New York Times, 8 Jan 1933, p. 31
W.J. MACDONALD, BUILDER, IS, DEAD
Former Secretary of M. Reid & Co. Succumbs at Home Here at Age of 73.
ERECTED COLUMBIA HALLS
Ritz-Carlton Hotel, Post-Graduate and St. Vincent's Hospitals Also Put Up by His Firm.
William J. MacDonald, for many years one of New York City's leading builders, died on Friday at his home, 865 West End Avenue, after an illness of about six months. From 1890 until his retirement in 1925 Mr. MacDonald was secretary of M. Reid & Co., 156 East Forty-second Street. His age was 73.
Born in Ireland, Mr. MacDonald was the son of the late Thomas J. MacDonald who taught in a school at Nobby, Ireland, and of the late Mrs. Ellen Reid MacDonald, who belonged to a family of builders and whose father, Michael Reid, designed and built the Monasterevan Cathedral in County Kildare, Ireland. Mr. MacDonald came to New York at the age of 13, after the death of his parents.
After attending the public schools, Mr. MacDonald attended the night school of the Society of Mechanics and Tradesmen for several years. Fifty years ago he went to work for his uncle, the late Michael Reid, son of the cathedral builder and head of M. Reid & Co.
Mr. MacDonald was active in the erection of many fine buildings by his firm. Among those built during his connection with the company were the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, the Hotel Imperial, New York Post-Graduate Hospital, the Metropolitan power stations at Seventy-fourth Street and the East River and Ninety-sixth Street and the river, the Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum in the Bronx, Burke Foundation in White Plains, Lenox Hill Hospital, the north wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the uptown dormitories of New York University.
The firm also built while he was its secretary Furnald, Livingston, Kent, Avery and Brooks Halls at Columbia University, its Mines and Engineering Building and President Nicholas Murray Butler's residence.
Many public libraries, office buildings, churches, schools and theatres were also erected by the company while Mr. MacDonald was its secretary. Among the private residences it put up were those of John Innes Kane, William C. Whitney, Joseph Pulitzer, Henry A.C. Taylor, Andrew Zabriskie and Henry Plant. The late Stanford White, the architect, was quoted as having called Mr. MacDonald one of the most dependable men he knew.
Mr. MacDonald is survived by his wife, the former Miss Adelaide Brady; three daughters, Mrs. George P. Kuzimer of Huntington, L.I.; Mrs. Neil Laprese of Crestwood, N.Y., and Miss Agnes MacDonald of New York, and a sister, Mrs. Edith McCormick of New York.
A solemn high mass of requiem will be celebrated for Mr. MacDonald at 10A.M. tomorrow at the Roman Catholic Church of the Ascension, 107th Street near Broadway. Burial will be in the Gate of Heaven Cemetery.
