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Circa 1905. "New York City, Snap Shatow, 42nd Street, showing entrance to Grand Central Station." 8x10 inch dry plate glass negative, Detroit Photographic Company. View full size.
Note the two pointsmen on the left controlling the points for the streetcars. I guess they stayed there all day as long as the cars were running.
In front of the main entrance, midway between curb and streetcar, all in black except for the light-colored purse. She has been catching my eye for the last few days. In a hundred years, her cape will be traded for a short puffy jacket, she will likely be wearing trousers or leggings and not a long pavement-touching skirt, and her ankles could very well be exposed on this chilly day. But she will still be dressed in black.
Wonder who's whose fingerprint is embedded near the top right corner?
At the bottom right. Despite starring in numerous Sherlock Holmes mysteries, these conveyances were not long for the world thanks to motorized taxicabs. For those tempted to spell hansom cab as handsome cab, I wish to point out that the handsome spelling was the original name of the inventor until Mr. Hansom changed it. He was a well know architect, and many of his creations in that field dot the British landscape including the Birmingham City Hall.
A terminal is a station from which trains do not go further. Trains enter and leave the station in only one direction -- which seems pretty simple once it's pointed out.
But I grew up in Boston, where both North Station and South Station are terminals, regardless of their names.
Grand Central was a terminal, not a station.
[In 1905, it was Grand Central Station. Before that, it was Grand Central Depot. Grand Central Terminal, which replaced the building in our photo, opened in 1913. - Dave]
This would be the predecessor of the current Grand Central Station Terminal. It lasted just ten years (1900-10) before being judged obsolete.
Snap Shatow? I see it in Detroit Photo Co.’s original caption, so I figure it’s not some sign in a window or on top of a building that Dave has snagged for the title. (Now I’m ready to be enlightened or admonished.)
[It is a mystery. It might refer to the source of the image -- a photographer named Shatow. - Dave]
A society without jaywalkers is a society without artists.
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