Down Town Association
The Down Town Association in the City of New York, located at 60 Pine Street in Manhattan, is the fifth oldest of all existing New York private clubs and was the first club formed in Lower Manhattan. The organizational meeting, which resulted in the formation of the Association, was held at the Astor House on December 23, 1859. The first general meeting of the Association was held on February 14, 1860, and a charter was granted by an act of the legislature of the State of New York on April 17, 1860.
History
The Romanesque Revival Clubhouse, a New York City landmark, was designed by C.C. Haight, a member of the Association, and was opened on May 23, 1887. Land, building, and furnishings cost $306,669.25. The Clubhouse is the oldest clubhouse in New York built for and still occupied by its members and is the second such oldest (behind the Hope Club of Providence) in the United States. In 1902 a major renovation converted the original Victorian decorative arts interiors to Edwardian and a partial sixth-floor containing laundry and other staff quarters was added to the original five-story structure. In 1910, Charles Wetmore of the firm of Warren & Wetmore, a member of the Association, was engaged to plan an addition which was completed on March 16, 1911, at a cost of $175,556.76. The addition, in an exterior style sympathetic to the original, added several private dining rooms as well as the magnificent Jacobean-style paneled Reading Room on a new mezzanine level.
Built and used until 1995 solely as a luncheon club, the DTA is now the only full-service social club in Lower Manhattan. Membership was originally restricted to men but women have been accepted as members since 1985. The membership has been a virtual Who's Who of the leading businessmen of New York including many men who went on to illustrious careers in public service. Notably, the list has included Franklin D. Roosevelt, Thomas E. Dewey, Wendall Wilkie, and William Donovan. The members are drawn heavily from the legal and financial professions but as Lower Manhattan becomes more residential many of the more recent members live nearby as well.
Premises
The entry on Pine Street gives onto a marble accented lobby with a mosaic tiled floor and fireplace. A cast-iron staircase, unique among New York clubs, rises four floors from the rear of the lobby. A large bar and lounging room, paneled in white oak, is reached a few steps down past the staircase. The principal rooms above the first floor are the previously mentioned Reading Room, the Pine Street Room, and larger Wainwright Room, now the Club's ballroom, on the second floor, the A la Carte Dining Room and the Buffet Room and Babcock Room, named for Samuel D. Babcock, the Club's third president, on the third floor and six private dining rooms and the Game Room on the fourth floor. A fitness facility on the fifth floor was built in the former employee's locker room. As originally conceived, and used until the early 1990s, the first floor was for pre-lunch preparation, either at the coat check, the men's or ladies washrooms, the barber, or at the bar and oyster bar. The Reading Room was principally used after lunch and was where members could take coffee, port wine, a cigar, or a nap. All other rooms were for the service of lunch and each had a unique menu. Meals in these rooms were delivered from service pantries and through an extensive system of dumbwaiters from the kitchens which occupied fully half the fifth floor. As the demand for lunch service declined the kitchen was moved and several of the dining rooms were converted to other uses, principally meetings and banquets. The Game Room, now a members-only room, was formerly a private dining room but now contains pocket billiards tables, games tables, a bar, and a large collection of hunting trophies.
See also
- Gentlemen's club
- List of American gentlemen's clubs
- List of Australian gentlemen's clubs
- List of London's gentlemen's clubs
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