We recently went on a trip back in time at some of the restaurants in the North Heights. Now it’s time to start doing the same down on Montague Street. What was there before today’s eateries? What do the owners want you to order if you stop by? Let’s find out!

Our first stop will be Teresa’s Restaurant (80 Montague Street – Yelp! profile).

Teresa’s Restaurant. Photo by Evan Bindelglass

According to owner Teresa Brzozowska (yes, there is a Teresa!), it was a dry cleaners before she opened the restaurant in 1989.

80 Montague Street, 1967. Photo courtesy NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

Brzozowska is originally from Gdansk, Poland. She came to America in 1980 and settled in Williamsburg, where she has lived ever since. She had what she described as “life experience in the food business.” She worked in delis (German, Jewish, Polish, French, and American) and, in 1985, she opened Teresa’s in the East Village (on 1^st Avenue between 6^th and 7^th). She had some customers and friends who lived in Brooklyn Heights and she found Montague to be a “nice street” and opened the second location. The original bit the dust in 2007, but the second incarnation is still going strong 25 years on. Brzozowska loves the support of the public and said being a “neighborhood place makes business very stable.”

What The Owner Says To Order:
Appetizer: Chicken soup
Entrée: Cheese and blueberry blintzes

ARCHIVE DOCUMENTS: 1988 Certificate of Occupancy | 2000 Certificate of Occupancy (PDFs)

Up next, we don’t have to go far. It’s on to Heights Café (84 Montague Street – website).

Heights Cafe. Photo by Evan Bindelglass

Buildings Department records from 1930 list the first floor as simply “stores.” As of 1940, the second floor was being used as a school. A 1976 document called the “Montague Street Revitalization” listed a York School, as well as an antique store. As of 1967m it was the Plymouth Pharmacy. For the 27 years prior to 1995, the first floor was the Promenade Restaurant, a staple of the area. It even had its own postcards!

84 Montague Street, 1967. Photo courtesy NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

Eventually it closed and the space became available. That caught the eye of Greg Markman, who opened Caffe Buon Gusto up the block in 1992 (he sold his interest in it over a decade ago). Markman teamed up with Joe Secondino, who was an accountant at ABC and with whom he’s been friends with since they were seventh graders at JHS 281 (now IS 281) in Bensonhurst, and, on May 15, 1995, opened Heights Café on the corner of Montague and Hicks.
Joe Secondino and Greg Markman. Photo by Evan Bindelglass

While they run the day-to-day, Markman’s father Martin and brother Glenn (the real estate brains) are also partners in the restaurant. Greg Markman always loved the corner and said it needed “something special.” Since then (with the exception of a closure from this January to April for a remodeling and menu sprucing up), they’ve been serving “something for everyone.” “We love our customers,” he said. “[Some of them see the restaurant as] an extension of their living room.” Secondino called them “friends.”

They have had some celebrity customers. Paul Giamatti stops in sometimes, as do Jennifer Connelly and her husband, Paul Bettany. Also spotted have been Leonardo DiCaprio, Anne Hathaway, Willem Dafoe, and Susan Sarandon. Markman even got a photo with “Transformers: Dark of the Moon” star and Victoria’s Secret model Rosie Huntington-Whiteley.
Greg Markman with Rosie Huntington-Whiteley. Photo courtesy Greg Markman.

What The Owners Say To Order:
Fried Chicken at Heights Cafe. Photo by Evan Bindelglass

The Southern Boneless Fried Chicken with mashed potatoes, gravy, and coleslaw. If you are worried about boneless chicken being dry, stop. It isn’t dry and it is full of flavor, as are the mashed potatoes. It is so easy to go wrong with coleslaw, but this was very well-balanced. If you want a little extra creaminess, it’s on the bottom. The  gravy is wonderful, but everything else is so great already that you might forget to make use of it. Try to remember.

Markman and Secondino also own Dellarocco’s Pizza around the corner (214 Hicks Street – website). They opened that in 2012. In 1976, it was listed as a hair stylist and from 1981 to 2011 it was home to the gift shop Overtures.

