Last Monday morning, this reporter (and hundreds of others) raced over to 34 East 62nd Street, where firefighters were still trying to put out the flames, following a massive explosion. Details began to emerge: it was not a terrorist attack, but allegedly the work of a distraught doctor, Nicholas Bartha.

Of course, there was the rambling 14-page email, that was first published in its entirety on The Real Estate. Also, The Observer interviewed Mark Baum, the doctor's real estate broker of the past six years, who received the email that morning.

Now, the author of that email, the suspected culprit in this headline-grabbing tragedy, has died. On Saturday night, Dr. Bartha--who had been in a coma for almost a week--passed away at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell hospital. He was 66.

Certainly, the Dr. Bartha story had all the ingredients of a Manhattan media frenzy: divorce, madness, and a 19th century townhouse exploding on a tony, Upper East Side block. The New York Times had at least 10 reporters working on a single story, and the local tabloids conjured up such headlines like "Dr. Death" and "Honey, I Blew Up The House."

This weekend, The Times offered several more stories on the Upper East Side blast: less breaking news and more analysis.

Architectural critic Christopher Gray wrote about how "this unusual block has lost its oldest building." James Barron--who's been following the story all week--reported on how next door neighbors are now coming back to East 62nd Street.

And Randy Kennedy examined the particularly New York response to the news. As 740 Park author Michael Gross told Mr. Kennedy: "It wasn't 17 seconds after it happened that people were talking about the worth of the lot--this is New York."

Indeed, the real estate value was analyzed too, and the New York Post reported that the lot could be worth more now without the historic brownstone on it. While some believe the property value is "set to boom," several Upper East Side brokers told The Real Estate that it will be many years before anything is built there.

Perhaps as he wished all along, Dr. Bartha has died, taking his account of that morning with him. But hopefully, the unfortunate victims of this explosion--whether an innocent bystander or firefighter--will make full recoveries. Obviously, there are some things--even in Manhattan's luxury real estate market--more important than property values.

- Michael Calderone

It was from one of his oldest clients, Dr. Nicholas Bartha, the 66-year-old doctor who owned the four-story townhouse at 34 East 62nd Street that exploded in flames and fell to the ground an hour after Mr. Baum saw the message.

Mr. Baum had spoken to Dr. Bartha just a few months earlier about possibly selling his residence, the end result of a nasty divorce. And although Mr. Baum noticed an attachment—with the tiny BlackBerry screen—he assumed it could wait until he got to the office to be opened.

At the time of the explosion, Mr. Baum was out walking his dogs near his house in the East 80’s; upon returning home, he flipped on the television and saw images of an inferno.

It was then that Mr. Baum heard the reporter announce the address where the explosion supposedly occurred: 32 East 62nd Street.

“I looked [at the television] and said that it wasn’t 32; it was 34,” said Mr. Baum, a vice president at Prudential Douglas Elliman. “Then I ran to my home computer and looked what the hell he wrote. I didn’t even read the whole thing. I saw the people it was sent to.”

At around 9 a.m., despite not yet finishing the lengthy screed, Mr. Baum called 911 and calmly informed the police that he believed it wasn’t a terrorist attack, and that he had information that could possibly help in the relief effort—including the building’s floor plans.

Roughly 30 to 40 minutes later, according to Mr. Baum, the police arrived—one from the homicide, the other from the bomb squad. They looked at his computer, read the e-mail and asked questions.

No doubt this paragraph, directed at Dr. Bartha’s ex-wife, was part of the reason they were so interested in Mr. Baum’s e-mail:

“When you read this lines your life will change forever. You deserve it. You will be transformed from gold digger to ash and rubbish digger. You always wanted me to sell the house I always told you ‘I will leave the house only if I am dead.’ You ridiculed me. You should have taken it seriously” [ sic].

“He’s written this stuff to me before,” said Mr. Baum, who once received an e-mail of approximately seven pages. “He’s written this type of history of his life to me in the past. But not that he’s going to bury in the building.”

