Treasure Trove

Christmas came early to my Lower Manhattan co-op. During our annual meeting last August, we learned that a routine facade inspection had revealed a chimney under the brickwork where my building, a former warehouse, meets the building next door. A few parents chuckled. Now they could tell their children Santa has a way to deliver their gifts. But it soon became clear that unless Santa planned to drop down a bag of cash, the chimney was going to cost us a bundle.

Our chimney isn’t lined with sugar plums. It’s a corroded metal flue that either has to be removed (which will require a huge assessment) or be brought up to code (which will require a colossal assessment). According to the preliminary report, the building next door is allowed access to our flue — and currently may be venting into it — but only we are responsible for its maintenance. 

We’re still waiting for the final report, but I found the hidden chimney and lopsided agreement between our 82-year-old building and the 101-year-old building next door irresistible, and I couldn’t wait to know more.  

The next morning, I borrowed the super’s keys and went down to the basement file room. After our building went co-op in 1979, supers used to store residents’ spare keys there. The walls of the small, narrow room are lined with boxes, the papers inside mostly unorganized. After an hour skimming through stacks of co-op reports, agendas and financials from decades past, I finally reached a cabinet against the farthest wall. 

Inside was unexpected treasure: neatly labeled files of my co-op’s first years. Folders marked Garbage, Agendas and Annual Meetings. Others labeled Venting, Insurance and Legal Proceedings. As I began to read, I forgot about the chimney. Instead, I sat on a nearby box of documents and delved into the past.

The first thing I noticed was that early meeting notes were handwritten. The bold, frantic script matches the pressures faced by the first board as they tried to bring order to what was then the Wild West of Lower Manhattan development. Even though the co-op is now running smoothly, many issues are the same — maintenance, insurance, leaky walls, creaky radiators, squeaky windows, a smelly garbage room. 

Then, as now, shareholders were admonished to remove their items from the fire stairwells, not to hold the elevator or play loud music on the roof deck. Everyone had suggestions for how to reconfigure the basement — for bike storage, a gym, even a wine cellar. And regardless of the era, some shareholders simply confounded the board. One exasperated note described negotiations with a shareholder who called from one of his three homes in Montana, pleading poverty and requesting an extension on paying his maintenance.

I learned that my building’s culture of moving slowly was established at the very beginning. Minutes from the first board meeting note the formation of a lobby committee. Six years later, the lobby committee submitted a report. Similar reports have been made over the decades, but it was not until 2016 that our lobby was finally renovated.

Also remarkably familiar were the reports on the first facade inspections — cracks that needed sealing, parapet joints that needed rebuilding, limestone that needed replacing. There was even mention of a chimney, but not the one that I came down to investigate. This one, located on the other side of the building, may or may not also still be hidden under the outer bricks.

Three hours and a coating of dust later, it was time to go. I grabbed the few remaining files, locked the doors and headed up to my apartment. Back at my desk, I opened the last folder. Though it had nothing to do with the chimney, I knew I had hit gold when I saw the label: Holiday Party.

I learned that despite the pressures, problems and expenses of building a community out of an old warehouse, for the first five years shareholders gathered in December for a movable feast that went from apartment to apartment. Residents were invited to play host and/or provide a tour of their new home. The menu, predetermined by a decisive Holiday Party Committee, was divvied up not just by items but by number of servings that every shareholder could, should and would donate. The fare extended from the standard wine and cheese starter to turkey salad and quiche entrées to a festive trifle and eggnog finale. A schedule was produced to ensure the progression from apartment to apartment was timed to the minute.

I sat back wondering if we were capable of pulling off such a complicated event today. Perhaps in the chaos of those early years, shareholders found comfort and joy in the structure and order of that party. And maybe now that we have structure and order in our building, we can relax knowing the only chaos is in our file room.

And while the original mystery of the chimney remained unsolved, by leading me into the co-op’s past, the chimney did what chimneys are supposed to do — make sure our gifts have a way to find us.