Dellarocco’s Pizza. Photo by Evan Bindelglass

ARCHIVE DOCUMENTS: 1930 Certificate of Occupancy | 1940 Certificate of Occupancy | 1972 Certificate of Occupancy (PDFs)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/70104

Novelist and Brooklyn Heights resident Elizabeth Gaffney was at the Brooklyn Historical Society yesterday evening to read from her second novel, When the World Was Young, on the date of its publication by Random House. She read two segments of the novel. The first told how a physician forced to give up her career because of injuries, both physical and emotional, suffered because of an auto accident in which her fiance, another physician, was killed, was courted by and married an old friend from her childhood and youth. Ms. Gaffney concluded this segment by saying, “So began a very bad marriage.” The second was from the 1950s youth of that couple’s daughter, Wally Baker, the novel’s protagonist, and told of her going to the St. George Hotel pool with a friend, Ham, who was black, and of the cicerone who guarded the pool entrance directing Ham to the “colored changing area.”

Following the readings, Ms. Gaffney was joined by Marcia Ely, BHS’s Vice President for External Affairs and Programs (on left in photo) for a discussion. Ms. Gaffney did extensive research for her novel at BHS, using its library and archives. Asked what were the most interesting materials she came across in her research, the author said she found maps of Brooklyn Heights and nearby neighborhoods in which each block was coded according to the number of black people who lived there. These maps were to facilitate banks’ practice of “redlining”; that is, to deny mortgages in places where there was a majority of black residents, and to increase rates in others that were seen to be likely to become majority black.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/69173

Plymouth Church is known for its pre-eminent role, under the leadership of Henry Ward Beecher, in the anti-slavery movement before the Civil War. While the Emancipation Proclamation declared the slaves free, and the Thirteenth Amendment abolished the “peculiar institution,” slavery still exists in the United States, and, on a larger scale, elsewhere in the world. Human trafficking for the sex trade is the best known aspect, but there is also slavery of the sort common in the antebellum South–men and women forced to do field or factory or domestic labor without pay and while held in bondage–in almost all parts of the world. Indeed, it is estimated that today there are more people held in slavery than ever in history.

The Brooklyn Historical society, Plymouth Church, and Free the Slaves, an organization that is combating slavery of all kinds throughout the world, are presenting two events, a roundtable discussion at BHS on Friday, january 10, and a concert at Plymouth on Saturday, January 11, featuring the Impressions (video above), the Inspirational Voices of Abyssinian Baptist Church, Naomi Shelton & the Gospel Queens, and members of the Dap-Kings. The roundtable discussion begins at 7:00 p.m. Friday, but the BHS doors will open at 6:00 to allow you a sneak peek at the new exhibit “Brooklyn Abolitionists in Pursuit of Freedom.” Admission to this event is free, but you must reserve tickets here. The concert, which is a benefit for Free the Slaves, starts at 8:00 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $25 or, for VIP seating, $150, and may be purchased here.

There is more information here.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/64685

This evening there was a book launch party at Plymouth Church for Brooklyn’s Plymouth Church in the Civil War Era: a Ministry of Freedom, (History Press, Charleston, SC, 2013) a new book by church member Frank Decker, assisted by Lois Rosebrooks, Plymouth’s Director of History Ministry Services. The book tells the story of Plymouth’s role in the antislavery movement in the years leading up to the war, led by its dynamic abolitionist minister Henry Ward Beecher; its participation in the “Underground Railroad” for escaping slaves; and its efforts in support of the Union cause during the war. You can read more about the book and order it here.

Your correspondent’s wife attended the book launch and took this photo of Mr. Decker and Ms. Rosebrooks.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/63256

BHB sources claim that the Palmetto Playground will officially be renamed the Adam Yauch Playground this week. A ceremony to usher in the new name will reportedly be held this Friday May 3.

Yauch, who grew up in Brooklyn Heights before achieving fame as a member of the Beastie Boys died on May 4, 2012 of cancer. Yauch played at Palmetto while growing up in the neighborhood.

Last year BHB pal/King of All Rock Journos Who Went to St. Ann’s Sasha Frere-Jones remembered Yauch in a New Yorker piece:

New Yorker: I first met Adam Yauch in 1982, in Brooklyn, when I was fifteen. I was sitting on the red steps in the lobby of St. Ann’s, where I was a sophomore in high school. His bandmate, Michael Diamond, was a grade ahead of me. Occasionally Mike and I would talk about records and argue. We talked about doing a newsletter, but that was also just talk. His hardcore band, the Beastie Boys, was getting bigger in the very small pond of downtown Manhattan. (In the nineteen-eighties, folks didn’t play rock music in Brooklyn. You had to go to “The City” for that.) The Beasties had managed to open for the Bad Brains, which was about the best thing that could happen to a young punk in 1982. People sometimes made fun of the Beasties for not being real or hard enough or some other imaginary variable. I only heard Mike complain once, about their name being spelled as Beasty Boys, because it sounded like a pet food store.

