The Downtown Community House at 105-107 Washington Street is a six-story, five-bay red brick building that is among the last vestiges of the Lower West Side of Manhattan's former life as an ethnic neighborhood known as “Little Syria.”Svehlak, Joe. "Save traces of Little Syria!" Downtown Express. 11 July 2012. . From the time of its establishment, the Bowling Green Neighborhood Association, housed in the Downtown Community House beginning in 1926, was a pioneering organization that served the local immigrant population as a settlement house and continued to provide services for the area well after the community house became defunct. Built in 1925 with philanthropic funds from William H. Childs,“Wall Street Poor Get $250,000 Gift.” The New York Times. 26 January 1925. p. 1. the founder of the Bon Ami household cleaner company, the Downtown Community House was designed by John F. Jackson, architect of over 70 Y.M.C.A. buildings and community centers,“John F. Jackson, 81, Y.M.C.A. Architect: Designer of 70 Association Buildings, Dies In Passiac.” The New York Times. 28 April 1948. and through its Colonial Revival styleShapiro, Julie. "Downtown Preservationists Fight to Save 1920s Community Center." DNA Info. 10 June 2011. . speaks to an underlying desire for the neighborhood's immigrant population to become Americanized and associate themselves with the country's foundations. In recent years, a collection of historic preservationists and Arab-American activists have lobbied the Landmarks Preservation Commission and its chairman Robert Tierney to designate the building as a city landmark.Dunlap, David. "An Effort to Save the Remnants of a Dwindling Little Syria." The New York Times. 2 January 2012. p. A18. , Retrieved 24 September 2012.
Early history
The community house located at 105-107 Washington Street was completed in 1926; prior to its construction, the lot was separated in two, with two early residential buildings (as Kate Reggev has speculated,Reggev, Kate. 105-107 and 109 Washington Street. "Save Washington Street" Report. September 2012. . p. 6. perhaps a single-family house with both front and rear buildings) constructed sometime prior to 1822. One of 107 Washington Street's early residents was Samuel Healy, a money broker, who had an office nearby on Greenwich Street.New York State Court of General Sessions. The New-York City-Hall Recorder. New York: E.B. Clayton, 1822. p. 102. By the 1860s, both tenements were boarding houses used by Irish immigrants and sailors from the nearby piers, and No. 105 had a saloon on the ground floor.“A Sailor Shot in a Washington Street Boarding House.” The New York Times. 12 March 1873; “Suicide of a Saloon-Keeper by Poison.” The New York Times. 12 April 1869. The area, because of its proximity to the wharves, was often recorded as the scene of fights, shootings, and other crimes; an inspection of No. 105 Washington Street in 1894 described it as a “five-story front and four-story rear tenement... The Inspector found the houses to be dirty, poorly ventilated, and the stairways considerably worn.”“Patchwork of Trinity: Only Partial Repairs Follow Health Board's Order.” The New York Times. 23 December 1894; “Mr. Roosevelt's Justice.” The New York Times. 24 July 1896. By 1896, both structures were condemned by the Board of Health, and the tenements were vacated until 1897 when they were remodeled and considered fit for human habitation.New York City Board of Health. Annual Report of the Board of Health. New York: Martin B. Brown Company, 1897. p. 16. Residents, including recently arrived Syrian immigrants, returned to the tenements and the storefronts continued to be occupied to serve the local community – the ground floor of 107 Washington Street had an Italian restaurant called Ferrintino Signorgro's in 1908.New York City Board of Health. Annual Report of the Board of Health. New York: Martin B. Brown Company, 1896. pp. 38, 71; “Robbed of $3,011 Savings.” The New York Times. 30 January 1908, p. 2; “Missing Persons.” The New York Times. 26 March 1923. In 1920, the two tenements were purchased by a realty corporation from Mrs. Schroen of Reno, Nevada, who had the property in her family for over fifty years.“Tenants Buy on Franklin Street.” The New York Times. 30 April 1920. In 1925, the property was purchased for the construction of the Downtown Community House to contain the Bowling Green Neighborhood Association.
