MAY CONTAIN NUTS
HOME
Home

Search Shorpy

SEARCH TIP: Click the tags above a photo to find more of same:
Mandatory field.

Search results -- 30 results per page

Original Baseball: 1925
October 8, 1925. "Patent Office. Original baseball patented 1883 by S.D. Castle." National Photo Company Collection glass ... Cemetery: his obituary (PDF) . The original baseball, patented in 1883 by Samuel D. Castle, was found in the patent office ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/05/2012 - 7:57pm -

October 8, 1925. "Patent Office. Original baseball patented 1883 by S.D. Castle." National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size. PalmerPretty fancy penmanship ... like the Palmer Method on steroids. Karl FenningThe man in the photo is Karl Fenning. The following ran as a caption for a similar photo from the Harris & Ewing studio. Fenning, a Washington native, is buried in the Congressional Cemetery: his obituary (PDF). The original baseball, patented in 1883 by Samuel D. Castle, was found in the patent office yesterday among those patents which are to be sold or laid aside. It is being exhibited by Assistant Commissioner of Patents Fenning. Washington Post, Oct 8, 1925 My BaseballHoly cow!!! That looks like the baseball my buddies and I used way back in the fourth grade. Value?Would love to see that ball appraised on Antiques Roadshow.... Roy HobbsCould this be the ball Roy Hobbs (aka Robert Redford) knocked the cover off for the Knights in the movie 'The Natural'? Which leads to the obvious questionWhat did they play baseball with before 1883? Mr. Castle's BaseballHere's a link to Samuel D. Castle's original patent for this baseball. Castle did not "invent" the baseball, per se, but rather a seamless version of it. Castle, of Bridgeport Ct, held over a dozen patents, most relating to machinery for treating and stretching leather and furs. Curiously, his patent for the baseball does not consist of any leather. Instead, the lack of seams is achieved by repeated dipping in gutta percha (a natural latex) which builds up a durable leather-like surface. Base BallThis "base ball" was intended for the same mass consumer use as a golf ball -- durable enough to be used over and over without the stuffing flying out of it. Interestingly, it looks like the stuffing is flying out of it. Seamless BaseballHad the seamless ball been accepted, the game would never have progressed to where it is today. Those seams provide the hurlers with the ability to change the aerodynamics of the pitched ball. (The Gallery, D.C., Natl Photo, Sports)
F Battery: 1918
... - the time (9:25 - presumably in the morning) - baseball cards - WWI photos - presumably family photos - a group photo (likely the company from WWI) - more baseball cards - photos of various buildings - and yes, more baseball cards ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 12/04/2014 - 2:35am -

"Lithnan & Latham, F Baltcry. 12 Peduri [?]" is the Library of Congress's uncertain transcription of the handwriting on this circa WWI negative. Which seems to say "F Battery," not Baltcry. "Lithnan" and "12 Peduri" are also iffy. Who can help us sort it out? National Photo Company Collection glass negative. View full size. Bear and LadyA performing bear (see the chain?) is being led by his itinerant showman-master (see the pack?) past a young woman who has tried to climb a stile or fence in fright, and in the process has her skirt caught, exposing what shouldn't be exposed. Somewhere there is undoubtedly a caption with a double-entendre in it. Barracks ArtI'd be interested in getting a better look at the pictures on the wall behind these guys. The one at top center looks like a woman with some exposed decolletage. Nothing too racy today, but basically the same subject matter that you would still see in a barracks today. [Click the image to enlarge, then click a second time to expand. - Dave] Could it beCould that be John Latham? http://www.history.army.mil/html/moh/worldwari.html http://www.medalofhonor.com/JohnLatham.htm 9:25I love close-ups. We have (from left to right): - the time (9:25 - presumably in the morning) - baseball cards - WWI photos - presumably family photos - a group photo (likely the company from WWI) - more baseball cards - photos of various buildings - and yes, more baseball cards PosterAbout the poster on the lower left side of the bulletin board, on closer examination it appears that a bear has the lady stump trained and is lifting up her dress. Baseball cardsThey all look like tobacco cards. The top right card is of Jean Dubuc, from 1914. Others are from 1909-11. Baseball cardsNever mind the cheesecake...look at all those baseball cards! Wish I had them on my wall. War Camp CanteenReminds me a little of this one. Except there's no drooling. Or maybe this one, with the pool table and Victrola. 12 PeduriLooks like "12 Picture(s)"? LOVE this site simply outstanding. More Baseball Cards This photo: http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/npcc.30803 [Entitled "Young man in dormitory room"] from the same collection has similar material hanging on the wall. Could it be the same barracks? [This looks like a dorm room at a military school or service academy. And strikes me as more boudoir than barracks. There are tens of thousands of negatives in the National Photo collection. Two pictures with baseball cards doesn't mean they were taken at the same place. It's a neat photo regardless. - Dave] Arlie LathamThe numerous baseball mementos suggest the possibility of an alternate Latham: Arlie Latham, a famed baseball player, served as umpire to Army-Navy baseball matches in the 1910s. Incidentally, I can see the "12 Pictures" but not so sure about "Lithnan" as first name. How about "Littrinan"? With my little eye I spyHere's what I think about this photo: This is the barracks day room of Battery F or an unknown horse-drawn Field Artillery Regiment. I think this is prior to 1918. The soldier in uniform has a belt buckle that looks like a snaffle bit and his hat is creased in a manner discontinued in 1911 when the Army adopted the Montana Peak look. The leggings look pre-WWI. See the illustration of 1906 uniform at http://www.militarymuseum.org/Resources/thanks.jpg Also in this illustration is an example of the the cap seen above the alarm clock. The large drawing on the wall is for a field gun...75mm? To the left of the drawing is a tanatlizing order or memo, with signatures, and most likely a headquarters designation. Any chance of a closer look at these two, Dave? Among the picture collection is a photo of a mounted unit in the field. Gas light fixture above the pool table has been refitted for electricity. The girlie photos all have a gay-90s look, not at all WW1 era. The picture at the top has an imprint top left...photographer? If the baseball cards are all from the 1910-11 timeframe then I think I am on the right track. Knew What They LikedThey might not have known much about art, but they didn't seem to be too single-minded. A variety of subjects, not just the cheesecake one might expect. But the one on the left with the bear is certainly the strangest/kinkiest. (The Gallery, Natl Photo, WWI)
Ray Schalk: 1924
... View full size. National Photo Company Collection. Baseball I just can't wait for the season to begin. Thanks for posting these ... Cooper , a journalist and fan of the "deadball" era of baseball and the Chicago White Sox during the early years of the past century. ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 03/07/2008 - 5:16pm -

"Schalk, Chicago, 1924." View full size. National Photo Company Collection. BaseballI just can't wait for the season to begin. Thanks for posting these classic pics of the great game. RayThere's a soon-to-be published biography on Ray Schalk coming from Brian Cooper, a journalist and fan of the "deadball" era of baseball and the Chicago White Sox during the early years of the past century. Cooper's biography of White Sox pitcher (and spitball artist) Red Faber is a wonderful evocation of that era. Schalk caught a majority of Faber's 254 career winning games. [It'll be interesting to see what they use for cover art. - Dave] On the Topic of BaseballTonight will be opening night for the Washington Nationals in their brand new ballpark ... took the virtual tour at their official website ... incredible place. Also... using photos from the National Photo Company Archives at the LOC ... have a "baseball project up at youtube.com, in time for the opening of the 2008 season ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_idXc_3rus even includes a bit of Harry Carey, and Abbott and Costello Dale BaseballDale, it's excellent - thank you Opening DayAnother great one, Dale. Thank you (The Gallery, Natl Photo, Sports)
Red Sox-Giants: 1912
October 1912. Washington, D.C. "Baseball, Professional. Electric scoreboard." A close-up of the "baseball game reproducer" from the previous post showing results of the 1912 ... "TV off! Use your imagination!" I still "watch" baseball in this manner (at work when I'm not investing company time on ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/04/2012 - 4:31am -

October 1912. Washington, D.C. "Baseball, Professional. Electric scoreboard." A close-up of the "baseball game reproducer" from the previous post showing results of the 1912 World Series between New York and Boston to crowds on a Washington street. Harris & Ewing Collection glass negative. View full size. Game 4This, specifically was Game 4, played on Friday, October 11. Harry Hooper had just reached on a single, and any moment now Steve Yerkes will reach on a bunt misplayed New York's catcher Chief Meyers. Boston would go on to win the game 3-1, and the World Series 4-3-1 (yes, there was a tie; game 2 was called in the 11th on account of darkness). Nationals vs. OpponentsI love this. Love the design of the scoreboard, with the two different (hand-written?) fonts for the players' names, the light-up figures on the field, and the bell (right?) to be rung... when there's a hit, maybe? I also love the idea of a huge crowd "watching" the game this way. How much fun must it have been to be there! The Mighty OzIgnore the man behind the scoreboard! Old SmokeyIt's great to See Smokey Joe Wood up there. His was a short career, but he was said to have been one of the best! TV Off! Use Your Imagination!Like Grandma Rose used to say, "TV off! Use your imagination!" I still "watch" baseball in this manner (at work when I'm not investing company time on Shorpy.com), through MLB.com's Gameday. It's still a decent way to "see" a ballgame! Hmmm....Notice that it is "the World's Series"? [Which is what people called it. - Dave] An Early Version of MLB's GamedayThe technology changed but the design remains the same: Fenway's InauguralThe 1912 season was also the first for the Red Sox in their new home - Fenway Park. The World's SeriesIt was called that because people still remembered that it was started by the New York World newspaper. In 1903 they set up the first championship series between the league champion of the established National League and the champions of the upstart American League (founded in 1901). The National League refused to compete in 1904 but came back in 1905. The series has been running ever since (well with the exception of the strike season of 1994). The series might be the last remembrance of the New York World even if most people aren't aware of it ("Why do they call it the World Series when only American teams play in it? The Japanese should be in it!") Every city - maybe every newspaper - had one of these Electric Scoreboards, at least for the World's Series. I've seen a lot of references to them in the newspapers from the 1910s and '20s but this is the first time I've really seen what one looks like. [According to the Baseball Hall of Fame and various "urban legend" authorities, the World Series has nothing to do with the New York World. - Dave] Baseball Game ReproducerWashington Post Apr 20, 1910 Fans Impressed With New Baseball Game Reproducer Thousands of excited fans stood for nearly two hours yesterday afternoon watching the Post's new electric baseball game reproducer, as it realistically reeled off play after play of the Nationals' last game of the double-header with Boston. It was the unanimous opinion of the crowd that it was the finest exhibition of electrical scoreboard work that has ever been witnessed in this city, the only regret being the defeat of McAleer's men in the ninth inning. Up to the fatal ninth, it looked as if the Nationals, with Johnson in the box, had the contest safely tucked away, and it was interesting to note the change of expressions on the faces as Stahl, the first man up, went out. Four green lights sent the next batsmen to first on balls, and then the big bell told of two singles and a double, and before the contest was over Boston had sent three runners over the plate, and the game was won. The board, which will reproduce every game the Nationals play away from hone, is a great improvement over the one which The Post used last season. It is arranged to accommodate an unusually large crowd, and instead of one board as heretofore two will be in operation at the same time, the boards being set at an angle that it will be almost impossible for any on in the crowd to miss a play. The lights indicating the various plays are so brilliant that they can be seen from the District building, and this alone is a big advantage to the crowd, especially those who are in the rear. It is pitched just far enough from the street so that every play is visible, and the play is recorded on the board a fraction of a second after it is completed on the ground where the game is played. Not the New York WorldApparently that origin of the name is actually untrue: http://www.snopes.com/business/names/worldseries.asp Board game?I have a vague recollection of a board game set up similar to this that was at my grandmother's house when I was a child. Given that my grandparents' generation would've been about 5 - 10 years old in 1912, I assume the game was based directly on these pre-radio electric scoreboards. By rolling dice or selecting cards (as I recall), you could play out a game by highlighting various positions and changing the players' names. Unfortunately, I was never much of a baseball fan, so it was all lost on me. Any of the baseball collectors here know what I'm talking about? I wouldn't begin to know how to google it. ComplicatedI'd love to see how they controlled that thing! Are the lights, or did someone put up cardboard or something behind the cutouts? [It looks to be boy-powered. Or at least boy-operated. - Dave] Baseball in another ageI read about these gadgets in Cait Murphy's "Crazy '08," an account of the 1908 pro baseball season and World Series. It's great to see a close-up, detailed photo of one of them. Baseball ReproducerTo see one of these in action I recommend watching "Eight Men Out" to see a hand-operated indoor version. A couple of scenes are set in a hotel ballroom that's being used (in 1919, the last season before the first games broadcast on radio) to translate pitch-by-pitch telegraph messages into graphics on a smaller board that looks very much like the outdoor board above. A man dressed like a headwaiter uses wooden dowel or pointer to move a "player" figure up a slot that representing the basepath. Of course there are at least 600 reasons to watch "Eight Men Out." Game 7It is actually Game 7. When looking at the lineup in the picture, Devore is playing RF. In the three games with the same pitching matchups, Devore plays RF in Game 7 only -- and LF in the others. (The Gallery, D.C., Harris + Ewing, Sports)
Heart of Cleveland: 1950
... home to Parkersburg. Mother became a lifelong Cleveland baseball fan in 1948 when the Indians won the series. Chief Wahoo stood watch ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 04/06/2024 - 5:22pm -

Summer 1950. "Heart of downtown Cleveland, Ohio, and Union Terminal Group (Terminal Tower and Hotel Cleveland)." Gelatin silver print by Carl McDow. View full size. The Flat Iron Cafe survivesThere have been many changes since this 1950 photo, but the Flat Iron Cafe (bottom left corner) is still there. Its profile says it's an unpretentious brick-walled tavern with live music. I suspect its younger patrons have no idea what a flat iron is. Click to embiggen Afternoon normalAfternoon rush hour getting underway as West Siders flood the Detroit/Superior Highlevel bridge. On the Cleveland Union Terminal Railroad, a streamlined Chesapeake & Ohio sleeper is getting set over to build the Nickel Plate's Cleveland-St. Louis train #9. The NKP will take the sleeper as far as Fostoria where it will join the C&O's "Sportsman" heading toward the Greenbrier resort. The sleeper will return to Cleveland via Columbus, Ohio, on the New York Central. In the flats, we see the yellow brick towered B&O station that lost its trains when the B&O moved the "Cleveland Night Express" and "Washingtonian" into the CUT. There is room on the near side of the CUT viaduct for additional tracks, and by 1960 the Cleveland Transit System will use that space for the cross-town Rapid Transit system. Just a Little Before I was BornThis would have been a vista of what my dad saw when in worked in Cleveland during 1948 and 1949. He met my mother in 1948 in Parkersburg, WV where they both lived. Dad got a job in Cleveland working at a key plant. He would hitchhike home from Cleveland every Friday evening after work to see my mother and hitchhike back to Cleveland on Sunday. There was no I-77 back then. Only U.S. Route 21. I’ve heard many stories about how long it took Dad to make it home to Parkersburg. Mother became a lifelong Cleveland baseball fan in 1948 when the Indians won the series. Chief Wahoo stood watch at her casket, and I still possess the Cleveland Indian pinback button Dad gave to my mother in 1948. Patrick Catenary SupportsThe overhead lattice structures over the trackage on the bridge were there to support catenary wire that carried 3000 volt DC current to power the electric locomotives used in Cleveland Union Terminal to comply with smoke abatement concerns. These locomotives or 'motors' were used until 1954 when they were modified to run off the 600 volt third rail in the New York City trackage into Grand Central Terminal. (The Gallery, Boats & Bridges, Cleveland, Railroads)
Rolling Coal: 1942
... (dime), pea (quarter), chestnut (golf ball), stove (baseball), and egg (softball). But I’m still a bit confused because those ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 04/03/2024 - 7:00pm -

November 1942. "Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (vicinity). Champion No. 1 cleaning plant. Loaded coal cars ready for market." Photo by John Collier, Office of War Information. View full size. *cough*This is why nobody cared if they smoked cigarettes back then. CLEAN coal???This has nothing to do with modern claims of cleaner (less polluting) coal. I did some research and this is about cleaning the dirt and detritus from the dirty coal. It looks cleaner but still burns dirty! Anthracite coal sizesI was intrigued by the different sizes of coal in the various cars, so I looked it up and discovered the following (from smallest to largest, by name of size): barley (size of coarse sand), rice (pencil eraser), buckwheat (dime), pea (quarter), chestnut (golf ball), stove (baseball), and egg (softball). But I’m still a bit confused because those chunks in the cars on the left are certainly bigger than softballs. This is not anthracite (hard) coal. This is bituminous (soft) coal, a higher sulfur coal -- smokier and more ash. There were different grades of soft coal, and this is most likely from the West Kittanning B seam. A very high heat to ash coal. The steel mills just ate this stuff up. Soft coal was mined in the western part of Pennsylvania along with West Virginia and Kentucky down the Appalachians, hard coal specifically to eastern Pennsylvania. Coal sizesI'm old enough to remember steam locomotives. A branch line separated two sections of my grandfather's farm, and I recall picking up huge chunks of coal that fell off overloaded tenders, some of them easily 12 inches or more in diameter. Coal was the common fuel in those days, and we used stove coal in the furnace. The water heater was fired with pea coal. (The Gallery, John Collier, Mining, Pittsburgh, Railroads)
Our Lady of Lourdes: 1914
... 148 Street next to the river where we played football and baseball? Today it's state of the art, at least compared to what we played on. ... and maybe 200 lbs. and a very good athlete -- basketball, baseball and could hold his own on a basketball court. I remember speaking to ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 12/13/2022 - 12:33pm -

