Building of the Day: 734 Willoughby Avenue

Brooklyn, one building at a time.

Name: August Grill House
Address: 734 Willoughby Avenue
Cross Streets: Marcus Garvey Blvd and Lewis Avenue
Neighborhood: Bedford Stuyvesant
Year Built: Late 1870s, early 1880s
Architectural Style: Second Empire
Architect: Unknown, perhaps Theobald Engelhardt
Landmarked: No

The story: By the last quarter of the 20th century, many of Bushwick’s wealthy German American businessmen were building homes on Willoughby Avenue. This part of this long street, from about Throop Avenue east, was all part of the large Eastern District, that large community that encompassed what is now the eastern part of Bedford Stuyvesant, Bushwick, and part of Williamsburg. This part of Brooklyn had seen massive growth, both in building stock and in wealth, due to the Germans who had come here in the middle of the century and immediately began building breweries, factories and other businesses. By the end of the century, they had become the most successful and wealthy immigrant group in the city.

August Grill was one of those men. He was born in Germany in 1843, and came here with his parents at the age of five. He grew up in Brooklyn, and went into the ice business with a wholesale ice company at Hewes Street, in Wallabout. His ice fields were near Shad Island in the Hudson River, and the ice was brought on the water down to Wallabout. Grill was right near the Wallabout market, Brooklyn’s important wholesale market, which sold meat, dairy, vegetables and other goods that needed cooling and refrigeration. Supplying Wallabout, as well as other clients, proved to be quite lucrative, allowing Grill to have this fine house built.

The records remain elusive, but if some of the other similar houses in the neighborhood are any indication, this house may have been designed by Theobalt Engelhardt, the Williamsburg-based architect who was the architect de jour to many of the German community’s most successful businessmen. The house next door, number 730, was probably designed by Englehardt, as well. The house is a large Second Empire style, with a classic Mansard roof. The house originally had a front porch, and you can still see on the front of the house where the porch was attached at the roof line. It’s a nice big house, 33×35 feet, with almost 4,100 square feet of living space. The Grill’s needed the room, August and his wife Bertha had ten children; seven boys and three girls.

The older sons followed their father into the ice business. One of them. Harry, apparently also liked driving fast. Or rather, he instructed his chauffeur to drive fast. In 1909 he was arrested for having his driver speed through the streets of Brooklyn. When they stopped for a light, they were pulled over by a cop on a bicycle, embarrassingly enough, who arrested them for going 15 miles an hour in a 5 mile zone. Speed demons! Both pleaded not guilty in the Gates Avenue courthouse, and were released. Another son, Frank, married the girl next door, literally. He married the daughter of William Auer, a prominent German-American builder who lived at the mansion at 730 Willoughby. The story of that house can be found here, in this BOTD.

August Grill died here at home, of pneumonia, in January of 1918. He was 75 years old. He was given a fine funeral mass at nearby St. John the Baptist Roman Catholic Church, and is buried at St. John’s Cemetery in Queens. His wife, who was younger, was made the executor of the estate. She died in 1933, and left the estate to all of the children. The ice company was still in business, although they probably weren’t using river ice anymore. The family lived in the house at least until after their mother died.

Ironically, this German American success story was marred by the Grill’s former countrymen. August died the same year the United States entered World War I. On the same page of the paper that announced Grill’s death, there was an article denouncing the Germans, and discussing the loyalty to the United States of America’s German population. Many German-Americans changed their names, or disavowed their German heritage and associations.

Twenty-five years later, another Grill, a man named John August Grill, was arrested for leading a pro-Nazi Bund group in Brooklyn and Queens. He lived nearby in Ridgewood. I couldn’t ascertain if he was a grandson or relative. It turns out that August Grill was a pretty common name. He pleaded guilty to avoiding the Selective Service Act.

Meanwhile, many of the homes once built by late 19th century Germans now belonged to 20th century Jews. Many were the children and grandchildren of immigrants who had crowded into the Lower East Side at the turn of the century. They too were successful business people, and were the next generation of homeowners in this neighborhood. Later, in the late 1950s and ’60s, the neighborhood became home to a black and Hispanic population. Today, this house is a legal six-family, but got a permit to combine the two ground floor units into one apartment. It remains quite a beautiful and grand house and an eye catcher for all the right reasons, here on Willoughby Avenue. GMAP