ALTON BROWN REFRIGERATOR PIE

Financial District, Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States

The 8-story Keuffel & Esser Co. Building was constructed in 1892-93 to the design of De Lemos & Cordes as the general offices and salesrooms for the firm that imported and manufactured drawing materials, drafting tools, and mathematical and surveying equipment. The richly-detailed Renaissance Revival style primary façade on Fulton Street has a tripartite division: a 2-story, arched cast-iron storefront that bears the firm’s name and representations of its products; and buff brick- and terra¬ cotta-clad upper stories, with the midsection having a recessed monumental round-arched window capped by a foliated sculptural relief of a knight’s helmet, shield, and winged orb, and the upper section featuring a 2-story angled metal window bay and culminating in a decorative cornice and balustrade. There is a secondary articulated façade on Ann Street.

Theodore W. E. De Lemos & August W. Cordes, born and educated in Germany, established their firm in 1884 and were active within New York’s German-American community, becoming noted for commercial structures and large department stores. The Keuffel & Esser Co., the first American company solely devoted to drawing and drafting materials, was founded in 1867 on Nassau Street by two other German émigrés, Wilhelm J. D. Keuffel and Herman Esser. Early on, the firm was successful and continually expanded, tentatively starting manufacture in 1870, opening a retail store in 1872, moving to 127 Fulton Street in 1878, and constructing a factory in Hoboken, N.J., in 1880-81. K&E introduced imported slide rules in 1880, began their first American manufacture in 1891, and became the nation’s foremost producer. Herman Esser was bought out in 1902, and the firm remained privately owned and managed by the Keuffel family until 1965.

K&E played a nationally significant role in the technological development of the United States, both as a leading manufacturer of drafting equipment, surveying instruments, and related products, and as the developer of continually advanced systems, until the 1980s. This building, which remained in use by K&E for nearly seven decades, is one of the best- preserved and distinguished of the smaller late-19th-century office buildings in the area of lower Manhattan between the financial district and City Hall.


DESCRIPTION AND ANALYSIS

Keuffel & Esser Co.

The Keuffel & Esser Co. was founded in 1867 at 79 Nassau Street by two German émigrés, Wilhelm Johann Diedrich Keuffel and Herman Esser, as importers and jobbers of European drawing and drafting materials. Keuffel (1838-1908), born in Walbeck, Germany, was employed in the hardware business in Germany and in Birmingham, England, prior to his immigration to Hoboken, N.J., in 1866. The next year, he joined with Herman Esser (18451908), who was originally from Wuppertal-Elberfeld. By 1869, Keuffel & Esser [hereafter K&E] advertised “DRAWING MATERIALS. Drawing Paper, Tracing Cloth, Swiss Instruments, Colors, Rubber Triangles, etc., etc., especially for Architects and Engineers, at and retail.” The singular role of this firm was indicated by the National Cyclopaedia of American Biography:

Drafting was at that time in its infancy in the United States, and Mr. Keuffel soon appreciated itsimportance in relation to the phenomenal development of American manufacturing and engineeringenterprise. To supply all the requirements, in office and field, of the surveyor, engineer, architect anddraftsman and make a specialty of this business was the purpose of the new firm, and Mr. Keuffel canwell be called the pioneer in this line, because up to 1867 drafting supplies had not been carriedexclusively by any house in this country.

Early on, the firm was successful and continually expanded, moving locations several times. K&E tentatively started manufacture and published its first instruments catalogue in 1870; opened its first retail store with a showroom in Manhattan in 1872; transferred its manufacturing to Hoboken, N.J., in 1875; moved its headquarters to 127 Fulton Street in 1878; and constructed a new factory building in Hoboken in 1880-81 (which was expanded in 1884, 1892, and 1900). The firm was incorporated in 1889, with Keuffel serving as president until his death. K&E, which had introduced imported slide rules in 1880, began their first American manufacture in 1891. The company became strongly associated with the product as the nation’s foremost manufacturer, credited with popularizing slide rules in the United States. In 1892-93, K&E constructed a new building at 127 Fulton Street to serve as its retail salesrooms and general offices.

K&E played a nationally significant role in the technological development of the United States. K&E products, which included measuring tapes and compasses, were used in countless construction and eng

Looking east down H Street NW at Washington, D.C.'s Chinatown.

