In February 2024 I walked the length of 37th Street from west to east, as part of FNY’s ongoing Crosstown series. I have yet to tackle it for a feature post but it’ll have its turn eventually. Between 7th Avenue and Broadway I recognized a name on a building I had seen around town on the Lefcourt Central Building.
Abraham Lefcourt developed numerous properties around Manhattan in the early 20th Century. From 1910 to 1932, according to the Newyorkitecture website, he developed 32 loft and office buildings – 20 in New York City – with an aggregate 5 million square feet of space on 477 floors, occupied by 200,000 people. Likely, his most famed building was the Essex House, which you may be familiar with because long ago, guests on Saturday Night Live were accommodated there and the hotel wound up featured on each broadcast.
Another of Lefcourt’s buildings was the Brill Building, Broadway and West 49th, famed for its big band and pop music publishing offices. You can see two busts of a young man on the front of the building. I had long supposed it was a member of the Brill family, but it is Abraham Lefcourt’s son, Alan, who tragically died young at age 17. I have photos of the Brill Building on this FNY page.
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7/11/24