Nomination of Historic Building, Structure, Site, Or

NOMINATION OF HISTORIC BUILDING, STRUCTURE, SITE, OR OBJECT PHILADELPHIA REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES PHILADELPHIA HISTORICAL COMMISSION SUBMIT ALL ATTACHED MATERIALS ON PAPER AND IN ELECTRONIC FORM ON CD (MS WORD FORMAT)

1. ADDRESS OF HISTORIC RESOURCE (must comply with a Board of Revision of Taxes address) Street address: 401-411 S. Broad Street st Postal code: 19147 Councilmanic District: 1 District

2. NAME OF HISTORIC RESOURCE Historic Name: Young Men’s & Young Women’s Hebrew Association Common Name: Gershman Y

3. TYPE OF HISTORIC RESOURCE ☒ Building ☐ Structure ☐ Site ☐ Object

4. PROPERTY INFORMATION Condition: ☐ excellent ☒ good ☐ fair ☐ poor ☐ ruins Occupancy: ☒ occupied ☐ vacant ☐ under construction ☐ unknown Current use: Community center, offices, galleries

5. BOUNDARY DESCRIPTION

SEE ATTACHED

6. DESCRIPTION

SEE ATTACHED

7. SIGNIFICANCE Period of Significance (from year to year): 1924-present Date(s) of construction and/or alteration: 1923-24 Architect, engineer, and/or designer: Frank E. Hahn, S. Brian Baylinson (associate), Paul Philippe Cret (consultant) Builder, contractor, and/or artisan: Original owner: Young Men’s & Young Women’s Hebrew Association Other significant persons: Albert M. Greenfield CRITERIA FOR DESIGNATION: The historic resource satisfies the following criteria for designation (check all that apply): ☒ (a) Has significant character, interest or value as part of the development, heritage or cultural characteristics of the City, Commonwealth or Nation or is associated with the life of a person significant in the past; or, ☐ (b) Is associated with an event of importance to the history of the City, Commonwealth or Nation; or, ☒ (c) Reflects the environment in an era characterized by a distinctive architectural style; or, ☒ (d) Embodies distinguishing characteristics of an architectural style or engineering specimen; or, ☒ (e) Is the work of a designer, architect, landscape architect or designer, or engineer whose work has significantly influenced the historical, architectural, economic, social, or cultural development of the City, Commonwealth or Nation; or, ☐ (f) Contains elements of design, detail, materials or craftsmanship which represent a significant innovation; or, ☐ (g) Is part of or related to a square, park or other distinctive area which should be preserved according to an historic, cultural or architectural motif; or, ☐ (h) Owing to its unique location or singular physical characteristic, represents an established and familiar visual feature of the neighborhood, community or City; or, ☐ (i) Has yielded, or may be likely to yield, information important in pre-history or history; or ☒ (j) Exemplifies the cultural, political, economic, social or historical heritage of the community.

8. MAJOR BIBLIOGRAPHICAL REFERENCES

SEE ATTACHED

9. NOMINATOR

Name with Title: Benjamin Leech, consultant Email: [email protected] Organization: Preservation Alliance for Greater Philadelphia Date: July 15, 2016 Street Address: 1608 Walnut Street, Suite 804 Telephone: (215) 546-1146 City, State, and Postal Code: Philadelphia, PA 19103 Nominator ☐ is ☒ is not the property owner.

PHC USE ONLY Date of Receipt:______☐ Correct-Complete ☐ Incorrect-Incomplete Date:______Date of Notice Issuance:______Property Owner at Time of Notice Name:______Address:______City:______State:____ Postal Code:______Date(s) Reviewed by the Committee on Historic Designation:______Date(s) Reviewed by the Historical Commission:______Date of Final Action:______☐ Designated ☐ Rejected 3/16/07

5. Boundary Description

Beginning at a point formed by the intersection of the Easterly side of Broad Street (113 feet wide) and the Southerly side of Pine Street (variable width); thence extending Southwardly along the Eastern side of Broad Street passing through basement steps which are partially within the bed of said Broad Street 140 feet to a point; thence Eastwardly passing through a wall passing along the Northerly end of a three feet wide alley by Deed which leads Southwardly and passing through a retaining wall 150 feet to a point on the Westerly side of Watts Street (20 feet wide); thence Northwardly along the said Westerly side of Watts Street passing along the Westerly side of steps at two places which steps are in the bed of said Watts Street and passing along the Westerly side of a cellar door 140 feet, 0 inches to a point on the Southerly side of said Pine Street; then Westerly along the said Southerly side of Pine Street 150 feet to a point on the Easterly side of said Broad Street being the first mentioned point and place of beginning.

