Alfred T. White and Brooklyn's Better Self

Last night, BHS hosted a book launch for The Social Vision of Alfred T. White, a new publication from Proteotypes, the publishing arm of the fantastic Brooklyn gallery and reading room Proteus Gowanus. It was a great event. Sasha Chavcahcadze and Tom LaFarge from Proteus spoke about White, his work and what compelled them to tell his story, and an interesting and diverse crowd of people were there to enjoy the speakers, our library, and some tasty treats. Brooklyn Historical was a collaborator on the book, and much research was done for it in our library. It is a great resource, and we were thrilled to be a part of the process.

Alfred Tredway White (1846-1921) is a frequent subject of reference questions in our library. Through helping people find sources to answer these questions, I've become really interested in his work. Throughout his life, he was a tireless advocate for affordable, dignified housing for the working classes and for poor and immigrant children in a Brooklyn that was quickly becoming an industrialized, populous metropolis. White is little remembered today, but his work is still seen all over the city in the form of buildings he built such as Riverside Apartments on Columbia Pl. in Brooklyn Heights, the Home and Tower Apartments on Hicks St. in Cobble Hill, and the Workingmen's Cottages on Warren Pl.

His influence reached beyond just the buildings he was directly responsible for. White was an engineer by training and a businessman by practice, and was driven by moral convictions fueled by his work with poor and immigrant children in the settlement schools of Brooklyn's First Unitarian Church. It was this unique combination of social calling, keen business acumen, and an engineer's problem-solving abilities and design sense that I think made his influence so far-reaching and effective. He advocated for a "philanthropy plus 5%" business model, and was able to persuade other wealthy men in his social circle to follow his lead and build housing that was affordable for the working class but would still show their owners a respectable profit. He directly influenced Frederic Pratt to build the Astral Apartments in Greenpoint for workers in its kerosene refineries, and the City and Suburban Homes Company's large developments on W. 68th and W. 69th Sts. in Manhattan; his writings helped in the passage of Tenement legislation in New York State in the 1890s; and with friend and Brooklyn Mayor Seth Low founded the Brooklyn Bureau of Charities.





The list of ways in which his philanthropy and advocacy was influential is much longer than this. If you are interested in learning more about White and his work, come in to our library. We have lithographs from the 1880s of floorplans and exterior views of the Tower and Home Buildings and Riverside Buildings in our works on paper collection; images of some of his buildings in the Edna Huntington Photographs (V1974.16.219-220) and others among our photography collections; and many hard to find books in our library collection. Among the records in the archives, we have Records of the Towers and House of the Riverside Buildings (Accession 1978.154), which are ledger books detailing the costs of construction of the buildings starting in 1878, and then the subsequent rental income from tenants until about 1949. The oversize hand-written ledger books are beautiful in their own right, and offer an amazingly detailed account of almost seven decades of life in these buildings. We also have records from the First Unitarian Church, The Brooklyn Bureau of Charities, The Children's Aid Society, and The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, all in which White was involved.