The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1908-03-29
ARlEOIHOTEL FOR 70 TEARS
STORY or TIE FIFTH AVENUE,
WHICH CLOSES THIS WEEK

IL Has Been Open Just . Year Lea Thhn
Half . Centuy-mS 0topplhg PIaee d
Noted MeA-Khg Edward Played Leap
frOg mere-Sones Il Has Witaessed,
The Fifth Avenue Hotel will close and
cease buAlneSs on Saturday night neXt,
after having been open without Interrupt
ton for Just q year lees than half . century.
IL ends lie existence In the period q itS
greatest prosperity, Just when indeed lts
management would find II ditiouit 10 oon-
tinue q programme which has been carried
on for a number Of years, that Il, taking
more and more ground space from rent
paying tenants 10 extend lie restaurant
facilities, 1t was recently stated by au-
thority that last year the hotel did the
biggest and most profitable business Of Ito
entire career.
The famous hotel closts from the aame
reasons that SCORES, hundreds, Of crowded
and substantial commercial buildings have
been torn down-to make room for larger,
more economically spbdivided buildings
which win pay more money to owners by
adding rentable floors where space costs
nothing, up In the air.
The site Of the Fifth Avenue Hotel has
contained q public house Of entertainment
for nearly three-quarters Of a century,
for before the beginning Of the second
half Of the last century ian ancient and
long established inn called the Madison
Cottage was loeSted there. Prints Of the
predecessor Of the big marble hotel show II
10 have been an attractive looking road
house two and a half stories high, not
counting q half story basement, which In
the old pictures suggest that Il stored
casks and barrels whose contents went 10
the refreshment Of the horsemen and other
sports who continued their drive from the
city beyond the turn Of the BoWery road
toward Greenwich Village, the popular
drive Of the day, up the Broadway plank
road "a the inn opposite MadiSon'S farm.
The sharply S~lantlng roof Of the Old Inn
continued down In front to make a cover
for the wide veranda facing the common,
now Madison Square, and there, 80 the old
chronicles tell us, coaching, single harness
horseracing, cockhghting and other sports
we're promoted, and also politics va
much discussed by authoritative old GENTLE
men who had been taught the gentle art Of
control Of elections by Madison, the man for
whom the inn was named. There were early
sessions Of the Amen Corner on the veranda
Of Madison Cottage those days when N. P.
Willis sang Of the Sweet Shady Side Of
Broadway
But along in 1852 the owner Of the land
on which the cottage stood began TO think
that more interest could be earned out Of
the holding II IL were covered by q larger
and finer building. Indeed. Amos r. Emo,
the owner, a young man then, say a vision.
II is reported Of him that sitting one day on
the veranda Of the cottage he pointed to
the scrubby looking common across the
way and said:
THAT plot over there belongs to the city.
1t should be cleaned up and made into Z
park. because one day this will be built up
here as It IL down by the Aston House
His friends TO whom he made this remark
probably suggested to young Emo that II he
went strictly on the water wagon for a
sedate period he would change his mind.
Dul Tue ldhu O"hCI kOb Tue iONGh WOTBo
as time went on, and a couple Of years later
tore down the cottage and said he would
build on the site a block Of marble stores.
Then his friends sought seriously to dis
suade him, but the block Of marble stores
was started and vas well under way when
the panic Of 1857 stopped operations and
the half finished walls were boarded over.
About that time one Paran Stevens,
who had made the Stevens House Of Boston
famous, came to New York to look for a
site for a hotcl. He too believed that Man
haitian Island would some day be built
uptown as far as T~wenty-thlrd street a.
closely as it was down about Fulton street.
So the Boston hote keeper when he saw
the boxed in part Of . building opposite
Madison Square vent TO Emo and suggested
70 him that the building would pay better
as a hotel than for commercial purposes.
Things began to move when the two
e~nthusiasms joine1. An architect was
commissioned TO make plans for finishing
the building as a hotel. Paran Stevens
brought a big sun Of Boston money to put.
into the scheme and the architect was
told to give his imagination all the play
he wanted and the three young enthusiasts
went ahead and built q hotel which became
famous before Il -aH cners1. II was such
a magnificent folly that all New York drove
out there on Sundays or took stage rides
on lazy afternoons after bualnesa hours