261 West 11th Street

West Village | built 1868

Open on the map3 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. 1868

    William Naugle designs a mansard-roofed house for Mrs. M. Doscher at 261 West 11th Street

    Architect William Naugle built this four-story brick house in 1868 for Mrs. M. Doscher, together with a twin at No. 265 that sits two lots away. Both took the mansard roof of the French Second Empire style, then in fashion, and bracketed cornices. A high stoop up to the parlor floor still survives at No. 261, though the curved window cornices that once decorated the doorway have been shaved off.

    “…erected in 1868 by architect William Naugle for Mrs. M. Doscher. They have the typical mansard roofs of the popular French Second Empire style…”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  2. 1871

    November 26

    The Randolph family, with eight children, moves in and hosts two family funerals

    Thompson Edgar Fitz Randolph, a Produce Exchange member who had married in 1857, moved his family into the new house in 1871, and seems to have talked the owner into selling it to him. The couple had eight children and belonged to the Church of the Strangers. A funeral for his wife's brother, Lewis F. Ireland, was held here on November 26, 1871, and her mother's followed in December 1874.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  3. 1926

    Actress and producer Eva Le Gallienne moves into the house the year she founds the Civic Repertory Theater

    Eva Le Gallienne moved here in 1926, the same year she opened the Civic Repertory Theater in the former Theatre Francais on West 14th Street. Daytonian in Manhattan reports that she apparently shared the apartment with her set designer, Gladys Calthrop. The house had been divided into apartments by 1921, when city records allowed no more than two families cooking.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

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