Between Seaman Avenue & Park Terrace West
Designed in 1924 by the architectural team of Springsteen and Goldhammer, Isham Gardens was the brainchild of builder Conrad Glaser. Glaser envisioned an uptown utopia where middle class New Yorkers could live amidst a resort like atmosphere.
And, Springsteen and Goldhammer were up to the task. They designed a romantic Italianate manor with sweeping views of Isham Park.
The consummate salesman, Glaser began a relentless advertising campaign where he espoused the clean air and vacation-like qualities of Isham Gardens.
A 1924 advertisement published in the New York Times promised a doctor, dentist, valet, barber, beauty salon and taxi stand all on premises. In a March 26, 1924 article printed in the New York Evening Post, Glaser also boasted that his 1,500 perspective tenants would also enjoy a ballroom, billiard room, roof garden and even a swimming pool.
Where Glaser intended to find room for all these amenities, which included a band-shell for hosting twice weekly concerts during the summer months, remains a mystery. Glaser’s pitch also included an observation tower so that all residents could take in the majesty of the Hudson River and the Jersey Palisades.
A Times article dated August 16, 1924 described Isham Gardens as it neared completion:
“The Isham Garden Apartments, located in the heart of Isham Park and overlooking the Hudson River and Spuyten Duyvl inlet, is nearing completion and will be ready for occupancy Oct. 1. The first unit of the project will contain 191 apartments with a total of 425 apartments ready by May 1, 1925. The entire group of buildings face along 214th Street and cover the blocks bounded by Park Terrace East, Park Terrace West, Seaman Avenue and Indian Road.
Isham Gardens is but one block from the beautiful Baker Oval, Columbia University’s athletic field, 304 feet from Spuyten Duyvil inlet, immediately adjoining the New York Park Department nurseries, several blocks from Inwood Park, which is to be enlarged by 111 acres of land the city is buying this Fall, and but three streets from Inwood’s shopping centre.
Each apartment of Isham Gardens overlooks a strip of public property. This was made possible by Conrad Glaser, owner of the project, having purchased half of the Isham estate. The Isham famly bought the land over 200 years ago and several years back presented the city with Isham Park and the balance of the land was sold to the present owner.
The apartments contain twin, three, four and five rooms with all the latest improvements. Some of the features of Isham Gardens is the radio equipment installed on the roof for the use of the tenants in hooking up their sets; a large, beautiful ballroom for social activities of the new community, four tennis and handball courts, free to the tenants and their friends, and boating on the Hudson.”
Sadly, Glaser’s utopia did not include elevator service.
An early photo of Isham Gardens shows a gatehouse/rental office and a bus offering free rides up the hill from Broadway.
And while the reality of Isham Gardens modern amenities didn’t last long, Glaser’s skills as a pitchman helped jumpstart a real estate boom in the neighborhood that continues to this day.
Cole, my family and I lived in that apartment until I left Inwood in 1982. Before it was renovated as a split-level 1 br apt rental unit, it was the pediatric office of David Borak, M.D., who later moved his office to W. 207th Street. Many of us as children who resided in the Isham Gardens Complex were his patients. It was a great location to get “house calls.” Isham Gardens was my home for 32 years. Many of us on this and other Inwood websites are the Children of Isham Gardens from the 40s thru the 80s, and have been working for years trying to get our story written. Someday.
Great page dedicated to Isham Gardens. Wow it brings back memories. I lived in the 229 section while growing up. This building will always be a special place for me. If I ever win the lottery, I’d buy it in a heartbeat.
WOW!
You, WILLIAM DONNELL, are the sole person who gave a significant HINT (229) as to the near-proper address of THIS building under-construction!
The internet with this photo-image is “littered” with erroneous information (165 Bennett Av/207 St & Seaman Ave) about this image.
About three hours’ worth of on-foot investigations/perceptions of buildings’ facades today, on my part, ultimately CONFIRMED that this apartment building’s address is ACTUALLY, 121-129 SEAMAN AVENUE in upper-Manhattan!!
I lived at 31 Park Terrace West from around 1950 to 1969. It was an idyllic place to grow up. So many children to make friends with, grass to play in, and woods to roam in. And those wonderful buildings to hide in. It was a fabulous place. And it’s amazing that there were no elevators.
[…] scarves over the grand piano, there is still that large and lovely apartment building known as Isham Gardens, with some off the most enticing rentals in the city. This Venetian looking place, has a very […]
I lived there from about 1972 to 1975. Wanted an apartment facing Isham Park, got one facing an alleyway. The building had known better times, but I thought the way it swept down the staircase from Park Terrace West to Seaman was gorgeous, and the way it curved into another building of the same style in Indian Road. It’s a romantic setting and it could be beautiful again.
