The Livingston – 126 West 66th Street

by Tom Miller

William L. Flanagan purchased the six vacant lots at the southwest corner of 66th Street and the Grand Boulevard (later Broadway) in 1889.  The developer wasted no time in “improving” the parcel.  On August 17, 1889, the Real Estate Record & Builders’ Guide reported that architect Julius Munckwitz had “the plans on the board” for a five-story flat on the site.  Completed within a year, the neo-Grec style structure was faced in red brick and trimmed in brownstone.  Munckwitz placed the entrance on the quieter 66th Street and included shops along the avenue for additional income.

There were two apartments per floor in the Livingston, each with seven rooms and a bath.  The residents were middle-class professionals.  Among those living here in 1900, for instance, were Joseph J. Pharo, manager of the East Side Lumber Company; Fred Crosby, who was in advertising; and Fred B. Fiske, who listed his profession as “presses.”  Interestingly, of the 10 apartments that year, three of them were occupied by widows.

The most celebrated couple in the building at the time were J. Henry McKinley and his wife Laura Celestina.  McKinley was a well-known concert soloist and Laura was an accomplished pianist who most was his accompanist.  Following a tour in 1897, the South Norwalk Evening Home wrote, “Mr. McKinley is one of the best American tenors, and his beautiful voice and artistic phrasing, notably in his aria, aroused the audience to great enthusiasm.  Such singing is rarely heard here.”

the Clio Club said it “interests itself in education, the home, philanthropy, arts, social economics, the drama, fiction, historical research, nature study, poetry, and women’s ideal.” 

The couple was highly involved with the Choral Society, founded in 1894.  J. Henry was its director and Laura its assistant director.  According to The Year Book of the (Collegiate) Reformed Protestant Dutch Church of the City of New York in 1895, they donated their services to the organization.

Laura was, as well, a member of the New England Women’s Club (as was another resident, Sallie Ackers), and of the Clio Club.  The latter club was founded in 1892, and its members were mostly women, although men were occasionally admitted.  Its main purpose was to foster “mental improvement and social intercourse.”  By its own description, it would seem there was little that the club did not discuss.  In Club Women of New York, the Clio Club said it “interests itself in education, the home, philanthropy, arts, social economics, the drama, fiction, historical research, nature study, poetry, and women’s ideal.”

Laura was the chairman of a Clio meeting in May 1909, during which the guest speaker was Dr. Jennie de le M. Lozier, whose topic was “Problems That Vex.”  Laura McKinley brought up a problem that vexed her.  The California newspaper, the Chico Record, reported on May 28 that she “had the unique experience of having had a great-grandmother with whom in her childhood she learned to play ‘muggins’ and ‘old maid.’”  Laura asked Lozier “to talk about growing old gracefully, as one of the most vexing problems she knew.  Her own grandmother had lived to a very old age, 105, having been born in Mulberry street in 1790, and she knew there was something to say about old age.”

One of the McKinleys’ artistic neighbors in 1905 was Anna B. Leonard, who operated her “porcelain decoration and design” studio from her apartment.  Her advertisement in Keramic Studio that year noted, “artistic tableware a specialty.”

Also living in the Livingston at the time were Dr. James Cooper Bayles and his wife, the former Ianthe Green.  Born on July 3, 1845, Bayles had served in the New York Heavy Artillery Regiment during the Civil War.  An engineer, from 1870 to 1889, he edited Iron Age and The Metal Worker magazines.  He was presented with an honorary Ph.D. by Rutgers College in 1890.  He was currently serving on the editorial staff of The New York Times.

On the morning of January 9, 1905, Ianthe “was stricken with paralysis,” as worded by The New York Times, in their apartment.  The article said she “died in a few hours.  She had been troubled with an affection of the heart.”  Ianthe Green Bayles was 59 years old.  Her husband would survive another eight years, dying at the age of 67 on May 7, 1913.

On May 18, 1917, Congress passed the Selective Service Act, which authorized the Federal Government to draft men from 21 to 45 years of age into the military.  Not everyone was willing to comply.  On July 31, 1917, The New York Herald published the names of what would be called “draft dodgers” during the Vietnam War.  The article noted, “Mamos G. Mainanganys of 126 West Sixty-sixth street, could not be found at that address,” and “Lewis Joseph Cintron of 126 West Sixty-sixth street, has moved away.”

two men were arrested “on the charge that they had used a hatchet and some carbolic acid with damaging effect on the furnishings of a two-room flat they rented from Charles B. Miller.”

At the war’s end, one of the stores on Broadway was home to the Lincoln Restaurant.  The suites upstairs were divided into furnished two-room apartments, which in 1920 were rented by the week, rather than by the month.  Among those living here at the time was Florence F. Wieland, who ran an art goods store around the corner at 1947 Broadway, and brothers William and Ladan B. Jackson.

The Jackson brothers were not happy when their landlord “told the men on March 16 that their rent would jump from $16 to $28,” said the New-York Tribune on March 23, 1920.  The next day Miller discovered they had taken out their fury on the furniture.  The New-York Tribune reported that the two men were arrested “on the charge that they had used a hatchet and some carbolic acid with damaging effect on the furnishings of a two-room flat they rented from Charles B. Miller.”

Japanese-born artist Olisver (Olive) K. Nakamura lived here in 1925 when she exhibited works at The Society of Independent Artists.

The Livingston survived until the mid-1960s, when it and its neighbors were demolished to make way for Alice Tully Hall, which opened in 1969.

Tom Miller is a social historian and blogger at daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com

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