There’s A Word For That

Another great term for the city lexicon:

On the West Coast, some firefighters call it a “Habitrail house.” In the Midwest, it is often a “packer house.” In parts of Nevada, it is a “multiple waiting to happen,” meaning a multiple-alarm fire.

But in New York City, and along much of the East Coast, a dwelling jammed rafter-high with junk is referred to by rescue personnel, with dismay and no small degree of respect, as a “Collyers’ Mansion.” As in, primary searches delayed because of Collyers’ Mansion conditions.

The phrase, as many New York history buffs know, refers to the legendary booby-trapped brownstone in Harlem in which the brothers Homer and Langley Collyer were found dead in 1947 amid more than 100 tons of stockpiled possessions, including stacks of phone books, newspapers, tin cans, clocks and a fake two-headed baby in formaldehyde.

The Collyer Mansion is not just a slice of urban lore and a monument to what psychologists now recognize as obsessive-compulsive disorder. It is, in New York, an official term of art, taught in the Fire Academy to cadets learning the potential dangers that can await in burning buildings.

So, on Monday, after 14 firefighters were injured putting out a three-alarm apartment fire in Sunnyside, Queens, Deputy Chief John Acerno described the scene this way: “They tried to open the door, and they couldn’t get it open because of all the debris that was behind the door. In Fire Department jargon, we call that a Collyers’ Mansion. There was debris from the floor to the ceiling throughout the entire apartment.”