304 West 10th Street

304 West 10th Street. . , The Building’s History , The site of the building had been part of the property of wealthy merchant Abraham Van Nest, which included a 4-story house on the corner and a 2-story house next door, sold in 1865 after his death. The property was acquired inn1972 by Charles Shultz, than a brick manufactured at “the foot of” West 11th Street, who resided at 621 Greenwich Avenue (by 1875, Shultz was a merchant on West 30th Street). This tenement building, constructed in 1873 to the design of William E. Waring, originally houses eight families and a store. Shultz retained the building until 1890, after which it was owned by Catherine and Ellen C. Atfield and members of the Sweeney family. In 1896, the ground story contained the saloon known as “The Plug Hat,” “On account of the schooners of beer set up holding nearly as much as could be put in a tall hat,” according to The New York Times., After a partition sale, the property was transferred in 1898 to Patrick Skelly, a prominent and wealthy Irish-born brewer and distiller. In 1876, Skelly and another brewer-distiller, Patrick A. Fogarty, had purchased as Astor family residence at 409-411 West 14th Street, which they altered and expanded into an ale brewery/flats building (1875, John B. Snook). This appears on an 1879 map as [Hugh] O’Reilly, Skelly and Fogarty’s Centennial Brewery (today it is located within the Gansevoort Market Historic District). By 1899, O’Reilly, Skelly and Fogarty were experiencing financial difficulty and their properties were sold at public auction in 1901. Skelly was also founder of the Kips Bay Brewery, and he and his son operated a wine and liquor business at 21-25 Ninth Avenue (also within the Gansevoort market Historic District) from 1886 until the 1910s. Skelly’s estate was worth nearly $1.8 million at the time of his death (c.1908), more (sic) and consisted mostly of real estate, including many saloons. He left trusts of $250,000 each to his daughters Genevieve and Emily., The Skelly family retained No. 304 West 10th Street until 1948. One tenant (c. 1922-29) was Walter G. Kauff, a clerk at the U.S. Customshouse. The Weehawken Bar and Grill was the ground-story commercial occupant from at least 1935 to 1960. Rose Rivers purchased the property in 1948, “intending to remodel the building into modern apartments,” and filed plans by architect Joseph Lau. It was foreclosed in 1956 and reverted to the estate of Genevieve C. Skelly McLouchlin (who died in 1956) and Emily H. Skelly Walsh. The Skelly heirs auctioned the building in 1957, at which time the “upper floors [were] closed,” according to the advertisement. In 1961, the ground story was converted to two apartments and a laundry room; the building housed three apartments per floor above this. the ground story facades were remodeled., Built during the second significant phase of the historic district’s development, when it continued to be improved with residential and industrial structures in the late 19th century, this handsome Italianate style tenement and store building. still substantially intact, contributes to the historically-mixed architectural character and varied uses – much of it maritime-related – of the Weehawken Street Historic District., Architectural Features , The building is clad in brick (now painted), with cast-iron segmental lintels and decorative sills, a segmental cast-iron entrance hood on the West 10th Street façade, and a surviving cast-iron pilaster on the ground story at the south end of the Weehawken Street façade. It features a prominent bracketed, denticulated, and modified pressed metal cornice that has a bowed section on each façade with decorative panels. To the east of the east end of the West 10th Street façade, there is an entrance to the side yard, with a segmental-arched brick enframement with cast-iron keystone and end blocks, corbeled cornice, and decorative iron gates. The visible eastern wall is pierced by windows. There are fire escapes on both major facades.