Perry Hose Company No. 23 firehouse

48 Horatio Street | also 48A Horatio Street | West Village | built 1856

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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. 1855

    An old stable on the lot serves as the Perry Hose Company's firehouse

    Before the present building, John B. Ireland's old stable stood on this site and had been converted into the home of Perry Hose Company No. 23, a volunteer company named for Commodore Matthew C. Perry. The Board of Assistant Aldermen described the quarters as ordinary in 1855. The company was entitled to 25 men but had only 11 volunteers, among them a cartman, a carpenter and a painter. This was an earlier building on the site.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  2. 1857

    The city builds an Italianate firehouse with a pedimented truck bay

    The city bought the property in 1856 and put up a new firehouse, finished in 1857. The red brick Italianate building has brownstone trim, a bracketed cornice, arched ground-floor openings and a central truck bay with a classical pediment. The hose engine and horses lived on the ground floor, with quarters, hay loft and equipment rooms above. The city appraised it at $6,100 in 1858.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  3. 1857

    Fireworks stored for a Jackson Square show explode in the new firehouse

    As Independence Day neared in 1857, a Mr. Edge of Jersey City stored crates of fireworks intended for a display in Jackson Square in the firehouse's back room. They went off a few days later, setting the building on fire and panicking the neighborhood. Sergeant Jacob Sebring of the Ninth Precinct blamed arsonists, since two boys had been seen climbing into a rear window, and arrested them on suspicion.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  4. 1861

    February

    Dead Rabbits gang members crash the company's ball and start a feud

    Around the first week of February 1861 the firefighters held a ball. Members of the Dead Rabbits gang from Five Points crashed it, and John Kerrigan, brother of a congressman, reportedly gave their leaders a thrashing. On February 12 a mob of 25 or 30 chased Kerrigan along Mulberry Street toward City Hall Park until he turned and fired two shots, which scattered them.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  5. 1865

    December 10

    The city auctions off the old volunteer firehouses after the paid department is created

    After the 1865 act replaced the volunteer companies with a paid Metropolitan department, unneeded firehouses were put up for auction on December 10. A $200 bid on Hose Company 23 was rejected as insultingly low, and the city leased the building for $325 a year to Alexander V. Davidson, the company's former foreman. It finally sold at auction on October 21, 1867 for $7,400.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  6. 1884

    March 21

    Company foreman Alexander Davidson, who later became sheriff, is indicted for grand larceny and flees

    Alexander V. Davidson led Perry Hose Company No. 23 as its foreman and later rented its old house; he became a deputy sheriff and then sheriff in 1882. On March 21, 1884 he was indicted on three counts of grand larceny and skipped town. In 1886 the furnishings of his house were auctioned, including a marble-topped table from the old volunteer company.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  7. 1947

    July 30

    A tenant is arrested for selling a fake "pony meter" said to pick winning horses

    William F. Wrieden, 39, who rented an apartment in the old firehouse, was arrested on July 30, 1947 on a charge of promoting a "pony meter." The Attorney General's office called the gadget a fake that was guaranteed to pick the winner at any track. Wrieden faced eight counts of grand larceny, and investigators were looking into dozens more complaints, including thirty-four bad checks.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

  8. 1955

    January

    A. Leiser & Co., sellers of scene painters' colors, keeps its shop on the ground floor

    Adolph Leiser bought the building around 1920, converted the first floor to a shop and put apartments above. His firm, A. Leiser & Co., sold a full line of colors and supplies to theatrical scene painters. After Leiser died in 1937 and left $3,000 to his employee Paul Wichert, the estate sold the property in January 1955, and the shop stayed until at least 1958.

    Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

Further reading

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