20 COURIER LIFE, JULY 3-9, 2020
Preserving history
City to consider landmarking
abolitionist house in Downtown BK
BY KEVIN DUGGAN
City landmarking gurus will soon
vote on whether to landmark a 19th
century row house that once housed
slavery abolitionists at 227 Duffi eld St.
in Downtown Brooklyn, after a push
from City Hall, offi cials said at a Tuesday
hearing.
“We have been increasingly seeking
to address diffi cult history in our
designations, documenting when there
was institutional racism and racist
government policies,” said Sarah Carroll,
chairwoman and a commissioner
of the city’s Landmarks Preservation
Commission at a June 30 virtual hearing.
“And one aspect of our research has
been the people and the institutions engaged
with the anti-slavery movement
before the civil war, whether through
political and religious activism or by
housing freedom seekers.”
The preservationists panel scheduled
a public hearing “in the near future” on
potentially granting a landmark designation
to the building, which housed
two prominent anti-slavery activists for
more than a decade in the mid-1800s, citing
a push to do so by Mayor Bill de Blasio
and the ongoing movement of nationwide
protests decrying police brutality
against Black people.
“The fact that consideration of the
property aligns with our commitment
to tell the complete story of the African-
American experience and heritage in
New York City through its designations
— especially in this current moment —
I’d like to urge that we vote to calendar
this property for consideration as an individual
landmark,” Carroll said.
Abolitionists Thomas and Harriet
Lee-Truesdell lived in the building from
1851 to 1863 and it remained in their
family’s possession until 1921, LPC researcher
Kate Lemos McCale said.
The couple were founders of several
abolitionist organizations in New England
and were also acquaintances of
prominent abolitionist and suffragist
journalist William Lloyd Garrison, who
co-founded the American Anti-Slavery
Society, according to the researcher.
The home, along with several others
along Duffi eld and Gold streets, may
have served as stops along the Underground
Railroad, according to local lore
— although, McCale and her fellow researchers
found no evidence of any such
stops at the site. Those networks, she
said, are often hard to verify.
“Verbal accounts that 227 Duffi eld
was a stop on the Underground Railroad
have not been verifi ed after extensive
research and physical analysis,”
she said at the hearing. “However,
historians agree that housing fugitives
and enslaved persons was a dangerous
and secretive activity making Underground
Railroad activity diffi cult to
227 Duffi eld St. in Downtown Brooklyn.
Photo by Susan De Vries
document or verify.”
If LPC votes to landmark the building,
any alteration, reconstruction,
demolition, or new construction affecting
the structure would have to be
approved by the agency fi rst.
One Manhattan-based historian and
activist who pushed for the co-namings
noted it was the only building with abolitionist
ties left on the street.
“It’s the only one left, so it’s incredibly
important symbolically. This is
what Brooklyn looked like before the
Civil War,” said the director of the Harlem
Historical Society, Jacob Morris.
“This was the last house that major abolitionists
lived in that were critical to
this network of abolitionists.”
The building changed ownership
several times, and developer Samiel
Hanasab bought it from the two remaining
owners at a combined price
of $588,000 between 2015-2017 — a steal
in the business district where properties
frequently fetch millions. Hanasab
fi led for demolition in June 2019, but the
structure has remained standing.
An attorney for the developer said
his client was strongly against landmarking
the building, claiming the restrictions
would scare away any development
of the site.
“By landmarking it there would
highly likely be no development of the
property and it would not be viable as a
standalone museum because no developer
would undertake that cost,” said
Garfi eld Heslop. “It would be cost-prohibitive,
because it’s not a large space.”
The developer plans to erect a 10-story
tower in its place, and would be willing
to include a museum on the lower fl oors
and residential units above.
“We believe it’s in the best interest
of the community to allow us to
develop the property and put the museum
in there and my client is willing
to be bound by that, that it would permanently
remain an African-American
museum or pay homage to African
American history,” he said.
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