Tom's Restaurant (Manhattan, New York) P001

Tom's Restaurant is a diner located at 2880

Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street **Broadway Theatre (53rd Stree ...

(on the corner of West

112th Street The New York City borough of Manhattan contains 214 numbered east–west streets ranging from 1st to 228th, the majority of them designated in the Commissioners' Plan of 1811. These streets do not run exactly east–west, because the grid plan ...

) in the Morningside Heights neighborhood of

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

. It is on the ground floor of

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

's Armstrong Hall, home to the

Goddard Institute for Space Studies The Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) is a laboratory in the Earth Sciences Division of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center affiliated with the Columbia University Earth Institute. The institute is located at Columbia University in N ...

. Frequented by Columbia students and faculty, it was founded by Tom Glikas in the 1940s and after a sale at some undetermined point has been owned and operated by the

Greek-American Greek Americans ( el, Ελληνοαμερικανοί ''Ellinoamerikanoí'' ''Ellinoamerikánoi'' ) are Americans of full or partial Greek ancestry. The lowest estimate is that 1.2 million Americans are of Greek descent while the highest es ...

family of Minas Zoulis, who retained the original name. Tom's Restaurant was the locale that inspired Suzanne Vega's 1987

song A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetit ...

Tom's Diner "Tom's Diner" is a song written in 1982 by American singer and songwriter Suzanne Vega. It was first released as a track on the January 1984 issue of '' Fast Folk Musical Magazine''. Originally featured on her second studio album, '' Solitude S ...

." Later, its exterior was used as a stand-in for the fictional

Monk's Café Monk's Café is a fictional coffee shop from the NBC sitcom ''Seinfeld''. The exterior of Tom's Restaurant on the corner of West 112th Street and Broadway, near Columbia University, which first appears in season 1 episode 3, "The Robbery," is ...

in the 1989–1998

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

sitcom A sitcom, a portmanteau of situation comedy, or situational comedy, is a genre of comedy centered on a fixed set of characters who mostly carry over from episode to episode. Sitcoms can be contrasted with sketch comedy, where a troupe may use ...

'' Seinfeld'', where comedian Jerry Seinfeld's eponymous character and his friends regularly convened to dine. The interior shown on the television show, however, looked very little like the real "Tom's", as indoor scenes were filmed on a set in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

. Early ''Seinfeld'' episodes showed the entire neon sign; later, the "Tom's" portion was cropped out, showing only the "RESTAURANT" wraparound. Even though the interior and exterior have undergone minor remodeling since the show, the distinctive sign has remained the same. Tom's is featured in "Kramer's Reality Tour" conducted by

Kenny Kramer Kenny Kramer (born May 1943) is an American former stand-up comedian, who was the inspiration for the character of Cosmo Kramer from the television sitcom ''Seinfeld''. Early life Kramer grew up in New York City, in the Tremont section of the ...

. Senator John McCain often ate at Tom's when he visited his daughter Meghan when she was a student at Columbia. Likewise,

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the ...

frequented the restaurant as a student at Columbia. Prior to ''Seinfeld'', Tom's exterior had been seen on television in the 1978 ''

The Bionic Woman ''The Bionic Woman'' is an American science fiction action-adventure television series created by Kenneth Johnson based on the 1972 novel ''Cyborg'' by Martin Caidin, starring Lindsay Wagner that aired from January 14, 1976, to May 13, 1978. ' ...

'' episode "Long Live the King" at around the 27 minute mark of the DVD release.

References

External links

Tom's Restaurant Official Homepage

Video shows Suzanne Vega talking about the Tom's Restaurant

Google Street View: 112th Street and Broadway
{{Morningside Heights, Manhattan Coffeehouses and cafés in the United States Morningside Heights, Manhattan Restaurants in Manhattan Columbia University campus

See also

References

External links