Living with Legends: Hotel Chelsea Blog

Arthur Miller’s Room in Landmark Chelsea Hotel on Chopping Block

The present, illegitimate, management this week began demolition/“renovation” in room 614 of the National and City Landmark Chelsea Hotel.  This is the room where the great Arthur Miller lived in the 1960s, and where he penned his play “After the Fall.”  The room is virtually unchanged from the time when Miller lived there, and contains many original features.  It has most recently been the home and work space of Dr. Peter Ferro, a dentist who was evicted from the hotel last year.  
    We feel that Miller’s room is a valuable resource for present and future generations of writers and playwrights, and that it should be preserved.  Unfortunately, due to the present management’s utter contempt for history, tradition, and the arts, we have every reason to fear that this room will end up much like Bob Dylan’s room—that is, unceremoniously gutted.

    As was the case with the demolition of Dylan’s room, we feel that the hotel has fraudulently obtained the permits for work on room 614.   In their applications for flooring, kitchen, and bathroom renovations, they falsely state that the Chelsea is not an SRO building, when in fact it is.  They further falsely state that the hotel does not contain rent stabilized units, when in  fact it does.  This allows the hotel to avoid the requirement that they obtain a Certificate of No Harassment—which, due to ongoing harassment, they’ll never get in a million years.

We thought we had cleared up this matter of permit falsification with the DOB in connection with the work on Dylan's room -- for which they issued a Stop Work Order which is still in effect -- but apparently they can't be bothered to read their own paperwork.

Earlier posts about Arthur Miller's room
Arthur Miller’s Suite Vacated, Likely Endangered by Some Asinine Scheme

Photo: (Bill Bolcom, Arnold Weinstein, and Arthur Miller at work in the Chelsea Hotel on the opera based on Miller's play, A View From the Bridge.) Source. Opera News.

Live Bloggin the Martha Stewart Show

We're blogging live this morning from the Martha Stewart show.  The topic:  greedy developers and rampant gentrification in NYC. Just kidding, folks.  It's really about blogs and bloggers. We are in the very back because we ignored the orders to wear pastels. (We would put up a picture, but that's not allowed right now.)  Ok. We managed to get that picture up.  See how far back we are.  That pad thai they're cooking really smells good from the cheap seats.

They're finished with the Pad Thai. Now they're frosting a cake with a blogger who's blog is about preparing recipes from Martha's cookbook. He's prepared 289 so far, though he claims to have a life.  He has on an apron with his head on Russell Crow's body. 

Pick Your Poison, Bohemians

Sugar and lard or pure grain alcohol.  We’ve got it all at the Chelsea Hotel.  In addition to Mark Isreal’s proposed doughnut shop, we have now received news that the Chelsea Hotel is getting not one but two bars on the ground floor.  All of these businesses will apparently be connected to the historic lobby:  the doughnut shop in the former Dan’s Guitars space, a bar in Stanley’s former office, and another bar somewhere behind the check-in desk.

The proprietor of at least one of these bars will reportedly be Noel Ashman, who should fit right in to the Chelsea Hotel culture, seeing as how he was evicted from his last establishment for non-payment of rent.  Noel also boasts his own facebook group established by former employees who claim he hasn’t paid them.  Welcome, Noel.  With your history we’re certain you’ll soon be meeting Belkin, Burden.  Be sure to say Hi to good ol’ Smokin’ Joe when you see him in court.

Blame the French for the Chelsea Hotel

In a recently published article, Sherill Tippins traces the origins of the Chelsea Hotel’s role as nexus of the artistic community to the French utopian socialist philosopher Charles Fourier’s influence upon architect Phillip Hubert. It’s Tippins contention that when Hubert completed the building in 1884 it encapsulated Fourier’s notion of art social – a philosophical ideal whereby artists have the role of “unifying a diverse population and guiding it forward in its evolution.”  Tippins history of the Chelsea Hotel, which will be published later this year, will show how Fourier’s ideas have anchored the Hotel throughout its many incarnations.  Below is an excerpt from the article.  

