Edward and Gertrude Dewey collection of Gage & Tollner records
Call Number
Date
Creator
Extent
Language of Materials
Abstract
Materials from the Gage & Tollner restaurant located at 372-374 Fulton Street in Downtown Brooklyn, mainly collected and compiled by the Dewey family who owned the restaurant from 1919 to 1988.
Historical note
Charles M. Gage first opened a restaurant in 1879 at 303 Fulton Street. He was joined in business by Eugene Tollner in 1880, and the business was named Gage & Tollner's in 1882. The restaurant moved and reopened at 372-374 Fulton Street in 1892. In 1911, it was sold to A.H. Cunningham and Alexander Ingalls. In 1919, they sold to Seth Bradford Dewey in association with his father Hiram S. Dewey and a friend, Alexander Graham. Seth Dewey had run the Manhattan restaurant H.T. Dewey & Sons for 18 years prior to purchasing Gage & Tollner. In 1923, the Dewey family purchased the restaurant's building as well. Seth Bradford Dewey passed away in 1938, and his sons Edward and Thomas took over running the business. Edward Dewey remained at the helm, later joined by his wife Gertrude or "Trudy", for over 40 years.
The restaurant's interior was landmarked in 1975 and the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. John and Gertrude Dewey sold the restaurant in the 1980s to Peter Aschkenasy. Joseph Chirico owned the restaurant from 1995 to 2004. At that time the restaurant closed and the building was sold to the Jemal family. The building held various tenants until 2016, when it was then vacated until 2019. At that time, restaurateurs Ben Schneider and St. John Frizell and chef Sohui Kim began renovations for reopening the restaurant. In 2021, the current iteration of Gage & Tollner opened in the original space.
Sources:
- "Gage and Tollner's is celebrated restaurant." The Restaurateur Vol. VI No. 52, December 29 1923, pp. 28-29.
- "Son of Seth Dewey to Follow Father's Footsteps as Host." Brooklyn Eagle, September 11 1938.
- "A Brief History of Gage & Tollner's Restaurant," circa 1960.
- "History." Gage & Tollner website. Accessed July 20, 2026. https://www.gageandtollner.com/history/
Arrangement
The collection is organized into three series: Series 1: Documents, clippings, and ephemera; Series 2: Photographs; and Series 3: Audio recordings. Series 1 is further sub-divided into five sub-series. Each series and sub-series is arranged chronologically.
Scope and Contents
The collection contains papers, photographs, audio recordings, and memorabilia of the Gage & Tollner restaurant, dating from the 1880s to 2013. The collection's paper records, including ephemera, ledgers, journal books, and correspondence, document the restaurant's business and operations. The photographs in this collection depict the interior and exterior of the restaurant's landmark building, events at the restaurant, as well as its owners and employees. The collection also contains an assortment of artifacts, such as a an ashtray, a fake mustache (part of the restaurant's branding), anniversary calendars, matches, toothpicks, pins, wallets, and two pitchers.
Subjects
Organizations
Genres
People
Topics
Donors
Conditions Governing Access
Open to researchers without restriction.
Conditions Governing Use
While many items at the Center for Brooklyn History are unrestricted, we do not own reproduction rights to all materials. Be aware of the several kinds of rights that might apply: copyright, licensing and trademarks. The researcher assumes all responsibility for copyright questions.
Preferred Citation
Identification of item, date (if known); Edward and Gertrude Dewey collection of Gage & Tollner records, 2016.034, Box and Folder number; Brooklyn Public Library, Center for Brooklyn History.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of Janet Dewey Pawlukiewicz, 2016.
Physical Characteristics and Technical Requirements
If digital surrogates exist, they should be used in place of the originals whenever possible.
Existence and Location of Copies
The digitized audio recordings from this collection are available on CBH's digital collections on the Internet Archive. See Series 3 for details.
About this Guide
Processing Information
The records were processed, arranged, and described by Yingwen Huang under the supervision of John Zarrillo, January-March 2017. The collection was reprocessed and the finding aid revised by Dee Bowers in July 2026. At that time, clippings were photocopied and the originals discarded. The following materials were additionally discarded: duplicate items, the cover and empty pages of the 1984 guestbook (with only signed pages retained), and a hardcover book about a winery visited by the Deweys in Europe. General Brooklyn history materials, duplicated elsewhere at CBH and with no evident connection to Gage & Tollner or the Deweys, was also removed. A small number of matchbooks and matchboxes from New York City restaurants and hotels was also removed.