6. Physical Description

The Young Men’s & Young Women’s Hebrew Association Building at 401-411 S. Broad Street, known since 1985 as the Gershman Y, is a four-story, reinforced concrete, masonry-clad structure occupying the southeast corner of Broad and Pine Streets in Center City Philadelphia. Completed in 1924, the Georgian Revival building was designed by architects Frank E. Hahn and S. Brian Baylinson in consultation with Paul Philippe Cret. The flat-roofed, rectangular building fills the entirety of its 140-foot by 150-foot lot, with its primary west elevation fronting Broad Street and a secondary north elevation fronting Pine Street [Fig 1]. Its rear (east) elevation fronts Watts Street; its side (south) elevation shares a party wall with an adjacent two-story building along Broad Street, but is otherwise freestanding. The Broad Street (west) and Pine Street (north) elevations are both clad in red brick, limestone, and terra cotta. Both the east and south elevations, also brick-clad, are primarily utilitarian in character.

The nine-bay Broad Street (west) elevation features a full-height, three-bay engaged temple front flanked by symmetrical three-bay wings [Fig. 2]. Terra cotta belt courses span the facade above the first and third floors, framed by brick quoining at each corner. Flanking the temple front, a limestone watertable runs the length of the facade, pierced by basement windows covered by ornamental iron grates. Round-arched first-floor windows sit atop this stone base, featuring ten-over-ten double-hung windows with arched divided-light transoms, limestone impost blocks and keystones, and iron railings; limestone roundels are set between each bay. Second-floor windows feature double-hung eight-over-eight sashes with matching eight-light transoms set under flat-arched limestone lintels with raised keystones, also with iron railings. Third-floor windows feature eight-over-eight double-hung sashes with flat-arched brick lintels, limestone keystones, and thin limestone sills. Fourth-floor windows are eight-over-eight double-hung sashes with no ornamental lintels. The terra cotta cornice features a flat fascia band, dentils, block modillions, and a brick parapet with balustrade panels centered above each window bay.

The facade’s central temple front stands slightly proud of its flanking wings on a quoined stone base that reaches the full height of the ground floor. The main entrance features a classical doorway surround capped by a broken pediment and an engaged, draped urn [Fig. 3]. A fascia panel over the doorway is inscribed “YM&YWHA.” The doorway itself is a non-original, metal

2 and glass double-leaf unit set under a large fixed glass transom. Atop this base, four engaged Corinthian pilasters rise three stories to the cornice, carrying a fascia panel inscribed “YOUNG MEN’S & YOUNG WOMEN’S HEBREW ASS’N” between two paterae. Between the pilasters, the upper story fenestration mirrors the proportions and configurations of the adjacent wings, but its windows are enframed in terra cotta surrounds and embellished with dentilled cornices and ornamental swags between the second and third floors. Above the fourth floor, the pediment tympanum features a bas-relief crest depicting clasped hands, the Star of David, and an oil lamp atop a stack of books, flanked by wheat sheafs, olive branches, and ornamental scrolls [Figs. 4-5]. A keystone at the corner of Broad and Pine Streets is inscribed “1923” along Broad Street and “5683” (the equivalent date in the Hebrew calendar) along Pine Street [Fig. 6].

The Pine Street elevation continues the basic ornamentation and fenestration programs of the Broad Street facade, but substitutes the pedimented temple front with a two-story, tripartite arched window flanked by paired Corinthian pilasters [Fig. 7]. The ground floor originally featured three bays of double-leaf metal doors set within a stone base two steps above sidewalk grade; only the westernmost bay currently remains operable, modified with non-historic metal doors and an accessible ramp running parallel to Pine Street. The other two openings are currently infilled with fixed panels. The arched window ensemble features a fifteen-over-fifteen double-hung window flanked by two narrow six-over-six double-hung sidelights. A heavy band of classical molding runs between the window heads and the arched transom light above, which is surrounded by a flat terra cotta archivolt. Impost blocks are inscribed with Greek frets, and a large keystone caps the arch. A band of bas-relief swags and urn stretches between pilaster capitals below a fascia band inscribed with “YM&YWHA,” framed by paterae.

The rear Watts Street elevation is primarily utilitarian in character, with steel and concrete balconies projecting from the building at the first, second, third, and fourth-floor levels, accessed through a miscellaneous collection of original doorways and modified windows [Fig. 8]. Tripartite, divided-light windows mark five central bays on the lower two floors. The first-floor windows are set at transom height and feature fixed fifteen-light central sashes flanked by six-light sidelights. At the second floor, double-hung fifteen-over-fifteen sashes are flanked by six-over-six sidelights. The fourth floor features three large arched window ensembles scaled to match the central window along Pine Street [Fig. 9]. The south-facing side elevation is also utilitarian, with the blank brick wall of an auditorium fly tower dominating the rear portion of the

3 building and a fenestrated light well set into the wall toward its Broad Street side. A tall brick smokestack is also prominent along this elevation, as is a rooftop playground enclosure (also visible along Broad Street) that is original to the building [Fig. 10].

With the exception of some surviving side and rear window units, all of the building’s windows have been replaced with new units matching the general configurations of the originals. Otherwise, the building retains a very high degree of integrity and has undergone few substantial exterior alterations since its original construction [Figs. 11-12].

Figure 1: Young Men’s & Young Women’s Hebrew Association/Gershman Y, 2016.

Figure 2: West (Broad Street) elevation, 2016.

Figure 3: West elevation entrance detail, 2016.

Figure 4: West elevation pediment detail, 2016.

Figure 5: West elevation tympanum detail, 2016.

