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Gilsey Building

1854 establishments in New York (state)1927 disestablishments in New York (state)Broadway (Manhattan)Buildings and structures demolished in 1927Demolished buildings and structures in Manhattan
Financial District, ManhattanOffice buildings completed in 1854Office buildings in ManhattanSource attribution
Gilsey's Building (Norton's Handbook of New York City, 1859)
Gilsey's Building (Norton's Handbook of New York City, 1859)

Gilsey Building (also known as the Benedict Building; 1854–1927) is a former commercial building in Manhattan, completed in 1854 and demolished in May 1927. It was located in the south corner of Cortlandt Street, west side of Broadway, at 169-171 Broadway, situated diagonally across from the Howard Hotel. Its proprietor, Peter Gilsey, has acquired a fortune in the cigar business, and also owned Gilsey House. The material was iron, and the color was white. The building's location made the numerous law and business offices among the most desirable in the city. It was a real estate holdout, forcing construction of the City Investing Building to wrap around it. The Gilsey Building was the first iron frame building erected in New York City.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Gilsey Building (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Gilsey Building
Broadway, New York Manhattan

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Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 40.7097 ° E -74.0104 °
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Address

One Liberty Plaza

Broadway 165
10006 New York, Manhattan
New York, United States
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Gilsey's Building (Norton's Handbook of New York City, 1859)
Gilsey's Building (Norton's Handbook of New York City, 1859)
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Singer Building
Singer Building

The Singer Building (also known as the Singer Tower) was an office building and early skyscraper in Manhattan, New York City. The headquarters of the Singer Manufacturing Company, it was at the northwestern corner of Liberty Street and Broadway in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan. Frederick Gilbert Bourne, leader of the Singer Company, commissioned the building, which architect Ernest Flagg designed in multiple phases from 1897 to 1908. The building's architecture contained elements of the Beaux-Arts and French Second Empire styles. The building was composed of four distinct sections. The original 10-story Singer Building at 149 Broadway was erected between 1897 and 1898, and the adjoining 14-story Bourne Building on Liberty Street was built from 1898 to 1899. In the first decade of the 20th century, the two buildings were expanded to form the 14-story base of the Singer Tower, which rose another 27 stories. The facade was made of brick, stone, and terracotta. A dome with a lantern capped the tower. The foundation of the tower was excavated using caissons; the building's base rested on shallower foundations. The Singer Building used a steel skeleton, though load-bearing walls initially supported the original structure before modification. When completed, the 41-story building had a marble-clad entrance lobby, 16 elevators, 410,000 square feet (38,000 m2) of office space, and an observation deck. With a roof height of 612 feet (187 m), the Singer Tower was the tallest building in the world from 1908 to 1909, when it was surpassed by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company Tower. The base occupied the building's entire land lot; the tower's floors took up just one-sixth of that area. Despite being regarded as a city icon, the Singer Building was razed between 1967 and 1969 to make way for One Liberty Plaza, which had several times more office space than the Singer Tower. At the time of its destruction, the Singer Building was the tallest building ever to be demolished.

City Investing Building
City Investing Building

The City Investing Building, also known as the Broadway–Cortlandt Building and the Benenson Building, was an office building and early skyscraper in Manhattan, New York. Serving as the headquarters of the City Investing Company, it was on Cortlandt Street between Church Street and Broadway in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan. The building was designed by Francis Kimball and constructed by the Hedden Construction Company. Because of the area's sloping topography, the City Investing Building rose 32 stories above Broadway and 33 stories above Church Street, excluding an attic. The bulk of the building was 26 stories high above Church Street and was capped by a seven-story central portion with gable roofs. The building had an asymmetrical F-shaped footprint with a light court facing Cortlandt Street, as well as a wing to Broadway that wrapped around a real estate holdout, the Gilsey Building. Inside was a massive lobby stretching between Broadway and Church Street. The upper stories each contained between 5,200 and 19,500 square feet (480 and 1,810 m2) of space on each floor. Work on the City Investing Building started in 1906, and it opened in 1908 with about 12 acres (49,000 m2; 520,000 sq ft) of floor area, becoming one of New York City's largest office buildings at the time. Though developed by the City Investing Company, the structure had multiple owners throughout its existence. The City Investing Building was sold to the financier Grigori Benenson (1860–1939) in 1919 and renamed the Benenson Building. After Benenson was unable to pay the mortgage, it was sold twice in the 1930s. The building was renamed 165 Broadway by 1938 and was renovated in 1941. The City Investing Building and the adjacent Singer Building were razed in 1968 to make room for One Liberty Plaza, which had more than twice the floor area as the two former buildings combined.