Port Richmond Project Part 4: (Port) Richmond Avenue between Ann and Bennett Streets

I hadn't planned to get many pictures from (Port) Richmond Avenue. My reluctance was based primarily on the poor quality of many of those photos. I got such a surprising amount of interest in the first three Port Richmond posts, though, I figure I might as well give it a go. So here we go.

One of the things I've been struck by over the years I've done this site is how ubiquitous Roulston's grocery stores were. I have a picture of one on Van Duzer Street, and I know there was another on Henderson and Davis. I've seen others as well, I just can't remember where right now. For an interesting read about the heirs of the chain's founder, go HERE.

It's hard to read the signs, but the one on the right is for "Foot Savers," an old shoe brand, so I'm guessing Anson Dansky was a shoe store. It's also another example of the house/store combo shown the other day.

I have no idea what the building on the left was other than an apartment. Whatever store was on ground level is a mystery. If anyone knows, let us know.

Toy stores also seemed to have been common as dirt in the "old" days. One block of Broad Street had two, while there was another across the street and one more a block away. I'm curious how more will turn up on (Port) Richmond Avenue as we work our way along it.

Dairy, Ex-Lax (a whole store of it?), dresses, and more. The original storefronts got covered up only a few years ago.

The shape remains, but the skin is completely covered over. That's really not surprising for a building that's at least eighty years old.

I'd love to find a picture of the original Masonic Hall. Clearly it was pretty big, as the property was taken up by three buildings.

The Stapleton Projects Project-Part Three

To make up for the debacle of the posting yesterday afternoon, I'm putting some more pictures right away.This block of Broad Street between the two vanished streets, Patten and Clarke, is a mix of commercial/residential buildings and actual houses. That's something you don't see much of anywhere. Just look at Port Richmond Avenue or New Dorp Lane. Detached houses would seem to a waste of valuable commercially zone lots.

For anyone curious about the name of this site, it comes from the Planet of the Apes movies.This site grew out of an earlier site called Fight Like Apes that fell apart with lots of unpleasant behavior. This site wasn't originally going to be about Staten Island. When it evolved into that I was already stuck with the name.

Glorious Broad Street - Stapleton Again

   The commercial heart of Stapleton is always assumed to be located at Canal and Water Streets along Tappen Park.  Well that's probably accurate it neglects the stores that ran from Wright Street all the way up Broad Street to Van Duzer Street.  According to my map reading skills that's about 1/2 a mile.  Add to that Broad Street from Bay to Tompkins and you get another 1/4 of a mile.  There half of the latter was pretty much residential, but still, that's about a mile's worth of stores catering to the needs and desires of Stapleton's citizens.  Once you add in the Tappen Park surrounds and Bay Street, Stapleton probably had at least as much commercial property as Port Richmond did.  Now much is gone or pretty low rent stuff.  So it goes.

291,293 and 297 Broad Street at the corner of Targee - 1931

When I was a kid the building on the left housed a canine patrol.  Its logo was a snarling dog's head.  My sister's dance school was originally in the same building on the Targee Street side.  It was called "Charing's Dance School" (or something very similar)

                                            Broad and Targee, northwest corner - 1931

Same corner today - It was an empty lot even when I was a kid in the mid seventies - I remember doing a cleanup of it when I was in the Weblos or Boy Scouts which would have been around 1977.

Broad Street, east from Gordon Street - 1931

Today - the corner store was candy store with a soda fountain when I was kid.  I only went once or twice but my mom and sister went there a bunch when she went to dance classes.

Broad, Canal and Tompkins - 1931

Today - Back in the early nineties the pizzeria (and as long as I can remember the building in the foreground has housed one) was called "Two Crusts".  I don't get why but it did make us laugh when we ordered and they picked up the phone and said it.

Bonus Picture:  Cop contemplating the world - 1931

Back to Business

I've been away for awhile. The luminous Mrs. V and I took and extended road trip west through Ontario and America's northern tier to Glacier National Park in Montana. I strongly recommend it to anyone with the slightest interest in seeing some of the country's most beautiful places.


In an effort to work something in with the heading I'd already come up with I glommed some pictures (the usual then/now sort of things) of businesses that are no longer with us even if the skeletal remains of their structures linger on in some reconfigured fashion. They reflect a pre-mall/shopping plaza era when the businesses people frequented were only a close walk, or at worst, a short bus ride away. While I miss the personal quirks of small, neighborhood stores, their higher prices and smaller selections make me not miss them that much.




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Canal Street, Stapleton 10/04/36 - north of Broad Street





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The foot of Victory Boulevard looking west from Bay Street, Tompkinsville - 11/08/33






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Morningstar and Innis, Elm Park - 3/24/28 - The curved section of the cornice on the building in the center reads "Bodine's Big Store".

More to come.......