920 Park Place
Mercein Thomas
1888-89; extension: William Kennedy, 1911-13

Perhaps the most unusual and picturesque site in Crown Heights North is the former Methodist Home for the Aged, an enormous freestanding complex. Originally located in Bedford-Stuyvesant and established in 1883, the institution was founded by the Methodist Church in Brooklyn to provide housing and care for its elderly parishioners. As the original structure quickly became too small, this grand building was constructed in the Romanesque Revival style just five years later. A new wing and Gothic Revival style chapel were added in 1911-13. The home, evolving into a nursing facility, moved again in 1976 to a more modern structure, and this building was left abandoned for several decades. Today, part of the complex is operated by the Hebron French Speaking 7^th Day Adventist School, a bi-lingual elementary school, but much of the complex is in a state of disrepair. This is a sad situation for an important building that stands not only as a beautiful architectural tableau, but as one of the few institutional buildings left in Crown Heights, which was once home to a large number of hospitals, asylums and homes for indigent populations.

The Former Brooklyn Methodist Episcopal Church Home for the Aged and the Infirm is located in the Crown Heights North II Historic District and the State and National Register of Historic Places Crown Heights North Historic District.