LB Parking
Fiss, Doerr & Carroll Auction Mart (later LB Parking), 147 E. 24th St. between Lexington and 3rd Aves. (1994)

The building to the right of this parking garage has a "carriages" sign, while the garage itself has the traces of "... horse company" across the pediment. A clearer image of this pediment can be found at the New York Public Library's Digital Collections. Click here for view from the other direction showing carriages sign. For yet another image of these buildings on their 25th St. side, click here. On this side one can read "carriages wagons horses harness".

This is the Fiss, Doerr & Carroll Auction Mart built in 1907, and the building next door is that company's stable built the same year. Fiss & Doerr was established in the 1870s, and the auction mart sold horses. They claimed to be the world's largest dealer in horses.(They became Fiss, Doerr & Carroll around 1900.)

An advertisement for the Fiss, Doerr & Carroll Horse Co., appeared in the New York Tribune, Jan. 1897.

For more on this building see Christopher Gray's article in the New York Times, Nov. 8, 1987, VIII, 14:3.

An advertisement for Fiss & Doerr, appeared in Moses King's Photographic Views of New York (1895). This is available on google books. The ad is on page 576, and there are a couple of photographs of the 24th St. location on page 577.

This ad for Fiss, Doerr & Carroll appeared in Trow's New York City Business Directory, 1906.

The Biggert Collection of Architectural Vignettes at Columbia University contains a Fiss & Doerr bill or receipt dated 30 March 1892, as well as a Fiss, Doerr & Carroll Horse Co. letter dated 28 February 1907 (signed J. D. Carroll, Treasurer). The Fiss, Doerr & Carroll main office is 153 East 24th St.

LB Parking was owned by the L. B. Oil Company who operated a parking garage here (for nearly sixty years!) from 1936 to 1994/5.

The L B in L B Parking was Louis Berkowitz (1892-ca.1980?). Louis Berkowitz registered for the World War I draft in 1917 stating that he was born in Hungary, 1 May 1892, and that he was doing "general work" for Hecht & Co., 242 Huron St., Greenpoint, Brooklyn. In the U. S. Census of 1920 he was living at 120 Lewis St., Manhattan, and was now the manager of a garage. By the mid-1920s he was partner in a garage called the Madison Square Garage, located at 156 E. 24th St. This must have been directly across the street from 147 E. 24th St. His partner was Henry Solomon Friedman (1886-?). Henry S. Friedman was initially involved in his father's business (the New York Pad Co.) during the period 1907 to 1918. New York Pad Co. made coat fronts and padding used in clothing manufacture. At a later date Henry S. Friedman was associated with Manhattan Paste & Sizing Co., glue manufacturers. This was approximately 1913 to 1922. At Manhattan Paste & Sizing Friedman had a partner named Frank Sam Kupfer (1887-1962). The Madison Square Garage was originally a partnership between Kupfer and Friedman. Somewhere in the mid-1920s Louis Berkowitz replaced Kupfer at the garage, and formed his own company L B Co. L B Co. became L B Co. & Associated Garages, and by 1931 the New York Times, 29 Nov. 1931, p. RE2, reported, "The one hundredth garage built by Louis Berkowitz was opened at 403 Lafayette Street yesterday on a site formerly owned by the John Jacob Astor estate. The building was built and equipped at a cost of $400,000. It is a three-story structure, with a capacity for 400 automobiles." (Click for image of 403 Lafayette St. in 2008.) This building has a cornerstone reading "L. B. 1931."

In the 1940s L B Garages became L B Oil Co. Registering for the World War II draft in 1942 Berkowitz described his employer as "Self (Gasoline Distributor)." L B Oil Co. maintained corporate offices at 51 Lexington Ave. (near 24th St.) from the early 1940s until 1982.

According to his death notice in the New York Times (15 Feb. 1946, p. 21) the New York Pad Co. was founded by Max D. Friedman (1861?-1946), an immigrant from Russia in the 1890s. N Y Pad Co. were in business from 1906 to 1979. Three generations of Friedmans ran the business. First there was Max, then his son, Henry S. Friedman. Subsequently there were two other sons, Morris Friedman (1890-1963) and Irving Friedman (1896-1957). The third generation was Irving Friedman's son, Howard J. Friedman (1922/23-?), who was president in the 1970s.

A photograph of the Fiss, Doerr & Carroll Building is found in the collections of the Museum of the City of New York. This is dated ca. 1974, and is a photo by Edmund V. Gillon, Jr., who did the photographs in Margot Gayle's Cast-Iron Architecture in New York (1974).

This entire block was demolished in the late 1990s when Baruch College expanded into new quarters here.

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