Figure 6: Cornerstone at Broad and Pine Streets, 2016.

Figure 7: Pine Street (north) elevation detail, 2016.

Figure 8: Watts Street (east) and Pine Street (north) elevations, 2016.

Figure 9: Watts Street (east) elevation detail, 2016.

Figure 10: South elevation, 2016.

Figure 11: YM-YWHA membership solicitation card, circa 1924. Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Albert M. Greenfield Papers.

Figure 12: Circa 1975. Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, YM/YWHA Arts Council records, 1962-2006.

10 7. Significance

The Young Men’s & Young Women’s Hebrew Association (YM-YWHA) building at 410-411 S. Broad Street is a significant Philadelphia landmark reflecting more than nine decades of Jewish social, cultural, and educational heritage. Designed by architect Frank E. Hahn and S. Brian Baylinson in consultation with Paul Philippe Cret, the prominent Georgian Revival building was celebrated at the time of its construction in 1924 as the largest Jewish institutional building of its kind in the United States. It was also the first center built jointly by formerly independent chapters of the Young Men’s and Young Women’s Hebrew Associations, a precursor to numerous subsequent mergers among peer associations across the country. The institution has operated continuously through a series of organizational realignments into the present day; since 1985, it has been known as the Gershman Y.

From its inception, the building was designed and operated as a multipurpose recreational, educational, and cultural center whose amenities included a 1,500-seat auditorium, library, swimming pool, gymnasium, bowling alley, kosher cafeteria, beauty parlor, social lounges, and twenty classrooms and clubrooms.1 The list of prominent figures involved in the building’s planning and construction reads as a veritable “who’s who” of early twentieth-century Philadelphia society: Albert M. Greenfield chaired its building committee and presided over its groundbreaking, cornerstone-laying, and dedication ceremonies; accomplished lawyers Leon J. Obermayer and Morris Wolf were the current president and vice-president, respectively, of the organization at the time; Charles and Ellis Gimbel, Samuel and Jacob Lit, Joseph Snellenburg, Samuel Fels, and Jules E. Mastbaum were all active in its fundraising drive; Samuel S. Fleisher directed its arts programs and, along with his siblings, endowed the building’s Simon B. Fleisher Memorial Auditorium in honor of their father.2 The building cemented Frank E. Hahn’s reputation as a favored architect among leading Jewish circles, and the project was lent further distinction through the involvement of Paul Philippe Cret, Hahn’s former mentor, in the building’s design.

At the peak of its popularity in an era before widespread postwar suburbanization, the YM-YWHA claimed over 20,000 active members from across the city and hosted an extensive

1 Langfeld, William R. The Young Men’s Hebrew Association of Philadelphia: A Fifty-Year Chronicle. Philadelphia: The Young Men’s and Young Women’s Hebrew Association, 1928, p. 96; 2 “Plan ‘Movie’ Play in Jewish Drive,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, Oct. 20, 1921; “Jews to Dedicate New Home Today,” Philadelphia Inquirer, Nov. 9, 1924. 11 program of day and evening classes for youth and adults, lecture salons, club meetings, and regular musical and theatrical performances catering to diverse audiences across and beyond the city’s Jewish community. The building was home to a Hebrew school for youth, a business college for adults, and night classes in art, literature, drama, psychology, real estate, bookkeeping, stenography, dressmaking, home economics, and myriad other topics. An incomplete but characteristically polyglot list of distinguished speakers and performers to appear at the YM-YWHA over the years includes Louis Marshall, Clarence Darrow, Albert Einstein, Margaret Mead, Robert Frost, e.e. cummings, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Betty Shabazz, Miriam Makeba, Louis I. Kahn, and Andy Warhol.3 In 1958, the YM-YWHA Arts Council was established to promote contemporary visual and performing arts in Philadelphia, quickly becoming one of the most influential and experimental arts organizations in the city’s modern history and playing a nationally significant role in the Pop Art movement of the 1960s.4

By virtue of its long and storied cultural legacy and its distinctive architectural character, the building clearly merits listing on the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places, satisfying the following five criteria established in Philadelphia’s Historic Preservation Ordinance, Section 14-1004 (1):

(A) Has significant character, interest, or value as part of the development, heritage, or cultural characteristics of the City, Commonwealth, or nation or is associated with the life of a person significant in the past;

(D) Embodies distinguishing characteristics of an architectural style or engineering specimen;

(E) Is the work of a designer, architect, landscape architect or designer, or professional engineer whose work has significantly influenced the historical,

3 Langfeld, p. 101; “Einstein to Talk at Philadelphia,” Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Feb. 3, 1931; “Dr. Margaret Mead to Speak at Meeting,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Jan. 8, 1956; “Jewish Groups to Mark 170 Years of Service,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Oct. 24, 1965; Burkhart, Kitsi, “Nation Must Solve Race Problem, Widow of Malcolm X Says Here,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Jan. 28, 1970; Joan Kron Papers, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. 4 Harper, Cheryl. A Happening Place: How the Arts Council Revolutionized the Philadelphia Art Scene in the Sixties. Philadelphia: The Jewish Community Centers of Philadelphia, 2003. 12 architectural, economic, social, or cultural development of the City, Commonwealth, or nation;

and

(J) Exemplifies the cultural, political, economic, social, or historical heritage of the community.

