Anthony Campagna Estate

640 West 249th Street | Riverdale | built 1930

Open on the map5 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. 1928

    Builder Anthony Campagna buys a three-acre Hudson River site from Percy R. Pyne

    Anthony Campagna, an Italian-born developer whose firm built Manhattan apartment houses such as 960 Fifth Avenue, already lived in Riverdale when he bought three acres here in 1928 from Percy R. Pyne, owner of the neighboring Alderbrook estate. The lot sat directly opposite Wave Hill. Campagna hired Dwight James Baum, who had designed a house for his brother Michael.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  2. 1930

    Dwight James Baum finishes an Italian-style villa for Campagna overlooking the Palisades

    Baum's steel-framed house of stucco-covered brick and Doria limestone was completed in 1930, along with a garage and chauffeur's quarters at the east end of the site. Campagna did the contracting himself and brought many materials over from Italy. The design recalls Tuscan villas without copying any one of them, with a walled forecourt and fountain on the entrance side and a triple-arched loggia facing the garden.

    “Campagna himself handled the contracting, and imported many of the materials directly from Italy.”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  3. 1934

    The estate's Italian gardens by Vitale & Geiffert win the Architectural League's gold medal

    Landscape architects Ferruccio Vitale, born in Florence, and his partner Alfred Geiffert Jr. laid out a tree-lined allee to the forecourt fountain, plus a reflecting pool flanked by garden walls with fountains. In 1934 the Architectural League of New York gave the design its gold medal for landscape architecture. Oscar B. Bach, an iron designer whose work also appears on Radio City Music Hall, designed the ironwork of the gates, balconies and outdoor stairs.

    “This design won the gold medal from the Architectural League of New York for landscape architecture in 1934…”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  4. 1943

    Campagna leases his villa to New York University as a wartime dormitory for women

    In 1941 Campagna and his family left the main house for the former garage and chauffeur's quarters, perhaps because of the Depression-era slump in building. Two years later he leased the villa to New York University, which used it to house women enrolled in a special course tied to the war effort.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  5. 1946

    Monitor Equipment Corporation buys the house for executive offices and a corporate institute

    The Monitor Equipment Corporation bought the villa in 1946 for executive offices and a corporate institute. The company stayed into the 1960s, until it went bankrupt; its president, George M. Gibson, then took the house in settlement of money owed him. Gibson sold it in 1982 to Eugene and Arlene Kule, and the Yeshiva of Telshe Alumni bought it in June 1993.

    “In 1946, the house was sold to the Monitor Equipment Corporation, for use as executive offices and a corporate institute.”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

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