Open Thread Wednesday

By on December 22, 2021 9:07 am in open thread

What’s on your mind? Comment away!

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  • kizz

    The signage of the old bar/restaurant Jack the Horse Tavern, at the NW corner of Cranberry and Hicks has had its signage fully removed and the wooden part painted white as preparation for the new signage coming soon.

    As a reminder, the place will be called Inga’s Bar. If you’re social, here is a page for their establishment:

    https://instagram.com/ingasbarnyc?utm_medium=copy_link

    Jäh bless

  • Jorale-man

    Oof. Talk about a bad time to be opening a restaurant, just as a contagious variant is spreading left and right in indoor spaces. Hope they can hold out a bit.

  • Mike Suko

    Not sure what your last 2 words mean, but I’ll take a guess and AGREE 100% with this:

    It’s great having (so it seems!) someone who understands hospitality … and also has a good head for business. For my money – and not a tiny amount over the years – both Henry’s End and Noodle Pudding HAVE that combo.

    JTH? Not sure I’ll ever forgive him for his Covid thievery, but this is a more measured take:

    Surely, this is Darwinism at its best – the strongest survive and evolution helps along a lot of the “good but not good enough” collections of genes or ingredients. (In this case, an excellent location was put to good use in a way that benefited neighborhood, employees and owning couple. Every reason to be optimistic re Inga’s prospects for the next umpty-ump years. (Hope, of course, that the prominent word “bar” does that bode ill in terms of the non-liquid fare.)

  • TeddyNYC

    I think they will. It looks like Omicron will burn through the population much faster than previous variants and we could actually see a true recovery begin in 2022, fingers crossed.

  • Andrew Porter

    Here’s the north side of Pineapple Street from 55, on the left, now altered beyond recognition in the late 1930s, to 71 on the right, in 1925. The three wooden houses in the center have since been replaced by 59 Pineapple Street:
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/1f59c447718567d1770ecd2f9a51f38eba042804209899e65077c3b6afc0fc5a.jpg

  • Andrew Porter

    And here’s 95 Hicks Street in 1922. This was torn down and replaced by a one-story garage which is still there. At right is the edge of 45 Pineapple Street, greatly altered in the late 1930s:
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0e117a8fe0cd86479c3706a50e9444445fe0b617f2febb0080a92d56ddbc9551.png

  • Remsen Street Dweller

    I just heard that Chase on Montague St. is due to close this Friday at least temporarily due to staff shortage, as many employees are refusing to be vaccinated.

  • Banet

    Interesting. It never occurred to me that skylights might exist 100 years ago. Thanks, as always, for sharing.

  • Jeremy

    That photo’s caption (as it appears in the NYPL archives) was written in 1925, but the photo itself is circa 1885-1890. We know that because the rightmost rowhouse in the pic is 69 Pineapple — it blew up in 1891! And a few years later was replaced by the tenement building that’s there today. Now, there’s only 2 brick rowhouses on the block, not 3.

  • Jeremy

    The clapboard house was torn down in the late ’20s for a development scheme but the Depression intervened. The garage was built in the late ’40s. When 45 Pineapple was redone in the ’30s, they had a plan to turn this lot into a big garden for the building, but unclear if that happened. Now, there’s a smaller courtyard behind the garage.

  • CassieVonMontague

    Looking for the reports of the explosion in the NYTimes archives but found none.

    Found these odds and ends otherwise:

  • CassieVonMontague

    AN EXPLOSIVE HARPOON.; NARROW ESCAPE FROM DEATH

    An explosion, remarkable for the narrow escape of three persons from instant death, occurred on Monday at No. 12 Pineapple-street, Brooklyn,

    https://www.nytimes.com/1881/07/14/archives/an-explosive-harpoon-narrow-escape-from-deathan-amateur-plumbers.html

    A man trying to fix a leaking pipe used an implement he found in the “long unused garrett” as a makeshift soldering iron. The implement turned out to be an explosive whaling harpoon left by a ship’s captain who occupied the house 10 years before.

  • CassieVonMontague

    A Civil War veteran who died of “camp fever” in 1863 lived at 69 Pineapple

    BLACKWOOD — On Sunday, Sept. 13. of camp fever, contracted while on duty in Pennsylvania. WILLIAM E. BLACKWOOD, in the 24th year of his age, late Lieutenant of Company H. Fifty-second regiment. N.Y.S. Militia.

    The relatives and friends of the family, also Lexington Lodge of F. & A.M., and the Masonic fraternity, the members of the regiment, the members of Brooklyn Engine Company No 17, are respectfully invited to attend the funeral, from his late residence, No. 69 Pineapple-st , Brooklyn, on Tuesday afternoon at 1 o’clock, without further invitation

    https://www.nytimes.com/1863/09/14/archives/died.html

    He is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery
    https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/57655552/william-e-blackwood

  • Andrew Porter

    Here’s a photo of the garden behind 45 and 55 Pineapple, which are sort of the same building. Apts A, B, and C are in 45; D, E, F, G, H, and J in 55:
    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/6edbd34b3f918bc9c34738eede1dac549381e26db79f6b2af30cfd0c53cc3738.jpg

  • Andrew Porter

    Well, #12 should probably be between Columbia Heights and Willow Streets…

  • Andrew Porter

    Skylights were a way to get bright light that didn’t require artificial sources. The old LICH surgery building on Amity Street had operating rooms on its top floor with skylights in them.

  • Jeremy

    Ha, gotta look in the Eagle!

    Two years after the damage, Constable tore down the house and put up the tenement (and took one of the apartments for himself).

    My fave part of the story is the reference to Parrish’s drug store at the corner of Orange & Henry — still there until the early 2000s!!

    https://bklyn.newspapers.com/image/50382018/?terms=%22james%20constable%22%20pineapple&match=1

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f4a67ce130b27a496faa6b8bab18b7d008fc1753cc2f50356e0ee0f6ffdfc0d1.jpg

  • Jeremy

    69 Pineapple in 1863 was the left-most wooden house in that picture, before the addresses changed in 1870.

  • Banet

    Makes sense.

    I guess I just assumed they could not create larger panes of glass and/or the waterproofing wasn’t good enough for glass that laid so close to a horizontal plane. Not to mention. The heat loss through single plane glass.

    Clearly (pun intended) I was wrong.

  • Andrew Porter

    Parrish manufactured and sold its own brand of condoms, I believe, before they were offered commercially. This would have been about a hundred years ago.

  • AEB

    If this is true, Chase–that branch–is keeping it under wraps. I just returned from it, and there was no posted notice saying that the branch was closing, even temporarily.

    By the way, and as long as I have your attention–I hope–keeping the St. George stores afloat is, at least in the case of Hans Market, going to be challenging. A pint of Haagen Daz ice cream there is $8.00. Yow!