The Young Men’s & Young Women’s Hebrew Association

The institution traces its roots to 1875, when a group of young, upwardly-mobile Jewish Philadelphians formed the Young Men’s Hebrew Association of Philadelphia, modelled loosely on a homonymous New York City literary society begun the previous year. Its original purpose, like many similar clubs that characterized middle- and upper-class Philadelphia society in that era, was for “the establishment of a reading room and library, lectures on historical, scientific, literary, and social topics, and Jewish history and literature, entertainments of a social, artistic, literary and musical nature.”5 The nascent group first rented quarters in the Spring Garden Institute building on the northeast corner of Broad and Spring Garden Streets [Fig. 13] before moving across the street to the new Odd Fellows Hall in 1883 [Fig. 14]. Three years later it moved again to the Handel & Haydn Hall at Eighth and Spring Garden Streets [Fig. 15]. By 1907 it had acquired its first standalone headquarters, a converted and expanded rowhouse at 1616 Master Street [Figs. 16-17] that remained its home until construction of the vastly larger new YM-YWHA in 1924.6

5 Langfeld, p. 8. 6 Ibid., p. 11ff. 13

Figure 13 (left): Spring Garden Institute, Broad and Spring Garden Streets (1875-1883). Figure 14 (center): Odd Fellows Hall (1883-1886) Figure 15 (right): Handel & Haydn Hall (1886-1892) All images from Langfeld, William R. The Young Men’s Hebrew Association of Philadelphia: A Fifty-Year Chronicle. Philadelphia: The Young Men’s and Young Women’s Hebrew Association, 1928

Figure 16 (left): YMHA Building, 1616 Master Street, c. 1907. Image from Langfeld, The Young Men’s Hebrew Association of Philadelphia. Figure 17 (right): YMHA Building c. 1917, remodeled by Sauer & Hahn. Philadelphia Evening Bulletin clippings, Special Collections Resource Center, Urban Archives, Temple University

14 In 1875, Philadelphia's entire Jewish population numbered 15,000, mostly German Jews living north of Market Street. By 1924, Philadelphia's Jews numbered more than 240,000 following an unprecedented wave of Eastern European immigration that began in the late nineteenth century.7 As it grew along with this population boom, the YWHA sought to establish a “middle ground” between elite society clubs like the Mercantile Club, which catered to the highest echelons of Philadelphia’s primarily German-Jewish “uptown” set, and the “downtown” landsmannschaften (benevolent societies) settlement houses, trade unions,and Talmud Torahs (Hebrew religious schools) that proliferated among South Philadelphia's primarily "Russian-Jewish" (in reality a mix of Russian, Ukrainian, and other Eastern European) immigrant communities.8 Its egalitarian character was described in 1928 thusly: “Its nature is that of a modestly-run club with emphasis on the side of culture and self-improvement. [...] It is not charitable in the sense that it does not minister to pressing physical needs. It is charitable in the sense that it does give a large measure of mental, moral, social, and cultural aid to those who by themselves, could not provide the quantity or quality thereof, which it offers.”9

Though female members were accepted beginning in 1870, other organizations like the Young Women’s Union (founded in 1885 and reincorporated in 1918 as the Neighborhood Centre) and the Young Women’s Hebrew Association (founded in 1920) were initially more effective in soliciting female membership and participation. This changed in the early 1920s when the YMHA and YWHA formally merged in anticipation of the construction of a new joint facility. The merger also followed a joint membership drive in 1922 that resulted in six thousand new members between the two organizations, making the soon-be-be-combined YM-YWHA the largest such chapter in the United States.10

Plans for “a far more pretentious and commodious structure than its present home” were first discussed by the YMHA in 1919, only three years after undertaking major renovations at their 1616 Master Street building.11 In October 1921, plans were announced for a "five-story modern fireproof building of the Georgian period built of brick and Indiana limestone." Though no site

7 Ibid, p. 5; Statistics of Jews, American Jewish Yearbook, 1920; “Study of the Social and Recreational Resources of the Jewish Community of Philadelphia.” New York: Jewish Welfare Board, 1924, p. 1. 8 Rosen, Philip, “German Jews vs. Russian Jews in Philadelphia Philanthropy,” Jewish Life in Philadelphia, 1830-1940, Murray Friedman, ed. Philadelphia: American Jewish Committee, 1983, p. 198ff. 9 Langfeld, p. 9. 10 Ibid., p. 93. 11 Ibid., p. 94. 15 had yet been selected, renderings of the proposed building depicted a prominent corner location along what appeared to be a major thoroughfare, clearly an ambitious upgrade in scale and prominence from 1616 Master Street [Fig. 18].12 The rendering was published to support an equally ambitious $750,000 fundraising campaign for the building's construction. Spearheaded by Albert M. Greenfield, Morris Wolf, Ellis A. Gimbel, and other prominent business and civic leaders, the campaign was launched on October 30; by November 7, nearly $900,000 had been raised.13 A special “movie play” was produced for the drive’s opening-night gala, featuring appearances by Cyrus Adler, Rabbi Joseph Krauskopf, Judge Horace Stern, Jules E. Mastbaum, Ellis A. Gimbel, Samuel D. Lit, Samuel S. Fleisher, and a number of leading society wives, including Mmes. Greenfield, Wolf, Mastbaum, Snellenberg, and Stern.14

