Building of the Day: 544 Halsey Street

Brooklyn, one building at a time.

Name: Freestanding private house
Address: 544 Halsey Street
Cross Streets: Lewis and Stuyvesant Avenues
Neighborhood: Stuyvesant Heights
Year Built: Unknown
Architectural Style: Italianate
Architect: Unknown
Landmarked: Yes, part of Stuyvesant Heights Expansion HD (2013)

The story: According to property conveyance records, this freestanding Italianate house was probably moved here in 1888 or 1889, from some other location. The property owner at the time was a man named John Brown. Moving a building today isn’t all that easy, so one can only imagine how arduous it must have been back then. The time honored way to move a house in the 19th century was thus: The house would have been supported on a platform, or a series of cross beams, the foundation removed, rolling logs placed underneath, and then the house would have been hitched to a brace of horses, and the building moved by rolling it on a track of heavy timbers. As the house passed over the tracks, the timbers from behind were moved to the front. By the end of the century, iron and steel took the place of some, or all of the wooden components. It worked really well, although certainly took a long time. Usually, the buildings were not moved all that far from where they started.

This was a classic wood framed Italianate house with a cupola, probably originally built in the 1860s or 1870s. In spite of all that’s been done to it since, like the brick patterned siding, you can still see much of the original shape: the front porch, the three-sided bay, and the original cornices, amazingly still intact on the roof, bay, porch and cupola. The windows on the cupola have been covered up, but the tax photo from the 1980s shows them still there at that time, so they may be under the siding. The same photo also shows what looks like the original front door, as well, before the entire porch was enclosed by security gates.

This is a large house, in a nice middle class neighborhood, but was probably always hampered by the presence of a very large stable next door, which no doubt, lowered the desirability of the property. By the first decades of the 20th century, the stable was turned into a garage for automobiles, and this house went from a residence to the headquarters of the Progressive Club of Kings County, in 1912.

The Progressive Club was a local branch of the new Progressive Party, or the “Bull Moose Party,” founded by Teddy Roosevelt in 1912, which fractured the Republican Party. The local club’s charter stated that they would “work for clean progressive government and civic rights and the election of candidates standing on principles and policies that are progressive according to the conventions and platforms of the Nation and the State of New York.”

Roosevelt’s party was extremely progressive for its day, or any other day. They advocated a separation of Big Business and politics, full disclosure of campaign funds, and a registration of lobbyists, a national health insurance, minimum wage laws, especially for women, farm relief, workman’s compensation for work-related injuries, an inheritance tax, a federal securities commission, and a Constitutional amendment for a Federal income tax. They also supported women’s suffrage, and allowed Northern blacks to join. Roosevelt didn’t think Southern blacks were ready. He also alienated Southern whites by sitting down and having dinner with black people in Rhode Island on the eve of the presidential election.

Sadly, his Bull Moose Party lost, squashed by lack of money and traditional politics. Roosevelt, who had already served two terms as president, did not run again. Three years after the Progressive Party was organized, they broke up, and most people returned to the Republican fold. The Clubhouse at 544 Halsey was closed in 1915, and the landlord rented it out again to families. The address disappears from the newspapers after 1931, after an obituary listing. Today, it is a two family house, and has a garage in the back. GMAP

(Photo: Greg Snodgrass for PropertyShark)