*Everyday Chatter

Forgotten NY takes a trip to the gone-but-not-forgotten Cheyenne Diner. [ForgottenNY]

Working to save the Cheyenne, Kyle Supley visits with video. [YouTube]

Another last look at the Cheyenne, which closed on Sunday. [Gothamist]

A piece of the past revealed! The Sucelt sign comes down and unveils a long-forgotten dumpling house from three decades ago:


More great pics of the Ratner/Brooklyn Museum protest from a VNY reader. [Kingston L]

The CBGB site reopened this weekend as a John Varvatos shop--complete with history under glass. [Racked]

The death of Meatpacking continues as the Hog Pit announces its closing--probably to be replaced by a Ralph Lauren store. [Eater] The Pit has only been there since 1995, but in this neighborhood, that's old-school. So how much will the new rent be? A year ago the owner said $40,000 a month.

A look at Page 6's coverage of the new kids on the Bowery and what would Hilly think. [EV Grieve]

"From laptops to lapdances, this high class piece of ass is gonna show you her lower east side!" Meet Sarah Jessica Porkher. [Gothamist]

Saving Cheyenne

At age 25, Michael Perlman has become a veteran preservationist in New York City. Who said "Don't trust anyone under 30?" I did. Well, I take it back--Michael gives me hope for the future. After succeeding in rescuing the Moondance Diner from destruction, he is now turning his powers of preservation to the threatened Cheyenne. I interviewed Michael over email and asked him about his work with the Moondance and his hopes for the Cheyenne.


Michael at the Moondance
photo credit: Mike Dabin

With the Moondance, he said, “I was aware that freestanding diners were pre-assembled and manufactured to move, so I figured ‘why not pick it up & move it?’” He then convinced Extell Development to donate the Moondance to the American Diner Museum in exchange for a tax write-off, and the rest is history—the Moondance is now beloved in Wyoming and should be opening its doors in June.

Could the same happen for the Cheyenne? It can if George Papas (owner of the Skylight Diner and landlord of the Cheyenne property) donates the moveable structure to the American Diner Museum instead of demolishing it. So far, Papas is open to that possibility. As he told Urbanite, "I would really love for somebody to take that away and put it somewhere." Michael happily confirmed that Papas supports the move, provided the diner is structurally sound.

Ironically, Papas is reopening the defunct Market Diner nearby and the Cheyenne used to be one in a chain of Market Diners, as seen here:


photo: John Baeder

The Cheyenne is a nostalgic gem and well worth saving, Michael says, as “the last streamlined railway car-inspired diner in Mid-Manhattan. It was pre-assembled by Paramount in 1940 and retains a majority of its original/distinctive elements. The facade features vertical and horizontal stainless steel securing bowed colorful enamel panels, wrap-around windows, a curved entryway with glass block, and a reverse channel illuminated neon sign. It was recently granted first prize on NYC-Architecture.com’s Top 10 New York Diners/Restaurants.”


photo: Michael's flickr: Still a favorite spot for cabs

Michael hopes that the diner will not go as far as the Moondance did (hopefully not all the way to the real Cheyenne), but might find a place somewhere in the outer boroughs of the city where New Yorkers can continue to enjoy it.


photo: my flickr

Every New Yorker can be a preservationist. Michael recommends that we all survey our neighborhoods “for places that hold the greatest sentimental value, initiate character, and preserve our city's diverse architecture and culture." Filling out the LPC's Request for Evaluation form is quick and easy. It’s up to us to “advocate for landmarking before more cherished sites fall victim to the wrecking ball and the unidealistic real estate craze. Once a site is endangered, it is often too late.”

But don’t be discouraged, Michael writes, “A landmark is (ideally) in the eyes of the majority. I encourage the public to share their landmarking/preservation concerns with me, and especially let me know if a diner or another meaningful type of establishment is at risk, or on their preservation wishlist. My e-mail is always open: unlockthevault@hotmail.com.”

In addition, Michael asks, "Does anyone know of someone who is hoping to purchase a classic diner if the current tenant, Spiros Kasimis, can't afford the rigging and lot acquisition costs?" Drop him a line today if you're in the market to adopt this imperiled souvenir of the real New York.