In April 1922, nine properties on the southeast corner of Broad And Pine Streets (1338-50 Pine Street, 411 S. Broad Street, and 402 Watts Street) were acquired and demolished after an October ceremony that featured Mrs. Albert Greenfield removing the row’s the first brick with a crowbar [Fig. 20].15 A ground-breaking ceremony in April 1923 and a cornerstone-laying ceremony in November 1923 were both presided over by Albert Greenfield; the later included a traditional Kaddish to honor Jewish American soldiers killed in World War I, a list of whose names were placed within the cornerstone.16 The new building was completed by the following summer and formally dedicated with a ceremony on Nov. 9th, 1924 at a ceremony attended by over 5,000 people. The final cost was $1,250,000, and a new membership drive launched to cover a $500,000 construction mortgage quickly pushed the organization’s rolls past 20,000.17

12 “Modern Structure Here Will be Memorial to Jews Who Fell in the World War,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, Oct. 16, 1921. 13 “Jewish Drive Ends Far Beyond Goal,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, Nov. 8, 1921. 14 “Plan ‘Movie’ Play in Jewish Drive,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, Oct. 20, 1921. 15 “New Home for Y.M.H.A.,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, April 20, 1922; “Y.M.H.A. Building Begun,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Oct. 11, 1922. 16 “Y.M.H.A. Breaks Ground, Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, April 27, 1923; “To Start Hebrew Centre,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Nov. 3, 1923 17 “Jews to Dedicate New Home Today,” Philadelphia Inquirer, Nov. 9, 1924; Langfeld, p. 98. 16

Figure 18: Preliminary rendering by S. Brian Baylinson, 1921. Philadelphia Evening Bulletin Photograph Collection, Special Collections Resource Center, Urban Archives, Temple University.

Figure 19: Broad Street elevation rendering by Frank E. Hahn, 1922. Philadelphia Evening Bulletin Photograph Collection, Special Collections Resource Center, Urban Archives, Temple University.

Figure 20: Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Oct. 11, 1922. Special Collections Resource Center, Urban Archives, Temple University.

18 Frank E. Hahn, S. Brian Baylinson, and Paul Philippe Cret

The building’s final design was credited to Frank E. Hahn (1879-1962) and S. Brian Baylinson (1895-1969) in consultation with Paul Philippe Cret (1876-1945), and was a refined iteration of the initial plans by Hahn and Baylinson circulated during the building’s funding drive [Fig. 19]. Hahn’s participation in the project was no surprise; he was a long-serving member of the YMHA’s board of directors and was also responsible, with his former firm Sauer & Hahn, for the 1913-14 remodelling of the association’s 1616 Master Street headquarters [Fig. 17]. In 1921, Hahn also completed a similar Georgian Revival design for the Federation of Jewish Charities on the northwest corner of 9th and Pine Streets [Fig. 21].18 His Royal Theater, built at 1534-36 South Street in 1920 for Morris and Abraham Wax, and his Jewish Education Center #2, completed in 1928 at Marshall and Porter Streets, are both individually listed on the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places.

Figure 21: Federation of Jewish Charities Building, Frank E. Hahn, 1922, 9th and Pine Streets. Meyers, Allen. The Jewish Community of South Philadelphia. Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing Company, 1998

18 Meyers, Allen. The Jewish Community of South Philadelphia. Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing Company, 1998, p. 90. 19 Hahn was a Philadelphia native and graduate of Northeast High School who first studied civil engineering at the University of Pennsylvania (B.S., 1900) before pursuing architectural design through the Philadelphia’s T-Square Club’s evening atelier while working as an engineer for the Pennsylvania Railroad. At the time, training at the T-Square Club was led by Paul A. Davis and Paul Cret, both strong proponents of the principles and curriculum of the Ecole des Beaux Arts. Cret in particular remained a mentor figure to Hahn even after the young architect entered private practise in 1906.19

S. Brian Baylinson, who was credited as associate architect in the building’s final design, attended the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Paris after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania in 1920. He returned to his native Philadelphia and joined Hahn’s practice around 1921. By around 1923 the partnership was formalized as Hahn & Baylinson, which under Baylinson’s direction as chief designer produced the Warwick Hotel (1925-28, 17th and Locust Streets) among other notable commissions. Their partnership was dissolved in 1928. Before moving to New York City in the early 1930s, Baylinson completed a number of local commissions in private practice, including the Philadelphia Register-listed Art Deco garage at 1501 Fairmount Avenue (1929).20

