Monday, July 1, 2013

☞ REMEMBER: 123rd and Amsterdam circa 1905


A photo taken over a century ago shows the majestic view facing west on 123rd Street from Amsterdam Avenue in West Harlem.  Grant's Tomb can be seen at the far distance along with the Acropolis Hotel at the north side of the street.  The lower photo shows the view today which has substantially been altered by the high rise buildings that eventually took over part of this particular block.

Archival photo courtesy the Museum of the City of New York
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2 comments:

  1. westsiderJuly 2, 2013 at 8:26 AM

    These old photos are always striking in that they offer a street scape that is very pleasing to the eye with it’s well proportioned architecture, The modern version is somewhat jarring with contemporary box like structures with too sharp edges and flat dreary surfaces.

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  2. Jonathan GillJuly 3, 2013 at 2:22 PM

    We used to live on 122nd and when Manhattan School of Music built their dormitory, they destroyed a view of Grant's Tomb from the east that had graced the neighborhood for more than a century!

    And though Morningside Gardens, which replaced the whole north side of the block in the old photo, may be unlovely from an aesthetic point of view, it was and is a pioneering racially and economically progressive housing cooperative (Thurgood Marshall was a resident there with his second wife just before he made the big move to D.C.). Morningside Gardens also has a wonderful pre-school that operates along the same progressive lines.

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