A wooden phone booth in an old Flatiron bar

Few bars have as much old-school atmosphere as the circa-1892 Old Town Bar on 18th Street next to Park Avenue South.

The long mahogany and marble bar is original, as are the tin ceilings. And the neon sign hanging outside gives off a warm New York glow.

The best part is inside: a wooden phone booth! It’s way in the back on the ground floor, partly obscured by a table. In the darkened room, it’s hard to even notice it.

The phone is gone, of course. Yet there’s a folding door for privacy, a wooden counter, and a sign on top referencing the Bell Telephone Company.

More of these remnants of pre-cell phone New York can be found here.

A lonely, long-gone West Village cocktail lounge

I have no idea when George Herdt’s bar and restaurant opened or closed.

And I can only guess at the clientele—perhaps the same mix of longshoremen, factory workers, and locals who frequented the White Horse a few blocks away back in the 1940s and 1950s, way before the far West Village became trendy.

This lovely, ghostly photo was taken in the early 1970s by author Katherine Towler. She lived in Chelsea then; luckily she documented some West Side haunts of the time—most, like this one, are no longer there.

Today 284 West 12th Street houses Cafe Cluny.