Warner’s Safe Remedies Building Endures

Construction of the Warner’s Safe Remedies Building began 130 years ago in 1883 and was completed in time for H. H. Warner’s 42nd birthday. Not many people get a building for their birthday, but Warner was not most people. His medicine empire was taking off by that time and the money was rolling in. The Safe Remedies Building became a symbol of his success and, unlike the Observatory and his Mansion, it survives to this day.

Engraving of Warner’s Safe Remedies Building

 Through the years, the Safe Remedies Building has been captured on film, which makes for an interesting retrospective.

Warner’s Safe Remedies Building in 1884

View of Warner’s Safe Remedies Building from Intersection of St. Pauls and Mortimer Streets in 1899

Warner’s Safe Remedies Building in 1924

View of Warner’s Safe Remedies Building from the Intersection of St. Pauls and Andrews Streets in 1949

Warner’s Safe Remedies Building in 2009

Advertisement for Warner Lofts

By 2009, the Safe Remedies Building was looking pretty shabby. All of the buildings that had been constructed around it had been demolished.  One had to wonder if a similar fate awaited the Safe Remedies Building. Fortunately, the building has since been renovated into residential housing known as the Warner Lofts. Here’s hoping that this landmark and one of the last standing monuments to H. H. Warner endures for many years to come.

Warner’s Safe Cure: Rochester Cityscapes (1904)

In my ongoing research of all things Safe Cure, I have had occasion to stumble upon some interesting material. Frequently, that material deals with the city where H. H. Warner chose to build his empire – Rochester.  He certainly made his mark on the city in a number of ways: the Warner’s Safe Remedies Building on St. Paul’s Avenue was opened in 1884, the Warner Observatory in 1883 and the Warner Mansion on East Avenue was finished in 1879. By 1887, Warner reached the apex of his success as the first president of the Rochester Chamber of Commerce and by 1893, his empire was in ruins.

In 1904, the Rochester Chamber of Commerce published a book with the not so remarkable title “Rochester in 1904.”  As one might expect, the book is a profile of the city, its history and flourishing business community.

 

Two things caught my attention in this book. The first was a series of wonderful skyline views of the city. The second was the almost complete absence of any reference to H. H. Warner or Warner’s Safe Cure. In the decade that followed the Panic of 1893 and the financial collapse of Warner, his previously indelible mark on the commercial face of Rochester had faded to nothing. The only mention of him in the book was the listing of his name as a signatory of the original Chamber of Commerce Certificate of Incorporation in June, 1888.  What a difference a decade makes. Here are a few of the Rochester cityscapes as they appeared in 1904.

Warner’s Safe Remedies Building: Living History

If you are a Warner’s Safe Cure collector, you owe it to yourself to visit the center of the Warner universe, Rochester,  New York.  I did so in 2001 and have written about it before in this blog.  During my visit, Jack Stecher and I were able to go into the building, but found that much of the space was carved up into commercial uses and undoubtedly bore little resemblence to the hustle and bustle of the patent medicine business that flourished there in the late-19th Century. Nevertheless, the fact that this wonderful piece of Victorian architecture was still standing for us to admire was no small thing. Rochester has lost more than its fair share of wonderful buildings to the wrecking ball, including other structures associated with H. H. Warner, such as his mansion and the Warner Observatory.

I was delighed recently to find that the Warner’s Safe Remedies Building has found yet another adaptive reuse in the form of the  H. H. Warner Lofts. Although I had not been back to the building to tour these new residential spaces, they appear to make wonderful use of  unique architecture of this building and will hopefully ensure that it lasts for many more years.

Best of all, the developers of this project have been mindful of the significance of the building’s history and its progenitor and have included photos of Warner’s Safe almanacs and trade cards on their website. I say “Bravo” to the H. H. Warner Lofts. If I lived in Rochester,  I might be considering a new address.

Warner’s Safe Cure: A Chronology

I thought I would take a shot at creating a time line that summaries the significant events in the existence of the Warner’s Safe Cure Company and its founder, H. H. Warner. I’m sure that I will miss something and welcome any suggestions. This will likely be a work in progress, but here goes:

• 1842    Hulbert Harrington Warner born near Syracuse, New York in a small town called Warners, which was named after his grandfather, Seth, who had moved there in 1807 from Stockbridge, Massachusetts.

• 1864     Warner marries Martha L. Keeney, a prominent young woman from Skaneateles, New York. Like Warner, she was born in 1842, but died suddenly in 1871. The marriage produced no children. 

