Anderson Cooper To Move Into Firehouse

Mr. CNN himself Anderson Cooper has purchased (for $4.3 million) and is renovating a fabulous old firehouse nominated for a spot on the National Register of Historic Places in New York.

The globetrotting Cooper, who recently stepped out of his role as reporter and rescued a Haitian boy caught in the middle of a looting that turned violent, had been spotted by neighbors visiting the firehouse regularly since it was sold in September for $4.3 million by the New York Board of Fire Underwriters, which operated the private Fire Patrol 2 out of the building beginning in 1906.

Construction crews have already begun work inside the building on West Third St., taking down partitions and ripping out old plumbing fixtures. Features of the new pad include original, sinewy spiral staircases, massive ceiling beams, wall murals of firemen through the ages, gleaming brass poles, a two-story stable filling out the rear and a strong-jawed bust of Mercury over the giant ground-floor doors.