Here’s a follow up on Bob Bonsall, pictured in this post, this post and this post.

The Baltimore Sun, Feb 17, 1968

Robert F. Bonsall

Funeral services for Robert F. Bonsall, supervisor for the Little Tavern Shops, Inc., will be held at 10 A.M. Today at the Loring Byers funeral establishment, 8728 Liberty Road.
Mr. Bonsall died Wednesday of a heart attack at his home at 355 Marriottsville rd, Randallstown MD. He was 41 years old.
A native of Baltimore, Mr. Bonsall attended parochial schools here.
He was a veteran of the Korean war, having served in the Army.
Mr. Bonsall worked for the Little tavern Shops for 25 years, rising to the position of supervisor.
Survivors include his wife, Mrs. Catherine Bonsall and his four sons, Robert Bonsall, Joseph Bonsall, Douglas Bonsall and Mark Bonsall.

Shell Station- 124th St. and Morningside, New York, NY
Architect John Eberson, who also designed both the Silver Theater and Bethesda Theater.

Pretty incredibly, it looks like it’s still there. It’s been badly remodeled it the original structure’s still under all that, but the proportions and footprint look the same as the old building.

Yum.

Diamond Jubilee At the Club LT

Author: William R. MacKaye
Date: Nov 22, 1987

The first name of artist Joseph Craig English was incorrect in the J Street section of the Magazine Sunday. (Published 11/24/87)

IT’S 1 A.M. OF A SUNDAY MORNING, just an hour past midnight at the oasis, and the man on the third stool from the end in the Little Tavern on Georgia Avenue in Silver Spring is in a foul mood.

He and the woman behind the counter have had a disagreement over his ashtray. The other five customers are studiously pretending there’s nothing going on, chatting animatedly with one another or staring expressionlessly at the grill, where two cheeseburgers are sizzling.

“I’ve studied law. I know what my rights are,” the man growls. The woman says nothing, turns to mash firmly on the cheeseburgers with her spatula.

The man growls a couple more times, but the tone is less ferocious. Then he orders another cup of coffee. Peace has returned to the oasis.

The Little Tavern oases are 60 years old this year, still offering snug havens day and especially night to a metropolis whose commercial spaces are ever more impersonal, alien and gigantic. Oh, sure, LT has updated a little. You can get breakfast now, 24 hours a day in fact. You can get french fries or a hot dog. Even the deep- fried fish and chicken sandwiches beloved of the red meat phobes have made their way onto the menu.

But there’s no salad bar, and the hamburgers, stoutly saluted over the years by the management as “Easily Distinguished From the Ordinary Run,” are made the same way they’ve always been made: pressed out from fresh, not frozen, ground beef, laced with chopped onions, grilled until thoroughly well done, inserted in buns and finally held in a steam drawer- not under an infrared light-until served. The price: 54 cents.

“I like them after they have been in the steamer about 20 minutes,” Little Tavern founder Harry F. Duncan once said. He opened LT No. 1 in Louisville in 1927. It’s long gone, but the building for No. 2, which introduced the chain to the Washington-Baltimore area, still stands at 3701 New Hampshire Ave. NW.

Gerald E. Wedren, an investor from Columbus, Ohio, bought the Little Taverns from Duncan and his partners in 1981 and moved to Washington, where he now works full time lovingly restoring the firm. Wedren has closed some shops, opened others and now presides over 28 of the steep-roofed LTs, 17 in metropolitan Washington and 11 in metropolitan Baltimore. He’s also ventured into a modestly upscale “finer diner” called Club LT that offers full-service meals in downtown’s National Place.

A big part of Wedren’s heart is plainly fixed in nurturing a Washington landmark. These days you can plunk down $10 and buy a handsome anniversary poster featuring a silk-screen print of the Georgia Avenue Little Tavern, one of nine silk-screens of Little Taverns executed by local artist James Craig English over the last 15 years.

Nostalgia’s not all, though. Profit matters too. So it is that historic No. 2 at the corner of New Hampshire and Georgia avenues NW closed its doors as this anniversary year opened. The building’s architecture still says Little Tavern. But the sign over the door says Jamal’s Pizza Hall &Subs.

Not sure if it’s just a typo or another hamburger shop I haven’t run across before, but has anyone heard of this one?

The classified copy, from Dec. 20, 1941 reads as follows:

Young Man to work in hamburger shop. Apply Little Castle Shops, 750 Washington Blvd.

Legal Notice Nov 24, 1939
Co-partnership Notices
Notify the partnership heretofore existing between George W. Gash and J. Gilbeert Johnson a restaurant business at 750 Washington Boulevard, under the trade name Little Castle Shop and 2837 Greenmount ave under the trade name Little Inn has been discontinued, partitioned and liquidated by mutual consent. Effective Nov. 1 1939 George W. Gash, Gilbert Johnson

Edit 12/15/12: Another Little Castle Shop was located at 3707 Eastern Avenue Baltimore MD.

It’s fun to listen to the Fun Phone!
Yet somehow the reel to reel concealing payphone reminds me of the telephones used in prison visitations. Bozo got sent up the river for a long time, kiddies.
In all seriousness- it was made c.1956 by Bally. Here’s more info on it, including an original promotional image.

I played “Sky Gunner“, from 1953.

I played a few other shooting games and some ski-ball before my quarters ran out.

Do these folks look familiar? Retroroadmap

They had two barbers doing vintage-style cuts at the Sledfest event. How could I pass up the opportunity?

Even made it into Roadside Wonders.

1958

St. Michael’s 1908

Frackville, PA

The way the colors on this place have weathered is beautiful. I wonder how long ago this place was “modern”.

You see a lot of Coca Cola signs, a few Pepsi ones, but not a whole lot of 7-up backlit plastic signs. The name has been painted over, as has part of the 7-up. No idea what occupied the other side of the building Michael’s is/was in.

Dig that texture.

Hanover Shoes authorized Salesman. Hanover shoes was based in Hanover Pennsylvania. They ceased production in 1974.

Old Cats Paw decals. I have a couple pairs of shoes that were re-soled with cats-paw heels. They don’t seem any better or worse than any other heels, but man they look good. They’re just a great piece of design work.

And then just across the street- Larry’s Sport Shop. This one’s for you Mr. Cultrera.

We made a few quick photo stops for disused trucks on the side of the road with neat hand painted lettering.

Here’s a great old lunch wagon truck, sitting by the side of the road in PA.

And an old Harley Davidson / Moxie panel delivery