25 Park Place Building

25 Park Place | also 22 Murray Street | Tribeca | built 1857

Open on the map5 entries

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

1. 1822

   Surgeon Valentine Mott buys the Park Place house in 1822 and lives there until 1836

   Mott, a leading New York surgeon who taught at nearby Columbia College, bought 25 Park Place in 1822 and lived there with his family until 1836. The house was an earlier building on the lot: John G. Leake bought the plot from Trinity Church in 1800 for $2,000, and Joshua Waddington had finished a home there by 1808. The Landmarks report notes that Waddington, like his neighbor, held enslaved people.

   Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

2. 1853

   By 1853 the old Park Place houses are joined into the Clifford House hotel

   As residents left Park Place in the 1840s, Nos. 23 and 25 served as rental properties or boarding houses. By 1853 the two houses had been joined and enlarged into a hotel called the Clifford House, run by Horace B. Alexander and William J. Fish. Within a few years the lots were redeveloped for the dry goods trade. This was an earlier building on the site.

   Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

3. 1879

   Ernest Steiger & Co., sellers of German books, globes and kindergarten supplies, move into 25 Park Place

   Steiger's firm arrived in 1879 and became the anchor tenant, staying until it moved to 49 Murray Street in 1910. Other publishers followed in the 1880s, among them Baird & Dillon, the Irish Nation, and Machell & Macnamara. By then the building had shifted from dry goods to books, wire manufacturing and other trades.

   Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

4. 1930

   The Hercules Seating Company sign marks 25 Park Place for decades, then hides under an OTB sign

   The Hercules Seating Company was the building's tenant from the 1930s until at least the early 1960s. Its weathered lettering over the entrance was later covered for years by the signage of an Off-Track Betting parlor, which Ephemeral New York describes as the building's last commercial incarnation. The old letters were back in view in 2013, and Forgotten New York had photographed the awning sign the year before.

   Source: Ephemeral New York

5. 2007

   March 13

   The Landmarks Commission designates the 25 Park Place Building over the owner's objection

   At the January 16, 2007 hearing, four people spoke for designation. They included speakers from Community Board 1, the Historic Districts Council and the Municipal Arts Society, while two representatives of the owner testified against. Architect Robert A. M. Stern sent a letter of support. The commission voted the designation on March 13, 2007 after the building had previously come before it in 1989 and 1990.

   Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

Further reading

• A STORE NAMED HERCULESForgotten New York
• A peek into the backstory of 25 Park PlaceEphemeral New York

Nearby

• 23 Park Place Building23 Park Place | 5 entries
• Four Seasons Hotel New York Downtown99 Church Street | 12 entries
• Fire Patrol No. 1 building41 Murray Street | 5 entries
• 43 Murray Street5 entries
• 45 Murray Street6 entries
• 47 Murray Street5 entries

All 564 buildings with stories in Tribeca