He headed off with the police to the Prudential Douglas Elliman office at 575 Madison Avenue, where his work computer was also examined. Later, Mr. Baum was questioned by the assistant district attorney and detectives, who asked him if Dr. Bartha—who was pulled from the rubble gravely injured and taken to New York–Presbyterian/Weill Cornell hospital—would be willing to talk to his real-estate broker. “Absolutely, he would talk to me,” replied Mr. Baum.

Flames continued to engulf the now-razed landmark brownstone situated in the Upper East Side Historic District, near some of Manhattan’s most expensive residences. Across the street was the Hermès flagship store, as well as billionaire Ronald Perelman’s offices.

Dr. Bartha’s home was also reportedly the site of a bit of history: Confidants of President Franklin D. Roosevelt—including Vincent Astor, Nelson Doubleday and Kermit Roosevelt—met in a place called “The Room.” Located upstairs, this particular room had a gold-leaf ceiling and a fireplace.

“You could feel the history in that room,” said Mr. Baum, who mentioned that in addition to discussing secret intelligence issues, the distinguished group also played a lot of cards.

For Dr. Bartha, who had lived in the 19th-century home since 1986 (although he’d purchased it six years earlier), there was a high level of attachment. “He would not have sold it unless he absolutely had to,” said Mr. Baum. But after a messy divorce proceeding, and owing a reported $4 million to his ex-wife, he wouldn’t have a choice. Incidentally, Mr. Baum estimated the townhouse as being worth $6.2 million.

While the doctor and his broker didn’t go out for dinner or do much socializing, the two had a cordial business relationship, built over six years of Mr. Baum renting out apartments in the building for Dr. Bartha.

And though he’s cooperating with police, who are reportedly focusing their investigation on Dr. Bartha, Mr. Baum still isn’t 100 percent convinced.

“The coincidences would leave you to believe ‘yes,’” said Mr. Baum. “I’m not saying he did it; I’m not saying he didn’t do it. But he was very despondent.”

Mr. Baum recalled that Dr. Bartha had had problems with gas over the years.

On one occasion, while Dr. Bartha was working at the hospital, Mr. Baum had to let in the new tenants—and there were problems.

“The new tenants that moved in that weekend had trouble with the hot water,” recalled Mr. Baum. “I had to get that boiler started. There was water on the oil, [so] that it wasn’t firing up. [Dr. Bartha] gave me the step-by-step instructions on what to do.”

Reportedly, investigators now believe that a gas line was tampered with shortly before the explosion.

Whether that was Dr. Bartha—and, if it was, whether he intended this massive disaster—Mr. Baum still isn’t sure.

“He might have tried to hurt himself, but he would never hurt anybody,” said Mr. Baum.

Lachlan Murdoch Sells on Spring Street

When Lachlan Murdoch resigned from News Corp. last summer, he gave up the prospect of inheriting his father Rupert Murdoch’s vast media empire—and returned to its capital, Sydney, Australia.

But career plans weren’t the only ones upended after the very public filial split: There were also his ambitious renovation plans to turn an enormous five-story brick building at 11 Spring Street into “what would have been the best family home in New York City,” as he put it recently in an Australian newspaper. It certainly would have been big: the former horse stables have a total of 14,000 square feet.

But now, with New York behind him, the junior Murdoch is selling the building to developer Mona Gora, several real-estate sources told The Observer.

On July 7, The Observer’s daily Web site, The Real Estate, reported that the massive building had gone to contract, but did not report the identity of the buyer.

And while broker Brooks Nicholson of the Corcoran Group confirmed that a deal was struck in late June, he declined to elaborate further.

Mr. Murdoch spent $5.25 million to buy the building in 2003, and was asking $14.99 million for it when Ms. Gora bought it—but we’ll have to wait for city records to confirm how much she actually paid. Ms. Gora probably didn’t fork over the full asking price, and in fact initially offered Mr. Murdoch less than $10 million to take the place off his hands in March, according to a source with knowledge of the deal.