• Cheyenne: Vanishing
• Market Diner & Cheyenne
• Rolando bemoans the Cheyenne
• Bid to save Cheyenne
  

*Everyday Chatter

You say aristocratization, I say Vongerichtification...it's an Onion joke, but not so far-flung from reality as the city moves closer to total oligarchy. [Observer]

This sounds like an Onion joke: Brooklyn Museum to give Bruce Ratner its highest honor while Marc Jacobs puts on a "Louis Vuitton performance...to bring attention to the serious issue of counterfeiting” handbags! That's right--let's make sure luxury goods are well protected. Go to the protest tonight. [Gothamist]

Sarah Jessica Parker warns: The Sex-and-the-Citification of the outer boroughs is coming. So watch out. (My words, not hers.) [Gothamist]

...But the girls in pink keep pouring into "not what it used to be" Manhattan--to the tune of $24,000 per 4-day trip. [Jezebel]

Woody Allen sues American Apparel--it's a psychoanalytic grudge match as the classic New York culture of neurosis fights back against the new New York culture of narcissism. Or, if you prefer, urban ethnicity vs. suburban assimilationism. Either way, I say, Go Woody! [Racked]

Old Homestead adds $81 burger to their menu--I guess that's because of rising oil prices on shipping now that they can no longer get their meat from directly across the street as in the Olden days. [Gothamist]

Cross your fingers, there's a chance the moms and pops of Harlem can fight back against the rezone--and that would be good news for all of us. [Times]

Ooh, good new word: Meta-Gentrification. Thanks NY Mag!

Check out this Hotel Chelsea event tonight. [LWL]

Another Barnes & Noble shutters because the behemoth can't pay the rent: "Is it possible? Have things taken such a turn in Manhattan that we are growing nostalgic for Barnes & Noble; the big bully that was once so easy to blame for the demise of the neighborhood bookshop?" [City Room]

Baby Dee is back--I'll never forget the sight of her, riding down my street on a giant tricycle and playing the accordion. [Chelsea Now]

"Manhattan is increasingly a borough of babies, and more and more of them are white and well-off...the median household income for this group of children was $280,000." [WPost]

Ratner's of 2nd Ave

I briefly reported recently that NYU may push the Met Foods grocery store out of its spot on 2nd Avenue between 6th and 7th Streets. A CB3 meeting will be held on April 15 to give the community a chance to speak out against this act of aggression. (Read The Villager for the full scoop and sign the petition here.)

In my post, I mentioned that Ratner's used to occupy the spot. A commenter wondered if there was, indeed, a Ratner's at 111 2nd Ave and if it was connected to the 97-year-old restaurant on Delancey. I began wondering about it myself and decided to do a little research--discovering a New York family mystery in the process.



Ratner's 2nd Ave was next to the Fillmore East (now a bank) and as such became a nighttime hangout for rock-n-roll legends like Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, and The Grateful Dead. The "R" is still embedded in Met Foods' floor.

It's hard to find images of this long-lost Ratner's, but if you search for the better-memorialized "Fillmore East" you will see its neon sign shining next door. In this photo, you can see Ratner's awning--and that's Block Drugs on the far left.


photo link

My search led me to street photographer Tony Marciante's amazing flickr page featuring many photos of New York in the 1960s and 70s, including a set from 1969 of a fire across the street from Ratner's. The fire is in a place called Hoagie's and So Forth, which is now the defunct Bamboo House (also check out the pet shop, Fish and Cheep's!).


photo link

The Met Foods/Ratner's site is located in the Saul Birns Building, seen in the photo below as the big, white building with many windows, bookended by Fillmore East and little Moishe's Bakery. Saul Birns, also known as Saul Birnzweig, ran the Atlantic Talking Machine Company where he sold record players, many in the shape of baby grand pianos.