“…. the Chelsea’s physical and economic design resembled in many ways those of a standard phalanstery, so the social makeup of its Association echoed that recommended by Fourier for a phalanx in its infancy : a central core of cultivators and manufacturers, a smaller population of capitalists, scholars, and artists for the sake of economic survival, psychological balance, and spiritual growth ; and a Board of Directors manned by the wealthiest and most knowledgeable members of the cooperative. [26] At the Chelsea, located not in the country but in the midst of an urban environment then under massive construction, the “cultivators and manufacturers” were represented by real estate developers, builders, and contractors then involved in the creative process of “growing” the city -in this case including most of the people who literally built, equipped, and decorated the Chelsea itself. The “capitalists, scholars, and artists” included not only by the painters and sculptors in the fifteen top-floor studios, but by a number of musicians, actors, authors, professors, bibliophiles, financiers, and wealthy philanthropists who lived downstairs. And with a founding Board of Directors that included a well-known stockbroker, a former president of the Merchants and Traders’ Exchange, a future governor of Virginia, and the president of the company that installed the Chelsea’s innovative, patented roof, the call for a wealthy and knowledgeable leadership had been answered as well.

With an eighty-family building and a reasonably diverse population, the Chelsea stood  poised to take its place, as John Noyes had recommended, “at the front of the general march of improvement.” But the question remained : how would it go about doing this ? What kind of work was to be accomplished here ?

The answer seems to lie in the Fourierist notion of art social -the importance assigned to the role of artists in unifying a diverse population and guiding it forward in its evolution. Hints of this intention lie not only in the provision of fifteen art studios occupying the Chelsea’s entire top floor, but also in the pronounced presence of nature themes in its décor-stained-glass transoms displaying images of seashells and flowers, etched-glass door panels featuring forest scenes, hand-carved wood fireplace mantels and hand-painted tiles, a lobby hung with paintings of the Hudson River school, and exquisite wrought-iron sunflowers adorning its exterior balconies and central stairway -the latter evoking a dream of the liberated American artist as vividly as Fourier’s Crown Imperial flower represented the downtrodden artist in “civilization.”

For more of Sherill's writings about the Chelsea Hotel read the "History of Activism" section of this blog.

 

Send In Your Abbie Hoffman Stories to Help Sherill Tippins Finish Her History of the Chelsea Hotel

 

From Harry Smith & William Burroughs to Andy Warhol & Stanley Bard, Chelsea Artists of the 60s Undermined the Complacency of Mainstream Society

 

History of Activism at the Chelsea Pt. 5: Jackson Pollock Raises a Toast to the W.P.A.

 

History of Activism at the Chelsea: Pt. 4: Painter John Sloan -- Fought for Change with the Socialist Party, the IWW, and the ACLU

 

The History of Activism at the Chelsea Hotel, Part 3: Writer Herbert Croly, Co-found of The New Republic, Had Chelsea Ties

 

Activism at the Chelsea Hotel Pt. II: William Dean Howells, Employed Literary Realism as a Tool for Change

 

Activism at the Chelsea Hotel Pt. I: Architect Philip Hubert, Designed the Chelsea as an Experiment in Socialist Living

Clogged Arteries at the Chelsea

 

Sad Passing of Chelsea Hotel Legend Willem Van es

UPDATE:  Willem's step daughter Devon wrote to let us know that there is a memorial page for Willem at
http://memorialwebsites.legacy.com/willemvanes/Homepage.aspx. 

Residents of the Chelsea Hotel were saddened to learn of the passing of their longtime neighbor and friend, Willem Van Es. Willem died on Christmas night in an airplane en route to Amsterdam. We all remember Willem as the owner of Johnny, the recently deceased Behemoth of the Chelsea, whose odor lingers in the elevators to this day. The photo is from Johnny's final birthday party.

In addition to Willem’s life work as a crafter of hand painted and hand made wall paper, he had spent the last 10 years working on a boat which he had jokingly christened the Sea-Banana. Sadly, Willem will never get to set sail in the bright yellow craft. We feel confident, however, that he has set sail on a much more joyous voyage.

William Burroughs Wishes a Merry Christmas to All of the Junkies at the Chelsea Hotel & Elsewhere Too

Thanks to Laki Vazakas for the Holiday reminder.

