Jackson & Throckmorton, 500 Broadway, New York, 2009
Austin H. Throckmorton (1821-1889) was a partner with James L. Jackson and Peter H. Jackson in the late 1850s. (For more on the Jacksons see the J. L. Jackson, Bro. page.) New York city directory listings locate the short-lived Jackson & Throckmorton foundry at 55 Goerck St., 52 Lewis St. and 330 Delancey St. between the years 1857 to 1860. Throckmorton was an iron moulder living on E. 7th St. from as early as 1848, and he is recorded as an iron founder at 55 Goerck St. from 1852 to 1860.
Throckmorton's relationship with the Jacksons is described as follows in a paper entitled California Concrete, 1876-1906: Jackson, Percy, and the Beginnings of Reinforced Concrete Construction in the United States (2009) by Sara E. Wermiel, "[In 1853 Peter H. Jackson] joined his elder brother James in his foundry to form a business called James L. Jackson, Brother and Company. In 1857, this firm closed and Peter partnered with a moulder from the firm, A. J. Throckmorton, to form a new company, Jackson & Throckmorton, Architectural Iron Works, located at 55-67 Goerck Street. ... [Soon] in 1860, this company dissolved and Jackson rejoined his brother to form the company James L. Jackson and Brother Iron Works..." (The paper is available on the internet at www.bma.arch.unige.it.)
Austin Throckmorton appears in the 1870 U. S. Census living in Ocean Township, Monmouth County, New Jersey. He was 49 years old, a "Commercial Broker," born New Jersey. He lived with his wife, Janette C., and three children, Austin R., Mary E. and Katie E. He is also in the 1880 census, living in Eatontown, N. J. with his wife, now called Jeannette, and daughter, Katie. In 1880 he was 59 years old and still gave his occupation as "Commercial Broker."
Cast-Iron Architecture in New York by Margot Gayle and Edmund V. Gillon, Jr., 1974, comments, "171 Duane St. (1859) ... A three-story federal house of 1828 forms the basis of the building. There is evidence that when the area ceased to be residential, the house was raised to five stories and the iron front put on, transforming it into an up-to-date commercial building. The date of this 'modernization,' 1859, can be inferred from the fact that the base of one of the piers shows a foundry label of Jackson and Throckmorton, who were partners for two years only, 1858 and 1859." As of 2009 the Jackson & Throckmorton foundry mark no longer exists at 171 Duane St.
Copyright (c) 2011 Walter Grutchfield