1028 Third Avenue, 1937
Photo: via Shorpy
Great Shorpy photo of an Italian grocery on Third Avenue, circa 1937 (as always with Shorpy, click through to see the high resolution version in all its glory). The building still stands, stripped of its decoration and given the dreaded styrofoam stucco treatment (in sea foam green, no less).
1028 Third Avenue, 2012
Photo: Google street views
Long before television, much less Comedy Central, Karl Marx opined that history repeats itself, first as tragedy, the second time as farce.
That about sums up Representative Yvette D. Clarke’s appearance on “The Colbert Report” on Tuesday night.
An embarrassment (or a particular inept comedienne, if her handlers are to be believed).
One of my favorite Greenpoint buildings.
Onlookers in Gravesend take in the standoff.
Photo: NYT
40 years ago today, John Wojtowicz and Salvatore Natuarale tried to rob a Chase Manhattan bank branch in Gravesend. The Times has and excellent post and archival slideshow on the resulting standoff.
Readers at Curbed and Brownstoner were up in arms a couple of weeks ago over a $2.5-million listing on Guernsey Street. I have no idea if the asking price is reasonable, but the renovation was nice enough, and the response among the commentariat was over the top.
The history here is pretty typical (the market will decide if the ask is the new normal or not):
But when Mr. Wald, 33, bought the house, at 87A Guernsey Street, three years ago, its Smurf-blue vinyl siding and mustard-yellow aluminum awning were hardly runway material… He ripped off the vinyl and found layers of metal and asphalt siding underneath, on top of what appeared to be the original cedar shingles. He pulled up the linoleum flooring and found a red cedar base. He scoured antiques stores from Rhode Island to Texas, buying up old doors and knobs, funky chandeliers and the like.
The facade is nice, but the shingle job like as not in no way resembles the “original” – it is more beachfront style than any turn of the century Greenpoint row house would have sported.
Despite being a character-defining feature of north Brooklyn, aluminum awnings on row houses are not well loved. At least in this case, the Times was not able to find journalistic balance.
Rainbow Theatre
167 Graham Avenue
Photo: Laguardia Archives via Cinema Treasures
This was what the entrance to the Rainbow Theatre on Graham Avenue looked like in 1939. According to Brownstoner, the building is in mid-gut as part of a condo conversion.
The 1,746-seat house of the theatre was back along Meserole Street. Like many movie houses of the day, the public face of the establishment was a small structure with a big presence on a prominent retail strip. The house was on a side street, where real estate was presumably cheaper.
One wonders whether the Rainbow was a conversion of older residential structure such as that seen to the left of the theatre. Based on historic maps (which show a 4-story brick store and tenement at this location as late as 1929), that would seem to be the case.
Closing out a mini-theme on abandonment and decay, I’d be remiss in not linking to this excellent profile of Mitch Waxman from Sunday’s Times.
More scenes of abandonment and decay – this time from the aptly title Abandoned NYC blog (via Business Insider, of all places).
Raw Sugar Warehouse, interior
Photo: Abandoned NYC
In the Daily Mail, a collection of photos from Williamsburg’s days (not so long ago) as a open-air chop shop.
Photo: James Cathcart
