Harlem in Disorder: A Spatial History of How Racial Violence Changed in 1935Main MenuREAD ME: Help Navigating This BookIntroductionOn the StreetsIn the CourtsUnder InvestigationThe Mayor's Commission on Conditions in HarlemOver TimeEventsSourcesStephen Robertsona1bf8804093bc01e94a0485d9f3510bb8508e3bfStanford University Press
Wohlmuth Tailors store, 157 Lenox Avenue, c. 1939-1941.
1media/nynyma_rec0040_1_01902_0034a_thumb.jpg2024-06-01T02:14:46+00:00Stephen Robertsona1bf8804093bc01e94a0485d9f3510bb8508e3bf12Source: DOF: Manhattan 1940s Tax Photos (New York City Municipal Archives).plain2024-06-01T02:16:14+00:00nynyma_rec0040_1_01902_0034a20180308114732+0000Stephen Robertsona1bf8804093bc01e94a0485d9f3510bb8508e3bf
12021-11-01T18:38:39+00:00Wohlmuth Tailors store window broken18plain2024-06-01T02:19:54+00:00The branch of Wohlmuth Tailors at 157 Lenox Avenue, on the southwest corner of West 118th Street, is one of the businesses in a list of those with broken windows made by a reporter for La Prensa who walked along West 116th Street, Lenox Avenue, and West 125th Street on the day after the disorder. The story did not give the address of the store, but it is listed between businesses located at 151 Lenox Avenue and 161 Lenox Avenue. An advertisement for Wohlmuth Tailors from 1932 lists a branch at 157 Lenox Avenue, which also appears as a white-owned business in the MCCH business survey taken between June and December 1935 and the Tax Department photograph of that address taken between 1939 and 1941.
The La Prensa story identified two other menswear stores in nearby blocks of Lenox Avenue that also had its windows broken but not goods taken, one at 112 Lenox Avenue a block south of West 116th Street and the other a further block south at 86 Lenox Avenue. Additional businesses in the area also likely had broken windows as the La Prensareporter concluded his list by noting he had not included others as they had only suffered minor damage ("y otras mas que por ser los danos ocasionados relativamente pequeños no creimus de interes catalogar entre los establecimientos ya mencionados").
No other sources mention this store, and no one arrested during the disorder is identified as breaking the store's windows. The store remained in business after the disorder.