The Arnet Seaman House at 51 Charles St: An 1867 Italianate-style home with ‘every convenience’
- ‘Every convenience’ at that time meant gas lighting and indoor plumbing
Among the more colorful tenants was Marion Abt Bachrach, the public relations director of the U.S. Communist Party, a “Red Scare” target.
Have you ever passed by an interesting residential building in New York City and wanted to know more about its history? In this series, Brick Underground teams up with Tom Miller, creator of Daytonian in Manhattan, a blog about Manhattan buildings and other historic architecture. Each week, we run an excerpt from the Daytonian’s archives with a link to the full article.
In 1866, George Starr began construction of a brick-faced mansion at the northwest corner of West Fourth Street and Van Nest Place. Completed in 1867, the Italianate-style home was three bays wide and three stories tall above a brownstone basement. A stone stoop rose to the parlor floor where, most likely, a cast iron balcony fronted the floor-to-ceiling windows.
The elliptically arched openings originally wore molded eyebrows and the doorway would have been impressive, adorned with scrolled brackets and a pediment or similar treatment.
Arnet Seaman, who operated a brick business, and his wife, the former Mary Anna Rhodes Riffey, purchased 1 Van Nest Pl. The family maintained a country home in Tarrytown, New York.
Even affluent families leased unneeded space in their homes and shortly after moving in, on February 22nd, 1867, the Seamans advertised a room to let with “every convenience.” In 1867, that meant gas lighting and indoor plumbing.
In 1893, The World reported 1 Van Nest Pl. had become a clubhouse as well as "residence and home for enlisted men serving on board ships of the United States Navy." It would be a short-lived venture. By March 1894, the club had moved out and the house was leased to a series of tenants.
The property was sold at auction in 1912. Eventually the name Van Nest Place was abandoned in favor of Charles Street and the corner structure was renumbered 51 Charles Street. A subsequent alteration in 1933 removed the stoop and lowered the front entrance, now with a Greek Revival inspired frame, to below grade. There were now four floor-through apartments in the building.
Among the more colorful tenants over the subsequent decades was Marion Abt Bachrach, the public relations director of the Communist Party of the United States and a target of the government’s “Red Scare” campaign. While suffering from cancer, she was tried in Federal Court on "charges of conspiring to teach and advocate the overthrow of the Government by force and violence." Perhaps surprisingly, she was acquitted in 1956. She was still living at 51 Charles St. in 1957 when she died.
As some point after 1940, the window details were removed. Otherwise, little has changed outwardly to 51 Charles St.
For more on this building and its colorful residents, check out the full article.
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