By Caitlin Hawke

By now, blog readers may know that the great Civil War era actor Maggie Mitchell (1836-1918) built 855 West End Avenue in 1895, at the southwest corner of W. 102nd Street, with the considerable fortune she earned on the American stage.

Her signature role was the waif in the eponymous play "Fanchon, the Cricket" which debuted in 1861. It was based on George Sand's novel "La Petite Fadette." Maggie played in this role 1500 times from Boston to New Orleans, performing a showstopping shadow dance in the second act that beguiled her audiences, fueling her fame and making her a household name. She played for Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre and was subsequently invited to the White House. Men who fought on both sides of the Civil War wrote love letters to her, some of which are in a small collection at the New York Public Library. Her likeness was affixed to soap, cigarettes, chewing tobacco, a race horse, and a schooner. A waltz was written for her. And promising up-and-comers were referred to as the new Maggie Mitchell, such was her fame in America.

She acknowledged where her bread was buttered by naming her apartment house at 855 after the scene in the play that made her famous, The St. Andoche. She also placed an effigy of her character Fanchon above the entry. See more about the building's name here and for a photo of the effigy, see here.

In 1915, 50 years after the heyday of the play, Paramount's movie version finally appeared with Mary Pickford in the title role. Upon its release, one Newark paper said "Mary Pickford isn't Maggie Mitchell, so we of the former generation stoutly maintain, but she is altogether a delightful Fanchon––the wild creature of unregulated emotion, the capricious but altogether womanly little being who in the end finds that which satisfies the love hunger of her starving soul."

According to neighbor Gil Tauber, the Pickford film has been showing recently on Turner Classic Movies. It had been lost until a print was discovered in Paris and has since been restored by the Mary Pickford Foundation and the Cinémathèque Française.  From the Pickford Foundation website: "Collaborating over the course of six years with the Cinémathèque, the British Film Institute (which held an incomplete nitrate print) and the Immagine Ritrovata in Bologna, Italy, the Mary Pickford Foundation has brought the 1915 film back to the public."

For a taste of the restoration, click the Maypole image or video below.

Thanks to Jim Mackin's new book on notable Upper West Siders which you can read about in my piece in the West Side Rag, we know that Mary Pickford lived at 270 Riverside Drive (at 99th Street) just a few streets south of the building Maggie put up. And a tantalizing tidbit from Anthony Bellov (who I recently interviewed here about his research on architect Rosario Candela) is that Douglas Fairbanks Sr. and Mary Pickford supposedly had assignations at 858 West End Avenue (then owned by Fairbanks' friend Frederick Bertuch) as their affair took flight before they eventually married in 1920.

​That would put the two Fanchons of stage and screen directly across the street from each other if only for a moment and if before Maggie's death at 855 West End in 1918.

For a wonderful write up about 858 West End Ave, see the Daytonian in Manhattan blog.

By Caitlin Hawke

You may have heard about "Notable New Yorkers of Manhattan’s Upper West Side," neighbor Jim Mackin's recent book in which he chronicles nearly 600 Bloomingdale and Morningside Heights residents of "note". However 800 other individuals didn't make it into the book, so Jim created a database which you can explore here.

For vignettes about several of the people who made the cut, see the article I wrote in today's West Side Rag here.

Jim Mackin arrived on the Upper West Side in 1971, obtained an MBA at NYU, and worked as chief financial officer of a division of JP Morgan. It was there that Jim developed an interest in the histories of companies. Soon, inspired Peter Salwen’s Upper West Side Story, he became a diehard student of the history of New York City. 

After retiring in 2005, Jim realized he could marry his passion for fresh air, exercise and local history at the street level by giving tours which he dubbed “WeekdayWalks.” He is a licensed tour guide with distinction, meaning that he scored high on the licensing exam for which he didn’t have to study as knowledge of the city has really be a lifetime pursuit. 
​
Last week, in preparation for the WSR piece, I caught up with Jim to ask him more about the genesis of  project.

​Here are excerpts from that Q&A:

​Caitlin: What gave you the idea for “Notable New Yorkers of Manhattan’s Upper West Side”?
Jim: Preparing for my walking tours, I started collecting addresses of famous people in the news or from books that I read. Then I put them onto a spreadsheet with some notes. Soon I had a few hundred which grew to over a thousand. A friend gave me the idea that I actually had a book. Next, I wrote up short biographies that I thought would be entertaining, and I discovered that it was fun to research and to write.

Caitlin: How did you organize all that data and what tools did you use?
Jim: I used a simple spreadsheet, which beyond the obvious details -- name, profession, dates, addresses -- included four designations: superstar, plaque-worthy, needs to be better appreciated, and especially interesting. These designations were invaluable in deciding which of my 1400+ notables should be included in the book so that it would be a reasonable size. Primarily, I used the internet, New York Times archives, and Ancestry.com. I also read books – a lot – usually from the New York Society Library.

Caitlin: What do you consider your greatest "finds" for this book? 
Jim: Amelia Earhart for just being in the neighborhood and the difficult Barnard situation endured by Harriet Brooks, the first U.S. female nuclear physicist, who worked with Ernest Rutherford and Marie Curie.

Caitlin: True story. Did you happen to dig out the nugget that Hunter S. Thompson lived on Morningside Drive for a short time? An air force buddy, he lived for a time in 1957-58 with my father at 110 Morningside Drive.
Jim: Didn’t know…thanks for this information. 

Caitlin: That's one more for the database! What you did was a huge and immersive undertaking. What fills your research time now that this book is out?
Jim: The Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group, of which I am one of ten, occupies most of my attention in NYC. As president of the Friends of Taconic State Park in Copake Falls, New York, we are preserving a historic iron works and building a narrow-gauge railroad attraction. I am also working on my second book that connects the family that built the Copake Iron Works and a very important person in NYC’s history.

Caitlin: If you had to live in another neighborhood, which one would you choose?
Jim: I have a very soft spot in my heart for Greenwich Village, where my wife Janet and I lived for half a year until we were kicked out of an illegal sublet. 

Caitlin: Great place to end – a typical New York story. Thank you.

By Caitlin Hawke

The Bloomingdale Neighborhood History Group presents an online event this evening, February 16, at 5:30 p.m. featuring Jim Mackin, author of Notable New Yorkers of Manhattan's Upper West Side, and another local historian Matthew Spady, who has written recently about Audubon Park up near W. 158th Street. Yes, the park is named for that Audubon. Matthew's book is titled The Neighborhood Manhattan Forgot. The director of Fordham University Press, Fred Nachbaur, will moderate. All are welcome to view the livestream via the link posted here: www.upperwestsidehistory.org. The group puts on consistently terrific programs. I am sure this one will not disappoint. Hope you can make it!