DEVELOPING…

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/58060

State Senator Daniel Squadron has put up his dukes over Friday morning’s confirmation that Long Island College Hospital will be shuttered by the SUNY Board of Trustees and sold for real estate development.

In a statement, he insists: “Our fight isn’t over. As I said yesterday, SUNY’s plan essentially turns a $63 million state grant into a subsidy for a massive real estate deal that will cut essential services without any community benefit. It should be no surprise that our community and Brooklyn will feel looted with this result. DOH has an opportunity to ensure the needs of this community and all of Brooklyn are met—and that’s precisely what we will urge it to do.”

Squadron testified at Thursday’s public hearing, in which community leaders and locals bemoaned the closing of the 155-year-old facility, at 339 Hicks Street in Cobble Hill.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/55066

The Bossert Hotel could begin receiving hotel guests at 98 Montague Street as early as this summer, according to a report from the Architect’s Newpaper—as long as construction remains on schedule. That includes preserving the facade, lobby and reception area, updating the rooms with new design finishes and amenities, and restoring the Marine Roof to a restaurant and lounge.

On January 8, the Board of Standards & Appeals unanimously approved a request for variance to change the Certificate of Occupancy for “transient hotel use, accessory hotel use and commercial use,” officially allowing the building to open its doors as a hotel once again.

David Bistricer and Joseph Chetrit closed on the 103-year-old, 14-story property, for $81 million in November. Since the 1980s, the building had been owned the Jehovah’s Witnesses and used as a community facility. At the time of purchase, Bistricer said the hotel would remain independent and maintain the name of original developer, lumber mogul Louis Bossert.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/54069

Following the January 4 BHB post that a Hampton Inn is coming to 125 Flatbush Avenue Extension (near Tillary Street) in Downtown Brooklyn, we relished McBrooklyn’s take on the biz that once occupied the space: Pepper & Potter Nash car dealership.

McB notes, “While we remember the old car dealership as a rundown wreck of a building, from photos available, it seems Lester Potter and Frank Pepper had quite the life back in the day.” Its 1946 slogan was, uh, “Picky People Pick Pepper & Potter.”

Sigh, however, a decade later, Pepper & Potter’s relationship began to crumble. The biz lived on until 2003, albeit as Metech. The whole story is covered—with photos—in a lengthy 2006 NYTimes story.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/53650

Emmy-award winning news producer & 22-year editor of the Brooklyn Heights Press Henrik Krogius has announced his retirement, reports the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. At the helm of the 75-year-old Brooklyn Heights Press and Cobble Hill News weekly, “Krogius chronicled the neighborhood’s change from a insular, Manhattan-oriented world to its present day as part of a transformed Brownstone and Downtown Brooklyn,” the paper says, adding, “His award-winning photography, insightful editorial comment and a deep working knowledge of Brooklyn’s history made the paper a must-read for residents of the Heights.”

In a farewell editorial, Krogius shares, “My career has gone through many changes, from movie house newsreels to early-days black-and-white television to color television and satellite transmissions, and back to the traditional weekly newspaper. I’ve sometimes felt I was a living anachronism, watching obsolescence take over everything I was involved in. Perhaps it’s time for something more restful or in any case, some project not bound to the insistent wheel of progress or ‘progress.’” (Photo: CT)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/53266

Developers and preservation advocates are playing tug of war as the Landmarks Preservation Committee debates whether to allow Brooklyn Heights Cinema owner Kenn Lowy to hold onto the landmarked 1895 building—or whether to replace it with a planned five-story condo.

DNAInfo.com reports that six votes are outstanding with the Landmarks Commission to approve or deny a proposal to demo the structure. At a November 27 meeting, design revisions for the new building were bandied, which Commissioner Michael Goldblum felt were “too reminiscent of the industrial Art Deco architecture, an inappropriate style for the district.”

Landmarks has not scheduled its next meeting, leaving the fate of the building hanging in the air. Meanwhile, Jane McGroarty of the Brooklyn Heights Association deems 70 Henry Street—one of the last buildings from the 1800s left standing in the area—”one of the handsomest commercial buildings in the district.” Likewise, Council Member Stephen Levin wrote to the Landmarks Commission, “70 Henry Street is a contributing building within the historic district on two levels: It is both architecturally and culturally significant to our neighborhood.”

