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When newspapers penned an obituary for James A. Timony, they attributed MAE WEST's stardom to his devoted stewardship. 
• • In 1916, the hard-working Brooklyn-bred attorney Matilda West introduced to her daughter was loyal and clever — — if no oil painting. When they met, Mae was 23 and Jim was 30, a solidly built balding Irish American whose injured leg required assistance from an expensive cane adorned with an elk's tooth.
• • Though they both hailed from Massachusetts, Jim's parents Thomas and Mary Timony each had Irish-English ancestry. A builder and contractor, Thomas K. Timony [1847 — 1912] provided well for his brood. Before marriage, Mary [1854 — 1935] had been a teacher in a public school. Of their seven children, five survived and were raised in a substantial dwelling that still exists in pristine condition on Rutland Road [in the Lefferts Park section of Flatbush]. James, born in 1886, attended the best schools and a respected law school, and set up his pratice in Times Square, advertising heavily for new clients.
• • A devout Roman Catholic, Jim Timony carried rosary beads and began each morning by going to Mass. Mae accompanied him during this daily ritual. For decades they went everywhere together — — on cross-country trains, on the Queen Mary, in Mae's "house car," and in limousines (first his and, eventually, hers).
• • The New York Times obituary, alas, reported his age incorrectly when they announced his death on 5 April 1954 from a heart attack at his Hollywood home. According to his obit, Timony had been in retirement for five years due to poor health. (At the time, Mae was 60 years old and performing with her hunky bodybuilders on the nightclub circuit. Timony was then in discussion with developers for a Mae West theme park.)
• • Calling James A. Timony the manager of Mae West for 25 years, and the person who "guided her to success," The Times also noted that he "received major credit for her development from a relatively obscure singer and dancer into an internationally known prototype of the American siren."
• • The Mae West Blog is saluting James A. Timony — — celebrating his life and successful partnership with the Empress of Sex, an intimate relationship that only ended with his death on 5 April 1954 at age 68.• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • Jim Timony • •
• • Feed — — http://feeds2.feedburner.com/MaeWestNYC
Mae West.
Go WEST, young men has been their clarion call for sixteen years now. In Los Angeles, California a group of Mae West celebrants are among the faithful who congregate, annually, on August 17th to remember her unique presence. 
• • Usually the festivities are organized by Hollywood resident Ramfis Diaz — — a 40-ish musician adorned by impressive, a-Mae-zing tattoos inspired by the Brooklyn bombshell herself. A lifelong hoarder of Mae West memorabilia, Mr. Diaz has his walls peppered with spicy images of the movie queen at her most liquorous, frisky, and engaging.
• • The merrymakers — — usually 40 to 50 guests — — track back to the "come up and see me sometime" gal via various connections.
• • Los Angeles Times reporter Kevin Thomas, a close comrade of the late icon, always attends along with Chris Basinger (a good buddy of Mae's during the 1970s, who worked at the Ravenswood and lived across the street from her), and Damon Devine, a Mae-West-iana collector since age 11 and, like Mae, born under the zodiac sign of Leo.
• • According to the divine Mr. Devine, "The rest of the revellers are mostly there out of curiosity, or attracted by the food, cake, and booze. Also a red-headed nudist seems to show up each year!"
• • A toast to Mae West [1893—1980] — — and the a-Mae-zing memories she stage-managed for each of her fans.
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
• • On Sunday afternoon 17 August 2008, during the "Mae West's Walk on the Wild Side" walking tour, Mae-mavens and walk-abouts will visit several locations in Greenwich Village linked to the stage career of the Empress of Sex. Music associated with Mae will be sung live.
• • Walking Tour: "Mae West's Walk on the Wild Side"
• • When: 1:00 PM on Sunday — — 17 August 2008 — — rain or shine• • Meet: Village Restaurant, 62 West Ninth Street, New York, NY 10011
• • Price: $20
• • Subway: E or F [IND] train to West Fourth Street; PATH to 9th Street station
• • Attire: why not wear a Mae West-inspired hat?
• • Info: Seesaw864@juno.com
• • This event — — which is part of the Annual Mae West Birthday Gala — — is open to the public.• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • private L.A. invite courtesy of Damon Devine and Ramfis Diaz • •
NYC
Mae West.
MAE WEST was famously jailed at Jefferson Market Jail in Greenwich Village [once located between Greenwich Lane and West Tenth Street], and tried at Jefferson Market Police Court in 1927. By 1927, the PRISON housed only female felons — — and, making the best use of her incarceration, the Broadway star took notes on the inmates and used this material in her play "Diamond Lil." Mae especially admired Lulu, an experienced stick-up woman in her cell. "It really takes a lot of nerve to hold up a man," the awed actress told a news man who covered the trial. "If I wanted local color, I sure got it in that place."