        A newly restored version of a Shorpy favorite that has collected three pages of comments since it was first posted in 2007 -- The caption for this one just says "Post Office." Thanks to our commenters we now know that the building with the statue is the Our Lady of Lourdes School at 468 W. 143rd Street in New York circa 1914. 8x10 glass negative, Bain News Service. View full size | The school in 2007. Post office?Looks like a Catholic school, actually. This is just a wild-a**ed guess, but St. Jean Baptiste on East 75th? This would coincide with the warehouse cart on the left (sort of). Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic SchoolThis is Our Lady of Lourdes School in New York City on 143rd Street between Amsterdam Avenue and Convent Avenue. The school was built in 1913 in Washington Heights, an exclusively white, upper middle-class neighborhood. It was built and equipped at a total cost of one hundred and forty thousand dollars. Besides classrooms for five hundred pupils, the building contained an auditorium with a stage lavishly equipped for theatrical productions, a gymnasium, a roof-top playground, an assembly room for parish organizations, rooms for classes in cooking and sewing, and offices for the school officials. The associated church (Our Lady of Lourdes) is located directly behind the school on the next block, 142nd Street. Yes...Which is the Post Office? The large building in the center must be a Catholic School, what with a saint on the roof and all. As for the location, I have no clue. Post OfficeWhich building is the Post Office? post officeBuilding with street level entrance and flags would be my likely guess. Today...Google Street View. It's always interesting to see NYC in the early years, and how it's changed. Our Lady of LourdesI attended this school for eight years in the 1950s. The lower grades entered by one door and the higher grades used the other. City College frat houses faced the school. Recess was on the street out front. We didn't have any cooking or sewing classes, no classrooms equipped for that. There wasn't any gym. We weren't allowed to go up on the roof and there wasn't an assembly room. We did have a annual spring play using the stage and we had a Christmas concert. There was a way into the church from the back of the school. The nuns that taught there were called Society of the Holy Child. Father Kline was one of the priests and Mother Mary Edward taught there. A good school, good memories. Johnny PumpThat fire hydrant probably was installed in the late 1880s. Was born and bred in NYC and traversed all five boroughs many many times, but NEVER laid eyes on a johnny pump like that. Every boy who ever grew up in "The City" is instinctively drawn to hop over as many hydrants as possible. However that one is a KILLER. Our Lady of LourdesI attended OLL from 1933 to 1941. The lower grades kindergarten to fourth were taught by the Ursuline Order of Sisters. The upper grades fifth to eighth were taught by the Sisters of the Holy Child. The school was funded and guided by the priests of the adjoining OLL Church. We were there to learn,to pray: no play, no library, no lunch room, no outside activities. It was not an easy life for children of poor families during this Great Depression Era. I often cried and asked God to help me through the day, the year. I know I received a very good education but not a happy one. There were nuns I would have died for, however there were many that should not have been allowed to teach children. The Church and school were founded by Monsignor Thomas McMann. There is a bust of the good priest near the entrance to the upper church. In the 1930s we were allowed on the roof for various activities. The term "very stern " comes to mind. The statue is Our Lady of Lourdes, similar to the statue in the grotto in the lower church on 142nd Street. It was removed a few years ago as it decayed and was ready to fall off the roof. Convent AvenueThis photo faces east, and the townhouses in the background are along the east side of Convent Avenue. All of them still stand, most are in superb condition. This is the finest real estate in Harlem; a house across the street sold for $3.89 million about 18 months ago. Here is a listing for a house a few doors down from the ones seen here: http://tinyurl.com/2396kb Note the terraces on two of the buildings -- those are stunning and almost never seen in New York. Does anyone remember anDoes anyone remember an Irish nun by the name of Sister Gerard? She was one of the Ursula ? nuns at the Our Lady of Lourdes in Manhatten. She emigrated about 1910, so am not sure anyone would remember her... Is there a cemetery associated with Our Lady of Lourdes? Upper and Lower ChurchCan you tell me if the Upper and Grotto Church still exists and do they have mass on Saturdays and Sundays? I lived 2 streets away a long time ago and would like to see the old neighborshood. I have never forgotten the Grotto. It's so unique. Would like to share it with my spouse. Or maybe I can speak with someone in the convent. Are the nuns still there? Thank you. Diana Gosciniak Our Lady of LourdesI also went there in the 1950's. The nuns were very dedicated to teaching. Our religion was the major reason they and all of us were there. The grotto was under the main stairs and confession was held downstairs at 4 pm on Saturday. The children's Mass was at 9 am on Sunday, a High Mass in Latin. The doors of the main church came from old St. Patrick's downtown in Little Italy. The sisters made sure that the majority of 8th grade students got into Catholic high school. A lot of the girls went to Cathedral H.S. and the boys went to Cardinal Hayes. The church was around the corner with a connection to the back of the school. The convent was right next door to the church and the rectory was across the street. Once in a while we were invited to go to the convent on a Saturday to see the nuns. The neighborhood was pretty good, all kind of stores that tolerated all of us kids. It was nice going there for eight years. Fond memories. O.L.L. Upper and lower churchYes, the upper church is still active with most Masses in Spanish. The lower church {the Grotto) is not used. However the statue of the Blessed Mother is still on view. The sisters left about 10 years ago. I visited the school and was told the Church no longer had any say in its operation. When did you attend? I was there from 1933 to 1940. J Woods Theatrical productions?Oh, how I wish I had your recall. However, I did attend O.L.L. from 1933 through 1940. Yes, the stage was used - but with limited equipment. I never saw or played on a rooftop playground. There was no gymnasium. The seats in the auditorium were moved to the side for military drilling by boys from grades 5 to 8 once a week. The girls exercised in a nearby room. The children in the lower grades had no physical training. I don't remember an assembly room for any parish organizations. Family members were not encouraged to come to the school except on Graduation Day or if the student had a serious problem that required a meeting with the principal and/or a parish priest. I must say we all received a very good education and were farther ahead in our studies than the Public School kids. Yours truly and in friendship, Jackie Woods OLL NeighborhoodI lived on Amsterdam Ave for 16 years. Where did you live? When did you attend OLL School? The few friends I had from the old days have passed on. I answered your other message; The Nuns left about 15 years ago. You need to have someone open the lower church to visit there. The Blessed Mother's Statue is still located in the Grotto but masses are no longer read there. Regards and in friendship. Jackie Woods Our Lady of Lourdes, 2008I had a chance to stop by West 143rd street and take a snapshot today. The cornerstone is dated 1912. As you can see, every building shown in the "1914" photograph is extant and all are in excellent condition. There is even a fire hydrant in the same location as the fire hydrant shown in the photo. As for changes — there are trees on the block now, and the cornice has been removed from Our Lady of Lourdes, as has the statue of the saint. And, of course, as with all modern photos taken in New York, it is full of automobiles. (Click to enlarge) The reddish sign on the left side of the street, behind the motorcycle, identifies this block as part of the Hamilton Heights Historical District (Hamilton Grange is only a few blocks away). Today was garbage day, so a distracting pile of trash sits in the foreground, sorry about that. Our Lady of LourdesCentral Harlem, did you attend Our Lady of Lourdes? If so what years? Thanks for the picture Jackie Woods Our Lady of LourdesI attended an Episcopalian school. I contributed that photo because of my joy in Harlem history, not any tie to this school in particular. Last weekend, I found a photograph of this block dating to 1908! All the buildings looked the same except for OLL, which was then an empty lot. Perhaps Team Shorpy can enlighten me -- would it be compliant with copyright law for me to scan and post it? [Is there a copyright notice on it? If it was copyrighted before 1923, the copyright has expired. - Dave] Our Lady of LourdesThank you for your latest information, Central Harlem. Where was your school located? Did you live nearby? I'm 80 years old going on 81 and all I have are my memories (mostly fond). And my memory is outstanding. I was hoping to hear from anyone who attended OLL with me. By the way, the folks on Amsterdam Avenue always envied the folks on Convent Avenue, always a beautiful clean street. (Today we would say "upscale.") Three of my children were born in The Lutheran Hospital of Manhattan on 144th off Convent. I had moved to upper Washington Heights by then but my doctor was still working out of there. Thank you and in friendship, Jackie Woods Our Lady of Lourdes, 1909I had a chance to scan the old photo I found of this block. It dates to 1909, not 1908 as I had first said. Every building seen in this photo remains, though some of the lots on the right-hand side of 143rd street were empty in 1909, including the lot that would house Our Lady of Lourdes three years later. Anticipating the interest of Shorpy's crew of automotive experts, I provide a closeup of that car on Amsterdam Avenue, below. Also, a note to Jackie Woods: we're of different generations. It is good to exchange notes here, but I'm sure we've never met. Our Lady of Lourdes SchoolWhat wonderful memories of days past. I attended OLL from 1943 and graduated in 1951. One of five brothers to do so. You may have known my older brothers, Larry, Dick or Bill. We lived in that apartment building at the end of the street on the OLL side. That was the location of Alexander Hamilton's house, Hamilton Grange. When it was built, it forced the move to its present location behind the church. It will be moved again to the SE corner of Convent and 141st Street. You also mentioned Lutheran Hospital. It wasn't so great for our family. My brother Dick was taken there after being hit by a car. While recovering, he contracted rheumatic fever in the hospital and later died at New York Hospital. We also lived at 310 Convent Avenue because my mother's family, the Healys, lived on 141st Street. If you have any other questions, ask away. I'm still in contact with several classmates and between us, we should be able to answer. "Thanks for the Memories" Bob Phillips OLL graduatesHi, Yes, I do remember a Phillips family. The boys or boy were in a higher grade with one of my brothers. As you can see, I had already left OLL when you started there. I am pleased you have good memories of your early years. Unfortunately, mine are mixed. An incident: a bunch of us, about 12 years old at the time, were fooling around and one of the boys fell out of a tree and broke his arm. We carried him to Lutheran Hospital They wouldn't let us in the front door. Told us to take him to Knickerbocker Hospital near 131st Street, and so we did. Today, I ask why no first aid was administered or an ambulance called. However, I have nothing but good words about the hospital in later years. I was sorry to hear about brother RIP Regards and in friendship, Jackie Woods PS My oldest sister, Ellen, class of 1936 Won scholorship to Holy Child Academy My older brother William (Billy), Class of 1937, won a scholarship to Regis High. MemoriesI graduated from OLL in 1973 and it is so wonderful to see a website with the School and the information that it offers. I too wondered about the Masses in the lower church. The grotto was always so beautiful and special. I have lived in Florida since 1986 and hope to make a trip to NYC just to visit the old school. Thanks again for bringing a smile to my face today. God bless. OLL MemoriesHi. I attended OLL from grades K to 5. I have the most beautiful memories of my childhood there. I loved the nuns. I can't believe how time has gone so fast. If anyone remembers me or remembers Sister Mary Owen or Ms. Valentine or the gym instructor George Izquierdo. I am talking about late 1960's, early 70's. Please contact me. Are the sisters still there? I went to visit Sister Mary Owen a couple of years ago. She wasn't wearing her habit any more. Those were good old days. I was so mischievous, always getting into trouble. Oh my God. I had the best early education there, never will I forget. I love history and I love these pictures that were posted up above, everything looks the same. Thanks! My family still lives up in Washington Heights. Our Lady of Lourdes School and ChurchAnd a HI to you, The good sisters left about ten years ago. You can reach the school online, it has a Web site. The school is no longer under the supervision of the Church. If you look over the rest of this page you will see that I have answered a number of postings that may be of interest to you. "Memories are made of this." In friendship, Jackie Woods OLL AlumniHello OLL'ers Head over to the OLL website www.ourladyoflourdesschool.net There's an alumni page where you can send your information and be put on the mailing list. OLLCould not connect with your e-mail: kbarkley@ourladyoflourdesschool.net Would you please check it. When did you attend OLL? I gave my information previously on bottom of page. Look forward to hearing from you. In friendship, Jackie woods To Jackie WoodsI knew Dennis before the war, and graduated OLL in 1937. My sister Marie graduated in 1936 and received a scholarship to Holy Name. Finding your web site after all these years is a small miracle. I'm sorry to say Marie, such a special person, passed away in 1977. Andrew, a 1943 or 44 graduate, died in 2000. I did not marry till 1985, had a daughter in 86. My wife Alice and I celebrated our daughter Colleen's wedding Nov. 24, 2007. I hope this proves I was not as bad as the sisters believed. They wanted so to see me go that they created the first coed class and skipped me from 6th to 8th grade. Yes we marched on the roof, auditorium, basement and in far away competition. I believe we had a West Point officer, but not certain. I just hope that life was as rewarding to all OLL graduates as I. God bless. John Orlando Wideawake80@verizon.net OLL, late 1950s and early 60sDon't know how I found this website, but so glad that I did. I graduated OLL in June 1961. The nuns are my most vivid memories of the school. The spring and Christmas plays that were held each year. Recess outside during lunchtime. Walking to school each day and spending the few pennies we had to buy candy at the store on Amsterdam Avenue, and the bicycle store there where we rented bikes on Saturday afternoons. Going to confession every Saturday down in the grotto. Checking the Legion of Decency list for movie listings. Learning to sing the Mass in Latin for every Sunday High Mass and, most important, the foundation the nuns gave us for our religion that is still strong to this day. A few years ago, we drove from Jersey up to the old place and convent still looked pretty good. Can someone please explain about not being under the archdiocese any longer. Thanks again. Lutheran HospitalI found this link when looking for the Lutheran Hospital. Very interesting information. I am researching my family history and found out this hospital is where my great grandfather passed away. Thinking that there may be additional information on the records, I searched for the hospital but have not been able to find any recent reference to it. Has the Hospital been closed? Can anybody give me some background information? I will certainly appreciate it, Anne [You might try the Archives search box on the New York Times Web site. Lutheran Hospital of Manhattan, at 343 Convent Avenue, merged with Norwegian Lutheran Deaconess Hospital in 1956 to form Our Saviour's Lutheran Hospital at the Norwegian Hospital facility on 46th Street and Fourth Avenue in Brooklyn. It's now called Lutheran Medical Center. - Dave] Lutheran HospitalHello Anne, Yes, I know Lutheran Hospital. My three oldest boys were born there: 1951: 1952: 1954. My brother-in-law's father died there c. 1937. When I last passed by the neighborhood, three years ago, I saw that the hospital had been converted to an assisted living facility. The neighborhood is looking great - real upscale. The brownstones that one could buy in the 1930s for a song are now selling for well over a million dollars. In the 1930s they were empty, thanks to the banks that foreclosed during the Depression. As kids we ran through them and at one time had a clubhouse inside one. In friendship, Jackie Woods Lutheran HospitalThanks you both, Dave and Jackie, for your responses. I will follow the advice and hope to be able to pass soon by the neighborhood. Anne OLL MemoriesHi Henry, I too remember Sister Mary Owen, my brother David Mora had her and she was really strict. We keep in touch with George Izquierdo and he is doing great. Sister Rosemarie passed away. I try to stay in touch with O.L.L. It was really a happy time in my childhood and the happy memories will always be a part of my life. Maxine Mora Lutheran Hospital of ManhattanLooking for pictures of the Hospital. I was born in 1940 in the facility and would like to see what it looked like in that era--anyone have a picture? Dad Was an AlumnusHello Jackie, I am curious to see if you know my father, Frank Corrigan, who was born in 1926, which would make him 82 this August. I think he was in the Class of 1941. I am also curious to see if you have any contact or info on Alfred Pereira or his sister Clara Pereira Mercado. Any help would be appreciated. Stephen Corrigan Please email me when you get a chance, stephenjcorrigan@aol.com. Frank CorriganYes, I knew Frank Corrigan, Class of 1940, not 1941, he was closer to my brother Dennis than me, I was a year younger. Didn't Frank have a younger very pretty sister? I last saw Frank c. 1968 in the upper Washington Heights area where many of the families from OLL had moved to from the 140th streets. I knew Pancho Pereira (the name Alfred does not ring a bell) and Clara, his younger sister. His little brother JoJo was killed in Korea. Pancho had a birthmark: strands of very white hair in the front of his head of very black hair. They were wonderful good people. Pancho was good friends with Jackie Koster, whose sister Barbara married Burl Ives in Hollywood and lived happily everafter. In friendship, Ed and Jackie Woods eandjwoods50@yahoo.com Vacant Houses in Hamilton HeightsI thought we were the only ones that got into those empty houses. Afternoons we'd go in through a back window to study and do our homework. We didn't break anything, and at our age we always wondered why the houses were vacant. The Depression angle we didn't figure out until later. Tom Calumet and Frank Howe went with me. I understand Frank has died and Tom Calumet left NYC around 1945 to go out west with his parents. I graduated from OLL in 1941, and now live in Hopkins, MN OLL MemoriesI graduated in 1960. There were about 10 of us cousins who graduated between 1955 and 1960. I remember Father Cline, Fr. Malloy, Monsignor Hart, Mother Bonaventure, Mother Dominica and others. Does anyone remember the day the frat boys across the street pushed the dummy out the window during our recess? I can almost taste the corn muffins and egg creams at the soda fountain around the corner on Amsterdam Avenue while "Barbara Ann" played on the jukebox. OLL PhotoI have a great a picture of my Confirmation Day. I'm in full OLL uniform dated c. May 1935. How can I send it to the OLL Shorpy site? Yours truly, Ed Woods [Click the links under "Become a member, contribute photos." - Dave] Frat boys 0, Mother Mary Edward 10I sure do remember that day. Mother Mary Edward marched over and blasted them. Also the candy store around the corner used to sell two-cent pumpkin seeds out of a little red box. Does anyone remember the rumor going around that the Grotto Chapel was haunted? I remember walking home with "Little Star" playing on the transistor radio. The OLL GrottoI remember serving at what was called the Workmen's Mass in the Grotto in the 1930s - 6 o'clock in the morning! I know the Grotto is not used any more (I visited there in December 2007). As to the candy store on the corner of 143rd and Amsterdam, it was a very busy place: candy, pen nibs (no fountain pens), book covers etc. One day the owner came to school and told Sister Casmere, the principal, that we were disorderly and she must tell the students to behave when shopping in his store. Her solution was to tell the entire student body that they were not allowed to shop there. In a day or so, the man was back begging forgiveness and asked to plaese allow the children to return to his store. The kids were his main business. HelloHi Maxine How are you? Thank you for responding to me. It was very nice to hear from you. Sorry to hear about Sister Rosemary, but I don't remember her was she the pricipal of the school. I do remember Mr. Izquierdo he was the gym instructor with another man don't recall his name I believe he became principal of the school later on. Oh! now I remember his name was Mr. White I believe. God trying to recall, it is getting a little difficult now a days but I like it. It brings me back in time. How time have changed it was so innocent back than not like now. Looking back in time, makes me feel like I grew up to fast. How is Mr. Izquierdo doing? How can I contact him? Please let me know. My e-mail address is Je_Ocejo@yahoo.com. I remember he got married back than to a girl name Rocio, I don't know if they are still together but that lady was my father's friend daughter. Who else do you remember. Please get back to me with pictures. I have pictures too. Let me know how can I e-mail them to you. Would you believe that we are talking about almost atleast 35 years ago but I don't forget. God Bless you. Henry OLLBob, Any recollections of my father, Frank Corrigan, Class of 1940? Maybe not yourself but some of your older brothers. Steve Corrigan More OLL MemoriesI graduated in 1937 and was probably a fellow graduate of a brother. I had skipped 7th grade and so did not get to know classmates well. It is possible that the Waters family lived across the alley on the second floor of the building on 142nd Street. We lived on the top floor of the next building on Hamilton Place. In the same building lived Buddy Sweeney and Sal Guizzardi, also a tall blond kid who graduated with me. I believe your mother and my mom, Agnes Orlando, were friends. I believe your mother visited mine in 1952-3 in our new home in Bergenfield, N.J. I remember a sister who must have graduated with me or my sister Marie Orlando in 1936. My brother Andrew graduated 1947. My mother, brother and sister have passed away. I remember Poncho, the Kosta family, the Madigans, Woodses, Rendeans, Glyforces, McCarvils, Walshes, Philipses, Flynns, Duggans, Hooks, Rodriquezes, Craigs, Hugheses, Conways etc. I am sure we had many things in common being OLL graduates at a very special interval of time. I wish you well in your very beautiful state which I have passed through on three occasions. Best wishes and fond memories. John and Alice Orlando OLLLot older than you. Attended OLL from late 1930s to early 40s. Baptized, first Holy Communion and Confirmation (Cardinal Spellman). Lived at 145 and the Drive. Remember principal when I was there, Mother Mary Margaret. First grade teacher was Mother Mary Andrews. Remember playing on roof and being shocked by Mother Mary Andrews jumping rope. Believe there was a Father Dolan around that that time. Only went to through the 3rd grade there and then moved to 75th St and the Blessed Sacrament -- a whole different world, and not as kind or caring. Memories of OldHi Henry. You may not remember me but I also taught gym with George and sometimes Ms. Ortiz. George is with the Department of Education on the East Side. I work for the Bloomberg Administration. Sister Mary Owen has moved to Rye and of course all the nuns are now gone. I left in 1996 but I still miss all of the good times shared during my years there. Memories Are GoodHello, You taught me gym and we also had alot of good times with the High School Club on Friday nights. I have most painful memories of O.L.L the day Msgr. Cahill passed away. I never knew how much a heart could have so much pain and yet go on. My dad died on 4-29-96, Max Mora and I felt the same pain all over again. Do you know where Mother John Fisher has gone ... her name had changed to Sister Maryanne. I would love to hear from you. Maxine Mora Hi HenryMy email address is mmorafredericks@aol.com. I have yours and I am so happy to be in contact with you I graduated in 1973. I went to Cathedral High School. Later moved to Florida. My brothers and sisters are still in NY and I miss so much of it. I look forward to catching up with you. I will write soon. God Bless. Maxine Fellow ClassmateHi Tony, It has been more than 48 years since I last saw you - at our graduation from OLL in 1960. Let me know what you have been up to in the past half century. My e-mail address is kmckenna@clarku.edu. Kevin LTNSMr. White! Not sure if you still come to this site, but on the off chance that you still visit i thought i would write. It's been so long since I've seen or heard from you, not since "Len Fong" closed. For all others that may still come by this site, I graduated in 1983 (possibly 82). Would love to hear from a blast from the past. Please email me at kellyw88@gmail.com John McKennaHi Kevin, Any chance you are related to the McKenna family? John McKenna, Class of 1941 Your name sure rings a bell, however there must be 20 years difference between us. Have a healthy and happy 2009 In friendship, Ed Woods John McKennaHi Ed, I'm afraid that I'm not related to John McKenna. My brothers, Donald and Desmond, graduated from Our Lady of Lourdes in the fifties. I wasn't aware of another McKenna family in the parish when I was at OLL. Happy and healthy 2009 to you as well, Ed. Cheers, Kevin McKenna FamilyThe John McKenna family I knew lived on the northeast corner of Hamilton Place and 141st street. I had other friends and schoolmates in that building. Thinking back, you probably had to be an Irish Catholic to live there. Whatever, I think you had to be an Irish Catholic to attend OLL. I never knew any others at that time, the 1930s. Most fathers worked for the subway and trolley systems or at the milk delivery companies along 125th Street near the river. Those were the days, my friend. Innocence prevailed! In friendship, Ed and Jackie Woods The Mc KennasJim McKenna and his younger brother Tommy lived in that house above Grizzardi's grocery. Tom hung around with Marty the Hanger Phipher and the Warriors. Billy Vahey and his brother Eddie who retired as a Lieutenant in the NYPD lived there also. Their mother was still there in the early 80s. You probably knew the Schadack family, who I believe owned Schrafft's or Donald York. I think the building was 644 West 145 St. It was the first apartment house in the city to have a self-service elevator. When we lived there the neighborhood was known as Washington Heights. For some reason it's now referred to as Hamilton Heights. A couple of great web sites -- Forgotten NY and Bridge and Tunnel Club. You can spend hours & hours on Rockaway Beach alone. Lots of good memories! How about the movie theaters -- the Delmar, the RKO Hamilton, the Dorset, the Loews Rio, the Loews 175 (now the Rev. Ikes Church) and all the theaters along 180th Street? Hamilton HeightsNorm, Many thanks for your fine memories of our old neighborhood but there are a few minor corrections I have to make. The first is the name Shadack family. I believe the correct spelling is Shattuck and his address was 676 Riverside Drive on the corner of 145th Street. We lived there and my brother Bill was classmates with Gene Shattuck. No relation to the Schrafft's empire. Secondly, Hamilton Heights was always known as such. Outsiders didn't know where that was so we usually said Washington Heights for simplicity. Washington Heights doesn't really start until 157th Street and is separated from Hamilton Heights by the Audubon plot. The Old NeighborhoodAlex Hamilton lived nearby. There was a very pleasant young man (OLL Class of 1941) named Eugene Shattuck who lived near 145th Street and Riverside Drive. His father was a professor at Manhattan College and his family owned the Schrafft's Restaurants. I fondly recall Eugene having the wonderful hourglass-shaped bottles of hard Schrafft's candy brought to school and distributing one bottle to each of his classmates at Christmas time. Needless to say, the poor Amsterdam Avenue kids were in awe of one who could afford to do such a good deed. You mention the Warriors, I knew the (Gang) but not any of the names mentioned here on Shorpy. In friendship, Ed and Jackie Woods P.S. My in-laws the Boyd family lived at 676 Riverside Drive. Les Sr. had a radio repair shop on 145th and Broadway. 676 Riverside DriveI lived at 676 as well. The family's name was Shattuck. In my day, many, many years ago, the elevator had an operator. A sweet man in full uniform. There was a doorman as well. Saw the building years later and was appalled at the change. Then went up to OLL and hardly recognized it. It was the best school I ever went to. Thank you for reminding me of the fun. And yes, of the education I got there. By the way, 676 on the Drive was called the Deerfield. OLL StudentsI am researching my family history and I came upon this great site. In 1930 my grandparents Michael and Marie Murphy were living at 1744 Amsterdam Avenue and later in the 1930s at 115 Hamilton Place. All of the Murphy children attended Our Lady of Lourdes School. They were: Maurice (born 1916) Rita (born 1917/ my Mother) John (born 1918) Theresa (born 1920) Vincent (born 1922) Veronica (born 1925) My mom had such fond memories of her time spent there. Rita Harmon Bianchetto Hi Neighbor!!Hi Rita, I'm a former resident of 676 Riverside. My family lived there from 1940 to 1960 in apartment 4A. Bobby Foy lived next door to us. I think you may have left just after we arrived since I remember the elevator operator. The change to automatic was somtime during or just after WWII. I remember they put up this 10 foot wall with a door to limit access to the building. Fat lot of good that did us as my mother was robbed in broad daylight in the service chamber of our apartment in 1960. That's when my Dad had us pack up and leave for a secure location in the Bronx. Anyway, the apartment was great. We had a balcony looking over 145th Street and the river. My brothers were Larry Jr., Bill and Nick. Bill was a good friend to Gene Shattuck and went to Xavier with him. Nick and I also went there. Larry had a scholarship to All Hallows. Judy, can you tell me your last name and if you knew me. Hope to hear from you. Bob Phillips at bobbyphilly@msn.com Your DadSorry Steve, I graduated in 1947 and my three brothers have died. But the name Corrigan does ring a bell. Probably from my brother Larry who knew just about everyone in OLL. Sorry I couldn't help out but it was great hearing from you. Bob Phillips Andrew.Yes, I remember your brother Andrew. We were in the same class and we used to kid him about his name - Andrew Orlando and how tall he was. What's he doing these days? Bob Phillips Those were the days, my friendsHello Rita, I remember the name Murphy but not the faces. We lived a block south of you at 1704 Amsterdam. My sister Ellen, Class of 1936, and brother Bill, Class of 1937, would have known your family. We had many friends on Hamilton Place, the Koster family for one: Anita, Class of 1936, her younger sister Barbara married Burl Ives, and her other sister Mary Lou married Eddie Byrne (1710 Amsterdam). Ed's sister married Chump Greeny -- killed at Anzio Beach. He must have lived near your family. My brother in law Les Boyd lived in the Deerfield and had an electric appliance store on the corner of 145th and B'way and a sporting goods store on the next block next to the Chinese restaurant. In friendship, Ed and Jackie Woods Hello RitaHello Rita, I attended St. Catherine's Academy on 151st between B'way and Amsterdam (It cost my dear old dad $10 a month for what was considered a private school.) I graduated in 1943 in a class of only four girls. I then went to the Sacred Heart of Mary Academy in Inwood (I had to climb the long steps up from B'way every day for four years -- Class of 1947. Most of my relatives went to OLL as did my husband of 59 years, Ed Woods. We are still alive, kicking and fighting and making up every day. In my Class of 1943, one of the girls was Ann Murphy -- any relation? Also a Virginia O'Malley and my best friend, June McAvoy, who keeps in touch with me. June's grandfather was Judge McAvoy, who had died by that time. I loved when my folks took me to McGuire's Bar and Restaurant on B'way and 155th. Oh that Roast Lamb (Irish style) on a Sunday or a holiday. The girls used to go to Nuestra Senora de Esperanza (Our Lady of Hope) next to the museum complex. We were told not to go there for confession, but the Spanish priests were limited in English. Thinking back we had but little to confess at that time. Eddie and I had an apartment on 150th near the Drive for a few years until 1956, then it was off to Long Island to raise our six children. In friendship and love hearing from you, Ed and Jackie Woods The MurphysHi Ed and Jackie, Thanks so very much for your reply. I wish my mom was still with us but she died in 1998, the last of the Murphy kids. My grandfather Mike Murphy worked for the Post Office (a mail carrier working out of the General P.O. at 33rd and 8th). My grandmother Marie Murphy died in 1939 while living at Hamilton Place. Uncle Maurice went to Regis H.S. for several years before leaving to attend All Hallows; John and Vincent then attended All Hallows; my mom, Rita, attended Cathedral; Veronica, I believe, attended St. Vincent, and Theresa died at age 25 in 1944 (not sure of her high school). Mom worked at Woolworth's on 145th Street and Broadway, and after high school at New York Telephone, retiring about 1980. She got married in 1943 and moved to 152nd Street, and we attended St. Catherine of Genoa on W. 153rd. I graduated in 1958. So I know the neighborhood. Peace, Rita Hi Ed and JackieSo Jackie you are a St. Kate's gal like me! My tuition was a dollar a month, so your education was really a private school. You have listed the Academy at 151st Street but I think that it was on 152nd between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue. I took my high school entrance exam at SHM so I am sort of familiar with the school -- fireworks were going off during our exam. The end result was I did fine and attended Blessed Sacrament on West 70th, Class of 1962. I last saw the "girls" at a reunion in 2002. My Spanish teacher just celebrated her 70th anniversary as a nun with the Sisters of Charity. I am not familiar with any of the girls names that you mentioned,including Ann Murphy. I do know McQuire's, where I had my first Shirley Temple, Mass at Our Lady of Esperanza, Trinity Cemetery & loved visiting the museums. Do either of you recall Eugenio Pacelli, before he became Pope Pius XII visiting at OLL ? Please tell me about your days on 150th Street near the Drive since I may have been the little skinny blond kid you both passed on the street. Peace, Rita in Northern New Jersy West 150th NYCHello Rita, Yes, we lived at 615 W. 150th from 1950 to 1956. Four of my children were born there (three at Lutheran Hospital and one at Jewish Memorial). We had many friends from school and the neighborhood living nearby. However, by 1956 it was time to move on; many changes in the neighborhood. One of my nearby friends was Juanita Poitier; Sidney was just getting started with his acting career. A real nice couple. Was Father Tracy (Pastor) still there when you attended school? How about Father Brady? He was always telling stories during Mass about his sea time with the Navy. Eddie remembers going to the Woolworths lunch counter (145th and B'way) in the early 1940s just to have an excuse to talk with the girls. He knew many of them from school and the neighborhood. In friendship, Jackie West 152ndHi Jackie and Ed, I lived at 620 West 152nd Street, just a stone's throw from you folks. My sister was born at Jewish Memorial Hospital in March 1952 -- Dr. Sandler from Broadway 150/151st St. delivered. Those were the days of Dave's deli on the corner of 151st & Broadway famous for pastrami on rye and a cold beer for the dads, Rafferty's Bar and Grill on the other side of B'way, Harry's or Pierre's homemade candy and ice cream parlor, Cora's beauty salon where my Nana would get a cold wave and blue tint. And not to be forgotten, Snow & Youman's drug store on B'Way and 151st. I recall the name Fr. Brady but it was Pastor Kane and Fr. Tracy (and his Irish Setter, Rusty) that I recall. I just sent a photo of Fr. Tracy to my classmates. Rita Japanese BazaarWho remembers the Japanese-American bazaar in the brownstones across from the OLL lower grades school during the war? They had the blue star & the gold star pennants hanging in the windows. They also had a store on Amsterdam Avenue near 144th Street and when they sold coffee the lines would go all around the block. How about the punchball games out side the school, or stoop ball? Anyone remember playing basketball and using the bottom rung on the fire escape ladder as a basket? The nearest basketball court was at 148th Street by the river. If you wanted to "take out" a ball from the park, you would leave a shirt as a deposit. I remember shoveling snow off the court in order to play. Unfortunately those days were the last time the country was almost 100% together. Twenty years from now, these will be the "good old days." Your brother AndrewI palled around with Andy & another kid named Eddie McGlynn. As a matter of fact I have a picture of Andy, Buddy Ayres & me at Rye Beach. Buddy went to Bishop Dubois with us. He was from Vinegar Hill. You didn't mention the Wittlingers. They lived on the first floor in your building. Brendan lives in Virginia. I'm still in touch with him, Matty Waters and Les Scantleberry. Pancho Pereria made a career of the Navy. He died several years ago. JoeJoe, one of my closest friends, was killed in Korea. Dave's DeliI haven't had a good hot corned beef sandwich since I last had one at Dave's. His son Milton was running the store in the 1950s after Dave retired to Florida. Dave's used to have a window in the summer that sold potato knishes (5 cents, with mustard) and of course kosher hot dogs. I heard a Clement Moore fan club still meets every Christmas Eve next to Trinity Church Cemetery and recites "The Night Before Christmas." I was born in 1928 at 853 Riverside Drive. When 90 Riverside was built in 1941 and blocked the view of the Hudson, we moved there. Warm regards, Jackie and Ed The old neighborhoodThe Wittlingers (the twins were the same age as my two younger brothers, also twins), Matty Waters, Les Scantleberry, JoJo: All those names I remember, especially Pancho and his family. For the life of me, I cannot understand why your name doesn't ring a bell. You mentioned the Warriors. Did you know Tommy or Willie Taylor, the Conroys, Drago, Jackie Hughes, etc. What years did you attend OLL? I looked up some old friends on the Internet over the past few years -- said hello and then goodbye when their families called to give me the news: Vinny McCarville, Bruce Boyd, Phil Marshall, Eddie O'Brien -- all gone to their maker. They were spread out all over the country. It was satisfying, however, just to say hello. I met Vinny in New Orleans and we had a beer for the first time in many years. We had gone to sea together during WWII and had a lot of memories. You must forgive my spelling etc. My eyesight is on its way out (along with everything else). I will be 82 in a few months but active and still traveling. I have been to six of the seven continents and my wish is to have breakfast at the South Pole. In friendship, Ed and Jackie Woods ToppersWas Dave's on B'Way near 140th Street? I sold the Sunday News there for 25 cents during the news strike. It was normally a nickel. We had to go down to the News Building to buy them. Overhead! Who remembers the Sugar Bowl on the corner of 143rd and Broadway? A great hangout for different age groups. How about Toppers Ice Cream parlor on B'Way between 139 & 140th? In the 1940s and early '50s you could go to the Audubon Theater at 168th and B'Way on Sunday for 77 Cents and see three features, 23 cartoons, newsreels and an eight-act stage show with such luminaries as Billy Halop of the Dead End Kids or Lash LaRue or Ferdinand the Bull. Top shelf. They must get at lest a buck fifty for admission today! Tea and Nut StoreHi Norm, My mom (Rita Murphy) mentioned there was an Asian family owned Tea and Nut shop in OLL Parish when she was a child (born 1917). She said her brothers, Maurice and John Murphy, would sometimes play with the owners' son. I am wondering if this could be the same shop. Rita ToppersDave's was on the southwest corner of Broadway and 151st Street, a short trip from my home on 152nd near Riverside Drive. I do recall the Sugar Bowl and maybe was in it once or twice but never hung out there. Topper's is a name I never heard before, as far as ice cream parlors go. Thanks so much for mentioning the name and location. Perhaps before my time (1945 baby) or too far from my home. Many people have mentioned the Audubon Theater to me (165-166th Street) but I have no memory of it at all. I do recall the San Juan Theater that took over the space of the old Audubon. I love hearing about Mom's (Rita Murphy's) old neighborhood. Thanks for sharing. Rita Your Name?No, Dave's Deli was on 151st and Broadway. Yes, Toppers & the Sugar Bowl were popular hangouts, however the Piedmont, the Staghorn and the Chesterfield were more popular later on. I have pictures of the great snowfall of December 27, 1947 taken in front of the above mentioned restaurants with a bunch of the guys posing in the cold. The Audubon Theater became better known when Malcom X was murdered in its ballroom. I saw Milton Berle there in the early 1940s. Actually, the Bluebird and the Washington were also popular as they only cost 10 cents (no heat or air conditioning). Memories, memories, dreams of long ago. Ed and Jackie Woods The OLL ChoirI sang in the OLL choir for about 5 or 6 years and hated it.T he only advantage was that we skipped the last class for practice. The downside was that after attending 9 o'clock Mass we had to sing at the 11 o'clock High Mass, which interfered with our Sunday football game. I played with the Junior Cadets. We had a very good team coached by Joe Romo, who went on to be the trainer for the Oakland A's for many years. I saw him at Yankee Stadium whenever the team played the Yankees at home. Joe died several years ago. Mr. Skyler, the choirmaster, wore a wig that could easily be mistaken for road kill. I used to wonder if he was committing a sin by wearing something on his head in church. After all it was no different then wearing a hat during Mass. Mrs. Daly was a very lovely lady who played the organ and gave piano lessons. She lived down the street from us on 142nd between Broadway and Hamilton Place and had something like 10 kids. My sister Maureen was friends with Theresa and Billie. John was I believe the youngest son. Maureen graduated from Notre Dame de Lourdes on Convent Avenue. My sister Frances was close friends with Helen and Rita Nerney, who lived across the street. Fran died in 2002. ToppersI lived at 635 Riverside Drive. I recall Toppers being near the corner of 141st, next to a Jewish deli. In the summer my dad took my brother Tom and me for ice cream there every evening. Happy memories! Bishop DuboisI graduated 1953 from Bishop Dubois. I believe your brother Ernie was in my class at OLL. I hope he is doing well. Give him my regards. Bill Healy Names from the Old NeighborhoodBrendan & Bernie turned 76 on February 2. Don't ask how I remember things like this. I forgot what I had for breakfast this morning. I'll be 76 August 11, weather permitting. Everyone seems to forget Pinky (Michael) Pereria. You are closer to my late brother Jim's age. Jim hung out with Jimmy and John Bartlett, Donald LaGuardia, Tommy & Willie Taylor (born on the same day a year apart -- Irish twins). Again I don't know why I remember these things. Eddie O'Brien used to go by the name Drawde Neirbo, his name spelled backwards. He was a close friend of Big Jack Hughes. I recall a group of you guys joining the Merchant Marine during the war. The Dragos lived on 141st Street between Hamilton Place and Amsterdam Avenue. The youngest (Joseph?) was in my class. A couple of years ago I went down to the old neighborhood with my sons. Surprisingly, it looks great. Lots of renovations going on. My beautiful wife June is a BIC (Bronx Irish Catholic) from the South Bronx. It's not as great a neighborhood as it used to be, but lots of great people came out of there. I took her away from there, married her 50 plus years ago and got her a decent dental plan and raised five kids in New Jersey. I graduated in 1948. It should have been 1947 but Mother Mary Inez red-shirted me in the 6th grade. Will stay in touch. Norm Brown Norm Brown??Norm, I graduated in 1947 from OLL. I knew a kid (Norman Brown) who lived on 141st between Hamilton and Broadway. I think he had a younger brother. He went to OLL with me, but he did not graduate from OLL. Eddie McGlynn was in my class, and the Wittlingers. I lived at 510 W 140th. Are you that Norman? Bill H. The Summer of '66Hi Jackie and Ed, I never had one of Dave or Milton's corned beef sandwiches but I can say that the pastrami on rye was a thing that dreams are made of. I recall the knishes out the window in the summer and the hot dogs. Thanks so much for taking me back in time. Milton would take the pastrami out of that silver steamer box sharpening his knife, and the rest was heaven on rye. Milton was still behind the counter in the summer of 1966 but after that I can't say. I am sure that "The Night Before Christmas" is still recited next to Clement Moore's grave, in Trinity Cemetery. In my day the Girl Scout Troop that met at the Church of the Intercession would participate in the recitation of the Moore piece. I know that 853 Riverside Drive is on the Upper Drive, since I sat on "The Wall" on summer evenings as a teenager. You said you moved in 1941 to 90 RSD -- did you mean 90 or 890? I am not familiar with the numbering of the "lower" drive where the red house sits (so it was called). I am off in search of a good sandwich. Peace, Rita Stagershorn & ChesterfieldMalcom X was shot in the Audubon Ballroom at the back of the theater, which later became the Teatro San Juan. I saw Abbott and Costello there en Espanol. At 7 years old I was run over by a truck at 142 Street and Broadway, right outside the Staghorn, I managed to live! I would hang from the window outside the Chesterfield, watching football games on TV with Bobby Heller and Herby Gil and Buddy McCarthy. That was a hell of a snowstorm in '47. Remember digging tunnels through the snowbanks? You forgot to mention Larry's, just next to the Sugar Bowl. I would watch "Victory at Sea" there. A couple of years ago I took a walk through the OLL neighborhood and realized that when you are a kid everything you see is at eye level and taken for granted, but as you look up and around from a mature aspect it becomes a whole different world. It is really a beautiful area. 90 Riverside Drive WestHi Rita. I'm positive 853 was on the Lower Drive. When the new building went up next to it around 1941, the address was 90 Riverside Drive West. However, it caused so much confusion with 90 Riverside Drive (downtown) that the address was changed to 159-32 Riverside. The plot originally hosted a small golf course. I also went to the Church of the Intercession with the Girl Scouts. Small world. And the wall -- on a hot summer night, standing room only. Jackie West 140th NYCThe kids I hung around with were in the OLL classes of 1940 and 1941. I had a weekend job in 1941 with Ike's Bike Rental on 141st. He needed someone to identify the kids who rented there (bikes rented for 20 cents an hour -- and that's the truth). We started a Junior Air Raid Wardens group and had a store next to Ike's. Collected paper etc, for the war effort. And you are correct, within three years, when we turned 16, McCarvill, O'Brien, Drago and I joined the merchant marine. Did you know the Kieley family -- lived at 1628 Amsterdam before moving to the lower Bronx: Pauline, Rita, Josephine, Peggy and the two boys Nicky and Jimmy. I loved going to their upstairs apartment for tea, especially when Mrs Kiely made Irish Soda Bread. My wife (then girlfriend) Jackie sponsored Jim Kieley when he became a citizen around 1948. He was from County Waterford, the same as her family. We celebrated our 59th anniversary last week. Regards, Eddie Woods My Brother JimYou probably knew my brother Jim Brown. He too was born in 1928. He died three years ago today. He graduated from Cardinal Hayes, spent a couple of years in the Army and graduated from Fordham University. Jim lived in Wycoff, N.J. He was very successful in business. Amsterdam AvenueThe Denning family (10 kids) lived on Amsterdam Avenue between 141st and 142nd. Hughie had polio and wrote away to FDR for an autograph during the war. As it turned out he was the last person to get one. He was in an iron lung at the time. It was a big deal. Lots of press. One of the boys, Peter Schaefer Denning, was born on the back of a beer truck on the way to the hospital. Hence the name. The Connolly brothers, Eamon and Timmy, lived in the same building. Everyone in the family had red hair. Not unlike Bobby Foy's family. If I recall properly, the father looked like Arthur Godfrey, his mom like Lucille Ball, Bobby like Red Skelton, and they had a red cat plus an Irish setter. It took a lot of guts for a group of 16-year-old kids to join the merchant marine. A belated thanks for your service. My wife makes great Irish soda bread. Is there any other kind? You can give ten women the same ingredients for soda bread and you'll get ten different tasting breads. All great! Especially with a cup of Lynches Irish tea. The season is almost upon us once again. The only Kiely (different spelling) I knew was my NYPD partner Timmy, who was from the South Bronx, Hunts Point. Tim grew up with Colin Powell. Having worked in the South Bronx for 25 years and marrying June Margaret O'Brien, one of six girls from there, I pretty much connect with the people of SOBRO, as the area is now known. Sooner or later everything gets yuppified. How about this web site? Something else! Take care, Norm Mea CulpaHi Jackie, Of course you know 853 RSD is on the Lower Drive but Google Maps does not. "Looks like 800 Block of Upper Drive is even numbers and 800 Block on Lower Drive is odd numbers." I did not locate 159-32 but I did find a 159-34 and 159-00, seems to be the last structure (red brick) on the Lower Drive area that we are speaking of, now a co-op but the year of construction is not listed. I have very fond memories of the folks I spent time with on "our" wall. Peace, Rita Yes, it's Kiely I was in error. For whatever resaon, The Dublin House on 79th off the NE corner of Broadway became a meeting place for many of the kids from the OLL area up until the early 1970s: Eamon Connolly, Tommy Taylor etc. I worked with Tom for a short time before be went on the force and then as a T Man. I have not heard from him in too many years. One of great fellows from the old neighborhood. In friendship, Ed Woods My e-mail: eandjwoods50@Yahoo.com P.S. The Kiely family moved to Crimmons Ave in the Bronx West 159th Street NYCDear Rita, I do enjoy rehashing the old neighborhood and the wonderful memories we can recall. Yes, it is the last buillding on the street and I lived there until 1950, when I married Ed. My uncle George lived there until c. 1981 in a rent controlled apartment, and yes, it did become a co-op. When first opened, the building had four entrances. Later, in the 1980s, it was down to one main entrance on the via-dock for safety reasons. I loved our apartment there, which had a beautiful view of the Hudson and the George Washington Bridge. My friend June, nee McAvoy, lived at 3750 B'way. We were together in school for 12 years at St. Catherine's and Sacred Heart. June lives in Maryland. By the way, my e-mail is eandjwoods50@yahoo.com Jackie Woods The Red HouseDear Jackie & Ed, How lucky you were to have lived in the Red House, especially with the views of the bridge and the river. Growing up I never knew anyone who lived there, so never saw the interior, I'm sure it was lovely. I heard that David Dinkins lived there at some point before he became mayor. Many of my classmates lived in 790 Riverside Drive and I was always so impressed that their apartments had two doors. Our apartment was on the fourth floor of a walkup and across the street from a garage. Funny how I was not really impressed by a doorman but by the two doors. I seem to remember a gas station near your friend June's house...other side of Broadway from the museum, now college. One of my St. Catherine's classmates, last I heard, he was teaching at the college. Was Rexall Drug on the corner of 157th, with the newsstand outside the door, when you lived in the Red House? In my home we seemed to have all of the city newspapers -- morning, afternoon and evening, some selling for 4 cents. To this day I read two papers every day and still long to go out Saturday night to pick up the Sunday paper. Thanks for the email. Peace, Rita Class of 1959I attended O.L.L. from 5th to 8th grade. My 5th grade teacher was Mother Mary Edward, what a wonderful woman, 6th was Mother Mary St. Hugh, 7th Mother Mary Edward and 8th Mother Mary Bernadette. Graduated in 1959. Classes were mxed -- black, white and Latino. Memories are mostly good ones -- Father Kline, Father Malloy, Father Hart. The religious experience most memorable, especially during Lent, novenas on Wednesday afternoon and Stations on Friday after school. Liggets / RexallHello Rita, I loved the lunch/soda counter at Liggetts/Rexalls. for whatever reason, my family used the pharmacy across the street, on the east side of B'way, to have prescriptions filled. The family that owned and operated the newsstand helped us lease our first apartment at 600 W. 157th. Apartments were in short supply in 1950. We lived in the unit formerly rented by the Singer Midgets next to Peaches Browning of Daddy Browning fame. Of course they were long gone when we lived there. My father was very active in the Tioga Democratic Club with the Simonetti family. Do you remember Warner's Cafeteria between 157 & 158th? We visited St. Catherine's Church Christmas week 2007 with our niece who wanted to see where she was baptized in 1953. She is on Mayor Bloomberg's staff. Warm regards, Jackie Woods eandjwoods50@yahoo.com Oh, as the poet said, "To return to yesteryear and our salad days." My brother ErnieBilly, Ernie and I went to Bishop Dubois. Ernie for two years and I for three. We both were bounced in 1951 and transferred to Don Bosco Prep in Ramsey, N.J. We went there on a Schrafft's scholarship. Our mom waited on tables at Schrafft's in order to send us there. In those days it was pretty much a blue collar school. It wasn't that far removed from being a reform school. VERY STRICT. Today it's much more hoity toity. I'm still in close touch with my old classmates, most of whom have been successful in life. Ernie was a great basketball player, the first to score over 50 points in a game in Bergen County (three times), breaking Sherman White's record. White was an All American but messed up his career in the 1950-51 college season. Ernie went to Fordham on an athletic scholarship. Ernie died in 2002. He was a very special guy, extremely generous and giving. We miss him a lot. He lived a couple of blocks away from me as did most of my siblings. Sad to say, the circle grows smaller. 1959 OLL gradsAre you out there, does any one remember or know of any of the following graduates of O.L.L. -- Starr Martin, Carol Long or her sisters, Carlotta and Tony, Josephine Velez, Melvina (Kinky) Boyd, Chicky Aponte. I went of to Cathedral and the others to various Catholic high schools and lost touch. After finding this site, many memories have come back. Would like to know how old friends are doing. 600 W. 157thHi Jackie, You lived around the corner from the post office. I remember going there once to get a money order and losing Mom's gray umbrella. Your building was by the Grinnell, where a friend's father was the superintendent during the 60s. Liggett/Rexall -- we went to Snow & Youman's for drugs but to Rexall for film, flashbulbs and of course the soda fountain. The last time I was there was April 1965, just before my son was born. I do not recall a Warner's Cafeteria but do remember the famous, and oh so good, Imperial Deli, Lambos Flower Shop, Commander Bar & Grill, Full Moon & McGuire's. I visited St. Catherine's about 1994 and it was like being in a time warp, except for the piano near the altar. The church was just as I remembered when I got married in 1964, only smaller. The school is now public. I am in touch with some of my friends from the Class of 1958. It was nice that your niece was able to visit the church where she was baptized. I never heard of the Tioga Democratic Club or the Simonetti family (the only Simonettis I know are the family whose niece and son are engaged). Jackie, was the pharmacy on the east side of B'way United or perhaps that was a sign for United Cigar? So nice this walk down memory lane. Best to your Eddie. Peace, Rita Memories: dreams of long agoHi Rita, My close friend June's, nee McAvoy, family lived in the Grinnell for many years. Her grandfather was Judge McAvoy. Eddie claims to have an exceptionally good memory but he says he needs to yield to you. You do have a most wonderful recall. However, he is more familiar with the OLL school and church neighborhood. My brother-in-law (much older than Eddie and me) was in the vending machine business: Ace Distributing -- jukeboxes, cigarette machines etc. Eddie worked for him for a few years when we first married and the company had locations in almost every store in the neighborhood (including the Commander). That is a dead business today. How about Pigeon Park? You couldn't sit there. Warm regards, Jackie Woods GrinnellHi Jackie, Do you recall a Doctor James Farley living in the Grinnell? Doctor Farley must have taken care of half of Washington Heights over a period of many years (had an office on 178 St. between Broadway and Ft. Washington Ave.). Ah, Pigeon Park...I remember it well and always tried to circumvent it! All the best. Rita I remember it wellHi Rita, Our family physician was Dr. VanWorth, as an adult I visited Dr. Liebling, who had an office c. 156th. He later moved down to 72nd Street. A wonderful caring man (who made house calls). My son Ed Jr. was 58 years old this week, I have a picture of him when he was 1 sitting on a pony taken on the corner of 155th and B'way. John Orlando's brother married a St Catherine's girl. I don't know her age. Ain't we got fun? Jackie Woods Current resident of the neighborhood (Grinnell)I'd like to invite you to visit www.audubonparkny.com, which is a virtual walking tour of the neighorhood you're discussing. You can "take the walking tour" online or go to the Sitemap/ Index of Images to read about specific buildings and see pictures from many eras. I'm happy to post any pictures (and credit the owners) of the neighborhood that you'd like to share - focusing on the Audubon Park area (155th to 158th, Broadway to the river). www.audubonparkny.com Walking TourThanks so very much for posting the site for the Audubon Park area...I had a delightful walking tour. Down Memory Lane at OLLWhat happened, did we all run out of memories? Who remembers the stickball field comprised of Hamilton Place from 140 to 141st Street. A ball hit over the small roof on 141st was a double and over the roof at 95 Hamilton Place was a homer. After the war the street was so crowded with cars that the games were moved to Convent Avenue in front of CCNY. There was some heavy money bet on these games. Walking TourThanks, Rita, I'm glad you enjoyed the walk! Please come back and visit the site again. I post a Newsletter on the homepage (www.AudubonParkNY.com ) each month highlighting new pages, information, and research, as well as updates on the Historic District project. Matthew The Prairie StateDoes anyone have memories of the Prairie State? It was a WWI battleship moored in the Hudson River at about 135 Street and I believe used for Naval Reserve training. As kids we snuck on board and played basketball on it. The deck (court) had a bow on it which is partially responsible for the replacement parts in my ankle today. How about the "Dust Bowl" at 148 Street next to the river where we played football and baseball? Today it's state of the art, at least compared to what we played on. Now there is grass on the field. Progress! Under the Via DockFar from being a battleship, the Prairie State (also called the Illinois) was an old transport. However, as youngsters we would have been impressed by its size. Pancho and another neighborhood boy whose name I can't recall trained there before being sent to England as frogmen in preparation for the D-Day landing. It was decided that those boys with big chests (big lungs) could do the job best. I can recall Pancho telling me after the war that he had only a few days of Boot Camp. Sports -- we used the oval near City College. Stick ball -- 144th between Amsterdam and B'way. A ball hit to any roof was an out, never a homer. Spaldines was Spaldings were costly in the 1930s. One had to learn to hit as far up the street as possible, over the sewers. That is why the good hitters (one strike only) were called three-sewer hitters. The Prairie State was docked under the Via Dock c. 130th St. Like you, we visited it often. Nearby were the meatpacking/butcher plants. During the 1930s there were two "Hoovervilles" (hobo camps) under the dock. The overhead gave the men some some protection from the elements. I had an uncle who took me fishing off the piers. I felt sorry for the "lost souls." Then one day they were all gone. Hosed away! I used to wonder where they went. In friendship Ed Woods eandjwoods50@yahoo.com PanchoAs you recall, Pancho was short, about 5'8" and maybe 200 lbs. and a very good athlete -- basketball, baseball and could hold his own on a basketball court. I remember speaking to him about the UDT (Underwater Demolition Teams,the precursor to the Navy Seals) and asking him if they were relegated to swimming all the time. He told me they spent most of the time running, running, running to build endurance. As I remember, the Oval was near Convent Avenue. We never used the term two sewers in stickball. That was a Bronx expression. We bought our pink "Spaldeens" at Rutenbergs candy store on Amsterdam Avenue between 140 and 141 Streets for a nickel. He also sold kids twofers, two for a penny loosies, and Bugle Tobacco so you could roll your own or purchase a corncob pipe to puff away. Loosies were two cigarettes for a penny. I understand due to the cost of smokes they are doing that again. We played "swift pitching" in the park at Hamilton Place between 140 and 141 streets. It was comprised of drawing a box (a strike zone) on the the handball court wall and throwing balls and strikes as hard as you could. I'm a little younger then you but I remember the Swift Meat Plant down by the river and the time John Garfield filmed a scene from a movie, Force of Evil, running down the steps toward the river. Somehow he ended up at the red lighthouse under the GW Bridge and discovered his brother's body, played by Thomas Gomez, in the river. As kids during the war we would fish and crag off the docks right near the old Two Six Precinct. I'll never forget the time my younger brother came home with a catfish and an eel and damn near burned the house down trying to cook them. Boy, life was a lot simpler then. Even with a world war raging. Amsterdam AveRutenbergs, address 1628 Amsterdam, I lived in the upstairs bldg for five years. The Rutenbergs lived in an apt in the back of their store. Tommy Smith worked their paper route for many years. Tommy lived in 1626 next to McCarvill. The Conroys (Johnny the Bull) lived in 1630. Eddie O'Brien lived in 1634 over the Rothschild Deli where we could buy Old Dutch beer for 14 cents a quart plus a 5 cent deposit. "It's for my father." The playground around the corner was busy at night after it closed for the day. My recall of loosies is six for five cents in a small paper bag with six wooden matches. You refer to the station house as the "Two Six Precinct." Something tells me you were "on the job." A good family friend, Frank Lynch, became the Captain at 152nd and Amsterdam (The Three Two)? Your e-mail? In friendship, Ed Woods Three Oh PrecinctYes I worked in the South Bronx for 25 years which included 10 years at the Yankee Stadium,ten of the best years of my life. A ring side seat at the world. We played many games there-- Shae, West Point, etc. -- and traveled to Venezuela with the New York Press team. I worked out with players on the DL. Thurman Munson was a good friend as was Catfish Hunter. Lou Pinella and Graig Nettles. We guarded Pope Paul and Pope John Paul II. John Paul II gave off an aura that was indescribable. I was very close to him on three occasions and he made you weak in the knees and start to shake. Believe me it wasn't his celebrity status. Some of the people I knew were Cary Grant who used to look for me when he came to many games. Someday I'll tell you how he saved my marriage. A funny story! Jimmy Cagney came to a few games. Boy was that sad to see Rocky Sullivan, every Irish American kid's hero, all crippled up with arthritis. I finished up in the Bronx Detective Task Force and never looked back. It was a great career if you rolled with the punches. The six for five must have been filter tips.I forgot about the wooden matches. Do you remember the Hooten Bars they sold? One by two inch chocolate candy stuck on wax paper. Nobody seems to remember them. Rutenberg had the greatest malteds. They kept the milk frozen. God! Were they good! The Three Oh Precinct was at 152 Street & Amsterdam Avenue across from St. Catherines Grammar School where I went to kindergarten for a day. Later it became Bishop Dubois H.S., which I attended for three years before getting bounced along with my younger brother. There was a kid by the name of Neally Riorden who may have lived in your building and a kid by the name of Brian Neeson Hannon who died around 1945. I remember going to his wake on Vinegar Hill. Next we should take a trip down Vinegar Hill. My e mail is fuzz408@optonline.net God bless & HAPPY EASTER Rutenberg'sRutenberg's had the greatest milkshakes mainly because they kept the milk semi frozen. They also had Hooten bars, sheets of one by two inch chocolate that sold for a penny each. I've never met anyone from a different neighborhood who heard of them. Yes, I was on the job for 25 years in the South Bronx. Check your personal e mail. The Three Oh was at 152 Street and Amsterdam Avenue. It's now a landmark. The new precinct is on 151st Street of Amsterdam. How about Wings Cigarettes with the photos of WW II planes? The Shamrock Bar was on the corner of 140th Street and Amsterdam. On weekends guys would pick up containers of beer and carry them over to Convent Avenue for refreshments during the stickball games. Take care, Norm PanchoLooking for any info on Pancho Periera. He is my godfather and was best friends with my dad, Frank Corrigan. OLLumnaI went graduated from OLL in 1950. I came across this great site and I am wondering if anyone graduated the same year. I have been trying to get in contact with my fellow classmates and this looked like a great opportunity! The Old ShamrockI visted the 140th Street area a few years ago and took a few pictures. The Shamrock is gone with the wind -- history. I showed a picture of the building (1626 Amsterdam) to Vinnie McCarvill, who had lived there, when I met him for a beer in New Orleans a few years ago, and he almost wept. Some great memories of our Salad Days came to mind. "Oh the nights at the playground on Hamilton Place." It's the place where we came of age. In friendship, Eddie and Jackie ParishesOne thing folks from New Orleans and New York City have in common is that you identified your neighborhood by the parish in which you lived. Agnes GerrityMy mother, Agnes Gerrity, born 1916, and her brothers Thomas and Richard (born c. 1914 and 1920) attended Our Lady of Lourdes until high school. All three have passed away but I'd love to hear if anyone happens to remember them. Like your mother, my mom loved that school and spoke of it often. Anne Collins OLL Confirmation Day 1935I thought former students would enjoy seeing the uniform we wore in Our Lady of Lourdes School Primary Dept (1st to 4th Grade) during the 1930s. KnickersIt was humiliating having to wear knickers. Remember pulling them down to your ankles and thinking "maybe people will think they are pegged pants"? Boy did we ever fool the public! And how about the high starched collars -- I don't think they could have even gotten Freddie Barthomew to wear them. Didn't we replace them with waterboarding? However Ed, they look great on you. Do you still wear them? Old OLL picsDoes any one have some old OLL class photos or just some neighborhood pictures to post here in the comments? I'm sure a lot of Shorpy addicts would appreciate them. OLLi go to school at lourdes now im in the 8th grade and i think its really cool to see people talk about the memories they had about my school before i was even born and i would love to see some kind of picture of the inside of the school like a class picture so i can see what it used to look like [Just wait'll you get to Capitalization and Punctuation. - Dave] Class of 1964I too went to OLL from '57-'64. My parents and I moved to 3495 Broadway at 143rd St. in 1956. I started in the 4th grade with Mother Mary William. The school in those days was no longer a military academy. We wore navy blue uniforms, white shirts and the school tie and the girls wore navy blue jumpers with a white blouse and blue tie. It was very interesting reading about all the students who came before me and where they lived. I always was so curious to find out how this old neighborhood looked like years before we moved in. As you all know, the area changed at some point racially, although when I was at OLL the school was still predominantly white with a handful of Black children. I will always have wonderful memories of my time at OLL. My parents moved out of the area in 1969 and I since been back once to recapture some old memories of my childhood. NostalgiaThe picture that follows is the 1937 graduation class with the girls omitted. Monsignor McMahon built church and school(1901-1913); after 15 years as Curator at St Patrick's Cathedral, constructed 7 years earlier. See church of Our Lady of Lourdes for construction details. At the time of graduation, Fr's Mahoney, Dillon and Brennan resided across from the Church. The Poor Clares home was to right of the church, and secondary had Society of the Holy Name Jesus sisters. School and Church gave us faith and hope and discipline. Our world was the depression years followed by the wars. Our class of 1937 was just in time. The handsome lad below the sergeant stripes is the brother of contributor Ed Woods.Ed,and brothers Bill and Dennis served with distinction. Andy Saraga bottom right was a highly decorated Marines The others served as well. I hope Our Lady of Lourdes provides the inspiration our families sought for us. Nostalgia 1937The 1937 graduation photo is great. It's with both sadness and pride to think that most of these wonderful kids would be defending our country in a very short time in different uniforms.Believe it or not this military training was useful. How about more pictures like this and some candid neighborhood shots. OLL in the NYThttp://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/16/nyregion/16priest.htm So interesting: A more recent residentJust want to say that I've read every entry on this post. It is so interesting to read the memories shared by those that lived way before you in the same neighborhood. My mother and I live on 135th Street near Riverside between 66th and 77th, then moved to 138th between Hamilton and Amsterdam. I went to PS 161 and graduated from CCNY. I also have fond memories of my childhood. I used to play basketball in an after school center at Our Lady of Lourdes as a young kid, visited the area a couple of years ago and brought back great pics. Cheers to all Mauricio The Grinnell: Celebrating Its Centennial Those of you who remember The Grinnell (800 Riverside Drive) may be interested to know that the residents have just begun celebrating the building's centennial. We're having a year of events,so this is a great year to visit! Check the website: http://www.thegrinnellat100.com/ for photos, historical news articles, and residents' memories (and contribute your own). Click the calendar tab for a listing of the events between now and July 2011. Matthew Why Grinnel!The hundredth anniversary of a building? Forgotten is the fact that it's also the anniversary of the site building, and all the memories fast fading. I think Ed Woods of all the graduates, always hit the mark. Several others struggled to add something. If someone remembers the names of the sisters and preferably anecdotes please don't deny this information from this site. I personally remember sister Rose from 4th grade 1934. I believe Mother Michael provided my brother Andy's Confirmation name. Others with better memories speak up. Also it wasn't only our generation that owes recognition for all given freely. Christmas at Our Lady of LourdesAt Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve, the statues in the creche would be replaced by live students. The scene would be repeated the following day at the 9 o'clock Children's Mass and the 11 o'clock High Mass. A live baby would be borrowed to lie in the manger. The girl who posed as the Blessed Mother and the boy who posed as Joseph were the envy of the entire student body. "Oh to return to yesteryear." Happy New YearThank you SHORPY for bringing back to us so many wonderful memories. It has been said pictures are worth a thousand words. Shorpy's pictures, however, are worth so much more -- just can't put a number on them. Thank you and a Happy New Year to the Shorpy Staff. Ed and Jackie Woods [And thank you, Ed and Jackie, for inspiring the hundreds of interesting comments in this thread. - Dave] The OLL neighborhoodIt's nice reading and re-reading your stories about OLL, Hamiliton Place,and seeing the names listed. Many years ago, in my past, I visited the old neighborhood only to find it somewhat depressing, old and in poor shape. One time in particular I had parked my new "rental car" near West 144th street, and was showing my young children some of the places I lived on Amsterdam Ave, Hamilton Place ( 95 and 115 buildings) when two older African Americans came up to us, and said you'd be better not park here." It wasn't said as a threat, but more it's unsafe here, now that the area has changed. I had told them that I used to live here many years ago. I am glad to hear from Norm, that the area has rebounded, and in looking at the prices of the real estate I wish we had stayed here. Keep up the good work. Matt Waters mattminn@aol.com Hi Anon Tipster 1959. I used to date Carlotta Long & visited her lovely home many times. 147 off Convent as I recall. I often wonder in my old age (69) whatever happened to her & how her life turned out. I did graduate from Dubois in 1960, so I'm very familiar w/the sights & places referenced here. So glad I found this site. Tis That Time of YearThank you SHORPY for another year of nostalgic pictures and comments. Brought to us in Black and White and Living Color. Such fond memories of long ago, especially the itchy bathing suits. In the 1920s and up to the early 1940s, when on or near the beach and boardwalk, boys had to wear the coarse wooolen suits with the tops on at all times. Merry Christmas and a Happy and Healthy New York to Dave and staff. Ed and Jackie Woods Our Yearly PlaysI graduated in 1960 after 8 memorable years. I remember our yearly plays in the auditorium and all the hard work and practice we put into it. Father Hart was our pastor and I remember our farewell speech to him. My best friend was Lydia Marin and I remember Maria Santory, Joyce Brown, Maria Matos, Alma Mora, Maureen Quirk. If any of you from this class are around, give a shout. Jackie Erick Class of 1964Class of 1964 where are you guys? Write something here you remember. Do you remember me? OLL Class of 1957Here's the names of the boys' teachers from 1949 to 1957. I think I have then all correct. Grade 1, 1949-1950: Mother Mary Theodosia Grade 2, 1950-1951: Sister Mary Macrina Grade 3, 1951-1952: Mother Mary Eulalia Grade 4, 1952-1953: Mother Mary Declan Grade 5, 1953-1954: Mother Mary Edwards Grade 6, 1954-1955: Mother Maria Del Amor Grade 7, 1955-1956: Mother Mary Euphrates Grade 8, 1956-1957: Mother Mary Rosario Eighteen nuns lived in the convent adjacent to the church on 142nd Street: eight boys' teachers, eight girls' teachers, the school principal, known as the Reverend Mother, and the housekeeper. Six priests and the pastor lived in the rectory on the south side of 142nd Street. OLL was also known as Old Ladies' Laundry. I've written down the names of almost all the boys who, at one point or another, were part of the class of 1957. Only 27 graduated in 1957. Many were expelled in 1956 as part of a crackdown on gang membership. Mother Mary Rosario was brought in to preside over a difficult situation, but after the expulsions her job turned out to be not that complicated. I'll post the list of names another time. Our Lady of Lourdes Alumni ReunionHello out there. I am a current parent at Our Lady of Lourdes. As we enter a new decade, OLL would would like to start planning a few reunions. I am looking for some potential organizers to help us reach out and plan events in the new year. Please reach out if you are interested in planning or connect dots. There are many new happenings at the school. We will be launching a new website by the end of the month with an alumni portion. Thank you! Vanessa vdecarbo@ollnyc.org Class of 1971Hi! I graduated in 1971 and our teacher was Sister Patricia. I remember Marlene Taylor, Karen, Miriam, Dina, Elsie, Maria and Robin, Carla, Margaret and Giselle. Our class was an all girl class. I also remember Sister Rebecca, Sister Theresa, Sister Rosemarie (our history teacher). I continued to Cathedral High School but I miss all my dear classmates. Is there anyone out there who enters this site? My email is n.krelios@yahoo.com I would love to hear from someone. Marlene Taylor became a doctor (wonderful!!!). Shorpy Hall of FameIf there were a Shorpy Hall of Fame, this photo would definitely have to be in the inaugural class. I've enjoyed going through the many comments for this photo going back to 2007 even though I have absolutely no connection to the school other than being Catholic. What is equally as awesome is that a look at the location today via Google Maps indicates that, other than a few trees, fire hydrants, automobiles and removal of the statue, everything is basically the same today. Double DutchKllroy is correct about not much having changed, but it looks like even the foreground fire hydrant is in the same place (but a newer model). It looks like the circa 1914 photographer was set-up on the northeast corner of Amsterdam Avenue and 143rd Street. The Google Maps photo was taken travelling northbound on Amsterdam Avenue. So basically both photos are shot from almost the same location; it is interesting how the vintage image makes 143rd Street appear much shorter than in the Google image. I guess it's the result of different formats and lenses. By the way, the buildings at the far end of the T-intersection, on Convent Avenue (mostly blocked by the trees in the Google image), reflect NYC's Dutch heritage [ETA:] as does "Amsterdam" Avenue. (The Gallery, Education, Schools, G.G. Bain, Kids, NYC)
Virtual Baseball: 1924
... the Yankees 5-1. A demonstration of the 1920s mania for baseball (and the straw boater), at just about the time radio was making ... the Eastern League on September 18. Optimism about a baseball season in Washington this spring is the highest it's been since, well, ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 07/31/2012 - 2:57pm -

