Frank Jump noticed his first ghost sign in Harlem. It was a towering, four-story tall series of blue ads painted on red brick, hawking a kind of all-purpose snake oil sold in the United States into the 1920s. Omega Oil, for sunburns, weak backs, stiff joints, sore muscles and athletes. Ten cents for a trial bottle.
“I nearly dropped to my knees,” Jump says. He was, at the time – about 15 years ago – looking for inspiration for a documentary photography class project around the theme of “the rise and fall of New York City,” or “the fall and rise of New York City.”
Jump’s been photographing the city’s ghost signs ever since, and he’s now corralled the images into a new book, Fading Ads of New York City. The images, painted years ago onto the side of buildings all over the city, sell solutions for everything a body might need: cure-alls, snacks, clothes, drinks and laundry products, fur vaults, speakeasies and even undertakers. Jump spoke with Atlantic Cities this week about some of his favorite images, what they say about the history of the city that hosts them, and why he was first drawn to fading ads not long after he was diagnosed with HIV. – CLICK HERE TO READ ENTIRE ARTICLE
