More Development Beyond Our Borders

Gossips has been watching this row of early houses for more than two years now. 

Ten Broeck Row in 1926|Photo courtesy Peter Cipkowski

I first assumed they had been built by Fred W. Jones for his workers at the New York Coral & Shell Marble Company (the houses are located right across the road from the house where he lived), but I was wrong. I have since learned they were built by the Ten Broeck family at the beginning of the last century, after Jones had already died, and maintained by the Ten Broecks as rental property. The houses were once known as Ten Broeck Row.

In February 2015, it was feared the row of houses was to be demolished. They were vacant, and notices had been posted on the doors. It turned out, however, that they were to be renovated. There was hope that the front porches might be spared and restored, and some effort was made to get that to happen, but alas, in April 2016, they came off. The original plan, as it was explained to Gossips by the Town of Greenport building inspector back in August 2015, was to change the orientation of the houses, putting their front doors in the back, giving access to a parking area. That plan seems to have changed, and recently little floating gables have appeared over the doors of a few of the houses. 

This morning, a reader sent Gossips a picture that shows that the final vision for the little houses involves brickface on the facades.

Photo: Robert Mechling

If I were ever to assemble a dictionary of architectural terms, I would probably use these before (below) and after (above) pictures to illustrate my definition of remuddling. 

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