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Portsmouth, New Hampshire, circa 1910. "Congress Street." 8x10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company. View full size.
So many people have commented on the sinister looking man in the window on the left. For goodness sakes, take a good look at the window on the far RIGHT! Not only does there appear to be a jack-o-lantern like skull near the very top of it, but if you look even more carefully, it appears to be sitting on the shoulders of some alien like beast with an enormous head!
Was there such a thing as an oculist pole? Also, there are many wagons here but few horses. Where are they?
[Attached to the wagons. Four wagons and four horses below. - Dave]
Even though I am a photographer, it always amazes me just how foreshortened the streets really are in the old photos. The distance between the YMCA and the church seems very short in the photo but on Street View, you can see that it is a LONG walk, indeed!
An unusual sight these days is seeing a bicycle that is not chained to a post, etc.
This one is more accurate - look at the details on the building housing the Sake Japanese Restaurant at 141 Congress:
"Young man, there's no need to feel down.
I said, young man, pick yourself off the ground.
I said, young man, 'cause you're in a new town
There's no need to be unhappy.
Young man, there's a place you can go.
I said, young man, when you're short on your dough.
You can stay there, and I'm sure you will find
Many ways to have a good time.
It's fun to stay at the y-m-c-a.
It's fun to stay at the y-m-c-a....."
The guy in the first floor window on the left.
Looks like Sake Japanese Restaurant is now in the YMCA building. The building with rounded corners and mansard roof appears to be on the corner of Chestnut street, and the church now sports a white spire. The wooden buildings appear to have been replaced by malls. Not surprising for Portsmouth, which has undergone lots of changes - they moved a bunch of buildings to Strawberry Banke and The Hill during urban renewal to prevent destroying them. I used to work in downtown Portsmouth - what a great place to be every day.
After the cell-phone time traveler found in the clip from Charlie Chaplin's The Circus was discovered, I didn't think another one was possible. And yet, there is a young girl with that familiar hand held to the ear that is all the rage (on the sidewalk, in the sunlight).
The man by the bicycle is looking at someone in the window.
One streetcar driver to the other: "Wanna race?"
I looked, but I don't think that building exists anymore. I wonder if that is an office or something.
This view is a little more accurate I think. The buildings on the right are hard to see through all the foliage in the original photo, but the building on the left seems to be mostly intact. Except they removed the bay windows. Why?!
Second story window of the Mens Association building.
Not really that creepy but I like that as the title.
There is a sinister looking fellow in the window of the building on the left.
I think he's looking up towards the open window. May be a loud conversation going on.
I rather think the photographer, just before he squeezed the bulb
and out of habit, yelled:"watch the birdie."
Note the sinister looking gent in the window of the building on the left.
Whilst crossing the trolley tracks, the lady raises her skirt, ever so slightly, to keep it out of the excrement and other debris that lie there.
I wonder if the man in the window was speaking to the photographer, attracting the man on the sidewalk's notice.
Those two guys are probably saying "#!@&*# vines!" On the other hand, Mr. High Pockets seems entranced by the lamp.
What could those guys on the mid-left be looking at?
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