Fight to Save the White Horse Gains Steam

The White Horse Today (Gabe Herman/the Villager); Jane Jacobs at the White Horse in 1961.

Village Preservation’s effort to secure landmark designation for the interior of the White Horse Tavern at 567 Hudson Street, in light of the building’s recent sale to notorious landlord and convicted felon Steve Croman, has gained increasing support in recent days. Last week we joined a rally organized by the Stop Croman Coalition of tenants, elected officials, and other community groups outside to call for landmark designation of the historic tavern. See Village Preservation’s speech here, and coverage at Gothamist, Patch, Crain’s, and Curbed. City Council Speaker Corey Johnson, Congressman Jerrold Nadler, State Senator Brad Hoylman, Assemblymember Deborah Glick, and Borough President Gale Brewer have written to the Landmarks Preservation Commission in support of our landmarking proposal (read their letter here). Regardless of what the new operator of the White Horse says about his intention to leave the space as it is, without interior landmark designation, the historic interior in which countless literary luminaries from Dylan Thomas to Jack Kerouac, James Baldwin to Jane Jacobs assembled can be destroyed at any time.