Boston Archives - Page 16 of 48

Trinity Church, Boston (2)

February 9, 2018November 6, 2015 by Derek Strahan

Another view of Trinity Church at Copley Square, taken around 1909. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

The scene in 2015:

As mentioned in the previous post, Trinity Church has been a prominent landmark at Copley Square since its completion in 1877, and this scene shows the view from in front of the Boston Public Library facing east across Copley Square and down Boylston Street. It is essentially the opposite direction of the photos in this post, which were taken from the steps of Trinity Church. The church itself is still standing, but not much else from the first photo survives today. The original MIT campus, seen in the distance on the left side of Boylston Street, is gone; the school relocated across the river to Cambridge a few years after the first photo was taken. The other buildings behind the church to the left and right have also since been replaced with modern skyscrapers, so today the only other buildings that remain are the ones on the far left on Boylston Street, which were featured in this post.

Trinity Church, Boston (1)

February 9, 2018November 6, 2015 by Derek Strahan

Trinity Church at Copley Square in Boston, around 1906. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

Copley Square in 2015:

Trinity Church has been the defining feature at Copley Square since it was completed in 1877, and over the years it has remained the one constant in this scene. It was designed by Henry Hobson Richardson, and its architecture helped to spark the Richardsonian Romanesque style that was popular in the late 1800s, especially in the Northeast. The congregation itself is much older than the church building, though; the Episcopalian parish was established in 1733, and for many years it was located on Summer Street. However, the Great Boston Fire of 1872 destroyed the building, along with the homes of many of the church members. Many began relocating to the newly-developed Back Bay, so Trinity Church, along with many other city churches, moved as well.

Today, the church still stands essentially unaltered from its original appearance, even as the city has grown up around it. Behind the church is the old John Hancock Building, now known as the Berkeley Building. It was completed in 1947, and in 1976 its much taller successor, the current John Hancock Tower, was completed just to the right of the church. The base of the tower is less than 100 feet from the church, and its construction actually caused substantial damage to the church by disrupting the soil and groundwater levels. The tower later had other design faults, including problems with the 4′ x 11′ glass windows detaching from the building and falling to the streets below; the problem was eventually resolved by replacing all 10,344 windows, and thankfully there were no injuries from falling glass.

Cathedral Church of St. Paul, Boston

November 6, 2015November 5, 2015 by Derek Strahan

The Cathedral Church of St. Paul on Tremont Street in Boston, around 1900-1910. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

The building in 2015:

This historic church was built in 1819 as St. Paul’s Church, making it the third Episcopal congregation in the city after Old North Church and Trinity Church. It was designed in the Greek Revival style by Alexander Parris, whose other works in the Boston area include the United First Parish Church in Quincy as well as Quincy Market in Boston. All three of these buildings still stand today, and all of them clearly show the Greek Revival influence of Parris’s work.

Only a few years after the first photo was taken, the church became the cathedral for the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, and it has served in that role ever since, even as the buildings around it have grown taller over the years. As of the 2015 photo, the church was under renovation, which explains the construction area in front. The most obvious change to the exterior, though, is the design on the pediment. The church’s original design called for a relief design of Paul preaching to King Agrippa II, but it never came about. Instead, in 2013, the church added the nautilus shell design with the bright blue background, which looks completely out of place on a 196 year old Greek Revival church. As one Episcopal priest put it, “it looks more like the entrance to a fancy seafood restaurant than a cathedral.”

Boston Skyline

November 5, 2015 by Derek Strahan

The skyline of Boston as seen across the Charles River in Cambridge, sometime in the 1880s. Image courtesy of the Boston Public Library.

The same view in 2015:

These two views certainly show how the city of Boston has changed over the past 125 years or so, but perhaps more remarkable is how much has remained the same. This view shows an arc of the city from Cambridge Street and the Longfellow Bridge on the left to the foot of Mount Vernon Street on the far right, and the most obvious difference between the two photos is the skyscrapers of downtown Boston in the distance.

