The first part of Audubon's original tract to be sold was the easterly section, extending from what is now the east side of Broadway to the Bloomingdale Road, and between the present One Hundred and Fifty-sixth and One Hundred and Fifty-seventh Streets; on that portion John Woodhouse Audubon built a large frame structure which, for a number of years, served as a boarding house for workmen employed in the sugar refinery of Messrs. Plume & Lamont that stood on the river-bank, at the foot of the present One Hundred and Sixtieth Street. Victor and John W. Audubon also built three houses on the hill, one of which, between One Hundred and Fifty-sixth and One Hundred and Fifty-seventh Streets, was occupied by Mr. Grinnell; another, at one time the dwelling of Henry A. Smythe, a former Collector of the Port of New York, was on land now covered by the Numismatic Building, while a third, which was occupied by Wellington Clapp, was on a part of the Archer M. Huntington estate, south of One Hundred and Fifty-sixth Street, and stood a little easterly of the present Riverside Drive; all of these houses have disappeared. In September, 1842, the Corporation of Trinity Parish acquired from Richard F. Carman, in Carmansville, the tract of land later known as "Trinity Cemetery"; this extended from Bloomingdale Road to the River, and between the present One Hundred and Fifty-third and One Hundred and Fifty-fifth Streets.[249] The original Audubon house, standing in the angle nearly opposite One Hundred and Fifty-fifth Street, is all but concealed, except from the river side, but may be approached by a lane which leads off from One Hundred and Fifty-eighth Street. In 1913, when this old landmark was in imminent danger of demolition, the Commissioner of Public Parks made an eloquent plea for its preservation to the Audubon Societies and to lovers of birds and nature everywhere. It was then suggested that instead of permitting the historic structure to be destroyed, the city should acquire it, float it up the Hudson River to Fort Washington Park, and re-establish it there as a permanent memorial to the naturalist; it was also noticed that the public interest was enhanced by the fact that the father of telegraphy, Samuel F. B. Morse, had worked upon his invention while Audubon's guest, and that the first message to be received from Philadelphia came over a wire which entered his room at the northwest corner of the building.