Industry

19. Merchant's Print Works factory, converted into poultry cold storage, 1939.

20. The Cudahy Cold Storage facility and the High Line, 1939.

21. Eagle Pencil factory, c. 1880.

22. East River Generating Station, 1927.

23. East River Generating Station, 2006.

24. Commercial Traders Building, 2006.

Industry on 14th Street began developing in the midnineteenth century primarily around the two working waterfronts. Light manufacturing facilities such as print works and carpentry shops were built on the western section of the street while dry docks appeared along the East River waterfront. Towards the turn of the century, as Union Square changed from a privileged residential enclave to a commercial center, loft buildings appeared along the inland portions of the street and supplied many of the goods sold in the area’s burgeoning department stores. While manufacturing has all but disappeared from 14th Street, many of these formerly industrial structures still exist. Their use may have changed but their presence brilliantly illustrates the area’s history as a center of production.

The Hudson River Waterfront

The western edge of 14th Street developed in the midnineteenth century as a mixed-use neighborhood, where industrial buildings were built in close proximity to residences. The industrial uses were mostly light manufacturing, such as print-works and carpentry shops (Figure 19). By the 1870s, the neighborhood was no longer a fashionable location for the single-family residences of the affluent and multi-family tenements began to appear alongside the industrial structures. In the 1880s, the city constructed two municipal markets in the area, and a decade later a large complex of cold storage warehouses were constructed to serve the markets. The development of commercial transportation corridors in the area during the 1930s— including the High Line freight line and the Holland Tunnel—lead to the emergence of the meatpacking industry, and many of the old market structures were converted into facilities to serve the emerging industry (Figure 20).

Several factors since the 1970s, including the decline of shipping on the Hudson River, recent government regulation of the meatpacking industry, and rising rent prices spurred on by up-scale development have lead to the steady decline of the area as an industrial neighborhood. The area remains zoned for industrial use, but night-clubs and clothing boutiques now occupy the former industrial structures.

The East River Waterfront

The East River waterfront also had a strong industrial character throughout the nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. The area was a center of wood shipbuilding before the Civil War, but the introduction of the steel hulled ship forced that industry to relocate to a location with access to deeper water The void—and the cheap land—left by the shipbuilding industry was soon filled by other industrial tenants including coal yards, a sanitation facility, and manufacturing buildings such as the vast Eagle Pencil Factory complex (demolished) (Figure 21).

The largest property owners in this area during the late-nineteenth century were the city’s gas companies, and their industrial structures—especially the large, cylindrical tanks in which illuminating gas was stored—dominated the streetscape. The triumph of electricity over gas illumination at the beginning of the twentieth century led to the merger of the two utilities, and in 1926 the New York Edison Company constructed their East River Generating Station on former gas company property along 14th Street’s East River waterfront (Figure 22). This location had the further advantage of being a mere five blocks away from the corporate headquarters of the Consolidated Gas Company, located at 14th Street and Irving Place.

Manhattan’s Lower East Side, including the eastern edge of 14th Street, stagnated throughout the 1920s and 1930s and Urban Renewal projects in the 1940s demolished nearly all traces of industry on the island’s East River waterfront. During this period the gas tanks and other industrial sites along the north side of 14th Street east of First Avenue were demolished to make way for Stuyvesant Town. Electrical generating facilities were the only industrial use that was allowed to remain on the East River waterfront. The East River Generating Station, enlarged in the 1950s, is the last remaining vestige of East 14th Street’s industrial past (Figure 23).

Inland Manufacturing

Although industry along the inland areas of 14th Street developed at a latter date and never dominated as it did along the waterfronts, the manufacturing facilities that were erected played an important role in changing the character of the area from a residential enclave to a bustling commercial center. Around the turn of the twentieth century, a number of loft buildings were constructed in close proximity to the commercial heart around Union Square and the blocks to the west. Some of these facilities were built to serve specific stores in the area, such as the Dagget & Ramsdell buildings, while others were erected as speculative ventures – such as the lavishly decorated structure at the southeast corner of Seventh Avenue. In both cases the open floor plan typical of the loft made these buildings particularly adaptable to the unforeseeable needs of future clients, and the loft building in general remains a desirable for this very reason.

Of particular note are the five single-bay loft buildings that still exist today. This unusual building type is a subset of the larger loft typology, and developed in response to the requirements of New York City’s traditional twenty five-foot lot size. The narrow width of these structures allowed a completely uninterrupted floor plan since the floor joists could span the entire distance without the need for additional support columns. This also meant that the front of the building could be opened almost entirely to windows, providing much needed light and ventilation. The earlier examples of this building type, such as the Newton Building on West 14th Street, typically reached a maximum of six stories since they were constructed of load-bearing masonry that became prohibitively thick above this height. The introduction of the steel skeleton allowed the single-bay lofts to reach up to nine to twelve stories, such as the Commercial Traders Building on Union Square East (Figure 24).