The building was long a neighborhood enigma, because one electric candle glowed every night, between swaths of white curtain, in every one of its 60-plus windows. Downtowners mystified by the building’s apparent abandonment—particularly since every other old warehouse building in the neighborhood had long been snapped up for retooling into luxury condos—were shocked when Mr. Murdoch bought the building as a single-family residence.

“Lachlan and his wife came in and loved it,” remembered Larry Michaels, a vice-president at Prudential Douglas Elliman. On that sale, Mr. Michaels was both the listing broker and represented Mr. Murdoch.

Beginning in December 2003, Mr. Murdoch spent an estimated $1.095 million on renovations, according to the building permits filed in the city. The last permits were filed a few days after July 28, 2005—the day after Mr. Murdoch e-mailed employees to inform them that he was resigning.

Ms. Gora likely has different plans. Although she has several developments out in Westchester, Ms. Gora is best known in the city for the Karl Fischer–designed Chelsea Club, a 42-unit luxury condominium on West 19th Street.

On that project, Ms. Gora worked alongside partner Joseph Klaynberg, both principals of MoeJoe Developers.

Now it looks like she’s going it alone: A spokesperson for Mr. Klaynberg told The Observer that Ms. Gora was developing the Spring Street building without him.

Murdoch père and fils both worked with broker Deborah Grubman, of the Corcoran Group, who sold the Spring Street building with Carol Cohen and Mr. Nicholson as well as Rupert Murdoch’s Soho triplex last year (to fashion mogul Elie Tahari.)

Ms. Gora didn’t return calls for comment.

It was from one of his oldest clients, Dr. Nicholas Bartha, the 66-year-old doctor who owned the four-story townhouse at 34 East 62nd Street that exploded in flames and fell to the ground an hour after Mr. Baum saw the message.

Mr. Baum had spoken to Dr. Bartha just a few months earlier about possibly selling his residence, the end result of a nasty divorce. And although Mr. Baum noticed an attachment—with the tiny BlackBerry screen—he assumed it could wait until he got to the office to be opened.

At the time of the explosion, Mr. Baum was out walking his dogs near his house in the East 80’s; upon returning home, he flipped on the television and saw images of an inferno.

It was then that Mr. Baum heard the reporter announce the address where the explosion supposedly occurred: 32 East 62nd Street.

“I looked [at the television] and said that it wasn’t 32; it was 34,” said Mr. Baum, a vice president at Prudential Douglas Elliman. “Then I ran to my home computer and looked what the hell he wrote. I didn’t even read the whole thing. I saw the people it was sent to.”

At around 9 a.m., despite not yet finishing the lengthy screed, Mr. Baum called 911 and calmly informed the police that he believed it wasn’t a terrorist attack, and that he had information that could possibly help in the relief effort—including the building’s floor plans.

Roughly 30 to 40 minutes later, according to Mr. Baum, the police arrived—one from the homicide, the other from the bomb squad. They looked at his computer, read the e-mail and asked questions.

No doubt this paragraph, directed at Dr. Bartha’s ex-wife, was part of the reason they were so interested in Mr. Baum’s e-mail:

“When you read this lines your life will change forever. You deserve it. You will be transformed from gold digger to ash and rubbish digger. You always wanted me to sell the house I always told you ‘I will leave the house only if I am dead.’ You ridiculed me. You should have taken it seriously” [sic].

“He’s written this stuff to me before,” said Mr. Baum, who once received an e-mail of approximately seven pages. “He’s written this type of history of his life to me in the past. But not that he’s going to bury in the building.”

He headed off with the police to the Prudential Douglas Elliman office at 575 Madison Avenue, where his work computer was also examined. Later, Mr. Baum was questioned by the assistant district attorney and detectives, who asked him if Dr. Bartha—who was pulled from the rubble gravely injured and taken to New York–Presbyterian/Weill Cornell hospital—would be willing to talk to his real-estate broker. “Absolutely, he would talk to me,” replied Mr. Baum.

