Romemu Manhattan

176 West 105th Street

by Tom Miller

At the turn of the last century, the wives of wealthy industrialists and businessmen busied themselves with charitable causes.  Among the favorites were settlement houses.  The Settlement House movement sought to improve the lives of the impoverished by training them in domestic arts and income-producing trades.  In 1915, the Grovernor Settlement House was established on the Lower East Side.  It provided daycare for children (thereby allowing mothers to work) and hot lunch programs.  The affluence of its women supporters was evidenced in a benefit performance by “society amateurs,” as worded by The New York Times, of Thalia at the high-toned Ritz-Carlton Hotel on December 10, 1915.

In 1961, the Grosvenor Settlement House erected an uptown branch, Grosvenor Neighborhood House, at the southeast corner of 105th Street and Amsterdam Avenue.  Designed by Moore & Hutchins, the $440,000, four-story structure was faced in beige brick above the ground floor.  Colorful, swimming pool-like tiles filled the panels below the first-floor windows on the avenue side.  Stainless steel letters announced the building’s name on the entablature near the 105th Street corner.  Grouped windows on the second and third floors admitted an abundance of natural light, and a caged playground was located on the roof.

trustees of the Grosvenor Neighborhood House were all female, all white, and all very wealthy. 

The trustees of the Grosvenor Neighborhood House were all female, all white, and all very wealthy.  Among them was Alouise Boker, who donated the funds to install a photographic laboratory and darkroom in 1964.  On November 17, The New York Times reported, “photo volunteers will instruct teen-agers in the settlement’s evening program, to help them learn vocational skills.”

However, the stark difference between the trustees and the mostly black and Puerto Rican children and teens who used the facilities eventually caused strain.  On August 26, 1972, the N.Y. Amsterdam News captioned a photograph,

Judging from the pleasant expression on the face of William Burns (standing center) and others, you would think that he was in the midst of celebration but, such is not the case because not long before this photo was taken, Mr. Burns was relieved of his duties as Program Director, at the Grosvenor Neighborhood Center., located at 176 West 105th Street. The likable worker received the full support of his co-workers and, in protest of his termination, they joined him on the picket line and vowed that they would not return to work until his reinstatement was effected.

The New York Times explained, “Mr. Burns, who was the first black program director of Grosvenor, contended that he was discharged because the all-white board objected to his militant activities outside the job.”  The neighborhood coalesced behind Burns and, calling themselves the Committee on Community Control of Grosvenor, seized control of the building in August.  The board fired all its employees, and the neighborhood responded by hiring an all-black staff.

In January 1974, the board obtained a court order to evict the group.  Then, during the first week of March 1973, Burns filed a complaint with the City Commission on Human Rights, charging the trustees with “blatant racism” and asking for $500,000 in damages.  On March 8, The New York Times reported that Burn’s dismissal “has triggered a bitter and continuing dispute for control of the Upper West Side Center.  On one side is the board of directors, with 41 socially prominent women on it.  On the other is a predominately black and Puerto Rican group known as the Committee on Community Control of Grosvenor.”

A balance was finally struck, and Grosvenor’s programs continued.  In December 1987, it was the venue for the Night of 100 Trees Benefit for AIDS, and on October 31, 1998, in an article about food insecurity, Newsday reported, “At Grosvenor Neighborhood House in Manhattan Valley, several staff members slip bags of food from the organization’s programs into a number of children’s backpacks when parents come to pick them up.”  In 1995, a program for youthful offenders was initiated that involved alternatives to incarceration.  Newsday described it as “a program for early adolescent girls to facilitate their positive, productive development.”

Grosvenor House was absorbed into the YMCA

In 2007, Grosvenor House was absorbed into the YMCA, and it would operate the center through 2018.  The unlikely building then became home to a religious institution, Romemu Synagogue, which paid $9 million for the property.  Its residency would be relatively short-lived.  In September 2024, the congregation sold the property for $10 million to the South Korean-based Christian Group World Mission Society Church of God.  Founded in 1964 by Ahn Sahnghong, the sect purportedly has 3.7 million members throughout the world.

The somewhat eccentric group anticipates the second coming of Jesus Christ and has predicted the end of the world three times.  Happily, for most, they were incorrect in each case.  The church has been accused—sometimes in court–of being a cult that uses coercion and psychological tactics to obtain and control its members.

No less quirky than its newest owners is the former Grosvenor House building itself.  Its boxy brick form, appearing to be half-school, half-prison, stands out as a peculiar architectural presence.

Tom Miller is a social historian and blogger at daytoninmanhattan.blogspot.com

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