August 29, 1924. "Crowd at Washington Star scoreboard for A.L. Pennant game, Nationals-New York." The Nats beat the Yankees 5-1. A demonstration of the 1920s mania for baseball (and the straw boater), at just about the time radio was making mechanical scoreboards obsolete. National Photo Co. View full size. IV LeagueIt almost looks like the scoreboard has a crude "LED display" for both teams' runs using Roman numerals. The odd arrangement of bulbs looks like you could display an assortment of X, V, and III characters. Got to be one in every crowdA real wise guy. Yeah, you. Walter Johnson WinsWalter Johnson bests Bullet Joe Bush for his 18th win of the year. No Gehrig in the lineup that day -- his time will come the next year when Wally Pipp sits out a game with that famous headache. Packed Like SardinesPickpockets must have been having a field day, so to speak. Almost time for my namesake to show upThat is, at least my screen namesake. Lefler joined the Nats from Worcester of the Eastern League on September 18. Optimism about a baseball season in Washington this spring is the highest it's been since, well, long before I was born. (Of course not having a team to be optimistic about was the norm for about 33 years.) My expectations are tempered and it's a more cynical, partisan country we now live in, but the kid in me would love to see this kind of excitement in the District again. Gregarious ain't we?Humans. We all cluster together. I can find only five women and three african americans in this crowd. But really, the most remarkable thing seems to me how they all wore hats back then. Perhaps this was a way to cover unwashed hair? Seems odd. Amber WavesIt must have taken all the straw in Nebraska to make all those hats! Could it be?another sale on straw hats? Hall of FamersFor the Yankees: Batting third: Babe Ruth Batting fifth: Wally Pip For the Nationals: Pitching: Walter Johnson And probably a couple more. NationalsI believe they were called the Senators back in 1924 and not the Nationals. I also believe in was the New York Giants and not the Yankees that played in this game. I did not see that this was the AL playoff game. Sorry. The Nationals name derives from the former Washington baseball team which had the same name (used interchangeably with Senators). Their nickname is "the Nats"—a shortened version that was also used by the old D.C. teams. Pipp Pipp, HoorayHard to imagine, even in today's sports-obsessed world, a crowd of people standing on a street corner waiting for a score. Of course, technology means none of us have to do that, but it's still fascinating to see the difference between then and now. I also noticed on the scoreboard that the First Baseman for the Yankees was Wally Pipp. Pipp would become infamous the next year when replaced in the lineup, due to a hitting slump, by a kid named Lou Gehrig. Pipp never got his starting position back with the Yanks. Baseball CapIn that vast sea of straw hats (and the occasional cloth cap), a cursory glance spots only one baseball cap. (Just to the left of the small tree, center right in the picture). You'd think that today it would be just the opposite! Why the Yanks lostWas because Mr. Gehrig was a year away. There's Wally Pipp batting fifth. Better not get a headache any time soon Mr. Pipp. Other HoFers on the field@Edvado : Besides Johnson and Ruth, Washington's Bucky Harris, Sam Rice, and Goose Goslin would join the Baseball Hall of Fame. Wally Pipp is not in the Hall. The Real Hall of Famers.This Nats lineup was loaded with Hall of Famers, and was almost certainly the greatest lineup in the history of Washington baseball. The Yankees though were still a little short of their H of F glory years to come. For Washington: Walter Johnson Goose Goslin Sam Rice and player-manager Bucky Harris For the Yanks: only the Babe This one is perfect for...a jigsaw puzzle! (The Gallery, D.C., Natl Photo, Sports)
Play-by-Play: 1924
"Washington baseball, 1924." The broadcasting cage at Griffith Stadium in the early days of ... to get away with such an arrangement today. Visions of baseball in 1924 This from a Washington Post article from last year... ... a telegraph. Ronald Reagan told stories about "live" baseball broadcasts in the 1930s where in the studio he narrated the ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 05/05/2013 - 4:37pm -

