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Two feet of snow and nowhere to go. Thousands of Brooklyn residents found themselves stuck without transportation and their cars buried under several feet of snow. The storm hit Sunday night and didn't stop until late Monday. Most businesses closed, even the few car services that serve the neighborhoods shutdown. The subways weren't running for a while either, because high winds piled up snowdrifts where the underground meets daylight just past the Carroll Street station. Just a handful of businesses opened, including Angry Wades, which I'm told was bustling with thirsty bar patrons. Some kids in Carroll Park were having a hey day tossing snowballs at people walking home from the subway station and the well behaved ones attached themselves to the backside of cars for a slippery ride down the street. Snowmen popped up in front of several homes and a nice guy walking down Sackett Street came to the rescue of an elderly woman, clad only in pajamas locked out of her apartment in the blowing snow. Even the mailman took a day off and trash collectors missed their Friday pickup. (check out the photo gallery)
Many bars in New York City are trying to find loopholes in Mayor Bloomberg's new smoking ban. Last month, THE COBBLER told you how Angry Wade's was building an outdoor deck on it's roof to accommodate smokers. Now, some Carroll Gardens taverns are ditching plans to make up to three of their employees co-owners. The Red Room on Court street, for instance, wanted to make each employee a one percent partner, but they soon found out city law requires that partners have at least a 25-percent interest in the bar. The most far-fetched idea may actually be the most probable----charging a buck at the door and using that cash to pay off fines leveled against the establishment.
I'm not sure what you call these things, but they sure look like ladders to me, but they come with pulley's so you can attach a clothes line from the ladder to the upper floors of the apartments in Brooklyn's old brownstones. I'm fascinated, for some reason , by these theses which dot hundreds of backyards and often pre-date most of the current residents. So, I posted a message on the Brooklyn board, a site for old timers to reflect on their days growing up in Brooklyn and asked: What's the origin of Laundry ladders? Now, a few responses: "I don't know either. I remember them as a kid and several old pictures I have seen of Brooklyn also show them. They're old wooden ones were quite dangerous to climb. I remember one of the steps coming out in my hand. Then years later I climbed poles for BellSouth and I learned how dangerous they really were. I can even recall seeing a few that fell clothes and all." And another…. "Hey George: We called it "The Ladder" or "The Ladder for the Line." That was it. I have no idea of when they were first installed, but some salesman must have made a bundle years ago, as every yard had one. I remember some yards having old wooden telephone-type poles to support the clotheslines --those must have been the originals. The "ladder" in our backyard (on Warren between Court and Smith) was an old rusty cast-iron-type job, probably dating to the late '30s (just speculation). Others had more weather-resistant aluminum-looking finishes. I think I remember seeing someone at the top of our ladder once. I think my father hired some teenaged kid from the neighborhood to climb up the thing and change out the pulleys. If I recall correctly, those ladders taper as they rise, so you'd barely have room for one foot per rung toward the top. As crazy as we were as kids, we'd jump on the ladder and go up a few rungs, but never attempt to climb to the top. We'd either get scared by the height, or someone would start screaming out the window: "GET DOWN, GET AWF DEAH!" NEW PUB Eamonn Doran is coming to Smith Street. The bar and grill is opening up near Kane street and will be much smaller than their pub on Montague street in Brooklyn Heights. Like it's other spots, Eamonn's Smith Street restaurant features a long bar and lots of woodwork. It's currently being painted bright red.
Some asked me the other day, why don't all of these brick buildings on Smith street have windows. Here's why: At one time, there was another building right next to it.
I just got off from work
and was hurriedly walking home from the subway, because I had to
pee. I turn off President Street onto Henry and this burly guy with
a walkie-talkie says, "Sorry can't go that way." "It's
really the only way to my frickin home, which is right there,"
I say. They were making a commercial for Nickelodeon, the kids cable
network. "No Parking" signs went up just hours before
the filming and neighbors, for the most part, didn't have a clue
that all of these trucks would show up. They parked on either side
of the street and were filming a few scenes for their promotional
spot near Henry and Carroll. TIPS & TIDBITS Got a tip, a wacky story, a neighborhood complaint, a secret? Send it to me and we'll likely print it for all of cyberworld to see. george@georgeweber.net |
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