I often visit the Merchant’s House Museum because I can’t get enough of its architecture, collections, mission, and the light it sheds on a seminal period in New York City history. It is a way-cool historic house, simply the best. History with a sense of humor. Not stuffy but fun and uplifting. That it survives at all amidst the tear-it-down-and-build-something-bigger ethos of “the city that’s never finished” makes it a treasure of the first magnitude, something every one who calls themselves a New Yorker, either by birth, by address, or by desire, can boast of as a jewel in the crown of this superb city. That’s why, to anyone who’s ever been there, this one of the most beloved and fascinating “secret treasures” in the treasure trove that is New York.