Bennet-Farrell-Feldmann House
119 95th Street | Bay Ridge | built 1899
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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.
- 1847
Joseph S. Bennet builds a Greek Revival villa on Shore Road, on land his grandparents farmed
Around 1847 Joseph S. Bennet had this house built on Shore Road, on ground that had once belonged to his grandparents' farm. It was one of three houses that members of the Bennet family put up along the road in the 1840s. The house stood on Shore Road until about 1913, when it was moved to its present spot on 95th Street.
“Built for Joseph S. Bennet around 1847, it was one of three houses erected by members of the Bennet family on Shore Road in the 1840s.”
- 1847
The frame villa shows off Greek Revival details: clapboards, tall corner pilasters and a columned porch
The house is a five-bay-wide, two-and-a-half-story frame building that keeps its original clapboard siding. Greek Revival touches include columned front and rear porches, two-story corner pilasters, denticulated cornices, molded window surrounds, and an attic story designed to read as a crowning entablature. The Landmarks Preservation Commission called it the grandest mid-nineteenth-century house still standing in southern Brooklyn.
- 1864
Bennet leaves Fort Hamilton for Staten Island and sells his villa to Matilda Church Whiting
A yellow fever epidemic struck Fort Hamilton in 1856, and several of Bennet's neighbors died; from 1856 to 1858 many Shore Road houses stood empty. Around 1859 Joseph Bennet decided to move to Staten Island and leased the house out. In May 1864 he sold it to Matilda Church Whiting, whose husband, Dr. Alexander B. Whiting, was a fashionable New York physician.
“Around 1859, Joseph S. Bennet decided to move from Fort Hamilton to Staten Island, and to lease, and later sell (in May 1864) his property…”
- 1874
After Dr. Whiting's death, his widow loses the house at a sheriff's sale
The Whitings used the Fort Hamilton house in summer and lived the rest of the year on East 34th Street in Manhattan with their three daughters. Dr. Whiting died in 1868, and Matilda Church Whiting then ran into money trouble. The property was sold at a sheriff's sale in 1874 and bought by Susan E. Crawford, wife of John Crawford, a retired dry goods merchant from Ireland.
- 1890
James P. Farrell, an Irish immigrant and Tammany Hall politician, buys the villa
In October 1890 James P. Farrell bought the former Bennet house. Born in Cork in 1842, he had come to the United States in 1865 as a poor immigrant, settled near the Brooklyn Navy Yard and built up his own dry goods importing business. He later became active in Irish fraternal groups and Tammany Hall politics, and around the time of the purchase he began dealing in southern Brooklyn real estate.
- 1902
The Farrell children include Georgina, a Pratt Institute graduate, and Jack, promoter for Buffalo Bill's show
James Farrell lived in the house with his wife Norah, six children and several servants. According to his grandson Fergus Bordewich, quoted in the landmark report, son Jack traveled the world as a promoter for Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. Daughter Georgina cared for wounded soldiers at Fort Hamilton in the Spanish-American War and graduated from Pratt Institute in 1902, which Bordewich called a rare achievement for a woman of her era.
“Georgina, my grandmother, tended wounded soldiers at Fort Hamilton during the Spanish-American War. She graduated from Pratt Institute, in 1902…”
- 1909
Farrell is dismissed as head of a Brooklyn reform school for boys, then dies in the house a year later
Farrell's political connections won him an appointment in 1900 as superintendent of a Brooklyn reform school for boys convicted in Children's Court. He kept the job until 1909, when accusations of mismanagement and of brutality toward the boys cost him his post. He died the next year, 1910, at his home on Shore Road.
“He remained in that position until 1909, when charges of mismanagement and brutality against the boys led to his dismissal.”
- 1912
The Feldmann family buys a vacant lot on 95th Street, apparently agreeing to pay for moving the house there
After Farrell's death his son and executor divided the Shore Road property. In April 1912 Clara Feldmann and her son and daughter bought the vacant lot at 119 95th Street for $100, plus other valuable considerations. Chief among these appears to have been paying to move the Bennet-Farrell house off Shore Road, which freed the corner lot for Farrell family development. The house was first taxed at its new site in 1914.
“The most important of these appears to have been an agreement to assume the costs of moving the Bennet-Farrell house from Shore Road to the Feldmanns' new site…”
- 1999
Landmarks Commission designates the house after a hearing and a petition of over 1,600 signatures
The Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the house an individual landmark on August 3, 1999. At its public hearing in September 1997, twenty witnesses spoke in favor of designating it and the building at 125 95th Street, among them representatives of the Historic Districts Council and the Bay Ridge Historical Society. A petition with more than 1,600 signatures and a letter from Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan also backed designation, while a representative of the owner spoke against it.
“Twenty witnesses spoke in favor of designation of both buildings... a petition with over 1,600 signatures and letters from Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan…”
- 2000
New owners restore the empty villa with help from a Landmarks Conservancy grant
The estate of a Feldmann relative still owned the house at its landmarking, and it stood empty and at risk of demolition for development. In 2000 new owners hired Anita Bartholin Brandt Architect, P.C. and the contractor PRESERV, Inc. A grant from the Landmarks Conservancy's Historic Properties Fund helped pay for new roofing and repairs to the clapboard, shutters, windows, foundation and porch.
Source: brownstoner.com
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