AS the years pass, more and more of the “faded ads” that I encountered in Forgotten NY’s early days 25 years ago are disappearing or ravaged by the elements. And sometimes they have help disappearing. Take this sign on the side of what was formerly a shoe factory at Hewes and South 5th Street in Williamsburg, which looked like the image on the left in 1999. The ad was visible from the northbound Hewes Street el platform on Broadway.
The ad has considerably faded over the years, and the local youth have set to work with their usual grim determination to put their stamp on the neighborhood.
Brooklyn’s Broadway formerly had a numerous array of faded ads like this, and the very first Forgotten NY tour on June 1st, 1999, marched down Broadway from the East River to East New York (with a train ride from Flushing Avenue to Chauncey Street) to take a peek at them.
The non-English script on the shoe factory ad uses Hebrew characters but is actually in Yiddish. FNY correspondent Sergey Kadinsky:
Although I can speak and understand some Yiddish, you should really thank my grandpa Z. Vaysbukh, who can read and speak the language perfectly.
The line below ”Shoe Factory ” reads a word for general production of the factory besides shoes: HABERDASHERY, which means that the factory also used to make socks, shirts, bracelets, pants, etc.
As for the now-obscured bottom portion:
Forgotten Fan Moshe Rapoport: The bottom line reads Scouring Powder Produkten (products).
Thus, the factory produced both clothing and cleaning products, likely two separate companies.
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5/29/24
9 comments
If they ever make a movie about Kevin Walsh,I wonder which movie star they’ll use
to play the part.
Horror movie
It’s an actual transliteration of “scouring powder” using Hebrew letters
I was thinking more along the lines of The Sound of Music.After great adversity you
finally stumble through the mountains as some Mother Superior lifts her voice in song.
If you want to know the full history of this building:
Aaron Smith Thomas formed this shoe company at the tail end of the 19th Century, in a small factory at 304
Hewes St. near Broadway. By the 1890s, Thomas had commissioned this larger facility. Born in Rhode Island
in 1846, Thomas entered the shoe industry after graduating from Yale University in 1869, working for various
shoemakers in Providence, before moving to New York. Thomas retired in 1905, and by the time of his death in
1915, his company had grown to employ nearly 500 workers, manufacturing boots and children‟s wear. By the
end of the 1910s, the building was owned by the Rokeach & Sons Company. Established in Russia in 1870,
Israel Rokeach immigrated to America ten years later, settling in the Lower East Side and selling his products
from pushcarts. The firm operated here for over a decade, eventually moving to a larger, more modern facility
at North 3rd St. and Wythe Ave. In 1930, Rokeach sold this building to Garber-Eagle Oil Corporation,
manufacturers of cooking oil and food products, which leased part of the site to the Maxfil Sportswear, a
clothing manufacturer. Since the 1970s, the building has housed a Yeshiva.
^ is that the Indispensable Walter Grutchfield?
Nope, I wrote a book on all the old factories across the 5 boroughs a few years ago. Lots of research, including reading Walter’s amazing website!
What is the title?
Hello Josh, what is the title of the book?