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Laconia, New Hampshire, circa 1907. "Pleasant and Main Streets." There's a lot to see in this super-detailed view, including the latest "moving pictures." 8x10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company. View full size.
The building just past the Eagle Hotel on Main Street is the (according to the placard on it in Street View) The Cook Building built in 1898.
It's a safe bet that beautiful open streetcar was built by the town's own Laconia Car Co.
The trolley rails were built below the general road level with ties similar to today's rail construction, then covered with dirt so horses, autos and walkers wouldn't trip when walking across them.
Here's a postcard of the Eagle Hotel the same year, from eBay.
Just like with railroad tracks in the weeds, there are ties buried under the rails in that dirt. But, cyclists and pedestrians should give wide berth when the trolley car company's sprinkling pot comes by. The electric pump on its water tank gives great reach to the spray from its nozzles, wetting down the dust all over the unpaved street.
I don't think I've ever seen a trolley running on what appears to be a dirt street.
How did they keep the rails aligned?
Actually, Adrift in New York was not a moving picture, but a play, written by and starring the incredible (if you believe the press of the time) Sara MacDonald. It opened in the late summer of 1906, as most great plays of the time did, in Boonton, NJ. It had stops in Baltimore, Newark, New York, and a few towns in New England. It must have gone on to great success because by 1917 the "Sara MacDonald Company" was advertising casting calls for the play in various theater publications. You can get a pretty clear view of the sign with MacDonald's name here, which is another view of Main Street, Laconia, only a few doors farther away from the Eagle Hotel:
Is headed for the poop! He'll have job security for probably another 15-20 years.
This would appear to be in 1907, as Sept 17 falls of Thursday in 1908, Tuesday in the former.
The placard for the moving picture "Adrift in New York" gives flesh to the urban-rural social dichotomy that still prevailed in the early 20th Century, no doubt heightening Laconians' gratitude at being able to live where the air was clean, the trolley yielded right-of-way to the street sweeper, L.L.'s cousin Frank ran the livery stable, and the café patronized the services of a sign painter of a decidedly calligraphic bent.
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