Flames continued to engulf the now-razed landmark brownstone situated in the Upper East Side Historic District, near some of Manhattan’s most expensive residences. Across the street was the Hermès flagship store, as well as billionaire Ronald Perelman’s offices.

Dr. Bartha’s home was also reportedly the site of a bit of history: Confidants of President Franklin D. Roosevelt—including Vincent Astor, Nelson Doubleday and Kermit Roosevelt—met in a place called “The Room.” Located upstairs, this particular room had a gold-leaf ceiling and a fireplace.

“You could feel the history in that room,” said Mr. Baum, who mentioned that in addition to discussing secret intelligence issues, the distinguished group also played a lot of cards.

For Dr. Bartha, who had lived in the 19th-century home since 1986 (although he’d purchased it six years earlier), there was a high level of attachment. “He would not have sold it unless he absolutely had to,” said Mr. Baum. But after a messy divorce proceeding, and owing a reported $4 million to his ex-wife, he wouldn’t have a choice. Incidentally, Mr. Baum estimated the townhouse as being worth $6.2 million.

While the doctor and his broker didn’t go out for dinner or do much socializing, the two had a cordial business relationship, built over six years of Mr. Baum renting out apartments in the building for Dr. Bartha.

And though he’s cooperating with police, who are reportedly focusing their investigation on Dr. Bartha, Mr. Baum still isn’t 100 percent convinced.

“The coincidences would leave you to believe ‘yes,’” said Mr. Baum. “I’m not saying he did it; I’m not saying he didn’t do it. But he was very despondent.”

Mr. Baum recalled that Dr. Bartha had had problems with gas over the years.

On one occasion, while Dr. Bartha was working at the hospital, Mr. Baum had to let in the new tenants—and there were problems.

“The new tenants that moved in that weekend had trouble with the hot water,” recalled Mr. Baum. “I had to get that boiler started. There was water on the oil, [so] that it wasn’t firing up. [Dr. Bartha] gave me the step-by-step instructions on what to do.”

Reportedly, investigators now believe that a gas line was tampered with shortly before the explosion.

Whether that was Dr. Bartha—and, if it was, whether he intended this massive disaster—Mr. Baum still isn’t sure.

“He might have tried to hurt himself, but he would never hurt anybody,” said Mr. Baum.

Lachlan Murdoch Sells on Spring Street

When Lachlan Murdoch resigned from News Corp. last summer, he gave up the prospect of inheriting his father Rupert Murdoch’s vast media empire—and returned to its capital, Sydney, Australia.

But career plans weren’t the only ones upended after the very public filial split: There were also his ambitious renovation plans to turn an enormous five-story brick building at 11 Spring Street into “what would have been the best family home in New York City,” as he put it recently in an Australian newspaper. It certainly would have been big: the former horse stables have a total of 14,000 square feet.

But now, with New York behind him, the junior Murdoch is selling the building to developer Mona Gora, several real-estate sources told The Observer.

On July 7, The Observer’s daily Web site, The Real Estate, reported that the massive building had gone to contract, but did not report the identity of the buyer.

And while broker Brooks Nicholson of the Corcoran Group confirmed that a deal was struck in late June, he declined to elaborate further.

Mr. Murdoch spent $5.25 million to buy the building in 2003, and was asking $14.99 million for it when Ms. Gora bought it—but we’ll have to wait for city records to confirm how much she actually paid. Ms. Gora probably didn’t fork over the full asking price, and in fact initially offered Mr. Murdoch less than $10 million to take the place off his hands in March, according to a source with knowledge of the deal.

The building was long a neighborhood enigma, because one electric candle glowed every night, between swaths of white curtain, in every one of its 60-plus windows. Downtowners mystified by the building’s apparent abandonment—particularly since every other old warehouse building in the neighborhood had long been snapped up for retooling into luxury condos—were shocked when Mr. Murdoch bought the building as a single-family residence.

