Magill House

Magill House
Magill House
Troy, New York was an industrial behemouth in the 19th century. It was where the Erie Canal began and was the location of important industrial railroads, once the railroads were taken seriously. During the 19th century, early Dutch farms gave way to impressive Victorian mansions inhabited by wealthy industrialists. As the the Industrial Revolution matured, workers, many of them immigrants, organized labor unions. Management resisted, sometimes violently. It was in this turbulent later half of the 19th century that the Magill House was built

Wednesday, July 17, 2024


For Rent,  Mid - October 2024   $1650 plus gas and electric

JOHN MAGILL -  Magill was not one of the industrial giants in Troy; nor was he socially accepted in the highest levels of society in the city.  He was an Irish immigrant, a master stone and brick mason and a builder. (He built the famed Oakwood crematorium.)  In short, he was a striver.  One might think that as an Irishman he would have been a Democrat.  Not Magill!  He was an Irish Republican.  In fact, he became the Republican police commissioner during the time when the city had two competing police department.  He was in the thick of the labour unrest and violence that grew out or Troy's industrial power...and he hired one of the most important architects in New York to design for him, a house which most Irish immigrants in the 19th Century could never dream of owning.   I call the Magill House, the house that graft built.  I hope you enjoy your visit.


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