DNAInfo reports: “To some movie-goers, the building’s muraled ceilings, stained star-patterned carpeted floors, dual entrance stairways and 150-seat sloping theaters hold historical value. The ornate cornice-covered facade and and boxy construction have survived centuries of nearby demolition which claimed most of the other buildings that were made in the same era.”

But according to Randy Gerner, architect of the proposed new building, 70 Henry has been renovated so many times over the last 75 years, including a commission-approved makeover in 1971, it has lost its historic claim. He also says the building, in its current state, is deteriorating.

Lowy says that Caruana has guaranteed the cinema would have a place on the ground floor of the new condo once it reopens, albeit with a rent hike and less space. He’s been told to expect an 18-month displacement, but is grateful to be included in plans for the new building: “I am an eternal optimist. I know we will continue to screen films whether in this building or one that is yet to be built.” (Photo: (remster_9/Flickr)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/53119

As BHB reported November 9, Red Hook’s Fairway Market suffered major damage from Hurricane Sandy. with the 52,000sf waterfront grocery at the base of Van Brunt taking on 5 feet of water and closed “indefinitely” as rebuilding ensues. Red Hook store General Manager Andy Zuleta has posted a video showing the destruction, cleanup efforts and his optimism for a bigger, badder locale in the near future. See it here, posted on November 13.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/51906

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/49730

The storied locale that housed Gage & Tollner restaurant from 1892 through the beginning of the millennium is both an endearing and bittersweet tale of Downtown Brooklyn’s history. New York City landmarked the eatery’s exterior in 1974 and a year later, its interior. It was the first landmarked dining room and the city’s third interior landmark of any kind. The first two were the New York Public Library and Grant’s Tomb.

In a lengthy piece in the Wall Street Journal, writer Barry Newman discusses the 120-year-old heritage of 374 Fulton Street, from the seafood restaurant owner’s purchase of the building in 1919 to its eventual demise. WSJ offers: In 1976, Fulton Street became a pedestrian mall, with no automobile traffic. The streets were scary, and the old crowd began eating elsewhere.” In 1985 then-owner Ed Dewey decided to sell the famous destination. In 1995, it filed for bankruptcy, before closing around 2004.

Since, it has held T.G.I. Friday’s, which lasted until 2007. Arby’s came next, in January 2010. It endured for just eight months. And in the summer of 2011, a discount costume jewelry store opened in the spot. WJS says, “The Landmarks commission says the landlord asked for a permit to make alterations after they were made. It denied the application for lack of detail and, this month, issued a violation. The commission, still lacking a satisfactory response, has issued another violation that can lead to a fine of $5,000 a day.”

Meanwhile, many of the original lighting fixtures from Gage & Tollner were stolen. Some mirrors and arches are said to survive behind bright pink panels. And what of the famous eatery that is no longer? Its last owners, Peter Aschkenasy and Joe Chirico still own the name. The latter says he’d like to reopen the restaurant “in a place where you can get to the front door.” And its Landmarked decor? In New York, he says, a crew can “replicate that in no time.” (Photo: Chuck Taylor/July 2010)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/49602

While new ABC TV drama-horror series “666 Park Avenue” may be based on New York’s Upper East Side, its pilot episode features interior scenes filmed here in Brooklyn Heights. The show—which launches Sunday at 10 p.m.—stars “Lost’s” Terry O’Quinn and Vanessa Williams, and is based on the Gabriella Pierce novel. It follows couple Gavin and Olivia Doran, owners of UES hotel The Drake, whose corridors and upscale tenants are haunted by a wicked force.

In early August, the main floor of Brooklyn’s iconic mid-1800s Borough Hall was utilized for a scene that we’ll see in the show, with men decked in tuxedos and women in formal evening dress. The Wall Street Journal reports that the hall acts as a stand-in for the mansion of a fictional New York mayor, while the show “showcases some of the city’s most impressive, and at times forbidding, classic architecture.”