"Washington baseball, 1924." The broadcasting cage at Griffith Stadium in the early days of commercial radio. Harris & Ewing glass negative. View full size. BleachersIf you were in the front row of the bleachers on the third base side, off to the left, odds were you had to ask folks how the game was going. Neat picture of an old Washington landmark, gone these many years. Everready 770 'B' BatteriesVery common in that era, but putting eight 45 volts batteries in series like that would yield 360 volts of fully exposed shock potential. You'd never be able to get away with such an arrangement today. Visions of baseball in 1924This from a Washington Post article from last year... "...the stadium erupted in mayhem when the home team entered the history books with a walk-off win in the deciding game of the World Series. As The Post reported, the crowd of 35,000, “delirious with joy, broke into a bedlam on the field that had never been duplicated in point of volume and intense excitement in the annals of sporting history.” The Washington mob was so unruly that Walter “Big Train” Johnson, the local team’s ace, fled the ballpark in a fast motorcar, trailed by a “sea of humanity in an endless snake-dance,” and the Secret Service was all but helpless to protect President Calvin Coolidge and his wife, who quaked in the presidential box." Bug?That looks like a semiautomatic telegraph key ("bug") - it makes dots fast if you push right, and one long dash if you push left - which enables you to send very fast morse code. Just going by the visible tops and the guy's arm position. That's a lot of foul territory but --I am sure the short fence in the outfield more than made up for any defensive advantage. re: Bug?I think rhhardin is correct, that is a telegraph. Ronald Reagan told stories about "live" baseball broadcasts in the 1930s where in the studio he narrated the play-by-play from a telegraph operator in the stadium. OK, not the most reliable source, but still I believe the practice endured for years after 1924. A Telegraph KeyWas used by AP (and other news services) to telegraph news stories to newspapers. This guy's got it backwardsThis type of telegraph sender was made by the Vibroplex Company of Brooklyn, NY, whose logo featured a likeness of something like a Box Elder Bug. Thus the keys themselves came to be known as "bugs." My now long-deceased neighbor, a railroad telegrapher, taught me the rudements of the trade, though I never got any good at it. Rule No. 1: learn to key with your left hand, leaving your right hand free to write your copy of each word as you send it (or underline what you have already received and are sending back as confirmation). When the computer mouse came out I realized that was a pretty good tactic. To this day, I drive my mouse with my left hand. Telegraph ticker broadcastsWhen I was a kid back in the very early 50s, Waite Hoyt, the local radio announcer for the Cincinnati Reds would do a play-by-play for out of town games based on information he received from a telegraph ticker. You could hear the ticker clacking away in the background during his broadcasts. Baseball Radio Broadcast: 1924When I lived in the Washington, DC suburbs in the 1950s and 1960s, I listened to Nat Allbright's broadcasts of the LA Dodgers games. Nat also used the AP wire service to create his own phony "play-by-play." Thus, his broadcasts always lagged a few minutes behind the live action. Once I found out what he was doing, I played a funny trick on my father that must have convinced him that I could predict the future. I wrote a brief story about it, and you can see it on my website. http://www.morningsonmaplestreet.com/personal7.html Re: The keyPhotographic evidence suggest that the key pictured is a "bug." A straight key, the kind we're more familiar with, doesn't have the side adjustments pictured. In fact, a normal straight key has, for most models, just two adjustments. A bug, depending on which model, can have up to nine adjustments adorning it! Teletype baseballBack in the late 1940's and early 1950's, the Indianapolis Indians road baseball games were broadcast on WISH radio by Luke Walton, a legend here in Indy, using a teletype, the listener could hear it in the background, he would tell us he was using a teletype. (Technology, The Gallery, D.C., Harris + Ewing, Sports)
Big Gun: 1917
... have caused real damage. As it was, they blew up the baseball backstop in the fort. Morale is said to have reached new lows after ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 02/26/2024 - 11:02pm -

Washington, D.C., or vicinity circa 1917. "Military training. Loading big gun." 4x5 inch glass negative, Harris & Ewing Collection. View full size. Disappearing Mount - Coast ArtilleryThat's a coast artillery gun (probably a 12-inch bore) on a disappearing mount. After loading, the gun was pivoted upward by an hydraulic cylinder over the concrete wall for firing. After firing, the recoil compressed the hydraulic cylinder and the gun returned to the loading position. Here's a full view of one in the "down" position: Fashion StatementIn the 1950's, boys' trousers with that belt and buckle arrangement were the fashion. Apparently, at some time, it was actually functional. Cooties Keep OutTheir will be no bugs climbing up into the pant legs of these fellows, although there looks to be plenty of apartment space for them above the knees. Ram It Home, Boys!This photo could have been the inspiration for this not-at-all-suggestive recruiting poster. Disappearing Mount (or Carriage)Is that picture from Fort Casey on Whidbey Island, in Washington State? The fort (now a state park) has two such guns, brought over from Corregidor in the Philippines. The guns show battle damage from WWII. There could be more such guns at other coastal forts but the Fort Casey ones are the only ones I know about. There is a similar fort (Ft. Stevens) near Astoria, Oregon, that had the same type of guns. Fort Stevens was shelled by a Japanese submarine during the early days of WWII. The soldiers manning the batteries were not allowed to return fire because the Japanese gun outranged the fort's guns and were more accurate to boot. It was apparent that the Japanese fire was harassing fire only and they didn't appear to know about the fort. Returning fire would only have alerted the Japanese to a real target and they could have caused real damage. As it was, they blew up the baseball backstop in the fort. Morale is said to have reached new lows after the attack. GunsRailsplitter: If memory serves, those guns came from Fort Wint, on Subic Bay. The guns at the various Manilla Bay forts were damaged a good deal more, but the overly hasty retreat to the Bataan peninsula left the Subic forts intact. (The Gallery, Harris + Ewing, WWI)
Leave It to Beaver: 1958
... time. I'm sure that I saw it a few years later. Loved the baseball reference. Keep up the good work. rcisco Cisco Photo Carmel, ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 07/15/2018 - 7:10pm -

