Postcard Thursday: St. John the Divine, 1941

On November 30, 1941—76 years ago today—a celebration kicked off at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in Morningside Heights to mark the completion of its massive nave.

As we write in Inside the Apple:

The cornerstone for the cathedral was laid on December 27, 1892—the feast of St. John the Divine—but work proceeded slowly. The sheer size of the project was daunting, and despite the rocky nature of the heights, it took workers a full two years—and 72 feet—before hitting solid bedrock. Once construction began, the architects’ grandiose plans were difficult to execute, in particular...[the] apse, which called for the world’s largest granite columns.

In 1907, before even the apse and choir were finished, [chief architect] George Heins died, which freed the cathedral from their contract with [his] firm. Once the apse was completed in 1911, the cathedral...hired Gothic aficionado Ralph Adams Cram to finish the church. Cram promised he could build the church faster and bigger.... Cram’s work began at the crossing in 1916 and over the next twenty-five years his team completed the massive nave. On November 30, 1941, the church kicked off an eight-day festival to celebrate the nave’s completion. On the final day of the festivities, December 7, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and, for all intents, work on the cathedral stopped.

Though some additional construction work on the cathedral has taken place in the intervening decades, most of the development on cathedral property today involves apartment buildings.

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Footprints in New York: Tracing the Lives of Four Centuries of New Yorkers

Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York City

Postcard Thursday: The Granite Colonnade at St. John the Divine

The next time you happen to be in Morningside Heights with a few minutes to spare, take a moment to visit the Cathedral of St. John the Divine on Amsterdam Avenue and walk to the building's apse to look at the massive granite columns surrounding the choir. These were originally intended by the cathedral's first architect, Heins & La Farge, to be the largest free-standing columns in the world.

As we write in Inside the Apple:

The cornerstone for the cathedral was laid on December 27, 1892—the feast of St. John the Divine—but work proceeded slowly. The sheer size of the project was daunting, and despite the rocky nature of the heights, it took workers a full two years—and 72 feet—before hitting solid bedrock. Once construction began, the architects’ grandiose plans were difficult to execute, in particular Heins and La Farge’s apse, which called for the world’s largest granite columns. A lathe had to be custom-built and only one granite quarry in the nation—in remote Vinalhaven, Maine—was deep enough for the excavations. However, the columns kept breaking under their own massive weight, and ultimately the plan had to be abandoned.

You can see one of the columns in two pieces in the postcard at the top. Today, when visiting the cathedral, if you look closely you can see the seams where pieces of stone have been connected together.

Heins & La Farge's vision for the cathedral (shown here in the black-and-white image) never came to fruition.

In 1907, before even the apse and choir were finished, George Heins died, which freed the cathedral from their contract with the firm. Once the apse was completed in 1911, the cathedral fired La Farge and hired Gothic aficionado Ralph Adams Cram to finish the church. Cram promised he could build the church faster and bigger. He also jettisoned any of Heins and La Farge’s Byzantine touches for a completely Gothic building. Cram’s work began at the crossing in 1916 and over the next twenty-five years his team completed the massive nave. On November 30, 1941, the church kicked off an eight-day festival to celebrate the nave’s completion. On the final day of the festivities, December 7, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and, for all intents, work on the cathedral stopped.

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Read more about NYC history in

 

Footprints in New York: Tracing the Lives of Four Centuries of New Yorkers

Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York City

Postcard Thursday: Morningside Heights

This image, produced around 1915, shows the first phase of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine (center), St. Luke's Hospital (to the right), and the oldest building in Morningside Heights, the Leake and Watts orphan house (the brick building to the left).

The Leake and Watts building (which blocks where the south transept of the cathedral would go if it were ever to be built), has an odd history. On June 2, 1827, merchant John George Leake passed away at age 75. He had no children or other lineal heirs, so he decided to leave his money to Robert Watts, the son of his best friend, John Watts. There was only one catch: Robert Watts would have to change his last name to Leake in order to claim the inheritance.

