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Post by fiona on Aug 21, 2010 20:20:53 GMT -5
The Triangle Coffee Shop, still owned by the Kane family, is on the point across the road from what used to be the YMCA and is now the new Utica Vet's Center. I worked there as a waitress and fry cook from 1965 to 1967. I go there too eat when I can. I went in there last month and had this sandwich. Doesn't it look yummy? I just had to photograph it! the shop is still owned and operated by Ed Kain's son, Terry, the most affable Irishman I know, other than Dave, of course. Attachments:
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Post by fiona on Aug 21, 2010 20:29:55 GMT -5
This place, The ChatterBox Cafe, is directly across from the Triangle. At one time, for many years, it was Utica Floral, owned and operated by Chris Brown. The ChatterBox did not do well on that corner. There is something else, another cafe, going in there now. I don't know just what.
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Post by dicknaegele on Aug 22, 2010 12:30:02 GMT -5
No, the old Y building is now the veterans center of some sort, and it is across Washington St to the west of the triangle coffee shop. Sorry that I was not clear in describing the location.
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Post by dicknaegele on Aug 30, 2010 19:09:46 GMT -5
Fiona, you earlier mentioned "Peter's Fine Foods" on Franklin Square. If I am not mistaken, that was run by Peter Perritano Sr. You might ask our friend "Corner" on the Clipper's Corner forum. He is related to the family and might be able to offer some more history about the place. I think Pete Perritano was originally a bar tender at a place called the Moosehead Grill that was also downtown in that Franklin Square area. Pete was a dapper little fellow with a thin moustache and naturally wavy hair. Does that sound familiar to you?
I worked downtown on a couple of occasions when I was young. I worked for my Grandfather as a stock boy and shipping clerk at Brayton's Hotel Supply that was located on Hotel St, one summer while in high school, and then while waiting to go in the Navy after I quit college, I worked for Don Jeffery at Jeffery's Hardware, which at that time was across the alley from the downtown Hemstrought's Bakery on Columbia St. I just read the other day that he was in a minor car accident, and that he is now 96 years old.
Downtown used to be a wonderful and bustling place. I loved working downtown, eating downtown, and shopping downtown. It is so very sad to see it laying as dormant and deserted as it is now.
There were times when I would wait for a bus at the busy corner, and the bus would be so full that a second bus was following it to carry the overflow.
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Post by dicknaegele on Aug 30, 2010 19:15:11 GMT -5
Does anyone remember the Hunt's Point Diner on Charlotte St? We used to stop there and get warm, over a cup of coffee on our way back to N. Utica from UFA in the early 60's. It was run by a guy who was always there all by himself, doing the serving and the cooking. Typical old fashioned diner with the huge gas burning coffee urns and the cook with a greasy apron and paper hat. We loved the place and would often stop there after school for coffee and pie from the Red Cherry Pie Shop, and then catch the city bus to N Utica from the busy corner.
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Post by jon on Aug 30, 2010 21:46:08 GMT -5
I worked for Don Jeffery at Jeffery's Hardware, which at that time was across the alley from the downtown Hemstrought's Bakery on Columbia St. I just read the other day that he was in a minor car accident, and that he is now 96 years old. |
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Post by Dave on Aug 30, 2010 21:58:41 GMT -5
I worked downtown on a couple of occasions when I was young. ... Downtown used to be a wonderful and bustling place. I loved working downtown, eating downtown, and shopping downtown. It is so very sad to see it laying as dormant and deserted as it is now. There were times when I would wait for a bus at the busy corner, and the bus would be so full that a second bus was following it to carry the overflow. Downtown surely was the place. I went to school there and after classes each day would walk over Bleecker Street to the busy corner and beyond to one place or another, often the Chocolate Shop, which was past the Hotel Utica. In '59 and '60 I worked after school for a wholesale jeweler who also sold clocks and electric frypans and anything else he could muster. His office and "showroom" was just up a couple flights on the east side of Genesee between Catherine and Oriskany Blvd. I'd take a hand truck filled with stuff up Genesee to the stores and later in the afternoon over to the post office to be shipped to his out of town customers. In '61 I got a job with more hours, including Saturdays, at .... shoot, the name just left me, but it was an electrical supply house over toward State St., maybe on Cornelia and Lafayette or somewhere around there. I think the family and the name of the business started with an M. Anyway, it was dead over there, compared to downtown proper. And do I ever remember the North Utica buses, but only at night. Every other one usually was for Herkimer Road but I'd wait for the Riverside bus. Through half of high school I dated a girl over that way. And I had cousins up on Trenton Rd. They lived where a strip of houses went up on the left just past what is now Firehouse Rd in the late 40's. We'd go up to visit and it was like the homes were a string of 8 or 10 wagons in a Wagon Train, all alone on the prairie. There was NOTHING around them but cornfields and pasture and woods and streams until sometime in the late fifties when waves of GE'ers arrived. |
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Post by dicknaegele on Aug 31, 2010 9:53:25 GMT -5
Were you possible thinking of M&L Electric? They were in that area of the city for many years. Who knows, they may still be there. There also was Mather Evans and Diehl, who sold and services electric motors and did commercial electrical work. I had a neighbor in N Utica that worked for them and I can still envision him coming and going in his company Studebaker service truck.
