Fifth Avenue in Bay Ridge is pretty typical shopping district with the usual mix of mostly independent stores characteristic of many city neighborhoods.
So what makes it stand out? The supercool store signs, so many of which are wonderful relics of a more personal city, when shop owners named their stores after themselves and advertised their business with big blocks of 1960s- and 1970s-style letters.
The sign for Fritsch Upholstering, above, is so old-school, they still use the old two-letter phone exchange: SH for nearby Shore Road.
The parking sign got in the way of the sign for Bay Ridge Bakery. That says “classic patisserie” underneath it in neon. Sounds delicious.
Tags: Bay Ridge Bakery, Bay Ridge Brooklyn, Bay Ridge Fifth Avenue, Bay Ridge shopping, Bay Ridge Store Signs, Bay Ridge Street Signs, Fritsch Upholstery, Old phone exchange Brooklyn, Old phone exchange signs
Ephemeral New York 
December 24, 2012 at 11:27 am |
I lived in the Sheepshead Bay section of Brooklyn (a LONG time ago). I had an “SH” telephone exchange. I was told that “SH” stood for “Sheepshead.”
December 24, 2012 at 3:15 pm |
According to this chart, it stood for both…I just figured in Bay Ridge it was for Shore Road, which is nearby.
http://phone.net46.net/nyc/latealphnumer.html
December 24, 2012 at 8:44 pm |
My family had both a YUkon-7 and GIbraltar-2 exchange on Staten Island in the early 1970s. Could never figure out what the Yukon and Rock of Gibraltar had to do with Staten Island! A NYCT bus depot on SI is named Yukon also. Any ideas why?
December 30, 2012 at 3:34 am |
I still remember the phone number of my childhood home in Dyker Heights. THe lettered exchange was “BE” and it stood for Bensonhurst. My cousins lived in Bay Ridge and their phone number started with “SH” and yes, we were told it represented SHore Road. I also remember numbers that started with “MU” for “Murray Hill.”