Miracle on Fourth Street: Saving an Old Merchant’s House

Miracle on Fourth Street is the story of the preservation of a family home that belonged to one of the early merchants of New York City. Lived in by one family for almost 100 years, the house was preserved as a museum upon the death of the last family member. The book recounts the struggle of the founder of the museum to realize his quixotic vi- sion, the critical intervention of an architect who devoted his life to an authentic struc- tural restoration, and the dedication of a group of women who would not give up their goal of reclaiming the beauty of the original furnishings.It is a story of creative solutions to structural calamities, heartbreaking setbacks, dis- appointing personality conflicts, and the current stewards’ triumph over a final brutal assault on the building that quite literally could have brought the house down.Now known as the Merchant’s House Museum, the landmarked site affords over 15,000 visitors a year a unique window into mid-nineteenth domestic life of the merchant elite of New York City.

Mary Knapp has been affiliated with the Merchant’s House Museum since 1995. She is the author of An Old Merchant’s House: Life at Home in New York City, 1835-65 (Girandole Books, 2012) and co-author with her husband, Herb, of One Potato, Two Potato: The Folklore of American Children (W.W. Norton, 1976) and Red, White, and Blue Paradise (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1984), a memoir of the couple’s years living and teaching in the Panama Canal Zone. She lives in New York City and blogs at www.hintsandechoes.wordpress.com.