Capitol Fishing Tackle Owner Supports the Bards

I own Capitol Fishing Tackle Co. I went to work at the store in 1973 and bought it in 1974.The Bards treated me fairly. The space wasn't cheap, but I made a living and it was fun.Stanley and his family are wonderful people. We were all in tears when we found out that Capitol Fishing could no longer remain at the Hotel Chelsea. I moved the store for two reasons. I couldn't think about closing a business that was 109 years old at that time, and, more importantly, our son wouldn't let me. Fishing is his passion and he loves working in the store that will some day be his. Our famous sign is at 132 W 36th St. We have a great landlord and a very long lease. I didn't let Marlene Krauss and David Elders win. Believe it or not, Marlene Krauss's father was a gentleman. If he was alive today, he wouldn't be proud of his daughter.   -- Richard Collins

Memorial Service for Stefan Brecht

Stefan Brecht, who wrote about and performed in the new and revolutionary theatre that erupted in New York in the 1960’s and early ‘70’s, will be remembered at a memorial to be held Sunday, Nov. 8 at 6 PM, at St. Mark’s Church-in-the-Bowery, E. 10^th St. at 2^nd Ave. 

The memorial, a celebration of his life and work, will include performances created for the occasion by Peter Schumann, of the Bread and Puppet Theatre and, on an audio disc, by Robert Wilson; Jim Neu, a playwright who performed with Stefan in early Robert Wilson plays, will read the letter, which Brecht wrote, from Wilson’s “A Letter to Queen Victoria”.  Drumming, musical performances and readings of Brecht’s poems will be part of the memorial, as will photographs and projected footage from his performances with Charles Ludlam, Robert Wilson, Stuart Sherman and Leandro Katz.

Brecht’s series on The Original Theatre of the City of New York: From the Mid-Sixties to the Mid-Seventies was left unfinished when he became ill, in 2001, with a form of Parkinson’s that destroyed his ability to write or speak.  His intent was to preserve, for those in later and much changed times, as much as possible of the sense of being there in New York in the ‘60’s-70’s; his writing ranged from detailed on-the-spot descriptions, sometimes poetic in language of the time, to analysis, to documentation of the particulars of the scene that gave rise to the radically new.

Completed books are: Queer Theatre, centering on Jack Smith and on Charles Ludlam’s Ridiculous Theatrical Company; The Theatre of Visions: Robert Wilson, evoking the “Nothing happens” spectacles of ’69 and the ‘70’s evolutions with the communal Byrd Hoffman company; and Bread and Puppet Theatre, with vivid accounts of the protest theatre on the ‘60’s streets and the first circuses in Vermont.  His account of Richard Foreman’s Ontological Hysteric Theatre is due for publication in 2010.

City Lights published his Poems; a later collection appeared in 2006, Eighth Avenue Poems, along with a book of photographs of the street pavements, 8^th Avenue. 

Guest Comes Clean on Ghostly Sighting at Chelsea Hotel

hi, this is Matt, the guy who wrote about this experience. I'm sure that it's hard for people to imagine something like this happening, but I have no reason to fabricate a story such as this. FWIW, I've been completely sober for almost 2 years now and my friend had 1 drink during our stay in the city and it wasn't on this night. to be honest, I doubted my friend after he had told me about seeing the ghost. I've known this guy since I was 4 and we like to play jokes on one another a lot, but we always laugh like 30 seconds into our jokes which gives us away. however, on this night I could easily see that he wasn't trying to pull one over on me. talking to him about this today, he thinks we ushered the ghost into our room due to the fact that I was playing "Something Else" and "My Way" by Sid Vicious. I was a big Sex Pistols fan back in high school so, I thought it would be fun to listen to these songs where Sid had lived. my friend had never heard Sid sing before and was appalled by his voice. after insulting the songs, he told me to turn them off. also, after we checked into the Chelsea, we took a walk around the city. we ended up passing St. Patrick's Old Cathedral and had the strange notion to walk inside. we lit candles and dipped our fingers in the holy water despite not being Catholic. in retrospect, we believe we did this random act based on our spirits warning us of the demons (negative energy) in the Chelsea. the holy water, candle and prayers may have been a protective shield which explains why we were not bothered by the ghost until our last night in the room. I didn't include those tidbits in the original story because they are just thoughts of ours. the events which transpired in that room really got to us. I couldn't think of anything else for the next month and kept asking myself, "why, why, why did this happen to me?" these are the only logical reasons I can think of unless, of course, there is no logical reason which is a logical reason, lol.

