The Largest building in Bedford Stuyvesant

The second 13th Regiment Armory,  i.e.,  the Sumner Avenue Armory,  was built in 1891 to replace the 1874  Flatbush Avenue  Armory. The new armory, designed by Rudolphe Lawrence Daus,  is  a massive,  early medieval inspired,  fortress-like  edifice dominated by a  two-story,  stone-trimmed sally port  and two  symmetrical,  originally six-story round towers  with crenelated parapets.  The armory is currently a city-owned homeless shelter. The second largest Amory in New York City and maybe the country but this building sit unprotected.  We have lost one tower of this great building already.  I hope that we do not lose more.

Orginial Amory Located at Altantic Center

                                                                         Amory Today

Located in the proposed Stuyvesant North Historic District the Thirteenth Regiment Armory covers almost the entire bloc k on Sumner Avenue (Marcus Garvey), between Putnam and Jefferson Avenues.  The cost of its construction was about $650,000.  The architecture of the structure is of the old Norman style with modern improvements of the time.  R. L. Daus  the architect, thinking that the Thirteenth Regiment would prefer a building, suggestive of the Thirteenth Century, and believing  that, apart from sentiment, the Norman barons of that period knew what was serviceable in military architecture with that idea.  The building was regarded by experts as the very expression of simplicity, strength and dignity.

Architect Rodolphe Lawrence Daus was born on August 10, 1854 in Mexico, where his parents ( Lepold and Emma Ruben-Daus a German and French couple) were residing temporarily. Owing to business relations of his father, who was a wholesale merchant. When he was only a few months old he was brought to New York, where he grew up.  At the age of 20 he came to Europe for his studies, entering the world famous Paris School of Fine Arts or École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts .  Among his classmates he was the first to graduate from the second to the first in class, a distinction that entities him to a special prize.  In assertion he gained medals in construction and mathematics, and his first “project.” Or design in the class gained him the highest award obtainable.  Another distinction he gained was the “Achilles le Clair” prize

Before returning to the United States he was married in Paris to Madamoiselle Louise Perrin.  He lived at his first home at 1419 Pacific in Crown Heights North.  During the latter part of his live he lived in the winter in the St. Hubert Hotel and the summers were spent at Sea Gate.  Daus had two daughters, Henriette and Emma and one son William Thallen Daus, who followed his father’s footsteps being a student of architecture at the Beaux Arts.

In 1899 Daus was appointed a member and secretary of the New York Building Code Commission, and, being the only architect in that body.  Daus was, moreover president of the Brooklyn American Institute of Architects, as well as an active member of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences and the Beaux Arts Society.  Among the clubs of which he was a member may be mentioned the Brooklyn Club, the Rembrandt Club, the Atlantic Yacht Club, the Riding and  Driving Club and the Riding Club.

Daus was a painter of oil and water color in which he achieved success. Daus died on September 30, 1916 at his Paris home located at 36 Avenue de la Bourdonnais.

Other Daus Buildings in Bedford Stuyvesant:

• 74 Halsey Street 1886 (unprotected but calendared)

• 615-613 Throop Ave 1890 (landmarked in 1971 Stuyvesant Heights)  

Daus also designed:

• 81 Willoughby Street NY& NJ Telephone Bldg. , Brooklyn

• Lincoln Club in Clinton Hil, Brooklyn
• NY County National Bank, 8^th and 14th St, Manhattan
• 266 West End Avenue, Manhattan
• 47 Montgomery Pl., Brooklyn
• Greenpoint Library, Brooklyn 
• 135 Plymouth St Dumbo, Brooklyn

Street address:	357 Sumner Avenue (now Marcus Garvey Boulevard, between Putnam and Jefferson avenues)
City:	Brooklyn
County:	Kings
Year constructed:	1892 - 1894
Architect:	Rudolphe Lawrance Daus
Size :	Regiment
Square footage:	232,606 NSF
Acreage:	2.62 Acres
Status:	Closed in 1971 / Used for homeless men's shelter

Units Stationed:	Years:
13th Regiment	1894 - 1899
13th Heavy Artillery	1900 - 1905
13th Coastal Artillery	1906 - 1907
13th Artillery District Co. 1-12	1908 - 1913
13th Coast Defense Command (Co. 1-12)	1914 - 1921
13th Coast Defense Command (Co. 357 - 368)	1922 - 1922
245th Artillery (Batteries A-M)	1923 - 1923
245th Coast Artillery Regiment	1924 - ????
Transportation Battalion	1961 - ????

