Buildings at 744–750 Broadway

As Broadway Row (also called " buildings at 744-750 Broadway " ) are known four terraced houses in Albany, New York. The built of brick houses are on the northwest side of the intersection of Broadway with the Wilson Street. They arose in the course of four decades in the 19th century, the various architectural styles reflect the time in which they were built. At that time, subject to the district known as Fifth Ward rapid growth, which was caused by the construction of the Erie canal and the subsequent industrialization of the city.

Many terraced houses then lined the Broadway in this area. Today, after many years of demolition and urban renewal only these four buildings are left of it. The four houses were added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987 together.

Description

The intersection of Broadway and Wilson Street is located directly north of the "Downtown Albany Historic District ". The four buildings are the Edward O'Neill Federal Building opposite on the south side of Broadway.

All four buildings have basically the same shape. There are three storey houses with a prominent basement. The façade spans each have three bays. The main entrance opens to laterally arranged main hallways.

In its ornamentation, the houses are different. The two southern terraced houses, 744 and 746, are a matched pair with a sandstone facade. Stone stairs with wrought iron railings lead to the entrances. They are framed by architraves of sandstone and shaped pilasters, above which is a small pediment. Sandstone was also used for the edging and decorating the window. Are serrated cornices and a simple frieze on the eaves. Pairs on the south side fireplaces protrude upward from the roof.

The house 748 Broadway has a base with rusticated sandstone. The entrance is flanked by Doric columns and in the shaping of the façade much marble was used. It is the only of the four houses that has no flat roof, but a slightly sloping gable roof.

Sandstone also enters into the basement of 750 Broadway. It has the most detailed facade of the four houses. Sandstone was used here for the balustrades of the steps that lead to a double door entrance, surmounted by a fighter window. The window sills resting on corbels and cross Buttercups are on the lintels. A bay window above the entrance is richly decorated, the roof begins above the cornice supported by corbels with the frieze.

History

As Albany 1686 statuiert, was today's Clinton Avenue the northern city limits. Eighty years later, Stephen Van Rensselaer II left, the Mansion around the area just north of the city at that time and put on a raster grid that ranged from the Clinton Avenue to the North Ferry and to the west by the Hudson River to the Northern Boulevard. This area was in 1795 for the Town of Colonie.

The population grew and in 1815 the area had one thousand inhabitants. This directed a petition to the government, to be annexed to Albany, and so the area to Albany's Fifth Ward was. Than ten years later, the Erie Canal was built, reaching the Hudson River only a few city blocks north of Wilson Street, this boosted the economy of the city vigorously and the development of the Fifth Ward increased as a port and railway installations expanded and built were. In addition, several industrial manufacturers settled, that took advantage of the channel. Within a decade the city's population increased to almost double. The Broadway was north of Clinton Avenue to a residential area for the betuchteren families of the city. The retired Army Colonel George Talcott built 748 Broadway in 1833 in an anonymous adaptation of the Federal-style, with some decorative elements of neoclassicism were interspersed. His family lived for many years in the house. It is now one of the gelungendsten examples in Albany for the combination of these two styles.

Eight years later, in 1841, built the city treasurer Sanford Cobb both houses 744 and 746 Broadway. The neo-classical feature of these houses can be seen at the input and the cornices of the house. In House 744 Van Schaick later members of the family, one of the oldest families in Albany lived.

The plot 750 Broadway remained undeveloped until 1875. Then set up Jacob Sager, a manufacturer of window accessories, his house there. The house is designed in the Italianate style and is with its extensive balustrade and provided with corbels cornice typical of city houses in the United States in the late 19th century. His family lived until the end of the 19th century in the house.

Many of the row houses on Broadway was in the middle and at the end of the 20th century demolished mainly for purposes of urban renewal. Another big gap was caused by the construction of the federal building on the south side of the road in 1969.