Marcus Reynolds - Hessberg House - Mystery Solved!

I wrote recently about buildings in Bethlehem designed by architect Marcus Reynolds. The article ended with the mystery of the Hessberg's home.  Where was it? Is it still there? What happened to it?


A reader commented about the Hessbergs showing up in the 1925 New York census at their residence in Bethlehem on River Road.  (US Census reports consistently show them at their Albany residence.) In the picture below, you can see Samuel and Rose Hessberg.  Scan down and you'll see William H. Weisheit, chauffeur.  Dawn Pratt of the Bethlehem Historical Association responded to that by calling up her friend Bill Weisheit, grandson of William. And, oh yes Dawn tells me, Bill's grandfather worked for the Hessbergs and passed down many stories.

Where was the house? Turns out it was at the location of today's Job Corps, on River Road, the former Our Lady of Angels Seminary.  The seminary was opened by the Vincentian Fathers in 1961. They built a very modern facility devoted to the training of parish priests. It closed in 1972, and, after much local controversy, Job Corp opened in 1977. Job Corp is a federal operation that provides residential vocational training.

Seminary brochure circa 1962.

Samuel Hessberg died in 1931, Rose in 1953.  I don't know when the property passed to the Vincentian Fathers.  The house was likely torn down to make way for the seminary buildings.

Previous to the Hessbergs, Allison Bennett notes that the Job Corp property had been owned by Van Wie family and that an early, brick, Dutch style house had been there. Her article, dated 1964, says the circa 1732 house was long gone.  A Van Wie family cemetery is still there with 13 interments dating from 1820-1871.

Job Corps circa 1983.

So, thank you Dawn for following up.  She's even got a line on a picture of the Hessberg house - supposedly Job Corp has a photo.   Stay tuned!

Architect Marcus T. Reynolds' work in Bethlehem

It turns out that Marcus Reynolds designed at least 6 properties in Bethlehem.  Four of them I knew about.  One I knew of the house but didn't know Reynolds designed it.  And one is completely new to me.  I love it when that happens!

Here's the list:

1. The Italian villa that is the Glenn house (AKA Gov Glynn Mansion, the former Elks Club, the Mansion at Cedar Hill) built in 1907.

Glynn

2. The MacDonald chalet in Cedar Hill which I wrote about last month.

MacDonald

3. Reynolds also updated J. B. Lyon's  home at Cedar Hill with a library addition. Glenn, MacDonald and Lyons were all friends who all employed Reynolds for their Cedar Hill summer houses.

4.The Cedar Hill Schoolhouse re-designed and enlarged in 1907.* Now home of the Bethlehem Historical Association.

Cedar Hill Schoolhouse

5. The Patterson house in Selkirk is the one I am aware of but didn't know Reynolds designed it.  It was built in 1901 as a summer home for General John H. Patterson and his wife Grace Learned Patterson.

Patterson

Patterson

and finally the mystery house

6. The Hessberg house.   Eugene Johnson in his book Style Follows Function: Architecture of Marcus T. Reynolds, describes a lovely Colonial Revival house built in Selkirk for Samuel and Rose Hessberg in 1909. Let me just quote Johnson:

"Samuel Hessberg, the son of a shoe merchant who immigrated from Germany in 1845, had amassed a considerable fortune as a banker and broker.  In 1889 he became the manager of the Albany office of Bache & Co., stockbrokers and in 1893 he became a member of the firm.  Five years later he married Rose Brilleman, the daughter of a leading jeweler of Albany.  In their Selkirk house the Hessberg's may have used the Colonial Revival style to assimilate themselves, as Jews, into the upper-class WASP culture of upstate New York to which their money and taste, but not their ancestry, gave them entree.  In the late eighteenth and early nineteen  centuries the old Dutch and Yankee families of the Hudson River Valley had built columned mansions on the high ground beside the river."

But where exactly is the Hessberg's house? I have found plenty of newspaper references to the Hessbergs including notes about Samuel Hessberg of Cedar Hill being a founding member of the Albany County Farm Bureau (established in 1916) and a reference to Samuel's "model country estate."  But I still haven't figured out where the house is or was.  Your town historian is frustrated!

Both of these drawings are found in Johnson's book on Marcus Reynolds.
Notice the similarity between the drawings and the Patterson house pictured above. 

P.S. I was going to write a brief bio of Reynolds, but Paul Grondahl has already done an excellent one.  Follow this link to his write up for the Times Union.

http://www.timesunion.com/local/article/Marcus-T-Reynolds-1869-1937-Albany-s-grandest-4983750.php



*Another history mystery is that Allison Bennett reports in her book Times Remembered that the Cedar Hill Schoolhouse was originally designed as a one room school by "Mr. Van Guysling" in 1859.  Bethlehem Revisited expands this saying it was Walter Hunter Van Guysling.  Well, Walter Hunter Van Guysling, Albany based architect and apprentice to Marcus Reynolds, wasn't born until 1878. And it wasn't his father, Walter Franklin, because he worked for the New York Central for eons - his obituary from 1944 implies that he started with the railroad when he was 11 years old!

A Swiss Chalet in Cedar Hill - updated!

I bet you didn't know we had a Swiss chalet tucked away in the Cedar Hill section of Bethlehem.   The current owners have done a wonderful job restoring the house to its Arts & Crafts glory.

