Friday, February 5, 2016
Friday Video: Boston by Streetcar, c1903
Friday, February 5, 2016
Isabella reporting,
Some of our most popular Friday Videos have featured turn-of-the-20th-century cities captured by early outdoor cameramen, usually from a streetcar. Here is Paris, and here's New York (in a blizzard) - and now we have these street scenes of Boston, c1903.
For those familiar with the city, this short film includes views of North Station, South Station, Atlantic Avenue, Copley Square, and Huntingdon Avenue. It's also a chronicle of urban transportation: while most people are traveling by foot, there are plenty of horse-drawn vehicles as well as streetcars, plus the newer trolleys and elevated cars whose tunnels are seen under construction. It's also a time without crosswalks or traffic lights, with pedestrians jaywalking with bravado. I love seeing how formally everyone is dressed, too, with almost every man and woman wearing a hat. For more about the film, see this article by the New England Historical Society.
This video was shared with me almost simultaneously by two of the blog's New England friends, Kimberly Alexander and Andrea Cawelti. Thank you both!
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7 comments:
Very interesting to see, look forward to seeing more videos like this one.
It seems so very crowded. Makes me wonder how someone from a rural area who had never been to a city must have felt had they gone there. Thanks for sharing!
Good presentation of some of our grandparents' lives 1903-in the USA or could be England... atk
Wow. Awesome. Doubly thrilled, being from Mass and also being one of those crazy people who spend hours of their lives restoring street cars. Thanks for sharing.
Awesome post. Thanks so much for sharing. :)
This is an awesome video! Boston is truly one of the finest cities in America. So much rich history and culture. It's truly incredible to see some of these videos from the turn of the century... Keep these coming!
Jackie from Maverick Productions, the leading provider of Boston video production.
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