 |
 |
|
SUMNER HEALEY ANTIQUE
SHOP (2) 905 Third Avenue,
discarded image The odd assortment of statuary in front of Sumner Healey Antiques presented Abbott with a ready-made surrealist tableau. Looming out from the shadows is a 10-foot-high figurehead of Mars, which had once adorned the prow of an eighteenth-century British battleship. A dummy wearing "authentic" Native-American garb glares out at passersby, and a pair of leaden dogs guards the entrance. Abbott exposed seven negatives of the storefront and printed two. A horizontal version captures the most detail and humorously includes a living animal, Healey's cat, catching the sun on a garden table. In the vertical version published in Changing New York, Abbott moved in closer; seen from the back, one of the dog statues seems alive. For many years, Sumner Healey operated his antique shop on Lexington Avenue and 56th Street. In 1932, perhaps seeking lower rents, he moved a block east to Third Avenue. Four years later, Healey died, and his son Roger inherited the business. By 1938, the business had closed. A discarded image of another boarded-up antique store at 905 Third Avenue (two blocks south), taken the same day, shows that Healey was not the only struggling shopkeeper in the neighborhood. Sumner Healey Antiques occupied the ground floor of one of a block-long row of tenements. The storefront still stands, although large corner buildings have left it stranded mid-block. The present tenant is an interior decorator, one of many in the neighborhood. Return to the Middle East Side |
