Jack's Oyster House

The year 1913 was marked by some memorable events. Thirteen years into the new century, Henry Ford opened his first assembly line automobile factory, permanently reshaping how the world would live and conduct business. It was the year when fathers across America were given their own national holiday and Charlie Chaplin starred in his first Hollywood movie, “Keystone Comedies.” And in Albany, N.Y., Jack Rosenstein, a former oyster shucker at the then-popular Keeler’s Restaurant, opened Jack’s Oyster House at the corner of Beaver and Green streets. A cup of coffee at the new restaurant cost a couple of pennies, while most of the more expensive dishes were priced around 35 cents. Now into its 10th decade, Jack’s Oyster House has rung in a lot of changes. What has remained constant, however, is Jack’s ownership. For 3 generations a member of the Rosenstein family has been greeting guests at the door. These days the 150-seat restaurant is run by Jack’s grandson, Brad Rosenstein, a Cornell graduate who preserves the restaurant’s longstanding traditions while introducing more 21st-century tastes and flourishes to a new generation of guests. “We try to retain a link with the past,” Brad Rosenstein explains, noting that the wood paneling in the dining room is original, and the photographs decorating the walls reflect an Albany of an earlier era.