Known today as, “the schoolhouse building”, 29 King started off as Public School No. 8. In 1887 the building was constructed for $250,000 and housed 1,200 students – all well-to-do immigrant boys – who learned drafting, mathematics, and sciences. In 1889 female students were allowed to enroll in classes teaching “penmenship, bookkeeping, phonography and drawing.” By the turn of the century as the well-to-do started migrating uptown the demographic of the school changed and by the mid 1950s,
29 King became known as a “600” school – for juvenile delinquents. In 1958, it was re-named “The Livingston School “ and was the city’s only public school exclusively for troubled girls, who where quietly referred to as “thuglettes”. Typical reasons that girls – aged 13 to 18 years old – were sent to Livingston: threatening bodily harm, punching boys, stealing textbooks, shouting in class, using vile language, smoking in school, striking boys over the head with chairs, pushing girls down the stairwells, ringing fire alarm.

In 1981, this lively Queen Anne style building was converted to 38 luxury apartments. Million dollar condos replaced the schoolrooms where tradeboys learned math and drafting and wayward girls tried to behave like ladies. Nothing much has changed.