In the foreground, however, is the Beacon Hill neighborhood, which really hasn’t changed much since the 19th century. Things are a little different along the waterfront – the trees of the Charles River Esplanade hide Storrow Drive, which cuts along the river now, but further up Beacon Hill this pocket of early 19th century Boston has survived as a low-rise residential neighborhood. Although it is hard to identify individual buildings, many of the ones from the 1880s view are still standing today. The most prominent building in the first photo is the dome of the Massachusetts State House, which stands at the top of the hill. Although it now has a backdrop of skyscrapers instead of just sky, it is still easily visible from here despite being over a half mile from the river.

Matthews Arena, Boston

November 4, 2015 by Derek Strahan

The Matthews Arena on St. Botolph Street in Boston, sometime during the 1920s. Image courtesy of the Boston Public Library.

The building in 2015:

Here’s a question that would stump a lot of people: What is the oldest professional sports venue in Boston? The logical answer, of course, is Fenway Park, which opened in 1912. However, less than a mile away from Fenway Park on the other side of the Back Bay Fens is the Matthews Arena, which was completed two years earlier as Boston Arena. Over the years, this seemingly nondescript building has been used for various sporting events, political rallies, concerts, and other major events. Both Theodore and Franklin Roosevelt held rallies here, and boxers such as Jack Dempsey and Joe Louis participated in matches here.

Many professional sports teams have had Boston Arena as their home arena; the Boston Bruins played their first home game here in 1924, and they remained here until the completion of the Boston Garden in 1928. Later on, several minor league hockey teams played here, and from 1972-1973 the New England Whalers, later the Hartford Whalers and now the Carolina Hurricanes, played here. The Boston Celtics also played here from their founding in 1946 until 1955, when they began playing all of their home games at Boston Garden.

Over the years, the arena has undergone some substantial changes, both outside and inside. After several major renovations, the original exterior windows were bricked up, and the ornate entrance to the left has been replaced by a much simpler arch. As built, it only had one level of seating, but the balcony was added in 1926, and today the it has a capacity of 6,000 for basketball and almost 5,000 for hockey, which is still a respectable capacity for a century-old arena. Northeastern University has used it for their athletic teams since 1930, and they purchased it in 1979 and later renamed it the Matthews Arena in 1982. Today, it is used by their Division I hockey and basketball teams, and it is among the oldest indoor hockey arenas in the world.

Blandford Street Incline, Boston

November 2, 2015 by Derek Strahan

Facing east on Commonwealth Avenue toward Kenmore Square, with the Blandford Street Incline in the foreground, on January 3, 1933. Image courtesy of the City of Boston Archives.

The same location in 1943. Image courtesy of the City of Boston Archives.

The view in 2015:

As mentioned in this post, trolley cars once entered and exited the subway from an incline in the median of Commonwealth Avenue just east of Kenmore Square. However, in 1932 the tunnel was extended a little to the west, with one branch emerging here, at the present-day Boston University campus. The first photo shows the incline shortly after it opened, and not much had changed ten years later when the second one was taken.

The most obvious change in the first two photos is the signs – by 1943 Kenmore Square had become home to many large advertisements, including ones for Dawson’s Pale Ale and Lager, Socony, the Hotel Kenmore, and Gulf. Several of these signs were easily visible from Fenway Park, with the Gulf sign in particular being prominent in photographs of the park from that era. Another sign in the foreground indicates that Park Street is a mere nine minutes away, which either suggests that the trolleys ran much faster than they do now, or that the Boston Elevated Railway was being a little generous in their estimates.

The second photo also reveals a largely forgotten piece of Boston history; the trolley coming up from the tunnel has “National League Park” as its destination. Long before the Red Sox, the Boston Braves were the city’s original Major League Baseball team, and from 1915 to 1952, they played about a mile up Commonwealth Avenue from here. After the team moved to Milwaukee for the 1953 season, the old stadium was purchased by Boston University and converted into Nickerson Field, with some of the original structure still standing today.

In the 2015 scene, the subway incline hasn’t changed much; even the poles supporting the overhead wires appear to be the same ones from the first two photos. To the left, the Boston University campus has continued to expand, and today several of BU’s buildings are visible here. In the distance, many of the buildings in Kenmore Square are still standing, and although none of the 1940s signs still exist, Kenmore Square is now home to arguably the city’s most famous sign, which appears to be located at the same spot as the old Socony sign. This Citgo sign is visible over the Green Monster at Fenway Park, and has been identified with the Boston Red Sox ever since it was first constructed in 1965.