D.C.'s Chinatown was established in 1884. But it wasn't where it is now.

The original Chinatown existed along the south side of Pennsylvania Avenue between 4th and 7th Streets, with the heaviest concentration of residences and businesses near where 4th Street, C Street, and Pennsylvania Avenue met. This was the site of Center Market. Back in the days before refrigeration and corporate ownership of food distribution, people around the United States shopped at privately or publicly owned farmer's markets. D.C.'s food markets were almost all privately owned, and suffered from poor hygiene. Shopping for food meant hoping you didn't come down with the hershey-squirts from the diseases your food would be infected with. The city itself decided to act by building a state-of-the-art market, complete with running water, ice house, and mechanical refrigeration. This was Center Market, and it was so immensely popular that nearly all the downtown trolley lines converged there.

Chinese and other Asian immigrants began moving into the area around Center Market in noticeable numbers as early as 1880. By 1884, the area was known as "Chinatown." As many as 15,000 people lived there. That's an astonishing number, considering that most buildings were only two or three stories high. People were just jammed into Chinatown.

D.C.'s original Chinatown existed as a vibrant community until 1935. Interestingly, throughout the 1800s, the federal government was so small that it could be housed in just five or six three-story office buildings. By 1900, however, it was clear that the federal government needed to grow. In 1926, Congress finally approved construction of six new massive federal office buildings. After two years of discussion, it was decided that the area south of Pennsylvania Avenue had to be totally torn down and these new office buildings constructed there. That was the beginning of Federal Triangle -- the largest conglomeration of federal office buildings anywhere in the country. The first buildings constructed were the Department of Commerce, the Internal Revenue Service building, and the Labor/ICC building (now the headquarters of the EPA). At first these buildings just uprooted the brothels, criminal hideouts, and gambling dens that formed D.C.'s infamous Murder Bay. But as Federal Triangle construction moved eastward, Chinatown had to go. Construction of the National Archives and the Apex Building (which houses the Federal Trade Commission) forced Chinatown to move.

Chinatown had a very well-organized community, however, composed of business leaders, religious leaders, politicians, and well-respected citizens. They quite literally looked for a place in the city where everyone could move together -- lock, stock, and barrel. They chose the current location on H Street NW.

At its peak, the "new" Chinatown extended from G Street NW north to Massachusetts Avenue NW, and from 9th Street NW east to 5th Street NW. But this only lasted for about 50 years. The 1968 riots which came after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. caused many businesses to flee downtown D.C. Chinatown's businesses, too, fell on hard times and many of them closed. Wealthy and middle-class Asian citizens fled for the suburbs, leaving many houses and apartments unoccupied. A mainstay of the community was the OCA Bank, but when it closed Chinatown emptied even further.

Chinatown was saved when the Gallery Place Metro station (Blue and Orange lines) opened in 1976. Determined to save Chinatown as a tourist attraction, in 1986 the city authorized the construction of the Friendship Archway, a $1 million traditional Chinese gate designed by local architect Alfred H. Liu. Symoblizing not only Chinatown but D.C.'s "sister city" status with Beijing, the Friendship Arch is the largest freestanding traditionally constructed Chinese-style arch anywhere in the world.

But Chinatown now is in serious decline. In 1993, Abe Pollin built the MCI Center on two whole city blocks bounded by 6th and 7th Streets NW and F and H Streets NW. The arena opened in 1997, and was renamed the Verizon Center after Verizon purchased the near-bankrupt MCI communications company.

In 1999, wealthy regional real estate investors built a vast new 13-story mixed-use shopping and housing complex over the Gallery Place-Chinatown Metro station. Gallery Place (the building) opened in the fall of 2004. It not only revitalized Chinatown, but revitalized the entire East End. Extensive construction began throughout the area as consumers, tourists, and young people flooded the area. Huge swaths of Chinatown were renovated and turned into restaurants, trendy bars, and up-scale shops.

Unfortunately, this caused rents to skyrocket, and pushed most of the Chinese population of D.C's Chinatown into Maryland and Northern Virginia. The Da Hua market, the last full-service Chinese grocery, closed in