Opening
The Bowling Green Neighborhood Association was formed in 1915 as an affiliate of the New York Milk Committee and had its first residence at the Bowling Green Community House at 45 West Street. At its inception, it was primarily devoted to children's work, but over time also created services for adults, with a focus on education and health; the Association had a medical and dental clinic and sponsored folk dances, fund-raisers for special holidays, and English classes for over fourteen nationalities in hopes of working to “weld together the peoples of the many nations in the Bowling Green neighborhood,” according to news articles from 1922 to 1925.“Bowling Green Neighborhood Association.” The Wall Street Journal. 24 December 1917; “Bowling Green Neighborhood Association.” The Wall Street Journal. 22 December 1922; “Bowling Green Neighborhood Association Needs Help to Bring Better Living Conditions.” 14 December 1922; “Downtown Community House.” The Wall Street Journal. 25 September 1925. p. 5. The Association described the neighborhood in 1922 as having an infant mortality rate that was twice the rate of the average of all of New York City and a death rate of tuberculosis that was four times the average in New York; they described the area as “the first, cheapest, and most convenient home for a motley immigration of Italians, Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Syrians, Slavs and Poles.”“Bowling Green Neighborhood Association Needs Help to Bring Better Living Conditions.” 14 December 1922. In the late 1910s and early 1920s, Bowling Green Neighborhood Association was one of the only health clinics or dispensaries serving the downtown Manhattan residential community.New York State Board of Social Welfare. Annual Report, Vol. 53. Albany: J.B. Lyon Company, 1920.
The Bowling Green Association also published annual reports of both the current conditions and of their successes in “Wall Street’s backyard,” announcing a decrease in infant mortality rates in Bowling Green by two-thirds between 1910 and 1924, a decline in the death rate in the area by 1923 of 14.5%, and the daily attendance of 400 people to their playground.“Democracy and Welfare.” The New York Times. 28 October 1924. The Association's Health Center, equipped with four doctors and a part-time dentist, carried out pioneering medical studies, documenting the eating habits and improved health of the neighborhood's children when given adequate nutritional options, treating thousands of patients.New York State Board of Social Welfare. Annual Report, Vol. 53. Albany: J.B. Lyon Company, 1920. p. 208; The Bowling Green Neighborhood Association. Activities of the Bowling Green Neighborhood Association. New York: Bowling Green Neighborhood Association, 1926. p. 9; Davis, Michael M. Immigrant Health and the Community. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1921. p. 381. In 1919, the Health Center had provided 1,801 physicians visits, 4,579 nurses visits, and had an annual attendance of 3,447; infant mortality was reduced from 321 to 175 per thousand.New York State Department of Social Welfare. Annual Report, Vol. 2. 1919. p. 209; “The Bowling Green Neighborhood Association.” The Outlook, Vol. 120. 11 September 1918. p. 44.
In 1917, after the publication of their second annual report, which received a special recommendation from the Mayor and other city officials, the Police Commissioner at the time, Arthur Woods, said that the Bowling Green Neighborhood Association had, “in the brief space of two years... developed a successful model program for community organization... that can, with profit, be studied by other social forces.”New York Public Library. Municipal Reference Library Notes, Volume IV, No. 3. New York: The New York Public Library. 19 September 1917. p. 36. Their 1918 experimental study, in which three meals a day were provided to neighborhood immigrant children for a period of six months, aimed to instruct parents in the proper nutrition and feeding of children.“Medical News.” The Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 74. 24 January 1920. p. 258. These significant accomplishments, in particular the nutrition study, were well known in New York and often published in newspapers and medical and health journals, as well as Henry Collin Brown's Valentine’s City of New York: A Guidebook.Brown, Henry Collins. Valentine's City of New York: A Guidebook. New York: The Chauncey Hold Company, 1920. p. 42; New York Department of Health. Weekly Bulletin of the Department of Health of the City of New York. Vol. VI, No. 20. 19 May 1917. p. 158; Gebhart, John C. “Defective Nutrition and Physical Retardation.” The Journal of Genetic Psychology. Vol. XXIIX. Albany: The Brandow Printing Company, 1921. p. 147; Manny, Frank A. “Philanthropy and the Public Health.” Modern Hospital. Vol. X. January 1918. pp. 129-120.
Along with medical concerns, sanitary living conditions were also of the utmost importance to the Bowling Green Neighborhood Association. Workers at the Downtown Community House were constantly on the lookout for unsanitary or unacceptable housing conditions, which they would subsequently report to the social worker in charge of building incidents; he would then notify the owner or agency of the building before informing the government agency of the situation. Two weeks after the complaint was recorded, the social worker would follow up on the case and send a letter to the head of the appropriate municipal department if the requested improvements were not made.“Effective Neighborhood Work.” Housing Betterment, Vol. 6. March 1917. p. 31. This ultimately resulted in a complete housing survey of the area and significant improvements in housing in the neighborhood, sometimes to the point of buildings being torn down or completely remodeled.“The Bowling Green Neighborhood Association.” The Outlook, Vol. 120. 11 September 1918. p. 44.