5th Avenue and Waldorf Hotel

The Fifth Avenue with horse-drawn carriages and pedestrians, looking south from 34th Street. The original Waldorf Hotel is on the west side. The old Astor Residence is on the right, on the site Astoria Hotel was completed in 1897. Holland House and the spire of Marble Collegiate Church are in the distance. Source: CUNY Graduate Center Collection.

John Jacob Astor (1864-1912), the fourth namesake of the patriarch of the family, and his cousin William Waldorf Astor (1848-1919) built a number of luxury hotels in the late 19th century and early 20th century. William Waldorf's Waldorf Hotel of 1895 and John Jacob's Astoria Hotel, begun in the same year on adjacent sites (both sites now occupied by the Empire State Building) were eventually joined to form the first Waldorf-Astoria Hotel (architect, Henry Hardenbergh) which was considered at the time to be the grandest New York hotel.