I was watching an episode from the second season (1958-59) of "Leave It to Beaver" tonight when I got to the part where Ward reads a note from Beaver's principal, Mrs. Rayburn. If you freeze-frame the note it says: Mr. Ward Cleaver 485 Mapleton Drive Mayfield, State My Dear Mr. Cleaver: This paragraph has absolutely nothing to do with anything. It is here merely to fill up space. Still, it is words, rather than repeated letters, since the latter might not give the proper appearance, namely, that of an actual note. For that matter, all of this is nonsense, and the only part of this that is to be read is the last paragraph, which part is the inspired creation of the producers of this very fine series. Another paragraph of stuff. Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their party. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. My typing is lousy, but the typewriter isn’t so hot either. After all, why should I take the blame for these mechanical imperfections, with which all of us must contend. Lew Burdette just hit a home run and Milwaukee leads seven to one in the series. This is the last line of the filler material of the note. No, my mistake, that was only the next to last. This is last. I hope you can find a suitable explanation for Theodore’s unusual conduct. Yours truly, Cornelia Rayburn To judge by the contents (here's the last line, whoops, no, HERE's the last line) whoever did this folded the note first, to mark the middle third of the paper, then put it in the typewriter, started the body of the letter at the first crease and banged away until he had enough to fill out the middle section. The Lew Burdette reference would put the date at October 2, 1958 — Game 2 of the World Series between the Braves and the Yankees, and a month before this episode ("Her Idol") aired. I see where this has been referenced elsewhere on the Web but as far as I can tell no one has transcribed the entire letter. Until now! We now return to our regularly scheduled program. [Postscript: The Jim Letter] Leave It To Beaver, 1958BEAUTIFUL!! :) Thanks for the update. We used to get this show Down Here (Oz) and I can remember watching every episode if possible. Crikey...that gives my age away! BK Canberra Australia LITB on DVDSeason 1 and Season 2 are available on DVD from Amazon. beaver lettertoo funny!!!!!!!!! Ahh...that's awesome. ThanksAhh...that's awesome. Thanks for posting this! I love it.That's FANTASTIC. Awesome!Back in the 50's they never dreamed anyone would be able to freeze frame on the TV picture. How funny would it have been had the writer typed something REALLY embarrassing! Great post!!Great post!! Fan-freakin- tastic!!This is just too cool for mere words. Nonetheless, words must suffice. Excellent!! Marvelous!I wish every movie had stuff like that for us to find. 21 inch B&W TV set.That's what you had if you really splurged on a TV for the living room in those days. No sense buying a color TV, since for the $700 (and up) one of those cost, you got to watch maybe one show a week in color - a variety show "special" with Fred Astaire perhaps. Anyway, you couldn't possibly read the letter from a 525-line video, no matter how big your TV was. Film, maybe, but not video. [I don't know about that. I'm the one who deciphered the letter and created this post, and I used a 10-year-old, 27-inch, 525-line low-definition Sony. The main obstacle to being able to read it in 1958 would have been that it was onscreen for just a few seconds. - Dave] Timely...Canadian viewers who get SunTV will be able to catch that episode this Friday (May 4th) at 12:30 pm... Re: awesome!Don't you know? Back inthe fifties people didn't HAVE embarrassing thoughts that could spill out onto the printed page! Sheesh. Get with the program. So, did a writer on the show type this up, ordid he hand it off to a secretary for her to type? This comment has absolutely nothing to do with anythingit's just here to take up space. I'd use this space to root for my favourite hockey team and thus forever determine the exact time this comment was written but I can't get excited about any of them. I would guessI would guess the tomfoolery is the prop master's work, and he probably made the prop the day before, or earlier in the day, so it's more likely the actual day of shooting was October 3rd. ["The date" means the date the note was typed. My hunch is that the show's producers, Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher, are behind it. They slipped written references to themselves into a number of other episodes. - Dave] That's tamer than most propThat's tamer than most prop letters I've seen. In the last play I worked on the prop master ranted for 3 pages about the playwright, added sexual escapades in the characters backstory and other in-jokes. Thank god the audience is 40 feet away and there's no freeze-frame in live theatre! wardi can't wait to get the second season. it's a great show. that is one hell of a letter. obviously Mrs. Rayburn is either on a nice dose of pharm's or desperately needs one. awesome. Rodine, NYC BK Canberra. crikey?For anyone reading BK's reply above, as another resident of australia, let me just assure you that nobody here actually uses the word "crikey". That would be like an american going around saying "dandy", "swell" or even that old chestnut, "geewilllickers". The crocodile hunter only ever used the word "crikey" when teasing an animal or selling something. Thanks, Dan, Sydney. Prop funIn a high school production of the musical Cinderella, the scroll that's supposed to contain all the names of His Royal Highness Christopher Rupert Windemere Vladimir (and so on) was covered by our props department with just one line, in big bold letters: "DON'T SCREW UP". I use the word Crikey on occasionAnd have been known to utter the odd 'by jingoes', 'cobber' or, my personal favourite, 'strewth'. Anyone who doesn't occasionally enjoy such words (especially when overseas) is quite simply un-Australian mate :) Mark, Sydney. PS: Good work on the leave it to Beaver letter - I love this stuff! LITBGolly geewillikers that was swell. The absolute bees knees. Just dandy. thanks. Egads......So, where's the text for the second page, which contains the *real* "Roswell Press Release"? :) That is so awesome! HowThat is so awesome! How freaking cool...I got chills reading it, because I'm sure that guy never thought anyone would ever read that letter. Sarah Too much like real lifeReading this, I am suddenly transported back 25 years to my American History class in 10th grade. I was supposed to be writing an essay about American gangsters of the early 20th century, and for some reason I became convinced that my teacher would never read everyone's paper every single time. So being the incredibly wise-ass young man that we all are at 16, I dropped in three or four lines, beginning mid-sentence in a paragraph about Al Capone's bootleg whiskey empire, all about how my grandmother's poodles enjoyed riding in cars (or some equally stupid text about my grandmother...the exact words escape me now), and then went on to say that I know that he (my teacher) would never read everyone's paper and that he would never know these lines were buried in my own paper. I then went on to finish the rest of the paper normally, and handed it in with a smile on my face. The day after I turned in the paper, the teacher stood in front of the whole class and read my paper out loud. Had there been a way to drop through the floor at that time...I'd have taken it. 25 years later, I can STILL feel my face get red, just thinking about it! I can commiserate with the author of Beaver's letter... "the typewriter isn't so hot""My typing is lousy, but the typewriter isn’t so hot either" why do I have this sense that in 1958 people weren't saying "the typewriter isn't so hot" [I don't know. Why do you? - Dave] bravo"After all, why should I take the blame for these mechanical imperfections, with which all of us must contend." GLORIOUS. greek to meLorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Vivamus risus risus, ultrices vel, mollis vel, faucibus sagittis, diam. Nunc dignissim odio in est. In mattis condimentum erat. Nunc ac nunc. Vivamus eget elit. Aliquam pellentesque. Aliquam dignissim tellus vitae tortor. Class aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos hymenaeos. Nam tincidunt pulvinar urna. Quisque sed risus. Sed tempus, elit ut tempus iaculis, purus sapien vulputate leo, quis commodo pede magna vel turpis. Cras ac pede. Suspendisse tincidunt, nunc vel ultrices adipiscing, lacus augue bibendum magna, sit amet scelerisque felis nulla eu lectus. Sed sit amet elit. Pellentesque id dui. Pellentesque vel justo. Quisque sit amet mi quis tellus rhoncus blandit. Maecenas arcu. Aliquam ipsum. [More like "Latin to me" - Dave] letter to mr. cleaver I thought it would read: "Gee, Ward. Don't you think you were a little hard on the Beaver last night?" Not a typical American, but...I say "swell" all the time. "Keen" and "Dandy", too. Lew Burdette's World Series HomerDid come in the bottom of the first inning on October 2, 1958. The Braves had already won the opening game the previous day, also in Milwaukee. The bottom of the first inning, after the Yankees got a 1-0 lead in their first at bat, began when Bill Bruton hit a 2-2 pitch for a home run to tie the game. The Braves went on to win the second game and then the Yankees won the third. After the Braves also won the fourth game, The Yankees won three in a row to win the series. This had only happened once before in 1925 when the Washington Senators came back with three straight wins after being down 3-1 against the Pittsburgh Pirates. Ten years later in 1968, the Detroit Tigers came back to win the final three games after being down 3-1 to win the 1968 World Series. Donald F Nelson LITB rocksexcellent "leave it to beaver" rocks!! ward rules! june was hot and i dont mean the month. Common PracticeHaving been a Property Master in the television business for quite a few years, I can assure you that this is extremely common. The text could be the actor's lines if they have a tough scene and the prop guy likes them. Sometimes it is jokes designed to crack the actor up during the first take. Other times it is exactly this kind of stream-of-consciousness rambling serving no greater purpose than filling up the page. My specialty was always the fine print on package labels. The warning on the beer labels in the first "American Pie" movie said that beer could cause pregnancy, cause you to act like an idiot, or just plain F- you up. Re: greek to me"Lorem ipsum" etc. is Latin not Greek. Quasi-LatinSee: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorem_ipsum Cheers! Have you everHave you ever noticed the newspapers Ward reads during this series? There is usually some reference to a MURDER or some other catastrophe. Highly unusual for Mayfield. And I thought we were obsessed with Beaver at The First Leave It To Beaver WebSite Stop by and learn about The Complete Unofficial Leave It To Beaver Trivia Encyclopedia Marcus Tee Speaking of Ward's newspapers...... do they ever include my two favorite column headlines: New Petitions Against Tax Building Code Under Fire After watching nearly 200 old films (courtesy of Mystery Science Theater 3000), these seem to be the two most common newspaper prop filler headlines in films of the '40s and '50s. I wonder if they found their way into '50s and '60s television, too. I adore thisSo far, this is the highlight of my day. Thanks for transcribing this! Love the BeavI love this show. So many great quotes: "Gee Dad, I wouldn't mind telling the truth if so much hollering didn't go along with it." But who knew there were Leave it to Beaver easter eggs? This post made my day. Re: "crikey"@Dan Re: "crikey" That was helpful. I've always wondered when Steve Irwin said that why no one from our Australian offices used the term. You confirmed what I thought. Thanks Lorem Ipsum to BeaverThat is just so much better than the placeholder text one typically sees. Are there jobs out there for lorem ipsum writers? Craigslist has not a one. Excellent post. Thanks. the sobsister http://www.thesobsister.com Building Code Under FireI think I've seen "Building Code Under Fire," & maybe the other headline as well in episodes of Perry Mason. Obviously some prop house printed a zillion front page mock-ups that were used forever. And often the program-specific headlines are in a completely different font than the rest of the mock-op. I also dig when a prop magazine is on glossy paper so it will look real, but the glossy stock it's printed on is so heavy it barely moves, let alone looks real. M. Bouffant Great!I think that is so very cool! interesting interchange!i enjoyed reading this very much. i'm in a library in orlando, florida. Very funny and entertaining!Very funny and entertaining! Gotta love all those old B&W shows!!! It's a pretty common practice.I've read some interesting freeze frames in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Roswell, also. oh?Can you post some BtVS freezeframes you find of interest? That's what I'm alwaysThat's what I'm always scared of! too funny!!! It's like the whole RoswellIt's like the whole Roswell Memo, but more important. Written on 10/2/58I don't know why but I decided to do some research on the date this letter may have been written and I'm pretty sure it's Thursday October 2nd 1958. I tried to go further and find the time of day but I can only estimate late afternoon pacific time (assuming it was written in LA). The Lew Burdette sentence references the first inning of game 2 in the 1958 World Series between the Milwaukee Braves and New York Yankees. Milwaukee went on to win the game 13 to 5 but the Yankees won the series. Re: Written 10/2/58Another clue would be the caption under the letter that says it was written during Game 2 of the World Series on Oct. 2, 1958! Thanks for posting this!It's too, too wonderful. Thank ghod there are people like you in the world who pay attention to details. my quiz for allHi all! You are The Best!!! G'night have you everI have noticed that, even in Mayfield. That was for Ward not the kids, the show was done from a childs view. Marcus your web site is really great, and the encylopedia with its "map" is a lot of fun. Nice running into you on this site. OMGIf you read the letter upside down and backwards, it says that Space Aliens are going to attack the world on May 09, 2007. HEY, THAT'S TOMORROW! RUN & HIDE! Old school Formatting Well, I tried the paper trick (folding it in thirds and starting the body of the letter at the crease) and now my printer is broken and the red light is flashing. Now what? Burdette "hit a homerun"?That's very odd, given that he was not a batter, but was instead famously known as the Braves' MVP pitcher, who won three games in the World Series of 1957! [It's kind of hard to pitch when your team is at bat. Lew hit a three-run homer. - Dave] Lew Burdette's homerunLew's three-run homer came in the first inning of Game 2. Leave it to Beaver, 1958Great photo from the archives. I was only 3 years old at the time. I'm sure that I saw it a few years later. Loved the baseball reference. Keep up the good work. rcisco Cisco Photo Carmel, IN Now you've done it.I always wondered what was written on prop letters, but never did anything to find out. Now I know how, and every movie I watch on DVD gets freeze frame and zoom. Last night it was My Fair Lady and while Eliza is working on her 'H's, just over 1 hour into the film...well, you ought to check it out. My family hates you. Letters shown on cameraSo I guess Ward didn't read this one out loud as others were read out loud. Wally reading the letter from the Continental Modeling Agency and the letter from the Merchant Marines. Also they don't show the letter from Marathon Records but Beav read it out loud as does Ward reading the letter from Mason Acme Products. Scrabby Newspapers on LITBDid you notice how many different newspapers are shown on the show. I had to freeze frame to find them all. Mayfield Times Mayfield Dispatcher Press Herald Courier Sun Mayfield News anymore? Scrabby Newspapers on LITBYou should talk to Marcus Tee at his web site (its posted a few comments down) he is the expert The Beaver LetterWard did read it out loud - the crucial last paragraph. Soapy SudsNotice how one magazine Ward is reading always has a Soapy Suds ad on the back. Lou, The Braves and the Beav...As a Milwaukee kid (then not quite five years old), I got a special kick out of seeing this. Oct. 2, 1958 was my big sister's 15th birthday. At that age she was a HUGE Braves fan-- found and mailed the team four-leaf clovers, etc. So (the '58 Series outcome notwithstanding) a Braves victory and a three-run shot by Burdette was probably a birthday present for her. A better letterHow fun! 100 years from now it'll be easier to find your transcription than to watch the entire episode. Perhaps the episode will have been made famous to future generations because they're hoping to catch a quick view of the Famous Letter. Full circle ironics and all that. P.L. Frederick Small and Big The LetterThis is the greatest letter I have ever read. Thank you. Other Letters on LITBWonder if the other letters that are sent to the Cleavers are written like this one. For instance the letter Beaver gets from the Continental Modeling Company which we only see the address or the letter from the Merchant Marines. Sometimes they don't even show the letter like the one from Mason Acme Co or Marathon Record Company. Lew BurdetteI remember Lew pitching. He had a routine: Adjust hat, lick fingertips, wipe on chest! I later copied the move when I pitched in Little League! BeaverI remember when Beav was playing with a set of trains over at Mary Ellen Rodgers's house. The were marked for the JC & BM railroad. Quite a nice layout, wonder who got to keep it. [Right. JC & BM were Joe Connelly and Bob Mosher, the series creators. - Dave] Currently #1 on RedditThe Beaver Letter has been the No. 1 post on Reddit since around midnight. Check out the comments. Modern speakWow, they used correct English in that letter. If that letter were typed today it would read: Mr. Ward Cleaver 485 Mapleton Drive Mayfield, State My Dear Mr. Cleaver: tl:dr GTFO. LOL, ur son iz dum. k thx I admit it!I went out with Loren Ipsum in high school and we fooled around behind the stage. Second base only! Those 1960s BirthdaysEveryone here looks terrified. My 7th Birthday Party in La Puente, California. Home Addressshame on that staff writer. If he had only payed paid attention to the opening theme he would know there was a clear shot of front door showing the house number as "211". But .. specifically: 211 Pine Street, Mayfield, Ohio [The Cleavers lived in two houses. The first was on Mapleton, the second on Pine. And as for Ohio, Mayfield was famously stateless. - Dave] Leave it to Beaver - the Skokie ConnectionHere is an update on Leave it to Beaver including vintage stock footage of Skokie, Illinois. I also very proudly deciphered the Beaver letter featured here, only to find Shorpy beat me to it by several years. As you'll see, I give full credit where it is due. http://silentlocations.wordpress.com/2013/03/04/leave-it-to-skokie-and-b... (Bizarre, Curiosities, Kids, TV)
Adrian C. Anson: 1887
A baseball card for Adrian C. Anson, first baseman for the Chicago White ... known this is, but this photo illustrates the fact that baseball cards were originally introduced in cigarette packs in order to keep ... do I get to the Susquehanna Hat Company?" Blowing Up A Baseball Card To The Size Of A Poster By my estimation, the "Full Image" ... 
 
Posted by Ken - 12/04/2007 - 12:20am -

A baseball card for Adrian C. Anson, first baseman for the Chicago White Stockings. Issued by Allen & Ginter Company, 1887. View full size Another look at "Cap" Anson."Cap" Anson was the was the 1st member of the 3000 hit club. Origin of cardsI don't know how commonly known this is, but this photo illustrates the fact that baseball cards were originally introduced in cigarette packs in order to keep the cigarettes from bending over. When they later started getting popular with kids they were packaged with bubble gum. On a totally different note, this illustration makes the guy look like he's in "Night of the Batting Dead." "How do I get to the Susquehanna Hat Company?" Blowing Up A Baseball Card To The Size Of A PosterBy my estimation, the "Full Image" version of this is approximately 30 times the size of what it's supposed to be, which would partially account for the somewhat pixilated effect. [And maybe even pixelated. - Dave] BatIt's interesting to view the evolution of baseball equipment over the decades, particularly (as this card shows) bats. Today's lumber has much more "meat" at the hittin' end, with a tapered handle that probably allows for higher swing speeds. Could this be due to better wood selection, lathing and curing techniques by the folks down there in Louisville? The lumber swung by the hitters of today's game make Cap's bat look like a fat stick. Ginter = Richmond industrialistLewis Ginter: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_Cemetery http://www.lewisginterrecreationassoc.org/history.html Major Lewis Ginter (1824 - October 1, 1897) was a prominent businessman, army officer, and philanthropist in Richmond, Virginia Of Dutch ancestry, he was born Lewis Guenther in New York City, New York, he moved to Richmond, Virginia in 1842. Ginter had a number of careers, arguably making and losing a fortune three times. Ginter amassed a great fortune in the tobacco industry via new technology for rolling cigarettes. He used this massive fortune to act as a philanthropist and for the development of civic and business interests in Richmond. He developed the neighborhood Ginter Park and brought the Union Theological Seminary there. His niece Grace Arents continued his philanthropy, spurring the development of St. Andrew's School, the Instructional Visiting Nurse Association and the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden at her home Bloemendaal. He served with the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War, rising to rank of Major. His residence Ginter House sits on the Monroe Park campus of Virginia Commonwealth University. Hired on to the John Allen & Co, he became a partner of the Allen and Ginter tobacco company that ushered in a number of innovations including cigarette cards and the use of local Virginia tobacco. In 1890 Ginter's company joined forces with James B. Duke to form the American Tobacco Co.. Ginter also commissioned the design and construction of the luxurious Jefferson Hotel Richmond, which opened in 1895. Anson helped erect the pro baseball color barrierhttp://www.capanson.com/chapter4.html Cap Anson was (common for the era, even in his native Iowa) a bigot. His racial attitudes were stronger than most, however, and he led efforts to exclude blacks from professional baseball. Note that Jackie Robinson was NOT the first black to play in the major leagues -- both Fleet and Welday Walker played in 1884 before the color barrier limited baseball to the (ahem) melanin-impaired. (Sports)
Harris at Bat: 1924
... Coleman scoreboard is in reality a small stage set as a baseball diamond. Mechanical figures clothed in actual uniforms of the rival ... 20's version of ESPN.com Gamecast or MLB.com Gameday. Baseball Reenactments At least during World Series contests back in the ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/04/2012 - 4:35am -

August 2, 1924. Washington, D.C. "Coleman's scoreboard invention." The Coleman Lifelike Scoreboard, with "pictures that move and play the game," made its debut at the National Theater in 1913, evidently taking 11 years to reach the state of perfection seen here. National Photo glass negative. View full size. Pay no attentionto the man behind the curtain! Be a Real Fan Washington Post, Aug 24, 1913 Show Game on Scoreboard This afternoon's game between Chicago and Washington will be shown at the National Theater on the Coleman lifelike scoreboard. This board was put before the public last Sunday, and made a decided hit with the fans. Each play, as on the field, is instantly shown, with the entire team in action, and an enjoyable afternoon's entertainment is in store for the ladies as well as the men. The box office opens at 11 o'clock for the sale of seats, and the game starts at 4 o'clock, Washington time. Washington Post, Jun 7, 1914 Stage Gossip Poli's theater has concluded an arrangement with George S. Coleman, inventor of the Coleman Lifelike Scoreboard, under the terms of which this ingenious device will be operated at Poli's theater this afternoon and every Sunday afternoon this summer when the Nationals are playing in other cities. The Coleman scoreboard is in reality a small stage set as a baseball diamond. Mechanical figures clothed in actual uniforms of the rival teams go through each play of the game as the description is flashed from the seat of war over a leased wire to the theater. The audience sees each player get up from the bench, walk over and pick up his bat, face the pitcher either in a right or left handed position, hit the ball, run the bases and get put out or slide to safety. When the pitcher and catcher are sent to the side lines to warm up, their activities are produced by the Coleman mannikins. The umpire is seen giving his decisions, jerking his right thumb into the air when a player is out, or spreading his hands, palms down, when the runner is safe. In a word, positively every detail of a game is shown two minutes after it is made upon the field as realistically as though the auditors were witnessing a motion picture reproduction of the details. Holy cow!This is about the coolest thing I've ever seen! Love it!How popular was it? How well did it work? Before its time.Reminds me of the old Tiger Electronics sports mini games that were a staple of my youth. GamecastThis is the 20's version of ESPN.com Gamecast or MLB.com Gameday. Baseball ReenactmentsAt least during World Series contests back in the early 1900's, some daily newspapers on Newspaper Row (Park Row) in Manhattan mounted large semi-automated signs on their building facades that gave streetside spectators the opportunity to follow the game in progress. That was before radio came along, of course. Be a real fanWear a bow tie. Boost your home teamOne of the fake outfield signs have three FBI-looking guys wearing suits and what appears to be sunglasses. Were people wearing sunglasses in 1924? I thought sunglasses were introduced by Sam Foster in 1929. [I think they just have dark eyes. On a side note, spectacles with tinted lenses go back hundreds of years. We see modern sunglasses for sale in this 1920 photo. - Dave] Penny ArcadesThe so called Penny Arcades, the precursor of Video Game Rooms used to have games like these. In some cases chits for prizes were awarded for high scoring. The scoreboard ideaScoreboards similar to this were used in public places into the 1940s until television killed them dead. There was one on a newspaper building in Albany. [Also one on a newspaper building here. - Dave] "Bring the Ladies"This advertisement for a New York location is from a book called "The Bounce: Baseball Teams' Great Falls and Comebacks" By G. Richard McKelvey. I couldn't see end note for his source so I don't know the year. Still not much to go on as far as how the dang thing worked. I would guess it's backlit, judging by the faint bits of text and images of players. I can imagine a crew of men behind it with different shapes on long sticks, moving them about as somebody reads the play-by-play off the wire. World's Series -- World's Series BASEBALL At 71st Regiment Armory, 34th Street and Park Avenue Beginning Today and Every Day During Series at 2 P.M. Direct Wire to Ball Grounds Every play reproduced instantly by the celebrated "COLEMAN LIFE-LIKE BASEBALL PLAYERS" acknowledged by the Press and Public where shown to be the greatest Base-ball invention in the world. You see every play as it is made on the field, with life-like pictures of players that hit the ball, run the bases, get put out or slide to safety. The ball sails through the air, actual players run, catch or pick up the ball and make the play. Umpires give decision. You see errors, fumbles, wild throws. In fact, it is just like being at the game. NOTHING LIKE IT OR NEAR IT IN THE WORLD Don't forget -- this wonderful invention in New York City ONLY at the 71st Regiment Armory, 34th Street and Park Avenue. BRING THE LADIES           ADMISSION 24 and 50 cents My husband and sonswould like to order one immediately for the family room. We Want a World SeriesI can only imagine the excitement of following a pennant race in Washington. It hasn't happened again since the end of WWII (the 1945 Nationals lost the AL pennant on the final day of the season). Without a team from 1972 to 2004 we couldn't even dream about it. Here's hoping the current incarnation of the Nats can finally turn things around and bring DC its first pennant since 1933 and first World Series title since 1924. Where is it now?Anyone have any information on the fate of this contraption? It's absolutely fascinating. SliderAnd they say Pete Rose invented the headfirst slide. Based on the player diving into third base in 1913 I don't think so, sorry Pete From Idaho to D.C.I notice something interesting about the date of this photo. Neat for me that pitching great Walter Johnson made his professional start in Idaho in 1906. (I have boys that play high-caliber baseball in the same area. And my own grandfather, By Speece, would also pitch on the WS winning '24 Nats.) Discovered and signed in 1907, The Big Train made his first start versus Detroit on August 2, 1907. Particularly later in his career, that August anniversary was celebrated because of his enormous popularity on teams usually known for their ineptitude. So I suspect this awesome theatre would have enhanced the celebration in this particularly successful baseball year as they would finish with their one and only World Series victory, and in incredible fashion. (The Gallery, D.C., Natl Photo, Sports)
Yard Cop: 1942
... of the yard cop with a night stick. Winchester is the baseball bat. I guess for the war effort and saboteurs? Changing job focus ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 12/04/2023 - 11:27am -

October 1942. "Tulsa, Oklahoma. Mid-Continent Petroleum Corp. refinery, Tulsa station of the Great Lakes pipeline. Armed railroad guard inspecting an oil tank car in the yards." Medium format acetate negative by John Vachon for the Office of War Information. View full size. The trusty WinchesterI've seen pictures of the yard cop with a night stick. Winchester is the baseball bat. I guess for the war effort and saboteurs? Changing job focusA few years earlier the railroad yard cop would have been after hobos; movies of the 1930s have many such scenes. By 1942, war and economic activity had largely solved the hobo 'problem'. Now the concerns were sabotage, theft of raw materials, and security in general. The Case of the Missing Journal LidSomeone obviously pilfered it! The oil-filled journal box should have a snug-fitting cover, as seen on the one at far left, to keep rain water and road dust out of the bearing area. The journal box closest to the gun-toting lawman seems to have taken its leave? Black and White HeatA rifle ... next to an oil tank(er)??? Guess he didn't see the movie (But he had a good excuse: it wouldn't be released until seven years later) Vintage graffiti?I hadn't thought about graffiti in 1942. But then why not. Much less ugly than spray paint! [Those are yard-crew markings. - Dave] How StylishIn a three-piece suit & tie complete with handkerchief, this fellow seems quite overdressed. Railyards (especially in the days of steam locomotives) were very dirty places. Bib overalls would have been more appropriate. Maybe he spends time in an office or just wanted to look good for Mr. Vachon's camera. (The Gallery, John Vachon, Railroads)
Inside Baseball: 1906
        "Indoor baseball, both from a spectacular point of view and from the benefit and ... Owosso, Mich., West-Side Indoor Base Ball Team." Indoor Baseball, said to have been invented in Chicago in 1887, eventually moved ... softball. The 1919 Encyclopedia Americana entry for Indoor Baseball specifies a hall at least 40 by 50 feet in size for play. Two ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 09/19/2017 - 8:17am -

        "Indoor baseball, both from a spectacular point of view and from the benefit and pleasure it gives participants, is in every way worthy to take a high place among the Winter sports." -- New York Times, Nov. 26, 1900 "World's Champions, 1905-1906, Owosso, Mich., West-Side Indoor Base Ball Team." Indoor Baseball, said to have been invented in Chicago in 1887, eventually moved outside, where it was renamed softball. The 1919 Encyclopedia Americana entry for Indoor Baseball specifies a hall at least 40 by 50 feet in size for play. Two outfielders could be "dispensed", leaving seven men on a team. The ball could be as big as 17¼ inches around. (Baseball-Reference.com) View full size. HemingwayErnest Hemingway briefly mentioned indoor baseball in his 1925 short story "Soldier's Home" where the sister of the main character plays the sport in Oklahoma. (The Gallery, Sports)
Eymard vs. Don Bosco: 1910
Suffern, N.Y., circa 1910. "Baseball team, Eymard Seminary. Eymard scored in the top of the 12th to beat ... don't see a lot of people wearing neckties while playing baseball anymore. Baseball seminarians? Wow, these fellows sure don't look happy about it! ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 12/29/2020 - 11:50am -

Suffern, N.Y., circa 1910. "Baseball team, Eymard Seminary. Eymard scored in the top of the 12th to beat Don Bosco 8 to 7." Witteman Photo Collection, Library of Congress. View full size. Poor Don BoscoWhat a heartbreaker for Don Bosco. They scored 3 runs in the bottom of the ninth to tie the game, then they lost in the 12th. Oh well, them's the breaks. By the looks of Father there in the center, I suspect there wasn't much chewing, spitting and cussing on the St. Eymard bench. Bringing back memoriesThat priest reminds me of Fr. Aylesworth when I was growing up in the land of long ago. He was friendly enough when he wasn't on the clock for the Big Guy. But whoa unto anyone straying from the str8 and narrow. Once my parents with children in tow made the cardinal error of arriving at Mass just as Fr. A was finishing his sermon, which he interrupted to announce to the entire congregation... "Ah Mr. and Mrs. C-, having arrived after the reading of the gospel, I look forward to the pleasure of your company at the next Mass." Mom was so mortified she insisted on going to St. Ambrose in the next town over for almost two months after that. On another occasion he was training some of us kids as altar boys. This being when everything was done in Latin, one of the boys said he didn't think he was smart enough. Fr. A looked at him hard and replied " every half wit and derelict in the Roman Empire could speak Latin fluently. So there is no reason you can't." Once during Mass when the altar boys were supposed to be reciting a lengthy prayer called the Confetior I mangled a couple of words and I can remember like it happened ten seconds ago. Fr. A's head snapped around and he gave me a silent glare clearly intended to turn me into a pillar of salt. He never said a word to me but that look will stay with me until they drop me in the ground. On the upside Fr. A a very Irish sense of humor and it was said he made the best gin and tonic in town. He died in the 1960s and some said it was Vatican II that did him in. Oddly this photo made me very nostalgic for a world and people now long gone. DapperYou don't see a lot of people wearing neckties while playing baseball anymore. Baseball seminarians?Wow, these fellows sure don't look happy about it! Except for one fellow in the top row, nary a smile among them (and one small smirk on his right). Are they emulating the big boss in the middle? No wonder I stopped going to church, though I was not Catholic. Both seminaries closed in 1965-66. I'll keep further wise remarks to myself In the ConfessionalPriest: Son, have you been entertaining impure thoughts? Boy: No, Father. They have been entertaining me. That's baseballFast forward to 2016, when the Chicago Cubs won the World Series. That's baseball in a sentence. Distinguished AlumnusDonald E. Pelotte graduated from Eymard Seminary in the 1960s. A member of the Abenaki tribe, he became the first Native American bishop in the U.S. Please note that I resisted the temptation to mention the Cleveland baseball team in this comment. (The Gallery, Sports)
Excelsior Baseball Club
... it. I have found no local records concerning an Excelsior baseball team. View full size. Found Excelsior link It's possible ... Powerplant in Whatcom County and was part of the camp baseball team, or worked at the Excelsior gold mine and was on their team. My ... 
 
