While I couldn't find the restaurant, I did find the addresses of two of my relatives that lived in NYC in the 1870s! Henry Battjer (my Great-great-grandfather) was a carman who lived at 49 Pitt Street. A few years later in 1880, he opened a bar called Smith & Battjer that after years of research I finally tracked down to be formerly located at 422 East 14th Street - just a few blocks from where I lived on 14th street for 4 years!
I wasn't able to find the restaurant, and I also learned that this was before the word restaurant was used in English, and so I had to find the directory listings for EATING HOUSES.
John is an artist who mainly works on creating the communal group homes he's built that houses 9 other people! It had been a while since I'd been to the apartment, so I asked John to take me on a tour of the recent developments because it's like walking through the externalization of an artistic genius' brain! The entire hallway is a communal music / book library...
I went to the Queens Library and made myself stay there until I'd finished everything I needed to do for work. (It's HARD to concentrate when the beach is so close!)
