History and architecture
Located on the south side of East 12th Street between Broadway and University Place, this building originally housed Grammar School 47, which was one of the first New York City schools built exclusively for the education of girls at a time when the city was trying to expand learning opportunities for young women. Constructed in 1855 for the New York City Board of Education, it was designed in the Anglo-Italianate style by architect Thomas R. Jackson.
This four-story building has a symmetrically-organized facade with two pedimented pavilions flanking a recessed central section. The rusticated brownstone base features prominent arched openings and a central entrance porch with paired Corinthian piers supporting an entablature. Lydia Wadleigh, an advocate of higher education for young women, taught at Grammar School 47, where she founded the 12th Street Advanced School for Girls in 1856. In 1897, this was reorganized as Girls' High School, the city's first official high school for girls.
The school was renamed Wadleigh High School in 1900, and moved to a new building on West 115th Street in Harlem in 1902. That year Girls' Technical High School, which was later renamed Washington Irving High School, was established in the East 12th Street school building. It ceased operating as an educational facility in 1914. Until 1958 it housed the Board of Education's building operations and maintenance offices, when it was turned over to the Police Department's Juvenile Aid Bureau and the Police Athletic League.
One of the oldest surviving school buildings in Manhattan, it remains the administrative offices of the Police Athletic League.
Sources and further reading
This history comes from the Landmarks app’s historical catalog. Names and building uses may reflect the period described.