Posted by citybeautiful - 09/18/2011 - 11:21pm -

The player fourth from the left is my great grandfather. He lived in the Puget Sound area is entire life. I would guess from the uniforms and his apparent age that this photograph dates from 1910 to 1915. This photograph was scanned from an unused postcard that has been in the family since that time. Other than that, we don't know anything about it. I have found no local records concerning an Excelsior baseball team. View full size. Found Excelsior linkIt's possible your grandfather was working to either build the Nooksack Powerplant in Whatcom County and was part of the camp baseball team, or worked at the Excelsior gold mine and was on their team. My great-grandfather was part owner of a few logging camps in the area, and they all had baseball teams that played each other, traveling on the logging trains to play each other. According to Google: "The powerplant was originally constructed in the early 1900s (the plant has been supplying hydroelectric power to Whatcom County and Bellingham for more than 100 years), and there's a present day campground called Excelsior campground, which sits on the former town-site for workers and their families who lived there during the construction and early operation of the powerplant. Homes, shops, and even a private school for the children of the workers fitted into this little hamlet. While forests and time have managed to hide most evidence of this, ruins of building foundations and remnant debris such as broken toys, pots, pans, and hardware have occasionally surfaced. The century-old original brick powerhouse building still houses operating generators and is listed on the Historic Register. The campground shares its name, Excelsior, with the formerly famous gold mine located across the river and a mile’s distance. Though both powerplant and mine were initially begun at the same time it wasn’t until a major rebuilding of the mine a decade later, that it became the closest customer of the powerplant. The powerlines, still active, that can be seen near the highway entrance to the campground mark another interesting lost site. Beneath the lines, a rocky talus slope appears as a scar in the steep forested hillside above the highway. Located directly below these lines and near the top of the slope is the buried portal of the First Chance Gold Mine. The visible rocky slopes are a combination of mine waste and rockslide. Ironically it was the powerplant that destroyed this mine. After clearing trees and shrubs from beneath the newly strung power lines, a brush fire somehow began in the dry slash and quickly swept over the mining camp destroying all the surface equipment. The stripped soil slid soon after burying what was left. The mine never a significant producer was never reopened." (ShorpyBlog, Member Gallery, Sports)
Baseball News: 1952
... Dodgers What kind of a name is "Dodgers" for a baseball team? Back when electric streetcars were first introduced to Brooklyn, ... the early years there were quite a few related deaths. The baseball team eventually adopted the nickname. The full story is here . ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 10/20/2020 - 11:12am -

September 1952. "Brooklyn Dodgers manager Charley Dressen the locker room with Jackie Robinson." Acetate negative from photos by Arthur Rothstein for the Look magazine assignment "Charley Dressen -- Genius Along the Gowanus." View full size. The original Amazon!Back pages of daily newspapers -- ever changing and updated products for mail order, unlike the Sears, Montgomery Ward or Penney annual catalog. Brooklyn (Trolley) DodgersWhat kind of a name is "Dodgers" for a baseball team? Back when electric streetcars were first introduced to Brooklyn, there were so many routes and streetcars that residents of Brooklyn became known as "trolley dodgers". In the early years there were quite a few related deaths. The baseball team eventually adopted the nickname. The full story is here. It looks like the ad for the Auto Safety Signal is a device to go in the rear window of a car. Is it an early type of turn signal / brake light? Standards then and nowImagine a major league locker room looking like that today. The other guy in the picture, Charley DressenCharley Dressen was an NFL quarterback, as well as a major league third baseman. Pretty impressive for a man 5 feet 5 inches tall and weighing 145 pounds. TrafficatorsYeah, I can imagine what the Auto Safety Signal was. Somewhere in this house, in a room I cannot currently access, I have an anthology of John Updike's early short stories. In one of them, circa 1951-1952, a character brags that his new car has "directional signals". I think those would be the blinky-blinky things we now take for granted. Before that, there were trafficators. Or, as I learned to call them from VW magazines in the 80s, semaphores. No driver trained in the last 60 years would have any idea to watch out for those. I had to look it up to be sure I hadn't imagined it. This is from the 1978 JC Whitney catalog, bought a few years ago on eBay, in a fit of childhood nostalgia. Auto Safety SignalHere is a reasonable explanation of the device in the ad. I recall them from my misspent youth. I opted for the Wolf Whistle (A guaranteed girl getter they said) "Your idea for a light that indicates a car is decelerating has merit, but I’m quite sure it’s been done before. I seem to remember an accessory that resembled a small traffic light, with red, yellow and green lenses. It was to be displayed in the rear window, with the red light wired to the car’s brake lights and the yellow and green to a vacuum-operated switch connected to the intake manifold. High vacuum (closed throttle on deceleration) would activate the yellow light, and low vacuum (wide or partially-open throttle) would show green. As I recall, you could buy them in accessory stores such as Western Auto, or order from the legendary J.C. Whitney. Whether the device was patented, I don’t know." https://www.oldcarsweekly.com/features/qa-with-kit-foster-august-30-2012 My favorite team in the 50'sMy favorite player on this team was Gil Hodges, arguably best fielding first baseman of his time and a great power hitter. He also managed the New York Mets to the championship in 1969.Finally in the baseball Hall of Fame. But Where?Dodgers are wearing their road grays here, and in September 1952 were only away to play that month in three stadiums: Shibe Park in Philly, the Polo Grounds in NYC and Braves Field in Boston. First guess, based on LOOK magazine assignment was New York, but almost 100 percent sure it's Boston, as the Braves home locker room photos of the era show the same pull-down single pane windows (great air flow-not!) and the small lockers below them with personal item numbered bins above. Chalked on for the visitors in this photo. Braves Field, long gone for baseball, still lives on as a part of Nickerson Field for Boston U sports. [New York. That newspaper is the New York Herald-Tribune. - Dave] (The Gallery, Arthur Rothstein, LOOK, NYC, Sports)
BASE BALL TO-DAY: 1909
... Record building and its "electric score board" of baseball results. (Set up to show runs and innings in Roman numerals?!) 8x10 ... but here's the box score for that day: https://www.baseball-almanac.com/box-scores/boxscore.php?boxid=190907170... Of all ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/09/2022 - 10:43pm -

Philadelphia circa 1909. "Chestnut Street and Post Office." Neighbor to the Philadelphia Record building and its "electric score board" of baseball results. (Set up to show runs and innings in Roman numerals?!) 8x10 inch dry plate glass negative. View full size. 'Base Ball To-day' means it must be July 19, 1909This picture was taken around 9:40 AM on the morning of Monday July 19 1909. First of all, the time on the clock in the picture shows 9:40, which judging from the brightness of the sky would have to have been in the AM. Second, all of the final results for July 17 1909 are shown on the score board, meaning it would at least have to be the 18th. But the Phillies and Pirates had Sunday the 18th off, and did not play each other again until Monday the 19th. Finally, The sign on the front of the streetcar clearly states "Base Ball To-day," eliminating the 18th as a possibility, since they did not play on the 18th. Ipso facto it must be about 9:40 AM on July 19 1909. Game day! (Phils lost that one too by a 5-4 score) [At the very least, you seem to be off by five minutes. — Dave] Honus Wagner at shortThank you bwayne for the box score link. I thought that might be THE Wagner at SS for the Pirates, and it is. When they voted the first Hall of Fame inductees, he came in second, behind Cobb and ahead of Ruth. Went 0-4 on July 17 though. The game had 7 errors! Beaten to the Punchbwayne beat me to the answer of July 17, 1909, but here's the box score for that day: https://www.baseball-almanac.com/box-scores/boxscore.php?boxid=190907170... Of all the players that played that day, only one, William Joseph "Jap" Barbeau, played for his team only in 1909; he was traded to the Cardinals in August. ELECTRIC SCORE BOARD.Who can figure out the exact date of the photo from these scores? (Our choice of 1909 as the year here is only a guess.) Click to embiggen. Nice dig into 1909!July 17, 1909. One second before the collision ...It would appear that the coatless young fellow running toward the camera near the lower left of the frame is on a collision course with the older fellow striding purposefully leftwards toward the corner of the shot. One wonders if his attorney ever saw a print of this probative photo ... Rounding IInd & headed IV IIIrdWhile in a full sprint wearing a necktie, this agile office boy is successfully weaving through straw hats and avoided the man on crutches who, apparently is screaming for everyone to keep away. No doubt this go-getting lad is wearing hard sole shoes, which may very well have given him a blister for his effort. When he returns to his employer's office, he will probably be asked what took him so long. PB & HWhat at first appears to be a spelling error ("Pittsburg") on the baseball scoreboard, in fact, is not. In 1891, the United States Board on Geographic Names officially deleted the "h" from the end of Pittsburgh. The Board officially reinstated the "h" in 1911. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Name_of_Pittsburgh Busy Street and BaseballA lot to see in this picture. But no automobiles. Almost everyone has a hat on. Boston had two baseball teams? I had to look it up. While the more famous American League Boston Red Sox have stayed steady, the National League Boston Doves at this time in 1909 had a history of much more name and location changes. Starting in 1876 to 1882 as the Boston Red Caps, then Beaneaters 1883 to 1906, then Doves 1907 to 1910, then Rustlers in 1911, then Braves 1912-1935, then the Bees 1936 to 1940, then Braves (again) from 1941 to 1952, the Milwaukee Braves 1953 to 1965, and finally the Atlanta Braves from 1966 to the present. Lost Record Buildinghttp://philaphilia.blogspot.com/2011/08/lost-building-of-week-august-3rd... Hold on to your hats, ladies!Looks like quite the blustery day, judging from the ladies at the lower right. Those Extra DigitsThe numbers to the left right of the team names reflect the final scores from the first game of the doubleheaders played that day between Brooklyn and the Cubs in the NL and the Athletics-Browns in the AL. The day in baseball The other teamPhiladelphia at the time, of course, had two teams, so one wonders who got possession of the Game Board; did they trade off based on who was home - or even away, as it looks like the Phillies were actually in Pittsburg - or was the "Record" a NL partisan (if so they got the demise they deserved!) Regardless, 1909 was a big year for baseball in Philly: The A's opened Shibe Park that year, the Major's first "modern" stadium. Scoreboard QuestionLooking at the scoreboard -- what are the numbers to the left of the first inning scores for the Athletics/St. Louis (0 & 2) and the Brooklyn/Chicago (1 & 0) games? They don't appear to be associated with close games that went into extra innings. I'm sure it must be something obvious but whatever it is I am missing it. Working from HomeAccording to that box score, the game was umpired single-handedly by Hall-of-Famer Bill Klem. If that's true, how long has it been since a Major League game was called by only one umpire? I've seen kids' league and high-school contests with one umpire, but not college or pro. In those, the ump positioned himself behind the pitcher's mound. But Wikipedia tells us that Klem worked exclusively behind home plate. If this is true, was he able to decide balls and strikes and all baserunning plays, plus all the business of running the game, from home plate? But base ball survives to this-dayvjmvjm's comment about the Lost Record Building made me wonder what this stretch of Chestnut Street looks like today. It looks very different. You're at the intersection of S 9th Street, looking west. Chestnut is, and maybe was, a one-way street coming towards you. Today, there are only two buildings on the north side of this block, a US courthouse and a Federal Reserve Bank. Nothing on either side of the street looks familiar until you get to the next intersection, S 10th. There, the white, Second Empire building with the rounded corner is the same as in the 1909 photograph. Read all about itThe sports page for July 20, 1909 ... https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83030214/1909-07-20/ed-1/seq-8... Jack ChesbroPer the sign, we can see that Jack Chesbro pitched for the New York Highlanders. Chesbro is still the record holder for the most wins in a season (41 in 1904), and the Highlanders -- who officially changed their name to the Yankees in 1913 -- are most famous for having the highest total of World Series victories of any team, at 27 (far ahead of second place St. Louis, who have 11). The Yanks and Cardinals may face each other this October. (The Gallery, DPC, Philadelphia, Sports, Streetcars)
Dormitory: 1911
"Young man in dormitory room." More baseball cards. Our cadet/orderly/cook has calendars for 1910 and 1911 on the ... those shelves aren't very wide. There looks to be more Baseball cards on the shelf above. I'm not sure if that's a toothbrush ... in the olden days, they called it a mirror. - Dave] Baseball cards! It's too early for the Babe, but there could be a Ty Cobb ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/15/2008 - 9:44am -

"Young man in dormitory room." More baseball cards. Our cadet/orderly/cook has calendars for 1910 and 1911 on the wall, and a crest for the Quartermaster Corps on the bed. Thanks to Kurt for suggesting this photo. View full size. National Photo Company Collection glass negative, Library of Congress. The Middle ShelfIt looks as though the middle shelf of his desk has more of the postcards that he's papered his wall with. Based on the size of his pocket watch (on the next lower shelf) those shelves aren't very wide. There looks to be more Baseball cards on the shelf above. I'm not sure if that's a toothbrush below the tooth powder cans. Somehow the size of the head looks to be too large - as large as his pocket watch. Note the whisk broom on his table; just the thing for brushing off a uniform. There are so many details about this picture that make you want to know more.National Photo suggests the Washington D.C. area; the decoration suggests permanent residence; the fact that it's not a large barracks room but rather just two beds in a small room suggests either a junior officer or an NCO (which his apparent age would argue against) but his clothing suggests something lower. Even the emblem of the Quartermasters Department (before 1912) on the bed doesn't tell us bis branch of the Army. Wouldn't equipment such as this, issued by the Department be marked in a obvious way to prevent theft? Tiny FridgeThat shiny object next to his elbow resembles a tiny refridgerator. the guy looks like a medical intern/student. [Back in the olden days, they called it a mirror. - Dave] Baseball cards!It's too early for the Babe, but there could be a Ty Cobb rookie card on that wall. Either way I'd give my left arm for those cards! This is an amazing photo.This is an amazing photo. Can anyone identify any of the players on any the baseball cards? This picture belongs in the collection of the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown! Mosquito nettingWhen was the last time you slept with netting on your bed? This was a time when we still had outbreaks of Malaria and yellow fever in this country. Kittens of Doom?The postcard in the top row, seventh over looks like it could be a Harry W. Frees picture of the "Kittens of Doom." Being pulled in a cart by what looks to me like a chicken? I am probably way off. Cool picture though, we plastered our dorm room walls with tons of stuff too. Almost 90 years later... QM CorpsThe crest on the bed appears to be the insignia of the Quartermaster Corps: sword and key on a wheel, topped with an eagle. GI bed. Hey JudeDoes this fellow remind you of Jude Law the actor? Great picture at many levels. Sugar DaddySeen on the wall: I like this town. I think I'll buy it for you. Too funny! PinupsThe thing that struck me immediately was the modesty of our cadet's pictures of ladies. And yet, there they are, up on the wall for him to sigh over. Collegiate SlobEvidently his RA never told him where the laundry room was. What, was he picking watermelons? Playing baseball? Back in the olden days, they called it a mirror. - Dave You're crackin' me up, man. If You're a Man, Smile!What's on the wall. Click the image to zoom, then click a second time to expand. Toothbrush/powderThe toothbrush looks rather well worn. Interesting containers for the toothpaste and powder. And if you don't smile?Guess our friend is not-so-manly. This IS an awesome post, Dave. Are those records in the middle shelf of his desk? I can't decide if that's what it is or just some papers/books. [On the wall: "If you're a man, smile! If you're a dog, wag your tail." - Dave] Dorm GuyI think the mosquito net is interesting. Tropical climes maybe. Like everybody else, I would really like that baseball card collection. Card IDThird card to the right of his left ear is 1909-1911 Chicago White Sox Doc White. From upper right, two down, four over is Frank Chance, Chicago Cubs, published by American Tobacco Company 1909-1911. TyThat's Ty Cobb leaning on the can by the pole at the right. Christy MathewsonA 1911 Christy Mathewson card is in the row above the whisk broom, 5th card from the right. Cards Cont'dMost of the cards to the left of this fellow are T 205 gold border cards, published by the American Tobacco Company in 1911. The complete 208 card set can be seen here -- http://www.vintagecardtraders.com/virtual/t205/t205.html The one leaning on the can is not Ty Cobb but Albert Bridwell, NY Giants -- I can ID most of the gold border cards. Starting below the post card with the dogs, to the left of the calendar, the three portraits are (top-bottom) Owen Wilson, Pittsburgh Pirates; John J. McGraw, NY Giants; and Arthur Devlin, NY Giants. Directly to the right, the four cards are (L-R) Larry Doyle, NY Giants; G. C. Ferguson, Boston Rustlers; Frank L. Chance, Chicago Cubs; and William A. Foxen, Chicago Cubs. Farther right, three cards vertically (top-bottom) Arthur Fletcher, NY Giants; Charles E. "Gabby" Street, Washington Senators; the bottom one I have not been able to ID. The five in full view to the right of the 'Ty Cobb' can (L-R) Christy Mathewson, NY Giants; Robert Ewing, Philadelphia Phillies; George Gibson, Pittsburgh Pirates; Frank L. Chance, Chicago Cubs; and Tony Smith, Brooklyn Superbas. That is all. Someone else do the rest! This is a dorm room for sure...Girls on the wall, sports figures and not a book to be seen. Gems"I love my wife, no more kids" "I like this town, I'll buy it for you." "We had a rompin' good time." Positive ID?OK, I think I got the one T 205 I couldn't before (bottom card in the vertical set of three farthest right). I believe it is Thomas J. Needham, Chicago Cubs. Other possibilities are Harry McIntyre, Chicago Cubs, or Ed Konetchy, St. Louis Cardinals. CardsThe cards behind his head look like mostly t206 white border. I see Josh Devore, Hal Chase, Red Ames, Ed Foster, Doc White, Christy Mathewson, Heinie Berger... Burning Down the HouseIt just occurred to me that this fellow looks like David Byrne of Talking Heads. i am entrancedThis is truly a fine and complex room. It radiates the personality of the occupant. Though he doesn't smile, his relaxed pose shows a humor that comes through in his eyes. The hands are clean and held in a "just ask me" clasp of slight composure. The ladies on the wall compete with the ballplayers. As was a sign of the times. Influenza was out and about, as were malaria and encephalitis. Mosquito nets were a necessity everywhere. My only big question is: Can you tell me about the 3rd large postcard or picture on the left?' It looks like Coronado Island of San Diego. I am sure I am wrong. Thanks for the excellent work on this Dave. It gave me introspection for my day of calamity (so far). (The Gallery, Natl Photo, Sports)
Zenith City: 1905
... size. The Old Ballgame Are those guys playing baseball in the lower right? They're spread out like they're playing something ... we can only guess our batter is not a pull hitter. Baseball? Good catch. Who's on second? This is why we look at the Shorpy ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/13/2012 - 6:55pm -

Duluth, Minnesota, circa 1905. "Elevators and harbor," along with a view of the Incline Railway and many other points of interest, make up our daily dose of Duluth. Detroit Publishing Company glass negative. View full size. The Old BallgameAre those guys playing baseball in the lower right? They're spread out like they're playing something very similar. (Click to enlarge.) Let us venture back to a timeWhen Railroads ruled the Earth. Are they birthing Orcs in that roundhouse? The same scene today.Despite all the changes, this scene is still recognizable. Alluring Alliteration "Daily dose of Duluth." Gotta love it. ImprovementsDuluth really looks much, much better today! Rail lineA mid 1880s source cites the "St. P.&D. and N.P. Round House." That's the biggestroundhouse I've ever seen! Any bigger and it wouldn't have a way to bring locos in. Here is a shot of a current Duluth roundhouse from above (Google). Re: The Old BallgameYep. I think we've stumbled onto some Duluth-variety hardball. And from the outfield alignment, we can only guess our batter is not a pull hitter. Baseball?Good catch. Who's on second? This is why we look at the ShorpyAnother truly amazing photo. It's deeply three-dimensional: From the busy shirtwaist lady in the foreground, to the slouchy men hanging out by the steam laundry, to the (obviously) baseball people, to the infernal roundhouse, to the ships in the harbor... Visually they're all stitched together, front to back, by the power poles: you can see individual insulators on the nearest ones, behind the Clarendon Hotel (New!), but they merge into infinity as they march to the shining harbor. This is surely one of Shorpy's best. Apart from the swimsuit girls, of course. Duluth & Iron RangeThe boxcars lower left look like they might have "D.&.I.R." on them. That would make it the Duluth & Iron Range, which merged in 1938 to become the D.M. & I.R. There are some more boxcars above those D&IR ones that look like they might be Great Northern. But the owner of the roundhouse is definitely not clear. Re: What's MissingIndeed, they probably walked to and from work. I grew up in Beech Grove, Indiana, home to a large repair yard for Penn, Penn Central and Amtrak that dates back to 1910 or a little before. In the early '60s it was astonishing to see hundreds of workers in overalls, kerchiefs and the traditional engineer cap (with its distinctive narrow gray striping) as they walked westward down Main Street after work. Each carried a lunch pail and most seemed to have a newspaper under the arm. They would crowd the sidewalks on both sides for several blocks, from a distance looking something like a pair of giant centipedes. Not surprising, Main Street was also lined with taverns which surely enticed many men to stop for a quick beer as they made their way home. Big SkyCan anyone comment on why many of these old photos have so much "head room"? Photographers today compose their shot to get the most matter and keep the sky to a minimum. (Not to mention having to deal with the contrast ratio.) What's Missing!!!If this photo were made today there would be employee cars parked everywhere. That roundhouse surely employs quite a number of people. In 1905 I assume that most folks either walked to work, like the folks walking on the viaduct, or rode the streetcar. There isn't even a horse and buggy to be seen. It does look like there might be a couple of streetcars way down the street. For the birdsI like the big bird house in the back yard of the place across the street from A. Larson's "General Arthur" store, or whatever that says. It looks just as ramshackle as the rest of the buildings. Being on a crookedstump doesn't help -- the eggs'll roll out! Unfortunate use of quotes"The Best" Beer in Milwaukee, eh? For some reason I don't believe you. Why'd you have to use the quotes, huh? The RoundhouseLots of comments about the roundhouse, and it is a big one: 36 stalls if I count right. It's interesting to see photos of such buildings when they were comparitively new as opposed to how they looked by the end of the steam age. Question I have is which railroad did it belong to? Has to be either C&NW or DM&IR, but I can't tell by the locomotives parked nearby as I'm not an expert on either road's power. I'm guessing C&NW, a far larger road who would need a roundhouse of this size. Selz Royal BlueFantastic details. This world of busy, grimy character has a real appeal for me. And what a great opportunity to see newly-painted side-of-building advertising in all its glory. Today one sees mostly faded "ghost" images. Across the way from Miller Beer, Selz Royal Blue was a shoe brand advertised all over the country. This ad in the Arizona Journal-Miner is from 1905. Rices PointThe rail yard is the Northern Pacific Railways's Rices Point Yard and roundhouse. The elevated tracks on the left are Great Northern Railway. Actually, that looks like cricketAs to the ballgame being played at the right, the people don't seem arrayed correctly for baseball, but it looks like it would work for cricket, which, as I understand it, was actually played in parts of the U.S. at the time. [Duluth -- "Cricket Wicket of the Unsalted Seas." - Dave] Iron AgeA portion of the fancy iron railroad bridge off in the distance still exists -- the first truss span -- visible on Google Maps and Street View from the freeway bridge next to it (its concealed by the freeway bridge in the modern view in the first comment). Its the only landmark I can find that exists from the original picture. (The Gallery, Boats & Bridges, DPC, Duluth, Railroads)
Super Giant: 1964
... to look "slobby" in public? No sagging pants or backwards baseball caps, anyway. I second the vote For blown up sections of ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 11/22/2008 - 6:35am -

