Stunning never-before-seen photos from 100 years ago tell vivid story of gritty New York City

[snagglepuss]

Almost a million images of New York and its municipal operations have been made public for the first time on the internet.

The city's Department of Records officially announced the debut of the photo database.

Culled from the Municipal Archives collection of more than 2.2 million images going back to the mid-1800s, the 870,000 photographs feature all manner of city oversight -- from stately ports and bridges to grisly gangland killings.




Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2134408/Never-seen-photos-100-years-ago-tell-vivid-story-gritty-New-York-City.html#ixzz1symLx1Rv

[Uncle Joe]

1. Kicked and recommended, I love history.

Thanks for the thread, snagglepuss.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

2. This is amazing!

Makes me want to go around and take shot of my own neighborhood/City for future generations to view.

[marybourg]

6. Do it!

[davsand]

3. Wow! I looked at the photos in the article and they are amazing.

Talk about a window into the past!


Laura

[mactime]

4. Thanks for sharing

[Rex]

5. Thank you.

.

[Happyhippychick]

7. You rock, these are amazing.

[Arkansas Granny]

8. What great photos. I tried following the link to the archives, but I couldn't connect.

Was anyone else able to get through? I'd love to see more of those.

[KansDem]

9. For those of us who don't know Kate Smith in photo no. 7 (with Babe Ruth).

She introduced a new song, "God Bless America" (Irving Berlin)

&feature=fvst

I believe this clip is from "This is the Army" (1943) and includes Ronald Reagan (4'21&quot

[Chipper Chat]

22. Gave me goose bumps!

ty

[KansDem]

28. My mom told me about Kate Smith and "God Bless America"

Her first husband, in the Army Air Corps, was shot down over Germany during WWII...and killed.

For so many Americans during that time, songs like this one gave them comfort.

[Chipper Chat]

39. I think it was that stunning high E-flat she hit at the end - after a pregnant pause - that did it.

I remember seeing her on TV pushed out in a wheel chair by Milton Berle in the mid 70s. She was very ill and could only mouth the words as an orchestra and chorus played Gob Bless America behind her.

[alfredo]

27. "This Land is Your Land" was a response to Kate Smith's GBA.

&feature=youtube_gdata_player

[KansDem]

31. I didn't know that!

Thanks for posting!

I learned that song on my banjo some 45 years ago.*

I always liked Woodie Guthrie's "So Long..."

______
[font size="1"]*Did I say "45 years ago?" Damn...

[alfredo]

47. Kate was a pompous ass.

[marble falls]

53. Knew her personaly? Little bit hateful about ...

someone who lost her husband in war, who still went on. What made her a pompous ass?

[alfredo]

61. My memories were during the 50's when she became the darling of the right wing.

BTW, Losing a loved one to war doesn't make them a saint. They can still be an asshole.

[marble falls]

63. And being a favorite entertainer to right wingers doesn't of itself make her a pompous ass....

and the sacrifice of her husband does speak to her patriotism in how she reacted to the loss. She went on and contributed to the war effort.

[alfredo]

64. I am talking post war.

[ronnie624]

10. Fascinating.

Good post.

[benld74]

11. server cant handle the load

Due to overwhelming demand, the New York City Municipal Archives Online Gallery is experiencing temporary difficulties. Please try again later.

[Gold Metal Flake]

14. Bookmark the link and give it a few days.

The direct link:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/records/html/misc/luna.shtml

It'll be worth the wait.

[lpbk2713]

12. Amazingly good quality.

History right before our eyes.

[Doremus]

13. Awesome!

[polichick]

15. Love old photos - and NYC! Thanks for posting.

[Egalitarian Thug]

16. Very cool, nice catch! K&R! n/t

[WCGreen]

17. I love looking at old pictures and try to find things that haven't changed all that much....

It is amazing how much different our lives are now than back in those days...

But the gritty street scenes I remember from the 60's going to Down Town Cleveland when it was the 8th largest city in the country and see all the people and all the shops and things you could only get downtown...

[-..__...]

18. 3rd pic down...

I thought that shot looked familiar...





More recent pic...

[winstars]

34. Very nice catch!!! "Noodles, I fell..." nt

[Blue_Tires]

19. ttt

[Lucky Luciano]

20. Cool! nt

[HughBeaumont]

21. K & R for Later, since, as usual, I can't see shit.

Ugh.

[alfredo]

23. Incredible collection

[No DUplicitous DUpe]

24. Thank you for finding this and sharing it here..

Wonderful photography, thanks again!

[elleng]

25. Thanks so much for this.

Dad, now 98 and failing, grew up there, the youngest of 5, so I'm looking for my family!

[pink-o]

26. My Uncle grew up in "Hell's Kitchen" when it was basically all tenaments.

Now it's called "Midtown" and wouldn't we love to have Real Estate there???

Too bad my Uncle died before he could see these shots. He would have loved them!

[Liberal_in_LA]

29. wonderful photos

[Cleita]

30. Notice there weren't any fat people in the Astoria public pool photo?

I remember in the forties that there weren't many fat people around. They weren't thinner because of starvation. Back then we had fresher and less processed food. Also, fewer people had cars and had to walk a lot.