Paul Philippe Cret, one of the most distinguished and influential Philadelphia architects of the 20th Century, was selected as consulting architect by the YM-YWHA building committee at Hahn’s urging. A native of Lyons, France, Cret was invited to Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania by Paul A. Davis in 1903; with the exception of his five years of service in the French Army during World War I, Cret remained in Philadelphia until his death in 1945. As a professor at Penn and patron of the T-Square Club atalier, Cret trained a generation of Philadelphia architects in the principles of Beaux Arts design while simultaneously cultivating, both in his own work and that of his students and disciples, creative experimentation towards Art Deco, “stripped classical,” and modern modes of design. In a letter to Greenfield and the YM-YWHA Building Committee, Hahn praised Cret as “a man most proficient in his profession, one who has had unlimited experience and whose name will be a credit to this office and whose efforts and consultations will add greatly to the results obtained for the Association and the

19 Tatman, Sandra L. “Hahn, Frank Eugene (1879-1962),” American Architects and Buildings database, https://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm?ArchitectId=A0552 20 Tatman, Sandra L. “Baylinson, Samuel Brian (1895-1969),” American Architects and Buildings database, https://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm/22259 20 community in general.”21 The YM-YWHA is the only known professional collaboration between Hahn and Cret, and a rare example of a Georgian Revival design directly associated with Cret. Though the extent of Cret’s hand in the final design is unclear and possibly minimal, his involvement succeeded in lending the project a desired level of prestige.

Georgian Revival

The building’s design is a notable example of the Georgian Revival style, a particular mode within a broader Colonial Revival movement which strongly influenced residential, commercial, and institutional architecture across America for much of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Particularly in Philadelphia, the popularity of Colonial Revival reached twin crescendoes marked by the Centennial Exposition of 1876 and the Sesquicentennial Exhibition of 1926, though in reality the style remained common (if not de rigueur) through the end of the twentieth century and into the present. Architectural historian Annie Robinson describes the enduring popularity of the Colonial Revival “as a movement or an impulse promoted by architects, historians, patriots and/or antiquarians, for purposes as diverse as the preservation of American buildings and culture, the discovery of an American ‘style,’ the reunification of a nation torn by civil war, and the acculturation of a growing immigrant population.”22 Less commonly acknowledged but equally significant, particularly in examples like the YM-YWHA project, is the strong influence of academic Beaux Arts traditions in the history of the Colonial Revival. As architectural historian Mardges Bacon notes, “Between 1890 and the depression, practitioners of the colonial revival were predominantly educated in Paris at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts or in America at schools that reflected Beaux-Arts methods and principles. Although their architecture was broadly labeled ‘Beaux-Arts,’ it embraced a variety of stylistic categories, among which the colonial revival most ardently expressed a growing need for national identity.” 23 Just as the Beaux Arts design approach championed the studied adaptation of classical forms

21 Frank E. Hahn to Albert M. Greenfield, May 24, 1922. Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia Records, Box 7, Folder 5, Special Collections Resource Center, Temple University. 22 Robinson, Annie, “A ‘Portrait of a Nation:’ The Role of the Historic American Buildings Survey in the Colonial Revival.” Recreating the American Past: Essays on the Colonial Revival, Richard Guy Wilson, Shaun Eyring, and Kenny Marotta, editors. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2006, pp. 99-100. 23 Bacon, Mardges, “Toward a National Style of Architecture: The Beaux-Arts Interpretation of the Colonial Revival.” The Colonial Revival in America, Alan Axelrod, editor. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1985, p. 91. 21 and details from antiquity, academic proponents of the Colonial Revival turned to early American architecture for a palette of forms, materials, and details through with to express a particularly “American” contemporary style. That many of these important Georgian precedents-- Independence Hall, Carpenter’s Hall, Christ Church, Cliveden, Mount Pleasant, etc.-- stood (and still stand) in Philadelphia only amplified the local significance of the movement and its emerging principles of contextualism in twentieth-century design.

Elements of Georgian architecture commonly adopted in the Georgian Revival included symmetrical red brick facades, corner quoins, round-arched and flat-arched windows with stone impost blocks, lintels and keystones, classical pediments, balustrade parapets, and other classical details, all of which are visible in the design of the YM-YWHA. Also noteworthy is the building’s place in a broader context of Jewish institutional architecture in twentieth-century Philadelphia, much of which (e.g. the Jewish Federation of Charities, Mount Sinai Hospital, and the Jewish Education Center #1) was built in the Georgian Revival or other Colonial Revival modes, no doubt to emphasize the successful assimilation of the Jewish community into mainstream American society.

