Bronx County Building

850 Walton Avenue | also 851 Grand Conc, 851 Grand Concourse | Concourse Village | built 1933

Open on the map8 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. 1931

    January

    Foundations go in for a new Bronx County Courthouse on the Grand Concourse

    The site just north of Franz Sigel Park, between 158th and 161st Streets, had been picked as early as 1928. Foundations were under way by January 1931, and architects Max Hausle and Joseph H. Freedlander filed their plans for approval that March. By July 1932 the building was nearly finished, though its sculpture and entrance porticoes were still missing.

    “By January of 1931 the foundations for the new building were under construction…”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  2. 1932

    September

    Seventy-ton blocks of Georgia marble arrive for the courthouse sculpture groups

    In September 1932 huge pink marble blocks from Tate, Georgia, each weighing 70 tons, began reaching New York for the eight sculpture groups that flank the porticoes. Adolph A. Weinman supervised the groups and designed two himself. George H. Snowden, Joseph Kiselewski and Edward Field Sanford made the others, with names like The Majesty of Law and Loyalty, Valor and Sacrifice.

    “…the great pink marble blocks, each weighing seventy tons, which were used for the eight sculpture groups flanking the porticoes…”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  3. 1934

    Charles Keck's frieze shows a figure holding a drawing of the courthouse

    Hausle and Freedlander, who appear to have worked together only on this job, set the nine-story limestone building on a rusticated granite podium with a portico centered on each side. Above the base runs Charles Keck's frieze of farming, trade, industry, the arts and America's wars. Near the southeast corner a seated figure holds up an elevation of the courthouse itself, labeled the Bronx Unity Building.

    “…a seated figure displays an elevation drawing of the courthouse itself -- labeled the "Bronx Unity Building…”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  4. 1934

    June 15

    A three-day dedication brings city government to the new Bronx courthouse

    For the courthouse's dedication in June 1934, Mayor Fiorello La Guardia moved the seat of city government from City Hall to the Bronx for three days. On Saturday, June 15, the Board of Estimate met in the new building, and its meeting was broadcast on radio for the first time. Borough President James Lyons gave the mayor a bronze key, joking that the Depression ruled out gold; when it turned out to open the courthouse detention room, La Guardia handed it back. The festivities also marked the Bronx's 20th anniversary as a county.

    “…the Board of Estimate meeting was held in the Courthouse, and was broadcast on radio for the first time…”

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  5. 1934

    June

    James Monroe Hewlett's murals of Bronx history are unveiled

    Four murals by James Monroe Hewlett, each 10 by 36 feet, fill the walls of the first-floor Veterans Memorial Hall and were unveiled in June 1934. They show Jonas Bronck's arrival in 1639, the first meeting of the Westchester County Court in 1764, the Battle of Pell's Point in 1776 and George Washington leaving the Van Cortlandt House in 1783.

    Source: Wikipedia

  6. 1971

    The Bronx Museum of the Arts opens in the courthouse lobby

    The Bronx Museum of the Arts began in 1971 in the lobby of the Bronx County Courthouse. In 1982 the city bought a vacant synagogue at 1040 Grand Concourse to give the museum a building of its own.

    Source: NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

  7. 1988

    February

    Mayor Koch renames the courthouse for District Attorney Mario Merola

    In February 1988 Mayor Edward Koch gave the Bronx County Courthouse a new name, the Mario Merola Building, in honor of the late Bronx County District Attorney Mario Merola. Though never officially called a borough hall, the building houses the borough's municipal offices and is marked as its borough hall on transit maps.

    Source: Wikipedia

  8. 2013

    August

    Workers damage the Jonas Bronck mural, prompting calls for its restoration

    In August 2013 workers damaged James Monroe Hewlett's mural of Jonas Bronck, considered the borough's founder. The owner of Jonas Bronck's Beer Co and a man described as a descendant of Laurens Duyts, a Danish farmer who sailed with Bronck, were among those who pushed to have it restored before the Bronx's 2014 centennial as a county.

    Source: Wikipedia

Further reading

Nearby

All 85 buildings with stories in Concourse Village