[HughBeaumont]

32. Fewer sedentary jobs/lifestyles also.

New Yorkers also walk a lot.

[Bluenorthwest]

43. The people were clearly all of a type, to say the least....

While that photo is from 1940 in New York City in 1931, there were 20 known cases of starvation; in 1934, there were 110 deaths caused by hunger. There were so many accounts of people starving in New York that the West African nation of Cameroon sent $3.77 in relief. Access to that which is there to access is now and in the past a major issue in American cities. Just interesting stuff....

[PatSeg]

33. These are great, thanks

[FarLeftFist]

35. THANKS! This NYer LOVES them!

[ananda]

36. Those are fantastic!

I also like the ambience of the Atlantic City of Boardwalk Empire, where Lucky Luciano is also a major figure.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

37. I GUARANTEE they've been seen before.

And the Daily Mail?

2 demerits.

[BumRushDaShow]

38. Philadelphia put a similar image database online a couple years ago from the same era

1880s -> and on...

http://www.phillyhistory.org/PhotoArchive/Home.aspx

It is just remarkable to see these big cities literally growing and constructing and growing and morphing over the past hundred+ years!

Thanks for posting the NYC one! Bookmarked!

[emilyg]

40. Thank you.

[Chorophyll]

41. Fantastic pictures. Thank you!

[RainDog]

42. k&r n/t

[steve2470]

44. awesome photos, thank you ! nt

[DirkGently]

45. These are great. Thanks for the link. (nt)

[UnrepentantLiberal]

46. Awesome.

I can look at old pictures forever.

[Iwillnevergiveup]

48. Stunning is the right word!

Thanks for cluing us in to these remarkable photos, from a grateful New Yorker. I've forwarded them over to my 90 year-old dad and will look at them with him when he wakes up tomorrow morning.

K&R

[snagglepuss]

49. Take a video camera or tape recorder with you to capture his reminiscences.

You won't regret it.

[fishwax]

50. awesome! thanks for sharing -- k/r

[Johnny Noshoes]

51. Well alrighty then...

Looks like its grab the camera and head to Manhattan hump day break for me. Sometimes I wonder how many of my digital images will survive me and be around a hundred years from now. I love these old photos of New York - the changes are amazing to see.

[vaberella]

52. Huh...100 years and aside from the fashion...my city hasn't changed that much. n/t

[Javaman]

54. The New York of both my sets of Grandparents. nt

[winstars]

55. Photos are so wonderful, but the NY website is down...

Trying to get to the collection since yesterday, server is overloaded, hope they fix it soon as the photos shown are just tantalizing me!!!

[mmonk]

56. Thanks. As a regular visitor to NYC, I found it interesting.

[UTUSN]

57. Just finished reading CARO's The Power Broker (bio of Robert MOSES)

who was one of the top three builders in history, albeit ruthless and arrogant and ruinous to hundreds of thousands he displaced, condemned, evicted, and whose guiding vision wrongly steered the city away from mass transit to individual vehicle transportation -- serving the public that could afford cars, the car and oil companies. The man was horrible, and just about every bridge and expressway and parkway was built by him, including the humongous dam complex at the St Lawrence Seaway (bigger than six pyramids).

Because he discovered a kink in the Constitution that declared Contracts as being inviolable, he set up a power base, through a maze of "public authorities" and State & City agencies, totally out of reach of Governors and Mayors and even the President: Many tried to get rid of him, FDR, LaGuardia, Robert WAGNER, and a slew of reformers, but finally, like, when he was in his 80s making it not-worth-it, it took the ROCKEFELLERs to do it, Nelson and Chase-Manhattan David.

CARO's books (this, and the LBJ) are crammed with niche vignettes of the rest of the cast of hundreds, and here we learn of the heart of Al SMITH, the vacuity of pretty boy John LINDSAY, the towering of hardboiled Nelson ROCKEFELLER, and scores of others. Just recently, Mrs BRADY, Florence HENDERSON, decided to grace us with the information that LINDSAY gave her the crabs. Oh. O.K.

Oh, and that MOSES condemned or otherwise took cheaply the land of others in order to build Lincoln Center, but paid a pretty price to somebodies named Joseph P. KENNEDY, RFK, and 3 KENNEDY sisters. Oh. O.K.

But one of the best things is that FDR's shadow moves through both the MOSES and LBJ bios showing him to be even more monumental than we already knew.

[Sherman A1]

58. K&R

[msanthrope]

59. Awesome thread--thank you!!! nt

[Solly Mack]

60. K&R

[Elwood P Dowd]

62. The link provided that shows ALL the pictures has been down since yesterday.

Just tried again and read the same message.

[winstars]

65. I 've been bring since the first day, it's been down since the story ...

came out I think. I hope they are getting more bandwidth going, although it is a NY city site... so we will see what happens.

[snagglepuss]

66. With so much interest you'd think that New York could devise a way to

make money from all the hits with the money paying for extra bandwidth.

[ornotna]

67. The site is down right now

But there is hope.

Shorpy has tons of great old photos to view. One of my favorite sites. http://www.shorpy.com/image/tid/245

[snagglepuss]

68. I've not seen that before. I love the interior shots.

Thanks for posting