Rumor Has it

The rumor is that Peter McManus Cafe, a very popular bar which has been located at 7th Avenue and 19th Street since 1932, will soon be gone and a new high rise residential building will be constructed at that space.

I will always remember how the regulars gathered twice a year for street stick ball games and how the noise on hot summer nights spilled out onto the street from the open windows.

What I will remember most of all is so long ago in 1968, when I moved into the neighborhood and before I had a telephone installed.... I went into McManus to use their phones which are still there, in old wooden phone booths.