Harlem YMCA, 1893, Seventh Avenue And 125th Street

The original Harlem YMCA on the corner of Seventh Avenue (today it is the Adam Clayton Powell Blvd.,) and 125th Street, Harlem New York City from 1893.

The Harlem Branch (125th Street) was organized in 1868 in its first rented headquarters at 122nd Street and Third Avenue in Harlem. Among the founders were Lorenzo and Samuel B. Holmes of the Old Reformed Dutch Church, Silas Miller of the Puritan Presbyterian Church, and S.H. Burr of Harlem First Baptist Church. The initial programs were the standard early YMCAs with a reading room and religious services for young men in the neighborhood.In 1880 it opened its own building on 125th Street. In operated in this building until 1929. A limited program was continued in another location until 1933. The Uptown Branch was an outgrowth of this former work in upper Manhattan.The 125th Street Harlem Branch should not be confused with the Colored Men’s or 135th Street Harlem Branch which served a primarily African-American community.Information from Terry Donahue’s An Event on Mercer Street (1951) and S.H. Burr’s remarks in 1918.

In the distance a number of blocks away is the Harlem Trolley Car in the middle of the cobblestone street heading south towards us.

In addition, there are tree branches that can be seen in the upper right hand corner of the photograph which leads us to believe that there was a tree on the northwest corner of the block.