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Syracuse, New York, 1907. "Vanderbilt House." With "Credit Parlors," billiards, a bowling alley and Trunks just around the corner. 8x10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Publishing Company. View full size.
Looks like a '05 Franklin, Model E parked at the curb
I think what they were really trying to sell were the Railroad tickets.
Tried researching "credit parlors" to no avail. Were they turn-of-the-century Amscots? Or were they an early pawn shop? I'm assuming that there was a business relationship to the many nearby billiard "parlors".
[A credit parlor was a clothing store that offered time payments. - Dave]
The tracks coming in from lower right are apparently a steam railroad. The trolley line crossing these tracks has the most common form of trolley guard, a woven metal cage running above the wire, which catches the trolley pole in case of a dewirement, and supplies power for the trolley to get across the crossing. Note that the guards for the two tracks are staggered, so they can protect the pole located toward the rear of the cars.
The guards are probably overkill in this case, as the steam trains would have been moving down the street trackage at very slow speed. However, dewirements were rather frequent, resulting in the conductor grabbing the retriever rope and "fishing" the pole back onto the wire. I've seen it happen many times.
Looking at patent records and Google books turns up some alternative designs, which were apparently unsuccessful.
on those tracks is because they are not streetcar tracks. Syracuse was notorious for its street level railroads with supposedly up to 100 trains a day traveling down the middle of Washington Street (which I believe is the line we see here) by the early 1930s.
There are some pictures in this article about some recently dug up Washington Street tracks.
And more about the early railroads of Syracuse.
"Held in Norfolk, Virginia, from April 26 to November 30, 1907"
Perhaps that narrows the date down a little closer, or maybe they were selling tickets in advance, for $15.45?
[Oh! Good eye. - Dave]
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