Word Puzzles Keep Customers Guessing At Flatiron Hardware Store

FLATIRON DISTRICT, NY – The Flatiron District's oldest retail store has a unique way of keeping its customers coming back – word games.

The owner of J&M Hardware & Locksmiths devises puzzles that use pictures to illustrate common phrases. He pins them behind the counter, inviting customers to try to crack the code.

His mind tests have built a cult following, with one regular even taking printouts into the classroom where he works as a school teacher to test his student's mental strength.

"He says it makes the kids think," said joint owner Neil Schneider who calls his challenge the Rebus Puzzle, named because of the Latin saying non verbis, sed rebus – not by words but by things.

“I’ve done things with politics, things with books, songs, olympics, year in review,” Schneider said of the puzzles, which he changes every month. “There’s always a theme. And they always have hardware in them.”

Think you can crack the code? Take a look at the puzzle below and post your answers in the comments section.

Brothers Jesse and Mack Packman opened J&M Hardware in 1947 on Broadway between 22nd and 23rd Street, about two blocks from where the store stands today. The original location burned in a 1966 fire which killed 12 firefighters — the heaviest loss of FDNY life until Sept. 11, 2001.

After the fire, it moved to a location on Park Avenue South and finally to the current store on 21st Street in 2004. In December, the Flatiron Business Improvement District named J&M the oldest retail store still in operation in the neighborhood, and the third longest-running business of any kind — The Provident Loan Society of New York and Eisenberg's Sandwich Shop captured the two top spots.

In a bid to attract customers to the 21st Street location, Schneider started making his puzzles soon after they opened at the latest location, he told Patch.

His first puzzle used actual materials instead of pictures on paper. “I had the word ‘mutiny’ on top of paper towels — it was ‘mutiny on the bounty,’” Schneider said.

After that, he decided to make the puzzles in their current format and enlisted one of his customers, a graphic artist originally from Chile, to help.

"It was kind of funny because she didn’t know idioms," Schneider said. "So she had no idea what the puzzles meant. After about three years of doing them, she was like I never want to see another puzzle."

Today, Schneider puts the puzzles together himself and they're printed by a J&M customer who runs a local print shop.

Schneider used to offer a prize to customers — typically a free key cut from the store — if they could solve the puzzle without help. Now his fans pore over them just for the fun of it.

Another customer, who works for Macmillan publishing in the nearby Flatiron Building, has encouraged Schneider to make a book out of the thousands of rebus puzzles that he’s created over the years. He keeps them all stored in a closet.

His customers say they're one of the things that make his store stand out for the big box outlets like Home Depot that are compete in the neighborhood.

“He’s one of the only remaining mom-and-pop style stores that are here,” customer Fred Weiner, 52, said.

“You could be out in the burbs because you got Marshalls, Home Depot, Old Navy, Lowes, you name it,” Weiner said of the surrounding Flatiron neighborhood.

“[The Puzzles] are the kind of thing that makes you remember where you are."

Photo credit: Ben Feuerherd