10th St. Glass

In 2007, we first heard that a string of buildings on East 10th Street would be razed for big-box construction. These buildings between Third and Fourth Avenues were once the epicenter of the Abstract Expressionist movement in the 1950s. They were not torn down. 

In 2008, we got word of more destruction--the corner was shuttered and gutted for an eventual teardown to make room for a luxury hotel. That still hasn't happened.

But there is some action on the block. Scaffolding recently came down off 84 E. 10th -- its bricks have been transformed into glass.

Containing an art gallery for many years, part of the 10th Street gallery "scene," this was once the home of the Off-Bowery Theater, where the New York Poets Theatre performed in the early 1960s, featuring Diane Di Prima, LeRoi Jones, and Michael McLure.

before photo via EV Grieve

The realtor's listing begs for a restaurant, or if not a restaurant, then a wine bar, gallery, fitness studio, or salon/spa.

And in the 1950s...

photo: James Burke for LIFE

Village Chess Shop

VANISHED

The Village Chess Shop has been at 230 Thompson Street since 1972. And now it's gone. A tipster sent in these photos of the empty windows and the "for sale: everything" signs. "They were cleaning out everything on Sunday and this is the empty storefront today," writes the tipster, who heard from the management company: "They were evicted."

The Chess Shop's Facebook page has officially announced: "Chess Shop is now closed however, it was a great 40 year run but while we attempted to preserve it, The Chess Shop became more of a curiosity or portrait than viable retail environment...Indeed, those who thoughtfully bid us farewell in the final days, admittedly had never set foot in the place lol...The Chess Shop lives on though. We'll be opening several smaller different type of sites for play, learning, competition and laughter...stay tuned."

photo: New York Magazine

I don't know how to play chess, but I always marveled, when walking on Thompson Street, that a little block could sustain not one, but two chess shops. I thought it made the street seem more gemutlich. Turns out, the two stores were bitter rivals. A former Chess Shop partner opened Chess Forum in 1995. Reported the Times, "Not since Bobby Fischer declared his last checkmate in 1972 has the downtown chess world been so torn asunder."

But The Chess Shop was there first, a classic. Its sidewalk was lined with battered tables and chairs for players to come together, its windows cluttered with odd and interesting chess sets. It had character. It felt like New York.

Here's how The Observer described The Village Chess Shop's owner: "Well into his 70′s, Mr. Frohlinde walks with a cane and speaks slowly with a thick German accent. He wore a brown leather jacket and the kind of bulky nerdy glasses sported by hip 30-somethings in the neighborhood; his thick, shoulder-length white hair hung messily under a wool hat. The outfit is one you’d see all the time in the East Village, but you get the sense Mr. Frohlinde was wearing the same thing well before it was cool. He was friends with Yoko Ono; casually references a conversation with Bertold Brecht; and had no idea who Russell Crowe was when the actor bought a $500 board a few years ago."

photo: Anomalous A's Flickr

The owner of the rival Chess Forum is hanging on, but as their owner said in 2008, "We are en route to vanishing." The Internet, of course, has been devastating--many people would rather play digital chess than to put their hands on the real thing.

Ghost Signs 1997

Reader Steve Fitch recently put together his slides of ghost signs from across the city, all taken in 1997, then he scanned them and got them up on Flickr for us to enjoy.

Some of my favorites: "Cooped Up? Feelin' Low? Enjoy a Movie Today." The best.

A lovely pawnbrokers' shop.

And our lost Amato Opera House--the mural vanished when NYU put up their dorm alongside it. Check out Steve's Flickr page for many more.

After Sandy

It's Monday and many of us are getting "back to normal" after the hurricane, while many others have a long way to go to normal.

You've seen the photos and the news footage: the buckled houses, homes sinking as if into quicksand, the boardwalks ripped up and scattered like busted piano keys, cars leapfrogging each other down the streets. You've seen the East River lapping, almost gently, over its barriers, and then the floodwaters that swamped Avenue C. You saw footage of the Con Edison plant on 14th Street explode into sick, green flashes of light like the coming of the alien invasion. You've seen the post-apocalyptic devastation in the Rockaways, like the bombing of Dresden, and the misery in Staten Island. And you've seen the people crying, digging through Dumpsters for food, begging Bloomberg to do something.

