Ghost signs, ghost ads & other phantoms

Sun Chun Mei 1 – Chinese Restaurant – Closed Over Six Years – West Village, NYC

Oct 12th, 2015

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June 2015 © Frank H. Jump

I remembering coming to eat at Sung Chun Mei 1 after ACT UP meetings in the late 80s. Enzo and I would go there on occasion when in the Village. We happened upon it again after the LGBT Pride NYC and it looked so perpetually closed. I could remember the last time we were there. Pork and string beans in a brown sauce. Pan fried dumplings. Cold noodle with sesame sauce. Eggplant with garlic sauce. I found this article that mentions it called No Longer Driving the Culture, is the Village Now “a Geography of Nowhere?” in the Washington Square Park Blog where Catherine says:

I knew Sung Chun Mei, the restaurant referenced in the article as closed and sitting shuttered for six years (picture above), well. It was a vibrant thriving business, a Chinese restaurant I considered my “go to” place to order dinner often. It is hard for me to even think of it as closed.

Jeremiah Moss references Sung Chun Mei more recently on September 28th in his Vanishing NY Blog. Living in Brooklyn, working in Brooklyn – I am so out of touch with Manhattan anymore. So much is changing in Flatbush, I find it hard to keep up with the changes and harder still to keep up with what isn’t changing beyond my immediate horizon.

Coca-Cola – Brown Circle – Farish Street – Jackson, MS

Oct 5th, 2015

by Frank.

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Farish Street © Frank H. Jump

A once thriving African-American Blues community is now a ghost town.

Kanab Hotel – Photo Shop – Portraits – Kanab, UT

Oct 1st, 2015

by Frank.

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Sugar Noll Cafe – Films – Groceries – Orderville, UT

Sep 30th, 2015

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Star Theatre – Fox Theatre – C. Victor Mazzone Insurance – Walsenburg, CO

Sep 17th, 2015

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Grand Hotel – Fire Proof – Coca-Cola – Chattanooga, TN

Sep 9th, 2015

by Frank.

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Hub Discount Department Stores – West Market – Louisville, KY

Aug 31st, 2015

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Gordon’s Gin – Regency Liquors – The Half Note Club – Chattanooga, TN

Aug 29th, 2015

by Frank.

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502 E MLK Blvd © Frank H. Jump

This awning was full of mold an inch deep and the smell coming out of the building of both the Half Note Club and Regency Liquors indicated they were closed for a number of years.

For decades, Ninth Street was the hub of the black community, home to black-owned retail shops, nightclubs and businesses. Bessie Smith sang there as a child and teenager, and it attracted many of biggest black entertainers such as Ella Fitzgerald, Lena Horne and Nat “King” Cole, who would stay in the Martin Hotel. Clubs like the Whole Note and The Half Note were full of blues and jazz.

East Ninth Street was renamed M.L King Boulevard in 1981. – Chattanooga Now, March 2014

According to a thread in Old Bars, Chattanooga;

The Whole Note started out as a top of the line club for R&B entertainment and the Half Note was private for the who’s who’s in African American businessmen and politicians. Charles Bryant was the owner.

Wink – The Sassy One – Canada Dry – Sun Hotel – South Scranton, PA

Aug 21st, 2015

by Frank.

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Six weeks since the Sun went down, Scranton police Officer Jill Foley drove her cruiser through a silent South Side on patrol Wednesday night looking for some sign, any sign of crime. – Denis J. O’Malley – Times Tribune, July 3, 2011

Today, I was also looking for a sign on Cedar Avenue. I found several. Not the kind of signs for which Officer Jill Foley was looking. Apparently, this once bustling late-19th-century neighborhood is now safer and quieter since this hotel has closed. Reviews on Google for this hotel are hilarious.

The guy in the front with the Harley-Davidson claims to have done the lettering on this sign “too many years ago to remember when.” Within one block, there were many signs of a previous life on Cedar Avenue that was not so nefarious and sleazy. The South Side, as it is called in Scranton, can use a comeback. But then again, so can the North Side and the Middle Side. Scranton has some great architectural and advertising remnant treasures which indicate it once had quite a hey-day. Like most of America’s cities, Scranton is waiting for a second wind.