Dan Davis, production designer for “666 Park Avenue,” says, “It’s the mythical New York everyone dreams about but no one who lives here really knows.” The series’ primary exterior shots, meanwhile, are filmed at the Ansonia, on Broadway between 73rd and 74th streets. Other NYC locations you’ll see in the series include The Drake’s “secret room” in the basement of the Church of the Intercession at West 155th Street in Washington Heights. The nearby Hispanic Society of America, a 1904 Beaux-Arts library and museum on Audubon Terrace, will also appear; as well as the Flatiron Building.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/48480

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/47187

Brooklyn Heights got its very own shout-out during the opening night of the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte Tuesday night, as Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley opened his speech with a odd little rant about his home state’s history some 225 years ago.

Within the first minute of his adddress—which aired just before the 10 o’clock hour (no major network coverage, but MSNBC and PBS were on it)—the guv said, “Since the first days of the American Revolution, Maryland has been called the Old Line State because of this true story of a group of soldiers called the Maryland Line: (etc. etc. etc.). It is August 27th, 1776, two months since our Declaration of Independence. Outnumbered and surrounded, Washington’s army is about to be crushed forever at Brooklyn Heights. The British are closing in.”

He goes on for another minute about Maryland’s deep-rooted history, before transitioning into a relevant point: “Together with President Obama, we are moving America forward, not back.” (Read the full text of his speech here.) Go, Brooklyn Heights! Yes we can! (Photo: AP)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/47074

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/46643

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/45690

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/45690

The manse at 40 Willow Place that sold for $7.3M, as we reported Tuesday, gets a deeper look in a story published by the New York Observer. It begins: “The modern masterpiece may not be able to command a sales price like some of its Brooklyn Heights neighbors—to wit, Truman Capote’s old abode at 70 Willow Street set a borough record when it sold for $12 million in March—but in the eyes of the tax assessor’s office, it is the finest in the borough.”

The Observer reports that new owners Charles Brian and Elizabeth O’Kelley, who moved from a West Village penthouse, will pay a heap of taxes for the 45-foot, 6,500sf home, which has an assessed market value of $6.35M (compared to the Capote house, valued at $5.14M). Sellers William and Kathleen Reiland bought the house for $3.1M in 2005.

Further, the property was first listed by Corcoran broker Deborah Rieders last October, asking $7.5M. It briefly entered contract in late fall, but didn’t close and returned to the market in April. She notes it is one of only three other modern houses in the neighborhood, all built on empty lots in the 1960s. Designed by Mary and Joseph Merz (among BHB’s Top 10 Most Interesting People in 2011), the home was featured in a 1966 issue of Architectural Record and is landmarked, despite its more recent vintage.

Rieders says that typically, it’s the older “grand dames” of the Heights that tend to fetch the neighborhood’s highest prices, in the $10M to $12M range. The five-bedroom, five-bath home has double-height ceilings with skylights, a 1,500-square-foot great room with a slate burning fireplace, a glass penthouse with a Japanese soaking tub and a rear curtain on the living spaces and bedrooms “that brings light streaming into the house all day,” according to the listing.

See more photos in the sideshow at the Observer here. (Photo: New York Observer, via Corcoran)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/46202

In a rare defeat for NYC Mayor Bloomberg and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a Manhattan Supreme Court Justice ruled Friday that the popular initiative to allow 18,000 livery cabs to take street hails from Manhattan to the outer boroughs and the upper reaches of the city is a no go. No doubt, this should have residents of Brooklyn Heights seeing red, since it can be next to impossible to convince yellow taxis to cross the Brooklyn Bridge late at night.

The decision by Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Arthur Engoron is also sour news for the city, which would lose $1 billion in revenue from 2,000 new medallion sales. NYC’s corporation counsel Michael Cardozo said he will immediately appeal the decision, according to The Wall Street Journal, saying city officials are “confident the appellate court will uphold” the law.

Taxi & Limousine Commissioner and Brooklyn Heights resident David Yassky also vowed to fight: “The court’s decision is a great loss to millions of New Yorkers outside of Manhattan, as well as for professional livery drivers whose ability to feed their families by providing a popular service their communities want and deserve is in jeopardy.”

The New York Daily News explains that earlier this summer, Engoron blocked the Bloomberg administration from selling the yellow medallions and taking applications for livery hail licenses after lobbyists for the yellow cab industry came up with the argument that the plan was illegal.

The judge determined that yellow cabbies would “suffer irreparable harm” if the plan were put into effect. Michael Woloz, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Taxicab Board of Trade, told WJS, “Thousands of individual owner-drivers and hundreds of small-business owners in both the taxi and livery industries are breathing a sigh of relief.”

