Wednesday, October 5, 2022

Wallet card with a very old shoeshine sign

"Shine 5¢". This sign was uncovered a few months ago on a storefront on Canal Street. As far as I can tell, the last time a shoeshine in New York City was a nickel was the 1930s, maybe 1940s. That would make this sign very old indeed. I suppose it is possible that it is a leftover from a movie shoot in some subsequent decade, but there's at least a pretty good chance that this sign is over 75 years old. Judging by the amount of graffiti on it in just the few months since it was uncovered, it's probably not going to be readable much longer, so I'm glad I got this shot in when I could.


 

2 comments:

  1. There's some old signage here in the "stuff:" I am going through. Pretty sure they are from the 50's and 60's, although I haven't researched them. The phone numbers on them are only 3 digits, so who knows how old they are.

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  2. It sure would be nice if certain groups of people didn't always have to ruin everything.

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