1964. The Super Giant supermarket in Rockville, Maryland. Color transparency by John Dominis, Life magazine photo archive. View full size. Twins?Look at the two ladies above checkout #7 and #8. They could be twins .. at least sisters. I love this photo ... there is so much to see! Funny how the Clorox label has not changed. That's good branding! Plaid ElephantDidn't that fellow come from the Island of Misfit Toys? Nice to see him or her gainfully employed. Credit cards?Are them Credit Card Imprinters on the registers? I didn't think grocery stores took credit cards until the late 80's. [The imprinters would be for charge cards, which for gas stations, grocery stores and other retailers go back at least to the 1950s and the era of the Charga-Plate. Charge accounts go back even farther, to the early days of retailing. Below: Artwork from a 1966 newspaper ad. What goes back to the late 80s is using bank-issued credit cards as an everyday substitute for cash, as opposed to merchant charge accounts, which generally had to be paid in full at the end of the month. - Dave] How little has changedIt's funny how things haven't changed. some of the equipment looks antiquated, but the whole checkout process is still the same. Little detailsLook closely at the rack at the checkout. One thing that stands out for me is razor blades. Lots and lots of razor blades. Now you're lucky if you even find them buried in among the 3-, 5-, 19-blade razors. (Don't even look for a safety razor today. I've tried 10 different stores here, no luck.) Next, just above the Lane 5 sign is a Brach's candy bin. Looks like the good folks at Time-Life have photoshopped the LIFE logo onto the bin. Anyone back me up on this? [That's not "photoshopped." It says "As advertised in LIFE." Often seen on product displays back in the Olden Days. - Dave] GeeSure were a lot of Caucasians back in 1964. Paper or plastic?It was at a Giant supermarket in suburban Washington in 1983 that I was first asked by the cashier "paper or plastic?" At first I was confused, thinking that she was asking me whether I wanted to pay with paper money or a credit card.... Keep GoingOh my great good God. I've never wanted a picture to "keep going" more than this one! I wish they had invented 360 degree viewing back then. AMAZING!! The good old daysI worked in a grocery store similar to this. Same cash registers. Brings back a lot of memories. Life Sure Got CasualComparing the turn-of-the-century pictures with this one shows the remarkable change in American public attire. The fellow writing the check in the right foreground might have been arrested for public indecency in earlier Shorpy Land. Didn't see too many men in short pants in 1905 stores. Deja VuI'm amazed at the number of products which are still instantly recognizable today. Unfortunately the same cannot be said for those prices! Check out the checkoutI can only imagine how long it took to get through the checkout line in the days before bar code scanners. It looks like the cashiers had to consult that notepad they all have propped up against their registers. Random musingsThose elephants are, like, crazy! People were thinner back then. The Clorox label hasn't changed a bit. Curious that the checkout ladies visible are all men. It's too bad we can't see the tabloid racks at the checkout stands. I just know there's a juicy headline on the Enquirer. Wow!I work about two miles from Rockville. Does anyone know the address of this store? Is it still there. This site is unbelievable... The ViewWhat strikes me about this is no one in view is morbidly obese. Look at the kid...... eyeballing that open Brach's candy display. Those are almost unchanged from than till now. I wonder if he copped a "sample"? CheckersThe checkers, the ones shown at least, are all male. This was once a well paid and somewhat skilled job if only for the sharp memory and hand-eye coordination. The gaudy merchandising hasn't changed much in 44 years but the checkout experience? Well, what do you all think , better or worse? Convenient beer & wineAt least in the late 70s, Marylanders learned to spot Super Giants, because through some complicated shift of definition (like SUVs = trucks), these stores were not subject to the prohibition that grocery stores and convenience stores can't sell alcohol. Today Giant Food remains but Super Giants are gone, and it's no longer possible to buy wine with your packaged ground beef. Pre-UPCOne of the more striking things here is the checkout registers where the clerk actually had to read a stamped-on price and key it in manually (after consulting a list of what might have been on discounted sale that day). Within ten years many registers would have their displays as bright glowing fluorescent digits (later LED/LCD) vs these mechanical pop-up number tags. UPC scanning lasers wouldn't be common for another 10 years or so. Look at all the Men!I am not accustomed to seeing so much testosterone in a grocery store! Everything looks supersized, even the hairdos. It's kinda funny how high they stacked the displays, you'd need a ladder to get at some of it. LinesThe lines are still as long after the "wonderful" invention of Bar Codes, Scanners and Chip & PIN credit/debit cards. One step forward, two steps back. So much to see!Dave, would you mind enlarging this to about six feet high? I can't make out all the details! What is Loon?On one of the ends.... [The sign says LOOK. - Dave] Supermarket "Where's Waldo?"Not one of these people have bottled water in their cart and there's no gum or candy visible on the registers... Now, find the: box of Life cereal, the Cracker Jacks, the Domino sugar, the Raisin Bran, the grape jelly, the grape juice, the box of Cheer detergent, and the anxious store manager. Brach's CandiesThe display of the bulk candy bin appears to read "Advertised in Life." I wonder how many Life readers caught the subtle product placement. A refreshing lack of "expression"Nary a tattoo nor a facial piercing in sight. Where's Waldo?I think he's in Aisle 6. Very interesting photo! Brach's CandiesScary how 21 years later, I could have been the kid looking into the Brach's Bulk Candies bin... I totally forgot about those bins until this picture. People were slimmer back thenOther than the antiquated cash registers and the male cashiers, what has changed the most is that we are more obese now. I love this pictureSo rich. So much to keep the eye busy. Almost like a Where's Waldo cartoon. From the Plaid Elephants advertising "Top Value" something-or other, all the way down to the Quaker logo on a box of Rice Chex. And who's that woman in line in front of the chip rack? She has a BIG BUTT! (If anyone tells me that's my mother, then she's YOUR mother.) Charge-a-platesThey go back to at least the 40's -- I remember them well. It was metal and specially notched for each of the stores which accepted them and where you had a charge account. Current plastic models, good for almost anything, are great but far less secure. Modern LifeThe Life cereal box behind the Rice Chex is virtually unchanged! Not so inexpensiveMedian income of all families in 1964 was about $6600. For female full-time workers, the median income was $3700. Median income of nonwhite males was $2800. http://www2.census.gov/prod2/popscan/p60-047.pdf I'll bet they didn't think these prices were all that cheap. I do wonder what day of the week this photo was taken - I'll bet it was a Saturday. Get your slob on!I imagine that this was taken on a very hot day. No matter what the weather, though, imagine this same scene in 1934 or 1904 - you wouldn't see people out in public wearing undershirts and shorts. I wonder if there's a particular moment in time or series of events when it became OK to look "slobby" in public? No sagging pants or backwards baseball caps, anyway. I second the vote For blown up sections of this photograph, a lot of shelves I would like to explore. [Click "view full size." That's as blown up as it gets. - Dave] Checking outWhen I worked in grocery in the mid 1970's, with only slightly newer registers, the checkout time would be about the same as now. Good checkers could check and bag at about the same rate as now - the difference being that the checker had to pay attention and couldn't have conversations with their coworkers while checking. The notepads have the produce prices on them. Typically, you would remember those after the first few checkouts of the same produce item per day and not need to refer back very often. Remember that the range of produce available was less than today, both because of improved distribution and widening of tastes. The preferred checking technique is to pull the item off with the left hand, check the price, and enter the price into the register with the right hand. The register we had had plastic covers to cover the keys for anything past $9.99, since items of that price were pretty rare, since grocery stores sold groceries and not other items. In general, we had fewer stoppages for price checks than a modern system will because of missing items in their database. The grocery stocked fewer items back then. The flip side is that inventory management was a pain - we would manually order based on what was on the shelves and did a periodic total inventory to find the correct wastage values from spoilage and shoplifting. I much prefer the wider range of food and produce available today. And just think...This could be one of the few larger group Shorpy pictures where most of the folks are still alive. The cute girl in the cart would be my sister's age; the adults are mostly in the mid-late 20s to early 40s range, giving them ages from the high 60s to the mid 80s. The older kids would still only be in their fifties. Anyone from Rockville know these folks? Fantastic Photo!Even though it's far "younger" that most of the great photos that Shorpy features, it's one of the most fascinating you've ever put up here. I can't take my eyes off it. Do we know the address?My partner and I -- en route to Bob's Noodle House -- have wondered about the origins of a now-empty grocery store in Rockville, near "downtown." Perhaps this Super Giant? Certainly of this era. You can just make it out in the middle of this view -- between the bus shelter and the tree -- through the parking lots. [The Super Giant was at 12051 Rockville Pike and Randolph Road, where Montrose Crossing is today. See the next comment up. - Dave] View Larger Map Rockville Super GiantThe 25,000-square-foot Super Giant that's the subject of this post opened November 12, 1962, at 12051 Rockville Pike at Randolph Road, anchoring a 205,000-square-foot discount shopping center with 3,000-car parking lot (and a "Jolly Trolley" to get you from car to store). Today it's a "lifestyle center" called Montrose Crossing. Below: A long time ago, in a shopping center far, far away ... Wow. Just wow.I, too, worked in a grocery store in the late-70s when I was in high school. As earlier commented, apparently not a whole lot changed from when this picture was taken to then (well, except the hairstyles and clothes -- which changed a *lot*). I remember the registers well -- the columns of keys were dedicated to 10's, 1's, 10 cents, 1 cent. The large palm-contoured key to the right would "enter" in the decimal digits. Lots of noise and moving parts. A good cashier could move the goods along the conveyor belt as quickly as the scanners of today. The rapid spinning of numbers on the register display was mesmerizing. The one big holdup was the dreaded "price check" if a stocker had to be summoned -- but more often the checker already had the price memorized (good thing too, since price label "swapping" was a problem). I stocked shelves using the incredibly complicated but efficient label gun used to print and affix the prices to the products. As a stocker you had a large holster that held this amazing device. The more I think about it, things have not changed that much. We still have lines, conveyor belts, "separators," shopping carts, impulse displays, checkers, baggers, stockers, butchers, and produce guys (the latter two being union jobs). At least until the self checkout and then later RFID based systems (you just walk out of the store with the goods and the store will automatically figure this out and bill your card). Top Value StampsMy mother collected those, they were also used at Kroger's in the Middle South. What surprises me is that there are no cigarette racks at the checkouts. When I was a kid, every grocery store had the cigarette packs in racks right at the checkouts, with a sign screaming "Buy A Pack Today!" Maybe it was a Maryland thing. I also remember drugstores and groceries where cigarettes were sold only in the pharmacies. Go figure. More of these pleaseI add my request for more photos like this of just ordinary life from the '50s & '60s. Sure brings back memories of simpler and I think happier times. When I was a kid I used to imagine how marvelous life would be fifty years hence in the 21st century. Well I'm there now -- and I'd like to go back to the 1950s please. [And you can, thanks to the magic of the Inter-nets! I wonder when we'll have those TVs you can hang on the wall like a painting. And Picture-Phones. Can't wait. - Dave] Mama can I have a penny?You know what would be right next to the electric doors (and that big rubber mat you had to step on to make them open) -- a row of gumball machines! Whatever happened to those? I loved just looking at them. Those glass globes, all those colorful gumballs. Sigh. RealityThats a highly posed photo. Everyone in the photo would have had to sign a model release for this to be published in Life. It is "possible" that the people where chosen for their looks. [I've worked in publishing for over 20 years. You wouldn't need a release for any picture taken in a public place, and certainly not for a crowd or group shot. Actually you don't need releases at all. Some publishers may have looked at them as insurance against lawsuits for invasion of privacy. Probably most didn't bother. As for "posed," I doubt it. - Dave] Blue StampsWhile I miss the concept of Blue Stamps or trading stamps, I get points from my store and they send me a check each quarter to use in the store. I have one premium my parents redeemed from a trading stamp program - a really hideous waterfront print which they had in their home until they divorced. I claimed it from my father and it's hung in the laundry room of every house I've ever lived in since I moved on my own. I remember the old way grocery stores were laid out, and I was always fascinated by the registers. Link: Whatever Happened to Green Stamps? [Down where I come from we had S&H Green Stamps -- Sperry and Hutchinson. And "redemption centers" chock-full of cheesy merchandise. Or you could get cash. When I was in college I chose cash. My fingers would be all green (and minty) from sticking wet stamps in the redemption books. - Dave] Lived next to one just like it in VirginiaThis is just like the Super Giant on South Glebe Road in Arlington, close by where my family was living in 1964. It's where my mother shopped and I loved to accompany her and browse around. You could buy anything from a live lobster to a coat, and just like the Rockville store, it was 20 minutes from downtown Washington. Deja vuMy supermarket experience goes back about 10 years before this one . . . but what a photo! We had women cashiers, and man, were they fast. I was a stock clerk and bagger, and had to move fast to get the groceries in those brown paper bags (no plastic). I also had to wear a white shirt and bow tie. Naturally, we took the groceries to the car for customers and put them in the car or trunk, wherever asked. That was known as customer service. We, too, gave S & H green stamps, although Top Value stamps were available a number of places. Price checkerMy father was a lifelong grocery man, making a cycle from clerk to manager to owner and finally back to clerking in the 1950s until he retired in 1966. He took pride in doing his job well, whatever it was. Each night, sitting in his green leather chair, he'd read our two newspapers, one local and one city, end to end. One night I noticed that he'd paused for quite some time at the full-page weekly ad for the market he worked at and I asked him why. He was memorizing the prices of the specials starting the next day. Brach's candy displayThe shot of the boy near the candy display reminds me of a time back in the very early 1960s where I did help myself to a piece or two. I looked up, saw an employee looking at me and boy, I was scared to death he would tell my parents. Also, with the evolution in scanning and so forth, it brought to an end, more or less, of checking the receipt tape against the stamped prices for mistakes the checker made. Checking ReceiptsI worked in a store just like this while in high school in the early '70s. The main difference I've noticed is that Sunday is a major shopping day now. Our store was open on Sunday, because the crosstown rival was open. We (and they) didn't do enough business to pay for the lights being on. Two people ran the store on Sundays - a checker and a stocker/bagboy. And we didn't have much to do. All we ever saw was people picking up a single item or picnic supplies. How times have changed. Now we check the receipt for mistakes made in shelf pricing. Did I get charged the sale price or not? [So after your groceries are rung up, you go back down the aisles checking the receipt against the shelf prices? Or you make note of the shelf prices while you're shopping? That's what I call diligent. - Dave] Stamp dispensersWhen I was a kid back in the late sixties, there were stamp dispenser next to each cash register, with a dial a lot like a telephone dial that would spew stamps as the cashier turned it. I'm surprised they don't have a similar thing in this store. [The grocery store we went to had an electric thingy that spit them out. Which looked a lot like the brown boxes shown in the photo. - Dave] Checking ReceiptsWe don't check every price - just the sale prices which are listed in the weekly ad, available at the front of the store. Sometimes the ad price doesn't get properly entered into the computer, so I pay attention, especially if it's a significant savings. Relative CostsMy mother kept note of her grocery bills for 40 years -- and in 1962 complained that it cost $12 a week to feed a family of four. Considering that my dad's salary was $75 a week, that was indeed a lot of money. We used to save Green Stamps, Plaid Stamps, and cigar bands for giveaways in the store. [That's a good point. I had to chuckle when I noticed that the most these registers could ring up is $99.99. - Dave] Amazing how pictures take you backThis is what grocery stores looked like when I was a wee lass in the '70's. This could have been our local A&P, except the freezer cases would have been brown instead of white. And I bet if you checked the ingredients on the packages those thin people are buying, you wouldn't see corn syrup as a top-ten ingredient of non-dessert items. A & PSee the short story by John Updike for the perfect literary pairing to this photo. Well, in my opinion anyways; it's the first thing that came to mind upon seeing it. I Remember Those Elephants!My great-grandma lived in Rockville at that time and I remember those elephants!! What a floodgate of memories just opened up! Thanks again, Dave! [Now we know why memory and elephants go together. - Dave] Making ChangeAs those cash registers (most likely) didn't display the change due, the cashiers actually had to know how to make change. [Cash registers waaay back in 1964 (and before) did indeed show change due. And sometimes were even connected to a change-maker that spit your coins into a little tray. - Dave] Brown paper packages tied up with stringThis is such an amazing photo -- I love it! As someone who was still 12 years away from being born when this photo was taken, I'm not familiar with the old customs. What kind of items would have been wrapped up in brown paper like the woman in line at register 7 has? It looks like a big box, so that ruled out meats or feminine products in my mind ...any ideas? [It's probably her laundry. - Dave] White MarketsIn Knoxville we had groceries called White Stores that looked like most any other grocery of the late 70's, early 80's: Dimly lit with greenish fluorescent tubes, bare-bones interior decoration, and indeed a Brach's candy bin. My mom used Green Stamps for years. It took eons to fill a book. At the White Stores you could "buy" various pieces of merchandise. She got a floor lamp one year and a set of Corning Ware the next. It seems like over the last 5-10 years, they've made grocery stores all upscale looking. Almost makes you feel like you're getting ripped off. Warehouse LookSay goodbye to this timeless shot and hello to the warehouse stylings of the local Costco. Grocery stores have been jazzing up their interiors hoping to attract and keep customers. It's not working. When I go to one, they are far less busy than even in the recent past. They have cut the payrolls down significantly here in San Diego due to losing profit to the warehouses. Consequently, the help is far less competent, far younger, far less helpful, and far below the wage scales of the wonderful veterans they cannot really replace. We need some grocery stores for certain smallish items that the warehouse giants will never carry. But they will dwindle down to a very precious few, and do it soon. Of course, this grandiose Super Giant displaced their mom-and-pop competitors. Same tune, different singers. Multi-tasking fingers>> the columns of keys were dedicated to 10's, 1's, 10 cents, 1 cent. And a really good clerk would be pressing at least two keys at a time, which modern keypads can't do. Pure gold.What could lure me from my busy, lurk-only status? Only this amazing photo! Wow. Just wow. And not a cell phone in sight... Pre-Obesity EpidemicAnd look. No great big fat people. Sure, there a couple of middle-agers spreading out here & there, but you know the ones I mean. Smaller aisles and carts!Because people are much bigger these days, everything else is too! I remember shopping with my mom and for the big holidays and having to use more than one cart. Super GiantThe Super Giant was in the shopping center that now has a Sports Authority, Old Navy and a much smaller Giant. Super Giant was similar to what you would find at WalMart now -- part department store, part grocery store. I grew up in Rockville and we used to shop there all the time, until they closed that is. Guess the world wasn't ready for that combination. I could be in that picture, but I'd be too young to walk. GurskyesqueThis reminds me of Andreas Gursky's photo "99 Cent" -- it could almost have been taken in the same place. Fiberglass tubs on conveyor belts.Great picture & website. I remember them bagging your groceries, putting them in fiberglass tubs, and giving you a placard with a 3 digit number on it. The tub would go on a conveyor belt to the outside of the store, you'd drive up, and they'd take your placard and load your groceries. Wonder if there are any pictures of those... Proto-WalmartThis store was huge and it was quite unique in the same model as today's Walmart with groceries, clothing, etc. It is odd that the concept did not survive in that era considering the success of Walmart today. Personally, as a kid, I didn't like it when my mom got clothes for me from there. They were the off-brands. I also remember the GEM membership store which was in the current Mid-Pike Plaza on the opposing SW corner, which was a precursor to Price Club except that it didn't have groceries. I Remember It WellI grew up in Rockville, MD and was in this store many times. It was a full "one stop" department store with a grocery store attached. I loved going there with my mother because while she was grocery shopping I could make my way to the toy department. Kid nirvana! I might have been there!Oh do I remember that! My family lived in Rockville until 1965, and my mother usually took me along. After moving, we'd go to the Rockville Super Giant only if we needed to stop at the department store side. The beige boxes that you see at Checkouts 6 and 7 were the Top Value Stamp dispensers. (The man in the T-shirt is signing a check on top of one.) They automatically spit out the right amount of those yellow stamps. We bought quite a few things with Top Value Stamps, including a well-built Westinghouse room dehumidifier. The Giant Food at Friendship Heights had a conveyor belt but this store did not. This one had so much land, there was a huge sidewalk area out front where you could bring your carts -- but not to the car. Instead there were pairs of plastic cards, one with a hook for the cart, one with a hole. They had a three digit number, and the note "NO TIPPING". Took me a while to understand that wasn't about tipping over the carts. When you pulled up, an employee (probably young) put the bags in your car for you. Speaking of brand names, I can see the stacks of Mueller's spaghetti in Aisle 6. It's the brand we ate then. (Now I know Farina flour has no business in pasta!) The meat department is along the wall at the left. Deli and seafood were at the far back corner. There were a pair of "Pick a Pickle" barrels in front of the deli counter. One Dill, one Half-Sour. Good pickles, and great fish. The fish department has always been a source of pride for Giant. Of course this was back when a flounder was over a foot long, not these six-inch midgets we get today. All the fish were whole on ice, only gutted, and they scraped the scales, and cut or filleted the fish to your order. The produce department starts behind the Brach's counter, and extends out the photo to the left. There were one or two manned scales there, where they would weigh your brown paper bag of produce, mark the price with a grease pencil, and staple it shut. If it was something tender like cherries, they would put "XX" on it, so that it would be correctly bagged. So the checkers only needed to know the prices of "piece" produce. There was a "post mix" soda machine at the end of Aisle 12, 13, or 14, which would mix syrup and soda water into a cup. I'd often get a Coke. Probably 5 cents. I remember getting Mercury dimes as change from that machine -- this photo is from the last year of silver dimes and quarters. (Serious inflation was kicking in to pay for the Vietnam War.) Cigarettes? Where were they? I should know, my mom smoked then. They were only in cartons, they were so dirt-cheap that nobody bought them by the pack, except in vending machines. They certainly didn't need to be kept "out of the reach of children" then. They were in a six-foot set of shelves somewhere. I suppose I had no taste in clothing at the time, as most of my clothes came from there. Well, let's be honest -- they were much nicer and more stylish than clothes at Sears. (Oh, those horrible Sears Toughskin jeans with the rubber inside the knees!) The department store side, which started to the right of the checkouts, was easily twice the size of what you see here. It had a lot of selection, and lots of good specialty counters. There was a photo counter at the front of the store (pretty much under the photographer, who was up in the balcony where the restrooms were). They sold things at fair prices, and gave good and honest sales help. There was a hobby counter in the far back right corner. Speaking of the restrooms, they had seats that automatically flipped up into the back of the toilet, with UV lights to "sanitize" them. Spooky. The current Giant Food store at that site, which my friends call the "Gucci Giant," is on the former department store side. When they first shut down the three Super Giant department stores, they left the grocery store were it was. I think about the time that White Flint Mall started "upscaling" Rockville Pike, they built a much fancier store on the old department store side. Compared to now, Rockville Pike was very working class, very blue collar. Congressional Plaza (on the site of the former Congressional Airport) had a JC Penney as the anchor, and a Giant Food. Near the Super Giant was an EJ Korvettes, now the site of G Street Decorator Fabrics. A little off Rockville Pike was GEM -- Government Employees Membership. These were the days when "Fair Trade" pricing (price fixing) was still legal, and enforceable everywhere but the District of Columbia. But GEM, being a "membership" store, could discount, so that's where you bought Fair Trade products like Farberware at a discount. Of course, GEM had to compete with discount stores in the District, which Congress had conveniently exempted from the Fair Trade Act, so they could shop cheaply. Scan itI enjoyed coming back to this photo for new comments -- I had one before, but long before the new post. I live not far from Troy, Ohio, where the local newspaper just had an article about the bar code scanner. The very first item scanned -- anywhere -- was at the Marsh Supermarket in Troy, in 1974. Troy is less then 30 miles north of Dayton, where NCR developed the scanner. The Marsh store is still there, but NCR is leaving. King Soopers, 1960I work for a division of Kroger called King Soopers in Colorado. My store, which opened in February 1960, has a lot in common with this one. They have tried to modernize it but you can still see the old store showing through in places. Great photo. Bagger NostalgiaRegrettably, the baggers are out of view to the right. My greatest nostalgia for supermarkets past concerns the bag boys, practitioners of a high art. They took pride in how compactly they could pack your groceries with attention to putting the fragile items on top -- not to mention that they all tried to outdo each other in speed. Bagger Nostalgia...Part DeuxWhen I was a kid (1950s) I used to go with my father to the grocery (Kroger's) on Saturday morning. I always helped bag the groceries, especially if they were short handed, and he would always remind me of his bagging rule: "Don't even think about putting the meat next to the soap or even in the same bag." In the 50s as I remember it the majority of the cashiers were women and that was their only job at the store. I notice that even as early as the 60s they had the security screens next to the cash register to keep unwanted fingers out of the till form the adjacent aisle. I also remember making the family excursion to the Top Value redemption store to select the "FREE" gift that the household needed when we had sufficient stamp books filled. The other Super GiantThe third Super Giant is in White Oak. They took the "Super" off ages ago, but it is all still there. Mostly we went to the one in Laurel, which still retains its huge circa-1960 sign in the parking lot. Around 1980 it ate the old Kresge store next door, but by that time the department store features of the biggest stores were mostly gone. It's kind of funny -- the mall they built just south of the shopping center almost killed the latter, but now the shopping center is very busy and the mall may well be torn down. Memories from the early '60sMy mom worked at Chestnut Lodge and would often stop by the Super Giant on Rockville Pike on her way home to shop for groceries -- and clothes for me! I was much too young to be brand- or fashion-conscious and I remember loving the little cotton A-line dresses that Mom would bring home. We lived in the District and a big thrill for me would be to drive up to Rockville with my parents on the weekends and shop at the Super Giant and Korvettes! Crossing the PotomacThe hype of Super Giant was enough to entice these Northern Virginians into crossing The Potomac River into Maryland. The commute is commonplace today but not so much in 1964. We had not seen anything like it. Racks & racks of mass produced clothing and groceries, too! Grandmother bought the same suit in 3 different sizes. She and my mother got their money's worth. I was 13. It never left my closet. The NoiseThe old registers were so noisy. No screens to check what was going on, just quick eye movement to try and keep track. Ahh...back in the day when every item had a price on it. Ohhhh yeah and is that Blake Shelton?I spent many weekends at this gigantic store on Rockville Pike. I think I even bought a prom dress here....is that possible? I very clearly remember going up to the glassed in observation balcony on the second floor, which gave an overall view of the store (as this photo shows). That way I could scan the aisles in order to see where my Dad was at any given moment. I love this photo, and HEY isn't that a time-traveling Blake Shelton a little left of the center wearing a white short-sleeved shirt?? (LIFE, Stores & Markets)
Phantom Baseball: 1895
Circa 1895. "Hasamaear, Washington baseball." Fan favorite William "Roaring Bill" Hasamaear keeps his eye on the ... D.C. View full size. Roaring Bill According to Baseball Reference his name is listed as William Hassamaer. He was 6 feet tall, ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 05/04/2017 - 11:16am -