Mind you, this is the same industry that just celebrated a whopping 17% fare hike. After Labor Day, the starting rate will remain $2.50, but the meter will climb 50 cents instead of 40 with every click, after one-fifth of a mile or 60 seconds. The flat rate from Manhattan to Kennedy Airport will climb by $7, to $52, and the surcharge from the city to Newark will escalate from $15 to $17.50.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/46017

The Brooklyn Heights Public Library at 280 Cadman Plaza West & Tillary Street was full of book-smart promise when it opened May 31, 1962, offering modern technology and a streamlined system for checking out and returning books. The series of pics (below), taken in February 1966, in fact, reveal a clever conveyor belt that sent books from the main-level chute to the lower floor, where they were processed to return to the shelves. Pretty neato.

In all, the Brooklyn Public Library system is the fifth-largest in the nation, with 58 branches located within a half mile of every Brooklyn resident. It’s a safe bet that some 45 years ago, not only did the air conditioning work at the Heights branch, but there probably weren’t too many stabbings at the library, either. Curiously, the lobby area has changed little since 1966. (Photos: Museum of the City of New York)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/45817

Legend has it that the red brick print shop in Brooklyn Heights where Walt Whitman set the type for the first edition of “Leaves” in 1855—torn down years ago to build the Whitman Close co-ops at 75 Henry Street—was salvaged, with bricks embedded in the ground around a planter near the A train stop on Cadman Plaza West.

(Sketch: Museum of the City of New York/Planter: McBrooklyn)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/45675

One of Brooklyn Heights’ mightiest architectural triumphs, the Romanesque Revival Herman Behr Mansion at 82 Pierrepont Street—which changed hands in 2008 for $10.98 million—has been covered in netting, as it undergoes a mass of restoration to its facade.

It was built in 1888 by architect Frank Freeman for $80,000, and named after the mining industrialist who built it—and had a sordid existence after its namesake died. (Behr’s son Karl, a renowned tennis pro, survived the sinking of the Titanic in 1912.) In 1919, after the family relocated upstate—with a massive add-on—it became The Hotel Palm, which those in the know were aware was a neighborhood bordello.

Afterward, as the Franciscan House of Studies, it housed the Order of the Franciscan monks, who were sent to the Brooklyn Heights locale when they needed a place to “dry out.” In 1977, it was converted to 26 rental apartments (six lucky bastards are rent-stabilized), and it has remained 100% occupied since.

(Info extracted from Chuck Taylor’s The Smoking Nun blog here.)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/45755

The six-story apartment building at 70 Clark Street and Henry is photographed here September 15, 1948. Note the three towering TV antennas along the roofline. The street-level retail gave us Parker Drugs, offering a lunch counter and soda fountain; with “Soda and Lunch,” “Cosmetics and Cigars” advertised along the front signage. (See details below.)

Today, 70 Clark, across the street from the St. George Hotel, is the location of Clark’s Restaurant and Ozu Japanese, while the residential coop has changed precious little over the past 50+ years. According to a recent Prudential Douglas Elliman listing, many of the building’s units feature 9-foot ceilings, along with a common garden between its twin structures.

(Historic Photo: Wurtz Brothers, Museum of the City of New York/Current: Chuck Taylor)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/45694

So we were apparently a little tardy in our weekend post about the closing of Montague Street’s Hallmark store. Let’s make good by sharing the latest on the building planned for 172-174 Montague, which will replace the two-story structure that once held Eammon’s and Hallmark.

First, the Brooklyn Eagle reveals that new owner “BH 1 CD LLC,” is operated by principals Eli Stoll and Charles Dayan. A little more digging by BHB shows that the company is based at 499 Seventh Avenue in Manhattan. As previously reported, the 8,150/sf building (and 5,000/sf lot) sold for $12 million. The current 50-foot wide and 95-feet deep structure—which also has a cellar—was originally constructed in 1925, and does not fall within the Brooklyn Heights Landmark District and thus is not subject to its 50 foot height limit. According to Property Shark, the building was most recently assessed at a value of $1,699,650.

With a C5-2/DB zoning designation, the property is approved for 60,000 buildable square feet and “significant air rights,” with a demolition permit already issued by the Department of Buildings, the Eagle says. Originally, an application was filed to construct a 19-story, 66-unit mixed-use residential building—but was nixed by DOB July 10.

