Memory Lane: The Times Square Hotel or The Times Square Motor Hotel or "The Times Square"

I hadn't gone wandering/wondering for a while, but I was put on the path again—this time memory lane—after reading a piece in Granta issue 126: Do You Remember? In "The Memory Box, Olivia Laing writes about her time in New York researching David Wojnarowicz. While working in his archives at NYU's Fales Library, she was staying at a place where her "room was on the corner of West 43rd Street and 8th Avenue, on the tenth floor of what once had been the Times Square Hotel."

Well that got my own remembering going, since on my only childhood real visit to New York (not counting seeing my grandmother prior to embarking to Germany in 1956 and just after disembarking in 1959), we had stayed at the Times Square Motor Hotel, which I assumed to be the same building. In her article, Laing goes on to write some more about how this building went from "glamour to a faded gentility."

Among other things, she says that the "Times Square Hotel was at the time in the third of its incarnations, and its history encapsulated the neighbourhood's uneasy accommodations between capital and enterprise, poverty and need." I had not been acquainted with any of the history a building which had been "[b]uilt like an art deco liner, with fifteen storeys and a marble ballroom," so it seemed only appropriate after reading about memory and persistence of objects to make my own wandering again—first to the basement to find the faded stationery shown above, and then to the Internet.
While it was not my first stop on the information highway, I do want to note up front that Wikipedia was particularly short on this subject (although I will probably add onto it after finishing this blog!), saying only that the hotel was in New York City and "was built in 1922 and was added to the National Register of Historic Places on May 4, 1995."

My initial Google search for the "Times Square Hotel" was very unsatisfying, only serving to yield a multitude of links to various hotels in the Times Square area. Thus, on to "Times Square Motor Hotel." The first hit there was to another round of time and memory games. In this instance, New York, You've Changed: Taxi Driver, a Wired New York thread about the 1976 movie "Taxi Driver," in which we follow Travis Bickle cruising through Times Square, but updating what we saw with what we would see now.

Thus, we are told that "we get a glimpse of the sign for the old Times Square Motor Hotel (free parking!)," followed by a reference to how, in 1988, the city "announced [its] intention to buy the hotel and use it as a residence for the homeless and as the site of a work-release program for jail inmates," but then the statement that "Times have changed since 1988: a Westin Hotel is now on the site." Luckily, one commentator corrects that and lets us know (as we already do) that "The Times Square Motor Hotel building still exists as a homeless shelter... I believe the building is landmarked."

Next up are several images of the Hotel from various sites selling old postcards. These are nice to have, and they clearly show the name of the hotel as "Times Square Motor Hotel" running down the side of corner.

Next up on Google are articles from the old grey lady herself, the New York Times, telling me about some more recent history. On November 17, 1987, in "New York City Seeks to Acquire Times Sq. Hotel," she writes how the Koch administration was seeking to purchase the Times Square Motor Hotel "as a long-term residence for the homeless, and as the site of a work-release program for New York City jail inmates." Next, on January 3, 1988, in "Covenant House Sells a Times Square Hotel," we are told that "Covenant House, the shelter for runaway youths that hoped to build its endowment when it bought the Times Square Motor Hotel on West 43d Street three years ago, has sold the hotel to the New York International Hostel Corporation after operating it at a loss."

Sticking with the Times (but showing up on search for "1922 times square hotel," I came up with an article from December 1, 2001 ("Perspectives: Housing the Dependent; Times Square Hotel as the Biggest S.R.O."), detailing the most recent metamorphosis of the building (to the one that Laing was staying in): "Now the partially occupied hotel is in the midst of reconstruction into a permanent residence for low-income single adults, including many dependent on a high level of social services." In telling about its transition to ownership by Common Ground, the story recounts that the hotel was "built in 1922 as a tourist hotel for men, with 1,000 rooms," and it concludes the 1988 saga by telling us that "[t]he hostel company went into bankruptcy, Covenant House defaulted on its mortgage (from Charles Keating's Lincoln Savings & Loan), and the property fell into the hands of the first mortgagee." Linking to the time period I stayed there is refers to the "partnership headed by Arthur Schwebel, who ran the building from 1962 to 1981." [Subsequently, I also found a link to the historical marker shown above, which credits Schwebel with helping the ultimate transformation of the building.]


Getting closer to a complete chain of ownership, without too many searches, but nothing about the name I knew. So back to Google, and one of the next hits is to an ashtray, which can be mine for a mere $129. The ashtray seller wants to provide some context and content, so now I find out for the first time that "The place was briefly named for its builder, Henry Clama, who is honored by a plaque at the entrance. Renamed the Times Square Motor Hotel in 1963, the huge hostelry has had a checkered past, once a notorious welfare hotel. It has been redeveloped the largest supportive housing facility in the nation." So, I now have hints that it may have a name other than the Times Square Hotel at the very beginning, and that (connecting my dots) Arthur Schwebel was there for the name change adding in "Motor"! Back to the Internet.

Well, "Henry Clama" was a nogo--no hits on any search engine. Time to go off the superhighway and do old-fashioned research, in this case hitting the New York Times archives with my library card ... so it turns out that I should have been looking for "Henry Claman" instead, plus I get all my other questions answered. As for Henry Claman, Google lets me discover that the ashtray had (mis)quoted Randall Gabrielan"s book Times Square and 42nd Street in Vintage Postcards (Postcard History). It also brought my to a website where I found the historical marker mentioned in that book. It also led me to the first of a "Claman Hotel," in this case some archive document in which it is listed among prominent buildings equipped with an "American Sash Chains" with "Gronenberg & Leuchtag, Architects Henry Claman, Builder." Finally, it led me to:

The Bruner Foundation, the Rudy Bruner Award for Urban Excellence, and most significantly, the 1997 Gold Medal Award given to the Common Ground's Times Square Project. In providing a brief history of the building the Foundation writes: "It changed management and took the name of The Times Square Hotel in 1923, with one floor reserved for women." Furthermore, it writes: "At one point in the 1960s it was known as The Times Square Motor Hotel."! Here, however, I ran aground and resorted to my archival search again, and the New York Times was more obliging than the Internet.

On the left are the headlines from a story from the March 18, 1920 issue ("PLAN NEW $2,500,000 TIMES SQUARE HOTEL: Will Replace Old Buildings at Corner of Eighth Avenue and Forty-third Street."), detailing the start of the project. On the right is a story from August 17, 1963 ("The Times Square Hotel Puts 'Motor' In Its Name") saying that Arthur Shwebel changed the name "because there was a need for moderately priced hotel accommodations with free parking."

 I have no memory of Dad parking the car, but I suspect that free parking in Manhattan, even in 1964, would have been a draw for him in taking us to the city for a couple days. So, there you have it a lot of wandering and wondering, and there is probably more that one could do, but I have gone back and gone on much longer than I had planned to. The only thing missing is a photo or two that I took during our trip in 1964, which may yet be added below, but first I have to find them. I don't have the same "Memory Box" as the one put together by David Wojnarowicz and looked at, and written about, by Olivia Laing.

ADDENDUM: In checking on Google indexing of this blog post, I entered "Times Square Motor Hotel," which I thought I had done before, but this time I had a wonderful first hit: A New York Times travel item with misinformation, but several great comments from people who had stayed at the hotel at various times from the 1960's to 1980's.