Hotel Knickerbocker 120 West 45th Street New York City

The Hotel Knickerbocker at 120 West 45th Street was a hotel in New York City, built in 1925 and closed in 1974. Not to be confused with the landmark Knickerbocker Hotel on Broadway and 42nd Street.

The 15-story hotel on a lot 95 feet by 100 feet, near Times Square, had 400 rooms, stores and commercial space. It also had celebrated Peppermint Lounge.

From 1926 to about 1932 Edward Bryce Bell was the manager. Bell entered the hotel business in 1920 and became general auditor and controller of the Manger Hotel chain. In 1926 he came to New York to operate the Knickerbocker, which he left in the early 1930s. Later he became a director of the Hotel Association of New York City.

In 1944, the Hotel Knickerbocker was sold by the Prudence Bonds Corporation to Samuel Rosen, owner and operator of the Hotel Bretton Hall. By that year, W.H. Fitzsimmons was the manager and, by 1946, the manager was James P. Somerville.

In 1955, Samuel Rosen Associates sold the Hotel Knickerbocker to Albert Harris of Cincinnati, who operated the Harris chain of hotels. In 1959, the Harris Group sold the hotel to a syndicate represented by Charles H. Kelman, lawyer.

In 1971, developer Seymour Durst was the owner of Hotel Knickerbocker, when it was placed under a court appointed receiver, Louis Glassman. The City ordered it shuttered in 1974. Then, the City let a nonprofit company run the hotel for a time. Later it was sold. By 1985 the Hotel Knickerbocker was demolished. It was replaced by Tower 45, an office building 40 stories high, completed in 1988.