Staten Island Family Courthouse

100 Richmond Terrace | St. George | built 1931

Open on the map3 entries

The lot about 1940
About 1940. Via 1940s.nyc
The lot about 1985
About 1985. Via 80s.nyc

The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.

Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.

  1. 1929

    Sibley & Fetherston design a gentle, scaled-down courthouse for women and children

    Unlike most imposing courthouses, this one was meant to feel approachable, likely because its users were mainly women and children. Sibley & Fetherston based it on Sir William Chambers' Somerset House in London, shrinking that model's rusticated base, pedimented portico and window frames, and clad it in glazed terra cotta. Charles Fetherston was a Staten Island native who spent most of his life in West New Brighton.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  2. 1930

    The cornerstone is laid for a children's court to get young people out of Borough Hall

    Staten Island's children's court had met in the Corn Exchange Bank Building and then in Borough Hall. Borough President John Lynch argued a separate building would spare children from walking through Borough Hall to the courtrooms and free space there for offices; the cornerstone went down in 1930. Of the city's children's courthouses built in that campaign, this is the only one still standing and still serving its original purpose.

    “The cornerstone of the new courthouse was laid in 1930.”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  3. 2001

    January 30

    The family courthouse is named a city landmark

    The Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the building on January 30, 2001, calling it the city's only surviving family, or children's, courthouse that still operates as a court. At the hearing on February 8, 2000, the Historic Districts Council and the Preservation League of Staten Island both spoke in favor, while State Assemblyman Connolly sent a letter against it.

    “It is the city's only extant family (children's) courthouse still in use as a court…”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

Nearby

All 47 buildings with stories in St. George