 Founded in 1896 by the merger of the formerly separate Gas Engine & Power Company & Charles L. Seabury Company, the firm operated along Morris Heights' waterfront until it moved to City Island following World War II.After a wave of arson ravaged the low-income communities of New York City throughout the 1970s, many if not most residential structures in Morris Heights were left seriously damaged or destroyed.The city began to rehabilitate many formerly abandoned tenement-style apartment buildings and designate them low-income housing beginning in the late 1970s.