Millennium Park (Manhattan)

A gas explosion occurred on December 11, 1970, at a building at Park Row and Ann Street in Manhattan, New York City, killing 12 people and injuring more than 60. The two upper floors of the building had been recently converted into a Chinese restaurant, which required a new gas line to be installed. A city inspector failed to notice defects in the new line and issued a certification on December 2. Although gas service was not scheduled to be turned on until December 14, the owner of the restaurant "clandestinely" arranged to have the gas turned on earlier, on December 11. Several hours later, at around 2:00pm, the unopened Chinese restaurant exploded, killing and injuring patrons in a nearby restaurant and in a barbershop, both colocated in the building. Patrons in a tavern on the first floor of the building were also injured, as were people walking on the sidewalk next to the building and workers in neighboring buildings. The five-alarm fire that followed sent flames 30 feet (9 m) into the air. The blaze was brought under control in 90 minutes by 200 firemen. In 1983, the New York Court of Appeals ruled that New York City was not liable for the explosion, stating that "a general obligation to all members of the public was not sufficient to establish liability in particular cases."

Park Row is a street located in the Financial District, Civic Center, and Chinatown neighborhoods of the New York City borough of Manhattan. The street runs east–west, sometimes called north–south because the western end is nearer to the Financial District. At the north end of Park Row is the confluence of Bowery, East Broadway, St. James Place, Oliver Street, Mott Street, and Worth Street at Chatham Square. At the street's south end, Broadway, Vesey Street, Barclay Street, and Ann Street intersect. The intersection includes a bus turnaround loop designated as Millennium Park. Park Row was once known as Chatham Street; it was renamed Park Row in 1886, a reference to the fact that it faces City Hall Park, the former New York Common.

The Astor House was a luxury hotel in New York City. Located on the corner of Broadway and Vesey Street in what is now the Civic Center and Tribeca neighborhoods of Lower Manhattan, it opened in 1836 and soon became the best-known hotel in America. Part of it was demolished in 1913; the rest in 1926.

Barnum's American Museum was located at the corner of Broadway, Park Row, and Ann Street in what is now the Financial District of Manhattan, New York City, from 1841 to 1865. The museum was owned by famous showman P. T. Barnum, who purchased Scudder's American Museum in 1841. The museum offered both strange and educational attractions and performances. Some were extremely reputable and historically or scientifically valuable, while others were less so.

The Park Row Building, also known as 15 Park Row, is a luxury apartment building and early skyscraper on Park Row in the Financial District of the New York City borough of Manhattan. The 391-foot-tall (119 m), 31-story building was designed by R. H. Robertson, a pioneer in steel skyscraper design, and engineered by the firm of Nathaniel Roberts. The Park Row Building includes 26 full floors, a partial 27th floor, and a pair of four-story cupolas. The architectural detail on the facade includes large columns and pilasters, as well as numerous ornamental overhanging balconies. J. Massey Rhind sculpted several ornamental details on the building, including the balconies and several figures atop the building. The Park Row Building was developed by the Park Row Construction Company as an office building between 1897 and 1899. It used a steel frame and elevators to make it one of the world's tallest buildings at the time. It was constructed over a period of two years and nine months. Upon completion, about 4,000 people worked at the Park Row Building, with tenants such as the Associated Press and the Interborough Rapid Transit Company. Until the completion of the Singer Building in 1908, it was the city's tallest building and the world's tallest office building. The Park Row Building was used as an office structure until the early 2000s, when it was converted to residential use. Today, the Park Row Building consists of 339 luxury apartment units, two penthouse apartments, ground floor retail, and office suites located in the building's historic cupola space. Upon its completion, the Park Row Building received praise from the general public, although architectural critics reviewed the building more harshly. The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission gave city landmark status to the Park Row Building in 1999, and the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2005.

The St. Paul Building was a skyscraper in the Financial District of lower Manhattan in New York City at 220 Broadway, at the southeast corner of Broadway's intersection with Ann Street. Designed by George B. Post and completed in 1898, it was one of the tallest skyscrapers in New York City upon its completion, at 26 stories and 315 feet (96 m). The facade, cantilevered from the superstructure, contained several sets of double-height Ionic-style colonnades, as well as a group of three sculptures designed by Karl Bitter. The foundations were dug to the level of the underlying sand due to the depth of the bedrock below. The superstructure was designed to allow easy identification and replacement of the beams. The building was occupied mostly by offices, with six elevators inside. The building site was purchased by the Havemeyer family in 1895. The St. Paul Building was named after St. Paul's Chapel, directly across Broadway to the west. It remained in the possession of the Havemeyer family until 1943, when it was sold to Webb and Knapp and then to Chase Bank. The St. Paul Building was demolished in 1958 in order to make way for the Western Electric Building. A part of the facade, including Bitter's sculptures, remains extant at Holliday Park in Indianapolis.

