Same here! This is an incredible collection -- thank you so much for sharing it. One could be a time traveler and never be tempted to leave New York City.
Well, I would time-travel all sorts of places if I could. But I like seeing the past of anywhere, alive.
Oh yes! As would I, with the utmost amazement. I was just trying to express how moved I was by those photos -- with unlimited access to New York's past, it would take a while before I'd even begin to lose interest in all that it includes. And writing that just made me think of a story, a gift from the stars.... The Past of Anywhere, Alive. But the words are yours and not for me to take, only to celebrate.
And writing that just made me think of a story, a gift from the stars.... The Past of Anywhere, Alive. But the words are yours and not for me to take, only to celebrate.
The night before last I finished a draft of a 7,000-word autobiographical essay about my acquaintanceship / friendship with Joanna Russ, and sent it to the editor who asked for it. Revisiting a journey that began almost thirty years ago has been surprising and illuminating in ways I never anticipated; I suspect that must be true of all forms of time travel.
I like the bottles of pop. It says they're cool, but how? Maybe there's ice around them. And all the barrels on Pearl Street! And the woman sitting in all the blackness, and the boy with his sister on his back. And the fancy grillwork around the balconies and fire escapes in Chinatown.
And all the barrels on Pearl Street! And the woman sitting in all the blackness, and the boy with his sister on his back. And the fancy grillwork around the balconies and fire escapes in Chinatown.
(It's a line from PJ Harvey's "The Faster I Breathe the Further I Go": It feels like it's wartime, the heat and the traffic . . . It's one of her New York songs.)
You take Ziegelheim's Hebrew Books, I'll take Rebecca's Yarn Shop. That photo and the horse-cart one might have been anywhere in any Jewish quarter, except I don't think you could get a Coke and a frankfurter in der Heym.
(Hesitations about whether or not to italicize the "in" in the phrase "in der heym", because if the preposition is English, rather than Yiddish, maybe it shouldn't turn the article to dative. Or maybe, on the other hand, it should be dative even following an English preposition, in which case it would be similar to sentences such as "I went to the circum", rather than "to the circus". A bit more common in German than in English, but quite awkward even in German.)
Oh, I was just typing as it passed through my head; thinking everything in English up to the noun and its article. I fear you've spent eloquence on my being a dummy. :)
Well, I'm actually more interested in corrupting the nubile young shopgirls while arguing the wholesale price of wool goods. If we have to go to the Forties to do it, I'm sure it can be arranged; it is New York, after all, and you can get anything from a shopfront on the LES, even a time machine.
One could still corrupt the nubile young shopgirls in the Forties, I'm assuming.
I'm a little ashamed to admit this, but the street views started off by reminding me of the Captain America movie from a couple of months ago. Anyhow... it's fun seeing them do away with the distancing effect of b/w photos. Everything looks so very sunny.
Anyhow... it's fun seeing them do away with the distancing effect of b/w photos. Everything looks so very sunny.
I love seeing what people wore when it wasn't all shades of grey, or chosen for the cameras. The kid in the cartoon-blue raincoat, the older woman in the pink-and-black plaid; the salvage-collecting crowd in blues and browns and that one woman in the red coat. I love Pearl Street, too.
And all the red brick in the sunlight! I think one of my favorite colors must be red brick in the afternoons. And even the old homeless guys sitting around staring at the water from Battery Park have a lovely blue sky above them. (And nice suits. Not that this is a new thing, but even homeless people are wearing rather snappy Man Uniform of their day. I'm always surprised all over again by that.)
They may be my favorite visual discovery of the week. The dinosaur feathers in amber would have been awesome even if there hadn't been an accompanying photograph.
These are wonderful. I love the luminosity of the colours, and I'm fascinated by the ways in which some of the places in question don't look so very different today.*
Thank you for the sharing of them.
*I do wish that the shot of McSorley's showed more of the street, as I'd be curious to know what else was there back then. Today, as best I recall, there's a Burmese restaurant next door, or perhaps it's one more over. I've never eaten there, but one of my professors ordered us takeaway from them one time when he had to change the day of our class on account of having a gig and the only available timeslot was during suppertime. Delicious food--it made me understand how he developed such a fondness for Burma.
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Same here! This is an incredible collection -- thank you so much for sharing it. One could be a time traveler and never be tempted to leave New York City.
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Well, I would time-travel all sorts of places if I could. But I like seeing the past of anywhere, alive.
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Oh yes! As would I, with the utmost amazement. I was just trying to express how moved I was by those photos -- with unlimited access to New York's past, it would take a while before I'd even begin to lose interest in all that it includes. And writing that just made me think of a story, a gift from the stars.... The Past of Anywhere, Alive. But the words are yours and not for me to take, only to celebrate.
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Why? Write the story!
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Thank you for that; I will try!
The night before last I finished a draft of a 7,000-word autobiographical essay about my acquaintanceship / friendship with Joanna Russ, and sent it to the editor who asked for it. Revisiting a journey that began almost thirty years ago has been surprising and illuminating in ways I never anticipated; I suspect that must be true of all forms of time travel.
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Charles W. Cushman.
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Nine
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My grandparents' when they came home for the holidays; they were in graduate school, Iowa and then California.
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Yes, it's a great collection.
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Yes. And the harbor. And the autumn light.
Yay wartime!
Mabel: So true... so true!
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(It's a line from PJ Harvey's "The Faster I Breathe the Further I Go": It feels like it's wartime, the heat and the traffic . . . It's one of her New York songs.)
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Dude, I actually can write a washing list in Babylonic cuneiform. Give me some credit.
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I know; it's the apparently terrible film version I've never seen.
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Answered privately.
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Better hats in those days.
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You saw the street signs in lower Manhattan?
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You're on. If either of them still exists. I'll take the bookstore anyway.
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One could still corrupt the nubile young shopgirls in the Forties, I'm assuming.
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I think there was an entire line of pulp novels devoted to it.
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Prrrt.
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I love seeing what people wore when it wasn't all shades of grey, or chosen for the cameras. The kid in the cartoon-blue raincoat, the older woman in the pink-and-black plaid; the salvage-collecting crowd in blues and browns and that one woman in the red coat. I love Pearl Street, too.
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They may be my favorite visual discovery of the week. The dinosaur feathers in amber would have been awesome even if there hadn't been an accompanying photograph.
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Thank you for the sharing of them.
*I do wish that the shot of McSorley's showed more of the street, as I'd be curious to know what else was there back then. Today, as best I recall, there's a Burmese restaurant next door, or perhaps it's one more over. I've never eaten there, but one of my professors ordered us takeaway from them one time when he had to change the day of our class on account of having a gig and the only available timeslot was during suppertime. Delicious food--it made me understand how he developed such a fondness for Burma.
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Yes! They're beautiful photographs, of whatever time.
Thank you for the sharing of them.
You're very welcome. This sort of thing needs to be shared.
Also, you had a pretty neat professor.