SOMETIMES, the only thing that keeps ads painted on walls from fading into oblivion is the quality of paint used. Can it stand up to pollution and rain and can it withstand direct sunlight? The latter has faded hundreds of street signs around town into illegibility. On Myrtle Avenue west of Broadway in Brooklyn, we have a perfect example of quality paint that still advertises a business that disappeared decades ago.
Information on the World Wide Web is sketchy about L. Salzinger. Not much is out there at all. The Salzinger Building, on which the two ads are painted on either side of the building, to gather attention from passing Myrtle Avenue El riders, formerly held a metalic sign over the entrance, “National Bolt & Nut Co.” I gather that the NBNC was based elsewhere and that L. Salzinger became a franchisee. The metallic “L. Salzinger” sign is newer than the painted ads, so I’d imagine Salzinger, of whom google mentions nothing, joined the NBNC after several independent years. But, I’m speculating. The much faded telephone number is a GLenmore 8 exchange.
Along Myrtle Avenue between Lewis Avenue and Broadway are the last remains the Myrtle Avenue line that ran west and crossed the Brooklyn Bridge to Park Row in Manhattan. This particular el structure and tracks opened April 27, 1889. The old Broadway station on the el, also no longer used, sits atop the Broadway el. The oldest el structure actually in use (1893) is part of the Broadway-Jamaica el and runs over Fulton Street between Alabama Avenue and Cypress Hills.
I do not know why this section was never torn down but it may have something to do with the structural integrity of the remaining el structure that sits above the Broadway el.
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6/13/24