Café Martin

New York City
1901-1912

By the late 1890s, the neighborhood surrounding Madison Square Park had lost some of its luster. After being the center of New York’s social scene for twenty-five years, its leading hotels and restaurants began to close. Delmonico’s, which had moved there from Union Square in 1876, now relocated to Fifth Avenue and 44th Street. Despite this notable departure, Madison Square was still a stylish part of town, prompting Jean and Louis Martin to take over Delmonico’s lease on the 26th Street location, well-situated between Fifth Avenue and Broadway. The French-born brothers refurbished the old building, giving it the latest flourishes of Art Nouveau design, and renamed it the Café Martin.

The Quick & Not-So-Quick Lunch

New York City,
1903

In the nineteenth century, Europeans visiting the United States were fascinated by how quickly Americans ate their meals, particularly lunch. By the 1890s, several new options had emerged for those in a hurry. In addition to lunch wagons and cafeterias, there were small restaurants that served the so-called “quick lunch.” These establishments especially captured the European imagination, as no such eateries existed in Europe at the time. In 1892, French writer Paul de Rousiers described the scene at one of these lunch places in his travelogue La Vie Américaine:

“Lunch time, the streets fill once more. In New York nobody goes home in the middle of the day. They eat wherever they happen to be: at the office, while working, in clubs, and in cafeterias…In blue-collar restaurants, thousands of people eat standing up, with their hats on, all in a line, like horses in a stable. The food is fresh and appetizing, though, and prices are lower than ours. While lines of men dug into plates brimming with meatballs, others wait to take their place.”

Of course, not everyone who lived in the big cities had to work for a living. For those who could afford to spend more time and money on their midday meal, there were many fine restaurants that served lunch at a more leisurely pace. Two menus from New York in 1903 reveal the lunchtime experience at both ends of the social spectrum.