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Ithaca, New York, circa 1900. "Greene Street." Hey, mister -- you missed a spot. 8x10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company. View full size.
How can something change like that? Beautiful photograph, horrible sensations now!
I only see one wire, strung tree to tree, and nothing going to the houses. Was there no electricity or phones to the houses yet?
that beautiful things in life never stay the same.
I was thinking the same thing as the person who wrote the "Moonlight feels right" comment but several moments later I did notice that there's at least one carbon arc streetlight in this picture. It's hanging above the middle of the street above the street sweeper's left shoulder in the middle of the thick canopy of leaves, making it hard to see, but it's there.
Western Upstate NY and else where around the Finger Lakes still has a lot of street scenes with all the houses like this still standing.
Take US20 East out of Buffalo and head to the NY State Fair. See a lot of rural people not effected by modern day life. Geneva, Batavia, Waterloo, Auburn. NY. Skaneateles could have been a set in a Hardy Boy book. Sits right on the North Shore of Lake Skaneateles.
In Toronto between Bloor and College St. same thing. Full of cars because of no driveways, but the houses are all still there. You can still time travel in your sub conscious
THAT's what was bugging me about this picture--the lack of driveways cut into the curbs. You just don't see that now.
The world of 110 years ago, while it lacked many good things we've learned and achieved since then, was very beautiful.
Wandering about the neighborhood a hundred and ten years later, I'd still live there. A hundred an ten years ago this was already a mature neighborhood, quality lasts.
No streetlamps! I bet it was pretty dark along that street at night, with only the glow from the electric (or still gas) lamps from the windows of those gorgeous houses to light the way.
I was certainly surprised to see that this was not just any generic Green Street, but the Green Street in my current city of residence! Yes, as others have pointed out, most of these old houses are gone, but Ithaca still has many, many old, historic homes similar to this. Unfortunately, few of them are single-family homes anymore-- they are mostly chopped up into two or three (or more) apartments. But such is the fate of a big old house in a college town.
"Wasteland"?? I explored around using the Street View posted below. It's still a very pleasant, leafy neighborhood with many if not most of the old houses still standing.
Back when "street sweeper," like "computer," was an occupation and not a machine!
This makes me sad. I looked at this scene, and said, "This is beautiful; I bet the only changes are that the street is now paved with concrete, the horse hitching posts are gone, and there are a few more wires strung through the air."
To see that one of the houses is a parking lot, and one entire side has been torn down for that THING on the right just makes me sad. Yes, I realize this street may have become blighted 50 or 60 years after this picture, but it's just such a beautiful street here, it's such a shame.
So sad to see the wasteland it turned into. (The same could be said for most of the American landscape.)
One of my major "peeves" is that today's lawn service workers just take their leafblowers, blow the grass and leaf debris out into the street and it becomes somebody else's problem. It also gets directed into the storm sewers and block up the drains causing sewer back-ups and all sorts of plumbing problems for the neighborhood. Even though it is SUPPOSED to be against the law to do this, it is never enforced. Not too much gets my goat, but leafblowers really DO.
And the drone of leaf blowers nowhere to be heard. Where'd I put my time machine?
In the distance comes a carriage. Should be here in half an hour or so. I'll go watch paint dry while I wait.
How beautiful our streets were before we had to park cars all along them.
The house in the foreground on the left is now a parking lot. All the houses on the right have been plowed under for a modern bakery.
What are the stacked blocks before the two houses in the center? I guess they are to stand on to get up onto your horse (after it's been untied from the metal stand across the street).
[They're called mounting blocks (for mounting and dismounting a carriage) and hitching posts. - Dave]
Are those the elm trees that died?
Keep up the good work Dave, these pictures make my day.
Are those steps at the curb for entering a carriage?
They have telephone wires strung on them. The first tree on the left seem to have a wooden sidepin with an insulator on it, and the next tree has the knob/spool type of insulator attached to it.
The other purpose of course is to look beautiful in the fall.
for the elm and chestnut trees of yore. How lovely they were.
Thanks for this great photo. Let me point out that it's "Green," without the E.
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