12 Mott Street
Chinatown | built 1910
Open on the map1 entry
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.
- 1883
Merchant Man Lee buys 12 Mott Street, among the first documented Chinese property purchases in the area
In 1883 Man Lee, a Chinese merchant, bought the building then standing at 12 Mott Street, and Kwong Hing Lung bought the one next door at number 10. The National Register nomination counts these among the first documented real estate purchases by Chinese immigrants on lower Mott Street. Not long before, the Irish congregation controlling Transfiguration Church had rented a row of townhouses to keep Chinese residents out, so the deeds marked a real shift in who could settle there. The current building on the lot dates to the early twentieth century.
Source: National Register nomination
Nearby
- 10 Mott Street1 entry
- 14 Mott Street lofts14 Mott Street | 2 entries
- 5 Chatham Square2 entries
- Chung Wah Gong Shaw (former CCBA headquarters)16 Mott Street | 4 entries
- Moo Tie Temple and Chinatown post office13 Mott Street | 1 entry
- 11 Mott Street1 entry