Deciding which New York City buildings receive landmark status, which means saving them from the wrecking ball, is an inherently controversial bit of regulatory practice. Case in point: a presumed stop on the Underground Railroad in Downtown Brooklyn was landmarked this week after a 16-year fight to preserve it. But a similar 19th century structure in Washington Heights with the same historical claim has been turned down by the city and faces destruction, although activists say there is still a chance to save it.

The difference is in the details.

There is no formal record of the Brooklyn rowhouse at 227 Duffield Street as a stop on the Underground Railroad. Why would there be? Who would write down such a dangerous thing in the years before the Civil War when it could land you a heavy fine or prison time?

The whole point of the Underground Railroad was to hide in plain sight, to exist without a trace.

Conspicuous exceptions prove the rule. One was Jermain Logeun, a Black preacher in Syracuse who took out newspaper ads to let fugitives know that they could shelter at his house. But his brand of defiance was rare. And that leaves the problem of what constitutes sufficient evidence to declare a structure an important site in the history of human rights by declaring: here was a likely way station for enslaved African-Americans in the midst of escaping to freedom.

The evidence is stronger in Downtown Brooklyn than in Washington Heights, at least as of now.

The well-known abolitionist couple Harriet and Thomas Truesdell lived at 227 Duffield Street from 1851 until 1863. It was “a time marked by more clandestine abolitionist activity due to the harsh penalties on those who broke the 1850 Fugitive Slave Law, which required that all escaped slaves be returned and that officials and citizens of free states had to cooperate,” as noted by Mayor Bill de Blasio in a statement about the landmarking of the building.

The Truesdells were friends with William Lloyd Garrison, belonged to anti-slavery societies, and convened anti-slavery conventions in New England. They hosted meetings and events to fight slavery at their Brooklyn home, which was in an area known for Underground Railroad activity. To mark that history, the city in 2007 renamed Duffield Street as “Abolitionist Place.”

The case is less clear for the four-story wood frame house at 857 Riverside Drive, built by sugar refiner Dennis Harris in 1851. Harris had lived over the previous decade in Lower Manhattan, where he preached fiery anti-slavery sermons. He also helped a fugitive escape slave catchers, and was active in the Underground Railroad. When his sugar refinery burned down, he moved the business to Washington Heights. There, he built the house and another refinery with a wharf on the Hudson River. Some preservationists say this would’ve been an ideal location for Harris to continue his work on the Underground Railroad, ferrying fugitives further north.

The case is strong but circumstantial.

But State Assemblyman Al Taylor, for one, is determined to make it. “It's a given that if that individual was involved with the Underground Railroad where he lived before and then relocated up here, he's going to continue that cause that's in heart,” Taylor said at a recent rally on a chilly morning outside 857 Riverside Drive. “He’s going to continue to help Black people run for freedom!”

Local historians have detailed Dennis Harris’s long list of abolitionist activities in an impressively thorough report. A coalition of neighborhood and preservationist groups submitted the report in November to the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission as part of a request that 857 Riverside Drive be considered for landmark status. The commission swiftly turned them down.

Lisa Kersavage, the Landmark Preservation Commission’s executive director, told Gothamist/WNYC that, crucially, Dennis Harris never lived in the house. She said this makes it less likely that the site was used for abolitionist activities. “The report acknowledged the house's use as part of the Underground Railroad was purely speculative,” she said. “We're really focusing on those places that have that documented history.”

Another hurdle would be the Harris house’s changed appearance.

"Riverside Drive, no. 857, at 159th Street, Manhattan," 1930s.

Courtesy of the NYPL

Once a charming wooden villa with a rooftop cupola and front porch, 857 Riverside Drive has been denuded of such structural details, as well as significant ornamentation. It is now, to the eye, little more than a boxy structure covered in something called permabrick. “When you have a building that's so altered, that it is essentially a 20th century building, it can't communicate its story,” Kersavage said. She added that the commission must consider buildings in their current state, and that it cannot require an owner to undertake a historical restoration.

But what about 227 Duffield Street, the city’s newest landmark, which is fronted by a two-story store added in the 1930s? The commission decided that enough of the building’s original appearance remains to convey its original time and place. They think the opposite about the visual appearance of 875 Riverside Drive, which has a more tenuous connection to the Underground Railroad.

In August, Spencer Developers filed a demolition permit with the Department of Buildings. The company, which would not comment on the project, plans to construct a 13-story residential tower on the site. At that height, it would soar above the neighborhood’s three-to-six story roofline.

Defenders of the Harris House, including Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer, are pleading with the city for time to find documentation more firmly linking it to the kind of Underground Railroad activity that its owner was known for.

The supporters will get no help from the Department of Buildings, according to spokesman Andrew Rudansky. “We review construction and demolition applications that we receive for compliance with the applicable laws of the City of New York, namely the NYC Construction Codes and NYC Zoning Resolution,” he wrote in an email. In other words, cultural considerations are outside the department’s purview and will not affect the timing of the demolition process.

But the demolition permit for 875 Riverside Drive is incomplete. It lacks an engineering plan to shore up neighboring structures while the building is taken down. It’s a major hurdle that the developer must clear. Approval usually includes a rigorous on-site inspection and could prove time-consuming, which might offer a sliver of hope for preservationists.

“I must admit, I cannot imagine them tearing down that house,” Ms. Brewer said. “Good grief.” She said the mayor’s office has reached out and offered support to the coalition of neighborhood groups that is working to preserve 875 Riverside Drive. Brewer added that should it be saved, money could be found from both private and government sources to restore it to its original charming self, which was an amalgam of Greek Revival and Italianate architectural styles. “I myself am used to finding a million dollars here and a million dollars there,” she said.

At the rally, Brewer joined other speakers in pointing out that Washington Heights is the kind of Black and brown neighborhood that the Landmarks Preservation Commission has overlooked in the past. “There are very few landmarks in our city that link to the anti-slavery movement,” she told a couple of dozen supporters. “Landmarks Preservation has only granted seventeen — only three in Manhattan. None in Upper Manhattan.”