980 2nd Avenue
Turtle Bay | built 1900
Open on the map1 entry
The city photographed every building for its tax records around 1940 and again in the 1980s. NYC Municipal Archives.
Written with AI from the source each entry cites, then fact-checked.
- 1960
Louis Mattia opens an antique lamp shop whose sign outlasts him
Louis Mattia, a machinist who restores and rewires lamps at night, opens an antique light fixtures business in a small tenement space at 980 Second Avenue in 1960. He runs the store for 35 years, until 1995, and dies in 2004 at age 87. His hand-painted sign in faded gold letters, which includes the old PL (for Plaza) phone number, remains on the facade years after the shop closes.
Source: Ephemeral New York
Further reading
- The man behind a faded store sign at 52nd StreetEphemeral New York
- A Turtle Bay lamp store sign reemerges againEphemeral New York
Nearby
- Halcyon305 East 51st Street | 7 entries
- Norwegian Seamen's Church317 East 52nd Street | 2 entries
- Rockefeller Guest House242 East 52nd Street | 12 entries
- Sutton Place Synagogue225 East 51st Street | 3 entries
- P.S. 135 (The Beekman Regent)351 East 51st Street | 3 entries
- Constance Baker Motley Recreation Center348 East 54th Street | 4 entries