Liberty Inn
51 10th Avenue | also 500 West 14th Street | West Village | built 1910
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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.
- 1908
The Strand opens as a sailors' boardinghouse with a saloon downstairs and 28 rooms above
The Strand opened in 1908 on a patch of land called Dalamater Square, in a flatiron-shaped building. A 1914 court document described three stories, a saloon on the ground floor and 28 rooms above, taking men only and serving people with business on the river front. The hotel's all-night license was revoked in 1910.
Source: Ephemeral New York
- 1912
The New York Times rents a floor of the Strand to phone in Titanic survivors' stories
After the Titanic sank, the New York Times took a floor of rooms at the Strand to cover the survivors' arrival at nearby Pier 54. Reporters sent to the pier were told to question survivors, then dash into the Strand and dictate notes over telephone lines connected to the newsroom in Times Square. The Times itself recalled the arrangement in a 2012 article.
Source: Ephemeral New York
- 1974
The Anvil opens in the former Strand Hotel as an after-hours gay bar and disco
From 1974, the small waterfront building that had been the Strand Hotel housed the Anvil, a private after-hours club for gay men. The main floor had a bar with go-go dancers, a dance floor and a performance area, with drag shows added in later years, while the basement held a smaller bar, film screenings and a large backroom. The NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project lists Andy Warhol, Truman Capote and Lou Reed among its visitors.
Source: NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project
- 1985
The Anvil closes voluntarily; Felipe Rose of the Village People had started out dancing there
The Anvil closed voluntarily on November 9, 1985. According to the New York Post, the club's operator was the Liberation Social Club, which had incorporated in 1976. Felipe Rose, later cast as the Indian in the Village People, began his career dancing at the Anvil.
Source: NYC LGBT Historic Sites Project
- 2015
After 107 years the Liberty Inn still rents rooms by the hour at 51 Tenth Avenue
By 2015 the flatiron-shaped hotel, then called the Liberty Inn, was one of the last low-rent motels in a Meatpacking District that had otherwise gentrified. Rooms were limited to two guests and cost $80 for two hours. Ephemeral New York counted 107 years since the building opened in 1908 as the Strand.
Source: Ephemeral New York
Further reading
- 107 colorful years at a Meatpacking District motelEphemeral New York
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