 

• 1865    Warner avoided service in the Union Army in the Civil War. He moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan where he and a partner were engaged in the stove and hardware business.

• 1870     Returned to New York and settled in Rochester as a dealer in fire and burglar proof safes. He was a dealer for the predecessor of the Mosler Safe Company of Cincinnati, Ohio. (See New York Daily Graphic, May 10, 1888; Rochester Union & Advertiser, April 27, 1883).

• 1872     Warner marries Emily Olive Stoddard (born 1847 in Michigan). It appears that this second marriage produced one child, a daughter, Maud. It also appears that Emily predeceased Warner.

• 1879     Following his recovery from Bright’s Disease, Warner purchases the rights to Dr. Charles Craig’s Kidney Cure and promptly begins to market it as Warner’s Safe Kidney & Liver Cure. In addition, he offers four other products: Safe Pills, Safe Nervine,  Safe Bitters and Safe Diabetes Cure. The company operates initially out of a building on Exhange Street in downtown Rochester.

• 1879     Warner is introduced to “Doctor” Lewis Swift, who was by vocation a partner in a hardware store and by avocation an astronomer who has discovered several comets. It was rumored that Swift was leaving Rochester, because he believed his talents were not sufficiently appreciated.

• 1882     Warner opens his Toronto Office and offers his cures in the 3-Cities bottles.

• 1883     Warner opens his London Office and begins offering his cures in a spectacular array of colored bottles.

• 1883     The Warner Observatory is completed and fitted out by January at a cost to Warner of $100,000. It boasts a 16″ telescope that was 22 feet long donated by the citizens of Rochester. It becomes a focal point of much of Warner’s advertising.

• 1884     The Warner’s Safe Remedies Building is opened on Warner’s 42nd birthday in January on St. Paul’s Avenue in Rochester. The iron front building was also marketed as the Warner’s Safe Yeast Building and in its eight stories housed Warner’s manufacturing, shipping and marketing operations. The fascade is graced with the monograms “W” and fitted out with first class details. The building remains today as the last vestige of Warner’s patent medicine empire.

 

• 1885     Warner adds his Safe Rheumatic Cure, Animal Cure and Safe Throatine to his product line. In addition, he introduces his Tippecanoe Bitters in two grades, “The Best” and “XXX” and phases out his Safe Bitters.

• 1887     Warner introduces his Log Cabin Remedies line of products, which included Log Cabin Sarsaparilla, Log Cabin Hops & Buchu Remedy, Log Cabin Cough and Consumption Remedy, Log Cabin Extract, Log Cabin Rose Cream, Log Cabin Hair Tonic, Log Cabin Plasters and Log Cabin Liver Pills.

 

• 1887     Warner opens his Frankfurt, Germany and Melbourne, Australia Office expanding his patent medicine empire onto three continents.

• 1888     Warner delivers his inaugeral address as president of the Rochester Chamber of Commerce in January.  Warner had been elected president in 1887 winning out over George Eastman, the owner of a little known camera company. Warner is perhaps at the peak of his prosperity with business failure and bankruptcy looming on the horizon.

• 1888     Warner opens his Pressburg, Hungary Office, which remains open only two years. Bottles from the Pressburg Office are particularly prized by collectors because of their rarity.

 

• 1891     Warner opens his Kreuzlingen, Switzerland and Dundein, New Zealand Offices. No Warner bottles embossed Kreuzlingen have ever surfaced. The bottles from the Dundein Office have become known as 4-Cities bottles because they bear the names of four of Warner’s offices at the time: Rochester, London, Toronto and Melbourne.

• 1893     In what would become known as the Panic of 1893, the American securities market crashed in February. Warner was overextended and when his creditors began to call his loans, he scrambled to raise cash. Warner’s longtime business partner, Arthur G. Yates, was unable to cover all of Warner’s debt. Warner was left to travel the country trying to offer his shares in H. H. Warner & Co. Ltd. as collateral for his debts. While some creditors accepted the shares, others did not, and Warner was forced into bankruptcy  on May 8. He lost his mansion on East Avenue, his Observatory, his yacht, his retreat on Warner Island in the St. Lawrence River and, most importantly, his reputation.

 

• 1917     Christina de Martinez Warner (born 1878 in Mexico) was never officially married to  Warner, but apparently resided with him and served as an officer to the Nuera Remedy Company in Minneapolis in the 1930’s to early 1940’s. She resided at his address of 1311 Blaisdell Avenue in Minneapolis between 1917 and 1948.

