339 Lafayette Street

339 Lafayette Street, nicknamed the Peace Pentagon, and officially numbered 339-345, is a building in the NoHo neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City known in the late 20th and early 21st century for the many left-wing and radical activist and political organizations headquartered there. The building was completed c.1920.[1]

The building in 2016, with construction scaffolding around it
The front door of the building, showing the War Resisters League sign

History

The War Resisters League began to rent the building in 1968, and purchased it in 1974 for $60,000.[2]

In 1978 the A. J. Muste Institute bought the building from the War Resisters League for $91,000.[2] [3] For decades the Institute provided office space to politically congenial activist organizations at below-market rates.[3]

In October 2015, the building was sold to the real estate holding company 337 Lafayette L.P., owned by developer Aby Rosen.[4]

Organizations with headquarters in the building have included the Granny Peace Brigade, the National Committee to Reopen the Rosenberg Case, the Socialist Party USA,[3] the Metropolitan Council on Housing,[2] Women's Pentagon Action, Catholic Peace Fellowship, Episcopal Churchmen for South Africa, the New York Anti-Nuclear Group, the Infant Formula Action Coalition, Art for Social Change, Political Art Documentation/Distribution, the Fund for Open Information and Accountability,[5] NYC Shut It Down, and Paper Tiger Television.

References
  1. New York City Geographic Information System Map
  2. Moynihan, Colin (September 4, 2007). "Region Structural Flaws Found in a Building That's Known as the Peace Pentagon". The New York Times. Retrieved April 13, 2016.
  3. Hogarty, Dave (February 28, 2012). "Wall Street, One Percenters Ready to Occupy 'Peace Pentagon'". Curbed. Retrieved April 13, 2016.
  4. Moynihan, Colin (April 12, 2016). "The 'Peace Pentagon,' an Activist Office in NoHo, Is Forced to Move". The New York Times. Retrieved April 13, 2016.
  5. Bennett, Scott (2003). Radical Pacifism: The War Resisters League and Gandhian Nonviolence in America, 1915-1963. Syracuse University Press. p. xiv.
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