The 1893 Henry A. Caesar House at 19 West 76th St: A single-family home that became 14 apartments
- Initially the house was occupied by a series of wealthy families including a founder of Stroock & Stroock
- A renovation completed in 1974 resulted in 14 apartments but did not affect the exterior of the property
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.
Developer Cornelius W. Luyster broke ground for five high-end townhouses on West 76th Street just west of Central Park West in 1892. Completed the following year and designed by John H. Duncan in the Renaissance Revival style, they were four-stories tall above English basements.
The basement and parlor levels of the westernmost house, 19 West 76th St., were faced in planar brownstone. A decorated dog-legged stoop rose to the double-doored entrance. The second floor was dominated by a three-sided oriel that provided a balcony to the third. Above a terra cotta frieze, the cornice was supported by foliate brackets of the same material.
John H. Uhlman was the original owner of the 25-foot-wide residence. He sold it to Henry A. Caesar and his wife, the former Laura F. Unger, in March 1902.
Born in Brooklyn on May 15th, 1856, Caesar was educated abroad and founded H. A. Caesar & Company, factors and commercial bankers, in 1886. He was also a director of the Germania Life Insurance Company and the Chemical Bank and Trust Company. He and Laura had three sons, Paul N., born in 1889; Harry I., born in 1891; and Charles U., who arrived in 1897.
The family remained at 19 West 76th St. until April 1917 when they sold the house to Solomon Marcuse Stroock and his wife, Hilda Weil. The couple were married in 1904 and had three children.
Stroock was born on September 22, 1873 of German immigrants. He graduated from the College of the City of New York in 1891, received his Masters degree from Columbia University in 1892, and his law degree from Columbia Law School in 1894. After being in partnership with attorney M. Warley Platzek since 1896, in 1907 Stroock established a law office, Stroock & Stroock, with his brother, Moses. (The firm, which later became Stroock & Stroock & Lavan, closed in 2025 after operating for 150 years.)
Stroock was highly involved in Jewish affairs. He was chairman of the board of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America and a member of the American Jewish Historical Society
Solomon Marcuse Stroock suffered a fatal heart attack while he and Hilda were at the Greenbrier Hotel in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia on September 11th, 1941. The West 76th St. house was sold to James H. Cruikshank, who resold it in November 1942 to George Lawall. In reporting on the latest sale, The New York Times mentioned, "The building contains nineteen rooms and eight baths."
A renovation completed in 1974 resulted in 14 apartments. None of the alterations, happily, affected the exterior.
For more on the property and the interesting people that lived here, check out the full article.
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