• 1923     Warner dies in Minneapolis having never regained the economic prominence he enjoyed when the the Warner’s Safe Remedies Company was at its peak. To his credit, he never quit trying to reestablish his former renown. Warner is buried next to his first wife, Martha, in her family’s plot at Lakeview Cemetary in Skaneateles, New York.

• 1929     The Warner Mansion on East Avenue in Rochester is razed to make way for a parking lot.

Federation of Historical Bottle Collectors Expo 2008 in York, Pennsylvania

Beautiful weather and a really nice show, what more could you ask for? Okay, a few showers, but otherwise delightful for August. Better yet, the Warner’s Safe Cures, Tippecanoes and Log Cabin Remedies were here for the picking during the dealers set-up and early admission. Many of us who worked on the Great Warner’s Safe Cure Exhibit  (“GWSCE”) in 2001 in Rochester, including Jack Stecher, Dave Kyle, Andy Lange and Bob Sheffield had a chance to catch-up. Andy was the clear winner as far as rare Warner’s on his sales table, including two London samples, a strap sided London Compound, a half-pint aqua London Safe Cure, two Pressburg Safe Cures (Green and Aqua), a labelled  olive London Diabetes Cure (perhaps one-of-a-kind), two Frankfurt half pint Nervines (in amber and green), a Frankfurt Diabetes Cure, a grass green Rochester Diabetes Remedy and two labelled Log Cabin Remedies with the orginal boxes. Seldom will you see so many bottles on the Warner A-List in one place, at one time. Nice work Andy!

When I was not drooling over Andy’s selection, I did manage to make it around the rest of the show. From Jack Stecher I got one of the original Safe Cure Almanacs from 1879-1880 and the London Almanac from 1888-1889. I have never seen either of these almanacs for sale before and neither had Jack. They had been in Dave Kyle’s collection.

In addition to the GWSCE, the show included folks from down under, who brought some of their Warner’s along. Wayne and Lorna Humphries from New Zealand came with Andy as well as James and Sandy Bell from Australia. Needless to say, they get the award for the longest journey. Perhaps the best thing was that there were Warner’s at almost every level from that for the beginning collector to that for the most seasoned collector. In addition to a host of Rochester Kidney & Liver Cures, Safe Remedies Company bottles and Kidney & Liver Remedies, I saw three Safe Bitters, four Animal Cures (including a light amber London, an olive London and an amber 3 Cities),  and a slug plate Rochester half-pint Nervine. In addition to the Safe Almanacs, Jack brought along so other go-withs, including vintage photos of the Warner Mansion and the Warner Observatory, several Benton’s Hair Growers and several stereoscope slides of Warner Island.

This Expo was a delight. Thanks to the Federation for a wonderful job. 🙂

The Warner Mansion (1879 – 1929)

1879 was a good year for H. H. Warner. It saw the launch of his patent medicine business as well as the completion of a stately house on Rochester’s posh East Avenue. According to Edward Atwater in his Perfect Pitch, the home did not want for opulence:

During its fifty years it had not been surpassed for flamboyance. The ebony and white holly woodwork, parquet floors, etched glass windows, fabulous staircase of carved black walnut, and the elevator – the first private elevator in Rochester – had once been the talk of the town.

Atwater at 189-190. The home was built by J. R. Thomas on the southwest corner of East and Goodman Avenues. The home was, no doubt, the scene of lavish social events as Warner’s medicine business prospered during the 1880’s and early 1890’s.

When Warner’s fortunes turned, he was forced to sell the home along with his other assests to satisfy his creditors. The home was purchased by Leon Grisheim in 1893 and his daughter resided there until is demolition. Despite its architectural uniqueness and appointments, the home ultimately met the wrecking ball in 1929. The home was levelled to make room for a parking lot. The site was donated to the Rochester Museum and Science Center in 1941.

The above photographs show the home in two distinct periods of its existence. The first, from the collection of the Rochester Public Library Local History Division was likely taken shortly after the completion of the home in 1879. The second shows the home in a considerable state of deterioration surrounded by overgrown trees and folliage and is from the Albert R. Stone Negative Collection of the Rochester Museum & Science Center.  A sign in front of the home reads “Seneca Club Property”.  I am not certain about the date that the second photograph, but given the growth of vegetation around the home, one would suspect it was taken in the early part of the 20th Century. Although I had seen the first photograph before, I had not seen the second until it was brought to my attention by Kevin Taft. Thanks Kevin!

Although the home survived its original owner by six years, its deterioration is symbolic of Warner’s rise and fall.