ESPN Armory

 interesting place, television studio, 1903_construction, Beaux-Arts (architecture)

3.5-story Beaux-Arts studio building originally completed in 1903 as the First Battery Armory. Designed by Horgan & Slattery, it was the seventh of ten armories built by the New York City Armory Board as part of a general campaign to control rioting workers in industrial cities. The First Battery, a mounted field artillery unit established in 1867, was a well-regarded volunteer unit of the National Guard of the State of New York, composed mostly of German-Americans. From 1913 to about 1973 the Armory was occupied by the 102nd Medical Battalion and its predecessors. And since 1976 it has been used as a television studio by Capital Cities/ABC, and more recently ESPN.

The facade of the First Battery Armory is a lively, brightly colored composition of turrets, crenelations, sally ports, machicolations, and other castle-like features, some of which are functional and others purely decorative. In 1900 when plans were filed for its armory, the First Battery was a small militia unit of 106 men within the First Brigade of the N.G.S.N.Y. Although legally a military unit, the 19th-century National Guard was in large part also a social organization. In fact its major activities were athletic events, dances, parties, picnics, and entertainments of all kinds. As built, the armory's ground floor housed concrete-floored drill room, a riding ring, and offices. Below street level were stalls for 76 horses, a 50-yard rifle range and 25-yard pistol range. Also in the basement were showers, toilet rooms, ammunition compartments, and shell, harness, and boiler rooms. The 2nd floor contained locker rooms, commissioned officers’ rooms, a gymnasium and a kitchen. The 3rd floor was dedicated to Captain Wendel’s apartment, his clerk’s apartment and a janitor’s apartment.

The principal facade is clad in varicolored red and tan brick, with a rough-faced and rusticated ground floor of tan granite, and tan granite trim; its design recalls a medieval castle, and is organized in a nearly symmetrical composition. As if they were medieval curtain walls connecting projecting towers, the main wall sections are slightly recessed behind areaways between a central tower and end pavilions which project to the building line. The massive turreted entrance pavilion has a recessed, round-arch entry now filled by glass double-doors with sidelights and an arched transom; it is approached by a low set of steps between stout bases for a pair of globe lamps atop black metal stands. Just to the outside of these there is a very narrow window. Above the entrance is a carved panel with A.D. 1901 at the top, and N.G.N.Y. at the bottom. The panel is framed by upper and lower string courses than extend out to the sides and cap the entire ground floor. On either side of the projecting entry pavilion are five narrow windows; the areaways in front of them are enclosed by iron fencing with granite posts capped by pyramids. Matching, projecting end pavilions have wide segmental-arched openings between turrets. The eastern is completely filled by large, wooden double-doors and the western one is divided into a tripartite configuration with a small central door. The flanking turrets each have three very small and narrow window slits, and the lower string course wrapping around the end pavilions has prominent corbels. At the top of the ground floor, between the end pavilion turrets, the space between the two string courses is ornamented by three recessed square panels with roundels, alternating with vertical slots; there are also crenelations at the tops of the turrets.

At the upper floors the central pavilion has a tripartite window and the turrets each have a pair of narrow windows. There are five windows on either side of the central pavilion. At the end pavilions, the 2nd floor has a tripartite window, and the 3rd floor has a bands of five narrow windows. All of the windows, including those on the ground floor, have horizontal stone bands separating a short upper pane from the main opening. The windows on the upper floors have rustic Gibbs surrounds of granite, and there are splayed lintels at the ground floor and 2nd floor. Another string course runs below the 3rd floor. A stone cornice across the 3rd floor is supported by a row of corbels and above it rises a crenelated parapet with stone copings.

The central pavilion rises above the parapet, with a projecting center panel of stone, carrried on corbels alternating with roundels. The panel includes the First Battery's insignia: carved in relief is a central shield with "1901," the date of construction; "N.G.N.Y."; and "Semper Paratus," meaning always ready. Above this shield is a helmet and crossed axes flanked by flags, and on the sides are muzzle loading cannons and cannon balls tended by militiamen in helmets including one on horseback. At the flanking turrets there are two small windows, the inner one placed higher. Long corbels support the string course around the top of the center tower, surmounted by crenelated brick parapets, with the eastern turret rising higher.