That is an amazing video of an amazing man. Don Jeffery is a icon in the hardware business in the city. When he was on Columbia St, he had 4 floors, the top three of which were stock and warehousing. I remember he and a man named Hank Bauer that worked for him, pouring over blue prints and bidding contracts for door hardware for new buildings. I remember in particular the Senior Citizen Tower in Rome. I took panel truck load after panel truck load to that construction site. Don and Hank would figure every door and window in a large project like that, every door closer, every lock, every hinge, every window latch. They would figure whether the door swung right or left, in or out, whether it locked or was a simple door latch. Thousands of pieces of hardware went into a job like that and every piece was specified, ordered and delivered with very few mistakes. He is the hardware expert of his era and still working at 96. It is simply amazing.
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Post by keith on Aug 31, 2010 14:26:27 GMT -5
M&L Electric moved out perhaps 15? years ago. Another company opened which I think specialized in lighting (I don't recall doing any business with them.) Part of the back wall of the building collapsed sending bricks into the street. It was in limbo for quite awhile, no funds to repair it or tear it down. I think the city finally took it down.
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Post by Dave on Aug 31, 2010 18:22:42 GMT -5
Yes, M&L is was, thank you! I can imagine it fell down. The building was ancient even in 1960-61 when I crawled around from floor to floor inventorying parts and filling an order occasionally. My memory of the experience is documented (in my more-story-than-history fashion) in "Theology," at: www.windsweptpress.com/theology.pdf |
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Post by keith on Aug 31, 2010 18:55:19 GMT -5
I'll have to mull that story over for a bit, Dave.
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Post by Dave on Aug 31, 2010 22:51:05 GMT -5
Don't mull too long ... you might believe all of it! Hahahaha!  Actually, Blowsy Belinda and Magda were real persons, names changed of course, and Belinda was younger in my story. Gordon was real, but wasn't the son of Herb, who in fact was real and that was his real name, although I gave him lines he didn't say in life and a few inches of height for good measure, so to speak. And indeed his venue was the entire top floor that was filled to the brim with nothing but light bulbs. The conveyor belt was accurately described, but the accident was only something I hoped might happen. |
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Post by jon on Aug 31, 2010 22:52:42 GMT -5
Fiona, you earlier mentioned "Peter's Fine Foods" on Franklin Square. If I am not mistaken, that was run by Peter Perritano Sr. You might ask our friend "Corner" on the Clipper's Corner forum. He is related to the family and might be able to offer some more history about the place. I think Pete Perritano was originally a bar tender at a place called the Moosehead Grill that was also downtown in that Franklin Square area. Pete was a dapper little fellow with a thin moustache and naturally wavy hair. Does that sound familiar to you?  |
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Post by jon on Aug 31, 2010 22:55:45 GMT -5
 Ted's Diner-134 N Genesee Street |
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Post by jon on Aug 31, 2010 23:08:09 GMT -5
The Triangle Coffee Shop, still owned by the Kane family, is on the point across the road from what used to be the YMCA and is now the new Utica Vet's Center. I worked there as a waitress and fry cook from 1965 to 1967. I go there too eat when I can. I went in there last month and had this sandwich. Doesn't it look yummy? I just had to photograph it! the shop is still owned and operated by Ed Kain's son, Terry, the most affable Irishman I know, other than Dave, of course.  The Red Brick Triangular Shaped Building directly across Genesee Street to the right (West) of the Gold Dome Bank is the Triangle Coffee Shop |
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