It may be difficult to imagine today, but in 1939 the corner of Military Road and Hertel Avenue was a center of neighborhood life and activity. At the intersection of the Grant and Hertel streetcar routes, a small hamlet of shops, surrounded by factories, had emerged. Here is the scene, looking north along Military Road toward the intersection with Hertel Avenue. At the southeast corner is a streetcar barn of the International Railway Company. At the northwest corner, a still extant wedge-shaped building houses a Deco restaurant, to the north which is John Krajanowski’s grocery, Casper Lesniak’s ice cream parlor, and the J. M. Grill, operated by John Mitulski. At the northeast corner, the barber pole and window sign of the Don & Phillips Gold Star Barber Shop is visible, as is a pole sign to the north for an Amoco filling station. At a time when Buffalo had about 575,000 residents, most of whom did not yet possess a motor vehicle, the economy was organized on the scale of a short walk or streetcar ride, rather than the 20-minute drive.