1930s

25-27 Elliot Street, Springfield, Mass

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The brick duplex at 25-27 Elliot Street in Springfield, around 1938-1939. Photo courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

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The building in 2013:

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This duplex on Elliot Street has clearly seen better days.  It was built in 1872 as one of several brick duplexes on the east side of Elliot Street, and today it is the last one still standing, although it may not be much longer.  In 2008, the building was damaged by a fire, which, among other things, completely destroyed the mansard third floor.  Since the fire, the Springfield Historical Commission has attempted to save the house from demolition, but at this point its future is still very much in doubt.  In September, the owners agreed to a four month deadline to either renovate or demolish it, so perhaps by next month we will have an idea what the future holds for the historic property.

George Ashmun House, Springfield, Mass

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The former home of Congressman George Ashmun, at 297 Union Street, Springfield Mass, around 1893. Photo from Sketches of the Old Inhabitants and Other Citizens of Old Springfield (1893)

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The building around 1938-1939. Photo courtesy of the Springfield Preservation Trust.

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The location in 2015:

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The house in the first two photos is located at the corner of Union and School Streets, and was the home of lawyer and politician George Ashmun from 1838 to 1841.  Ashmun was first elected to the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1833, at the age of 29.  He served there until 1837, then spent three years in the Massachusetts Senate before returning to the House and serving as Speaker in 1841.  He later represented the Sixth District of Massachusetts in Congress from 1845 to 1851.

However, his most significant political and historical moment came in 1860, when he served as the chairman of the Republican National Convention in Chicago.  Going into the convention, Senator William Seward had been the favorite to win the nomination, but in the end, the delegates chose Abraham Lincoln, a former colleague of Ashmun who served alongside him in the House.  As the chairman, he traveled to Springfield, Illinois, to inform Lincoln that he had received the nomination.

Ashmun worked with Lincoln throughout his presidency, meeting with him for the last time in the White House on the evening of April 14, 1865, shortly before Lincoln left to attend a play at Ford’s Theatre.  When they departed, President Lincoln promised to meet with him the next morning; this meeting obviously did not happen.

The house that Ashmun once lived in still stood at the corner of Union and School until around the mid 20th century; it was there when the WPA photo was taken in the late 1930s, but was probably demolished when the present-day school building was built in 1962.

Hull Street, Boston

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Children keep cool next to a block of ice on Hull Street in Boston’s North End, sometime in the 1930s. Photo courtesy of Boston Public Library, Leslie Jones Collection.

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Hull Street in 2014:

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Not much has changed on Hull Street in the past 80 years – the neighborhood has become wealthier, but it remains predominantly Italian-American, as it was when the 1930s photo was taken.  At least some of the children in the photo were probably either Italian or Jewish, and it is likely that some of them have children or grandchildren who live in the area.  In fact, some of them might still be alive today, and who knows – perhaps one of them lives here on Hull Street, where they can now sit in air conditioned homes to stay cool, instead of hovering around a block of ice.  Everything else is the same, from the houses to the left, to the Copp’s Hill Burying Ground on the right, and the apartment building beyond it.  In fact, the curb stones are probably the same ones that the ice cart rested against.

Faneuil Hall and Dock Square, Boston (2)

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Faneuil Hall, taken from Dock Square in Boston in 1930. Photo courtesy of Boston Public Library, Leslie Jones Collection.

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The scene in 2014:

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Similar to the scene in the photos in this post, this view shows Faneuil Hall as the one constant in an otherwise very different scene.  It was probably the oldest building in the 1930 photo by at least 100 years, but 84 years later it has outlasted all of the other buildings, many of which were taken down during various urban renewal projects in the 1950s and 1960s, including the construction of the Central Artery.

Faneuil Hall and Dock Square, Boston (1)

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Faneuil Hall, taken from Dock Square in Boston in 1930. Photo courtesy of Boston Public Library, Leslie Jones Collection.

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The scene in 2014:

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Faneuil Hall and the Custom House Tower are still there, but otherwise this scene has changed dramatically.  Taken from in front of modern-day City Hall, the scene in the first photo shows the Faneuil Hall area when it was still a major commercial center in the city, as opposed to a destination primarily for tourists and city workers on their lunch break.  Today, Congress Street cuts through the area where Dock Square once was, and behind the photos, City Hall towers over the area.

Arcade Theatre, Springfield

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The Arcade Theatre on State Street in Springfield, around 1933. Photo courtesy of Cinema Treasures.

1930s

The same scene in 2012:

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The building in the foreground of the 1933 photo is the Arcade Theatre, which opened two years earlier.  The marquee advertises the film College Humor, a Bing Crosby comedy that was released in July of 1933, hence giving the approximate date of the photo.  The theater closed in 1971, and was demolished a year later to allow for Dwight Street to be extended up the hill to Maple Street.  This enabled Dwight Street and Maple/Chestnut Streets to function as a one-way pair to help with traffic around the newly-built Civic Center (now the MassMutual Center, barely visible on the far right of the 2012 photo).  The building in the center of the photo is the Epiphany Tower, which is being renovated to become a Holiday Inn Express.  Several other buildings that still exist are the c.1893 old Masonic Building at the corner of State and Main (with the green tower) and 1200 Main Street just beyond it, which was built in 1908.

Notice also the road itself – 1933 seems like a rather late date for a major road in Springfield – at the time it was part of Route 20 – to be paved with cobblestone, but apparently that was the case.  Notice the trolley tracks as well, and the trolley in the distance – very different from the PVTA buses that now navigate the streets of Springfield.