He was indicted in 1915 as a "phonograph swindler" for running a fraudulent mail order scheme that, according to the Times, "promised foreigners an opportunity of hearing their native songs produced on a talking machine, which would be sent them on free trial." But after Mr. Birns got his deposit money, he would pull a switcheroo, sending a cheap phonograph to the foreigners instead of the quality machine he'd promised. The Saul Birns Building is now part of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts.


photo link and click for close up

But back to Ratner's of 2nd Ave and the question of why it's been mostly forgotten and was it connected to the Delancey place.

It was owned by Abraham Harmatz, who died on May 29, 1974, the very day after his landmark dairy restaurant closed. In the Times article it says that "Ratner's had been a Second Avenue fixture for more than 50 years, a gastronomic diadem in the crown of what years ago was called the Jewish Rialto." It also states that "it is not connected" with the one on Delancey, "although they share common ancestors and have been run by different branches of the same family."

The first Ratner's opened on Pitt Street in 1908 under brothers Jacob and Harry Harmatz and brother-in-law Alex Ratner. Ratner left the shop and "The brothers went their separate ways as the business expanded" -- Jacob opened the Delancey Ratner's in 1918 (yes, this year would have been its 100th birthday, had it survived hipsterification) and Harry went to 2nd Ave around the same time. Harry begat Abraham, cousin to Jacob's son Harold who continued to run the Delancey location and who considered reopening the 2nd Ave site after Abraham's death, but this did not come to fruition.


Ratner's Delancey, similar neon typeface

In the extensive 2004 obit for Harold Harmatz, there is no mention of uncle Harry, after whom Harold was clearly named. It says only that father Jacob opened the Delancey place with brother-in-law Alex Ratner. Even in a correction at the end, the Times says they omitted other co-owners, some Zankel brothers, but again where's uncle Harry? This Wikipedia article also omits him.

So there is a mystery within this mystery. What does it mean that Jacob and Harry went their separate ways? Why has Harry and Abraham's 2nd Ave Ratner's been, in some weird way, stricken from history? I have to wonder, did they have a rift much like the Manganaros? If it was a family feud, the Delancey branch definitely won the claim to Ratner's fame.

Other than photographs, the only concrete evidence we have of Harry and Abraham's 2nd Ave restaurant is that R embedded in the floor of Met Foods.

Manganaro's Grosseria

With so many vanishings in the city, it's comforting to know that some things never change. One of those changeless places is Manganaro's Grosseria on 9th Ave near 37th St. Opened in 1893 as Petrucci's, it became Manganaro's in the 1920s, and stepping into the shop today is like walking into your grandfather's New York.



The shop is dimly lit and sparsely stocked. Pepperoni and salami hang from above, beneath a ceiling of pressed tin and before a backdrop of empty green shelves. Keep walking, under the skylight, past the big Toledo scale, and you'll come to a small cafe furnished with chrome tables under cloths with chairs that must hail from the Nixon administration.



The walls of the trattoria are paneled, the lights are florescent, and the back-room ambiance makes you feel like you've stumbled in on a secret meeting-place. A flight of red-railed stairs goes up to a second-floor dining room, which is closed and dark, and strangely beckoning.



Proprietor and cook, Seline Dell'Orto (James Manganaro's grand-niece), leaves her kaffe klatsch to step behind the counter and say, "Come over here and tell me what you want." It's like being fed by your Italian aunt--warm, welcoming, and a little brusque. She heaps a plate with macaroni and when you say, "That's plenty," she ignores your request, heaping on another spoonful or two, for which you will be grateful. The food is good.

I asked her about the sign chalked out front: "M. Foods is not connected to Hero Boy; but that's old news!" She spoke bitterly of the rift between Manganaro's and the Hero Boy cafe next door as if the wound were fresh, the rift recently torn, as if Hero Boy were an upstart in the neighborhood. But it turns out that Hero Boy opened half a century ago and this feud has been going on for decades. That's authentically Italian, too--it's not an Italian family unless somebody's not speaking to somebody.

I asked how the grosseria was doing, with all the changes in the neighborhood, and she said they're not going anywhere, despite the disturbing influx of foreign investors and rising Con-Ed prices. "This summer," she said, "we're doing it European style." What does that mean? "No lights!"



