24 FEBRUARY 15, 2018 RIDGEWOOD TIMES WWW.QNS.COM
OUR NEIGHBORHOOD: THE WAY IT WAS
One of Ridgewood’s forgotten builders
BY THE OLD TIMER
EDITORIAL@RIDGEWOODTIMES.COM
@RIDGEWOODTIMES
When it comes to the people
who literally built Ridgewood
and the surrounding
area in the early 20th century, two
names are at the forefront.
The fi rst is Gustave Mathews, who
developed those golden-bricked,
six-family apartment houses across
Ridgewood that gave families a
healthier alternative to the traditional
tenement. The other is Paul Stier, who
built numerous one- and two-family
rowhouses across the neighborhood.
Many of their structures are now city
landmarks, and included among the
more than 2,900 Ridgewood buildings
listed in the State and National Registers
of Historic Places.
One local developer, however, who
is largely overlooked is Charles Henry
Grosch. It’s not known exactly how many
buildings he helped to build in Our
Neighborhood, but we do know that he
did help develop parts of Ridgewood
and Glendale into the modern urban
communities we know and love today.
In the Sept. 19, 1985 issue of the
Ridgewood Times, The Old Timer
told Grosch’s story with the help of
his daughter, the late Mildred Lehner
of Glendale. We’re happy to retell the
story in this week’s issue.
Charles Henry Grosch was born in
Mainz, Germany in 1877; he came to
the U.S. in 1887 at the age of ten with his
parents, who lived near Broadway and
Myrtle Avenue in Bushwick. Eventually,
he began training as a carpenter and
became quite skilled.
On May 5, 1899, at the age of 22, he
eloped with Mamie Kuntz and they
became married. They went on to have
four children: Emily (Lahr Schmidt),
Mildred (Lehner), Helen (Smith) and
Charles Louis Grosch. Mamie’s sister,
Charles Henry Grosch (below) once resided at this home on 64th Street in Ridgewood.
Clara, happened to also be the fi rst wife
of Gustave Mathews.
In 1904, Grosch began building his
own houses. His fi rst successful project
as 381 Bleecker St. in Brooklyn. Aft er
selling that, he constructed four more
houses, in June and July of 1905, in the
area of St. Nicholas Avenue and Linden
Street.
After that, Grosch kept right on
building in Brooklyn and Ridgewood.
In March 1908, he built three houses at
Elm (present-day Catalpa) Avenue and
Buchman Avenue (present-day 60th
Lane). The following September, he
constructed a home on Elm Avenue between
Fresh Pond Road and Buchman
Avenue.
Grosch, in building these homes, did
not organize a construction company;
instead, he and Mamie sold the homes
as individuals.
Between the fall of 1909 and the
spring of 1911, Charles Grosch teamed
up with architect Louis Berger — who
was also president of Ridgewood
National Bank — to build 46 two-story
brick row homes in an area generally
bounded by Catalpa and 68th Avenues
between 64th and 65th Streets. These
homes were on what had been part of
the Henry and Frederick Wagner Farm,
which at one time spanned 23 acres of
Ridgewood.
When the construction of these
homes was completed, Grosch resumed
building elsewhere. In May 1911, he
built a home on Harman Street in
St. Nicholas Avenue; in August 1912,
he fi nished constructing six homes
on Chaff e (present-day 64th) Street
near Catalpa Avenue, and a house on
Sedgwick (present-day 62nd) Street
between Catalpa Avenue and Hughes
Street (present-day 68th Avenue).
Grosch kept building one home after
another in Ridgewood until early
1916, when the Ivanhoe Company
hired him as their superintendent of
construction. The Ivanhoe Company
was owned by the estate of Henry W.
Meyer, who had built his fortune manufacturing
Ivanhoe chewing and pipe
tobacco in Brooklyn. Meyer had moved
to Glendale in 1886 and had purchased
dozens of acres of local farmland in
the neighborhood as well as in Middle
Village.
Aft er Meyer died in 1898, his children
and son-in-law organized the Ivanhoe
Company to manage their real estate
assets. They held onto the farmland
until the building boom that started in
Ridgewood arrived in Glendale.
On Nov. 18, 1916, the Ivanhoe Company
mortgaged 17 building sites along
Schley Street (now 65th Place) between
Central and 70th Avenues. Under
Grosch’s leadership, they constructed
three-story, six-family homes that copied
the Mathews Flats in plan, but not
in detail. About two months later, in
January 1917, the company mortgaged
an additional 17 building sites on the
opposite side of Schley Street and built
several more six-family homes.
About two months later, on Jan. 17,
1917, the company got to work building
similar homes a block south on Schley
Street between Central and Myrtle Avenues,
and a block over on the west side
of Valentine Street (now 66th Street)
between Myrtle and Central Avenues;
and on Valentine Street between Central
and 70th Avenues.
The last home Grosch built was in
1922, and became his home: 69-26 64th
St. He had the foresight to construct a
two-car garage with a wide driveway.
Grosch died in 1936 at the age of 59.
He was interred at Germonds Presbyterian
Church graveyard in upstate
New City.
Share your history with us by emailing
editorial@ridgewoodtimes.com (subject:
Our Neighborhood: The Way it Was) or
write to The Old Timer, ℅ Ridgewood
Times, 38-15 Bell Blvd., Bayside, NY
11361. Any mailed pictures will be
carefully returned to you upon request.