It is a little unclear what happened next, but before Robert Watts could get the courts to legally change his name he died of, in the words of one writer, "a severe cold contracted during a game of ball." John Watts was then faced with the dilemma. He didn't really want the money—after all, his son had forsaken him to become John George Leake's heir—but what was he going to do with it?

It turned out that had his son refused the inheritance in the first place, the money would have gone to found an orphanage. So John Watts approached the state to relinquish his claim on the money. In 1831, Leake and Watts Orphan House was founded and in 1843, they moved into their home in Morningside Heights. (At the end of the 19th century, a group of John George Leake's distant relatives wormed out of the woodwork to claim that they had been defrauded of their rightful inheritance. It took some time, but eventually their case was dismissed.)

The early history of the cathedral is almost as convoluted. As we write in Footprints in New York:

The building of St. John the Divine was plagued with problems from the start. The trustees, under [JP Morgan's] guidance, hosted a design competition, ultimately selecting the firm of Heins & La Farge, even though their design was no one’s first choice.

Work on the cathedral didn’t begin until the spring of 1893, and immediately the crew ran into trouble. A foundation that should have taken months to lay ended up taking years. Without anything to show for it, the cathedral was already over budget, so Morgan wrote a check for $500,000, “to get us out of the hole”—literally and figuratively. In 1903, the giant granite columns of the apse were hoisted into place, but by 1905, only one chapel had been completed. Then, in 1907, George Heins died of meningitis. Though the trustees were legally able to break their contract, they allowed La Farge to continue until the apsidal end of the church was complete. This small portion of the cathedral, known as the choir, was consecrated on April 19, 1911. With this milestone behind them, the trustees ended their relationship with Heins & La Farge and hired Ralph Adams Cram to finish the church.

Cram's nave of the church, completed in 1941, was the last major work done on the church, which is still decades away from completion—if, indeed, that day ever comes.

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Explore more NYC history in

Footprints in New York: Tracing the Lives of Four Centuries of New Yorkers

If you haven't had a chance to pick up a copy of Footprints yet,

you can order it from your favorite online retailers (Amazon, Barnes and Noble, etc.) or

from independent bookstores across the country.

The Leake and Watts Orphan House, Morningside Heights

photo by gmpicket on flickr

The oldest building in Morningside Heights stands on the grounds of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. Opened in 1843, this handsome Greek Revival temple designed by Ithiel Town has a strange history. 

One hundred eighty-two years ago today--on June 2, 1827--merchant John George Leake passed away at age 75. He had no children or other lineal heirs, so he decided to leave his money to Robert Watts, the son of his best friend, John Watts. There was only one catch: Robert Watts would have to change his last name to Leake in order to claim the inheritance.

It is a little unclear what happened next, but before Robert Watts could get the courts to legally change his name he died of, in the words of one writer, "a severe cold contracted during a game of ball."  John Watts was then faced with the dilemma. He didn't really want the money--after all, his son had forsaken him to become John George Leake's heir--but what was he going to do with it?

It turned out that had his son refused the inheritance in the first place, the money would have gone to found an orphanage. So John Watts approached the state to relinquish his claim on the money. In 1831, Leake and Watts Orphan House was founded and in 1843, they moved into their home in Morningside Heights.

The only other major institution in the neighborhood was the Bloomingdale Asylum for the Insane, which stood where the main campus of Columbia University now stands.

At the end of the 19th century, a group of John George Leake's distant relatives wormed out of the woodwork to claim that they had been defrauded of their rightful inheritance. It took some time, but eventually their case was dismissed.

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A much more detailed consideration of the Leake and Watts Orphan House and the early history of Morningside Heights can be found in Inside the Apple, available at bookstores everywhere or online.

A couple of weeks ago, we gave a tour of Morningide Heights (including Leake and Watts) for a wonderful group from openhousenewyork. Photos from the tour--including a great shot of the St. John the Divine's stunning white peacock--are online at http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=84219&id=48448504645&ref=nf.

Our next tour, of Financial District architecture, is on Sunday, June 21, at 5:00PM -- and it's free! For more information, see our tours page.

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