Enter the cobbler

[108-13 and 108-17 Atlantic Avenue, Richmond Hill, Queens, c. 1939–1941. From the NYC Municipal Archives Collections. Click either image for a much larger view.]

Just a small moment from a day in Queens.

Drop the -ing , and Electric Shoe Repair, like Electric Soup Kitchen, sounds (to me anyway) like the name of a short-lived rock group. Let’s title their one album Lace . O’Sullivan is a name with a stronger basis in reality. Humphrey O’Sullivan, a Massachusetts printer who tired of long hours on his feet, invented the rubber heel.

You’ll have to click for a much larger view to have any idea of what I’m writing about.

A gas station would later occupy this corner. Then nothing. Then a laundromat. The empty corner space is now a parking area.



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More photographs from the NYC Municipal Archives (Pinboard)