“When the 1920s theater at 138 East 14th Street bit the dust in 1997, more was lost than just the Palladium nightclub, which had occupied the space in the 1980s. On the second floor was the cavernous Julian’s Billiard Academy, run since 1933 by the Julian family, but operating as a pool hall since 1916. Until Julian’s shut its doors in 1991, it was New York’s oldest billiards room and once one of hundreds across the city.

“Old school” is the way ex-customers describe it. Like the rest of this stretch of East 14th Street, it was slightly seedy but safe, attracting “students, actors, businessmen, and bums” and providing “safe harbor at most hours of the night and morning.” What brought it down? High rent, of course. According to a New York Times article, it went from $300 a month in 1933 to $6,000 in 1987. “ — pool legends

Painter Reginald Marsh shot the image on the upper left. Active from the 1920s through the 1940s, Mr. March was known for his images of the Bowery, Times Square and Coney Island.

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