Circa 1895. "Hasamaear, Washington baseball." Fan favorite William "Roaring Bill" Hasamaear keeps his eye on the ball, such as it is. 5x7 inch glass negative from the C.M. Bell portrait studio in Washington, D.C. View full size. Roaring BillAccording to Baseball Reference his name is listed as William Hassamaer. He was 6 feet tall, 180 pounds. He played three years for two teams, The Washington Senators and the Louisville Colonels. Lifetime batting average of .289, 178 RBI and 25 stolen bases. No mention of how he received his nickname of Roaring Bill. [Bill's last name was also rendered as Hasmear, Hasmaer, Hassamaear, Hassamear, etc. - Dave] Meier, a common German family nameeither alone or in combinations like this one. German Wikipedia lists almost 30 spelling variations of it, although none like this baseball player. Immigration officials were very creative in phonetically spelling names if the person entering was illiterate. Meier was the name of a farm supervisor for a nobleman that owned the farm, thus resulting in it being one of the most common last names in German speaking Europe. Later on, people who were merely renting the farm from the nobleman took the name, probably because of its perceived prestige over "Bauer", which means "farmer". Effete present-day bonus babies take note:None of those sissy fielder's gloves needed here! (The Gallery, Bell Studio, D.C., Sports)
Base-ball To-day: 1906
... Question for the linguists When did "base-ball" become "baseball"??? (The Gallery, Atlantic City, DPC, Horses, Swimming) ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/13/2012 - 7:26pm -

The Jersey Shore circa 1906. "On the beach, Atlantic City." Note the DEFOREST WIRELESS station on the pier. Who wants ice cream? View full size. Bet the ice cream was goodThose freezer buckets in the cart at right appear to be for 5-gallon ice cream cans. Large freezers like that are still available, complete with a belt wheel instead of a hand crank on the turning mechanism so a motor can do the work. Weekend get-awayDo you think all those folks were there to get away from it all? "Dry Ice"Must have been a necessity for those ice cream wagons, and surely it was available in 1906. [Dry ice was not used commercially until the mid-1920s. -tterrace] Question for the linguistsWhen did "base-ball" become "baseball"??? (The Gallery, Atlantic City, DPC, Horses, Swimming)
When the Grocery Looked Like That: 1947
... how beautifully he laid out his merchandise. Any new baseball cards Today, Mr. Terrace? No, well I guess I'll have a candy bar ... 
 
Posted by tterrace - 01/09/2015 - 1:16pm -

My father in his San Francisco store, the De Luxe Groceteria, not exactly the proud, optimistic-looking fellow thirteen years before. The neighborhood was going to the dogs, charge customers were running up three-figure balances and paying a couple bucks on account when the mood struck them, plus riding the bus back home across the bridge every night with a briefcase stuffed with quarts of milk was probably getting old. Three years later, he had the place sold and was continuing in the grocery business in a lower-stress capacity, one that had a pension to boot. View full size. Groceteria artifactUnfortunately, we don't have any of the cool product signage, but here's a page from my father's account pad, showing the kind of balances some of his customers ran up. Too bad he didn't put the real date in, but I suspect this is from the 1940s despite the old "193_" pad. The well done run dryHas tterrace finally run out? He posted this pic two years ago. Way to goGotta tell ya tterrace, your father knew how to display his wares. In both pictures he shows how beautifully he laid out his merchandise. Any new baseball cardsToday, Mr. Terrace? No, well I guess I'll have a candy bar with that cold pop then. Fresh Frozen Fryers??They can be fresh. They can be frozen. They cannot be both. Just sayin'. Reissue"Digitally remastered from archival materials, with new commentary track." On my shopping listNow I know where I may find some Shinola White shoe polish, Nucoa oleomargarine, and Nuchief fruit all in one quick and convenient stop. None of my beeswax BUTdid your father ever get robbed at gunpoint by a thug or have any other "close calls" with bad guys? I currently live in middle America where I always thought people were safer but it seems like convenience store clerks and those who manage small grocery stores get robbed more than taxi drivers and pizza delivery people and often are shot and killed for a paltry sum of cash. To be alone managing a small store these days seems like an invitation for trouble. It probably was not considered a high risk job in 1944. ConfusedStill trying to figure the layout from the earlier picture in relation to this one. Where are the columns from the first photo? Are those the same windows? The state of the neighborhoodFrom the earlier posting of this picture I learned that your father's grocery store, in a neighborhood that went "to the dogs" back around the end of WWII, was just a block away from where I used to live at Valencia & 14th Street. Back when I lived there in the late '80s and early '90s the area was still a little dodgy. But you could see the gentrification coming then, and from the evidence of Google Streetview it seems to have arrived with a vengeance. Your father's old store is now surrounded by new apartment buildings with huge windows. I sure couldn't afford to live around there anymore. The ceilingThe ceiling seems to be flaking, leaking or otherwise displaying signs of damp issues. Hint HuntCould Hint Hunt be a punch card game? Some kind of lottery? Dad's almost-groceryThere was a similar store in my neighborhood in the '50s and '60s. They carried a lot of credit as well, all registered by hand in those little account books. They hung on for years despite a modern supermarket being open since 1958, less than a mile away. I think the owners tried to sell the store more than once. My old man considered buying the place but could not deal with staircases in the building due to a war injury. They finally unloaded the place in the mid-'60s. The new owners (with no prior experience) were out of the grocery business after about four years. They tried selling blue jeans for awhile, but they didn't last long doing that, either. Lights and columns and windows, oh my!Hi! I'm new here... only been lurking the last month or so. I like the contrasts provided by a "before and after" with a ten-year gap. But like someone else noted, the columns look different (they're gone in the later shot). So do the lights (two rows of lights earlier, one row of lights later). And the windows (they switch walls). Many other differences between the shots showing progress (?) and change in the ensuing ten years. The neighborhood outside may have been "going to the dogs" but building maintenance must have become a challenge, too. There are big patches in the ceiling of the later shot. Leaky roof or pipes in the ceiling? Condensation from air conditioning ducts? There's a ceiling vent that's not in the earlier shot. And who could have known back in the day that arch-rival brands Butternut and Wonder Bread would end up stablemates in the same company? http://www.hostessbrands.com/ also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_Bakeries Very cool! Thanks for sharing. I've been turned on by so many new (well, old) things by tracing the Library on Congress sources for some of your shots. Thanks again! Love all of your picsI have enjoyed all of your pictures. Keep them coming please. I was born in 1967. Love all of your photos. AlterationsThe answer is that the landlord decided to remodel the building, making more room for the middle business in the building, a bar. The new wall is where the columns were. The side windows were closed over, and the ones in back were boarded up, because there had been break-ins, and petty cash was taken. And the back wall to the storeroom was opened at the top, so you can see the two small windows that had wire mesh over them on the back wall. Father was angry at the landlord, because he had less room for his wares, and the rent was the same. During the war a large housing project was built in the neighborhood which was for workers in the war construction industry. Business was still good while the war was going on, but later when the ship yards and other industries were shutting down, and letting off workers, people had less money and took advantage of the credit that he let them have. And then used what cash they had to buy their groceries at the new supermarkets that were coming into the neighborhoods. Milk wasn't the only thing he brought home in his leather valise after work. It had a cloth bag with the contents of the cash register. Thank heaven he was never mugged. As far as robberies, I remember our father talking about the time a "young punk" came in pretending to represent the "Black Hand" and trying to get protection money from him. He said he grabbed the thug by the throat and told him if he ever came back he would get the **** beat out of him. He never did. Quiz Show"Hint Hunt" was a radio game show sponsored by Armour Star Meat Packing. Not sure when it started, but it was canceled in 1949. Excellent pictureMany of our grocers shops still look like this in England (except for the leaking ceiling!) The Layout ExplainedHere's my thoughts on the layout changes from the 1934 picture to the 1944 picture: A new wall was built where the row of columns once stood. In the 1944 picture, you can see the outline of the old counter on the floor in the middle front. You can also verify that this was the right edge of the counter because the row of lights in the earlier picture ran along that right edge. This looks like it's about the same distance from the wall as the original counter was from the row of columns. Using that as a location marker, I would say the two windows in the earlier picture are covered up by the Butter Nut poster and the poster behind it (looks like a wine ad?). I think the wall from the 1934 picture was knocked down, thus making visible the windows in the back of the 1944 picture as well as the ceiling vents. If you follow the floor of the later picture, you can see a slight change in texture that lines up with the wine poster on the right wall, thus further verifying that this was the placement of the back wall in the 1934 picture. [See the definitive answer below, under "alterations." - Dave] A Shorpy educationWow, I learn things on Shorpy I never knew before, even about my own family. Point-of-SaleGazing at the advertising displays lining the walls (Royal Crown, Butter-Nut), I am seized by ephemera-envy. I don't suppose any of those survived? Balance dueThat would be something like a $5,000 balance today! And that's only for a single customer. Glad your dad was able to get out of it. Grandmom's StoreMy grandmother had a neighborhood store. She would let us eat Fudgesicles and drink NuGrape sodas till we were sick. Grandmom had to deal with shoplifters mostly. One attempted armed robbery. The guy ran away when she began to pray out loud. Oh the memories!I remember stores like that. I never really liked the goods behind the grocer. :) Now, I'm not THAT old but I grew up in small towns in Kansas that still had stores like this. I rememberThis looks like the Ed Adkins grocery on Lawrence Ave. in Toledo when I was little. Supermarkets existed then, but were not all that common yet. You told Ed or Larry, his assistant, what you wanted and they went and got it, much like a modern auto parts store today. [This was a self-service store.] (ShorpyBlog, Member Gallery, Stores & Markets, tterrapix)
Wyoming Baseball: 1910s
... College in northeastern Pennsylvania. "Wyoming baseball" is all it says on this 4x5 negative, from the same batch of glass ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 11/26/2014 - 1:51pm -

        UPDATE: Our astute commenters reveal the location to be Wyoming Valley Seminary College in northeastern Pennsylvania. "Wyoming baseball" is all it says on this 4x5 negative, from the same batch of glass plates as these college lads. The buildings are another clue. View full size. Looking into the pastSince the two principal structures still exist this would be a perfect setting for this type of photograph. Any Shorpyites up to the job? Wyoming Seminary, Kingston, PAHere's a Street View near where this photo was taken. View Larger Map View Larger Map Wyoming Valley Seminary CollegeI am thinking this is taken at the Wyoming Valley Seminary College in northeastern Pennsylvania. This Methodist seminary was founded in 1840. (Edit: I notice that while I was posting my guess, kbostian was ahead of me by 2 minutes. Curses, foiled again.) [More like 2½ hours, if you look at the time stamps. Although your comments were published simultaneously. -Dave] (Edit: another thing I learned, when you edit your comments, the time stamp changes too.) [Good point! -Dave] Ripley Would Have Been ProudVenus de Milo in the window on the left and The Elephant Man in the window to her right. Some clewsThe graffito directly to the man's left says "1912." (A proleptic message from the Class of, perhaps?) I looked to see whether the building in the background matches any churches in Laramie. Although there are some with similar capped buttresses, I couldn't find a match. [As it turns out (see below), Wyoming is in Pennsylvania. - Dave] Not impressedAfter more than three years of being amazed by the historical and technical knowledge of the Shorpyites, coupled with their incredibly persistent detective work, I am unsatisfied with just knowing this is Wyoming Valley College. I want to know the position played by the ballplayer, and whether he was right or left-handed. The clock is ticking. PS: I cannot recall ever seeing trousers with a belt loop over the fly. Night footballThe recent Wyoming Seminary postings especially caught my eye as I live in Mansfield, PA and Wyoming was Mansfield State Normal's opponent in the first American football game played at night in 1892. The town, along with what is now Mansfield University, reenact the flying wedge style game as part of an annual 1890s themed weekend of activities. (The Gallery, Found Photos, Sports)
Up Woodward: 1908
... nifty ESPN smart phone app? When you can get the latest baseball scores posted on the roof of a building! Smokestacks and Spires ... the first church on the left there's a partial view of a baseball scoreboard showing the Tigers and the White Stockings. That's how ... 
 
Posted by Dave - 08/08/2012 - 7:37pm -

Detroit circa 1908. "Up Woodward Avenue from Grand Circus Park." A record number of "moonlight tower" arc lamp standards on view here. 8x10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company. View full size. Moonlight TowersAnd all this time I've considered cell phone towers a major symbol of our modern crassness, as another reason to long for a return to the Edwardian Era of enlightened tastes! Perhaps we're not so bad after all. Where's a DeLorean when you need one! I wish someone would hurry up and invent a time machine so I can go back and live here. Living in the Detroit area today, and having spent a lot of time in this particular area represented in this photograph, I would give anything to be back "there" today, instead of what we have now. Even if it meant I had to shovel coal, or clean up after horses. View Larger Map Who needs a nifty ESPN smart phone app?When you can get the latest baseball scores posted on the roof of a building! Smokestacks and SpiresIndustry and faith--a winning combination in my book! Also, I wonder who won the Detroit/Chicago game. It got cut off in the fifth inning. Let There Be Light!How many moonlight towers does everyone count? I can see maybe twelve, thirteen or fourteen. If we could enlarge it even further ... Scoreboard!I noticed that just past the first church on the left there's a partial view of a baseball scoreboard showing the Tigers and the White Stockings. That's how folks got the score back then. They were wired from the stadium to various points and posted so fans could keep up in near real-time conditions. Some of these places also served simple food and beer and were generally an all-male gathering spot. High anxietyWho's gonna be the one to go up there and change a lightbulb? [Note that the lights are on pulleys and can be lowered to the ground. - Dave] High (and low) WiresHow are all these tower guy-wires anchored? Two look like they are converging in the small park on the right but I can't follow them to the end. Were they fastened to something right on the ground or perhaps out of reach on a pole? I believe this is 1907In the 1907 World Series, Game 5, the Chicago Cubs scored a run in each inning of the first and second as shown on the outdoor baseball scoreboard in this shot. It didn't match any scores from the 1908 series. Baseball gameWith the trees still bare this is early in the baseball season (April or May). If back then they used the convention of away team on top and home team on the bottom like now then this puts the picture at April 14th (season opener) or April 16th. on 4/14/1908 Sox 15 Tigers 8. on 4/16/1908 Tigers 4 Sox 2. Unfortunately box scores are hard to find earlier than about 1918. [This photo was made in the fall, not the spring. - Dave] And in TimeThis Woodward Avenue, in about 55 years, would become famous for the fact that many Auto manufacturers would come out and compare models by running out Woodward. And that the tradition still lives on. Not that they were "racing," ahem, Officer, cough. The lights and the pulleysThe pulleys are for raising and lowering the work platform, visible near the bottom of the tower. This feature has been disabled on the surviving towers in Austin. Softly glowing celltowersThat would be kind of cool -- big ol' twisty CFL bulbs dotting the modern landscape. Austin transplanted towersIn a March 1964 visit to Austin, Texas, when I first saw some of these Moonlight Towers that had been transplanted there I first thought that they were for some type of microwave relay system. They are plotted on a USGS quadrangle map (1954) of the area and supposedly when viewed from above once made the outline of a five-pointed star. 1907 perhaps? Tigers vs. CubsI think the baseball game might not be the Detroit Tigers vs. Chicago White Sox, but rather the Tigers and Chicago Cubs. The Tigers and Cubs played each other in the World Series in consecutive years in 1907 and 1908. I think this might be Game 5 of the 1907 World Series. World Series Game 5 Played on Saturday, October 12, 1907 (D) at Bennett Park CHI N 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 - 2 7 1 DET A 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 - 0 7 2 The convention of listing the home team on the bottom has not always been consistent, and perhaps DETROIT was always listed on top in Detroit. www.retrosheet.org has box scores going back to 1871. To be sure, I'd have to rule out all the regular season games between the White Sox and Tigers, which I have not done... Off seasonI suppose the picture could have been anytime after October 12, 1907 as that was the last game of the World Series, and therefore the season. I suppose they could have left it up for a while without another game necessitating the change. Time frameNot only do the long shadows indicate a late afternoon time for the picture, the fact that there aren't any people on the balcony where the box score is displayed makes it likely that the picture was taken sometime after the end of the game (and definitely after the fifth inning). Baseball Almanac says that the game lasted 1:42 (hah!) but doesn't say when it began. Look at the mastLook at how the base of the moonlight tower in the foreground is anchored to the ground. It tapers to one ordinary steel pole! The structure has guy wire anchors to support it, but it still it doesn't look very sturdy. I wonder if they had difficulty finding enough maintenance people crazy enough to climb these things. It is interesting to note that thousands of similar structures would be used in the radio era, in the years to come. Game 5First, I think the trees are too bare for October 12. Second, the teams are listed the wrong way -- the Tigers were at home for Game 5, 1908. Moonlight towers: steampunk for real!I would love to see how well those things really worked. A lovely September afternoon!Tuesday, Sep 8 L DET 2 CHW 5 Wednesday, Sep 9 W DET 7 CHW 6 Thursday, Sep 10 W DET 6 CHW 5 Friday, Sep 11 L DET 2 CHW 4 Saturday, Sep 12 L DET 1 CHW 2 So tallThe towers seem so tall compared to our average street lights today. Yet, these are undoubtedly the precursors to the tall, multi-fixture light towers around today's modern expressway interchanges. Today's lights also lower to the ground with pulleys. I wonder how far those old tall towers would throw the light, and how bright they would be compared to today? Towers and TigersDetroit had more of these moonlight lighting towers than any city in the world - well over 100 at their peak - before they were all taken out in the 1910s in favor of modern street level electric lighting. A few of these Detroit towers were purchased and moved and some are still in use in Austin, Texas. More here on the evolution of this form of public lighting. As for the baseball score on the roof on the right, I think it may be from one of the final games of the razor-close 1908 American League pennant race. The Tigers traveled to Chicago for the final series of the season, a 3 game set starting on October 4th, with a 1.5 game lead over Cleveland and a 2.5 game lead over Chicago. Detroit lost the first two games of the series to the White Sox, and I think the scoreboard shown here may be from one of those 2 games, so probably Oct. 4th or 5th 1908. This set up a climactic final game for the championship. The Tigers won that game 7-0 and claimed their second consecutive American League pennant by a game over Chicago and a half-game over Cleveland. The AL race, however, was somewhat overshadowed by the National League race, which also came down to a final game, between the New York Giants and Chicago Cubs, necessitated by the infamous "Merkle's Boner" play. The Cubs won, and went on to defeat Detroit 4 games to 1 in the World Series. Austin TowersThe former Detroit towers here in Austin are still used a lighting as well as historical markers. The one in Zilker Park is turned into our "Xmas tree" each year. Austin moonlight towersIn the early days when Austin's moonlight towers had carbon-arc lamps, one city employee had the full-time occupation of driving around in a buggy to each tower once a day, hoisting himself up by the internal lift rigging, and adjusting the carbon sticks to their proper gap for making an electrical arc. I suppose all these towers worked that way In the Day. Three ChurchesThe three large churches visible on the righthand side of the picture along Woodward Avenue are, from front to back: first, the Central United Methodist at 23 E. Adams at Woodward, and built in 1866 (still extant); second, St. John's Episcopal at 2326 Woodward at Fisher Freeway, and built in 1859 (still extant); and third, Woodward Avenue Baptist at 2464 Woodward, and built in 1886 (demolished). Backward TimeI agree with you. My Grandfathers' house where I lived for a number of years is now part of the baseball park (122 E. Vernor Hwy). I attended the Boy Scouts at Central Methodist Church. My Mom and Dad worked at the Hotel Statler. I also went to the Franklin Elementary School and Cass Technical High School. We have a lot in common and your Google Earth is something for me to view. (The Gallery, Detroit Photos, DPC, Streetcars)
Vintage Baseball
... 'class photo' style of the teams playing an early century baseball game. The game appears to have taken place at the Medfield State Hospital (see scoreboard), between Medfield Baseball club and the USS Georgia. The outfits of the players, band, and ... 
 
Posted by Archiuser - 11/22/2013 - 7:45pm -

Another photo found in a bought frame; this one from a prop house that was the successor to the 20th Century prop department. This picture shows a 'class photo' style of the teams playing an early century baseball game. The game appears to have taken place at the Medfield State Hospital (see scoreboard), between Medfield Baseball club and the USS Georgia. The outfits of the players, band, and women in the back, along with what little we can see of the car leads me to believe this is from the early 1900s. Beyond that I know very little, there is nothing listed on the back of the photo. Any information would be appreciated, I'd love to get this photo or a historical society for Medford, the USS Georgia, or other similar group. View full size. MedfieldYou can find information here from the Medfield Historical Society. I don't find anything much for the USS Georgia, but there's a wikipedia entry for it, as well as for the hospital. She was a pre-dreadnoughtscrapped in 1923. My guess is the photo dates from the mid-teens, possibly WW I. More photos and information here: http://www.navsource.org/archives/01/15b.htm (ShorpyBlog, Member Gallery)
After the Baseball Game
After a baseball game the Raybestos Company employee team is shown relaxing at the ... 
 
Posted by rapidrobert - 09/22/2011 - 11:37pm -

After a baseball game the Raybestos Company employee team is shown relaxing at the Brooklawn Country Club in Fairfield, Connecticut. My father, James Edward McKenna, fourth from the left in the back row, is leaning against a tree. Picture was taken about 1917. From the several smiles on their faces, I imagine that they won the game that day. - Robert Edward McKenna View full size. Bob's DadHi Bob, What a fine looking man your dad was! Thanks for sharing your picture of him with us. Colleen Fitzpatrick Quizmaster General www.forensicgenealogy.info Fairfield, Connecticut.Fairfield CT was/is a very upscale area in Southern CT...near Westport, Southport, and Greenwich. When you drive east on Rt 1 (from Rhode Island) you can tell immediately as you pass into Fairfield County: everything suddenly becomes clean, neat, orderly, and easy on the eye. Brooklawn Country ClubHello. I was a member at this country club for some years in the 1990s. The immediate area, while still nice and part of pretty suburban Fairfield County, has fallen away due to nearby Bridgeport, Conn., which is a tough and poor city on the coast of Long Island Sound. Brooklawn CC is right on the border of Bridgeport but is itself still lovely. (ShorpyBlog, Member Gallery)
Malden Baseball
My great-grandfather's baseball team in Malden, Massachusetts, circa 1910. His name was Ralph J. Mahar ... 
 
Posted by Latauska - 09/23/2011 - 12:17am -

My great-grandfather's baseball team in Malden, Massachusetts, circa 1910. His name was Ralph J. Mahar and he is in the front row at the far left. Great Site! View full size. this reminds me ofthis photo reminds me of the famous "meet the beatles" album cover I was thinking...Something along the lines of, Queen, Bohemian Rhapsody? Or ... Night games seemed to be pretty tough (ShorpyBlog, Member Gallery, Portraits)
[1]23…next ›last »
Syndicate content  Shorpy.com is a vintage photography site featuring thousands of high-definition images. The site is named after Shorpy Higginbotham, a teenage coal miner who lived 100 years ago. Contact us | Privacy policy | Accessibility Statement | Site © 2024 Shorpy Inc.