The Park Theatre, originally known as the New Theatre, was a playhouse in New York City, located at 21–25 Park Row in the present Civic Center neighborhood of Manhattan, about 200 feet (61 m) east of Ann Street and backing Theatre Alley. The location, at the north end of the city, overlooked the park that would soon house City Hall. French architect Marc Isambard Brunel collaborated with fellow émigré Joseph-François Mangin and his brother Charles on the design of the building in the 1790s. Construction costs mounted to precipitous levels, and changes were made in the design; the resulting theatre had a rather plain exterior. The doors opened in January 1798. In its early years, the Park enjoyed little to no competition in New York City. Nevertheless, it rarely made a profit for its owners or managers, prompting them to sell it in 1805. Under the management of Stephen Price and Edmund Simpson in the 1810s and 1820s, the Park enjoyed its most successful period. Price and Simpson initiated a star system by importing English talent and providing the theatre a veneer of upper-class respectability. Rivals such as the Chatham Garden and Bowery theatres appeared in the 1820s, and the Park had to adapt to survive. Blackface acts and melodrama squeezed Italian opera and English drama out of their preferential positions. Nevertheless, the theatre maintained its upscale image until it burned down in 1848.

The Transportation Building is a 44-story skyscraper located at 225 Broadway on the corner of Barclay Street in the Civic Center neighborhood of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It also carries the address 2-4 Barclay Street. It was built in 1927 and was designed by the architecture firm of York & Sawyer, in the Renaissance Revival style, using setbacks common to skyscrapers built after the adoption of the 1916 Zoning Resolution. It sits across Barclay Street from the Woolworth Building. The site of the Transportation Building had previously been the northern portion of the Astor House, New York's first luxury hotel. The hotel went into a long decline which began in the 1850s with the building of newer, more luxurious hotels. In 1913, the southern part was razed and replaced in 1915-16 with the Astor House Building at 217 Broadway, which is still extant. The northern part was torn down in 1926 to make way for the Transportation Building.One of the first tenants of the Transportation Building was the Pace Institute – the predecessor of the school that is now Pace University – which moved into the new building in 1927 and remained until the 1950s.

The Woolworth Building is an early American skyscraper designed by architect Cass Gilbert located at 233 Broadway in the Tribeca neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It was the tallest building in the world from 1913 to 1930, with a height of 792 feet (241 m). More than a century after its construction, it remains one of the 100 tallest buildings in the United States. The Woolworth Building is bounded by Broadway and City Hall Park to its east, Park Place to its north, and Barclay Street to its south. It consists of a 30-story base topped by a 30-story tower. Its facade is mostly decorated with architectural terracotta, though the lower portions are limestone, and it features thousands of windows. The ornate lobby contains various sculptures, mosaics, and architectural touches. The structure was designed with several amenities and attractions, including a now-closed observatory on the 57th floor and a private swimming pool in the basement. F. W. Woolworth, the founder of a brand of popular five-and-ten-cent stores, conceived the skyscraper as a headquarters for his company. Woolworth planned the skyscraper jointly with the Irving National Exchange Bank, which also agreed to use the structure as its headquarters. The Woolworth Building had originally been planned as a 12- to 16-story commercial building but underwent several revisions during its planning process. Its final height was not decided upon until January 1911. Construction started in 1910 and was completed two years later. The building officially opened on April 24, 1913. The Woolworth Building has undergone several changes throughout its history. The facade was cleaned in 1932, and the building received an extensive renovation between 1977 and 1981. The Irving National Exchange Bank moved its headquarters to 1 Wall Street in 1931, but the Woolworth Company (later Venator Group) continued to own the Woolworth Building for most of the 20th century. The structure was sold to the Witkoff Group in 1998. The top 30 floors were sold to a developer in 2012 and converted into residences. Office and commercial tenants use the rest of the building. The Woolworth Building has been a National Historic Landmark since 1966, and a New York City designated landmark since 1983.

J&R was an online electronics and music retailer, based in New York City. It had a well-known retail location on Park Row in Civic Center, Manhattan, across from New York City Hall, from 1971 to 2014. J&R stands for the founders Joe and Rachelle Friedman who established the company in 1971 after emigrating separately from Israel as young children. The heavily trafficked store had expanded from selling LPs to eventually encompassing J&R Music World and J&R Computer World, selling everything from Blu-ray Disc players to the latest electronic gadgets.J&R also had a location at Columbia University, which closed in late 2002. J&R later opened a J&R Express at the bottom level of Macy's Herald Square in 2006, and which was later closed in 2012.

The City Hall Post Office and Courthouse was designed by architect Alfred B. Mullett for a triangular site in New York City along Broadway in Civic Center, Lower Manhattan, in City Hall Park south of New York City Hall. The Second Empire style building, erected between 1869 and 1880, was not well received. Commonly called "Mullett's Monstrosity", it was demolished in 1939 and the site used to extend City Hall Park to the south.

Theatre Alley is a block-long cobblestone alley in the Financial District of Manhattan, New York City, between Ann and Beekman Streets. It is one of Manhattan's few alleys that is not privately owned, and prior to the expansion of 5 Beekman Street adjacent to the alley c. 2010, it was "dank and claustrophobic".The alley was named for adjacent Park Theatre, which burned down in 1848. According to Forgotten NY, it was New York's first one-way street, created to alleviate traffic jams caused by horse-drawn carriages arriving at the theater.