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327 West 41st Street Public Bath

Original cost: $135,300

The West 41st Street Bath was built on the northern end of what was then called "The Tenderloin", a notorious red-light district that extended down to 23rd street. The location near Times Square may have meant that the facility was intended to serve transients as well as neighborhood (predominantly Negro) residents. The neighborhood continued to be haven for the sex trade through the 20th Century, later becoming known as The Deuce.

As of this writing, 327 West 41st Street is the loading dock for the old McGraw-Hill Building, a skyscraper covered in distinctive blue-green terra cotta that opened in 1931. If the street numbering is the same as it was in 1904, that would make this one of the first bathhouses to fall to the wrecking ball. In 1949, the Port Authority Bus Terminal was built on the block just to the South between 40th and 41st streets and the terminal was expanded North in the late 1970s to occupy the half of the block just East of where the bathhouse may have stood. Regardless, there is nothing obvious remaining anywhere in the area to indicate the former bathhouse location.

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