I spotted this ghost sign for the Independence Community Bank across the street from the Newkirk Plaza subway station in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn. Apparently this was “the best banking value.” Fading Ad Blog has a better photo, taken 7 years ago when the sign was less deteriorated.
The San Francisco Cable Car Museum is located in the Washington/Mason powerhouse and carbarn on Nob Hill, at 1201 Mason St., and admission is free!
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This abandoned hotel on Cass Ave. at Temple in Detroit boasts two ghost signs for its two incarnations: the larger, painted Hotel Fort Wayne and the more modest American Hotel. More information about this building can be found here.
A billboard promoting Blake “The Attorney” Maislin — I don’t think it means what he thinks it means. Spotted in the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood of Cincinnati.
Take a book. Return a book. What could be a lovelier, more neighborly gesture than a DIY library in your community? The Little Free Library is a network of small, weatherproof boxes, started in 2010 in the town of Hudson, WI and now spanning the globe, including a couple I’ve recently come across in Indianapolis.
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The former Classic Antiques & Collectibles is located at 119 North Ontario St. in glorious Toledo. It’s a pretty cool building that seems to have last been used as headquarters for the 2012 Obama presidential campaign. Forward!
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Located at 2104 East Washington St. in Indianapolis, the ghost sign for the California Nite Club contains a sun and palm trees as a kind of shorthand representation of the name. The building is fairly grand for the area and, while I know nothing about the club, this description recommended that you “bring your A-game.”
Mom & Pop’s Toy Shop was located in the heart of Hamtramck’s retail district on Joseph Campau Ave., Hamtramck being a separate town inside of Detroit, which was at one point mostly Polish, then seemed to become more hipster, with an influx of other ethnic groups and, on my last visit, seemed a bit barren, with more ghost signs than I’d expected.
Trivergence by Carl Leck is a series of overpass murals in Indianapolis, located on East 10th St. under I-65. Measuring approximately 1,000 linear feet, it was painted by a group of volunteers as part of the 46 for XLVI mural initiative [public art created in preparation for Indy hosting the Super Bowl].
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Located at 2 New Montgomery St. in downtown San Francisco, the Palace Hotel was designed by NYC-based Trowbridge & Livingston and erected in 1909 on the site of the original hotel of the same name, which fell victim to the 1906 earthquake.
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Department of Everyday Visualingual 