The work of Magnus Emil Dahlander in Stuyvesant North

Stuyvesant and Jefferson 1894 Drawing Magnus Emil Dahlander Architect, built for Eli H. Bishop

591 Jefferson Ave Langston and Dahlander Architects 1891

Magnus Emil Dahlander

East side of Stuyvesant Ave M. Dahlander built 1892

Magnus Emil Dahlander - architect and heritage carers - was born in Sater Sweden on August 2, 1862 and died in the same city on 8 May 1951. This does not mean that all his life he lived in Sater. On the contrary. He led the next 55 years, a very active life. The father, who was a pharmacist and as such created a good financial standing, moved with his family in 1866 to Linde, where he built his own house. The drawings of the building were eventually the young Magnus' first primer in the building alongside the real abc book, where he became acquainted with the elementary school in the city and then to continue the preparation of learning acquisition in Gothenburg during the years 1872 to 1874 . Years later the father sold his pharmacy in Linde and purchase by hovapoteket crown in Stockholm. The family moved there and now Magnus continued his schooling in New Elementary School. It was during an era when this school with traditions from Carl Jonas Love Almquist time, as the state's sample school yet still took a rank position among Swedish high school. He stayed there mate with several young men, who in different ways and in different political camps would become known personalities, including Louis Stavenow, Karl Staaf, Bergegren and Daniel Fallström. His first acquaintance with art in its higher meaning he did in 1876 when he entered the Free Art The Academy in its elementary drawing school or, as it is also called, basically school. Here he met the first time, Anders Zorn. At that time he undertook a summer trip to Dalarna with some of his schoolmates, referred depicted by him in his remembrance. From that time never ceased Dalarna, his birthplace, to pull him to her. But before he would come to experience a lot. In 1879 he moved from Stockholm and New Elementary School to Örebro, where he graduated in 1883 matriculation. It was followed by a brief stay in Paris, where he in accordance with the family.

Stuyvesant and Jefferson c.1900

Stuyvesant and Jefferson built 1892

Dahilander recieved his Degree at the University of Technology in 1888, followed by studies in such United States and several European countries. City Architect in Örebro 1899-1914. Architect in army barracks building committee from 1914 to 1917. Moved to Sater 1917th County Architect in Kopparberg County 1920 - '. Chair. the Planning Committee in Sater 1919 -? Founded the local history museum Åsgårdstrand

500 Hancock built 1891 Langston and Dahlander Architects

500 Hancock built 1891 Langston and Dahlander Architects

500 Hancock built 1891 Langston and Dahlander Architects

While in the US Dahlander lived and worked in Brooklyn, New York.  He only lived in Brooklyn from 1888 to 1896.  In that short time this man would transform Brooklyn residential architecture into something the city has never seen before.   Many of Dahlander homes can be found in Crown, Heights, Park Slope, Prospect Heights, Bedford and Stuyvesant Heights.  Dahlander worked with architect Frederick B. Langston for the first few years here finially going on his own.  Eli Bishop a local developer who I plan to write about in the near future often hired Dahlander to design his beautiful townhomes. Before Dahlander left for Sweden he linked up with another Swede name Axel Hedman and would design many homes in central Brooklyn.  Dahlander would past the torch to Hedman who would stay in New York until his death.

571 - 587 Jefferson Avenue built in 1891 Langston and Dahlander Architects

Stuyvesant North is not landmarked and we would love to protect the great work of Dahlander and the many other architects that worked in this area of Bedford Stuyveant. 

View other works of Magnus Emil Dahlander here

595-605 Jefferson Avenue Stuyvesant North

In 1904 Willfur Burr had architect Benjamin Driesler design these handsome six two story and basement limestone on Jefferson Ave between Lewis and Stuyvesant. Benjamin Driesler was a Bavarian, German born architect that came to the US in 1881. According to the Prospect Heights designation report his office was located at Avenue C and Flatbush Avenue later moving to Avenue F. Driesler was marketing his designs for "modest, modern, model homes" to individuals and professional builders. Driesler designed 400 homes in New York in fifteen months. Many of homes are found in Kensington, Ditmas Park and Fiske Terrace-Midwood Park to name a few. These homes in what we are calling the Stuyvesant Heights North section which is not landmarked and protected.

Eubie Blake's house at 284A Stuyvesant Ave.

Eubie Blake Neo-Grec home at 284A Stuyvesant Avenue home is out side the historic Stuyvesant Heights District and not protected at this time. This house with its high stoop most likely had massive heavy cast-iron handrails at one time. Leading up the stoop the large double-leaf wood doors welcome you into this lovely brownstone. The massive door hood and enframement with angular decorative elements resting on brackets gives this small home grandeur. I can truly imagine this brownstone being full of great music.
James Hubert “Eubie” Blake (February 7, 1887 - February 12, 1983) was a composer and pianist of ragtime, jazz, and popular music, as well as a lyricist. With his long time collaborator Noble Sissle, Blake wrote the Broadway musical Shuffle Along in 1921; this was the first Broadway musical ever to be written and directed by African Americans. Blake’s hit compositions included “Bandana Days”, “Charleston Rag”, “Love Will Find A Way”, “Memories of You”, and “I’m Just Wild About Harry”. In 1978, the musical Eubie! opened on Broadway.

571-579 Jefferson Ave in Stuyvesant Heights

These Jefferson Avenue beauties are in Stuyvesant Heights (but outside the current historic district) have a very unique identity of there own. Similar to a row built on Garfield Pl in Park Slope the Romanesque style townhouses were most likely constructed just before the turn of the twentieth century. Typical of the Romanesque style you have rounded arched doorways and round top windows. The combination's of texture and material with rough-hewn blocks and stone details of intertwined leafwork often called "Byzantine Leafwork" are very different of earlier brownstone facades . The asymmetrical massed roofline gives this block a different feel as you walk along Jefferson Avenue. This Brooklyn daily eagle article from 1900 shows the white painted house on the far left for sale.