Then and Now: Wienerwald in Times Square, Manhattan

Then and Now: Wienerwald in Times Square

1560 Seventh Avenue in Manhattan, New York in the spring of 1975 (Nick DeWolf).

Times Square in New York City is one of the busiest pieces of real estate in the world. It is known as the "Crossroads of the world," among other things. You might think that it is constantly changing from year to year to keep up with the cutting-edge of cultural shifts. Well, I found the above 1975 photo of 1560 Times Square, an address located on the east side of 7th Avenue between 46th and 47th Streets, and grew curious about what it looks like now. So, I did a comparison of 1560 Seventh Avenue in Manhattan from Spring 1975 to 2018. I used Google Street View for the most recent shot below.

We can pinpoint the exact location due to the Embassy Theater (aka Embassy 1 Theater) which is at the extreme left of the 1975 shot (it is showing Irwin Allen's "Earthquake"). The Embassy closed in 1997 and, after renovation, was reopened in 1998 as the Times Square Visitor Center (retaining its iconic marquee). One of the most noticeable parts of the 1975 photo is the big green Wienerwald sign. Wienerwald ("Vienna Woods" in German) was a large (860 restaurants) chain of Austrian chicken restaurants (no, not wieners as you might have thought, which may have contributed to some of its difficulties in the United States). Wienerwald continued at this location until roughly 1982, when the company filed for bankruptcy. As part of its reorganization, Wienerwald closed all of its American restaurants (some Wienerwald restaurants continue in Austria).

Well, people have to eat, so another restaurant moved into the old Wienerwald spot. It didn't serve chicken, except on sandwiches.

This shot of the old Wienerwald site was taken 28 December 2013 (Paul Rudoff).

Yes, McDonald's took over the Wienerwald location around 1984 and has been there ever since. There is a certain irony to this since the growth of the US fast food franchise industry is part of the reason why Wienerwald itself closed its store in the United States. This location at 1560 Seventh Avenue is a fairly famous spot. It was in Bobby Brown's music video for his song "On Our Town," for instance. Of course, any time a film shows someone traveling through Times Square it is likely to give a glimpse of the spot. As shown in the Google Street View shot below, the McDonalds itself has become somewhat of an institution in Times Square.

This just shows that the more things change, the more they stay the same. A good location for a food establishment is always going to be one so long as the area remains popular, and Times Square continues to attract visitors from around the world. It's would probably be a bit of a let-down for German tourists to wind up eating at a Wienerwald in Times Square, so maybe a more American-themed restaurant in that spot is for the best.

Anyway, thanks for visiting, and I hope you enjoyed this brief excursion back into the history of Times Square as much as I did.

1560 Seventh Avenue in Times Square, Manhattan ca. 2018 (Google Street View).

I also have pages for the other Wienerwald locations in New York City, there were three in all:

• 46th Street and Seventh Avenue
• 48th Street and Broadway
• 51st Street and Broadway.

Why were they so closely bunched together? You'd have to ask them. But, there likely was enough foot traffic in the area to sustain them, so why not?

2018