The dates on New York’s buildings and signs

I love looking up at old signs and facades and seeing the date the building or business opened. Sometimes the numbers are more functional than architecturally beautiful, but it’s always worth knowing how long a store or service has been around.

The sign for Northern Dispensary, kind of a walk-in health clinic for Greenwich Villagers in the early 19th century, has one of the oldest dates I’ve seen: 1827.

By comparison, the Treiss Building, on Atlantic Avenue on the Cobble Hill-Brooklyn Heights border since 1872, is practically a newbie.

Ornamentation like this, from the facade of a city firehouse established in 1894 in the Flatiron District, is always a treat. And the AD is a nice touch.

I’d love to go back in time and see what Thomas Drugs, on Columbus Avenue on the Upper West Side, looked like in 1904.

Judging from its shabby-chic faded look, the sign for Yonah Shimmel Knishes, on Houston Street, just might actually have been painted in 1910.