I don't even know what they sell in the building with the Indian standing guard on the rooftop at the NW corner of 63rd & Pulaski. The eye care center is still down the next storefront, and there had been a cigar store there for decades. I believe it was a White Owl store, unless that brad of cigar is as common as, say, Old Style signs. Before I moved to Burbank, it had already turned into half tobacco sop/half crappy figurines in the windows. I have taken the opportunity to show how, if taken at the right angle, it looks as if the Indian has L'il Kaw-liga out for a visit.
The huge building on the NE side of the intersection is one of my favorite buildings, and I was always hypnotized on summer nights as I watched cheap window fans cranking silently in the upper windows. The third photo shows that First Lawn Bank was its anchor, but that had closed in the early 90s. I've written about an incident involving my dad, back when he was a cop, which occurred in this building. The story is called "This Old Man Came Rolling Home." The short end: an old guy died ad the neighbors called the police after a few days of not seeing him, my dad and a few other cops from the 8th found a paper about five days old, and the crime scene evidence showed that the guy likely fell and died in the bathroom. The funny (as in peculiar) thing was that the guy had two Dobermans, and they seemed quite content. That was because they ate the old man. Along with other bags of food in the pantry. The clincher was when one of the cops found a thigh bone hidden behind a couch cushion. The apartment is a few windows to the left of the shoe store sign, maybe three stories up.
I kept walking towards the viaduct at Central Park, to take photos of the old station house, and I'll post those tomorrow, along with pictures of what had been Traxx. I passed this bungalow where the owners seemed to have gone overboard with the lawn statues.
