8 Jane Street
West Village | built 1843
Open on the map3 entries
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.
- 1843
Heirs of Leonard DeKlyn build a speculative row of three Greek Revival houses at 4-8 Jane Street
The heirs of merchant Leonard DeKlyn built Nos. 4-8 Jane Street in 1843 as a speculative row of three-story brick houses. DeKlyn had bought the land in 1817, and similar rows went up on West Twelfth Street and Greenwich Avenue in the 1840s. Carpenters Stephen H. Williams and Enoch Dunham, who paid the taxes on No. 6, were almost certainly the builders, and Nos. 6 and 8 keep their original appearance.
“…built for speculative purposes in 1843 by the heirs of Leonard DeKlyn.”
- 1889
A boarding house on Jane Street shelters a clairvoyant who works as Madame Mantell
By 1889 No. 8 Jane Street was a boarding house kept by Mrs. Eliza Murray. Among her boarders, Matilda Peck, a Southern-born clairvoyant who worked under the name Madame Mantell, died suddenly in her room at the age of 50. The New York Times described her as educated and intelligent, and Spiritualists regarded her as a remarkable medium.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
- 1895
A drunken boarder beats a fellow tenant and gouges out an eye; the dying man asks to go home
On May 24, 1895, coal dealer George Meehan, drunk and abusing his wife, kicked and beat 65-year-old tenant Elvin O. Buck, who had tried to intervene, and gouged out one of his eyes. At St. Vincent's Hospital, doctors told Buck he would not recover, and at his request he was returned to his room at No. 8, where he soon died. Meehan was held on $1,000 bail.
Source: Daytonian in Manhattan
Further reading
- Clairvoyance and Murder - No. 8 Jane StreetDaytonian in Manhattan
- Then & Now photos: 247-251 West 12th Street (aka 10-14 Jane Street)Village Preservation: Greenwich Village Then & Now
Nearby
- 111 Greenwich Avenue2 entries
- 109 Greenwich Avenue1 entry
- 115 Greenwich Avenue3 entries
- 107 Greenwich Avenue1 entry
- 103 Greenwich Avenue1 entry
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