I’ve been cutting the stereoscopic views down to one image when I use them, but why? So here’s a stereoscope of the construction of the spires of St. Patrick’s Cathedral, circa 1888. The cathedral itself was some ten years old at that time, and the spires were being added to an already-functioning building. It looks like we have two A-frame derricks on each tower for lifting the stone blocks.
Here’s a view around 1900, before skyscrapers made the towers look short:
In case you’re wondering about the “almost” in the post title, look very closely at the pinnacles along the north side of St. Pat’s, because there’s something missing. Six somethings, actually: there are no flying buttresses. And there are no flying buttresses because the roof of the cathedral is a set of timber trusses supporting a plaster ceiling below, rather than timber trusses providing weather protection to stone vaulting, as the architecture suggests.
The ornate fence and areaway/moat on the right belong to the Vanderbilt mansion, on the west side of Fifth Avenue. The lot at the northeast corner of Fifth and 50th Street, across the street from Vanderbilt and St. Pat’s, “To Be Sold,” is an interesting continuation of the same story. Here’s a 1910 map:
The color code uses blue for stone construction, which was relatively rare in the city. Beige means “fireproof construction,” or in other words steel beams supporting tile arches for floors; beige with a blue stripe is a stone-fronted fireproof building, which was just the thing for Fifth Avenue. The building directly north of the cathedral is the Union Club, at 641 Fifth, then there are two houses at 645 and 647 that are mirror-images of each other, then there’s another house at 2 East 51st Street. Note that house means “mansion” in this context. Here’s a view from Easter of 1903:
The ornate three-story building to the left of the cathedral is the Union Club. In this low-resolution version, it’s hard to see what’s going on north of the club, so here’s a cropped piece of the high-res version:
The twin houses are under construction. The brick side walls have been built, and their ends left toothed to receive the front facades. The corner house hasn’t been started yet.
The club and houses met varying fates: the club and the southern twin were demolished in the 1970s for the Olympic Tower, which is big but boring. 647 Fifth Avenue became a Versace store, and 2 West 51st Street is Cartier.
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