YM-YWHA Arts Council

Reflecting a much different legacy relative to mainstream American society, another significant aspect of the building’s history lies in its role as the headquarters of the YM-YWHA Arts Council, one of the city’s most significant contemporary arts organizations of the 1960s. Though arts education had been central to the association’s mission from its inception, and particularly during Samuel S. Fleisher’s tenure as art director in the late 1920s, this facet of the organization had atrophied somewhat by the 1950s. In response, a group of self-described “volunteer housewives” formed the YM-YWHA Arts Council in 1958, modelled loosely on programs offered by the 92nd Street YMHA in New York City.24 Among the first to volunteer were Phyllis Yusem, Joan Kron, and Audrey Sabol (wife of NFL Films founder Ed Sabol), each of whom had a strong interest in the avant-garde arts scene then emerging in New York City. By 1961, the group had already presented a major exhibit of Irving Penn photographs and hosted poetry readings by

24 Foley, Eileen, “Phyllis Yusem: Talent Scout,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Oct. 28, 1965. 22 e.e. cummings and Robert Frost.25 In 1962, the Arts Council organized what is now recognized as the first exhibition of “Pop Art” on the East Coast, featuring major works by then-obscure but now internationally-acclaimed artists Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, Marisol, Claes Oldenburg, Robert Rauschenberg, Jean Tinguely, and others [Fig. 22]. The show, entitled “ART 1963/A New Vocabulary,” was accompanied by one of pioneering performance artist Allan Kaprow’s famous “Happenings,” an installation that filled the building’s auditorium with hundreds of live, frozen, and roasted chickens, chicken eggs, and a giant chickenwire chicken effigy.26 Other noteworthy artists to exhibit in subsequent years included Frank Stella, Ed Ruscha, Robert Indiana, Christo, and Andy Warhol [Fig. 23-24]. In 1966, the Arts Council hosted Warhol’s seminal multimedia event “Exploding Plastic Inevitable,” featuring Edie Sedgwick, the Velvet Underground and Nico.27 The following year, a performance of “Paradise Now” by the acclaimed off-Broadway theatre troupe the Living Theatre was raided by Philadelphia police, and three semi-nude actors were arrested for public indecency.28

Though the Arts Council was sponsored by the YM-YWHA and used its Broad and Pine Street building for the majority of its exhibits and events, it promoted itself as a semi-autonomous, non-sectarian membership organization aimed at a wide regional audience. Addressing the National Conference of Jewish Communal Service in 1967, Phyllis Yusem framed the success of the Arts Council within the broader redevelopment narrative of postwar Philadelphia:

The face of Center City Philadelphia began to change about ten years ago, too. Slums began to be redeveloped into restored town houses and elegant high-rise apartments. Accordingly, there was a mass re-entry of residents into the center of the city, especially of the young, upper middle class, educated Jews. Access to the city for the confirmed suburbanites was facilitated by the advent of the super highway. The “Family Second Car” literally gave wheels to women whose school children no longer needed their attention until late afternoon. They were energetic, intelligent, and educated. Some were professionals in various fields; other were housewives. But most important, they shared a mutual interest in the arts and were naturally drawn to the Y for the Arts Council program.29

25 Harper, p. 6. 26 Ibid., p. 26. 27 “A Warhol ‘Happening” in YMHA Auditorium,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Dec. 4, 1966. 28 Gaffney, John J., Jr., “‘Nude’ Actors on Broad St. Get No Encore From Police,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Nov. 27, 1968. 29 Yusem, Phyllis F. “A Jewish Center Cultural Program-- A Volunteer’s Viewpoint,” unpublished typescript, Joan Kron Papers, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution. 23

Figure 22: Exhibition poster, “ART 1963/A New Vocabulary,” 1962. Harper, Cheryl. A Happening Place: How the Arts Council Revolutionized the Philadelphia Art Scene in the Sixties. Philadelphia: The Jewish Community Centers of Philadelphia, 2003.

Figure 22: Exhibition postcard, “How the West Has Done,” 1966. Audrey Sabol Papers, American Archives of Art, Smithsonian Institution.

Figure 23: Jewish Exponent, Dec. 2, 1966

The Arts Council remained a major fixture of Philadelphia’s art scene through the 1970s, credited with fostering a dynamic local community of contemporary artists and audiences years before equivalent efforts were undertaken by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art, the Institute for Contemporary Art, and others. “[M]ajor exhibitions organized by the Arts Council… were certainly in advance of many other museums generally sand Philadelphia institutions in particular,” noted art historian Marina Pacini in a 1987 retrospective article in the Archives of American Art Journal. “Eventually, local museums and

25 galleries displaced the Arts Council; but before that happened, the Arts Council introduced contemporary art to Philadelphia and made it available to the general public.”30

Gershman Y

In 1965, the YM-YWHA merged with the Neighborhood Centre (formerly the Young Women’s Union) to form the Jewish Ys and Centers of Greater Philadelphia, which in turn reincorporated as the Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia in 1984, with various branches in Northeast, West, and South Philadelphia. The following year, the Broad and Pine Street building was rededicated as the Charles and Elizabeth Gershman Y. Its existing educational, cultural, and recreational programs continued another fifteen years until another major reorganization in 2000, when the Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia closed its pool and gym and sold the building to the University of the Arts, the building’s current owner.31 The Gershman Y remained the building’s main tenant under the parent JCC, with a focus on arts and culture programming tailored to complement South Broad Street’s transformation into the Avenue of the Arts district. In 2009, the Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia officially disbanded and the Gershman Y became an independent non-profit organization. Today, it continues to operate art exhibitions, community programs, Jewish cultural events, and the annual Philadelphia Jewish Film Festival out of the Broad and Pine Street building.32

