Oral History interview with Allan Lorimer,
Pastor of First Congregational Church of Greenwich; 1927 - 1934

Binney Park Land Sale

So one night, I was down at Mr. Binney's and there was Mother Binney. They were wonderful to me. Allan Kitchel and the Binneys and my wife were there. Their son June Binney had just died. Mrs. Binney said she wanted to make a memorial for June. We have the Parish House in the church. Mr. Binney said they went by that “awful swamp” across from the church and thought that could be made into a beautiful park. It was owned by Cyrus Miller in New York.

"He's a skinflint and he wants to keep it for future development, but we don't want any kind of apartment house (they didn't have any zoning laws then). I'd like to buy it and make it into a beautiful park in memory of June, but Cyrus knows all about me and furthermore he knows that I want to buy it, so his price has gone way, way up,
so it's prohibitive and he thinks I'll meet that price. So I'd like to ask you if you'd be good enough to talk with Cyrus Miller and give him a community story.” Mr. Binney said he'd go up to $30,000.

So I went in on a train with Allan Kitchel and got off at 125th Street and met Cyrus at the Edgar Allen Poe House. He took me through it and then I said “I'd like to have a talk with you.”

We sat out on the porch and he said, "Did Ed Binney send you here as his agent? Tell me why I should sell you my property for a measly $30,000."

I said, “Right, I couldn't put that any more succinctly."

He said, “What's your argument?

I said, “I haven't any, goodbye!”

He said “Wait a minute.”

I said, "Goodbye, Mr. Miller. I'm sorry you told me this Edgar Allen Poe House was not the original, but there are very few people who know it. And you didn't even rehabilitate the original. You put up a fake house and nobody knows it. If that's the kind of man I know I'm going to have to deal with, I know I won't get to first base. I don't know anything about that kind of business. It's too flimflammy for me. It's against my ethics. Goodbye."

He said “Wait a minute” and took me to lunch at some club in the Bronx. He said at lunch, “Before we talk about business, let me ask you something about religion. I've never been to a church in my life.”

That's all I needed. He became pretty mellow and then he began asking questions. I began to see he needed religion. “You’re asking me for religion, aren't you?”

He said, "Yes, I am." I asked why. He said, "Not one of my employees has ever stood up to me like you have, that's why I first admired you. I just wanted to see if you had any guts. That's why I asked you for religion. Now I know I really need it. But I need it in a different way. I've got a lot of courage."

I said, "You've got a lot of things to hide, too. And you've got to come straight out with me, Mr. Miller."

He said, "Will you have luncheon with me the first Monday of each month for four months?"

I said sure, and I did. He became a very serious communicant in a Lutheran church up there.

We went to his law office. He asked me how far Ed Binney really was willing to go, so I told him how he wanted it as a memorial to his son. And I told Cyrus it wouldn't mean anything to him because he didn't have any structure, spiritual or moral, to understand what it is to have a loving memorial in the form of a beautiful park.