• • Misinformed people have spread the incorrect assumption that Mae West was in the tall, modernized Women's House of Detention. Not only was the House of Detention not around in 1927, since it was designed during the Prohibition Era, it would look quite unlike the elaborate nineteenth century jail, which beautifully matched the rest of the judicial complex. [The left foreground area shows a low-rise masonry market building designed by Douglas Smith in 1883.] • • People who make this mistake include actor David Duchovny, whose motion picture "House of D" [2004] paid homage to the former correctional facility [erected 1931, Sloan and Robertson, architects; demolished 1974]. When I interviewed the Yale-educated actor, he proudly told me Mae West had been locked up there. I winced.• • In this 1883 illustration, the Jefferson Market Jail is on the far left. That is the structure that would be razed and replaced with an ugly Art Deco House of Detention [1931-1974] that resembled an upright milk container. This one acre lot — — formerly a jail, and once a house of detention — — is now a garden.
• • Preservation takes many forms. Greenwich Villagers, led by Margot Gayle, stopped the city from destroying the courthouse and clock tower. Another Greenwich Villager has preserved some of the cultural history of the jail and courthouse by situating a few scenes in her play Courting Mae West: Sex, Censorship, and Secrets here.
• • Jefferson Market history buffs might enjoy jeffersonmarketcourthouseny.blogspot.com/
• • What's left? What was spared by the wrecking ball? • • What is left of the magnificent nineteenth century courthouse, with its iconic fire tower and "Old Jeff" (its beloved chiming clock), is in deplorable condition — — an unsafe deterioration that has been ignored by the great minds that run the New York Public Library.
• • Instead of fixing the front portico of the former courthouse, for instance, which had dangerously detached from the building (letting the rain and snow penetrate and rust the iron framework), the Fifth Avenue goons diddled away almost $200,000 of City funding [i.e., taxpayers' money] by planning a teen music lounge for the library's basement. Oh, yes, it's clear the New York Public Library bigwigs need to read more books about architecture and landmark preservation, we'd say.
• • Here is an article that appeared (shortly after Mae West's birthday) about the overdue restoration of the New York City landmark. Staffmembers at The New York Times are no longer as careful about fact-checking as they used to be, alas. Fortunately, reporters can refer to the blogosphere and correct their errors with our guidance [even if they do not credit our blogs].
• • A Long-Needed Restoration for a Victorian Gothic Masterpiece • •
• • Jefferson Market Courthouse • •
• • The former Jefferson Market Courthouse, a Victorian Gothic masterpiece in Greenwich Village, will undergo a $7 million renovation to fix its façade, windows, roof, and tower and shore up its structural integrity, city officials announced today.
• • The building — — at 425 Avenue of the Americas at West 10th Street — — now houses a branch of the New York Public Library. But it is in a precarious state.
• • A report completed in February by LI/Saltzman Architects, an architectural preservation firm, found significant deterioration in the building’s sandstone and brickwork. The deterioration, which included open mortar joints and cracked stone, had allowed water to penetrate the building’s façade, causing the stonework to move and settle and rusting the iron framework.
• • A sidewalk bridge has been in place for four years outside the library to protect passers-by from falling pieces of sandstone, caused by the corrosion of the iron framework and cracks throughout the stonework. The entrance portico on the Avenue of the Americas has detached from the building and is leaning slightly toward the street. The funding will go to not only correct these issues and return the façade to its original splendor, but also to shore up the previous deficiencies that led to the original deterioration.
• • About $7 million has now been dedicated to the project.
• • The City Council speaker, Christine C. Quinn, a Democrat who represents the Village, has allocated about $4.1 million to the renovations, and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has contributed about $2.2 million. State Senator Thomas K. Duane allocated about $700,000 to the project when he was a Council member. Ms. Quinn and Mr. Duane joined the president of the New York Public Library, Paul LeClerc, for a financing announcement at the library this afternoon.
• • Christopher Gray of The Times described the building’s rich history in a Streetscapes column in 1994.
• • Designed by Frederick Clark Withers and Calvert Vaux, the building was erected between 1875 and 1877. Over the years it was used, among other things, as a Women’s House of Detention [sic — if reporter Sewell Chan cannot get this straight, then I hope he reads this!], and a police academy. It was a courthouse until 1946, and after that, changed hands among various agencies. ...
• • • • After noticing his errors called out here on the MAE WEST Blog, Sewell Chan adjusted the date the courthouse closed from an incorrect 1927 to a corrected 1946. He also revised the following paragraph.
• • Designed by Frederick Clark Withers and Calvert Vaux, the building was erected between 1875 and 1877. Over the years it was used, among other things, as a jail and a police academy; an adjacent Women’s House of Detention stood on the site from 1929 (when construction started) until 1973 (when it was demolished). The main building served as a courthouse until 1946, and after that, changed hands among various agencies. By 1959, when the preservationist Margot Gayle began a local effort to save the building, it had been abandoned and slated for demolition. Local residents — — including the architect Harold Edelman, the urban theorists Jane Jacobs and Lewis Mumford, the poet E. E. Cummings and the actor Maurice Evans — — joined Ms. Gayle’s effort, and in 1961, Mayor Robert F. Wagner announced the building would be converted to a library, which occurred in 1967.
• • In the mid-1960s, the building was painstakingly restored under the direction of the architect Giorgio Cavaglieri. Mr. Cavaglieri, who died in May [2007] at the age of 95, inserted air conditioning, elevators and library furniture into the building.
