At 72nd Street and Columbus Avenue, a lovely stained glass ice cream sign hides above a cafe, affixed to the second floor of a corner building.
It looks very 1920s or 1930s, but it’s a ghost sign that seems to have long outlived the store it was attached to. Whose store was it?
A few blocks north, at 74th Street and Columbus Avenue, is this less mysterious ice cream signage: for the J.M. Horton Ice Cream Company.
It’s a sweet remnant of the Upper West Side’s manufacturing past. So what happened to Horton?
More than a century ago, the small local dairy “was supplying over half of New York’s ice cream,” explains The New York Times in a 2000 article.
By 1930, competition from bigger producers put them out of business.
[Horton’s sign tip: Chris Wilmore]
Tags: ghost signs, Horton Ice Cream Company, Horton Ice Cream Sign Columbus Avenue, Ice Cream Upper West Side, New York store signs, Stained Glass Ice Cream Sign Columbus Avenue, Vintage signs
Ephemeral New York 
May 28, 2012 at 4:45 am |
Odd that the current landlord chooses to have “JM HORTON ICE CREAM” picked-out in an easy-to-read contrasting paint color, seeing as how the tenant’s long since vacated. Good for them, they must be an ephemera enthusiast!
As for the stained glass sign, I have a sneaking suspicion that this one’s age may be deceptive, and more likely date to the 1970’s or later. My reasons: A) Seems to be in implausibly-good condition for an 80-90 year old exterior leaded glass sign. B) It’s rather a pastiche of two different eras– the leaded glass screams 1910’s, whereas the typography style is 20’s/ 30’s. C) there was indeed a revival for stained-glass in the 70’s (it may have even been more ubiquitous in the 1970’s than in the early twentieth century).
May 28, 2012 at 5:03 am |
I should have known it was too good to be true–a vintage ice cream sign from the 1920s….
May 28, 2012 at 5:27 am |
My guess is just that– purely a guess.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to bluster in and possibly shatter your dearly-held illusions!. Besides, forty year old signs are still respectably “vintage”.
May 30, 2012 at 9:37 pm |
I agree with Lisa – I’ve lived on the UWS since 1974 and have a very strong memory of that sign – just cannot remember exactly what the name of the shop was!
June 1, 2012 at 12:47 am |
In the 1980s Diane’s Uptown restaurant was in the storefront below the stained glass ice cream sign. I believe one part of the storefront was a walk-up ice cream window or shop. Diane’s may have been there before the 1980s but I wouldn’t know, that’s before my time.
June 1, 2012 at 2:14 pm |
Ah, mystery solved! I was hoping it was a very early Schrafft’s.
June 6, 2012 at 4:18 am |
I scream, you scream …. well, anyway.
March 24, 2013 at 2:33 pm |
“Diane’s” was the name of the restaurant she opened after the Ice Cream store did well – it was called “Sedutto’s”. Diane’s was a burger joint that probably would have done better in an era of “Shake Shake” and the like – it was before its time. The sign probably dates from the mid ’70s but no earlier than that.
As to the other sign – it likely is a landmark and the building owner probably can’t change it or the colors even if he wanted to!!
March 9, 2014 at 4:52 pm |
Is Diane’s Uptown still existing as a restaurant? I was in New York in 1980 and Went there several times. I also Went back to New York in 1986 and again visited Diane’s. Now the family and I is going back to the Big Apple. I would like to take them to lunch there if the restaurant still exist.
March 9, 2014 at 9:41 pm |
I don’t believe Diane’s exists anymore–just the sign.
January 4, 2016 at 7:56 pm |
would anyone know how to get a hold of diane the owner. I worked there in the early 90s and was hoping to reconnect.
July 22, 2019 at 4:49 am |
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