21-43 45th Avenue

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.

1870
Root & Rust put up 21-43 among six narrow Italianate row houses
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No. 21-43 belongs to a run of six brick houses, Nos. 21-41 to 21-51, that the developers Root & Rust erected in the 1870s. Three stories over a basement, they sit on 16-foot lots, which gives their windows a more vertical look. Their lintels and sills are unornamented, but the roof cornices survive and match those on Root & Rust's houses at Nos. 21-09 to 21-17.
Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission
1909
Queensboro Bridge opens as old Twelfth Street draws theater performers
The Queensboro Bridge linked Manhattan and Long Island City in 1909, and many businesses moved across the river. By the time elevated trains reached the area a few years later, Twelfth Street, now 45th Avenue, had attracted theatrical performers, for whom the nearby trains put Broadway within easy reach. The noise of the El drove many longtime families away, and during the Depression the street's houses were divided into multi-family dwellings.
“Old Twelfth Street had by this time attracted theatrical performers.”
Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

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