“Lachlan and his wife came in and loved it,” remembered Larry Michaels, a vice-president at Prudential Douglas Elliman. On that sale, Mr. Michaels was both the listing broker and represented Mr. Murdoch.

Beginning in December 2003, Mr. Murdoch spent an estimated $1.095 million on renovations, according to the building permits filed in the city. The last permits were filed a few days after July 28, 2005—the day after Mr. Murdoch e-mailed employees to inform them that he was resigning.

Ms. Gora likely has different plans. Although she has several developments out in Westchester, Ms. Gora is best known in the city for the Karl Fischer–designed Chelsea Club, a 42-unit luxury condominium on West 19th Street.

On that project, Ms. Gora worked alongside partner Joseph Klaynberg, both principals of MoeJoe Developers.

Now it looks like she’s going it alone: A spokesperson for Mr. Klaynberg told The Observer that Ms. Gora was developing the Spring Street building without him.

Murdoch père and fils both worked with broker Deborah Grubman, of the Corcoran Group, who sold the Spring Street building with Carol Cohen and Mr. Nicholson as well as Rupert Murdoch’s Soho triplex last year (to fashion mogul Elie Tahari.)

Ms. Gora didn’t return calls for comment.

"I read the email at around 8:50 or 8:55," said Mr. Baum, who became concerned for the doctor's welfare. "I reported it to 911 right away."

However, the explosion occurred at approximately 8:45 a.m, and Dr. Bartha was later found in the rubble, still alive.

It has been reported that Dr. Bartha's estranged wife also received the rambling, 15-page email, but not how many others did, too.

"The email will eventually be made public," said Mr. Baum, who did not go into details.

Mr. Baum had worked with Dr. Bartha in the past, renting out at least one of the apartments in the four-story townhouse, according to a real estate source.

" We had a business relationship.," said Mr. Baum. "After six years, you can build a relationship a little bit outside of the business. Not that we socialized much, but we had a smooth business relationship."

"He was definitely hurt by the divorce," said Mr. Baum.

- Michael Calderone

“They” are the designers invited by the American Hospital of Paris Foundation to decorate 21 of the house’s rooms for public viewing, with the proceeds from ticket sales going to the hospital’s charity fund.

But when the doors of the mansion slam shut on Nov. 20, Russian-born real-estate investor Janna Bullock hopes that someone will pay a lot more to get in again. She’s put the refurbished five-story building between Madison and Fifth avenues on the market for $29 million with Shel Joblin and C.B. Whyte of Stribling and Associates.

And though her donation of the house to the American Hospital of Paris for the month seems generous, her generosity could pay well: She bought the place through a corporate entity for $10 million—and only last April.

For the $19 million she hopes to make, Ms. Bullock has gotten a team of designers to gussy up the place and show it off for free.

It’s happening more and more with expensive townhouses on the Upper East Side: the Showhouse Flip.

It may sound easy, but it wasn’t. Ms. Bullock’s efforts began well before the ink dried last April on her deal to buy the mansion. There were 14 months of ups and downs before her own massive renovation on the house began last spring.

“It was quite an ordeal, and I followed it all the way to the end,” said Mark Baum of the Corcoran Group, who represented the seller along with his colleague, Carrie Chiang.

Mr. Baum first discussed selling the townhouse three years ago with the occupant and partial owner, lawyer Stuart Shaw.

A legal battle later ensued over who would take home the money from the sale of the house, which was part of an inheritance bequeathed by the late Margaret Shaw Miller. Lawyers for Mr. Shaw’s sister, Denise Schure, and his brother-in-law, Louis Schure, soon arrived to duke it out; midway through the lengthy transaction, lawyers for his estranged brother, David Shaw, a convicted sex offender living in California, popped up to complicate things.

By early 2004, Ms. Bullock seemed close to a deal to buy the 25-foot-wide townhouse for $9.5 million, and an offer was accepted by February. All that was left was to buy off the building’s one rent-stabilized tenant—which meant tacking another $400,000 onto the price.

