Bell Laboratories Building (Manhattan)

Bell Telephone Laboratories
Location 463 West Street, Manhattan, New York City, New York
Coordinates 40°44′11.8″N 74°0′35″W / 40.736611°N 74.00972°W / 40.736611; -74.00972Coordinates: 40°44′11.8″N 74°0′35″W / 40.736611°N 74.00972°W / 40.736611; -74.00972
Built 1896-1898
Architect Cyrus L. W. Eidlitz and others
NRHP Reference # 75001202
Significant dates
Added to NRHP May 15, 1975[1]
Designated NHL May 15, 1975[2]

463 West Street is a 13 building complex located on the block between West Street, Washington Street, Bank Street, and Bethune Street in Manhattan, New York. It was originally the home of Bell Telephone Laboratories between 1898 and 1966. For a time, it was the largest industrial research center in the United States. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places and further designated as a National Historic Landmark, as Bell Telephone Laboratories.[2]

Many early technological inventions were developed here including automatic telephone panel and crossbar switches, the first experimental talking movies (1923), black and white and color TV, video telephones, radar, the vacuum tube, medical equipment, the development of the phonograph record[3] and the first commercial broadcasts including the first broadcast of a baseball game and the New York Philharmonic with Toscanini conducting. It also served as the headquarters for the company from 1925 to the early 1960s,[4] after which the headquarters moved to Murray Hill, New Jersey.

The site was also the home for part of the Manhattan Project during World War II. Shortly after the war, the transistor was invented here.

After two years of renovations by Richard Meier, the building was reopened in 1970 as Westbeth Artists Community for low to middle income artists. In addition to affordable artist housing, the complex contains a theatre, an art gallery, and a synagogue.

It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1975.[2][3] The complex was listed a second time on the National Register in 2009, for its high-profile and successful example of adaptive reuse of the property.

Bell Laboratories Building in 1936

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Westbeth Complex.
  1. ↑ National Park Service (2007-01-23). "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service.
  2. 1 2 3 "Bell Telephone Laboratories". National Historic Landmark summary listing. National Park Service. 2007-09-08. Archived from the original on 2007-10-13.
  3. 1 2 James Sheire (March 5, 1975). "National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination: Bell Telephone Laboratories" (pdf). National Park Service.
  4. ↑ ATT history
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