2011 INVESTMENT PERFORMANCE

Corona, Queens

Built for Edward E. Sanford about 1871, this small, two-story, frame house is one of the last intact 19th-century buildings remaining in what was the village of Newtown, one of the oldest settlements on western Long Island. Rendered in a modified Italianate style, the house is stylistically within an architectural tradition established in the second quarter of the 19th century for the design of suburban and rural cottages of a type often illustrated in builders' handbooks. The house retains most of its original fabric and is particularly notable for the decorative detailing of its porch, eaves, and property-line fence. These fancifully carved elements display the craftsmanship of 19th-century carpenters and builders, who, using simple techniques, could transform a humble, domestic structure into an architectural delight.

Development of Newtown

From its first settlement until 1898 with the Act of Incorporation of Greater New York, the boundaries of Queens County also included Nassau County.

At the time of incorporation, only the three western townships of the county voted to become part of New York City: Jamaica, Flushing, and Newtown. Newtown, which borders the East River and lies closest to Manhattan, was first settled by the Dutch in 1640. About the middle of the 17th century, they were joined by a steady flow of New Englanders; however, population growth was slow. In 1790, the number of inhabitants of the township hovered at about 2,000. By 1850, there had only been an increase of 5,000 residents.

The town's economic base was agriculture, particularly the cultivation of vegetables and fruits for the people of Manhattan. This market expanded rapidly during the 1850s due to the exceptional growth taking place on Manhattan and in downtown Brooklyn. It was noted at the time that:

The introduction of turnpike roads, the establishment of daily stages and steamboat communication with the city of New York, have increased the facilities for travel and transportation of produce to a remarkable degree.

This growth, although interrupted by the Civil War, continued through the rest of the century, spurred on by the extension of railroads and street railways throughout the county. Real estate developers, recognizing the proximity of Newtown to Manhattan and Brooklyn, began buying parcels and tracts of farmland on the outskirts of the village. One of the earliest investors was Benjamin W. Hitchcock who owned the site of the Sanford house and the surrounding area, which he called the Village of West Flushing in 1854.3 Daniel Sanford Duncomb (1813-1883), a Manhattan merchant, began to invest in village real estate and, having acquired the present site of the 102-45 47th Avenue House, sold it to Edward R. Sanford in April 1871. 4 The house that Sanford built and which remained in his family for over 100 years is one of the rare intact houses remaining frcm this period of suburbanization.

The Architecture of the Sanford House

It is unlikely that the house was designed by an architect or by the owner.

The usual practice in suburban and rural areas was for a property owner to hire a builder, either a mason or a carpenter, to erect a house on his site. Since the vast majority of the houses of the period had similar floor plans and methods of construction, a practiced builder needed little outside aid. Builders' guidebooks, which gave practical advice on construction techniques to those in the building trade and often included plans for houses and architectural details, were widely used.

A.J. Downing's, The Architecture of Country Houses, and Calvert Vaux's, Villas & Cottages, exemplify these very popular mid-19th-century handbooks. Moreover, architectural elements such as foliate brackets, window and entrance enframements, and wooden doors, sashes, and shutters were mass-produced and available at local lumberyards. Hence, it is quite likely that Sanford hired a local carpenter from the village to erect his new house, following the building traditions of the period.

Stylistically, the house is a vernacular or simplified version of the highly popular Italianate style. Architectural elements such as the square-headed windows and doors, the cap-molded lintels, and porch colonnettes are typical of the Italianate mode, while the carved details follow the picturesque tradition of country "Italian villas," once so much a part of America's rural and suburban landscape.

Decription

The house, set back from the street behind a wooden fence of simulated balusters, occupies the western half of a 50' wide lot. It rises two-and-one-half stories with a gable roof, is three bays wide, and is sheathed in clapboards. Extending to the east of the house and set back from the facade is a two-bay wide, one-story extension. A porch, raised above ground level and tying the extension to the main house, shades the first story. The porch has seven squared colonnettes on thin plinths which are crowned by capi

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