The New York TimesThe Lively Morgue

Aug. 4, 1959: Toots Shor at a hole in the wall of his West 51st Street restaurant, Toots Shor’s, which was demolished to make way for the Zeckendorf Hotel. (The wrecking ball was painted to resemble a baseball, a tip to the sportsmen who frequented the restaurant.) Mr. Shor was a one-time speakeasy bouncer “whose style and enterprise carried him into the circles of mink-clad society and cigar-chomping politicians,” according to a 1971 article about the closing of another of his restaurants.Photo: Neal Boenzi/The New York Times