• • “He took countless photos to ensure accuracy in replacing a stained-glass window and carved black walnut doors,” Douglas Martin wrote in his obituary of Mr. Cavaglieri. “But features he designed as new — — rather than copied — — were contemporary in material and style. The new entrance to the old circular stair tower, for instance, was through a sleek glass door set into the old carved limestone. The most striking addition was a stark catwalk above the main reading room.”
• • Mr. Gray described the restoration as “the first real instance of a successful historic preservation project in New York City, at a time when skepticism to such a novelty remained very high.”
• • In 1995, the two-ton bell in the tower of the courthouse was tolled, for the first time since 1898, to mark a new slate roof and the completion of the library’s renovation. Now, it seems, the building is crying out for restoration yet again.
— — Source: — — • • The New York Times — — www.nytimes.com/• • Byline: Sewell Chan — — http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/author/schan/2007/08/21/
• • Published on: 21 August 2007
• • The Jefferson Market Branch Library is located at 425 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10011. Greenwich Villagers still refer to the roadway as "Sixth Avenue."
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Photo: • • Mae West • • none • •
NYC
Mae West.
In 1927 Mae West was prosecuted here on Sixth Avenue for obscenity — — particularly because of the homosexual content of her shows. 
But more recently the nineteenth century landmark was about to be raped by the pencil-pushers who rule The New York Public Library. Fortunately, Greenwich Village residents rallied in the name of justice and won.
• • The Villager recently published this news about the beloved Jefferson Market Courthouse turned library.
• • In his front page feature "Long-overdue library facade repairs finally fully funded," staffwriter Albert Amateau explained the cause for jubilation. He wrote: "Villagers who have long been demanding the renovation of the Jefferson Market Library’s exterior celebrated the announcement on Tuesday [21 August 2007] that new city funding has assured the project.
• • Council Speaker Christine Quinn joined State Senator Tom Duane, New York Public Library President Paul LeClerc and Village leaders in the community room of the landmarked library to announce that the new funding brings the total allocation to more than $7 million for renovating the facade, windows, roof, and tower of the landmarked building erected in 1877 as a courthouse.
• • The beginning of construction is planned for June 2009 and is expected to be completed in two years. A two-month design phase includes review by the Landmarks Preservation Commission because the building is a designated New York City landmark. A final design and development of construction documents will follow and be submitted to contractors for bidding.
• • Several Greenwich Village Block Associations ... renewed the call for preserving the deteriorating exterior of the library. Since 2003, the Sixth Avenue and West 10th Street sides of the library have been obscured by a sidewalk shed erected to protect people from fragments of limestone and brick falling from the facade.
• • “We all know that the Jefferson Market Library is one of the great library buildings in the city,” Quinn said. “In 1880, it was cited as one of the 10 most beautiful buildings in the country. But in the past few years you had to squint to see it because of the scaffold.”
• • Quinn recalled that when Duane was city councilmember for the Village in 1992 — — and she was then on his staff — — he was able to get more than $700,000 allocated for restoring the building. Added to that, Quinn this year allocated $2.7 million in addition to $1.39 million she earmarked in previous years. Also this year, Mayor Bloomberg provided matching funds of $2.2 million for the library restoration.
• • It was uncertain last year whether previous funds appropriated for a redesign of the library’s interior could be reallocated for facade and structural work. But in February 2007, LI/ Salzman Architects completed a report funded by Quinn and Duane that concluded that because of significant deterioration of the sandstone and brickwork, plus open mortar joints and cracked stone, water had penetrated the facade causing the stonework to shift and settle and allowing the building’s iron structure to rust.
• • In addition, it was found that the Sixth Avenue portico has detached slightly from the facade and leans slightly toward the street.
• • All but $184,000 — — spent for interior design work [a design that would have reconfigured the library's reference room into a music lounge for teens] — — of more than $2 million previously funded will be transferred to the exterior project. The work includes shoring up deficiencies that contributed to the deterioration and returning the building to its original splendor.
• • Community Board 2 called the library "the most iconic building in the Village.”
• • Designed by Frederick Clark Withers and Calvert Vaux in 1875 and completed two years later, the courthouse was where Harry K. Thaw was found guilty of murdering the architect Stanford White and where Mae West was prosecuted for the sexual content of her shows.
• • The courthouse was erected on the site of the Jefferson Market, where a 100-foot-tall wooden fire tower kept watch over the Village. The courthouse tower is also 100 feet tall and holds the original fire bell from its wooden precursor.
• • By 1945 the building was no longer used as a courthouse and other agencies had occupied it. A 1958 decision to demolish the building was fought by Village advocates . . .
— — excerpt — —
• • Source: The Villager — — www.TheVillager.com
• • Byline: Albert Amateau
• • Published on: 23 August 2007
• • Unfortunately, this landmark has not preserved the building's cultural history via a plaque nor a permanent exhibition inside, where there's lots of space for it — — and now the funding. MAE WEST and a heap of women's history-makers tramped through these corridors. Maybe. . . .
• • Come up and see Mae every day online: http://MaeWest.blogspot.com/
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Mae West
• • Illustration: • • Mae West on trial • • 1927 • •
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Mae West.
