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New York. April 19, 1919. "St. Paul's Church and St. Paul Building from Woolworth Building." The St. Paul Building at left, seen here in the previous post in 1900 when it was one of the world's tallest, now cut down to size by its much bigger neighbors. Bain News Service glass negative. View full size.
When I saw the smaller version of this picture I thought how nice it was that all of those people were enjoying the huge lawn in front of the church. The larger version reveals they're not really enjoying it.
Neat to see some of the young trees that make this scene not visible with satellite technology today.
The Sixth Avenue El is visible over Church street on the right a handful of blocks north of where it split from the Ninth Avenue El (which ran over Greenwich St. a block west) and a few blocks south of where it turned west on Murray St. to make the shift to West Broadway on its way to Sixth Avenue. The Sixth and Ninth Avenue Els were demolished between 1938 and 1940 having been replaced by subway lines.
Also visible in the back right of the photo beyond Church street is the Hudson Terminal of the Hudson and Manhattan Railroad, the current PATH. The Hudson Terminal was demolished to make way for the original World Trade Center.
A view of St. Paul's today with large trees completely hiding any view of the tombstones.
I believe the whole block under the "Sonora" billboard is now J&R Music and Computer World, and the corner by the sign is Anne Street (east/west), with the intersection of Park Row and Broadway coming from the bottom left. One can see the tracks of the then-elevated subway that is now the "1" Train going towards South Ferry to the (what else) south.
Of course, just to the right (west) of the graveyard stood the WTC until 9/11/01. The church still stands. The graveyard has several luminaries of 1700's and 1800's NY.
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