The New York Mercantile Exchange Building

628 Broadway | also 160 Crosby Street | NoHo | built 1883

Open on the map4 entries

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

1. 1883

   H. J. Schwarzmann & Co. gives a Broadway loft building bamboo-pole columns

   Clothing-trimmings importer Henry Newman commissioned the six-story building at 628-630 Broadway, designed by the Philadelphia firm H. J. Schwarzmann & Co. and finished in 1883. Its cast-iron front borrowed from the Aesthetic Movement: columns shaped like bamboo poles, incised leaf panels, palm trees and calla lilies, and Moorish-style filigree arches around the top-floor windows.

   Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

2. 1884

   August 19

   A fifth-floor fire soaks the stock of two clothing firms in the new building

   Shortly after 4 a.m. on August 19, 1884, fire was found on the fifth floor, where Henry Newman & Co. and Cohn, Ball & Co. had just stored their fall and winter stock. Firefighters stopped it within an hour, but water damage reached the shops below: a hat store lost $4,000 in ruined stock and a gentlemen's furnishings store lost $5,000. A second fire in July 1887 caused $130,000 in damage, and Ball & Co. never returned to the building.

   Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

3. 1886

   The Mercantile Exchange's name is lettered on the facade, and its offices fill the upper floors

   The lettering on the building's front reads The New York Mercantile Exchange, the commodities market then based at 2 Harrison Street. A city alteration application filed in 1886 shows the Exchange's offices and salesrooms on the upper floors, with a warehouse at street level. By 1892 the building had turned to light manufacturing, a use that continued into the mid-twentieth century.

   Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

4. 1908

   A toy-store order for teddy bears ends in a lawsuit over a presidential nomination

   The Steinfeld Brothers toy store on the ground floor ordered 525 dozen teddy bears from manufacturer Rudolph Fleischer, betting that Theodore Roosevelt would seek a third term and keep the toy popular. When the Republicans nominated William Howard Taft instead, the store said it would take only 20 dozen. Fleischer sued, calling the surplus bears white elephants, and the New-York Tribune reported the dispute on July 4, 1908.

   Source: Daytonian in Manhattan

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