History

Businesses with Historic Character “Main Street is more than a line on the map. It’s a sense of place, a reflection on a simpler past, a connection to a heritage,” Pat Ross writes in her book, Remembering Main Street: An American Album. “People talk a lot about the way Main Street has changed and how it […]

565 Main Street Leonard Italiano would be amazed by the vast and prestigious selection of jewelry, crystal, china and other fine gifts that fills the Main Street store at the corner of Centre Avenue. Italiano was one New Rochelle’s premier jewelers – first working door-to-door and then in an upstairs store on Mechanic Street (now

Since 1927 New Rochelle children have been walking through the doors of 510 Main Street to buy their seasonal wardrobes. Unlike any other Main Street store, founded by Herman Liebman and his partner, Herman Pinals, Liebman’s has been in its same location for almost 70 years. The building itself evokes a wonderful sense of time,

“Banks are symbols of power, money, security and conservatism: their image, therefore, can be expected to be strong in terms of design. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when many Unite States banking institutions got their start, they were more locally oriented than at present…they were usually single-unit enterprises created by local individuals.

What does 519 Main Street, at the prominent corner of Main Street and Memorial Plaza, have in common with the 81 Centre Artist Studios, Talner’s Jewelry, the Curtain Shop and the “Palace” buildings? Just look up. They all boast fine architectural terra cotta details. Look up, and you’ll see an abundance of the glazed ceramics

451-453 Main Street Early History The local chapter of the Fraternal Order of Masons was making a clear statement when it constructed this imposing building at the turn of the 20th century. Located in the heart of the community’s rapidly growing business district, the structure was designed to be one of the largest in the

One Library PlazaCirca 1979 and 2001 Recipient of the National Award for Excellence for Library Architecture, the New Rochelle Public Library, built in 1979, in part from an existing parking garage, serves as an educational center for the City. Norman Rockwell’s original mural, Land of Enchantment, his gift to New Rochelle, graces a wall of

(Now the Curtain Shop and General Store)541 Main Street History of the Building This brick building replaced an earlier one that had been destroyed by fire on January 27, 1897. Just 10 months later, William Weisskpof had completed a new, bigger and better building for his “resort” enterprise—an entertainment center in the heart of New

When Lou Gehrig shopped at I.B. Cohen’s, in the early 1930s, he had Nat Cohen make suits from material Gehrig had purchased while playing exhibition games in Japan. Each suit cost the famous Yankee $32.00. At the same time- and years before- artist Norman Rockwell bought his clothes here. Many other celebrities, CEOs, and area

Norman Rockwell in the 1940s: A View of the American Homefront organized by the Norman Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, MA, and Norman Rockwell’s New Rochelle Years, organized by Barbara Davis, New Rochelle Public Library, were the inaugural exhibits at the Museum of Arts & Culture, a program of the New Rochelle Fund for Educational Excellence. Born