Besen & Associates, which brokered the deal, says the seller Robar, LLC (a private investor) “resisted the temptation to sell his air rights on several occasions after receiving unsolicited offers,” according to David Davidson, who represented the seller with Besen’s Lynda Blumberg. That includes a bid from the developer of the 34-story Archstone luxury rental next door, at 180 Montague Street. It was built in 1999, and sold in 2006 to residential REIT Archstone Smith for $101 million.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/45576

Three City Council members representing both Brooklyn and Manhattan believe the Brooklyn Bridge needs to fatten up. Citing tight quarters along the pedestrian and bicycle paths, the members proposed Tuesday to widen the upper-level platform for tourists and commuters.

The New York Times reports that Brooklyn Councilman Stephen Levin suggested that “the engineering and ideas community” could be enlisted to widen the artery by as much as three times its current span, perhaps through a competition organized by local design groups.

Likewise, Councilman Brad Lander of Brooklyn, believes that “just looking at how the path goes around the buttresses gives you a sense that a wider path is feasible. If it can widen out there, surely we can find a way to widen it out elsewhere.” Councilwoman Margaret Chin, who represents the Manhattan side, also attended the event on Tuesday to lend support.

Lander’s office says the city Transportation Department has not yet been consulted about a possible plan, though Seth Solomonow, a spokesman for the Transportation Department, said the city shares their “interest in enhancing safety and accommodating the growing number of people crossing this iconic transportation hub and tourist destination.” Any proposed designs “would be part of a long-term look at improving bridge access and safety,” he said.

The width of the main portion of the 129-year-old Bridge’s pathway varies between 8 and 16 feet. A bike lane on the bridge can comfortably fit only one rider in many areas, though traffic is intended to flow in both directions. The council members cited a Transportation Department estimate that 4,000 pedestrians and 3,100 cyclists cross the bridge each day.

See the full NY Times story here. DNAInfo also reports here.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/45242

The one-story 1963 homely building that housed the long-lived “Brooklyn Eagle” newspaper at 30 Henry Street is history. It was two months ago that the lot in Brooklyn Heights was boarded up and by June 8 the roof of the structure had been removed. Brownstoner reports that all that remains as of Tuesday is the building’s foundation.

And now it’s time for the site’s new life: DUMBO-based developer Fortis Manor, which purchased the property in November 2011 for $3.5 million ($500K over its asking price), received Landmarks approval in December for a five-story, six-unit condo building, with underground parking and a courtyard with waterfall. Let’s hope this project goes smoother than its neighbor up the street at 20 Henry Street.

(Photo: Brownstoner)

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/44765

Most of us Brooklyn Heights denizens have seen dozens of pics of the Brooklyn Heights Promenade in its early days, but there are actually a couple here that were new to a guy who loves to scour the webbie for Heights history. How about you? Via Gothamist here.

Here’s the text that accompanies the Gothamist slideshow:

The idea of the Brooklyn Heights Promenade had been bounced around since Hezekiah Pierrepont proposed it in 1827 (decades later, in 1864, Abraham Lincoln declared, “There may be finer views than this in the world, but I don’t believe it.”). The idea didn’t happen in Pierrepont’s lifetime, but he “lived and died in the belief and desire, that the Heights some day be made a public promenade.” Over 100 years later, enter Robert Moses.

Moses originally proposed that the BQE go directly through Brooklyn Heights, but was talked down from this crazy idea by the powerful residents of the neighborhood. The idea for the design with the promenade on top was actually proposed by one such resident “whose private garden would be destroyed by the arterial highway”—he suggested that the BQE be two levels, and have a “cover” on top protecting the gardens from smog and noise. The “cover” became the promenade, and the space was dedicated on October 7th, 1950, when Moses announced: “I don’t know of anything quite like this in any city in the world.”

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/44319

In a lengthy Q&A on New York magazine’s Vulture blog, Spike Lee talks with writer Will Leitch in detail about his roots in Brooklyn’s Cobble Hill. The director was born in Atlanta, and moved to Crown Heights at an early age, followed by eight years beginning around the age of 4—from 1961 to 1969—at 186 Warren Street, between Henry and Clinton streets.

Lee’s take: Cobble Hill has gentrified to the point that it’s now… Brooklyn Heights. Read more at Cobble Hill Blog.

Source: Brooklyn Heights Blog
http://brooklynheightsblog.com/archives/43864