I had just missed meeting her father, but Sal still works in the shop. On Manganaro's website it says, "Watch Sal at his espresso machine and imagine what he thinks of the Johny come latelies who think they understand coffee." This quote sums up the Manganaro's experience and reminds me of the conversation I had with Annie of DeRobertis' Pasticceria, who said, “People come in and tell me I don’t know how to make cappuccino. They tell me, 'Starbucks makes it this way.' I tell them, 'I’m here before Starbucks.'"

Manganaro's was here before Starbucks, too. So go in and tell them what you want--but don't tell them how to make it or serve it. Just eat it.

• See more pics of Manganaro's on my flickr

*Everyday Chatter: April Fool's

The Empire State Building is being gutted, revitalized, rebuilt, and converted into luxury condos...

...April Fool's! But, you have to admit, it could happen.

Bellevue Hospital's super-spooky, totally haunted psychiatric hospital is being converted into a luxury hotel...

photo credit
No fooling. [Observer]

Yesterday, I broke the news that the Cheyenne is closing. But now Jerry Lewis, whose autographed picture hangs on the wall of the diner with the "greatest egg cremies in the world," has pledged to save the Cheyenne from destruction...

April Fool's. Nothing can save the Cheyenne. Unless Michael Perlman comes to the rescue, according to Urbanite. Until then, its last day will be Sunday. Today, the Daily News pounced on the story and filled in the details: The diner was pushed out by another diner, the Skylight, and the same people who are reopening the Market Diner! Last night I went by for my last meal--see pics here.

When Congestion Pricing fails to dissuade the poor from entering Manhattan, Bloomberg will go to Plan B: He's personally hiring the National Guard to build a wall around Manhattan to keep out the riff-raff... April Fool's! But how long before the city becomes a gated community for the super-rich?

Madonna is bored out of her mind when she visits the new, super-gentrified, soul-sucked New York... No fooling. She says, "It's not the exciting place it used to be...it doesn't feel alive." [Gothamist]

Trump Soho, plagued by disaster, ghostly curses, and voodoo jinxes, will be abandoned by the Donald and converted to low- to middle-income artist housing... April Fool's. But you must read this article that chronicles the shitstorm that is Trump Soho. [NY Mag]

NYU is trying to kick Met Foods out of the East Village, where it is one of the only places for senior citizens and people on a budget to afford grocery shopping...


Let your voice be heard about this potential shutdown of Met Foods at the CB3 meeting Tuesday, April 15, 6:30 p.m., at Project Renewal, Kenton Hall, 333 Bowery (bet 2nd and 3rd). At last week's meeting with NYU, writes neighborhood advocate David Mulkins, "Some 75 or more residents filled to overflowing the space we were meeting in, and NYU heard loud and clear that 'this is just the beginning': we will not let the university make further destructive moves into our neighborhood's quality of life." ... They will also be discussing retail plans for Avalon Bay, so don't miss it.

Remains of CBGB's

Just checking in on what remains and what is vanishing still of CBGB's, I found the new John Varvatos store making headway, having installed what look like arched French windows in the old club's not-so-French-windowed space:


CBGB's back alley, Extra Place, is parked end-to-end with German engineering as it prepares to undergo its luxury transformation. The Ramones used to hang out back here--but this weekend, Marky Ramone was watching American Idol on HDTV instead:


The 313 Gallery is now the Morrison Hotel Gallery, a museum of rock-and-roll photography:


And, speaking of museums, the retail store on St. Mark's is shutting down on June 30. The sign says they are "sad to physically leave another legendary location." I'm not sure what they mean by "legendary"--the store just moved here about 5 minutes ago--unless they're referring to the fact that the totally renovated shopping mall in which they reside was once The Dom, The Electric Circus, and most recently, the All-Craft rehab center. Still, it's a mall store inside a shopping mall--let's not pretend otherwise.

There you will find one of the last remaining pieces of the club, a hunk of graffitied plywood scrawled with the word "bitch" that can be yours for $495:


If that price is too steep, you can bring home another artifact for just 5 bucks--a leftover, limited edition T-shirt from the defeated Save CBGB campaign of yore. I bought one myself, unable to resist the irony.