5TH AVENUE SUNSET PARK

BACK in March I walked sections of 4th and 5th Avenues in Sunset Park, an area I had neglected, at least on foot. I have traveled beneath 4th Avenue on the R, D and N trains (earlier the M and B) since the 1960s, and since my high school was located in Clinton Hill, my college and a couple of early jobs in Brooklyn Heights, I was a regular B63 rider on 5th Avenue from 1971 through the mid-1980s. Again, though, I had made relatively few passes on foot down 5th Avenue in Sunset Park, between 40th and 60th Streets. Thus on this day I was able to see a few items on both avenues I had previously missed. This page will progress from 40th south to 60th on 5th Avenue.

A good deal of the page will discuss sidewalk business signs of which 5th Avenue has quite a few engaging samples, here at #4008. The Spanish means “Church of of missionary evangelization, young Christians” in red and blue plastic letters. I can’t identify the font.

Judy’s is a relatively new (2019) bar at #4022. I found the handpainted sign interesting. I could be wrong but it looks a lot like it was crafted at the New York Sign Museum in East New York, which also makes custom painted and neon signage.

I didn’t enter Sunset Park itself on this occasion, I wasn’t keen on its steep hills, but I’ve explored it extensively in the past. Sunset Park proper is 24.5 hilly acres in a rectangle from 5th to 7th Avenues and from 41st to 44th Streets, and has quiet areas, playgrounds, and a 1930s-era swimming pool.

When I turned 9 or 10, it was time to start to be a little more independent and I acquired a bicycle and started to rove all over Brooklyn, expanding my reach a little bit every year; by college I was routinely reaching as far as Valley Stream and Elmont. When I was still small, though, my elders repeatedly warned me about Sunset Park. Don’t go there, they said, because “that’s where the bad boys are.” For many years, therefore, my only glimpses of this community that bordered my own, Bay Ridge, was what I could see out bus windows on the B63 (5th Avenue) and the B70 (8th Avenue).

From its website, “Pantomima is a theatrical daycare that combines Spanish as a second language with appropriate socialization skills through theatrical techniques such as: pretend play character development, personality projection, emotional expression, puppetry, literary awareness, and pantomime. Combining aspects of varied philosophies, our children work independently, following their own pace and tendencies. They will learn Theatre and its branches as they receive extensive imaginative experiences to encounter varied scenarios to play.”

I found it interesting seeing the hobbyhorses piled on the car, no doubt to be used inside. If I remember Monty Python correctly, in England a “pantomime horse” is a horse costume occupied by two people, with their two legs subbing for the horse’s four.

Another plastic-letter sign, this one on 5th Avenue and 45th Street. There is a smaller sign around the corner. Though South Asian immigrants settled Sunset Park’s eastern section east of 8th Avenue in the 1980s, there has been some migration into the Latin and Caribbean dominated west, making for some fascinating juxtapositions.

The Monchito Place sign, placed before 1998 and subsequently blue, not green, was named for community activist Jose “Monchito” Pascualy in 1997.

La Gran Via Bakery was founded in 1978 by Armando Leyva, and his son Roy cuurently manages it:

“At the very young age of 23, Mr. Armando Leyva alongside his wife, Mrs. Lorely Leyva, decided to follow in his father’s footsteps and enter the bakery business. Still a novice to the bakery world, he leaned on his father’s many years of experience as a bread master. They would soon discover many talents needed to be learned, and fast. The pastry arts were tackled as were desserts of all sorts, and then the art of cake decorating was finally conquered. Every skill was self-taught and then perfected. Now, their children have taken over the reins and continue to serve our community with a smile on their faces and a tasty morsel in their hands.”

It looks like the original signage may be in place, with illuminated plastic shingle signs, and plastic-lettered sidewalk signs in the Cooper Black, Aachen and Helvetica Black fonts. “Bizcochos” refers to a variety of baked sweets, depending on what Spanish-speaking country you’re in!

New Star Tobacco has some toy cars in the window. I’m reminded of when I was in grade school and periodically I’d go to a newsstand on 5th Avenue in Bay Ridge and purchase a Matchbox car now and then. The counterman got it out of a wooden cabinet behind the counter. (Since they were so small they were easy to pilfer.)

This ornate apartment building at 5th and 48th has had much of its ornamentation chiseled off since 1940. Passing by on the bus in the 1970s and 1980s, I noted a German restaurant on the second floor accessed by the side entrance. Any readers remember what its name was?

Baker House

I was tipped by Sunset Park historian Tony Giordano that this small house, #540 50th Street east of 5th Avenue, may be the oldest house in southern Brooklyn; by some accounts it was built in 1777. I’ll let these clippings provided by Tony tell the story.

This new building at 5102- 5th Avenue replaced a pair of buildings as recently as 2023. The corner featured a branch of the shoes franchise Father and Son, and a sidewalk clock stood in front of an optometrist.

According to the FDNY, Ladder Company114, #5209 5th Avenue, started out as Ladder 18 of the Brooklyn Fire Department on September 15, 1897. It was later reorganized to Ladder 114 on January 1 1913. I am unsure when this Deco-esque firehouse was built.

FNY covered the former Bay Ridge Savings Bank, 5th Avenue and 54th Street, on this page from May 2025.

Dueling murals, one dating to 2010 and carefully maintained, face off across 54th Street across from the Bay Ridge Savings Bank.

For the most part these 5th Avenue properties look much the same as they did in the early 20th Century when built. The cone-shaped roofline turrets on the corners that had been there have been removed, though.

Kelly’s Pharmacy, on the NE corner of 5th Avenue and 59th Street, is a longtime fixture on 5th Avenue, here since at least 1940 when this tax photo was taken.

The Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic basilica, one of the largest churches of any denomination in Brooklyn, was dedicated on Easter Sunday 1909. The parish itself dates to 1892, established by the Redemptorists. The basilica is positioned on a hill and is easily recognizable from a ferryboat in Upper New York Bay.

Note the swashy lettering below the Nora’s Fashion sign at 5th Avenue and 60th Street. This is one of the last remnants of Ebinger’s Bakery in Brooklyn. A full view of the sign was available in 2015.

Some bay-windowed attached residences on 60th Street between 4th and 5th Avenues.

Check out the ForgottenBook, take a look at the  gift shop. As always, “comment…as you see fit.” I earn a small payment when you click on any ad on the site. 

6/29/25