Maybe you are one of those people. Maybe you're among them, helping. Or maybe you spent the night looting their homes. This week we've seen both the horrors and the wonders of humanity.

But there is one burden we all share: We invited Sandy to our shores. The product of human-induced climate change, we invited her with our burning of fossil fuels, our hunger for convenience and speed, our selfishness. We're all guilty to some extent or another. We must not turn away from this painful truth.

Diesel Jeans ad

We also invited her by voting for politicians who don't put the environment at the top of the priority list. Tomorrow, we have a chance to at least vote against a man who thinks the rising of the oceans is a joke, who believes global warming isn't happening, and who probably doesn't care what happens to Earth when he's gone because he'll be the God of planet Kolob by then.

Avenue C and 8th St.

It's time to get our heads out of the sand, as we dig out from Sandy, and face reality. Our planet is warming, our oceans are rising, we will be inundated again and again if we don't take action.

On Avenue A

*Everyday Chatter

It's been a difficult week, but I am here. I've been keeping up with those of you on Facebook, and hope everyone got through the storm okay. The news could go on forever, but here are just a few links from the week with Sandy:

The Rockaways were devastated. [Gothamist]

Coney Island took a beating. [ATZ]

Central Park lost over 250 trees. [Gothamist]

The death toll on Staten Island keeps climbing. [SIL]

Images of flooding and wreckage keep coming in. [J&KM]

The payphone became necessary again. [HuffPo]

The uptown/downtown divide led one Melissa Kao to rechristen downtown SoPo--South of Power:



Gawker declared an Uptown/Downtown civil war. [Gawker]

People in the East Village resorted to Dumpster diving for food. [EVG]

While many New Yorkers were lining up for food, gas, transportation, hundreds were lining up for the latest Apple product. [Racked]

Battered Red Hook emerged from the flood waters. [Curbed]

The National Guard arrived on the LES. [BB]

Many heeded the call for volunteers and donations. [TLD]

A renegade Halloween Parade took over the Village. [Gothamist]

Bloomberg endorsed Obama for his stance on climate change. [MB]

*Everyday Chatter

You must see "Zipper" at the NYC Documentary Fest--a heartbreaking and enraging story about greed, politics, and destruction in modern-day Coney Island. [DocNYC]

Gimme Gimme Records is gone. Here's the last letter they received, from a distraught customer. [EVG]

About that random piece of High Line in Yvonne's 1980s photos...it was over Jane Street. [FNY]

On trucks full of firewood and ice. And icepicks. And stab wounds. [WIC]

Playland Arcade, the wonderful Coney ruin, is currently under demolition. [ATZ]

Going back to the Gas Station, the "former gas station that turned into a junkies' shooting gallery that turned into an art-installation-cum-performance space over on Avenue B," now a Duane Reade. [FP]

A new fro-yo joint is coming to Park Slope, and the locals share their thoughts: WTF. ANOTHER ONE? It's better than an effing cell phone store [crossed out]. We should get a Sprint Store.

History on the neon sign of the Keller Hotel. [NYN]

Take a walk down 2nd Avenue in the East Village--10 years ago. [J&KM]

Meet Ricky Powell, a native New Yorker and photographer, feeding squirrels and talking about the new Greenwich Village, where he writes graffiti to say: "Fuck the new-jack cornballs" with their "creepy, ugly vibes," and "Go back to schmucksville." [Vimeo]

In Astoria, the mayor is still Koch. [OMFS]

The watercolor streetscapes of 6th Avenue in the Village, by AFineLyne. [UNY]

An artist watches artist studios wipe out the factories and warehouses of Bushwick. [TUH]

A comic-strip take on the B&H Dairy. [YB]

Enjoy scenes of Tompkins Square Park in 1988--thanks to Michelle Shocked:

Colony Gone

In August, we first learned that Colony Music would be vanishing after 60 years in Times Square. Their landlord hiked the rent to $5 million. Now Colony is gone. All the sheet music, the CDs, the memorabilia is gone. A reader sends in the following snapshots.

The windows are empty.

The neon lights are off.

And the inside is gutted.

And what's coming to replace those 60 years of history?