<p>This building has housed some of the more famous and infamous financial service firms.  Originally constructed on the site of Isaac Seligman's original store, the firm bought 4 adjacent lots and constructed the firm's headquarters when they became involved in investment banking after the Civil War.  Then it became the headquarters of the Lehman Brothers holdings in 1929.  Among the firm amenities was the company dining room which the New York Times rated as the best lunch in the Wall St area in 1979.  The building is now owned by Banca Commerciale Italiana who had their architect Gino Valle complete an addition in 1986. Lehman, alas, didn't fare quite as well and collapsed in 2008.</p><p> </p>

Banca Commerciale Italiana 

 The New York Times devotes a Sunday article to the Dining Rooms of Wall Street - one of the highlights is Lehman Brothers.  

 Joseph Seligman and his brothers founded J &amp; W Seligman &amp; Company banks. During the Civil War, his bank helped to finance the Union Army. In 1877, however, he and his family were denied their stay at the Grand Union Hotel, one of the first cases of anti-semitism in the United States to gain national notoriety. 

 Historian and lawyer James Kaplan details the history of the now defunct Lehman Brothers financial firm. The Lehman Brothers made their fortune in cotton trading and, as such, were heavily invested on the Confederates' side of the Civil War. The Lehman Brothers purchased 1 William Street from the J &amp; W Seligman &amp; Company in 1928 and headquartered themselves there until 1980. 

 The fourth stop on the Great Crash of 1929: Tour of the Financial District is in front of the former headquarters of both the Seligman Brothers and the Lehman Brothers financial companies. Interestingly, while the Seligman Brothers were financial backers of the Union Army in the Civil War, the Lehman Brothers backed the Confederate Army because much of the money came from cotton plantations in the South. 