It was built about 1907 (probably designed by Marcus Reynolds, but possibly by Walter H. Van Guysling - a debate for another day) for Dr. Willis Goss MacDonald as a summer home.  MacDonald was pals with J. B. Lyon and Marcus Glynn, prominent Albanians who also had summer  homes nearby.

MacDonald is an interesting character.  He was a famous surgeon in the Albany area.  His obituary ran in the New York Times on December 31, 1910.  Born in Cobleskill in 1863, he graduated from Albany Medical College in 1887 and also trained in Berlin in 1889 and 90. His surgical expertise was widely noted.  Doing a newspaper search online, I turned up an abundance of hits referring to Dr. MacDonald attending to his patients.

His life was cut tragically short.  MacDonald died December 30, 1910 at the age of 47.  His obituary is oddly specific.  "Dr. Willis G. MacDonald, one of the noted surgeons of this country, died to-night after five days illness from pneumonia contracted at a dinner given him at the Orange Club last Saturday night to members of a committee pf physicians having in charge the construction of new medical college buildings."  That snippet makes me wonder who else got sick at the dinner.

Anyway, MacDonald only enjoyed his chalet in Bethlehem for a few years.  After his death, the home came into the hands of J. B. Lyon's children.  They made it into a year round residence.

After his death, a sculpture of MacDonald was erected in his home town of Cobleskill. **

Dr. W. G. MacDonald **

**
Many thanks to the folks who posted these pictures on the FindAGrave website!  Visit it here
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=92876626


And many thanks to the current owners for giving me a tour!!


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November 3, 2016

Just found the pictures below.  Enjoy!

The Four Corners from the Albany County Post

A friend let me borrow his November 21, 1952 edition of the Albany County Post.
Here are some clippings.  Enjoy!

Joe Allgaier, Bethlehem Town Historian from 1991-2005

Joe Allgaier passed away not too long ago and I've been thinking about his contributions to Bethlehem's local history.  And I just don't know where to start the list is so long.

Editorial team for the 1993 publication "Bethlehem Revisited" from left to right: Joe Allgaier, Chuck McKinney, Floyd Brewer, Hugh Hewitt and Peter Christoph.  

  I probably met Joe when I attended my first Bethlehem Historical meeting in September of 1995.  He was an approachable guy always willing to share his expertise and encouragement.  His legacy as town historian is long and includes the book Bethlehem Revisited for which he served on the editorial team and wrote two chapters Business and Industry and Will of the People. Bethlehem Revisited is a book I refer to constantly - go read it if you haven't already!

Another legacy I use everyday is the database Joe created for the town's archival records. That database stemmed from a re-organization that I am sure was a huge project.  He collaborated closely with then Town Clerk Kathy Newkirk and others to assess, inventory and properly store the records.  The resulting searchable database really is awesome.  99% of the time when the database produces a hit and I go looking for a specific document in a specific folder in a specific archival storage box, it is there just like it is supposed to be.

Joe took me in hand when I was first appointed town historian in nine years ago, giving me the tour, giving me the keys to the database, answering my many questions about how to be a historian and encouraging me to make the position of historian my own.

Bethlehem and its history are the richer for having been served by town historian Joe Allgaier.  Personally, his influence on how I do my job has been profound and deeply appreciated.

Rest in Peace Joe!

Delmar Four Corners

Here are some circa 1970 photos of the Delmar Four Corners for your rainy Monday.

The first two on the roll of film capture an emergency response at the Four Corners.  Notice the background.   Anyone remember the Delmar Department Store and the Delmar Bootery?

And how about this one.  Again there is the emergency on the right.  But notice how much gas was back then. And notice that there was even a gas station where the mini park and clock are now.  And notice that Peter Harris used to be where the sub shop is today.

The rest of the pictures seem to be documenting the large brick building that was on the corner of Delaware and Kenwood where Key Bank is today. It was taken down in 1974, so that gives an idea of the date of these snapshots.   Enjoy!

Looking east on Delaware.  The Delmar Corner Store on the left is where Swifty's tent is today.

The Delmar Meat Market on the right in the background is where Great Wall is today.

South Bethlehem and the Horton Sisters

Last Saturday morning was a fine day for a history hike in South Bethlehem.  The group included Alan Baumes, a descendant of the prominent South Bethlehem family. He told wonderful stories about his great aunts who lived on Willowbrook Avenue.  More about the Baumes family in another post.  For now, I want to introduce you to the Horton Family. 

One of my favorite things that sometimes happens during history hikes is when property owners come out to talk.  At first I think they are just wondering about, and maybe suspicious of, all these folks standing in front of their house.   So I always give a cheerful good morning and introduce myself.  If we're in luck, they start telling stories about their home.  


So, walking along Willowbrook, a gentleman comes out and says, "You know, this is where the Horton Sisters used to live."  And I was like, "What!  The Horton Sisters!"  When I first was town historian, nine years ago this September, I came across a flyer for the Horton Family Orchestra from South Bethlehem.  It has been in a file ever since. Forgotten. 

How could I forget the Originators of Real Rhythm and the Horton Girl Unit?!


From what I gather, they were popular in the 1930s and 40s. I've found ads for their performances in Gloversville and Corinth as well as Guilderland and Albany.   Interestingly, I couldn't find them on the 1930 or 1940 US census.  Anywhere.  So, they will remain a bit of a mystery until more research gets done.  




April 12, 1940 Altamont Enterprise