ATTRIBUTED TO JOHN WILLIAM HILL
New Jersey/California/England, 1812-1879
Astor House, Rendezvous of the New York Merchants and Ship Captains, circa 1854. For many years the Astor House was the favorite meeting place for New York merchants.
Oil on canvas, 36" x 48". Framed 39.75" x 49.5".
Provenance:
James A. Farrell (President of U.S. Steel), New York, donated to India House, circa 1920.
India House, New York, New York.

Literature:
Carl C. Cutler's A descriptive Catalogue of the Marine Collection at India House (At the Sign of the Gosden Head, New York: 1935), #100, p. 41, with an extensive description.

Notes:
The Astor House was built by John Jacob Astor, who assembled the lots around his former house until he had purchased the full block in the heart of the city's most fashionable residential district. Construction began in 1834, and the hotel opened in June 1836 as the Park Hotel. It was located on the west side of Broadway between Vesey and Barclay Streets, across from City Hall Park and diagonally across from the offices of the "New York Herald". The building was designed by Isaiah Rogers, who in 1829 had designed the first luxury hotel in the United States, the Tremont House, in Boston.

Astor House contained 309 rooms in five stories, with servant's rooms on the sixth floor, whose mezzanine windows opened in the frieze below the building's cornice. It had gaslights – the gas was produced in the hotel's own plant – and bathing and toilet facilities on each floor, with the water pumped up by steam engines. Its tree-shaded central courtyard was covered over in 1852 by an elliptical vaulted cast iron and glass "rotunda" designed by James Bogardus. Under the direction of its proprietor, "Col." Charles A. Stetson (1837–1877), it was the city's most stylish luncheon place for gentlemen. It featured a curving bar, and side dining rooms entered from Vesey Street or Barclay Street. Guests could order from thirty meat and fish dishes offered daily. Although by the 1850s some restaurants allowed men and women to dine together, and others had a special ladies' dining room with separate entrances to reserved drawing rooms, the Astor House would not admit unaccompanied women to enter, a policy which prevented prostitutes from nearby brothels from plying their trade in the hotel.

Original canvas. Not relined. UV light is difficult to read due to old uneven varnish. Needs professional cleaning.