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The stereo view above shows the Pavilion Hotel on Staten Island, which was originally built to be the home of 19th-century real estate developer Thomas E. Davis.
Who?
You're not alone: Davis -- who by some accounts was the third-largest land owner in the city -- has been almost totally passed over by history.
To rectify that, James wrote a piece for CurbedNY that appeared yesterday. Read it at: http://ny.curbed.com/archives/2015/02/11/the_forgotten_developer_who_transformed_19thcentury_nyc.php.
The only picture James was able to dig up of a Thomas Davis shows this fellow:
Is that our Thomas Davis? Alas, we may never know.
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Explore more NYC history in
If you haven't had a chance to pick up a copy of Footprints yet,
And, of course, Inside the Apple is available at fine bookstores everywhere.
No, I'm afraid not. the Thomas Davis pictured in that card is actually Thomas Osborne Davis of Mallow, County Cork, Ireland. He was a writer who penned several Irish Nationalist songs, the one most famous is "A Nation Once Again". He died at age 30 of Scarlet Fever in Ireland.
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