Blatt’s 4 - 8 & 19¢ Store

[Blatt’s 4 - 8 & 19¢ Store, 5005 13th Avenue, Boro Park, Brooklyn, c. 1939–1941. From the NYC Municipal Archives Collections. Click for a much larger view.]

Clicking my way down 13th Avenue in 1940s.nyc, I stopped in front of Blatt’s. The name drew my eye. A five-and-dime? No way! Four cents! Eight cents! Bargains indeed. I also like the traces of snow and what looks to me like wintry light. And oh — there’s a baby carriage parked in front.

The Brooklyn Daily Eagle has a story from 1925 about an attempted safecracking at a Blatt’s Department Store in Williamsburg. The same Blatt? I have no idea. I found a handful of advertisements for the Boro Park Blatt’s that clearly establish mid-century prices rising well above the 19¢ mark.

[Brooklyn Daily, September 25, 1956; September 19, 1962; September 21, 1962. Click any advertisement for a larger view and bigger savings.]

On October 16, 1962, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle reported a four-alarm fire at the store. Nineteen firefighters suffered smoke inhalation. After that, I can find no sign of Blatt’s in business. Today 5005 13th Avenue, severely reduced in size, houses a jewelry showroom.

I was about to give up on finding out more about Blatt’s when I thought I’d check The New York Times. Perhaps there was a story about the fire? No soap. But I did find something of interest, a December 29, 1974 article, “Blatt Brothers Hold the Price Line — Almost.” Holy smokes: Dean, Jerry, and Sandy Blatt, sons of William and Frances Blatt of the 4 - 8 & 19¢ Store, opened a 69¢ Shop on Lexington Avenue in 1959. Four more 69¢ Shops followed, along with a $1.69 Shop. I’d think of those stores as the forerunners of today’s dollar stores.

[“Blatt Brothers Hold the Price Line — Almost.” The New York Times, December 29, 1974.]

Deep nostalgia: On the drive from New Jersey to visit maternal grandparents in Brooklyn, when nearing the Brooklyn Bridge, we passed the 69¢ Shop at 89 Chambers Street countless times. On Saturdays and Sundays, the store was closed; the area, a ghost town. The store always seemed like a place of great wonders. It probably wasn’t.

Related reading
More OCA posts with photographs from the NYC Municipal Archives

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