I never lived in Inwood/Washington Heights, but when I was a child, my aunt (born in 1912 and passed away in 2006) lived in a different building on Seaman Avenue. She was the wife of my dad’s brother; and, at that time (circa 1980), she and I shared the exact same name — Mary Lombardi. My friends and I enjoyed looking up my name in the phone book and then laughing that I was the only 11 or 12 year old with her own phone listing (lol) even though it wasn’t really mine!
Watches the latest episode (11.10.13) of Boardwalk Empire. As part of the story the Isham Park apartments are mentioned. They showed the advertisement. I’m sure that it was not noticed by 99.9% of the audience, but I must compliment their research.
Does anyone remember the “commissary” (small store) that was located in the building. Thanks for the memories.
Mr. and Mrs. Jacobs ran the Commissary for many years. Some of the local men would gather in the room behind the store from time to time to drink a beer or two.
We lived in a 5 room apartment at 222 Seaman on the second floor. That building was the second of the two Isham Gardens buildings. My parents moved there from 182 Street in 1943 when I was about 2 years old. I think the landlord in the late 40’s and 50’s was a Mr Cohen. The rent was $75.74 in the 50’s.
The buildings were coal fired when built and converted to oil in the late 1940’s. The Super was Mr Shorey until the late 40’s.
I lived at 261 Seaman and loved going to the commissary after school with my 25 cent allowance and buying candy there.
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I lived at 600 West 218th Street off Seaman Ave. In the early 1950’s. Anyone remember Murray’s grocery righbefore the park?
I have been in the neighborhood since 1972, down Seaman Ave. at 204th. I do remember getting up to 218th once in a while when there was a small grocery/deli at the corner of 218th and Indian Road. By then, it was pretty much at the end of its existence and a purchase of a sandwich one day was my first and last visit there. I assume that this is what was Murray’s at one point. It had a rebirth around a decade ago as Indian Road Cafe, which was probably the first Inwood restaurant I was aware of that people came from other neighborhoods to eat and drink. That is, other than places that were specifically Irish, Puerto Rican and more recently Dominican that drew from their particular ethnic diaspora in the metropolitan area.
https://www.indianroadcafe.com/
I sure remember Murray’s store. When we planned to sneak into Baker Field for Columbia football games, Murray lent us white store aprons and we equipped ourselves with cardboard boxes that originally held hotdog buns (market on the outside with the contents). We wore the aprons, small white clip on buttons with the word “Vendor” (we made them out of old political buttons, painted white, carefully lettered, covered with stretched cellophane from cigarette packages), and with the empty boxes on our shoulders, marched unchallenged through the Student Ticket Taker gate.
We also would dress up a bit, and joined by two girls we knew who carried (prop) blankets for sitting in the wooden stands. Many people carried blankets, which made us fit in well. We positioned ourselves on Broadway, and when an adult couple heading for Baker Field rounded the corner we positioned ourselves just in front of them and joined the throng headed for the game. At the gate (again, manned by student ticket takers) we filed through the entry lanes without being challenged by the kids taking tickets, thinking we were with our “mom and dad” right behind us. Because of their inexperience, I always suspected they were fearful of making a scene when they realized that the two elderly people were NOT associated with us in any way, and by then, we had melted into the crowd and were home free.
Great memories of Inwood in the 40’s and 50’s.
For many YEARS I’ve LOVED the old photo-image of this “isham Park Gardens” apartment building under construction, with the bus and renting office booth affront it, occasionally posted about the internet and Facebook.
BUT, there was never an exact identification of the actual address/street/avenue of this apartment-building-under-construction.
SO, TODAY (April 16th, 2020), tired of self-confinement within my own apartment due to the “Covid-19” issue, I decided to get out-of-house and investigate, ON FOOT, from 204th street to 218th street, west of Broadway, until I FINALLY DISCOVERED THE MYSTERY, based on the building’s unique facade and window-arrangements.
ITS PRESENT ADDRESS IS ACTUALLY 221-229 SEAMAN AVENUE, between 214th & 215th streets in upper Manhattan!
Please attempt to RECTIFY any erroneous postings of this building’s photo-image you may see on-line!
The photo of the newspaper advertisement appears in HBO’s “Boardwalk Empire” season 4, episode 10.
I’ve never visited Isham Gardens, but I’ve always wanted to. My Dad used to tell us stories of his time there as a building manager back in the late 1920’s, early 1930’s. He spoke of the magnificence of the architecture and the lovely residents. One day, I’d like to make it up there to see for myself.