Two well-informed 1st Ward sources report that developer T. Eric Galloway has, as widely rumored in town, a deal in place to purchase the 10,000-square-foot former Allen Street School in Hudson. Galloway also recently purchased the former House of Beauty building in the 400 block at a somewhat controversial City auction of foreclosed properties.
The building’s educational facade gives little hint of the staggering interior spaces, which feature very high ceilings and views of the River. There are four large loftlike rooms on the second floor each with a large side coatroom, a ballroom-like space and more large rooms on the main floor, plus a vast basement and attic.
The current owner, Eleanor Ambos, replaced the remains of several crumbling staircases with makeshift steps and bricked in the front entrance, while holding the property empty for over a decade. The overall feeling in its current condition is of being in an abandoned Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) or Havana mansion.
Galvan Initiatives Fund advisor Rick Scalera is also known to have performed some property management duties for Ambos, keeping things all in the political family.
One could readily imagine any number of functions for such a building, but given the warehousing and snail’s-pace renovations at many Galloway properties, this one could be another decade before it is put to any productive use.
