A plaque remaining from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem.

Above, a 1934 plaque from the Big Apple Night Club at West 135th Street and Seventh Avenue in Harlem. Discarded as trash in 2006. Now a Popeyes fast food restaurant on Google Maps.

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Entry from February 19, 2005
Scratchiti
Graffiti marks scratched into glass or plastic (such as subway windows) are sometimes called "scratchiti" or "scratchitti." The word was coined by Newsday writer Dennis Duggan in the mid-1990s.

http://www.wordspy.com/words/scratchiti.asp
scratchiti (skra.CHEE.tee) n. A form of graffiti in marks are etched into windows and other glass surfaces (scratch + graffiti). Also: scratchitti.

Earliest Citation:

It is costing the Transit Authority upwards of $ 20 million yearly to combat the "scratchiti" inflicted on us by a new generation of defacers. The money is spent replacing scratched glass and on cleaning crews who can wipe off the lighter scratches.
—Dennis Duggan, "A New War on 'Scratchiti'," Newsday, April 6, 1995

18 October 1998, Newsday, pg. G2:
The TA has ceded part of its turf to the idiots who scratch their idle thoughts on the subway car windows. I (Dennis Duggan - ed.) coined a word for that years ago when these window-obscuring doodles first appeared: scratchiti.

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Names/Phrases • Saturday, February 19, 2005 • Permalink


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