More Evidence of the Paranormal at the Chelsea Hotel

During a recent trip to the Big Apple, my friend and I decided to call the Chelsea Hotel home for 4 days. It has always been a secret fantasy of mine to stay here and my friend was just content to get away from home for a while. Upon our arrival, the guy at the front desk put us up in room 124 as it was the “last room available” for the weekend. He could’ve put us up on the roof and I would’ve been just as happy. Its the Chelsea Hotel! I was to meet another guy who worked at the hotel later that evening who informed us that more rooms were available. I didn’t think twice about why they put us in 124. Like I said, we were in the Chelsea freakin’ Hotel!

Our room was quite spacious complete with a kitchenette, 2 large beds, a couple of desks and an old Victorian styled couch which looked like a prop from The Munsters’ TV set. My friend commented on the couch and likened it to a couch old school funeral parlors used to prop dead people up on so they could be photographed. We got to joking around about this and my friend decided to have me pose on the couch as if I had been murdered. A few hours after our impromptu photo session and after having been out to explore the golden secrets Manhattan has to offer, we found ourselves back at the Chelsea shooting the shit. I was sitting on my bed as my friend was relaxing on the couch. All of a sudden, his demeanor took a 360 and he turned pale. He very nonchalantly remarked, “I just saw a ghost.” I laughed. Ghosts aren’t real, they only exist in movies and Joseph Arthur songs. Supposedly he had seen a fuzzy image of a man walk out of our bathroom and disappear.

Afterwards, some dark gloomy cloud of sadness settled over him. “I’ve got to get up off this couch before I start crying,” he said, face red and eyes full of tears. “Something bad happened here, in this room, on this couch. I have to delete those pics we took earlier. It was wrong for us to have joked around about that. I HAVE to delete them now to make things right again.” I agreed with him. We did get carried away. After pressing him for a good 10 minutes about what it was he had seen, a small part of me began to believe him. This guy and I have been friends for our entire lives and our jokes never last longer than a minute or two. I was just finding it hard to wrap my head around such an abstract idea such as ghosts, and I’m the poet, go figure. Anyways, I suggested he call our friend who works at the hotel and see if he could answer some of our questions. As he was on the phone with the front desk trying to get connected to our friend, I made my way to the bathroom to take a leak. Midway through my business, I felt something pulling up 3-4 hairs on my right forearm. It wasn’t just that weird feeling you get like with static. It was something tugging on a few of my arm hairs. I looked down to see if something had gotten stuck on my arm like piece of thread from jeans and nothing was there. I then felt something like cold droplets of water falling on my left forearm. Again, I scanned my surroundings in search of a leak or something that would explain this weird sensation. I could find nothing.

Startled, I emerged from the bathroom and suggested to my friend that we head downstairs and try and get some answers. Half-dazed and in our bed clothes, we made our way to the front desk. The lady smiled at us and we just kind of stood there in a strange stupor. Moments later my friend opened his mouth, “Is this place haunted? We saw something in our room…” The lady behind the front desk just kind of laughed and said that the place wasn’t haunted and, with a fierce look in her eyes, silently asked us to go away. Back at the room, I suggested we Google the hotel to see if it was haunted. To our surprise, we stumbled upon countless stories of run-ins with the paranormal at the Chelsea.

I’m not sure what happened in room 124 of the Hotel Chelsea but both my friend and I experienced something in that room that we’ll never forget. I walked into the Chelsea believing that ghosts were figments of crazy people’s minds to walking out of the Chelsea believing in the paranormal. Life sure is crazy, ain’t it?

