Mario Restaurant, New York City
Contributed by Stephen Coles on Feb 5th, 2014. Artwork published in
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“I don’t have any idea how this card came to exist amongst my heaps of ephemera, but I’m very fond of it. It’s either New Wave or Art Deco. I’m thinking because Mario had his phone number set using the old phone exchange, it might actually be from the 30's.” — Carrie Hamilton
I also hoped this was a personal card — so blunt and mysterious — but in turns out that Mario was an Italian restaurant, operating in the 1930s–40s. Below is a postcard for the establishment postdated 1946. The location has housed various restaurants since. The current tenant is Sotto 13.
Source: rover.ebay.com License: All Rights Reserved.
“This is a postcard showing ‘The Original Mario Restaurant, 140 West 13th Street, New York City, NY.’ Divided back, postally-used in 1946, postmarked New York, NY”
![<cite>andersw[oh]er</cite> by Katja Pilisi](https://assets.fontsinuse.com/static/use-media-items/157/156325/thumb/61f7d0b2/@2x/Insta_Poster_square.webp "<cite>andersw[oh]er</cite> by Katja Pilisi")
5 Comments on “Mario Restaurant, New York City”
My grandfather owned this restaurant in the 50s & 60s and it was called the Original Mario.
Yay! Hi RT!
Carrie Hamilton
This was my favorite in the late 60's/ early 70's. Girlfriend lived just a block away at 25 W. 13th.
Hi my aunt and uncle owned the restaurant in the 1960’s
there name was Irene and Henry bracco they owned it with a cousin Virginia and Renato do you know anything about this please let me know if you do…
West 13th Street in the 1920s between 6th and 7th Avenue was known as a block that housed a few speakeasies; I suspect Mario’s served that purpose before it became a bona fide restaurant in the 1930s.
Edith Halpert, one of the first women art dealers, ran her “Downtown Gallery” at 113 West 13th (same block) and liked to stop in sometimes. A lively block: 153 West 13th housed the offices of the “The Dial,” the avant-garde literary magazine, from 1920 to 1929.