1910s

Public Garden Incline, Boston (2)

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Trolleys at the Public Garden Incline at the corner of Boylston and Arlington Streets in Boston, around 1910-1911. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

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The scene in 2014:

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These were taken from near the location of the photos in this post, showing trolleys entering and emerging from the Tremont Street Subway onto Boylston Street.  The car on the right-hand side is returning from Brookline Village, and the one on the left is heading toward Huntington Avenue, along the modern-day E Branch of the Green Line.  This car is particularly intriguing, because one of the flyers on the front reads “Baseball to-day American League Huntington Avenue,” The exact date of this photo isn’t clear, and the Library of Congress estimates that it was taken between 1910 and 1920, but this little flyer indicates that it couldn’t have been any later than 1911, the last year that the Red Sox played at Huntington Avenue before moving to Fenway Park.  Many of the people on the trolley are probably fans heading to the game, and will likely see future Red Sox legends such Smoky Joe Wood, Tris Speaker, and Harry Hooper.  Today, Red Sox fans still travel along this route to get to the game, although the incline that the trolleys once emerged from has been closed for a century, and no evidence remains on the surface that it ever existed.

Tremont Street, Boston

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Looking up Tremont Street toward Beacon Street, with the Granary Burying Ground to the left, taken around 1910. Photo courtesy of Boston Public Library.

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The scene in 2014:

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This section of Tremont Street actually hasn’t changed much – the Granary Burying Ground is essentially the same, and a few of the buildings are still there, including the massive Tremont Building.  Built in 1895 on the site of the Tremont House hotel, the office building still looks much the same as it did over 100 years ago.

Massachusetts State House, Boston

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The Massachusetts State House, with a Beacon Street house being demolished in the foreground.  Photo taken January 27, 1917 by Lewis Wickes Hine of the National Child Labor Committee, courtesy of the Library of Congress.

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The scene in 2014:

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The Massachusetts State House was built in 1798, but has been expanded several times over the years.  An 1895 expansion was built behind the original building, and in 1917 the east and west wings were added (east wings visible on the right-hand side of both photos).  The west wing, however, required the demolition of a number of houses on Beacon Street, Joy Place, and Mount Vernon Place, and the elimination of Hancock Avenue altogether.

One of the demolished buildings can be seen here in the first photo.  In this particular scene, Lewis Wickes Hine captures workers, including young children, bringing wood home, presumably to use for firewood on what was probably a chilly late January day.

Boylston Street, Boston

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Looking west on Boylston Street toward Arlington Street, between 1910 and 1914. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

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Boylston Street in 2014:

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The buildings on the left are a little taller, but otherwise not a great deal has changed in this scene.  The Boston Public Garden to the right is still there, and Arlington Street Church, although hidden by the trees in 2014, is still there.  Notice, however, the trolleys in the background.  At the time, trolleys running on the present-day Green Line would travel along Boylston until Arlington, and then descend into the subway in the Public Garden.  From here, they would travel under Boylston and Tremont Streets, and eventually emerge from the subway near North Station.  This was the first subway tunnel in North America, and was opened in 1897.  However, the presence of the trolleys gives an upper limit to the date of this photo; in 1914, the subway tunnel under Boylston Street was extended to Kenmore Square.  A new incline was built here, in the center of Boylston Street, to serve what is now the “E” Branch of the Green Line; this branch was not put underground until 1941, at which point the Public Garden incline was permanently closed.

Temple Place from Tremont Street, Boston

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Looking up Temple Place from Tremont Street, facing away from Boston Common.  Photo taken between 1910 and 1916, courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

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The scene in 2014:

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This area was a major shopping center around the turn of the last century, and it still is today.  Temple Place doesn’t look all that different, with many of the same buildings still there.  However, the street has since been truncated at Washington Street (the next block down), with Macy’s and other retail stores occupying the area where the street (actually called Avon Street on the other side of Washington) used to be.  The building on the far left, the R.H. Stearns Building, is essentially unchanged, although it has different tenants now.  The R.H. Stearns department store occupied the building from its completion in 1908 until 1977, when the company closed.

Milk Street, Boston

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Looking down Milk Street, just past Old South Meeting House, around 1911. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

The same street in 2014:

The Library of Congress estimates that the first photo was taken between 1910 and 1920, but the license plate on the car appears to be dated 1911, which would, assuming the driver’s registration was current, place the photo around that time.  It captures a scene, frozen in time, not long before some major world events began to happen.  At the time, the Titanic was still under construction, the czar still ruled in Russia (for the next few years), and World War I was just a couple years away.  Automobiles such as the one in the photo were still a fairly new concept, and although none are seen in the photo, horse-drawn carriages were still a common sight around Boston.

The world has dramatically changed since the first photo was taken, but the street scene here isn’t completely altered – several buildings are still there, including the one on the far left, and the one just over a block down the street on the right.  Based on their architectural styles, they were probably brand-new in 1911, but today they don’t look all that different from the outside.