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Fascinating Pictures of New York City From the 1870s to 1930s_Ha

New York City has a long and sprawling history, but looking at the city today, it's hard to tell what it looked like in the past. Luckily, an enterprising coder has solved that problem by creating a Google Street View map for New York City for the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Developer Dan Vanderkam collaborated with the New York Public Library to plot all the old photos from the Photographic Views of New York City, 1870s-1970s collection on an interactive map.

The project, called OldNYC, lets you browse 19th-century New York as easily as you would click around on Google Maps. The collection contains over 80,000 original photographs.

Visit the OldNYC site here, or look below for some of the best photos of the city in the past, marked with their locations.

Brooklyn Bridge under construction, 1873

 

Fifth Avenue, east side, 1885

 

Central Park, 1892

 

Wall Street, west across Broad (left) and Nassau (right) Street's, to Broadway, 1894

 

Fifth Avenue at N.E. corner of 46th Street, 1899

 

Broadway, west side, north from West 34th Street, 1901

 

Skating on the frozen pond at 110th Street and the Botanical Gardens in Central Park, 1905

 

Fifth Avenue, north from 25th Street, 1909

 

Fifth Avenue & 42nd Street, 1910

 

At the racetrack, Pelham Parkway, 1910

 

Bryant Park, 1912

 

An open-air concert at the Music Pavilion, Central Park, 1912

 

42nd Street & Fifth Avenue, 1913

 

Bathing at Coney Island

 

Queensboro Bridge Connection, 1917

 

The Victory Arch on Fifth Avenue at 25th Street, 1918

 

Broad Street, 1920

 

Broadway & West 34th Street, 1921

 

Typical noonday street rush at Sixth Ave., and 34th Street, 1921

 

Country house (now JFK airport), Queens, 1922

 

560 Fifth Avenue, at S.W. corner of 46th Street, 1926

 

West 42nd Street, 1928

 

Broadway, west side, from 34th to 38th Streets, 1928

 

Coca-Cola ad Weehawken & Christopher, 1929

 

19 West 34th Street (Fifth Avenue - Sixth Avenue), ca. 1929

 

East 86th Street, north side, west of Third Avenue, 1932

 

Art exhibit, Greenwich Village, 1933

 

Fifth Avenue, East side, and 42nd Street, 1933

 

A market scene on Ninth Avenue, near West 40th Street, 1936

 

Sixth Avenue & West 42nd Street, 1930s

(via Insider)