Former Engine Company 55 firehouse

185 Lafayette Street | Little Italy | built 1887

Open on the map5 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. 1887

    June 4

    Engine Company 55 is organized at 173 Elm Street

    Engine Company 55 was organized on June 4, 1887, at 173 Elm Street, a number later changed to 185 Lafayette Street. Two other firehouses already served the neighborhood, Engine 9 on Marion Street and Hook & Ladder 18 on Elizabeth Street. The Landmarks Preservation Commission thinks the new company was meant to protect the loft buildings then rising along Elm and Centre Streets.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  2. 1887

    Napoleon LeBrun & Son's Queen Anne firehouse is completed for the city

    The city built this firehouse in 1886-87 to a design by Napoleon LeBrun & Son, its fire department architects, as SoHo's lofts, factories and warehouses created demand for new stations. The polychrome Queen Anne facade has cast-iron first-story columns with acanthus capitals, diaper-pattern brickwork, terra-cotta rosettes and small gables along the cornice.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  3. 1888

    May 24

    Engine 55 firefighters respond to a deadly rag-warehouse fire at 59 Spring Street

    A fire broke out on the top floor of Hugh McGinnis's rag warehouse at 59 Spring Street on May 24, 1888, trapping ten women who sorted rags there. Firefighter Edwin Ford of Engine 55 climbed through the flames and carried Catharine Sullivan, whose dress was burning, to an adjoining roof. Bridget O'Mara, who fell while sliding down a rope, died at St. Vincent's Hospital that night.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  4. 1898

    Widening Elm Street into Lafayette Street leaves the firehouse set back and shortened

    When Elm Street was widened into Lafayette Street, the city moved this firehouse's facade back to the new property line after Engine 55 left for Broome Street. The top floor was removed around 1898, and the cornice, terra-cotta band and brick brackets were carefully lowered so the change looked seamless. The old building then took the address No. 185 Lafayette Street.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  5. 1917

    May

    The city offers the old firehouse in a land trade, and it later becomes a garage, a surplus store and a home

    By 1914 the city was using the old station only to house Deputy Fire Chief Thomas R. Langford. In May 1917 it was packaged with other properties for exchange against undeveloped land at Inwood Hill. The ground floor was an auto repair shop by 1923 and, at mid-century, Elias Ziegler's surplus store. In 2004 the building was converted to a ground-floor studio with one apartment above.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

Further reading

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All 76 buildings with stories in Little Italy