By September, there was still no contract signed, and Ms. Bullock upped her offer to $10 million in an effort get things moving. By early January 2005, the Corcoran brokers’ exclusive deal to sell the house expired, and Mr. Shaw took Ms. Bullock and her brokers to court to try to get out of the deal. He presented three contracts of sale to the judge (for more than Ms. Bullock’s $10 million), but Ms. Bullock won and was ruled the rightful buyer of the house. The closing date was set for three months later, and on a harried spring day a $10 million check—obtained from the bank in a downtown Pathmark—was handed to Mr. Shaw.

“I put too much time into it,” said Mr. Baum. “I would have paid money to keep this deal alive.” Fortunately for the broker, he never had to make such a drastic move. Mr. Baum left the protracted sale with a nice commission—and a trophy! Last month, at REBNY’s annual awards ceremony at the Puck Building, the sale of 9 East 67th Street was voted a runner-up for the Residential Deal of the Year. Mr. Joblin and Ms. Whyte also shared in the honor, having represented Ms. Bullock throughout the process.

Now they had little more than a summer to turn the building, which had been split into 13 apartments and was looking a little rickety, into a showhouse—and a property worth a lot more than the cost of renovations to Ms. Bullock. As many as 200 workers were employed on the site at any one time between April and last month. It’s now being offered as a single-family mansion with seven bedrooms and five full baths.

“Every detail is considered by the designer to make it what it is,” said Charles Patteson, the showhouse organizer, who has been producing events like this for over 20 years. “The sense of classicism [the designers] have given to the house give it the feeling of either Victorian or Old World decorating.”

DENNIS MEHIEL RAISES $15.78 M.—FOR MANSION CONDO

Democratic fund-raiser Dennis Mehiel recently bought a condo carved out of the Carhart Mansion on East 95th Street for $15.78 million, according to deed-transfer records. A contract was signed for slightly over the asking price in February, but the deal didn’t close until late September.

In 2002, the Lycée Français sold the entire 34,000-square-foot mansion to developers for only $15 million—less than the selling price of this one parcel. Architect John Simpson led the extensive renovation of building, and the end result was four condos ranging in price from $12.5 million to $23.5 million, listed with Carrie Chiang of the Corcoran Group. Ms. Chiang did not return calls for comment.

This 10,350-square-foot apartment includes five bedrooms, six bathrooms and a Juliet balcony. There is also a 24-hour doorman, an exercise room, a study and a powder room.

Mr. Mehiel didn’t return calls for comment, so it’s unclear whether the 95th Street pad will become his primary city residence, or if he plans to stay on Park Avenue. Three years ago, he made real-estate news after the exclusive Dakota co-op board rejected his bid to purchase a second apartment.

A Westchester businessman, Mr. Mehiel ran for lieutenant governor in 2002 on the losing ticket with H. Carl McCall. Late in the gubernatorial campaign, he received plenty of publicity when it emerged that he had fathered two children out of wedlock. However, he still has considerable political clout (and plenty of money to make campaign contributions); in 2004, the wealthy businessman worked as state chairman for Senator John Kerry’s unsuccessful Presidential bid.

New Beresford Listing Asks $31 Million

It’s not often that a duplex opens up in the Beresford—so when one does, it ain’t cheap.

The price for the apartment, on the 17th and 18th floors, with two terraces looking out over the park and the city skyline? Thirty-one million dollars.

(That’s five times what Glenn Close paid to live downstairs, but she got a deal: The estate of actor Rock Hudson had been trying to unload the two-bedroom apartment for over two years before dropping the price from $9 million to the $5.99 million she paid for it.)

The three-bedroom, four-and-a-half-bathroom apartment also has a windowed eat-in kitchen and dining room, a wood-burning fireplace, hardwood floors and walk-in closets.

Besides Ms. Close, you’re checking your mail next to Jerry Seinfeld, Bob Weinstein and John McEnroe.

The listing broker, Marion Selig of Stribling and Associates, declined to comment on the listing.