Conclusion

The Young Men’s & Young Women’s Hebrew Association (YM-YWHA) building at 410-411 S. Broad Street is a significant architectural and cultural landmark which the meets five criteria for listing on the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places. By virtue of its prominent role in Philadelphia’s Jewish community and its unique place in the history of twentieth-century art, the building possesses significant character, interest, and value as part of the development, heritage, or cultural characteristics of the City (Criterion A) and exemplifies the cultural, political,

30 Pacini, Marina. “Who But the Arts Council,” Archives of American Art Journal, Vol. 27, n. 4 (1987), p. 9. 31 Marrone, Jenna, “Historical Note, Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia Records,” SCRC 177, Special Collections Research Center, Temple University Libraries. http://library.temple.edu/scrc/jewish-community-centers 32 “About,” http://www.gershmany.org/about/ 26 economic, social, or historical heritage of the community (Criterion J). Criterion A is further met through the building’s association with Albert M. Greenfield, the chairman of its building committee who proved instrumental in its planning, fundraising, and construction. The building’s Georgian Revival design reflects the environment in an era characterized by a distinctive architectural style (Criterion C) and embodies distinguishing characteristics of an architectural style or engineering specimen (Criterion D). Finally, the building stands as one of the most prominent buildings designed by prolific Philadelphia architect Frank E. Hahn, whose work has significantly influenced the historical, architectural, economic, social, or cultural development of the city (Criterion E), and whose collaboration with Paul Philippe Cret and S. Brian Baylinson on the design adds yet another layer of significance to the building.

27 8. Bibliography

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“About,” http://www.gershmany.org/about/ Accessed July 13, 2016.

Bacon, Mardges, “Toward a National Style of Architecture: The Beaux-Arts Interpretation of the Colonial Revival.” The Colonial Revival in America, Alan Axelrod, editor. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1985.

Burkhart, Kitsi, “Nation Must Solve Race Problem, Widow of Malcolm X Says Here,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Jan. 28, 1970.

“Dr. Margaret Mead to Speak at Meeting,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Jan. 8, 1956.

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Foley, Eileen, “Phyllis Yusem: Talent Scout,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Oct. 28, 1965.

Gaffney, John J., Jr., “‘Nude’ Actors on Broad St. Get No Encore From Police,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Nov. 27, 1968.

Hahn, Frank E. to Greenfield, Albert M., May 24, 1922. Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia Records, Box 7, Folder 5, Special Collections Resource Center, Temple University.

Harper, Cheryl. A Happening Place: How the Arts Council Revolutionized the Philadelphia Art Scene in the Sixties. Philadelphia: The Jewish Community Centers of Philadelphia, 2003.

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Langfeld, William R. The Young Men’s Hebrew Association of Philadelphia: A Fifty-Year Chronicle. Philadelphia: The Young Men’s and Young Women’s Hebrew Association, 1928.

Marrone, Jenna, “Historical Note, Jewish Community Centers of Greater Philadelphia Records,” SCRC 177, Special Collections Research Center, Temple University Libraries. http://library.temple.edu/scrc/jewish-community-centers, accessed July 13, 2016.

Meyers, Allen. The Jewish Community of South Philadelphia. Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing Company, 1998.

28 “Modern Structure Here Will be Memorial to Jews Who Fell in the World War,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, Oct. 16, 1921.

“New Home for Y.M.H.A.,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, April 20, 1922; “Y.M.H.A. Building Begun,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Oct. 11, 1922.

Pacini, Marina. “Who But the Arts Council,” Archives of American Art Journal, Vol. 27, n. 4 (1987), pp. 9-23.

“Plan ‘Movie’ Play in Jewish Drive,” Philadelphia Public Ledger, Oct. 20, 1921.

Robinson, Annie, “A ‘Portrait of a Nation:’ The Role of the Historic American Buildings Survey in the Colonial Revival.” Recreating the American Past: Essays on the Colonial Revival, Richard Guy Wilson, Shaun Eyring, and Kenny Marotta, editors. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2006.

Rosen, Philip, “German Jews vs. Russian Jews in Philadelphia Philanthropy,” Jewish Life in Philadelphia, 1830-1940, Murray Friedman, ed. Philadelphia: American Jewish Committee, 1983.

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“Study of the Social and Recreational Resources of the Jewish Community of Philadelphia.” New York: Jewish Welfare Board, 1924.

Tatman, Sandra L. “Baylinson, Samuel Brian (1895-1969),” American Architects and Buildings database, https://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm/22259, accessed July 13, 2016.

Tatman, Sandra L. “Hahn, Frank Eugene (1879-1962),” American Architects and Buildings database, https://www.philadelphiabuildings.org/pab/app/ar_display.cfm?ArchitectId=A0552 accessed July 13, 2016.

“Warhol Wing-Ding,” Jewish Exponent, Dec. 2, 1966.

“Y.M.H.A. Breaks Ground, Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, April 27, 1923; “To Start Hebrew Centre,” Philadelphia Evening Bulletin, Nov. 3, 1923.

Yusem, Phyllis F. “A Jewish Center Cultural Program-- A Volunteer’s Viewpoint,” unpublished typescript, Joan Kron Papers, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution.