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Thank you for all this useful information!
From Google Earth views it looks like Horace Mann acquired both upper and lower Post Roads. Did they purchase the land in the 1919 auction and then develop it in the 1950s? (When was the Mosholu schoolhouse razed?)
In the photo used in the auction there appears to be a possible error: what is now known as Manhattan College Pkwy is shown as Corlear Ave in the lower left corner. For years before 1953 it was known as Spuyten Duyvil Pkwy. Could the name have been changed subsequent to the auction?
Also, in the photo, just behind the elevated station, there is a round house structure. Was this a carousal, a tavern or had it some other function? It is also shown in a post card in your collection. Do you know when it was razed?
Hello Nick.
I was comparing the maps you referenced in your message #3840. In particular, I was looking at the Hadley House and another to the south of it that seems to exist today, namely, the house at 4710 Post Road. I’m wondering if this is the house of Emmons whom you mention in your article “The Hadley House at 5122 Post Road, is this the oldest house in The Bronx?”Also, do you have information regarding the closing of the section of the Post Road between W 246th Street and 4708 Post Road? I assume that Horace Mann School purchased the land, but from whom? If I recall correctly, that section of Post Road was closed around 1952. Were there any private homes involved in the sale to Horace Mann School? If so, were they razed?
Thanks for this!
I assume that Minnie was a nickname for one of the seven daughters of Samuel as Wikipedia doesn’t list a Minnie. My guess is that Maria, born in 1860, was Minnie as she would have been 17 in 1877 and it seems to me that a girl of that age would have liked to have kept a scrapbook.
As of 1902 she was still living in NYC and was listed as being unmarried:
https://archive.org/details/babcockgenealogy00babc/page/390/mode/2up?q=ezra+babcockI’ve been unsuccessful in finding an obituary or ferreting out the date of her death. Perhaps that scrapbook has more clues. Too bad bad that it was so expensive.
I think that I am wrong about the identity of the two buildings upon closer examination of the photo. The building probably is 4568 Manhattan College Pkwy.
About an inch to the left of the smoke stack, more or less in the center of the first photo, appears to be De La Salle Hall, Manhattan College, whose corner stone was laid in 1922.
I’ve lost the link for an interactive map showing the buildings and the year of construction. If memory serves me, I think that 4568 Manhattan College was built in 1925 – 1926. So, the photo was taken around that time, at the earliest.
Tmara2, a few of the houses shown in the near field of the first photo in your link are still in existence today. In the photo below the Bromley Map are shown two brick apartment buildings. The second apartment building is seen peeking out to the left of the first building. That second building was/is 4652 Spuyten Duyvil Pkwy (now Manhattan College Pkwy). My family and I moved into this apartment building in 1937. The first building was/is 226 W 242nd St. Thanks for the link.
Peter, I concur. From a study of the photo, I believe that the artist was on the bank of Tibbitt’s Brook roughly at a spot that can be located by dropping a vertical line from the large multi-story building with a tower structure (is this P.S. 7?) to the water. It is hard to discern if, behind the yellow house, there was a road with an arched bridge that may have connected with Tibbett Avenue just south of the intersection with W 230th St. But, if there had been, that bridge is shown in the painting, I think.
Enlarging the photo on the left shows the elevated train station at 238th street at Broadway. Neat!
If that large building with the tower structure is indeed P.S. 7 (built in 1882), then the building must have had major face lifting in subsequent years. Google Street View doesn’t show it looking like the photo. On a personal note, my Mother was the music teacher at that school in the ’60s and early ’70s. I went to P.S. 81, graduating in 1950.
Nick, thank you for all this!
Thank Thomas. The is a survey of which property? The notations are too fuzzy to read. Where is this property located?
Thomas, thank you for posting this picture. However, I’m confused as to what it represents. Could you explain?
I agree with you, Nick. I’m unfamiliar with surveying methods; are monuments numbered when there are many of them placed in order to easily identify them on a survey map? I can see how that would be helpful. Perhaps there exists a map with such a reference. It would be nice to “nail” this down, so to speak. lol
Thank you, Nick, for the superimposition of the maps. It gives a good understanding of the relationship of the earlier map with today’s reality. Monument #54 is well-separated from lot 54 and remains a puzzlement.
Could there be government records of early surveying in the area of interest that might reveal the purpose of the monument? Perhaps the survey of 740 W 232nd street might show something. Streets appearing, moving, being truncated would need surveying I would think. I wonder if survey maps drawn when the Seton Hall grounds were repurposed would show the monument. Actually this sounds like a lot of work to uncover the provenance of a wayward monument.
Would there be a way to superimpose a current map with the map showing lot #54 to give an idea of the relationship of the lot map with current streets? I don’t have that skill.
We also had a Hoffman TV that was purchased probably in 1953. It was a nice console with doors enclosing the 13 inch screen and a large grilled speaker beneath…cherry wood I believe. The yellow-green tint set it apart from the other available TVs. I don’t know if it was purchased from Progress Radio & TV, but given that we lived blocks away, it probably was. I wonder if free delivery was offered. I can still remember coming home from DeWitt Clinton HS in the afternoons and watching the baseball games…instead of doing my homework, lol. Does anyone remember the DuMont station, channel 5 I think. Watching the Jackie Gleason show was a blast.
Thank you for this, Nick. It’s always a joy to experience life in the past through those who were living in those times.
For those who find enjoyment in thinking of life in the past, I recommend reading two books written by Jack Finney, From Time To Time and its sequel, Time And Again. The imagery of New York City in the 1892, as seen by the protagonist, Simon Morley, who can slip back in time from the late 1960’s, transports me and I feel the vibrancy of the, then, life in Manhattan juxtapose those places I know of now.
On the north side of the street going up the hill in the blow-up picture, there appear to be a Studebaker Starlight, vintage 1948, and a Pontiac Streamliner, circa 1948. The car parked on the south side in front of the Riverdale Delicatessen appears to be a 1948 Buick Roadmaster. Further up, the car parked next to the lamp post facing down hill appears to be a 1948 Nash Ambassador.
There are two other (light colored) cars that appear to be postwar further up from the Pontiac that I cannot identify. All the other vehicles appear to be prewar. I would say that the photograph was probably taken in 1948.
Going further west on the north side of 231st, past Kingsbridge Ave., a little more than half way down to Corlear Ave , was a store that sold baby carriages and cribs. I can’t remember its name, but, I worked there after school assembling things and cleaning up the store. That was around 1952 to 1954. Anyone else a DeWitt Clinton alumnus?
This is a very enjoyable video. I had wondered how the developer was able to destroy the Villa Rosa Bonheur. Now I know, he used a “loophole”, among other things. The interior of the Edgehill Church matches the beauty of its exterior. I hope to one day see it in person.
Also, it is a bonus for me to now have a face associated with the name Nick Dembowski 😉
The language used in describing the festivities of the official opening of the canal paints a vivid picture of the day. Lovely. When I revisit my old stomping grounds, I’ll remember what it was like on June 18, 1985 and savor the thought. Thanks for posting this bit of history for us to enjoy.
Regarding Nick’s post #1198, there is foliage on the trees, people walking with overcoats and jackets and a 1942 Pontiac Streamliner parked behind the van on Marble Hill Avenue south of West 230th street. Since I can see no gas ration sticker in the passenger window of the auto facing W. 230th (at the corner) and rationing began in the May of 1942, I would judge the photo to have taken in late Fall, 1941 or early Spring, 1942. That’s my WAG.
Upon closer examination, overlaying the 1938 map with Google Maps, I do believe that Alan Lasky’s positioning of the buildings at the edge of the high school track is correct. My earlier positioning suggestion was incorrect. I’m sorry for any confusion I may have caused. Again, it was astute analysis made by Mr. Lasky.
In the aerial view dpr_18162, #1 Riverdale Avenue can be seen.Kudos, Alan Lasky! Great detective sleuthing! Your additional information and photos are eye-opening in showing how sparsely populated the area was in 1940. Off in the distance one can see the Charlotte Bronte Villa and the four-year-old Henry Hudson Bridge. The map shows Sage Place – Kingsbridge Rd that no longer exists (that I could find).
Further to the South on the map there is a lot #725. The NYCItyMap site shows the J.F. Kennedy H.S. being on lot #725. Assuming the lot numbers remained the same while the Block numbers were changed (at some point), that would put the buildings in question to the north of the current high school, perhaps at the north side of the high school at the parking lot. Or am I completely mistaken?
Perhaps it is selfish of me to say that I am glad that the Harlem River wasn’t “annihilated or buried” as the NYT article called for. Portage of the Circle Line boat from the Third Avenue Bridge to beyond Macombs Dam Bridge as part of the cruise around Manhattan would require Herculean strength <grins> Seriously, being able to cruise around Manhattan, taking in all of the various sights along the route, is an adventure not to be missed. A lotta times it’s better to leave things as they are.
I’m judging that the picture of the King’s Bridge (#1882) was taken circa 1910 because, in the background, there appears to be a derrick on the tower of the Church of the Mediator which looks almost completed. The church’s cornerstone was laid in 1911 and the creek was filled in in 1914 according to Wikipedia.
