broadway and 4th Avenue) and if you study the building you can see that it is indeed the same structure as Cafe Leo, but all the ornamentation has been stripped off. Not an improvement. This is most likely the late 1960’s or early 1970’s and is the Nedick’s I remember. Ah Nedick’s where you could get thin, water downed orange juice--not great, but a hot dog on a toasted bun with mustard and relish was the ultimate tube steak. It was the place for hot dogs. I ate a lot of pig meat when I was a young pup. Some people said Nehdick’s and some said Needick’s---I was a Nehdick’s kind of guy.

You can see part of a Berkey- Peerless ad on the north end of the Rogers Peet Building.

This is how I remember Union Square in the early 1960’s. Our family moved to Broadway and Tenth Street in 1960. That first Halloween we (two of my brothers and myself) went uptown four blocks and found Union Square totally bereft of any one who was not homeless except for some young punks, one of whom clonked me on the head with a blackjack. This picture sort of captures that feeling. “May’s” Department Store is splendid--not! It had succeeded Ohrbach’s. To the left of the DSMB replacement you can see an ad for Berkey Photo on 842 Broadway---Rogers Peet Building.

New York back then was kind of gray and desperate. There was a tacit undercurrent that New York might not make it.

This shot on the left is earlier than the one immediately above---this one is probably the 1940’s. Old friends pop out at us--I hope they are popping up for you--so to speak! You can see Ohrbach’s sign on the very right. Can you spot the German Saving Bank? I hope so!

The big tower behind Klein’s is the Consolidated Edison (Con-Ed) building. It was designed by Henry J. Hardenbergh, who did the Dakota Apartment House and the Plaza Hotel.

Our little block of interest is more billboards than building. The old Maison Doree site, had become, when I was a kid a Barton Candy shop. They had some mean Almond Bark--which was worse than it’s bite---if you know what I mean. In the middle of the block, the family burlesque site was, when I was a lad, a Chock Full o’ Nuts--which all in all was the best luncheon place in the universe. The donuts, coffee, and sandwiches were totally unsurpassed.

This statue of Gandhi (by K.B Patel) which was installed in 1986 is interesting because it shows our block behind it. The only buildings that have remained unchanged from the 1850’s are the ones immediately to the west of the former site of Cafe Leo/Nedick’s, and the building to the west (or left) of it---the former Union Square Theater. But what is amazing is that you can see the huge peaked roof of the Union Square Theatre still looming large--- though forgotten and abandoned---just to the right of Gandhi’s left leg. Note the German Saving Bank replacement on the left; what could be more pedestrian and uninspired? Too much of New York City has succumbed, alas, to such crass mediocrity. There is no thought, whatsoever, that a edifice’s mere existence can cast a pall on everything surrounding it; such buildings never acknowledge their responsibility, but almost pretend that they are not there.

The picture, above right, was taken by Mark Kane in 1992 and shows the sad demolition of what had been the Union Square Theatre. I had passed this building thousands of times and never had a clue what lurked behind the facade. Kane says there was a handsome painting on that center circular medallion in the back--but when he returned a few days later someone had made off with it. In the view, above left, which is the interior of the Union Square Theatre (note the steeply banked balcony seats) you can catch a glimpse of that lost medallion in the center of the proscenium. I read somewhere that it was a picture of Shakespeare: hard to tell.

This curve in the cobbles and trolley tracks is Broadway at 10th Street and it is here that Broadway first turns in its long journey up from the Battery. You can see a glimpse of Grace Church on the right. Past the trolley car on the left, with the banner waving above, is the DSMB. It looks like the Star Theatre is still extant on 13th Street. The impact of that dynamic Union Square neighborhood must have been palpable these few short blocks away.

S. Klein’s can be seen in the photos above, and in the photo to the right in a 1935 close-up. Klein’s was on the eastern edge of Union Square, (German Savings Bank on the extreme right).  As a consumer-wannabe I toured Klein’s often but rarely bought anything. The place was run-down and rambled, but the chaos was contagious. There were guys hawking stuff on little platforms and huge bins of clothing were surrounded by countless women flailing their arms like possessed windmills--in a frantic search to find something they didn’t know yet that they had to have.

Here are three views of the south end of Union Square between Broadway on the left and University Place on the right. The DSMB replacement is the large 23 storied structure. It is 849-853 Broadway, called the Union Building, it was put up in 1928 and the architect was the famed Emery Roth (Elderado, Beresford and Ritz Hotel Tower among others). But I find this building very ordinary---Roth having a bad building day. There is a crimson treatment on three lower floors which resembles linoleum but might be cast iron. (See small picture above--lower left). Maybe it’s not so terrible in itself; it’s just it suffers badly compared to what it replaced.

Here, on the right, after incomplete glimpses, is Grace Church, the inspiration for my interest in close-by Union Square. My father called Grace Church an oasis; just four short blocks south of Union Square on Broadway and Tenth Street. In this view the Consolidated Edison Building rises up behind it---to the right. Grace looks like the solitary, beautiful and slightly anachronistic Belle of Old Broadway. Does this elegant marble sentinel miss Maison Doree, The Academy of Music, Wallack’s, The Domestic Sewing Machine Building, The German Savings Bank, Cafe Leo’s, Klein’s and Ohrbach’s and the non-naughty bits at the Family Burlesque? All are gone, just like those beautiful faces that so brightly lit up Union Square in the 1870’s, 80’s and 90’s. Grace Church is among the few survivors--and I hope it will ‘never, like earth’s proud empires pass away.‘

We are, again, back where we started, showing our block of Union Square south, with Fourth Avenue on the left and Broadway on the right. I know we started with a similar view, but I just wanted to push you out of your historical reverie and bring you back to reality.  Snap out of it!  It was quite different 150 years ago—no? The paucity of much of modern art is symbolized by the ridiculous ‘Metronome’ sculpture that is stuck on this building: it portends much, but is, finally, tawdry, empty and meaningless and at a whopping cost of 30 million dollars nobody got their money’s worth. 

If one fine day you happen to pass this block, and if, in your mind’s eye, you can picture the fabulous history that once was-----there is the possibility you might hope for something less bland and more grand: my hope for that hope will have made this project more than worthwhile.

William H. Minifie

March 2012

New York City