Our Historical Neighborhood – An Anecdotal History of New York City with Glimpses into the Past of Particular Relevance to 300 West 23rd Street

Our neighbor Joe Polacek offers us this look at our surroundings – part memoir and part historical discourse – to enhance our appreciation for our building and neighborhood.

Chapter 5

Those of us who are lucky enough to live on a high floor in our building and have a view to the west can almost see the spot where the duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr occurred.

Dueling was illegal in New York, so the two rowed across the Hudson, climbed to the summit of the palisades in what is now Weehawken, and dueled. Hamilton was wounded, brought back to New York City, where he died days later. Aaron Burr’s barn still exists at 17 Barrow Street in the Village. In my teens, there was an Italian restaurant in it called 17 Barrow Street. It had red-checkered tablecloths, wine bottles covered with wax from burning candles on each table, and they played classical music. It was inexpensive so always crowded. After it closed, a new charming restaurant was opened in its place called “One If By Land.”

Those of us facing east can see the tops of many buildings on what was known for years as the Women’s Mile, along 6th Avenue south of 23rd Street. We are fortunate to see a resurrection of this area and many fine old buildings that used to contain some great stores specializing in women’s clothes, hats, etc. An interesting thing was the location of a very elegant house of prostitution on the south side of 23rd Street, a few buildings west of 6th Avenue. It is said that when the women forced their husbands to accompany them shopping, the husbands would find some excuse to leave them for awhile, making location for this “house” ideal.

Some early tenants of 300 West 23rd Street could remember the famous Proctors department store on the north side of 23rd Street between 6th and 7th Avenues. It had its name embedded in the sidewalk, in bold brass letters about 1½ feet tall at entrances on the east and west sides of the store.

Across 23rd Street between 8th and 9th Avenues, about where the Chelsea West movie theater currently sits was the original I. Miller Shoes store. The I Miller brand appealed to anyone in the theatre, especially dancers and wealthy women. Their store later moved to the corner of Broadway and 45th Street and is noted by four statues on the second floor.

Although the Chelsea area has had and has now many famous people living in it, the area never became as popular as Greenwich Village or Harlem. In 1800, anything above Canal Street was rural, with the exception of the small town of Harlem and another small town mid-island called Bloomingdales. Harlem, of course, was named after the Dutch town of Haarlem.

Just north of Chelsea was the notorious area called Hell’s Kitchen, made famous by the movie Dead End Kids. The movie West Side Story was filmed in the area that was torn down to make way for Lincoln Center.

A short walk to the corner of 7th Avenue and 18th Street, there was a restaurant named Le Madri – where a sculpted horse’s head protrudes near the roof toward 7th Avenue. Macy’s once stabled their horses here during the time the furniture was delivered by horse and wagon.

Gone are the days of coal chutes and coal bins. Our building now burns oil, and the incinerator no longer burns our garbage. Things are a little cleaner, but years ago the garbage outside was restricted to a few barrels of cinders and bottles.

Air conditioning is a blessing in both making the rooms cool and keeping out the noise. How many of you remember living at 300 West 23rd Street in the old days, before A/C? If you had a friendly neighbor opposite you, you would open your inner door (our present door) and leave the screen door latched while your neighbor did the same, creating a breeze through both apartments. If you look closely, you may still see the holes in the doorframes of some apartments where the screen door was attached. However, years of painting has filled in most of these holes.

During the days when new tenants were lured into the building with one-or two-months’ free rent, many people found it easy and financially necessary to move each time their lease ended. One old friend in the Bronx said that as a child she remembers moving about six or seven times.