The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1906-07-15
RENTS AND HOUSES
BOTH GOING UP
$4,000 Yearly for Store But
48 Feet Square
FARMS BUILT FORTUNES
How Wealth of Astors, Gerrys, eoelets
and Other Families 5egan-The
Most opulent Church in
United States.
FARMS Built FORTUNES

New York.-The $4,000 year which is
to be paid for the use of the ground floor
in the new building at the southeast
corner of Wall street and Broadway is
said to break the record for New York
rentals The store in question being only
IS feet square, every foot of Its area will
bring in $51O2 annually, and the total sum
represents more than twenty times the
value of an average Wall street lot a CEN
fury ago.
THAT astute and far-seeing realty in
weston, John Jacob Aston" said an off
cial Of the Trust Company of America,
whose duties in connection with the af-
fairs of that great corporation require
him to keep thoroughly Informed as to
real estate, would have laughed to scorn
any person who should have told him In
1906 that such values would obtain in
1906 so near the site of his little Water
street office and yet he was accounted
foolish by his contemporaries when he
disposed of lot on Wall street for 5000
(supposed to be a low price, and bought
eighty lots so far out In the country as
Canal street When, within a few years,
the value of this purchase increased ten
fold, Aston the First proved himself to be
wiser than all his generation"
Aston Properties.
In fact. the allied Aston properties,
worth today more tnan $3OO,0uO,OOO were
originally acquired for low prices as farm
lands or vacant lots. Twenty-Five thou-
sand dollars bought the John Thompson
farm, extending from Thirty-fourth 10
Thirty-fifth streets and from Madison
avenue almost to Broadway. Although
large parcels of this land have been sold
over one hundred lots still belong to the
Astors, with a value. excluding improve
ments, of from $4,000 to $4,000 each inc
old Leandert farm on the lower East
Side now yields the estate large yearly
income as tenement property; about lzo
lots, worth in the aggregate So,ooO'OOO, OF
more, still remain of the Greenwich pace
farm land, which once stretched from ths
old Fitz Roy road to the Hudson In the
vicinity of Fourteenth street, and Two
smaller farms to the north along Nihth
and Tenth avenues add over 100 lots more
to the Astor holdings.
When 1.-THE butcher boy OF WALDORF
bought the Eden farm, on the west SIDE
of the Albany Post road NOW Broadway
from Forty-fourth to Forty-seVenth
streets and to Ninth avenue), he coula
not have foreseen that 1t would become
the center of the hotel and theatrical as
trict. Yet had the citys growth extend
ed only I'M the East Side, or up Fifth av-
enue or along the Hudson he left to his
heirs properties in those districts that
would have amply fulfilled his expeeta-
tions.
In addition to these farm lands there
were among the early purchases parcels
of land on the Bowery and cham OF
properties on Broadway downtown.
Among the latter Is the old Aston mousse
perhaps the best known hostelry In Amer
lea. An amusing story is connected with
the erection of the old hotel. 1t seems
that about seventy years ago, when Aston
had determined upon building. he secured
with little trouble all the property nee
essary for his plans except small lot
owned by a retired merchant named
Coster, who, though he had been offered
$40 O0O-twiee the value OF his holding
would hear of no price, and refused to
SELL There followed a period OF wrang-
ling. during which Aston, who was noted
neither for his easy temper nor his lack
of resolution, vowed he would have the
land at any cost and offered Coster $780,
600 The latter weakened, but not until
Aston went in person to Mrs. Coster and
got her consent.
Has Vast Holdings.
Then genius and good fortune of the
original John Jacob Aston are forcibly
brought to mind when one considers that
today New York's total realty is valued
at the enormous sum of 1921, bS2, 3Ol, and
of this more than per cent is owned by
his descendants 1t is notable. also, that
this family was not among the original or
early settlers in Manhattan When Astor
came to America, in 1888, names like Goe-
let Rhinelander, Barclay and Roosevelt,
were, as now. synonymous with wealth
and realty possessions. Today the Goelet
esate is valued at over one hundred mill
lions and embraces scattered properties
from the upper East Side to the lower
West Side Hannah Goelet married an
ancestor of Elbridge T. Gerry, and when
the latter with all the wealth of property
that had descended to him, married, his
wife, who was one of the heirs of the
Hoffman estate, brought handsome
dowry In Manhattan realty.
The Hoffmans owe their millions largely
to the fact that their grandfather had
faith enough in the future of New York
to pay 5000 each for some eighty odd lots
comprising the block bounded by Fifth
and Sixth avenues and Forty-second and
Forty-thlrd streets. Today the land,
which Is divided between the Honmans
and Mrs Gerry, is appraised at S.33s 600.
Among other prominent realty holders we
find such names as Hammersley, Potter,
Gallatin Cutting and Gilsey, and. of more
modern origin. Crimmns Hoe, Bowling
and Clafin. Isaac Clothier of Philadel-
pha and the late Marshall Field of Chi
cago.
Two corporations, Intimately connected
with the old names and with the history
of Manhattan stand out among the realty
holders. They are Trinity church and the
Sailors Snug Harbor. Trinity, which ex
listed even when New Workers were
Dutch burghers, continually received
gifts of farms of value. The boundaries
of the Trinity property have changed
much with the years, but the original
church plot as first granted ran down to
the river Much of this was disposed of
by Trinity to found other churches. some
was sold to meet financial emergencies,
but enough remains even in the one tract
to furnish a splendid income The corner
of Broadway and Murray street. small
part of the original holding, brings into
the Golfers of the church fifty thousand
dollars year. In point OF fact, Trinity
church is the second richest property
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