Matt

Mysterious Skeleton Haunts the Chelsea Hotel

Dear Ed,

My mom, sister, and I stayed at the Chelsea hotel a few weeks ago.  The three of us decided to take a spur of the moment trip to New York before I had to go back to teaching in the fall.  Because it was such a last minute trip, none of us had taken the time to research the hotel.  We had no idea about any of the ghost stories of the Chelsea until after our stay, but from the moment we arrived until the day we left we had quite an experience.  I have no doubt that the place is haunted!  We stayed in room (redacted) and the lights in our bathroom and hallway went off and on over and over while we were there.  Is that a normal occurrence at the Chelsea?  The people working at the front desk were as nice as they could be, but none 
of them seemed to have an answer for that.  While we were there, we found a small door in our closet that opened up to what I'm assuming is empty space in the wall.  I took a picture of it and I'm attaching it to this email.  Look closely on the far left peeking out from behind the door.  Zoom in to get a better view.  What in the world is that?  It looks like a skeleton with a clown nose.  It wasn't there in real life.  One night during out stay, my sister met up with a friend, so my mom and I were back in our hotel room getting ready for bed.  I was in the bathroom brushing my teeth with the door open and my mom was in the main room.  Suddenly there was a woman's scream (not high pitched...almost like singing) right in my ear really loud.  My mom came running into the bathroom, because she had heard it too.  Another strange thing that happened was on the last night we were there.  The sink kept turning off and on full blast and bubbles were coming up from the drain!  Our mom would get up to turn it off and everytime she would lie back down, the sink would come back on.  Needless to say, we didn't get much sleep that night.  While we were there, the hotel always stopped on the 1st floor whenever my sister was alone.  Since I've been home I checked out the Hotel Chelsea blog and got your book Legends of the Chelsea Hotel.  What an interesting hotel with so much history!

Kathleen

Woman Haunted by Mysterious Disemboddied Head In Mirror at Chelsea Hotel

Hi, I am writing to share a recent experience I had at the Chelsea Hotel. I was hoping to post my story and get some feedback to see if anybody has experienced the same:

______________________________________________________________________________

 

My boyfriend and I decided to visit New York City this month. It was our first time, and we chose to stay at the Chelsea hotel for 3 nights. I had little prior knowledge of the hotel's history (as far as the spritual visitors which are supposed to still live there). We were staying on the first floor in Room 114. The first two nights were fine- I slept peacefully. However, on the last night, things changed. I am not a complete believer in ghosts, although I believe anything is possible to a point, and I know I have good intuition and can read people and situations fairly easily. The entire night was too vivid and the details too accurate and fresh in my mind for me to 100% believe that it was a dream.

 

That night, we ended up going to bed around 1:30 am. My boyfriend fell asleep immediately. It was not the same for me. I had a strange feeling, not a good feeling at all. I had this immense fear that stayed with me the entire night. I tried to close my eyes and re-play a "joyful" song in my head, but the eerie thoughts and feelings kept creeping back. Nothing had happened, but this overwhelming feeling crept over me, and I felt my heart beating nearly out of my chest. I began sweating profusely. I tried to cover myself with the blankets, and cling onto my boyfriend, but I felt like I was not alone. I had my phone next to me, and each time I would check the time. I suddely heard a door slam extremely loudly and a man yelling with the sound of frantic footsteps running down the hallway. I froze. The running continued for another three minutes or so and then was gone. I then heard the sound of footsteps creeping in the room behind me. This continued the entire night. Somewhere during the course of two hours, I suddenly looked up and right in front of the bedroom mirror, I saw a head in mid-air. The head seemed to grimace at me, and I will never forget the eyes staring me down, almost bug-eyed. The face seemed to be wearing some kind of theatre make-up, bright red lips drawn on very carefully, white face paint, and ear-length tightly coiled black hair. Suddenly, the face shifted over to a black and white version of the face, without the makeup. I froze and not knowing what to think (I was terrified) I ducked under the bed and pressed tightly to my sleeping partner. After ten minutes or so, I emerged, and the head was gone. However, I still felt a cold "compression" next to my right ear for five minutes. I grabbed my phone. It read 4:16 am. I had set my alarm for 7:00 am, but I changed it to 6:00 am, just hoping for the morning light to rescue me. I was terrified, and even considered waking my boyfriend, but I became afraid that if I did so (I don't know why I thought this) that the "head" would re-appear. I did not sleep the entire night and I contemplated what I was doing there, and why. Couldn't I just run down and call a cab to take me to the next "non-haunted" hotel? I seriously considered this. After I set the alarm and stayed awake until my alarm sounded off at 6:00 am. My pillow was drenched when I awoke. I was in shock with the image clear in my mind. It's menacing look will stay with me...and I wondered who that was? I have an idea of who this man was after looking at images of the famous that lived there and departed to the afterlife. The picture I observed made my stomach sink..it was the same face, that same grimace, and those same sad and large eyes. It looked like Dylan Thomas' face.

