Harry Rosen was determined to recreate a restaurant on that famous corner.  It was to be a new family-style place.  Saddled by debt with the failure of the Enduro, he scraped together every dime he had and built Junior’s Restaurant, named in honor of his two sons, Walter and Marvin.

When Junior’s opened on Election Day in 1950, it was a modern restaurant in every way–with new neon marquee sign similar to the one on the Paramount Theater across the street, wood countertops and naugahyde booths.  Junior’s had become a landmark from the start with bright orange awnings adorning the windows and the red, white and blue bunting that draped the restaurant on that famous Tuesday in November, 1950.

In 1955, the Brooklyn Dodgers won the World Series.  The press had called them “the Bums” since the mid-1930s when the team could not get out of the cellar.

The Dodgers were the home grown symbol of how to win:  when you get knocked down, you get up again-the eternal secret to success.

In 1957, the Dodgers played their last game at Ebbets Field.  They moved to sunny LA. Brooklyn didn’t merely lose a baseball team.  The Dodgers had been the fighters and scrappers who represented millions of people who had struggled to make good in a new country. On that last day at Ebbets Field, an entire way of life was eradicated.  In 1960, the Field was demolished.

For Junior’s, it marked a definite loss of customers and a sign of a changing Brooklyn in the 1960’s.   Harry’s son, Walter still has a small piece of brick from the famous ballpark mounted on a color rendering of the field.  It sits in his office at Junior’s.  In the restaurant, you can see stadium seats and memorabilia from that bygone era.