200 Years & Counting

200 Years and Counting. 206-8 Bowery. Remarkably surviving for over 200 years, 206 Bowery is one of the few row houses on the Bowery that still retains most of its Federal style characteristics, including its 2 ½-story height, 3-bay width, gambrel roof and pair of gable dormers. Its walls are one-foot thick and laid with Flemish-bond brickwork over a stone foundation., In the early 19th Century, many residents, especially butchers, moved from lower Manhattan to this portion of the Bowery, which was being improved by digging out the roadbed, laying sidewalk stones and installing gaslights. John Brown and his wife, Lydia, lived here and operated John Brown’s Porterhouse, a tavern serving area butchers in the adjoining 208 Bowery, which before alterations looked very much like its intact neighbor. 208 later became the popular Wood’s Photography Studio, which attracted sharpshooter legend Annie Oakley., -Mitchell Grubler, Chair, Landmarks Committee, Bowery Alliance of Neighbors