 I would like to put this information out in hopes that someone has had a similar experience and would like to share. I am listening.

 

_______________________________________________________________________

 

Hopefully, I will be able to share this story and get some feedback. Please let me know!

 

Thank you,

Anna

RIP Author Jim Carroll

From the comment section of Rolling Stone, by commentor Dennis Spencer.

"In 1978 I lived at the Chelsea Hotel in New York City. One afternoon I heard a knock on my door. When I opened it there stood a tall, drugged- out looking, skinny guy about my age with stringy red hair. With  him were two other guys that were larger and even scarier looking than him.

With a fast talking New York accent and a desperate tone the red- headed one held up an LP and blasted into this rapid fire sales pitch:

“Listen, I know you don’t know me but my name is Jim Carroll and I have a band called The Jim Carroll Band and I am on Rolling Stones

Records and Tapes. I have a single coming out next month called “People Who Died”. I just this minute got back from England and what I have here in my hand is a copy of the new Rolling Stones album called
“Some Girls”.This the ONLY copy that exists in the United States. I haven’t even heard it. Nobody has heard it, not one single person in the U.S. has heard it, but YOU can be the first. My only question to
you is: Do you have a stereo?”

Now wait a second, yes I had a stereo, a very nice one as a matter of fact. More importantly I also had a fair amount of drugs in my room that took a whole day of hustling to get and I wasn’t about to let this trio of losers bust into my room and take my shit.

The album did look authentic though with the Rolling Stones logo and the red-head’s story had a ring of authenticity so I let them in.

As everyone knows the first song on the album is “Miss You” which begins that opening line “nah nah nah nanana” in falsetto. We all had a hard time figuring out if I had the turntable set at the right speed but of course I did. We then listened to both sides of this fabulous
album and it was of course, great.

On the way out Jim flipped a paper back book to me which of course was “Basketball Diaries” and said: “Check it out, this is the story of my life. One day you can say you met me.”

Now I am glad to say that I did.

[ROLLING STONE/"Basketball Diaries" author,Punk Icon Jim Carroll dead at 60]

Ding Dong, The Witch is Dead: The “Invincible” Marlene Krauss Goes Down in Flames

Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. God has interceded in the affairs of mankind, and the prayers of all sentient beings have been answered. Chelsea Hotel minority shareholder Marlene Krauss, MD, MBA, has been forced to liquidate her company, KBL Healthcare, Acquisition Corp III due to her inability to complete an acquisition. In other words, even with all of the millions her investors threw at her, Marlene couldn’t find a satisfactory company to buy. Word of her troubles began to leak out earlier this week with a press release indicating that Krauss was being forced to buy out 30% of KBL’s shareholders to prevent them from voting against her proposed merger with a company called PRWT. Krauss began to look even more desperate when a second press release went out announcing the cancellation of the upcoming KBL stockholders meeting. Obviously Marlene was scrambling to find the funds necessary to buy out the shareholders--and just as obviously she failed to do so! Expect lots of lawsuits to follow as stockholders ask: Where’s my money, Marlene?

What this shows is that KBL’s shareholders finally caught on to wannabe Master of the Universe Marlene’s shady tactics. Her business model is to take over companies in order to loot their assets--which is exactly what she’s trying to do with the Chelsea. Perhaps now the rest of the Chelsea Hotel shareholders will get wise like the KBL shareholders did and send her packing.

Many of of you have noticed that we haven’t been blogging lately, (www.twitter.com/hotelchelsea) but we couldn’t resist coming out of retirement briefly to report this news. Burn Witch Burn in everlasting torment. Bring Back the Bards. And add another chapter to the book.